The Palestinians Can't Get Along? It's Someone Else's Fault. Again.
Like little children, it's never their fault:
The Palestinians are not pinning high hopes on US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's current visit, saying Washington has yet to change its opposition to the proposed Palestinian Authority unity government and to pressurize Israel to channel funds to the PA. Rice is scheduled to meet here on Wednesday with PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and some of his top advisers to discuss ways of reviving the peace process and supporting Fatah in the ongoing struggle with Hamas.
Yeah, that's clearly what's stopping a Palestinian unity government. It has nothing to do with the fact that they're murdering each other in the streets and threatening to assassinate each other's leaders. It's obviously because the US hasn't given its blessing to a Palestinian unity government. And that's before we even get into the whole "it's the Palestinians' fault that the US won't recognize their government, since Hamas refuses to recognize Israel".
Although, in slight tension with this position, we would like to say we told you so about how there's not going to be a civil war:
Any attempt to harm its leaders would lead to an all-out confrontation with Fatah, Hamas warned on Tuesday. It said political assassinations would prompt it to resort to "scorched earth" tactics. The rival parties on Tuesday observed an Egyptian-brokered cease-fire, and no major incidents of violence were reported. However, Fatah gunmen in Nablus set two vehicles belonging to Hamas institutions on fire. No casualties were reported. The warning came in response to a leaflet distributed late Monday night by Fatah's Aksa Martyrs Brigades, which called for "executing" Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, Palestinian Authority Interior Minister Said Siam and Youssef al-Zahar, the commander of the 3,000-strong Hamas "back-up" force in the Gaza Strip. Hamas legislator and spokesman Mushir al-Masri described the authors of the leaflet as "agents of the Zionist occupation." He said the threats were issued by a "hired gang that claims to be a nationalist force, but is in fact helping the Zionist occupation achieve what it had failed to achieve... This leaflet reflects the moral and political decline of this suspicious gang."
Right - because if it's not the US's fault, then obviously it's Israel's fault. So today's lesson is that if the entire world spends fifty years telling millions of people that they're helpless, those millions will start believing it. The constant "if it's not the Jews it's the Catholics... if it's not the Catholics it's the Americans... if it's not the Americans, it's the Jews..." cycle is enabled intellectually (if we can use that word) by the pathological conspiracy theories that circulate through the Arab and Muslim worlds. But as a matter of sensibility, the cycle of blaming others is its own pathetic, victimological sensibility. They've been definitional victims for four or five generations now - of course the reflexive externalization has gone all the way down to instinct and reflex.
[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
The Palestinians are not pinning high hopes on US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's current visit, saying Washington has yet to change its opposition to the proposed Palestinian Authority unity government and to pressurize Israel to channel funds to the PA. Rice is scheduled to meet here on Wednesday with PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and some of his top advisers to discuss ways of reviving the peace process and supporting Fatah in the ongoing struggle with Hamas.
Yeah, that's clearly what's stopping a Palestinian unity government. It has nothing to do with the fact that they're murdering each other in the streets and threatening to assassinate each other's leaders. It's obviously because the US hasn't given its blessing to a Palestinian unity government. And that's before we even get into the whole "it's the Palestinians' fault that the US won't recognize their government, since Hamas refuses to recognize Israel".
Although, in slight tension with this position, we would like to say we told you so about how there's not going to be a civil war:
Any attempt to harm its leaders would lead to an all-out confrontation with Fatah, Hamas warned on Tuesday. It said political assassinations would prompt it to resort to "scorched earth" tactics. The rival parties on Tuesday observed an Egyptian-brokered cease-fire, and no major incidents of violence were reported. However, Fatah gunmen in Nablus set two vehicles belonging to Hamas institutions on fire. No casualties were reported. The warning came in response to a leaflet distributed late Monday night by Fatah's Aksa Martyrs Brigades, which called for "executing" Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, Palestinian Authority Interior Minister Said Siam and Youssef al-Zahar, the commander of the 3,000-strong Hamas "back-up" force in the Gaza Strip. Hamas legislator and spokesman Mushir al-Masri described the authors of the leaflet as "agents of the Zionist occupation." He said the threats were issued by a "hired gang that claims to be a nationalist force, but is in fact helping the Zionist occupation achieve what it had failed to achieve... This leaflet reflects the moral and political decline of this suspicious gang."
Right - because if it's not the US's fault, then obviously it's Israel's fault. So today's lesson is that if the entire world spends fifty years telling millions of people that they're helpless, those millions will start believing it. The constant "if it's not the Jews it's the Catholics... if it's not the Catholics it's the Americans... if it's not the Americans, it's the Jews..." cycle is enabled intellectually (if we can use that word) by the pathological conspiracy theories that circulate through the Arab and Muslim worlds. But as a matter of sensibility, the cycle of blaming others is its own pathetic, victimological sensibility. They've been definitional victims for four or five generations now - of course the reflexive externalization has gone all the way down to instinct and reflex.
[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
