October 04, 2006

The Free World Continues to Have the Financial Upper Hand on Hamastan - And Is Using It

After Hamas gained control of the government of the so-called Palestinians, foreign aid to Hamastan was suspended due to its official policy of seeking to destroy the nation of Israel. Last February I posted that I expected the free world to keep up the financial pressure on Hamastan:

There can be little doubt that a turning point in the war on Islamofascism is taking place this week. For the first time, Hamastan is at the mercy of the free world, depending for financing on the free world it seeks to destroy, and very specifically, depending on Israel. Israel collects monthly customer revenue and gives it to what may now be called Hamastan, on condition that the Palestinians abide by specific agreements—agreements which Hamastan has now abrogated…

...It is not human nature to let up on someone who’s trying to kill you when you have the upper hand. I do not expect the free world to let up on Hamastan now that the terrorists of Hamas are in need of our financial help.

It appears that I was correct. Per Strategy Page, the foreign charity cutoff is continuing, and is putting massive pressure on the Palestinians to drop their policy of seeking to destroy Israel:

October 2, 2006: Over the last few days, growing unrest in Gaza, between Hamas and Fatah gunmen, has left eight dead and dozens wounded. Fatah blames Hamas for the foreign charity cutoff, which has made it impossible to pay 168,000 Palestinian Authority civil servants. This has crippled the Palestinian authority, and most Palestinians blame Hamas for not pretending to drop their call for Israel’s destruction, so that the foreign money will flow again.

An earlier post on Strategy Page (same link) shows the pressure the foreign aid cutoff is putting on the Hamastan banking system:

September 28, 2006: The Palestinian Authority began making partial payments to 168,000 civil servants, who have largely been unpaid for the last six months. Money donated by Qatar and Saudi Arabia, and smuggled in, allowed each civil servant to get about $350. But many actually got nothing, for they already had loans out to banks, which applied the payments to those loans. The banks did not expect to be holding those loans for this long, and are fearful of their own survival as the foreign aid cut off continues. There have been several partial payments like this, but that amounts to less than a third of the pay due all these people.

There has been much concern that Europe would cave and start financing Hamastan again. But so far it hasn’t happened. As I noted last February, “it is not human nature to let up on someone who’s trying to kill you when you have the upper hand.” We’ve got the upper hand on the failed state of Hamastan, which never had a national purpose except to try to destroy Israel, and for that reason has little functioning economy. 

Daniel Pipes has stated that if Hamastan recognizes Israel, the rest of the Arab world may as well:

Israel needs only to defeat the Palestinian Arabs, not the whole Arab or Muslim populations, who eventually will follow the Palestinian Arab lead.

This is surely one of the most significant developments of the year in the war against Islamic fascism.