THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XI, Issue # 15, January 14, 2009
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
A CEASEFIRE IN GAZA?
By Dr. Denis MacEoin
THE ISRAELI-HAMAS WAR & THE DEMAND FOR A CEASEFIRE: NO TIME FOR A CEASEFIRE IN THE WAR IN WHICH
ISRAEL IS DEFENDING ITSELF AGAINST HAMAS, A MASSIVELY FINANCED & ARMED ISLAMIST TERRORIST ENTITY THAT IS
WAGING A JIHAD TO CONQUER & DESTROY ISRAEL & TO KILL ALL JEWS, THOSE IN THE DIASPORA AS WELL AS THOSE IN
ISRAEL -- THE RULES OF WAR IN A JIHAD & HOW ISLAMISTS, UNDER THESE RULES, UTILIZE HUDNAS, OR CEASEFIRES, IN
THEIR TERROR WAR AGAINST THE NON-MUSLIM WORLD -- THE DISASTROUS EVENTS THAT WOULD ENSUE, SHOULD
ISRAEL & THE WEST GIVE UP THE STRUGGLE AGAINST ISLAMIST TERRORISM
FULL STORY:
Today, everyone's talking about a ceasefire in Gaza. With the UN proposing one and Israel demurring, the public,
unaware of anything much about Gaza, Hamas or Israel, blithely puts Israel in the dock. Yet, during the last "ceasefire,"
when rockets continued to land in Israeli civilian centers, there was a noticeable silence on the part of the international
community. It seems it's okay to drag Israel back from an attack on a massively financed and armed terrorist entity (and,
if Hamas isn't a terrorist entity, it's hard to know what it is), but just not right to demand the same sort of action on
the part of the terrorists. Don't forget, Israel isn't the only one refusing a ceasefire at this point: Hamas is rejecting one
too, and for dishonest reasons.
There are things going on here that half the world just doesn't get. All those clamoring for a ceasefire think all other
parties understand the word just like they do. They'd be wrong. The secular Arabic press, such as the international
newspaper al-Sharq al-Awsat, uses the standard Arabic term for a cessation of fire: waqf al-nar or waqf itlaq
al-nar. That is a literal translation, and it means exactly what ceasefire means in English and other languages. But Hamas
doesn't talk about a cessation of fire, because that would be to introduce a term from the Western political vocabulary
into their discourse, and they can't do that.
Why not? Because Hamas is a deeply-grounded Islamist movement that follows the principle that Muslims must never
do anything that resembles what the non-believers do. That's why many Muslims here in Britain will only wear Muslim
clothes and refuse to join in Christmas, birthday, or other celebrations with their Christian neighbors.
Hamas is an acronym for Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya, the Islamic Resistance Movement, and, unlike Fatah, it
prioritizes religious values and aims. A Hamas council has just introduced the implementation of severe punishments,
such as amputations and crucifixions for breaches of Islamic law in matters like theft or adultery. Read their 1988 Covenant
(al-Mithaq) and you will grasp the fact that their struggle against Israel has nothing to do with land in the sense
that is understood in international law. Their gripe is that the whole of what they anachronistically term "Palestine" (the
old Southern Syria) was conquered by Islam in the 7th century and not an inch of it must pass out of Muslim hands
forever.
As their Covenant makes clear, they are fighting a Jihad, and the rules they observe are Jihad rules, based on centuries of
legislation about the waging of war against unbelievers. The problem with Jihad rules is that they simply don't recognize
all the elements of international law that modern states base their treaties and international conventions on. Jihad law
includes rules on how and when to deceive the foe, and envisages no outcome other than the death or submission of
non-Muslims.
When Hamas announces a temporary ceasefire (a hudna or, recently, a tahdiyya, or lull), it does so, not to have an
opportunity to talk peace, but to regroup and re-arm. "Initiatives, and socalled peaceful solutions and international
conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement." The only solution to the Middle
East problem is war:
"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."
Numerous times in the past, Israel has shown itself willing to reach an agreement with the Palestinians, on conditions
similar to those propounded by the Quartet, first and foremost, recognition of Israel's right to exist, followed by a
guarantee that there will be no further resort to violence, including terrorist attacks on civilians (and that includes firing
rockets at them). As time has passed, especially since the death of Yasser Arafat, a degree of pragmatism has entered the
Palestinian mind, but not the thinking of Hamas. Not only will Hamas not make peace with Israel in order to create a viable
Palestinian state, they are as ready to kill Palestinian Muslims in order to gain total control of Gaza and the West Bank.
A recent Hamas pronouncement boasted that the Palestinians (for which read Hamas) have made an industry of death
and that everyone plays a part:
". . . the women exceed at this, and so too do the mujahideen
[fighters in jihad] and the children. That's why they have
formed human shields of the women, the children, the elderly,
and the mujahideen in order to challenge the Zionist bombing
machine."
This is the only fighting force in history to boast that they have made human shields of their own people. There are films
of "brave" Hamas gunmen dragging screaming children along to serve as shields, and of civilians sent onto the roofs of
rocket launching sites, where, ironically, they know the Israelis will not fire on them. It is a mockery of military ethics, yet
it goes barely noticed in the Western media.
Israel is not alone in fighting terrorism. Even now, Britain fights al-Qai'da and its affiliates in Iraq or the Taliban in
Afghanistan. If we ever gave up the fight against Islamist terror in Britain, we would reap the whirlwind in bombings on
land and in the air. Why then do so many of us scorn what Israel does? A combination of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran
could one day bring Israel down, resulting in the deaths of millions of Jews. Is there any good reason why Israel should
acquiesce in this? Is our grassroots anti-Semitism still so ferocious that we cannot bear the thought of a Jewish state in
the Middle East, even if that state was brought into being by a majority vote of the UN?
This war is not a pretty war, but, truth be told, no wars are pretty. If Hamas cannot be fought to a standstill or until it is a
spent force, lulls in the fighting will be of absolutely no use. Beaten to a ceasefire, Hamas will return. They will return and
they will fight to a standstill again, then they will regroup and attack once more. More deaths, of Israelis and Palestinians
both. Ever-postponed statehood for the Palestinians, unending vituperation of Israel, which is only a democracy trying to
defend its civilians from crimes Britain would not bear for a week.
It's not a time for a ceasefire. When it comes, let the Palestinian Authority make it and keep to it, and let the PA police its
own territories and rein in the madmen who cannot accept anything but their own right to rule everybody else, and their
self-proclaimed right to kill Jews wherever they may be found. For Hamas has now announced that they will do exactly
that: kill Jews, not just Israeli Jews, but Jews in any country where they may be found. And these are the people the UN
and others would have Israel make a ceasefire with today.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Israel & the Arabs -- The Israeli-Arab Conflict
Middle East -- Arabs, Arab States,
& Their Middle Eastern Neighbors
American Foreign Policy -- The Middle East
Islamism & Jihadism -- Radical Islam & Islamic Terrorism
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
International Politics & World Disorder:
War, Peace, & Geopolitics in the Real World:
Foreign Affairs & U.S. National Security
Page Two
Page One
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
U.S. National Security Strategy
Family Security Matters Contributing Editor Dr. Denis MacEoin has lectured in Arabic and Islamic Studies and
is the incoming Editor of the Middle East Quarterly.
The foregoing article by Dr. MacEoin was originally published in Family Security Matters, January 14, 2009, and
can be found on the Internet website maintained by the Middle East Forum, a foreign policy think tank which seeks to
define and promote American interests in the Middle East, defining U.S. interests to include fighting radical Islam,
working for Palestinian Arab acceptance of the State of Israel, improving the management of U.S. efforts to promote
constitutional democracy in the Middle East, reducing America's energy dependence on the Middle East, more robustly
asserting U.S. interests vis-à-vis Saudi Arabia, and countering the Iranian threat.
(Article URL: http://www.meforum.org/article/2048)
Republished with Permission of the Middle East Forum
Reprinted from the Middle East Forum News
mefnews@meforum.org (MEF NEWS)
January 14, 2009
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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