Why shouldn’t a so-called “terrorist organization” be willing to talk with us? Because the United States is a bigger terrorist threat to the Third World than Osama bin Laden is to America. If the Middle East, a region we’ve exploited and manipulated through tyrannical dictators for more than half a century, collectively decided that they too “do not negotiate with terrorists” then no one would ever talk to us. American foreign policy IS terrorism.

Terrorism is defined by The American Heritage Dictionary as: “The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons.”

Though it is standard military procedure for both the US and Israeli military to extrajudicially kill terror suspects, these actions are illegal under international law. Acting as the world police (if police had the authority to kill suspects without trial), the United States routinely assassinates suspects in other countries, while killing innocent civilians in the process. This isn’t what civilized nations do; it’s what the mafia does. Were Cuba to launch a missile into Miami to kill Luis Posada Carriles, a former CIA operative who faces terrorism charges in Venezuela and Cuba, it would rightly be seen as an act of war against the United States.

A Brief History Lesson of American Terror in Gaza

Always eager to violate international law, the US, EU, and Israel have been trying to overthrow the democratically-elected government of Hamas since 2006 by first cutting off aid to Palestine. When a Unity Government was formed between the two parties of Fatah and Hamas, Washington made it clear that they would boycott the new government as long as Hamas was in it. Israel also illegally kidnapped around one-third of the Hamas cabinet during its illegal war against Gaza and Lebanon. These terrorist tactics against the Palestinian people and their elected-government are all accepted as justifiable in American political discussion.

The US and Israel provided Fatah with funds for an early election (to bypass the Hamas victory they didn’t like) and arms in preparation for a violent takeover. Recent confidential documents confirm the US plot to forcibly topple Hamas. One document, addressed to Mahmous Abbas and signed off by President Bush and Secretary Rice, instructed the Fatah leader that if Hamas refused to submit to the Zionist regime then Abbas was to simply scrap the government and “form an emergency government explicitly committed to that platform”.

Fatah did just that, but was stopped in Gaza. The American corporate media immediately spun this as a Hamas coup of Gaza, when in fact Hamas was preventing a US-backed terrorist plot which went against the will of the Palestinian people. Ismail Haniya, senior political leader of Hamas and legitimate Prime Minister of the Palestinian National Authority, said Abbas’ replacement of the Unity Government was illegal and refused to set up a separate Hamas-ruled state in Gaza. The Western media did not report Haniya’s position or the following statement he gave just days after the bloodshed: “Gaza belongs to all the Palestinian people and not just Hamas. Separation is not on the agenda and never will be.” Despite the tensions, Hamas immediately expressed the desire to open dialogue. Fatah refused the offer and continues to refuse it under our instruction.

The Only Way to Peace is for the US to Reject Terror

An article in Reuters on Tuesday titled “Carter, defying Israel, meets Hamas ex-minister” caught my attention because I had no idea Former US President Carter needed Israel’s permission to do anything. Sadly, we’ve come to the point where an American leader “defying” Israeli orders is outrageous enough be become headline material for the political ratings-driven tabloids we call news.

Khaled Mashal, the exiled leader of Hamas whom Carter is meeting with, has previously stated that Hamas would cease its legitimate right to armed resistance if Israel recognized the 1967 borders, withdrew itself from all Palestinian occupied territories, and recognized the Palestinian right of return. So why is Carter being demonized by Democrats and Republicans alike as a naïve traitor for meeting with someone who thinks international consensus ought to be upheld?

64% of Israelis say they want their government to talk with Hamas, but Israel will not hold talks with people unless they agree beforehand that everything they say is right. Israeli PM Olmert and other policymakers even snubbed President Carter’s request for a meeting due to Jimmy’s generous comparison of Israel’s systematic treatment of Palestinians to apartheid. John Dugard, A UN human rights envoy and South African lawyer, has described Israel’s policy in Gaza as “ethnic cleansing”, and its treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank as “apartheid”. Yet, with US/Israeli human rights abuses so clearly being the roadblock to peace, apologists will accuse Hamas of derailing a peace process which never really existed.

Israeli/Palestinian “peace talks,” like Annapolis, have always been bullshit because Israel has always been required under international law to release the occupied territories and withdraw to its pre-1967 borders. THAT is the plan Israel would follow if it actually wanted peace. These talks are not necessary and simply occur so that Israel can legitimize its failure to comply with international law by establishing new goals between it and the US rather than fulfilling what is required by the international community.

Apologists will argue that Israel has been generous in these talks, and that the Palestinians are the difficult and uncompromising party. Using that logic, we can say a thief is being generous by giving back a portion of what he stole. If you reject the offer because you want everything back, well then you’re apparently being difficult. Never mind the fact that the seizure of your property was illegal or that you are entitled to all of it back under the law.

Rather than place blame on the Palestinian, Lebanese, or Iraqi resistance for defending their land, Israel and the US deserve full blame for making peaceful solutions impossible. In September of last year, Israel declared Gaza a “hostile entity”, creating the same loophole that the Bush administration created by declaring detainees “illegal enemy combatants”. Under this new definition, the Zionist regime argues that international law no longer applies to any of the 1.5 million inhabitants of Gaza due to the existential threat of Qassam rocket attacks.

However, if we are to renounce terrorism, then we must acknowledge that the occupied inhabitants of Palestine have rights and the aggressors do not. Israel’s occupation is illegal, our support is criminal, and both the US and Israel have no rights in Hamas’ land. The right of people to rule themselves in their own home is not subject to whether their choices coincide with our imperialistic Western vision. Hamas is the legitimate government of Palestine, and in talking with them Jimmy Carter is in fact renouncing terror and embracing democracy.