[Marxism] A tactics proposal to Hamas

[Stuart Munckton]

There is a problem here. Firstly, I am certain Hamas are attacking Israeli
troops and there are reports of fierce battles. However, the exact extent of
it its nearly impossible to figure out and Israeli propaganda seeks to
downplay them. Hamas claim to have killed a lot more soldiers than Israel
says have been killed. The truth is not possible to determine, except that
there are enough accounts of battles to know there are serious battles with
Israeli troops, even if we can't know how successful the resistance has
been.

Secondly, regardless of the tactical wiseness or otherwise of firing the
rockets in general, in the current context there is no way that Hamas cold
cease firing them without a ceasfire that met their basic demands. It would
be seen as a defeat. The continuation of rockets coming from Gaza is seen
everywhere as a symbol of Israel's failure to defeat Gaza.

Also, there is a dynamic here that goes beyond Hamas. The concept that this
is some decision specific to the organisation Hamas seems wrong to me. If
they didn't fire the riockets, others would, like Islamic Jihad. And Hamas
would start losing support to that group. There is a political imperative on
them to fire the rockets, and Hamas described the return to rocket fire not
as a decision by the leadership to give instructions to start firing again,
but as the leadership no longer being able to enforce the moratorium on
firing rockets.
I agree with Andrew that "Hamas's political right, in fact duty, to resist,
including by military means, is key".