Saturday, May 7, 2011

The Wall Street Journal's "Hamas Leader Nods to New Partners": Et tu, Brute?

In a Wall Street Journal article entitled "Hamas Leader Nods to New Partners" (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704810504576307510480968584.html), Charles Levinson and Matt Bradley write:

"Hamas has scaled back its use of violence in recent years, halting suicide bombings and reining in the firing of rockets at Israel. Still, Hamas militants in the West Bank were responsible for a number of shootings of Israeli settlers in the West Bank last year. Last month, Hamas militants in Gaza fired an antitank missile at an Israeli school bus, killing one child."

Hamas "halted" suicide bombings? This is incorrect. The fence between the West Bank and Israel, closure of Israel's border with Gaza, and security cooperation between Israel and Fatah ended this horror.

Hamas "reined in" the firing of rockets? Over the course of a single weekend in April 2011, some 120 mortar shells, rockets and missiles were fired from Gaza at civilian targets in southern Israel. This barrage ceased only after Israel retaliated and Hamas discovered that the "Iron Dome" anti-rocket system was bringing down their Grad missiles.

On Tuesday, The Washington Post published Jimmy Carter's guest opinion piece entitled "Support the Palestinian unity government" (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/support-the-palestinian-unity-government/2011/05/03/AFSbd6iF_print.html), in which he advised the United States to support a Palestinian unity government to be created by Hamas and Fatah. Ignoring recent outrages perpetrated by Hamas against civilians in southern Israel, Carter warned that if the Quartet did not support the unity government, Israel could face "a new round of violence" (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2011/05/jimmy-carters-support-palestinian-unity.html).

On Wednesday, The New York Times published a contributor op-ed entitled "Hurting Moderates, Helping Militants" (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/05/opinion/05Thrall.html?ref=opinion) in which someone named Nathan Thrall tried to persuade us that if Israel doesn't negotiate with Hamas, something worse could come along (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2011/05/nathan-thralls-hurting-moderates.html).

Now The Wall Street Journal would also have us believe that Hamas has been reining in terror?

Et tu, Brute?

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