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01/27/2006:
"The Palestinians' democratic choice must be respected"
Hamas's triumph in Wednesday's Palestinian elections is the best news from the Middle East for a long time. The poll was a more impressive display of democracy than any other in the region, outstripping last year's votes in Lebanon and Iraq both in turnout and the range of views that candidates represented.Whereas in Iraq parties that opposed the occupation had to downplay or even obscure their views, Palestinian supporters of armed resistance to Israel's expansionist strategies were able to run openly. It is true that Hamas candidates did not make relations with Israel the centrepiece of their campaign. They focused on reform in the Palestinian Authority. But few voters were unaware of Hamas's uncompromising hostility to occupation and its record in fighting it.
Wednesday's election was remarkable also in owing nothing to Washington's (selective) efforts to promote democracy in the Arab world. Instead, it was further proof that civil society in Palestine is more vibrant than anywhere else in the region and that Palestinian politics has its own dynamics, dictated not by outside pressure but the social and economic demands of ordinary people in appalling conditions. Providing a forum to freely express hopes and fears, debate policy and seek agreed solutions is, after all, what democracy is about.
In Israel and Washington reaction to Hamas's victory has been predictably negative. European governments should take a more sensitive view. The first watchword is caution. Applaud the process but don't take issue with the result. While the dust settles and Hamas works out its own priorities for government, Europeans should calmly analyse why Hamas got so much support.
guardian.co.uk
Bush Defends His Goal of Spreading Democracy to the Mideast
WASHINGTON, Jan. 26 — The sweeping victory of Hamas in the Palestinian elections threw President Bush and his aides on the defensive on Thursday, complicating the administration's policy of trying to promote democracy as an antidote to the spread of terrorism.
Reacting uneasily to the Hamas triumph, Mr. Bush said the results spoke to the failures of President Mahmoud Abbas and the "old guard" of his Fatah faction to root out corruption and mismanagement, not to any flaws in the administration's policy of advocating democracy.
ha. They set up a bogus US/Isreali puppet government and then made the fatal error of allowing the Palestinian people to vote, and now they have to backpedal on this democratic fiction they've been trying to foist on the region.
After Hamas Victory, Israel's Likely Course
JERUSALEM, Jan. 26 — The Hamas landslide in Palestinian elections has stunned Israelis, but it may also have brought them a rare moment of clarity: with peace talks off the table, Israel will most likely pursue unilateral actions, drawing its own borders and separating itself from the Palestinians.
Ehud Olmert, the acting prime minister, made it clear after an emergency cabinet meeting that talks with Hamas, a Palestinian party sworn to Israel's destruction, were out of the question, while experts said Israel was now freer to establish its future on its own.
This is not one bit different from what Israel has always been doing, except that it doesn't have its bogus 'Palestinian Authority' to be 'negotiating' with.
