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Hamas controls health clinic day care welfare services { January 27 2006 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/01/27/MNGBEGUHCF1.DTLhttp://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/01/27/MNGBEGUHCF1.DTL
Landslide for Hamas -- limbo in Mideast
Leaders say Israel won't be recognized
- Matthew Kalman, Chronicle Foreign Service
Friday, January 27, 2006
Ramallah, West Bank -- The Palestinian territories and Israel have been plunged into their deepest upheaval in a decade after voters toppled the ruling Fatah party from power and handed a landslide victory in the Palestinian Authority to Hamas in Wednesday's parliamentary election.
Hamas leaders did not hide their surprise and delight on Thursday at being handed the reins of power in their first attempt to enter national politics, but they said they would not recognize or negotiate with Israel and remained committed to its destruction.
Hamas -- its formal name is the Islamic Resistance Movement -- is considered a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union, which provides half the annual budget of the Palestinian Authority. The fate of that aid is one of the many unanswered questions raised by the unexpected shift in power.
Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip took to the streets to celebrate as their leaders tried to come to terms with the results of the election, which no one -- not even Hamas -- had forecast. Its Change and Reform Party, created last year to participate in the elections, won 76 seats in the 132-seat Palestinian Legislative Council, leaving Fatah a distant second with only 43 seats, according to preliminary results released on Thursday with 95 percent of the votes counted. The 13 remaining seats went to several smaller parties and independents. Voter turnout was a huge 74.64 percent.
Fatah, founded by the late Yasser Arafat, has dominated Palestinian politics for nearly half a century and has dominated the Palestinian Authority since that body was established in 1994 after the Oslo peace accords. Hamas has opposed the Oslo peace framework, intended to lead to side-by-side Palestinian and Israeli states.
"There is no point in negotiations" with Israel, said Farhat Assad, the Hamas campaign director on the West Bank. "There have been negotiations for 50 years, and they have not brought us or the Israelis or anyone in the world quiet, security or stability."
Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar, in remarks reported by the Associated Press, said the organization is prepared to continue the year-long informal cease-fire with Israel but would respond to Israeli attacks.
Israeli officials said they will neither negotiate nor establish contacts with Hamas, whose armed wing, the Qassem Brigades, orchestrates violent attacks against Israeli soldiers and civilians.
"The victory of Hamas is bad news for everybody who believes in peace and negotiations. This organization is not ready to put an end to terrorism and make peace with Israel," said Oslo accords architect Yossi Beilin.
Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in a statement Thursday, "Israel will not negotiate with a Palestinian administration if its members include an armed terrorist organization that calls for the destruction of the state of Israel; in any case, Israel will continue to fight terrorism with a heavy hand, everywhere."
Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Palestinians have created "Hamastan" whose aim is "to destroy Israel." Other right-wing Israeli politicians said the Hamas victory was encouraged by Israel's unilateral pullout from Gaza last year.
Both Olmert and Netanyahu are running in Israel's March elections, called by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon before he had a debilitating stroke early this month. Israel's unsettled political situation adds another degree of complications to the Palestinian upheaval.
In Jerusalem, some Israelis who have lost relatives and friends in Hamas suicide bombings said there should be no contact with the new Palestinian government.
"The mother who sent her son to kill my son was elected today as a member of parliament in Gaza," said Avi Zana, whose son Ariel was killed in an attack by the son of Maryam Farahat, elected to represent Hamas. "We have reached a situation which no one expected."
Israeli security officials called urgent consultations to prepare a government brief on the new situation. They admitted they had not planned for a Hamas victory. One fear is that the tiny Islamic Jihad group, which has carried out a series of suicide attacks in the past year while Hamas observed a partial cease-fire, will strike out again in an effort to win radical support while Hamas is engaged in trying to run the government.
In Washington, both President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice criticized Hamas for refusing to renounce terrorist tactics and to accept the existence of Israel. Such remarks did not impress Ismael Hanieya, the Gaza Hamas leader who is likely to become the new prime minister.
"The American government must respect the will of the Palestinian people expressed through the ballot box," said Hanieya, who holds the top spot on the Change and Reform Party list.
Hamas leaders said they expect Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to invite Hanieya to form the next government, but said they prefer to form a coalition government with Fatah and other groups. Abbas, leader of Fatah, was elected separately and continues to hold his post.
Hamas is partially financed by Iran and maintains offices in Syria. From Damascus, Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal phoned Abbas and invited Fatah to join a national unity government. Fatah leaders rejected the overtures Thursday, saying they would not join a Hamas-led coalition.
After accepting the resignation of the Fatah-led government and Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia, Abbas said he will remain in office as the Palestinian president and vowed to pursue the peace platform on which he was elected following Arafat's death.
"I am committed to implementing the program on which you elected me a year ago," he said in a televised speech. "It is a program based on negotiations and peaceful settlement with Israel."
He hinted he might bypass the new government by acting as the head of the Palestine Liberation Organization rather than the Palestinian Authority. The PLO, founded in 1964, remains the ultimate power in Palestinian politics.
"We are going to reactivate the role of the PLO," Abbas said. Such a move would leave Hamas in charge of domestic policy, with Abbas and the PLO guiding diplomacy -- a pragmatic compromise that would allow normal life to continue without Hamas having to jettison its ideological opposition to talks with Israel.
Hamas leaders said they will concentrate on cleaning up the corruption-riddled Palestinian Authority.
The organization already maintains a network of health clinics, day-care centers, kindergartens and welfare services that have brought it huge support among ordinary Palestinians. Its popularity also stems from its commitment to efficiency and public accountability, which officials said it will now apply to the notoriously inefficient Palestinian Authority administration.
"On one hand, we will maintain the agenda of resistance," said Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri. "On the other hand, we seek to make change and reform in the Palestinian arena."
Exuberant Hamas supporters swept into the streets Thursday, handing out traditional sweetmeats and chanting pro-Hamas slogans.
In Ramallah, the center of Palestinian political activity, Manara Square was swathed in green and white Hamas flags as thousands of jubilant supporters thronged into the square to dance, sing and listen to victory speeches.
Posters featuring Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the Hamas founder assassinated by Israel two years ago for directing suicide attacks, were plastered across walls and billboards, replacing images of Abbas and Arafat.
"I'm very happy. I need a change. I've been waiting 10 years for this," said Hassan, a clothing shopkeeper just off the square who declined to give his last name.
Violence broke out at the Palestinian parliament building across town, where several shots were fired. Two people were injured when Fatah and Hamas supporters traded stones and gunfire. A Fatah loyalist tore down a Hamas flag that the victors had raised over the building. The incident ended after Hamas leaders called for calm.
Hamas had expected to do well, presenting Palestinians with a clear program to clean up the corruption-riddled politics of the Palestinian Authority and channel money into much-needed health, education and social services. But the extent of their victory suggests that the Palestinian people were intent on dealing a killer blow to Fatah after a decade of inept, corrupt, crony-ridden rule that has failed to bring them any nearer to statehood or peace. And with its rout, Fatah's future remains cloudy.
In Hebron, Jibril Rajoub, one of the most powerful Fatah figures on the West Bank and a top security adviser under Arafat and Abbas, said it is time for Fatah to "disappear" after he was defeated in his home district by his own brother.
"We are a democratic movement and we respect the choice of the people," Rajoub said, shortly after learning he had lost. "We must now disappear from the political scene and allow our brothers in Hamas to govern."
In Gaza, one prominent Fatah activist blamed his own party leadership for the drubbing.
"Fatah paid the price because of its corrupt administration and a bunch of corrupt leaders," said Samir Mashharawi. "Our interest now is to serve as a real opposition and to accept responsibility for the mistakes we made."
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About Hamas
Organization: Hamas is an acronym for Harakat Al-Muqawama Al-Islamia, which means Islamic Resistance Movement. Its headquarters is in Damascus, Syria, but most members are in the Palestinian territories.
History: Hamas began in 1967 as a wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. In 1978, it registered with Israeli authorities as a nonprofit, religious organization under the leadership of Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, who was also head of the Muslim Brotherhood in Gaza. The organization worked to win support for the Islamist movement in Palestinian institutions, universities, mosques and political entities.
Base: Its main base is in the Gaza Strip, but it also is popular in parts of the West Bank. Its following is partly due to its extensive social welfare programs, which many poor Palestinians consider more effective than those run by the Palestinian Authority. It is disliked by secular and Christian Palestinians who oppose its stance on creation of an Islamic state. It has participated in both Palestinian uprisings, or intifadas, and has orchestrated a suicide bombing campaign and other violence against Israel.
Finances: It receives funds from Iran as well as donations from Palestinian expatriates and sympathizers in moderate Arab states, Western Europe and North America.
Structure: Hamas is the organization's political wing. Its military wing, the Qassem Brigades, carries out attacks on Israelis. Last year, it created the Change and Reform Party, which did well in recent municipal elections in the West Bank and Gaza, and on Wednesday won control of the Palestinian Legislative Council.
Political leaders
-- Khaled Mashaal, recognized as the leader of Hamas, based in Damascus. Mashaal makes the decisions about Hamas policy in consultation with West Bank and Gaza leaders as well as others in Damascus. Mashaal maintains an uncompromising line against Israel. He survived an abortive Israeli assassination attempt in Jordan in 1997.
-- Mahmoud Zahar, the local political leader of Hamas, is a founder of the group. He was the personal physician for Yassin, the spiritual force behind Hamas who was killed in an Israeli air strike in Gaza in 2004. Zahar adopts a stern, harsh policy toward Israel, promoting the Hamas ideology that rejects the existence of a Jewish state in an Islamic Middle East.
-- Ismael Hanieya, the top candidate on the Hamas list, is known as a relative moderate. He is one of the most public of the Hamas figures, remaining available to comment on events even when most of the other leaders drop out of sight for fear of Israeli attacks.
-- Sheikh Hassan Yousef, the top Hamas figure in the West Bank, released from Israeli prison in 2004. Yousef is the most moderate of the Hamas leaders, refusing to rule out talks with Israel under strict conditions.
Sources: Associated Press; Federation of American Scientists; Congressional Research Service; Chronicle research by Lois Jermyn
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Hamas the winner
Final results will not be certified for
two weeks, but based on a count of 95 percent of the vote for the 132-member
Palestinian Parliament, Hamas won 76 seats, while Fatah won 43.
Percent of Parliament
Hamas 57.6%
Fatah 32.6%
Other 9.8%
Number of seats
Hamas 76
Fatah 43
Independents 4
PFLP* 3
Third Way 2
Badil 2
Independent 2
Palestine
*Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
Source: Central Elections Commission
Associated Press
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