# Hamas vs Fatah: Who Will "Win"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 14, 2007, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034 "2007-06-14T20:01:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![tagos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@tagos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tagos)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/21 "2007-06-15T14:52:30Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] Hamas was elected because they had a better grass-roots support due to the fact that they were busy building infrastructure while Arafat was out capitalizing and courting world opinion. Hamas won’t necessarily drive them into poverty, but Israel might because Israel can control revenue. Hamas generally does more directly for the Palestinian people than Fatah. [/QUOTE] Yes. People forget that Hamas, like Hezbollah, have assiduously built up political capital by functioning as a welfare state. They, in practice, were doing much more for the people than the Palestinian Authority. Whatever mixture of motives, from an expression of Islamic charity to cynical manipulation, they were genuinely popular in a way the corrupt Arafat lot haven’t been for decades. [Jerusalem Post: Why people voted for Hamas](http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull&cid=1136361071223) > [@](#): > > In mid-December’s elections for the local council in Ramallah’s adjacent municipality, El-Bireh, Hamas won nine of the 15 council seats. > > Two went to independent candidates and Abbas’s Fatah list won only four. > > “It was a protest against Fatah corruption,” says the flat-capped owner of a dry-goods store around the corner from the municipality building. “People are fed up with the mess.” > > You don’t have to press hard for details. Over cups of bitter coffee, the grievances come pouring out. On a national level, people see top Fatah officials building themselves lavish homes and driving luxury cars. And on a local level, they see jobs being given to relatives and friends, unfairnesses in the awarding of building permits, dirty streets. > > He doesn’t volunteer whom he voted for, and I don’t push him. He notes that only 6,000 locals voted in the El-Bireh elections, perhaps a quarter of the potential electorate. He says he doesn’t know if people’s despair over what he calls “interior issues” will translate into similar support for Hamas in the parliamentary vote. And he asserts that voters didn’t opt for Hamas “out of religious affiliation.” > > But the bottom line, he says, is that Abbas’s PA has lost the trust of ordinary Palestinians. “People think Hamas will do better, be fairer, than Fatah.” We can’t go around bleating about bringing democracy to the Middle East and then destroy any freely elected govt we don’t like. Makes us look like hypocrites. To quote Churchill ‘jaw-jaw is always preferable to war-war.’ But then there is on the other side this complete unreality. > [@](#): > > “People are disgusted with the PA,” she rushes on. “They were depositing millions of dollars in bank accounts abroad for themselves and their children. They didn’t do anything for the people. My daughter [she has seven children] sent her CV to all the ministers after graduating university. She’s very bright. But we’re simple people, without connections. She didn’t get a job.” > > Isn’t she worried that, if Palestinians now vote for a parliament with a heavy Hamas presence, the world will withdraw aid because of Hamas’s extremism, and ordinary people will suffer? > > “If the world cuts funding, it will only strengthen Hamas,” she pronounces with certainty. And then, unlike the man in the dry-goods store, she launches a religious defense of the Hamas ideology: Peace with Israel is “impossible,” she says. “Our religion says the conflict will continue until the day of judgment. They took the land of Palestine and the people will never give up.” It might help matters if Israel ended “the humiliations, the checkpoints, the walls, the killings. My mother-in-law is in Mokassed hospital [in east Jerusalem] and we can’t visit her. Her children are in Jordan and can’t come and see her. She’ll die alone. This makes the people hate Israel.” > > But no, there could be no peace no matter how Israel behaved. “The only solution is for those who came from Russia, Ethiopia, America, to go back. I was born in El-Bireh but my parents are from Lod; we’re refugees from 1948” - she lowers her voice - “and we’re still considered outsiders here. There’ll be no return in my generation, but I think in the next generation it’s possible.” I have had this argument a dozen times with a Palestinian friend. I know it’s a bitter pill to swallow but the Palestinians have lost. They are history’s losers. It’s unfair but that is just the way it is. Israel is going nowhere. It is an historical fact and it has a right to exist within secure borders unthreatened by missiles and bombers. You are never going to get a right of return. Your only option is to strike the best deal you can. And ‘best deal’ is going to get crappier with each passing year. It just seems to me that the last thing Israel and the West should do is play into the hands of extremists and that is what we did by refusing to engage in a dialogue. Like we refuse to engage with the Saudi plan whenever it is bought back to life. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/22 "2007-06-15T17:56:10Z")
[QUOTE=tagos] I know it’s a bitter pill to swallow but the Palestinians have lost. They are history’s losers. It’s unfair but that is just the way it is. Israel is going nowhere. It is an historical fact and it has a right to exist within secure borders unthreatened by missiles and bombers. You are never going to get a right of return. Your only option is to strike the best deal you can. And ‘best deal’ is going to get crappier with each passing year. [/QUOTE] You know, if the Jews can say “Next year in Jerusalem” for 2,000 years before making it stick, why can’t the Palestinians? I actually think that the Israeli position has been eroding for some time, and the Hamas takeover in Gaza is just one more incremental step toward the end of Israel as we know it. The Palestinians must be sensing the same. And I’m betting the West Bank is going to go the same way, though it’ll be a bit messier. Fatah’s credibility is gone, and the futile attempts of Israel and America to prop it up will only end up undermining it further. I actually think the Palestinians’ chance of getting a “deal” is much better with Hamas – Israel is more scared of them than it is of the largely impotent Fatah. Hamas is better armed, better disciplined, more reckless, and has better support among the people. It also has some friends with teeth. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/23 "2007-06-15T18:08:48Z")
[QUOTE=tagos] Yes. People forget that Hamas, like Hezbollah, have assiduously built up political capital by functioning as a welfare state. They, in practice, were doing much more for the people than the Palestinian Authority. **Whatever mixture of motives, from an expression of Islamic charity to cynical manipulation** , they were genuinely popular in a way the corrupt Arafat lot haven’t been for decades. [/QUOTE] The way you say this it sounds like you view Hamas as some sort of alien entity manipulating the poor Palestinian people, as opposed to people who are actually working to build a working civil infrastructure for their people. I mean they could be building schools and hospitals in their communities because they would like to have schools and hospitals in their communities right? **sal ammoniac** The Palestinians are not ‘a people’ in the way the Israelis were. They didn’t have a historical bond in the same way. The Palestinians really are a conglomeration of the people who got shafted by Transjordan, Syria and Egypt. If they were a people like the Israelis then you’d see a lot more legitimate help coming from Jordan, Egypt and Syria, rather than using them as a buffer people against their enemy. They were essentially abandoned by ‘their people’, when the partitions occurred. The Jews are a bit of a singularity in their ability to maintain social cohesion across vast physical and temporal distances. I seriously doubt the Palestinians will ever have that sort of cohesion. More likely the Palestinian people will fall into the dustbin of history as another tribe that was destroyed/assimilated into a wider culture. I know a Palestinian guy here in New York who is convinced that emulating the Israelis is the key to Palestinian success, I’d be interested in seeing how much traction he gets with that idea. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/24 "2007-06-15T18:15:38Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] **sal ammoniac** The Palestinians are not ‘a people’ in the way the Israelis were. They didn’t have a historical bond in the same way. [/QUOTE] Not to go too far down this road, because it’s a bit of a hijack, but I think this is nonsense. I think the Palestinians are vastly more coherent as a people than the Jews are. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/25 "2007-06-15T18:21:56Z")
[QUOTE=Sal Ammoniac] Not to go too far down this road, because it’s a bit of a hijack, but I think this is nonsense. I think the Palestinians are vastly more coherent as a people than the Jews are. [/QUOTE] I don’t think history supports that notion. When Jews were having problems in Ethiopia, Israel airlifted them to Israel. When Palestinians were having problems in Jordan, the military opened fire upon them. The Palestinians are part of the same tribal system as the Jordanians, Lebanese and Syrians, but there was not really any attempt to assimilate them into those countries when Israel was formed. Israel on the other hand assimilated jews from all over the planet. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/26 "2007-06-15T18:45:27Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] I don’t think history supports that notion. When Jews were having problems in Ethiopia, Israel airlifted them to Israel. [/QUOTE] Except how Jewish they really were was and continues to be a question. But, as I said, this is a subject for another thread. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/27 "2007-06-15T19:13:52Z")
[QUOTE=Sal Ammoniac] You know, if the Jews can say “Next year in Jerusalem” for 2,000 years before making it stick, why can’t the Palestinians? I actually think that the Israeli position has been eroding for some time, and the Hamas takeover in Gaza is just one more incremental step toward the end of Israel as we know it. The Palestinians must be sensing the same. And I’m betting the West Bank is going to go the same way, though it’ll be a bit messier. Fatah’s credibility is gone, and the futile attempts of Israel and America to prop it up will only end up undermining it further. I actually think the Palestinians’ chance of getting a “deal” is much better with Hamas – Israel is more scared of them than it is of the largely impotent Fatah. Hamas is better armed, better disciplined, more reckless, and has better support among the people. It also has some friends with teeth. [/QUOTE] You think current events are _good_ news for Palestinians? I beg to differ. I’ll echo what was said by someone’s Palestinian friend - the best chance for Palestinian statehood, is in emulating the successful example set by Israel itself. Before Israel was a state, it was divided into a more radical and militant faction (the Irgun and allies) and a more moderate faction. The two came into conflict, and the more moderate faction suppressed the more militant one. I suggest that the victory of the moderate nationalists over the “reckless” ones “with teeth” was vital to their success. Conversely, the exact reverse situation is going to lead to nothing but failure. ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/28 "2007-06-15T19:17:24Z")
Is there anything stopping the Israelis from using attack helicopters to pick off all those black-hooded gunmen seen running around Gaza? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/29 "2007-06-15T19:44:39Z")
[QUOTE=ralph124c] **Hamas vs Fatah: Who Will “Win”?** [/QUOTE] The U.S., according to [David Welch.](http://warincontext.org/2007_06_10_archive.html#2369796006009353298) > [@Assistant Secretary of State and U.S. Envoy to the Middle East David Welch](#): > > I like this violence. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/30 "2007-06-15T20:37:27Z")
[QUOTE=Malthus] I’ll echo what was said by someone’s Palestinian friend - the best chance for Palestinian statehood, is in emulating the successful example set by Israel itself. [/QUOTE] In other words, by militarily driving the Jews from the land? ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/31 "2007-06-15T20:54:53Z")
[QUOTE=Sal Ammoniac] In other words, by militarily driving the Jews from the land? [/QUOTE] No. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/32 "2007-06-15T20:59:23Z")
[QUOTE=smiling bandit] Well, half the point of pushing for elections was to bring out this result. [/QUOTE] 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/33 "2007-06-15T21:07:00Z")
This might have been inevitable. The Palestinians who were alive in 1948 when the current mess started are dying off, leaving fewer people who have actual memories of pre-Israel existence. Maybe a schism is forming between Palestinians who are reconciled to Israel’s existence and those who’ll never accept it and the former group sees a chance for relative prosperity and peace if they give up on a dream that for most of them died with their ancestors. I bet in five years the West Bank will be relatively stable and Gaza will become more extreme, with devout Israel-haters moving in and moderates getting the heck out. The West Bank might have a chance (albeit as an impoverished, semi-stable microstate eking by as Israel’s labour force), while Gaza will remain a shithole for quite some time to come. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/34 "2007-06-15T21:10:25Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] This might have been inevitable. The Palestinians who were alive in 1948 when the current mess started are dying off, leaving fewer people who have actual memories of pre-Israel existence. Maybe a schism is forming between Palestinians who are reconciled to Israel’s existence and those who’ll never accept it and the former group sees a chance for relative prosperity and peace if they give up on a dream that for most of them died with their ancestors. I bet in five years the West Bank will be relatively stable and Gaza will become more extreme, with devout Israel-haters moving in and moderates getting the heck out. The West Bank might have a chance (albeit as an impoverished, semi-stable microstate eking by as Israel’s labour force), while Gaza will remain a shithole for quite some time to come. [/QUOTE] I think the divide is more between Fatah’s kleptocrats and Hamas’s Islamists than it is about acceptance of Israel or not. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/35 "2007-06-15T21:23:37Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] 😕 [/QUOTE] It’s not pretty, but I do believe in democracy, even if it results in unpleasant results. More importantly, in this particular case, a signal was needed to demonstrate just what public opinion was. And it obviously isn’t pretty. While no one knew exactly what was going to happen, this has actually clarified the situation. We know now that no compromise is going to happen for the foreseeable future; Arafat (hence Fatah) wouldn’t do it, and Hamas certainly won’t. The people’s real desires have been made obvious to everyone. They don’t want a compromise. So we can cut off the money fueling murder and terror without looking like monsters. So Israel is going to build a wall to keep the suicide bombers out, and will most likely overrun Gaza once Hamas starts attacking from there. The Palestinians lose. But they’ve made their own bed and will have to lie in it. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/36 "2007-06-15T21:43:43Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] I think the divide is more between Fatah’s kleptocrats and Hamas’s Islamists than it is about acceptance of Israel or not. [/QUOTE] Well, Israel is the public outrage bandied about at every level in every speech, but I’d like to think Achmed Average just wants a private life and is likelier to support (as opposed to just showing up at scripted mass rallies and chanting and other useless activities) a government that may be crooked but isn’t randomly violent. The West bank has a small chance if they can foist their nuttier denizens off on Gaza. I hope they don’t blow it. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/37 "2007-06-15T22:29:30Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] **Hamas** had the legitimate mandate in the elections. [/quote] Well, yes and no. It is perhaps worth mentioning that Hamas won somewhat more than half the parliamentary seats while taking somewhat less than half of the popular vote. Primarily because of this… > [@](#): > > Hamas is better organized and has better grass roots support. The Palestinian election system is a bit weird. Half the members are elected proprtionally based on voting for slates. Half are elected by district. Hamas took the single largest block of the proportional vote ( just slightly ahead of Fatah ), but less than that of the total combined secular parties. Where they surged to power was in the district voting, where strict party discipline meant they were often running a single Hamas candidate against _two_ different Fatah candidates, plus assorted other secularist candidates. So the secularists frequently split their votes, while the Hamas slate was unified. Not that the election didn’t represent a sea-change. It may well have - certainly it was very significant indeed whether it was the result of anger at Fatah corruption or a greater social shift towards militant Islamism ( or both ). But the lesson to take home, IMHO, is that Palestinian society is even more deeply divided than ever before, rather than more unified. - Tamerlane ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/38 "2007-06-15T23:31:57Z")
[QUOTE=smiling bandit] It’s not pretty, but I do believe in democracy, even if it results in unpleasant results. More importantly, in this particular case, a signal was needed to demonstrate just what public opinion was. And it obviously isn’t pretty. While no one knew exactly what was going to happen, this has actually clarified the situation. We know now that no compromise is going to happen for the foreseeable future; Arafat (hence Fatah) wouldn’t do it, and Hamas certainly won’t. The people’s real desires have been made obvious to everyone. They don’t want a compromise. So we can cut off the money fueling murder and terror without looking like monsters. [/QUOTE] You might see all that as the bright side :rolleyes: , but still, what makes you think setting off a civil war among Palestinians was “half the point of pushing for elections”? I don’t recall anyone saying or even implying that at the time. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/39 "2007-06-15T23:37:12Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] **sal ammoniac** The Palestinians are not ‘a people’ in the way the Israelis were. [/QUOTE] You’ve got that backwards. The Israelis – as distinct from the Jews – are “a people” **now.** In 1948 they were not. The Palestinians, OTOH, had no national identity in 1948 – but they do now; their circumstances and experience have brought it into being. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2007, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034/40 "2007-06-15T23:39:03Z")
I think it’s now more obvious than ever that nothing but a one-state solution is going to work. Relevant [article.](http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070618/benvenisti) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hamas-vs-fatah-who-will-win/408034.md?page=3)