# How Many Arab Governments SECRETLY Wish for the End of Hamas? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 29, 2008, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107 "2008-12-29T19:57:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/1 "2008-12-29T19:57:35Z")
I suspect that many Arab governments secretly support Israel’s destruction of Hamas. The Palestinian Authority and Fatah probably would like to see the leadership of Hamas dead…ditto for Egypt, Syria, and SA. So, while these governments spout the obligatory “Death to Israel” lines, a good number are secretly pleased that Israel has made the decision (apparently) to extirpate Hamas. What is Obama likely to do about this end-of-year fait accompli?😕 ---
**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:** [December 29, 2008, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/2 "2008-12-29T20:01:34Z")
I’m not sure how the question can be answered, and the governments in question are prone to factional division so even if one faction _secretly_ wants something, they’re matched by others who _secretly_ want something else. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/3 "2008-12-29T20:49:28Z")
I seriously doubt the current military action will lead to anything close to the destruction of Hamas. According to [this](http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-israel-analysis29-2008dec29,0,3905805.story) the goal of the operation is > [@](#): > > Rather than remove Hamas from power, he and other Israeli officials say, the goal is to weaken the movement and demonstrate the price it would pay for continuing to launch rockets" Also: > [@OP](#): > > ditto for Egypt, Syria, and SA. So, while these governments spout the obligatory “Death to Israel” lines Umm, Egypt hasn’t called for the destruction of Israel since 1979. Thats almost forty years ago. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/4 "2008-12-29T20:52:37Z")
> [@Simplicio](#): > > I seriously doubt the current military action will lead to anything close to the destruction of Hamas. According to [this](http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-israel-analysis29-2008dec29,0,3905805.story) the goal of the operation is > Also: > Umm, Egypt hasn’t called for the destruction of Israel since 1979. Thats almost **forty years ago**. Almost thirty. ---
**Author:** ![eenerms](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cdc98d/32.png) [@eenerms](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eenerms)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2008, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/5 "2008-12-30T03:49:34Z")
I think Qatar has been open to dialogs with Israel, much to its neighbors dismay. The lobing of bombs by Israel isn’t going over too well though. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2009, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/6 "2009-01-01T23:16:45Z")
[http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24860529-15084,00.html](http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24860529-15084,00.html) Apparently, some aren’t so secretly wanting the end of it now. God knows how accurate this article is. Anyone? ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2009, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/7 "2009-01-01T23:59:55Z")
The interests of various players are not straightforward. Interestingly enough a fairly detailed analysis is offered up by [the Russian News and Information Service.](http://en.rian.ru/analysis/20081230/119236498.html) Go figure. Just more of what the Australian News reports though. > [@](#): > > Far from all Arab governments have denounced “the new Israeli aggression.” The response would have been different several years ago. > > Even Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of the Palestinian National Authority, has condemned the Israeli action but said Hamas could have prevented the slaughter had it prolonged the six-month truce with Israel, which expired on December 19. Instead, on December 25 the Islamists showered adjacent Israeli territory with high-trajectory Qassam missiles. > > Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said he had appealed to Hamas more than once to prolong the truce with Israel, but they refused saying they want their hands free. > > Paradoxically, it is not only Israel who needed the current invasion of Gaza to protect its citizens from Islamic fighters. The Hamas leaders, who have been at loggerheads with Abbas, whose powers expire in January 2009, will also benefit from the attack. > > The Hamas leadership in Gaza and the movement’s spiritual leader Khaled Meshaal, 45, who is living in exile in Damascus, are ready to sacrifice thousands of their compatriots to strengthen their power in Gaza and their influence on Palestinians in the West Bank controlled by the Abbas administration and Israel. > > Israel will not eradicate Hamas’s ideas. Even if it invades and occupies Gaza, this will only strengthen the surviving Palestinians’ belief in Hamas and hatred for “the Zionist enemy.” This is exactly what the Islamists need. > > Only Syria and Iran have unconditionally denounced Israel’s actions. Syria has said it will terminate the indirect talks with Israel, whereas Iran has said the Israeli leaders must be tried in the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity. > > But the Gulf countries have reacted differently. Saudi King Abdullah has said in a telephone conversation with President George W. Bush that the United States must interfere to stop the Israeli attacks in Gaza. > > The other Arab monarchs keep silence because they have always known that standing behind Hamas are Iran and Syria, which do not need a separate peace between Palestinians and Israel on any conditions. > > Iran wants to remain the regional superpower, while Syria wants to prevent a separate solution of the Palestinian problem by the U.S.-Israel-PNA trio. Syria also wants to force the U.S. to act friendly in order to resolve the problem of the Golan Heights, which Israel occupied during the 1967 war. The players are now falling out along the lines of those whose best interests are served by preventing a real negotiated settlement - who benefit from the boogeyman of Israel and ongoing conflict - Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, to some degree lesser Syria (although that has the potential to change once a separate Israeli-Syria deal is struck), Al-Queda, and other Islamists in general - and those who see the bigger threat as now being the very Islamists they once helped create, and the specter of Iranian hegemony in the region - Egypt, Saudia Arabia, the UAE, etc. Some governments have enough domestic power that they can be public in their disgust with Hamas; some, such as Jordan, must play to the crowds. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/8 "2009-01-02T14:32:08Z")
Which means that a peace in the middle east is actually becoming more possible, because… Holy hell. Without Iraq in the picture, Iran becomes the big bully, and that means people are going to line up against them. My god, Bush might have done something right, and all it involved was wrecking an entire country and killing hundreds of thousands. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/9 "2009-01-02T15:47:05Z")
> [@runner pat](#): > > Almost thirty. They secretly wanted it ten years earlier? 🙂 -Joe ---
**Author:** ![kniz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@kniz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kniz)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2009, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/10 "2009-01-02T18:47:22Z")
“Be careful what you wish for.” is something to keep in mind. It might sound good but the saying is based on the fact that there are unforseen consequences to what is wished for. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-arab-governments-secretly-wish-for-the-end-of-hamas/479107/11 "2009-01-04T03:01:53Z")
The thing that confuses people about Arabs is the West sees them as one people. But this is only VERY superficially so. Israel is a tiny state, even with nukes the Israelis couldn’t stop a determained and united Arab front. Oh sure they could inflict massive damage but in a final show down the Arabs would survive and the Israelis not. The real thing you have to look at is, Israel is a convenient enemy. You see Egypt doesn’t really like Syria, nor Jordan. And Egypt would like to be a leader and not Saudi Arabia. The Gulf States don’t much care to be dominated by the Saudis. In each Arab state there are divisons that don’t like each other. BUT if Egypt isn’t gonna make no trouble for Syria if it’s worried about Israel. Jordan doesn’t have to worry about Syria if it’s busy tied up with Israel. Iran (which isn’t Arab) doesn’t have to fight Israel directly if it can do so through Lebanon. (which is similar to the US and the USSR fighting each other through Korea and Vietnam) You see the destruction of Israel wouldn’t solve the problems it would just remove the focus. If Israel disappears the people of Egypt or Syria or Jordan aren’t gonna get rich. And then the people of Egypt, Syria or Jordan are gonna say “I guess it wasn’t Israel, perhaps we should turn on our own governments.” While the Arabs don’t like Israel it does provide a great place to direct hostility away from home and provide a focus for their problems. This has been used countless number of times by Hitler, Stalin, Napoleon and going all the way back. This said the destruction of Israel isn’t a good thing, neither is the destruction of Hamas, because it keeps Israel occupied and out of the Arab hair. Just like in Iraq, the Sunni’s rules viciously against the Kurds and Shi’ites. It is in the Sunni’s interest to make JUST enough trouble to keep America in the country to prevent the Kurds and Shi’ites from taking revenge when America leaves.