No going back now

Israel may be seeking to destroy Hamas, but what it is actually doing is destroying any possibility for peace, writes Khaled Amayreh in Ramallah

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A Palestinian man holds his child during a candlelit vigil in support of Gaza in the West Bank city of Ramallah (photo: AP)

Despite official denials from the Israeli government, the central goal of the Israeli campaign in the Gaza Strip may well be the elimination of the elected Hamas government and the reinstallation in power of the Western- backed Palestinian Authority (PA).

From a purely military point of view, the removal of the Hamas authority in Gaza is not a particularly difficult task, given the immense superiority of Israeli firepower in comparison to the primitive means of defence that Hamas and all other Palestinian resistance factions possess. In fact, the ongoing Israeli blitz has already seriously weakened the government in Gaza, especially its ability to re-establish a semblance of normal life in the bombed-out coastal enclave and meet the basic needs of its thoroughly ravaged inhabitants.

Indeed, with Gaza looking very much like Dresden in the closing months of World War II, reverting to the "status quo ante", which by no means was rosy given the harsh Israeli siege, will be too formidable a task for Hamas to tackle alone. In short, the horrific bombing of basic civilian infrastructure, including nearly all public buildings and basic facilities, will make the task of rehabilitating life in Gaza nearly impossible for any normal government, let alone a beaten organisation, strangled by Israel and hated by many in the international community.

However, while a brief reoccupation of Gaza by the Israeli army would effectively spell the end of the Islamist government, Hamas would continue nonetheless to play a pivotal role in the Palestinian arena, especially in the Gaza Strip.

Some Israeli commentators have argued justifiably that Israel's real problems would begin the day after the Israeli army reoccupied Gaza. Israel, then, would be obliged to deal with and meet the basic needs of a hostile and embittered population. This task, these commentators say, will be anything but easy. Israel is likely then to face costly guerrilla warfare that could prompt the Israeli government to withdraw.

Another possibility is that Israel might wait a few weeks until an "alternative" Palestinian authority could be installed in Gaza to replace Hamas. Such an authority would probably be backed and enforced by international or Arab (eg. Egyptian) troops that would help the new authority overcome any potential resistance from the populace, especially the numerous Hamas supporters.

Should Israel decide to reoccupy the Gaza Strip, the Israeli army would likely launch a witch-hunt campaign against Hamas's political and resistance leaders. And in order to give the Israeli public a clear sense of victory, the Israeli army might resort to publicly humiliating some of Hamas's leaders. Needless to say, such behaviour, despicable as it may be, would enormously boost the chances of Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak and Kadima leader Tzipi Livni of winning a larger number of parliament seats in Israeli elections in February.

This notwithstanding, Israel realises well that Hamas is not only armed resistance, homemade rockets and bearded ideologues delivering fiery speeches exhorting the Palestinian masses to keep up the struggle against their Israeli occupiers. Hamas has hundreds of thousands of supporters and followers in the occupied Palestinian territories and millions of sympathisers across the Arab and Muslim worlds. These supporters and sympathisers are already thoroughly incensed by the "holocaust" unfolding in Gaza.

Their frustration, one can safely argue, is likely to reach boiling point if Israel goes further in achieving its declared and undeclared goals in Gaza. Hence, should Israel bring the Hamas government down, Hamas would be forced, under pressure from its rank and file, to undergo a radical transformation that wouldn't auger well, neither for Israel nor for the PA, nor for the peace process.

According to some Islamist leaders who spoke to Al-Ahram Weekly recently, Hamas, brutalised by the Israeli war machine and betrayed and abandoned by Arab regimes, may move politically and ideologically towards Al-Qaeda. This potential development could be justified on the grounds that the US-dominated international community won't allow home-grown Islamic political movements to flourish, and that the only alternative available to Islamic movements and Muslims in general would be a revolution that would topple existing regimes in the Muslim world that are at America's beck and call.

The predicted radicalisation of Hamas could also take the form of an early return to suicide bomb attacks against Israeli and Jewish targets, not only in the Israeli- Palestinian theatre, but also all over the world. Manifest failure to reach a genuine peace settlement acceptable to a majority of the Palestinian people could very well reinforce and accelerate such a trend, also taking in other Palestinian factions such as the Islamic Jihad and some non-conformist elements within Fatah as well.

Another scenario is the restoration of national unity, or a semblance of it, with Fatah. However, this possibility is largely predicated on how coherent and intact Hamas will be when the current Israeli campaign is over. That aside, there remain obstacles.

First, there are many within Hamas who view the PA leadership as a key accomplice in the Israeli campaign against Gaza. Hence, the thought of entering into a government of national unity with the PA would be bitterly rejected by many Islamist leaders, furious with the PA's alleged "treachery".

Second, the PA itself, weak and dependent on foreign aid, is likely to come under strong Israeli and Western pressure to exclude Hamas from any prospective government until at least the Islamist group recognises Israel, which is unthinkable, all the more so now.

Moreover, the inclusion of Hamas in a new national unity government would ensure that the PLO wouldn't reach a peace agreement with Israel, at least one that meets the minimum of Palestinian aspirations, including full Israeli withdrawal from the territories occupied in 1967, agreement on Jerusalem and a just solution of the plight of Palestinian refugees.

Some commentators argue that one of the key aims of the Israeli blitz against Gaza is to neutralise any Palestinian position vis-à-vis any prospective Israeli-drafted settlement imposed on the weak and vulnerable PA leadership -- i.e. one that would be viewed as a shameful surrender by Hamas and a majority of Palestinians both at home and abroad.

Hamas, one can say, is unlikely to remain silent in the face of such a possibility.