There is the attempt to construct what is happening in palestine that Hamas seized power. They never siezed power. They were democratically elected, but all the powers that be such as the US and the EU (which withdrew its funding for the emerging palestinian state), and including the old palestinian adminstration rearguard combined together and did thier damned hardest to countervaile the democratic wishes of the palestinian people.
Secondly, PLO, Fatah etc are hardly famed for thier democratic credentials, i mean lets face it arafat was a gangster that was towards the end of his reign was getting loathed by the palestinian people which was also the time of the rise of Hamas.
Thirdly, there isnt any historical precendent to justify the notion that if islamist type administration get into power through democratic or the very least quasi-democratic means that they will impose antidemocracy. Becuase, the contingent facts regarding islamis regimes is that whenever they nearly come to fruition through the popular will of the people they have always been undermined by forces within the nation states (military juntas) and forces without these nations states such as US support. Algeria is a classic example of this.
And i believe to an extent that in a sence its by the fact that whenever there is a move to islamism by the popular will of the people that is repressed that actually shapes the anti democratic islamist responce. Since thier aspirations no longer can be achieved through democracy of course its going to channel it in another direction. Thats exactly what happened in Algeria.
IMHO if islamic aspirations had been allowed to manifest themselves through the will of the people and then for them to Feck up just like any other grand social experiment it wouldve probably meant that radical islam woudlve died off a long time ago, but now its a hornets nest.
The lessons never get learned, i mean look at how in turkey where they are making small cautious islamist steps have the military waiting in the wings to defend the ‘free’ secular state…
One last point. Its only when you get the people at the extremes of poltical viewpoints to come to a resolution that progress can get made. People in the middle of two opposing viewpoints always have common ground its the people at the fringes that really call the shots. I mean look at the sucess of the power sharing they’ve got going in stormont with Ian Paisley the leader of the DUP as the first minister and Martin McGuinness the deputy leader of Sinn Fein as the deputy first minister.
The sad thing is, whilst hamas where still going for thier death to isreal rhetoric *which they had to do so as not to alienate aspects of thier support* they were moving pragmatically towards a tacit acceptance of a two state solution. This was a great opertunity that was missed there, and it will be a long time till it comes back again. IF ever.
