Articles
Talking to terrorists is a sign of weakness, not strength
23 July 2010
The poll conducted by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research has given us a remarkable insight into Anglo-Jewry and its attitudes towards Israel. On the whole there is much to celebrate. The vast majority of British Jews show a healthy support for the Jewish state and most identify themselves as Zionists. British Jews largely back Israeli measures of self defence, such as the security barrier, and military operations like Cast Lead.
But the most startling revelation is the one highlighted by this paper last week: more than half of British Jews believe that ‘the government of Israel should negotiate with Hamas in its efforts to achieve peace.’
At first glance it is not clear what there would be to talk about. Hamas is a fanatical Islamist movement that is committed to destroying the Jewish state. Its opposition to Israel springs not from any territorial grievance but from the country’s very existence, as well as a visceral hatred of Jews.
The Hamas Charter, which borrows much from the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, accuses Jews of controlling the world media for their own purposes. It declares that Jews use their influence and money to stir endless wars around the world and blames them for every modern revolution. In particular, it depicts Zionists as malevolent land grabbers with a ‘limitless’ plan to create a state from ‘the Nile to the Euphrates.’
This is nothing but a vicious and paranoid charter of hate that belongs to the Nazi era. It is hardly surprising that Hamas rejects peaceful solutions to the Arab-Israeli problem as ‘contrary to the beliefs of the Islamic Resistance Movement.’
At most, its participation in peace talks would yield a hudna, a temporary cessation of hostilities for purely tactical purposes, rather than a lasting settlement. This would allow the terrorists to consolidate their strength and regroup before another round of hostilities.
Yet treating Hamas as a respectable interlocutor would also gravely affect the West’s counter terrorism strategy. Commentators often countenance a dialogue with ‘moderate’ Islamists (they mean Hamas and Hezbollah) in order to counter the more lethal tendencies of al-Qaeda.
Yet Hamas is a Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist movement described by one commentator as ‘the common wellspring of all modern jihadi terrorism.’ In the past, Hamas has co-operated with local al-Qaeda affiliates such as Jaish al-Islam, the group that abducted Alan Johnston and Gilad Schalit.
Hamas’ leaders have openly distributed propaganda material that salutes jihadists in Chechnya, Kashmir and Afghanistan. And despite the Sunni/Shia divide, they are bankrolled by Iran, the world’s leading sponsor of Islamist terror. With these insidious connections, Hamas is a key player in radical Islam’s war against the West and giving it formal recognition would be disastrous.
In fact, if recent history teaches us anything, it is that negotiating with terrorist groups only produces an upsurge in violence. In 1972, as Northern Ireland witnessed a breakdown in law and order, the British government held unofficial talks with IRA leaders.
When these talks collapsed, the IRA carried out a series of 22 explosions on one day that killed 9 people and injured 130. Willie Whitelaw, the Northern Ireland Secretary, was forced to reflect on the ‘risks of dealing with terrorists.’
In the same decade, Palestinian terrorists unleashed a relentless wave of attacks on European soil. They hijacked planes, bombed embassies and murdered civilians in cold blood.
But what accompanied this sickening violence was increasing goodwill from Europe’s governments. Some negotiated with the groups directly and all of them released terrorists quickly from prison. Not surprisingly, the campaign of bombings, murders and hijackings intensified.
In more recent years, Israel’s efforts at peacemaking have led to a similar response. Israel’s ultimate reward for the Oslo process was Arafat’s second intifada while the disengagement from Gaza saw an immediate upsurge in rocket attacks. At the time, neither the PLO nor Hamas had abandoned their war against the Jewish state, leading both to view Israeli concessions as a victory for ‘resistance.’
In general, terrorists interpret peacemaking as a sign of weakness. They believe that their enemies are on the ropes and that they have succumbed due to a campaign of murderous intimidation. Hence they increase the number of terrorist outrages in order to extract maximum concessions from the other side.
There is a great difference between talking to terrorists who are emboldened by violence and negotiating with others who have been forced to renounce their militancy. Hamas is an unrepentant terrorist organisation and that should put them beyond the pale for the west.
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