Palestinian Authority prime minister Rami Hamdallah, protected by a squad of 40 Fatah bodyguards, rolled into Gaza in his silver Audi Thursday for the first Fatah-Hamas “unity” cabinet meeting to convince the world that it now is safe to throw more money away so Gaza terrorists can shoot more missiles at Israel.
The establishment media bought the meeting hook, line and sinker, with the Associated Press reporting its “marking the end of more than seven years of absolute Hamas control of the coastal territory.”
But AP, like all other media, added that the show of unity’s purpose was to assure donor countries that “absolute Hamas control has ended and that it can lead the rebuilding of the war-battered territory.”
Dig down more than a dozen paragraphs in The New York Times’ rendition of the quickie PR stunt and you will discover that PA foreign minister Riad Malki told Voice of Palestine radio, “This meeting is more symbolic than anything else. It was important that it was convened and the role of the consensus government was cemented in the reconstruction process.”
Unity between Hamas in Gaza and the Ramallah-based regime of Mahmoud Abbas is not the goal.
The real goal is money, and lots of it, and it is no coincidence that the “unity” show took place one day before Hamdallah and several PA ministers will travel to Cairo for a conference to suck up foreign aid from more than 30 countries expected to attend.
Hamas official Salah Bardawil told reporters the visit by Hamdallah “is important for the conference to remove the international and Israeli pretext that there is no unified Palestinian government.”
It is the biggest con game since the peace process.
“Fatah wants the government to impose its control on the whole Gaza Strip and to carry out its missions and duties without any obstacles. Hamas wants the government to act as a government of national consensus and to take into consideration the reality or the de facto situation in Gaza — that Hamas is the authority that has control on the ground,” said Gaza political analyst Talal Okal, quoted by the Times.
He said the meeting “tells the world that the Palestinians are ready and have ways to deal with the reconstruction file.”
That “file” has been dealt with several times. The world helps Hamas rebuild Gaza. Hamas then attacks Israel. Israel fights back and bombs terrorist hideouts, such as school, homes and mosques. Gaza needs more money to re-build.
It is a movie that has had several re-runs.
The show of unity is to prove that this time it will be different, but no one knows if the unity cabinet will have any authority. It is composed of “technocrats” who ostensibly are not Hamas or Fatah politicians, but Hamas’s terrorist organization and goon squads still enforce the peace, so to speak, in Gaza.
Hamas supposedly is not involved in the cabinet, but whom did Hamdallah visit after the meeting? None other than Ismail Haniyeh, who officially is no longer prime minster of Gaza. It was described as a “good will” visit, but Haniyeh does not have authority in Gaza just like Hezbollah does not have anything to do with the Lebanese army.
Hamdallah on Thursday did an excellent PR job. He said at the meeting, which took place at Abbas’ former Gaza City residence, “I cried in Beit Hanoun when I saw how the people live and sleep. The priority is reconstruction.”
Every tear is worth a few million dollars.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has said that this will be the last time that the international community is going to rebuild Gaza only to see its terrorists attack Israel, followed by another round of bombing to stop the attacks.