In Palestinine's first parliamentary elections in a decade, the Islamist Hamas party won an easy victory over its chief secular and long-ruling rival, Fatah. It appears that the party's victory was due less to its anti-Zionism than to its effectiveness at delivering social services and an image of incorruptibility, particularly compared to Fatah. Hamas also wants to strengthen a judicial system which has resulted in a breakdown of economic, social and security structures in Palestine.
But Hamas is an ultra-religious party that makes many liberal-minded Palestinians uncomfortable.
"It would be scary as an individual, as a person, as woman," said local resident Qubbaj of a Hamas victory. "We know they have kind of a conservative social agenda that I would oppose." A Hamas victory, she said may include interference with women's education, work, family life and freedom of dress.
While Bush declined to say whether Washington would cut aid to the Palestinian Authority if Hamas takes over the government, he stressed that if Hamas sticks to both its ideological and actual guns -- the U.S. officially considers it a "terrorist" organization -- Washington would not welcome it into a peace process. "We are hearing all this talk about how can the Israelis deal with the Palestinians now after Hamas' victory?" said Phyllis Bennis, of the left-wing Institute for Policy Studies (IPS). "But there haven't been any (bilateral) negotiations for the past two years except between Israel and the U.S., so that's not anything new and different."
MORE on Hamas election victory
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Even while U.S. troops are bogged down in an ugly counterinsurgency campaign in Iraq, the neo-conservatives have picked up their efforts pushing for wider military engagement in the region, focusing particular attention on Iran. And key to this campaign is another central weapon in their arsenal -- the media
THE WAR IN IRAQ
POLITICS AS USUAL
