re: #100 lawhawk

Well, if I started getting into the nuances of Hamas, proxy armies for the likes of Iran and Syria, media malfeasance that gives propaganda wins to terror groups, human rights groups that take a blind eye to terror but slam Israel at every turn, and my response would go from pithy to verbose.

You don’t have to sacrifice pith, and what you’re presenting— by saying that this is a Palestine vs. Israel issue and not an Israel vs. the rest of the Muslim world— you are being very, very, very inaccurate.

However, what Hamas is doing, or trying to do in Gaza does defy a neat description and that discussion had come up previously. Gaza is not occupied by Israel; Hamas is in control - but it is not a declared state. I would say it’s a failed state. Hamas is a legitimate representative of the Palestinians as being duly elected by the Palestinians at their last election. They are the sole representatives in Gaza after their civil war with Fatah. That puts them in de facto control of Gaza. They enforce their “law” and exercise a near monopoly on the use of force (control the “security” forces, coordinate terror attacks, etc.). That puts them well ahead of a gang or warlord - a situation as in Somalia for example.

You cannot both say a place is a failed state and a totalitarian state. As I said, they are nowhere near organized enough to be totalitarian. They also do not have a monopoly on violence— if nothing else, Israel also projects force into the area.

But the end results are the same - Hamas controls what’s going on in Gaza and is responsible for the situation there.

No, this is not true, and you should stop saying it. Leaving out the effects of the propaganda from Saudi Arabia and other Islamic nations, leaving out the financial support from those nations, leaving out the treatment of the Palestinians by those other nations, leaves out an absolutely essential part of the conflict. Hamas is not fully responsible for the situation in Gaza; Hamas was and is supported by a wide variety of external forces, and the support they receive is due, in large part, to propaganda that is universal in the Muslim world and in no way particular to Hamas.

And Saudi Arabia are our allies, and they are one of the main funders of anti-Israel propaganda. That fact is uncomfortable for us, but we must face it.