SHOULD HAMAS HAVE A ROLE IN A FUTURE PALESTINE?
March 12, 2024We’re constantly fed a narrative that Israel’s abhorrent violence and genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank, must not stop until Hamas is eliminated.
Israel, with the US’s support, reiterated the idea that Hamas is an existential threat and that NOT abolishing them places Israel at risk.
But is this actually true or are we being fed a false narrative? It suggests a dichotomy that either Hamas is destroyed or Israel will no longer exist. But is that in fact correct or just what Israel, the USA, UK and those in that camp want us to believe?
Or rather is the question we should be asking ourselves: “If Israel ended its aggression, oppression, apartheid, ethnic-cleaning, destruction and violence against the Palestinians, would Hamas even need to exist?”
We know Hamas was borne because of 75 years of torture and violence against the Palestinians. It was not created in a healthy, peacful, prosperous environment where Palestinians were treated with equality and dignity. It was in resistance to the open-air prison they had been forced to live in for decades.
If we analyse similar historic cases of previous resistance movements that were once deemed terror organisations, but ultimately, through fair-minded negotiations to end the conflict, were dissolved militarily and transformed into active political parties, we can see that there is an alternative solution.
This report looks at the African National Congress (ANC), the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and the FARC of Colombia to provide historical precedent and demonstrate that an alternate solution is real and possible.
Whilst we are not advocating for Hamas or any other group, we feel it is important to contextualise the argument surrounding Hamas today and the rhetoric being repeated that “Hamas must be eliminated” as the only solution, versus what has been achieved peacefully in the past and is still in tact today.
Ultimately, however, it should not be a foreign power or body that dictates who rules, controls or governs any nation.
THAT SHOULD BE DECIDED BY THE CITIZENS OF A COUNTRY!
@georgegallowayofficial @sinn_fein @anc @southafrica @maryloumcdonaldsf
English Script:
Daizy: One of the biggest debates on the global political agenda is the question of Hamas and its role, if any it should have in a future solution for Palestine. Deemed a terrorist organisation by Israel, the US and UK and a few other nations, who have all called for it to be eliminated and refused to consider it as partner of any future solution for Palestine, as we have often recently heard repeated:
Netanyahu: victory is within reach and you can’t have victory until you eliminate Hamas.
Michiel Hoogeveen: Hamas, on the other hand, is a terrorist organization. It keeps spreading anti-Semitism through their propaganda
Nadav Zafrir: We must eliminate Hamas.
Daniel S. Goldman: Hamas needs to be eliminated from Gaza.
Daizy: But is this a fair judgement considering historically, other alleged terrorist groups have not been eliminated but rather brought into the fold of legitimacy by their own people and world governments. Let’s take a look at just a few of the most famous and recent examples…As this might allow us to better understand the role, if any, Hamas might play in a future Palestinian state. Firstly, let’s look at the ANC, the African National Congress. This was a group founded in 1912 in South Africa to advocate for the rights of black South Africans. By 1948, their central goal was to fight against the institutionalised apartheid that the government at the time was waging against them. But here’s what happened… and please…contrast this story with what’s happening in Palestine today. 1960 came along, and this group that called themselves a liberation movement, a group that was fighting for their rights against a racist regime, were banned!! Many of their leaders were imprisoned and forced into exile, including their most famous prisoner, Nelson Mandela. What is more interesting is that South Africa, The United States and the UK, all declared the ANC a terrorist organisation. Ring any bells?
“Nelson Mandela continues to be included on the United States terrorist watch list due to his leadership and participation with the African National Congress”.
Daizy: But this didn’t stop the ANC which held firmly to its stance of seeking liberation, equality and rights for all black South Africans. We all know apartheid ended in 1990 in South Africa. Mandela was released that same year and the ANC’s ban was repealed. Four years later free and fair elections were held and the ANC won making it a “legitimate” political party. Mandela was elected the President of the new democratic republic of South Africa. So, the group that was declared a terrorist organisation, that was banned, became an official political party that has turned the tide today and waged its own legal case of apartheid against the Israeli government. On a side note, did you know the U.S. Government Had Mandela on a terrorist watch list until 2008. Interesting huh?
The ANC is not the only example. Take a look at the IRA, the Irish Republican Army that sought to end British rule in Northern Ireland and achieve reunification and fought a bloody war for 30 years. This entity was declared a terrorist organisation by both the UK and the Republic of Ireland.
“I was labeled a terrorist. The organization that I was part of, the IRA was labeled a terrorist organization”.
Daizy: But, in 1997 it declared a ceasefire, decommissioned its weapons and only kept its political wing, Sinn Fein which has become so successful that it won the most seats in the 2022 election!! This should provide us with valuable precedent that world leaders should be referring to when analysing Hamas and its role in a future Palestine. Because maybe, just like the IRA, a formerly declared terrorist group became a popular and powerful political party, so too can Hamas. Then there’s, of course, Farc in Colombia, an armed force founded in 1966 that signed a ceasefire accord in 2016, 50 years later and became a legal political party. Antony Blinken. The US Secretary of State, released a statement saying: “Today’s revocation of Farc terrorist designations is a credit to the 2016 peace accord with the Colombian government”. All these examples highlight one thing, former terror organizations can merge into political parties and successfully participate in a country’s elections. Perhaps the US and Israel should shift their rhetoric. Instead of eliminating Hamas, why not create the conditions for it to be an internationally accepted Palestinian political party? As George Galloway recently stated, it should be up to the Palestinian people to decide their leaders, not external players with vested interests and their own agendas.
Galloway: Hamas should be allowed to govern Gaza? Should we ask Britain to decide who runs Gaza or the BBC? Perhaps the people of Palestine must pick their own governments.
Daizy: But before we end, let’s look at one more example, one that exists in the Israeli government today. We’ve all heard of Israel’s far right government. You know, people like Ben-Gvir. Now what gets hidden is the party that this guy comes from. Ben-Gvir is part of a party called Otzma Yehudit, a descendant of the Kach party, which was barred from elections and declared a terrorist organization by Canada, the predecessor to the EU and the United States, but more importantly, by Israel itself. Just take a look at this article by the Times of Israel inquiring about whether Ben-Gvir is a Kahanist. A word used to describe the ideology of the Kach party. The question: Is Otzma Yehudit leader Itamar Ben-gvir, now running for Knesset as part of the religious Zionism slate, “full-blown Kahanist,” or something less extreme? If the descendant of a former Israeli declared terrorist organization can be in politics today, why do we exclude this option for Hamas? Now, this is not to support Hamas’s ideology, but it’s to apply a similar rule that was applied to those before. Not to apply double standards, which we have seen time and time again when it comes to Palestine.
So let’s just pause and think with me for a moment. If we don’t buy into the logic of the West and Israel that no solution for Palestine is possible whilst Hamas exists and instead consider the historic precedent laid out above. Like with the ANC, IRA and Farc, and we accept Hamas as a potential legitimate political player.n But importantly, we change the conditions the Palestinians are living under and apartheid and oppression and end violence. Then armed resistance would no longer be necessary. Then Hamas would not be a threat to Israel because Israel would no longer be a threat to the Palestinians. This would then pave the way for Hamas to become a legitimate political party and would have to contest elections along with every other Palestinian political party. It’s a real and fair solution. We just need to create the conditions for it to occur.
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