Wednesday, April 27, 2011

What Does Presumed Hamas-Fatah Reconciliation Mean For Peace Process?

Egyptian news sources are indicating that Hamas and Fatah have managed to overcome their ideological differences and are paving the way for holding new elections and power-sharing. The plan involves creating a caretaker government and then holding elections that are long overdue.

Hamas and Fatah engaged in a civil war following Israel's Gaza disengagement. Hamas threw Fatah out of Gaza and left Fatah maintaining a tenuous hold on the West Bank with the backing of Israel, while Hamas consolidated its power in Gaza.

Hamas refuses to recognize Israel's right to exist, which means that the "reconciliation" would necessarily affect any supposed peace process with Israel. With one party to the peace process refusing to accept the existence of the other, peace is simply impossible.

For its part, Fatah has asserted that it would unilaterally declare a Palestinian state and petition the UN for acceptance.

I can therefore only conclude that this will once again mean that Hamas and Fatah are going to fully coordinate in their triangle offense of terror against Israel. As they've done in the past, they'll use terror attacks to further their ideological goal of eliminating Israel and establishing a Palestinian state on all the land west of the Jordan River all while denying Israel and its Jewish population any rights to any territory - including access to Jewish holy sites that are situated in disputed territory.

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