Overthrowing a Democratic Vote

"The United States and Israel are discussing ways to destabilize the Palestinian government so that newly elected Hamas officials will fail and elections will be called again, according to Israeli officials and Western diplomats.

The intention is to starve the Palestinian Authority of money and international connections to the point where, some months from now, its president, Mahmoud Abbas, is compelled to call a new election. The hope is that Palestinians will be so unhappy with life under Hamas that they will return to office a reformed and chastened Fatah movement."

If this report in the New York Times is correct [read the full article here] then it is very troubling. Everyone, it would seem, agrees that the Palestinian election was duly and properly conducted. It was the democratic-processes that George Bush espoused he was looking for in the Middle East.

So, now that the result is in and Israel and the USA don't like it.....they are trying to, in effect, overturn it. Not only is it of grave concern that both countries believe they can side-step the election-result, but it sets a very dangerous precedent, in many ways,for many countries and regions around the world.

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