Hamas Wins

[I think not]

What about the native people of Alaska and Hawaii.

What about them?

And I would admit the same for the native people of the North West Territories.

Why stop there when you're on a roll?

look up UNPO,

Unrecognized Nations and Peoples Organization.

Look up what? 200 year old statuses?

 

[FiveParadox]

lol, First Nations status does not "expire." Statutes and regulations from two hundred years ago are no less relevent today; a little dust on the Statutes book doesn't invalidate the content.

 

[I think not]

Re: RE: Hamas Wins

lol, First Nations status does not "expire." Statutes and regulations from two hundred years ago are no less relevent today; a little dust on the Statutes book doesn't invalidate the content.

He was referring to states like Texas and California FiveParadox.

 

[Jersay]

What about them?

They don't want to be part of America. The native people of hawaii want there kingdom back.

There is an organization called Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization.

I believe www.unpo.org.

And I agree Five that we have to look at the success and the unsucessful circumstances around First nations and Canada.

 

[I think not]

What about them?

They don't want to be part of America. The native people of hawaii want there kingdom back.

There is an organization called Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization.

I believe www.unpo.org.

And I agree Five that we have to look at the success and the unsucessful circumstances around First nations and Canada.

Quit while you're ahead Jersay. If you think the indepedence movement is anything as grand as the BQ in Quebec, you need to read up on it. There are a handful, yes a handful, of natives that scream independence, the same thing is going on in Alaska.

 

[Jersay]

How does this have to do with Hamas?

Oh well, now, why in Alaska did the independence Party head win the governorship in the 1990s, if independence is not on the minds of most Alaskans.

I will give it credit though and admit, he did not try to advance indepence once he got into office.

 

[I think not]

How does this have to do with Hamas?

Oh well, now, why in Alaska did the independence Party head win the governorship in the 1990s, if independence is not on the minds of most Alaskans.

I will give it credit though and admit, he did not try to advance indepence once he got into office.

It has nothing to do with Hamas, you diverted attention by claiming the US is a colonial power, remember?

 

[Jersay]

It has nothing to do with Hamas, you diverted attention by claiming the US is a colonial power, remember?

Nitzomoe said that the United States was a colonial power and I totally agree.

 

[FiveParadox]

Come on, people — civil debate.

It's not a diversion if the topic stems from the original.

Anyway, on the issue of the Hamas Government — should Canada refuse to recognize the government as being legitimate, or simply openly state that we oppose the government and its principles? The latter would, I assert, be less controversial (in terms of foreign affairs).

 

[Jersay]

Agreed.

 

[nitzomoe]

A colonising nation is a nation that systematically interferes with, tampers with and eventually destroys another nation’s ability to exert itself as a sovereign nation, taking up de facto power over that nation. Common actions of a coloniser are the subversion of the colonised's culture and to demonize the colonized as the "other" which legitimizes any action however brutal.

Therefore, the US has colonized and continues to exert their power over several nations throughout the history of america including:
-Cuba before Castro, as far back as the Spanish American wars
-Nicaragua before, during and shortly after Noriega and the Sandinista rebellion
-Colombia for a time
-Haiti
-the Philippines for god knows how long
-Chile
-Iran (leadership in the destruction of Mossadegh's government and the placing of the Shah)
-continue to fight true democracy in Lebanon
-Vietnam
-Argentina
-Taiwan for a very long time

the list really does go on for a really long while essentially every president from Washington onwards has been involved in colonising other nations to profit america, it only got worse after world war 2.

and a more contemporary twist:
-Iraq
-Afghanistan

in both instances, the coloniser has engaged in brutal subversion and destruction of the countries culture and an attempt to export its "values" to the barbarians who live there. The coloniser has attempted to justify its actions or disregard them as simply rogue elements when the facts prove otherwise. Btw, that’s a quote from one of the senators on Chris Mathews Hardball.

The facts stand clear from error, the US is a colonising nation and as befits a colonising nation it shows disregard for the nations it destroys, disregard and contempt for other cultures and presents itself as an empowerer to the ppl it enslaves.

 

[nitzomoe]

i need to get out more? CC is being cruel for no reason.

 

[MMMike]

Hamas: Separate classes for girls and boys
By MARK MACKINNON

Saturday, January 28, 2006 Posted at 3:16 AM EST

Globe and Mail Update

The incoming Hamas government will move quickly to make Islamic sharia “a source” of law in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and will overhaul the Palestinian education system to separate boys and girls and introduce a more Islamic curriculum, a senior official in the movement said yesterday.

Spelling out the domestic agenda of Hamas for the first time since the group's stunning victory in a legislative election this week, Sheik Mohammed Abu Teir also said Hamas would not go to foreign donors on bended knee if they withdrew aid to the Palestinian Authority.

The armed struggle against Israel will continue as long as Israel continues its occupation of Palestinian lands, he added.

More

Not a very good sign.

 

[Freethinker]

More

Not a very good sign.

Agreed. Much as predicted by Janice Stein on Diplomatic Immunity (TVO program).

 

[manda]

I have yet to understand how they could possibly win, has there been any investigation into rigging?

 

[Freethinker]

Re: RE: Hamas Wins

I have yet to understand how they could possibly win, has there been any investigation into rigging?

Religious conservatives win elections over more moderate government in power largely driven by corruption scandals of sitting government...

Seems it happens in Canada and Palestein....

 

[Curiosity]

Win or not....Hamas will be cut from funding

N.Y. Times - January 27, 2006 (registration req'd)

January 28, 2006
Hamas Is Facing a Money Crisis; Aid May Be Cut
By STEVEN ERLANGER
JERUSALEM, Jan. 27 — Hamas leaders, savoring their landslide victory in Palestinian elections, faced an array of threats on Friday: a huge government deficit, a likely cutoff of most aid, international ostracism and the rage of defeated and armed Fatah militants.

Of the many questions that the Hamas victory presents, the need to pay basic bills and salaries to Palestinians is perhaps the most pressing. The Palestinian Authority is functionally bankrupt, with a deficit of $69 million for January alone.

That will be an urgent question when the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations, known as the quartet, meet in London on Monday to discuss the Palestinian vote, especially if, as some American officials fear, Hamas turns to Iran to make up some of the difference.

"They don't have enough to get through the end of the month," a knowledgeable Western diplomat said. "The United States and the European Union both consider Hamas a terrorist organization, and we don't provide money to terrorist organizations or members of terrorist organizations."

In Washington, President Bush said "aid packages won't go forward" for the Palestinian Authority if Hamas did not renounce violence or its commitment to destroy Israel.

"That's their decision to make," he said on CBS News. "But we won't be providing help to a government that wants to destroy our ally and friend."

Meanwhile, in the southern Gaza town of Khan Yunis, Hamas supporters clashed with Fatah gunmen and the Palestinian security forces in two separate incidents, leaving six people wounded, according to witnesses and medical workers. [Page A9.]

In Davos, Switzerland, James D. Wolfensohn, the quartet's envoy to the Middle East, spoke of the Palestinians' financial problems, saying there was not enough money to pay the salaries of 135,000 Palestinian civil servants, including some 58,000 members of the security forces, which he said could lead to further chaos.

Because Hamas has not yet formed a government, the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, has asked American help to persuade the Persian Gulf countries to provide more aid now, and to ensure that Israel delivers the $40 million to $50 million owed to the Palestinian Authority from tax and customs receipts, which Israel collects on behalf of the Palestinians.

Israel has made it clear that it will not deal with a Palestinian Authority run by Hamas and has said some of those who have won election are wanted for suspected involvement in anti-Israel violence. Most of them are in semi-seclusion, and fear arrest if they try to travel to Ramallah, the site of the Palestinian parliament in the West Bank.

Also in Davos, Joseph Bachar, director general of Israel's Finance Ministry, raised the question of whether Israel would continue to transfer the tax and customs receipts to an authority run by Hamas, which does not recognize the existence of Israel.

The departing Palestinian economy minister, Mazen Sinokrot, said the 135,000 civil servants were the main breadwinners for 30 percent of Palestinian families. "If these salaries do not come in, this is a message for violence," he said.

Israeli officials suggested that Ehud Olmert, Israel's acting prime minister, would agree to release this month's money anyway, since a Hamas government has not been formed, but questioned whether Israel would agree to give any money to Hamas in the future. "We don't want to punish the Palestinian people," an official said. "But we don't have any illusions about Hamas."

Mahmoud Zahar, a top Hamas official, said in an interview in Gaza that he was not worried about the lack of money from the West.

"All the money from Europe and American went into the pockets of corrupt men," Mr. Zahar said, citing Palestinian security chiefs as a leading example. "The leaders of these services became multimillionaires. We are going to reform these services. This is our mission."

The current financial crunch has little to do with Hamas. The Palestinian Authority last summer broke its promises to the World Bank and the donor countries and significantly raised salaries to public employees, a number swollen by the effort to absorb armed young men into the security forces. All its $1 billion in revenues is now taken up by salaries, according to the World Bank, leaving an expected budget deficit for 2006 of $600 million to $700 million; only about $320 million of that would have been covered by foreign contributions from the United States, Europe and Arab countries.

The plan assumed a Fatah victory in the elections and the formation of a new, more technocratic government. Donor countries and the World Bank were working on a restructuring program for the Palestinian Authority that would cover its large financial debt for the next few years in return for serious reforms and job-creation programs.

But the victory by Hamas has exploded all those assumptions.

Direct payments from the United States are banned by American law, and many European nations have said they will not continue to aid the Palestinian Authority until Hamas agrees to recognize Israel and disavow violence, which Hamas has said it will never do.

American and European officials are also banned from talking to Hamas officials, elected or otherwise. Once a group is on the American terrorist list, as Hamas is, it is difficult to get off; it takes more than pledges or statements, a Western diplomat said.

The development minister for the new German government, Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, said Friday that German aid to the Palestinians depended on Hamas's renouncing violence and recognizing Israel.

Chancellor Angela Merkel is scheduled to make a first official visit to the region next week, and her spokesman, Ulrich Wilhelm, said Friday: "The recognition of Israel's right to security and to exist remains an irrevocable cornerstone of German foreign policy." Ms. Merkel will meet Mr. Abbas but no Hamas official.

Hamas candidates and officials have played down the problem, saying they will appeal to the Arab and Muslim world, which already gives large amounts of aid to Hamas and its charitable and educational organizations — some of which, Israel says, moves seamlessly to finance its military operations.

Hamas already gets aid from Iran, Israeli and American officials say, and it is possible that Iran may be willing to provide larger sums to the Palestinian Authority. But Israeli and Western diplomats say Hamas, as a Palestinian branch of the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood, could also be wary of becoming overly dependent on Shiite Iran.

Former President Jimmy Carter, who led a team of election observers for the Palestinian voting, said in an interview on Friday that the United States and Europe should redirect their relief aid to United Nations organizations and nongovernmental organizations to skirt legal restrictions.

"The donor community can deal with it successfully," Mr. Carter said. "I would hope the world community can collectively tide the Palestinians over." He urged support for what he said Mr. Wolfensohn was describing to him as a $500 million appeal.

"It may well be that Hamas can change," Mr. Carter said, remembering his presidency, when the Palestine Liberation Organization under Yasir Arafat finally agreed to recognize the existence of Israel and to forswear terrorism. "It's a mistake to abandon optimism completely."

He urged Israel and the world: "Don't drive the Palestinians away from rationality. Don't force them into assuming arms as the only way to achieve their legitimate goals. Give them some encouragement and the benefit of the doubt."

But it will be politically difficult to do that. Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., Democrat of Delaware, said he had spoken to the Europeans and Mr. Wolfensohn about the fiscal crunch. "But the fact of the matter is, you cannot pour millions and hundreds of millions of dollars into a group that, in fact, calls for the destruction of an ally, or for any country, for that matter," Mr. Biden said.

The Western diplomat said: "We're discussing a lot of complicated questions. But even before the election, the Palestinian Authority's fiscal house was in disarray, with a huge deficit every month."

It will be worse still, he said, if the Israelis stop cash transfers and there is a halt in direct aid from the West and the World Bank.

Greg Myre contributed reporting from Gaza for this article, and Steven R. Weisman from Washington.

Another middle east country's people starving because of their insane governmental practices.

 

[Freethinker]

Another middle east country's people starving because of their insane governmental practices.

An Irony that is never lost on me, is that the Arabs that have the most freedom and democracy in the Middle East are the Israeli Arabs. There are at least 3 different Arab parties with elected members in Parliment.

 

[nitzomoe]

Another middle east country's people starving because of their insane governmental practices.

An Irony that is never lost on me, is that the Arabs that have the most freedom and democracy in the Middle East are the Israeli Arabs. There are at least 3 different Arab parties with elected members in Parliment.

actually the arabs who have the most freedom are Emiratians compared to all other arabs. The israeli arabs are treated like criminals and second class citizens.

-for instance israeli courts tend to put higher sentences for arabs than israeli jews for similar sentences
-there exists little to no laws with regard ot discrimination for jobs, education and special health care
-nearly 45% of arabs live in poverty, compared with the national average of 15%
-most of the arabs who actually presided in what is now israel were kicked out by jewish terrorist factions, namely Ergun and Lehi
-Israeli arabs who have claims to land during british rule must go through the israeli court system to get legitimacy and in many cases the deeds are ripped up, especially in the case of Tel AViv university lands which are disputed
-if a palestinian is to marry an arab israeli he/she will not be considered a citizen
-arab israelis are prone to revenge attacks and are quite large in number (most notable being the Kafr Qasim massacre)
-During jewish terrorist activities it was arabs israelis who were barred and imprisoned even though Baruch Goldstein was responsible for the deaths
-The list goes on and on, they are essentially second class citizens similar to black before the 1990s (they didnt really get fully freedom until teh 90s in reality, Martin Luther King paved the way for that in the 60's but discrimination was the norm until the 90s)
-there exists quite a bit of apathy and discrimination for israeli arabs
-the whole system is hypocritical as it only recognises those arabs who live in israel and own property, yet many arabs where ethnically cleansed from Israel or there property was taken by the government

its pathetic to think arab israelis have more rights than other arab countries as it is just not true, another preconception advertised by the israeli government.

Regardless of the past I do beleive eventually we shall come to a resolution that is justified. Maybe Hamas is a bad thing, maybe it will create the environment for peace (which im hoping) by fostering a curruption free government, create infrastructure and an aeconomy that is stable and then pursue peace.

Its sad to read the article that was previously posted about separate schools but I prefer the palestinian ppl naturally come to democracy rather than be forced to it like in Iraq, only when it occurs naturally can democracy take hold.

 

[I think not]

11% of Elected Palestinian Deputies in Prison

By Zaman, Jerusalem
Published: Saturday, January 28, 2006
zaman.com

Fourteen among 132 deputies, who won the Palestine elections Wednesday, are announced to be still serving time in Israeli prisons.

Similarly, a newly elected Palestinian member of the parliament is being jailed at a Palestinian prison.

The most famous of all these candidates, winners of the election, is Marwan Barghuti of al-Fatah.

Another famous name to enter the parliament, while still serving prison time, is Sheik Hasan Yusouf of HAMAS (Islamic Resistance Movement) West Bank responsible.

In the meantime, The Arab World urges HAMAS to have peace talks with Israel.

Egyptian President Husnu Mubarak said al- Fatah and HAMAS should cooperate to "establish an independent state and peace."

Jordan and Yemen as well want HAMAS to follow the peace process.

Link