Owings Mills, Md.: Professor,<\/p>\n
How would you fit Hamas’s (admittedly Democratic) takeover of the Palestinian Authority into your functional theory of terrorist-state connections? Hamas is likely to funnel any foreign aid to their terrorist infrastructure; does that make accomplices of any foreign donors? What tactics would you propose to Israel, the E.U., and the U.S. for diminishing Hamas’s capability for harm?<\/p>\n
Daniel Byman: This is the question of the day.<\/p>\n
Now that Hamas has won, it faces a whole new range of challenges — and thus a whole new range of potential pressure points. The effort so far to deny Hamas any financial support until it renounces terrorism and accepts the idea of Israel is a good first start. Hamas now has to deal with the huge host of problems the PA had, and money is essential for its survival. Moreover, if Hamas breaks the ceasefire and Israel responds the Palestinian people will hold Hamas responsible in a way they never did before.<\/p>\n
That said, terrorist groups, including Hamas, have a remarkable propensity for illogic.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Gee, that sure was insightful Mr. Byman, did you copy and paste that response directly from Condy Rice? The one position that seems to be gaining popularity over ‘blowhard politician’ in Washington is ‘Israeli-state sponsored academic’ and Mr. Byman is the perfect proof.<\/p>\n
Washington, D.C.: Most people of the world view Hamas as leading a legitimate fight against a brutal Israeli occupation. Don’t you agree that Israel’s treatment of Palestinians has been extremely harsh and barbaric (c’mon, which civilized nation can carry of extra judicial killings)? Why doesn’t the US and Britain work to moderate Israel’s treatment of Palestinians? Maybe that would be the most effective antidote to terrorism rather than bombing people to submission, which we tried in Iraq and doesn’t seem to be working real well.<\/p>\n
Daniel Byman: We disagree on this. Hamas has repeatedly targeted noncombatants in its fight against Israel. While targeted killings have at times led to the deaths of innocents, this has not been their purpose and Israel has tried to minimize this.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Oh, thank you oh so much for clarifying! See, if the United States provides the bulk of Israel’s weapons, and then Israel uses its military to blow up a few people… well that’s not terrorism, that’s just combatting terrorism! It’s the civilized version of capitol punishment, and we should all be thankful that such a refined pencil pusher like Daniel Byman can help us differentiate between blowing up people intentionally and blowing up people accidentally.<\/p>\n
Oh, and Mr. Byman, I really enjoyed your 2003 article about democracy in Iraq<\/a>, where once again you show your propensity to copy and paste with more ‘stay the course’ rhetoric. Did Dick Cheney show up to your house with a barrel full of petro after you had the opportunity to pass your thinly-guised bull shit into academia?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From a chat today at WashingtonPost.com with Daniel Byman, author of a new book entitled “Deadly Connections: States That Sponsor Terrorism”. Owings Mills, Md.: Professor, How would you fit Hamas’s (admittedly Democratic) takeover of the Palestinian Authority into your functional theory of terrorist-state connections? Hamas is likely to funnel any foreign aid to their terrorist […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n
You Seem So Out of Context - Prose Before Hos<\/title>\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n