PA to shut down 103 charities in apparent attempt to weaken Hamas

the islamic renaissance.I was amused by your reference to the'retards'.On a more serious note,you are right about looking forward,rather than looking only to the past.I did not know that there is no hierarchy in the original Quran,that any imam can set himself up as a spiritual leader.Interesting.looking forward to reading the rest.Regards.

to you either on this thread or some other,where we are sure to meet.Meanwhile,for my immediate response to your post,please read my post to Mehmet(35)It puts in a nutshell my considered position.My own view briefly,after I looked at Palestinian history since the late 19th century,the arrival of the zionists,the arab revolts etc., is that this is the first time that Palestine has had a serious Resistance/Movement in Hamas.It has to do with the confluence of circumstances,the emergence of a coherent fusion of islamism and modernity(represented by Hamas which is very different from any of the other islamic movements),the emergence of a dedicated leadership,which is also evolving in its ideas(I am surprised at Mishal's pronouncements in the last few months,CNN interviewer Nic Robertson used the word'miracle' to explain how CNN was able to get an interview with Mishal & so on). More anon. Regards

Well said!! I will visit your blogspot. I am definitely hopeful!

"I am sickened and disgusted by all of this bad news on a daily basis." While you were being sickened and disgusted by the news today, do you know how many thousands died in Sudan at the hands of Muslim gangs? Or how many were executed in China for taking bribes? Or how many Gazans per minute die from curable diseases because Hamas would rather buy weapons then medicine? No, because those topics are not covered in the news. The "suffocating oppression under the Israelis" is much news-worthy, even if it's much less harmful than the other things I mentioned. But I do appreciate your effort to condemn both sides equally.

Not calling for an assassination, Jasmine, merely predicting it.

at this Talk Balk has raised any questions about my bonafides.They assume(correctly) that I am an Indian and that I am a supporter of Hamas.Why is it an issue with you ? Do you have something to hide? Re: the question of abbas' sincerity,I have stated my position very clearly.I have nothing further to add and your ad hominem attack on my position is not convincing.Even the rabid zionists on this site come up with better arguments!

understanding of the Palestinian situation.What is happening is not islam versus judaic israel etc.but the struggle for liberation between a genuine Resistance/Liberation Movement(Hamas), against a powerful brutal military Occupation.In my part of the world we have a saying:"If you want to stretch your legs,you must first sit down." That is what is going on in Palestine.First the Palestinians have to establish their state,then we are talking about the larger issues.

Hamas gained much of it's support amongst Palestinians by providing charities far more effectively than did the PLO. Abbas cannot eliminate Fatah corruption and incompetence. He can shut down Hamas run charities, indeed many have been trashed and burned in the last two months. I doubt if it will harm Hamas as much as he must imagine. It will hurt the people who depend upon the charitable organizations he is closing. That I do not think will help Abbas or hurt Hamas. Probably the opposite.

his own people! See my post 3 for a short list of his crimes.

That's very English of you, isn't it?

Apart from the desperation of the US and Israel to try to bring Hamas to its knees, what is the purpose of this - does the quisling not recognize that such moves will make it much more difficult to get a Palestinian consensus for any agreement he may make?

You still have the Army on your side.

For shame.

I suspect that at some point Abbas will retreat to a fortified Israeli army base and will issue his edicts for the Palestinian people from there.

Laksmi, as you read in my posts, I am for peace with Israel, and I have been very critical of the IDF and criminal settlers. I have also been very critical of suicide bombings and killings of innocent Palestinians by both Arab and Jewish terrorists. I have also been critical of the PLO, Fatah and Hamas and I think the entire Palestinian leadership should be put on trial. What I do not understand is the faiures of our people to drive these guys and throw them out of Ramallah and Gaza. There must be something wrong with our people? Read my blog at www.jeffersoncorner.blogspot.com for more on my views on this and others.

I congratulate Abbas for his courage to try his utmost to achieve pieece for his people. It is people like yourself who are the real traitors for wishing to condemn the Palestinin people to etrnal violence and suffering. Why are you scared of telling the talkback where you are from anyway? Have you got something to hide?

I think the Pal Gov is less to blame then you think. It is possible that the charities which are being discussed were closed as part of an ongoing trial in the US. The assets are frozen. It seems a great deal of the funds were going to weaponry and not to charitable items. This is not the first time this has happened.

It seems Abbass is again being told to bring Hamas to its knees if he wants to talk to Olmert. From what history tells us, resistance is only carried out standing on your feet. Abbass on the other hand has gone down on his knees.

The Israeli Uncle Tom cares nothing for the welfare of the Palestinian people. that the closure of these charities might cause real hardship for the poorest people is of no concern to him. Abbas' prime motivation is to weaken the main threat to his position, Hamas. I suspect that he and the unelected placemen and head-nodders in his so-called "cabinet" are not long for this world.

". . .Abbas not only gets his instructions from Elliot Abrams . . . but he did not carry out the orders of David Walsh when he told Abbas "your job is to open fire on them, the more you kill the better" so they all know who is in charge." - El Birawi Abbas is getting nothing from Abrams, not even orders. Once he took action against Hamas the Bush administration considered it "mission accomplished" and lost all interest. Everyone seems to figure that having 'isolated' Hamas then the game is over. "No wonder the US gave Abbas $80 millions to arm and train his militia to shoot and kill Palestinians." - El Birawi Hamas picked up lots of those weapons in Gaza, only dropped once. It is astounding how men who believe that the solution to all of the world's problems is regime change can't manage to do it right, or figure out why they always screw it up. It is too late to save Abbas, but had Israel and the US acted quickly to relieve suffering in Palestine, he might have prospered.

Why are there hamas charities ? Because PA is so corrupt that they had to leave the field to islamists who can feed on the poverty and hopelessness of the Palestinian people. Religion is to blame for fanaticism, be it islam, judaism or christianity. Israelis are zillion times more educated than the Palestinians but when it comes to fanaticsm, they are not less fanatic than hamas (the right wing of Israeli politics I mean). Corruption, ignorance and selfishness leads to hamas-like structures in the Islamic world, look at us, Turks, who lost the battle against the islamic fanatics today. Why is america still supporting the islamist turks ? What are the jewish lobby doing ? Enough religion in the world, we should turn all churches, mosques and synagogs into sports halls and restaurants and close a bloody chapter in human history.

Israel must do whatever it can to promote a SECULAR Palestinian State. I know it is the state policy of Israel to keep Palestinians stateless but if they have a trace amount of human feelings they should do that and at the same time they should fight hamas who are a bunch of islamic fanatics. Islamists must be stopped at all costs. Look at Turkey, today we lost the last bastion of our secular structure, because of whom ? Because of money bosses and Americans who go to bed with islamists for personal and financial gains. Americans are stupid enough not to learn from Bin Ladin experience, there is nothing as moderate islam, islam asymptotically converges to fanaticsm.

report in Maan News yesterday stated that most of the discussion is going to be about security.So does the crawl in today's Haaretz.He should be tried for treason against his people.See my post 3 where I list some of the crimes he has committed against his own people.

The so-called charities support weapons and terrorists and not the welfare of the people. Don't worry the people will continue on the dole of UNHCR and others while (the uncorruptable) Hamas continues to line their own pockets and buy weapons. It's an old story and the same shell game as terrorists have always used.

you think they would lie (which they usually do) and say they had nothing to do with these charities, but nope! they tucked their tales betwixt their legs and lay back down in the sweltering stench of Gaza

we've noticed that your arguments have been losing quality recently. It's a mere dipute between East x West

that the issue is no longer a national issue for PALS, but a West vs. Islam issue. Abbas is backed by powerful western interests (including Saudia, Jordanianian, Egyptian, Emerite eilites, most of the EU, Aussies etc. and Hamas has Iran, Syria, (maybe Russia and China)and Islamist states. So it no longer has anything to do with this peice of land or that piece of lanmd -- its now an ideological war --a fight against Islamic Fascism. You have no idea how hard we will fight back against the Islamists, especially after they take out a US or European city. Thank you for clarifying the issue.

It seems that Abbas is in the same position as Malki is in Baghdad. It seems that Abbas not only gets his instructions from Elliot Abrams who inturn gets his instructions from Likud in Tel-Aviv, but he did not carry out the orders of David Walsh when he told Abbas "your job is to open fire on them, the more you kill the better" so they all know who is in charge. This is a quote from the book by Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post and as quoted by Tal Schneider of Maariv. No wonder the US gave Abbas $80 millions to arm and train his militia to shoot and kill Palestinians. Rajoub and Dahlan no doubt negotiating the terms.

And then, the next step will be to interdit holy madrassas and forbid women to use the nijab. That's what the West want, isnt it? Are you happy now? Do you understand now, baby, why Hamas is the only solution?

We all remember vividly how there was resistence to doing anything to HAMAS because it was a "charitable organization". Benevolent glove on a terrorist hand.

This man is unable to offer Palestinians anything and at the same time he is trying to cripple Palestinians further and further and further. I feel that Hamas is too patient with this guy. Hamas must draw a red circle and ask this stupid Israeli collaborator to stay inside it, otherwise......... I was a supporter of this guy at the begging because I have felt that he is going to build a real democracy. Unfortunately, I have been wrong. He is just a mini dictator in clothes of an Israeli collaborator used the slogans of democracy to put us inside his grip.

This latest decision from Abbas, Inc. comes after Hamas, Inc. decided to shut down medical clinics operated by Fatah members. If these two groups truly gave a damn about their own people, they would stop acting like a bunch of spoiled and stubborn children and grow up! The Israeli government and its intransigence is just as pathetic if not worse. My heart goes out to the Palestinian people who not only have to endure a suffocating oppression under the Israelis, but must put up with their own political groups tyranny. They are being screwed from all sides. I am sickened and disgusted by all of this bad news on a daily basis.

from what I have read, it is possible these charities are tied to the Holy Land Foundation. All their assets have been frozen by the US Gov. If that is the case, Abbas would have no choice.

So you close 103 of them ? Ha ha ha ha ha.....

Holy Land Foundation.

This is a good start from Fayyad. Now he needs to close the many PA organizations and open the files into the billions of dollars stolen by key officers and officials from the PA and in particular from Fatah. It is so surprising that no one has the courage within the Palestinian community to demand, let alone open a transparent investigations into unlawful wealth of many of Fatah and PLO officers and functionaries. Also it is time to open an invesitigation into the billions stolen by the late Arafat.

Keep up the good work Abbas. We love you.

He ordered the ordered the civil service not to work in Gaza,he asked the israelis not to open Rafah,his rep.at the U.N.prevented the Qatar resolution for humanitarian assistance to Gaza,he ordered doctors to strike work and his thugs have been attacking charity institutions in the West Bank,including a disabled people's office,a home where prostheitics were destroyed and now he is closing 103 charity organisations.Fayyad,to the extent that he participated in this criminal activity against his own people,should also be tried!

This does not sound like a smart move. Are the Palestinians who lose the charity help going to blame Hamas or Abbas? Mr. Abbas is showing signs of desperation. Not that I can blame him. He certainly has not been delivered what Elliott Abrams was promising.

hamas will fight to the last palestinian civilian in order to achieve their goals. according to their actions, one gets the impression that hamas is more intent on wiping out their own people instead of the jews. i doubt they even care.