The Savages won. Essentially nothing's changed.
I am with Daniel on this one,Don't
Deal with Terrorists - Daniel Pipes
An increasing number of voices
are calling for Hamas to be recognized, arguing that the imperatives of
governance would tame it. The historical record, however, refutes this "pothole
theory of democracy." Mussolini made the trains run, Hitler built autobahns,
Stalin cleared the snow, and Castro reduced infant mortality - without any of
these totalitarians giving up their ideological zeal nor their grandiose
ambitions. Like al-Qaeda, Hamas should be destroyed, not legitimated, much less
courted.
They've got their mandate, eh?
Hamas:
Recognizing Israel Not on Our Agenda
After Hamas won a decisive
victory in legislative elections, senior Hamas official Mushir al-Masri said on
Thursday, "Negotiations with Israel is not on our agenda....Recognizing Israel
is not on the agenda either."
Photo: Hamas celebrating the old fashioned way.......with guns.
Vital Perspective will be blogging
the entire day - without exception - on Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.
Breaking news, analysis, and updates from the internal Palestinian situation,
the U.S. positions, Israel and the rest of the region. They will be using
all of their contacts throughout the region extensively today.
History of Hamas Murderous Attacks (click below)
By Hillel Fendel
Hamas has set the
destruction of Israel as its goal. Between September 2000 and April 2004, Hamas
perpetrated 425 terrorist attacks against Israel and murdered 377 Israelis -
nine every month.
Hamas was founded by Islamic militant extremists in the
Gaza Strip in 1988, shortly after the first intifada broke out. The word Hamas
is an acronym for the Arabic words for "Islamic Resistance Movement."
Though it is also involved in social and welfare programs, the
organization is devoted chiefly to the obliteration of Israel. Its charter
states, "Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will
obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it."
The charter
further states, "There is no solution for the Palestinian question except
through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a
waste of time and vain endeavors.
Hamas is responsible for 24 murders
before the Oslo Accords, 156 more before the Oslo War began in September 2000,
and at least another 377 since then - a total of at least 557.
The
organization's first mass attack was a car bomb that blew up at a bus stop in
Afula in April 1994, murdering 8 and wounding 51. Among the most horrific Hamas
attacks were the following:
* 22 people killed and 56 wounded in a
suicide bombing attack on the No. 5 bus on
Dizengoff St. in Tel Aviv, Oct.
1994
* 26 killed by suicide bomber on a #18 bus near the Jerusalem
Central Bus Station, Feb. 1996
* 16 killed in the Mahane Yehuda open
market in Jerusalem in a double suicide attack, July 1997
* 23 dead and
115 wounded when a Hamas suicide bomber blew himself up on a No. 2 bus line
coming from the Western Wall in Jerusalem, August 2003
* 45 murdered
within the space of five days in March 2002: a suicide Hamas terrorist blew
himself up in a Haifa restaurant, killing 15, and another one did the same in
the Park Hotel in in Netanya during a Passover Seder, murdering some 30 and
wounding 144.
The ten worst Oslo War Hamas attacks, in which a total of
186 were murdered, also included the following:
* June 1, 2001 -
Dolphinarium in Tel Aviv, 21 killed - mostly new-immigrant teenagers from the
former Soviet Union
* Aug. 9, 2001 - Sbarro's Pizzeria in Jerusalem, 15
killed, including the parents and three children of the Schijveschuurder
family
* Dec. 2, 2001 - Haifa bus, 15 killed
* May 7, 2002 -
Rishon Letzion hall, 16 killed
* June 18, 2002 - #32 bus from Gilo,
Jerusalem, 19 killed
* March 5, 2003 - #37 bus in Haifa, 15 dead
*
June 11, 2003 - #14 bus, Jerusalem, 17 murdered
A full list of attacks
since 2000 can be seen on the IMRA website.
Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was
killed in an Israeli missile attack in March 2004, and less than a month later,
the same fate befell his successor, Abdel Aziz Rantisi.
