A recent article in Iran has overstepped the government line in criticizing the way Hamas took over the Gaza Strip. An article by the Iranian Baztab News Agency last week stated that during the takeover of the Strip, "serious mistakes" of historical proportions were made by the organization's activists.

The serious acts harmed Hamas itself, as they did the entire Palestinian people, the article said.

The argument presented by the article is not typical of the mainstream opinions expressed by the Iranian media, which backs Hamas and its actions, in keeping with the regime's official line of vigorous support for the organization.

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However the publication of the article by the Baztab News Agency is very significant, since the agency is owned by Mohsen Rezai, the former commander of the Revolutionary Guards, who still holds a senior position in Tehran.

Meir Javedanfar, an Israeli expert in Iranian affairs who has recently written a book about President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, believes the article shows that "warning bells" have begun to ring in Iran about the implications of events in Gaza. There is concern that a separation between Gaza and the West Bank will lead to a major backlash against Hamas by the Arab countries. The article also raised the question of whether the decision to take over Gaza was made in Iran.

The confusion expressed in the article has come to the fore as well in other countries of the region that usually stand with Hamas. In Damascus last week Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem expressed ambivalence over Hamas and Fatah. "Syria recognizes the legitimacy of President Mahmoud Abbas and his legal right to disband the government. At the same time, it stresses that there is a legally elected government and a legally elected parliament," he said.

The Syrian foreign minister's statement seems to express indirect support for Hamas, because it controls a large majority in the Palestinian parliament.

Qatari position unclear
The official Qatari stand is also unclear, expressing support for Hamas indirectly. Doha announced after Hamas' takeover of the Gaza Strip that it "did not prefer one faction over another faction."

Its attitude toward Abbas as head of "one of the factions" is perceived as a devaluation of the Palestinian Authority chairman.

In discussions held by Arab foreign ministers in Cairo last week, Qatar expressed a pro-Hamas stand, announcing that it believed representatives of the movement should have been invited to the meetings.

More moderate countries in the region, particularly Jordan and Egypt, have slammed Hamas. Egyptian pundit Ma'amoun Fendi compared Hamas to a computer virus attacking 22 files, which is the number of Arab countries.

"Either the programmer will erase the folder and get rid of the virus, or the destructive virus will spread to all the other folders and will shut down the whole computer," he wrote.