Ali Abuminah, the founder of the anti-Israel website, Electronic Intifada, has been given op-ed space in the New York Times. In that space he has written the highly misleading, Hamas, the I.R.A. and Us. I will have to disagree with some of my allies, as this is not the lowest the New York Times has sunk; the Times has given op-ed space to an actual member of Hamas, not just one of its sympathizers. (via memeorandum)
Abuminah writes:
Mr. Mitchell’s comparison is misleading at best. Success in the Irish talks was the result not just of determination and time, but also a very different United States approach to diplomacy.
The conflict in Northern Ireland had been intractable for decades. Unionists backed by the British government saw any political compromise with Irish nationalists as a danger, one that would lead to a united Ireland in which a Catholic majority would dominate minority Protestant unionists. The British government also refused to deal with the Irish nationalist party Sinn Fein, despite its significant electoral mandate, because of its close ties to the Irish Republican Army, which had carried out violent acts in the United Kingdom.
A parallel can be seen with the American refusal to speak to the Palestinian party Hamas, which decisively won elections in the West Bank and Gaza in 2006. Asked what role Hamas would have in the renewed talks, Mr. Mitchell answered with one word: “None.†No serious analyst believes that peace can be made between Palestinians and Israelis without Hamas on board, any more than could have been the case in Northern Ireland without Sinn Fein and the I.R.A.
This is the heart of his specious claim: Hamas is just like the IRA and just like the IRA was convinced to make peace by being engaged instead of shunned, so too Hamas must be engaged in order to make peace in the Middle East.
Well for this analysis to hold, for one thing, Hamas and the I.R.A. ought to be comparable. They’re not.
All these contrasts come back to the one major difference between the IRA and Hamas — religion. For the Irish, religion is not rooted in all facets of life as it is in with Israelis and Palestinians. Religion in Northern Ireland is understood as a cultural and historical force, while in the Middle East it ties Israelis and Palestinians to the same land. Furthermore, Hamas being a religious organization claims religious justifications for attempting to wipe out Israel. This factor is what differentiates the two groups and will ultimately prove how futile Hamas’ reform efforts are.
Z-Word lays out how the concession to Gerry Addams would translate into terms of the Arab-Israeli conflict:
The concession of the visa to Adams, for a trip which involved nothing more than glad handing Irish American supporters of the Provisional Republican movement, may well have improved the mood of certain sectors of Sinn Féin – IRA with regard to calling a ceasefire. If the concession of US visa to Ismail Haniye for a trip that would allow him some tea drinking and back slapping with Arab American supporters were likely to lead to a complete Hamas ceasefire leading to something like a Good Friday deal between Israel and Hamas, I’d be all for it.
Let’s just remind ourselves what Sinn Féin – IRA settled for in the Good Friday Agreement. They recognized Northern as an integral part of the UK, decommissioned their weapons and dissolved the military structure of the IRA. In return they got the early release of their prisoners (on license, any return to violence by the main Provisional Republican movement and they’ll be straight back in the can), some policing reforms, a couple of cross border talking shops and an autonomous local assembly.
I’ll try to translate that into the situation of the Israel-Palestine conflict. Hamas accepts that the West Bank and Gaza (why not?) form part of Greater Israel, a Jewish state. Hamas abandons the armed struggle and hands over its weapons to UN monitors. Israel sets up an autonomous Palestine parliament to rule the territories. As well as representative to that assembly Palestinians also get to elect some members to take care of their interests in the Knesset. In return, Israel releases Hamas’s prisoners on parole, guarantees that a larger percentage of Magav recruits will be Arabs and promises to make greater efforts to promote the Arabic language and Arab culture in Israel.
Abuminah argues that John Hume – a negotiator of the peace accord for Northern Ireland – wrote an op-ed advocating for Israeli recognition of Hamas. However, that isn’t the unanimous position of all those involved. David Trimble, also Nobel Lauereate for his efforts wrote:
If there is one lesson to learn from the Northern Ireland experience, it is that preconditions are crucial in ending violence and producing a settlement. Being overgenerous to extremist groups is like giving sweets to a spoilt child in the hope that it will improve its behaviour – it usually results in worse actions. Our experience suggests that while some flexibility is desirable, there have to be clear principles and boundaries. A failure to recognise this risks drawing the wrong conclusions from the recent history of Northern Ireland and fundamentally misunderstanding the peace process.
This is also the view of former British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw (h/t Daled Amos):
Could I just add one thing to that, if I may? Of course, negotiation is far, far better — infinitely better — than military action. As far as Northern Ireland is concerned, we welcome hugely the progress that has been made following the Good Friday Agreement. It also has to be said that before that happened, there had to be a change of approach by those who saw terrorism as the answer. And that approach partly changed because of the firmness of the military and police response to that terrorism. And if there had not been that firm response by successive British governments and others to the terrorist threat that was posed on both sides, we would not have been able to get some of those people into negotiations. We would not be marking what is a satisfactory day in the history of Northern Ireland today.
Fresno Zionism attacks Abuminah’s claim of the sanctity of the Palestinian right of return.
You must give Abumimah and his friends credit for chutzpah: first, they invent a ‘right’ — the repatriation of the descendants of refugees from a war that their own leaders caused — that has never existed in history, then they breed a whole population in misery for years to make a demographic weapon of mass destruction out of them, and finally they demand that they be allowed to use it to end the Jewish state. What will remain for them to ‘recognize’?
Naturally, he believes that the reason the US was tough on the British but will not get tough on Israel is the nefarious Jewish (OK, he says ‘Israel’) Lobby. Hamas knew about the Jewish Lobby all along.
Balfour Street makes a similar argument.
Elder of Ziyon gets to the heart of the matter with a single rhetorical question:
So according to Abunimah, for Israel to ask its negotiating partners to not demand its violent destruction is “unworkable”?
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
