[WCUSP] "Pariah State": A Meeting with Hamas' Prime Minister Haniyeh

[KATHARLOW at aol.com]

As leader of the Fellowship of Reconciliation's Interfaith Peace Committee  
for Citizen Diplomacy, Scott Kennedy of the Resource Center for NonViolence  
(Santa Cruz, California) recently visited Gaza and sent this report.
-------------------------------------------------
“Pariah State"
Meeting with Palestinian Prime Minister Ismai’l  Haniyeh
By Scott Kennedy
30 November 2006

“Gaza is  the second most dangerous place in the world for an American 
to visit,” a  highly placed US State Department official commented to a 
friend and me two  weeks ago (November 15, 2006) in Jerusalem.

I first visited  Gaza in 1968 and have returned more two dozen times, 
including many study  groups and fact-finding delegations. My most 
recent visit was in April 2002.  Since then, Israeli authorities have 
prevented our visiting Gaza. I was  eager to return, to renew 
friendships and see for myself the changes that  have taken place. I 
also wanted, if at all possible, to convey my support  for those 
courageous people who continue to work for human rights, democracy  and 
a political resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. They  
persist despite formidable obstacles. It is imperative, therefore, for  
them as well as for us, that those suffering such extreme isolation are  
not forgotten and that their voices still be heard.

But  visiting the Gaza Strip is no easy thing. After Hamas won control 
of the  Palestinian Authority (PA) in January 2006 elections, the Bush  
Administration determined that the Islamic movement represents a key  
thread in the web of global terrorism. Israel in turn decided Hamas  
constitutes a mortal threat to its survival. The European and other  
nations followed suit by supporting both a US-led international  
diplomatic and economic boycott of Hamas and Israel’s military siege of  
the Gaza Strip. By all but official Israeli accounts, these factors 
have  created a severe humanitarian crisis for the 1.5 million people 
crammed into  Gaza’s 140 square miles and surviving on less than $2.00 
per  day.

Two months ago, a friend told me he wanted to gain a  first hand view 
of what is happening on the ground in the ongoing conflict  between 
Israel and the Palestinians. I suggested that we visit Gaza. I also  
told him that the US and Israeli governments would put up as many  
bureaucratic obstacles as possible to our going to Gaza. And then, if 
we  persisted, they would try to scare us out of going. Nevertheless, 
before  leaving California we had received “permission” to enter the 
Palestinian  territory for three days through his contact at an Israeli 
consulate in the  USA. The American government for its part was 
determined to dissuade us from  visiting, the hellhole of a fourth world 
country known as the Gaza  Strip.

The Jerusalem diplomat spoke in a lifeless monotone  during our 
half-hour meeting. Mustering as much reveal as possible, he  emphasized 
just how dangerous Gaza is. Second most dangerous place for  Americans 
to visit in the world, in fact. Who beat out Gaza, I mused? It  must be 
Baghdad. Or maybe Tehran or Kabul. But I wasn’t sure. Perhaps it is  St. 
Louis, named “murder capital” of the USA during the recent World  
Series.

The diplomat and his head of security detailed  the recent kidnapping 
of two Fox News personnel in Gaza. The cameraman, who  happened to be 
from New Zealand, apparently persuaded his captors to look at  a world 
map. He tried in vain to convince them that New Zealand is not part  of 
the United States. No matter how unimportant we might be, and it was  
clear from the diplomat’s demeanor that he considered us altogether  
unimportant, we would surely be “prime targets” for kidnapping or 
worse,  just because we’re Americans.

We also learned that if we  were taken prisoner, our government could 
do nothing to help us. He  forewarned that the US no longer has any 
contacts in the Gaza Strip and we’d  be on our own should anything 
happen. We were to believe that the sole Super  Power is incapable of 
communicating with groups operating in or influencing  events in Gaza.

We listened with more than a bit of  skepticism to the American 
official as he tried to to prevail upon us not to  visit Gaza.

The final straw, however, came later that day  during a phone 
conversation with Washington, DC. An official at the  Department of 
State told my friend, “Were you to travel to Gaza, you will  almost 
certainly be killed.” That night, he explained his decision against  
Gaza, “If we were rescuing hostages or something, I might be able to  
justify making such a trip. But I would be going just for my  
self-education. It doesn’t seem to be worth the risk.”

I was not entirely surprised, but disappointed in his decision of 
course. I  wish I’d had the presence of mind to counter, “But there are 
1.5 million  hostages in Gaza!” Since the capture of an Israeli soldier 
early this  summer, the Gaza strip had suffered a devastating blockade 
and complete  isolation that made it nearly impossible for anyone to 
visit. Growing hunger  and despair reveal a civilian population held 
hostage to political power  games by the Palestinian factions, Israel 
and the United  States.

I resolved that night to make the trip to Gaza on  my own.

Three days later, an hour-long taxi drive from East  Jerusalem brought 
me to the Erez border crossing between Israel and Gaza. A  half dozen 
journalists and I were the only people seeking entry into Gaza.  The 
crossing seemed old hat to them, while for me it was an adventure. The  
Israeli Foreign Ministry had assured me the day before that my name was  
still on the list of those permitted to enter Gaza. The young solider  
behind the counter staring lazily at the computer screen before him,  
however, first told me that my name was not on the list and made a 
phone  call. He next said that my name was on the list, but I had to 
wait while  they checked things out. Another phone call. Still later, I 
was told that my  name was on the list but my permission had expired on 
May 15, 2006. (I had  only applied for permission in October, a month 
previously.) A few more  people filtered into the transit room as I 
waited patiently. Still later,  after checking by phone with higher ups 
for the umpteenth time, the soldier  smiled, handed me my passport, and 
stated without any explanation that there  was no problem for me to 
enter Gaza after all.

Finished  with the Israeli army step, I next handed my passport to 
another soldier six  feet down the counter. She asked my reason for 
visiting and advised me it  was unsafe to travel to Gaza. When I told 
her I was visiting a  non-governmental organization, she asked why I 
would do that. I told her I  supported their work. She asked if I work 
for them and if I have any friend  sin Gaza. Finally, she wanted to know 
if I had a business card demonstrating  that I work for an NGO?

I handed her a personal business  card with no mention of a non-profit 
organization. She looked at it  quizzically, raised her eyebrows, handed 
it back to me, and said, “Have a  nice trip!”

I had permission to pass through Erez into Gaza  and there was almost 
nobody else at the crossing facility. Still, it took me  over an hour 
and a half to clear the Israeli procedures. All of this fuss  was 
occasioned by my entering a territory from which the Israelis had  
“disengaged” more than a year ago. I understand the need for nations to  
control who enters their country. It’s not entirely clear, however, why  
Israel would be so concerned with my visiting Palestinian Gaza? If they  
thought I was smuggling Qassam rockets into Gaza, they would at least  
have looked into my bag. Instead, the civilian employee from a private  
security firm simply waved me past without so much as a glance into my  
shoulder bag.

I passed through a series of turnstile  and then made my way several 
hundred yards through a concrete corridor. The  two lane street was 
lined by the same 8 meter high concrete sections that  Israel uses to 
build the “separation wall” through the West Bank. There were  concrete 
benches as part of the foot of the wall for long sections, should  one 
tire, and corrugated iron provided cover from the heat or rain. As I  
approached the Palestinian end of the passageway, the wall was lower 
and  funkier. A single Arab porter waited at the halfway point with a 
neon vest  and a wheel chair.

At the other end of the course way,  uniformed Palestinian border 
officials were sitting around a simple table  under a metal awning with 
a couple of men in civilian clothes. They were  chatting and drinking 
tea. As I approached, they smiled and welcomed me to  Palestine without 
getting up, then wrote my name by pen in a lined register  book. Getting 
into Gaza, as opposed to leaving Israel, took all of two  minutes. They 
weren’t concerned the least bit about what I might be carrying  into 
Palestine, and didn’t ask to look in my bag.

A  translator and guide from the Gaza Community Mental Health Program 
and the  Union of Women’s Health Committees in Gaza, along with a police 
escort,  waited for me on the Palestinian side of the border. They 
motioned for me to  sit in the front passenger seat of a small white 
station wagon . For the  next two days, I traveled with a police car in 
front and a heavily armed  security detail from the Palestinian 
Authority’s Interior Ministry in a  pickup behind. With blue lights 
flashing and sirens blaring, I’m still not  sure if I was any safer for 
all the effort. But anybody gunning for me  definitely knew we were 
coming. Children rushed to the street to see the  passing attraction. 
They must have been disappointed to see only me waving  back at them.

We made stops at a demolished mosque in the  town of Beit Hanoun, at a 
home where 19 people had been killed ten days  before and a hospital in 
Jebaliya Refugee Camp, and Gaza City. We rushed  from site to site 
because I was scheduled to meet with Palestinian Prime  Minister Ismai’l 
Haniyeh shortly after noon. When we pulled up in front of a  tall office 
building in busy Gaza City, armed security milled around with a  dozen 
members of the press awaiting our arrival. Several dozen other curious  
passersby waited to see what was going on. The Prime Minister’s staff  
greeted us and led us quickly made our way up two short flights of 
steps  and into the building. I noticed several men on their knees in 
prayer in a  room off to the right as we hurried by, lest I forget that 
I’d soon be  meeting with the elected head of the Hamas government. The 
elevator failed  to move for several minutes despite multiple pushes of 
the button. We joked  nervously when the elevator not only failed to 
rise but the door wouldn’t  open to let us out. Finally, the man 
accompanying us hit the red button and  a loud alarm sounded. I imagined 
an onslaught of armed security forces  converging on the elevator, but 
no one seemed to notice. We soon exited the  elevator on an upper floor 
into a spacious office suite with golden brown  rug and overstuffed 
sofas and men in suits standing around. A few minutes  later I was 
ushered into the Prime Minister’s office.

After shaking hands, Prime Minster Haniyeh motioned for me to sit next 
to  him at one end of a rectangular office. A Palestinian flag stood 
behind us.  Another faced us from the far reach of the office where four 
men in dark  suits sat chatting and answering cell phones during our 
meeting.  Introductions later revealed they were the Palestinian cabinet 
members,  representing the Ministries of Information, Transportation, 
and the  Interior, and spokesperson for the PA.

Haniyeh turned to  face me and through an interpreter welcomed me 
warmly. He wore a neat gray  suit, a freshly pressed shirt opened at the 
neck. I introduced myself and  explained that I was visiting the region 
on behalf of three pacifist  organizations that oppose violence by all 
parties to the Israeli-Palestinian  conflict. I had come to express my 
opposition to the United States’ campaign  to isolate the PA because of 
Hamas’ victory in the January 2006 elections  and to oppose the killing 
economic sanctions against Haniyeh’s government  and Israel’s military 
siege of the Gaza Strip.

Prime  Minister Haniyeh said how pleased he was to have a visitor from 
the United  States and that Hamas bears no ill will toward the American 
people. He noted  with irony that those calling for the spread of 
democratic society didn’t  respect the results of the Palestinian 
elections, even though the January  elections were universally viewed as 
fair. “I was shocked by the US response  to the Palestinian electoral 
process,” he added.

Haniyeh acknowledged that I had already seen some of the evidence of 
the  Palestinians’ suffering and the destruction brought about by 
Israel’s  “incursions” into Gaza. “Gaza Strip is under total siege by 
sea, air and by  land. This has resulted in tremendous humanitarian 
suffering.” He said the  military escalation culminated in the recent 
massacre in Beit Hanoun in  which 19 people from one family were killed 
by Israeli artillery. I had met  two young survivors earlier in the day. 
The week before my visit, the USA  vetoed a UN Security Council 
condemning the accidental killings in Beit  Hanoun. Haniyeh said the US 
veto gave a green light to Israeli aggression  against Gaza. The veto 
also sends messages that Israel is above the law and  Palestinian lives 
are worth less than other lives.

Many  commentators say that Hamas had not expected to take control of 
the  Palestinian government. This view is widely shared by those I met 
in Gaza.  Hamas ran on a platform of “reform and change” and the Islamic 
movement’s  candidates benefited from the moribund peace process, 
deteriorating economic  situation in Gaza, and widespread corruption in 
the PA dominated by Arafat’s  Fateh Party. Their political strength is 
rooted in an Islamic social program  that has developed over a decade 
and a half. A secular woman activist told  me that the Hamas political 
program largely focuses on the role of women in  society. She described 
a recent attempt to alter Palestinian law in order to  permit polygamy 
according to Hamas’ reading of the Koran. The proposed  change was 
withdrawn after meetings with a broad coalition of grassroots  human 
rights and women’s organizations. Hamas does not have a strong  “foreign 
policy” agenda. They choose instead to fold themselves within the  
Palestinian consensus. Hence Haniyeh’s indications that Hamas will live  
with a political accommodation with Israel.

I pressed  the Prime Minister about the question of Hamas making peace 
with Israel.  Haniyeh said that the problem remains that Israel has yet 
to determine its  position towards the Palestinians. Despite all of the 
peace talks, “We have  received no real offer” of peace from Israel. 
Instead a series of demands  have been made of the Hamas-led government: 
that they recognize Israel,  honor agreements previously entered into by 
the PA, and renounce violence.  He asked rhetorically whether the same 
demands are made of Israel? Answering  his own question, Haniyeh argued 
that Israel must first recognize the  legitimate rights of the 
Palestinians, including a clear statement about  what borders the 
Palestinian state will have. Only then will Hamas be able  to clarify 
its position.

Haniyeh reiterated his  oft-stated position that Hamas is willing to 
enter into a ten year interim  peace agreement with Israel and perhaps 
longer term truce to enable the  Palestinians and Israelis to build a 
new relationship. For the past   eighteen months, they had observed a 
unilateral cease-fire with Israel. He  covered the same points he has 
made elsewhere, "We are strongly in favor of  direct talks between 
Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the PLO and the head of the  government, and 
the prime minister of Israel, Olmert.... If they reach an  agreement in 
their discussions that's acceptable to the Palestinian people,  we will 
accept it, also. Hamas will."

There is an  international consensus in support of a Two State Solution 
to the  Israel-Palestine conflict. This solution calls for an exchange 
of “land for  peace” and creation of a Palestinian state consisting of 
East Jerusalem, the  West Bank and Gaza Strip, that Israel occupied in 
1967. Support for a Two  State Solution has been officially adopted by 
every Arab state, the European  Union, the United Nations, the 
nonaligned countries, Russia and the  Commonwealth of Independent 
States, and every other significant grouping of  world nations. Sheer 
exhaustion, if not a change of heart, has brought the  Palestinian 
people to accept the international consensus in support of a Two  State 
solution. Hamas would have had to bend to domestic Palestinian  pressure 
and the international consensus, just as the grizzled guerilla  leader 
Yasser Arafat had been compelled to do, . Sadly, the US gave Hamas no  
grace period to come to terms with this Palestinian consensus.

Meanwhile Israel’s continued annexation of Palestinian land threatens  
to render the “land for peace” formula meaningless and the Two State  
solution irrelevant.

I can’t claim the same gift George  Bush professes -- the ability to 
look into a man’s eyes and size up his  soul. But I did look squarely 
into Haniyeh’s eyes during much of our  half-hour conversation. There 
was no evasion and no shifting of eyes. He  seemed to be a kind and 
thoughtful person.

When I asked  Haniyeh about the so-called “clash of civilizations” that 
has dominated  American understanding and discussion of global events 
since the September  11th terrorist attacks, I sensed a deep sadness. 
With a clear and determined  voice, he slowly laid our his position on a 
question he obviously had  answered many times: “We believe in dialogue 
between civilizations and not  the clash of civilizations.... We know 
how special the relationship is  between the US and Israel. We don’t 
look to stop this strategic alliance. We  are only asking for a more 

balanced position.” He lamented the fact that  after September 11th, the 
US missed a real opportunity for cooperation and  coordination between 
East and West, based on mutual respect. The USA missed  another 
opportunity when it chose to oppose the democratically elected  
government of Hamas. “Hamas is moderate and pragmatic and realistic....  
We are not a terrorist organization just because we are part of the  
Islamic world. We can be a bridge between the US and the West and Islam  
and the Arab World. Instead, the US has pushed Hamas into a  corner….”

Haniyeh rose to prominence after his  mentor Sheikh Yassein and other 
Hamas leaders were assassinated by Israel.  Immediately after his 
election, Israel and the United States moved  decisively to bring about 
his downfall. I couldn’t help but wonder whether  this soft-spoken man 
is well-suited for the job. When I shared my assessment  of their prime 
minister, my guide and translator said that Haniyeh is known  among the 
people in Gaza as a very thoughtful and kind person both before  and 
after his election as prime minister. His stature was enhanced in  
recent days when he offered to step down as Prime Minister if necessary  
for Israel and the United States to lift the devastating siege on the  
people of Gaza.

President Bush would have none of this  talk of bridges or lifting 
sieges. His administration decided immediately  after the election of 
Isma’il Haniyeh to bring down the Hamas government.  Taxes that Israel 
has collected from the Palestinians are withheld from the  Palestinian 
Authority in defiance of written agreements and international  law. 
International aid has also been suspended. 150,000 government employees  
including teachers and police have not been paid for more than eight  
months.

Standard operating procedure for the Bush  Presidency includes breaking 
off communication with those who won’t go along  with our nation’s 
global agenda and trying in turn to bring down governments  we 
stigmatize as “terrorist.” Syria fought alongside the US in the first  
Gulf War, was taken off the list of “terrorist nations” and the US  
publicly thanked Assad’s regime for their active cooperation combating  
terror after 9/11. Bush helped force Syria out of Lebanon and then  
watched as that country slid into chaos and war with Israel. Now the  
Bush Administration faults Damascus for the situation in Lebanon and  
Iraq and shuns Bashara al Assad along with Iran and North  Korea.

The net effect is that relations with these  countries continue to 
decline and drift towards escalated conflict and war.  Meanwhile, the 
United States grows more isolated. 156 countries, including  the 
European nations, voted for a General Assembly resolution expressing  
sympathy for the Palestinians killed in the Israeli attack on Beit  
Hanoun. The resolution also opposed Palestinians firing rockets from  
Gaza into Israel. Seven nations abstained, but only half a dozen  
nations, including several Pacific island nations, joined the US in  
voting against the resolution.

In the five years since  the World Trade Center attacks, President Bush 
has squandered global  solidarity and support for the USA and the 
American people by fomenting an  unprecedented anti-American sentiment 
around the globe. For the first time  in my four decades visiting the 
region, I experienced explicit anti-American  feeling in my two weeks in 
Israel and the occupied Palestinian West Bank.  This rising anger at the 
American people for its government’s actions  prompted the heavy 
security arrangements in Gaza, the likes of which I have  never 
experienced before.

In his effort to isolate  Hamas as a “pariah state,” Bush has achieved 
quite the opposite effect. The  US is increasingly isolated on the world 
stage and it is our nation that is  viewed as bullying and warlike. The 
US’s continued backing for Israel, no  matter how heinous its crimes, 
reinforces the general deterioration in world  esteem for our nation and 
its people. Bush may very well have succeeded  within our own borders in 
defining Hamas and other political movements as  terrorist groups. But 
there is little doubt, from the perspective of the  broad international 
consensus about how to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli  conflict, it is 
the United States that has become the pariah  state.

President Bush sits by while Israel effectively  destroys the only 
possible solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He  may in the 
short run bring down the Hamas government, but at what long term  cost 
to regional stability and peace?

Scott Kennedy and Prime  Minister Isma'il Haniyeh in Gaza City, November 
18,  2006.




Palestinian Authority security by the remains of an 800  year old Mosque 
in Beit Hanoun in the Gaza Strip demolished by Israeli  military the 
first week of November. Flags of the Fateh Movement and the  Palestinian 
national flag fly from the minaret that was left  standing.   (Photo by 
Scott  Kennedy)






Several of approximately four dozen people  whose homes were destroyed 
along with the Mosque in Beit Hanoun the first  week of November 2006. 
(Photo by Scott  Kennedy)













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