Friday, May 19, 2006

Hamas tries to smuggle $800K into Gaza

Here's a weird one: A senior Hamas official was caught trying to smuggle over $800,000 in cash into the Gaza Strip on Friday.

Hamas is, of course, broke. This is due to pretty much the entire world cutting off aid to the Palestinian Authority since Hamas' election victory. One solution to the situation would be for Hamas to moderate a bit. The other solution is, apparently, to break the laws that Hamas itself is supposed to be enforcing, and risk further damaging the already-crippled Palestinian economy, by bringing boatloads of cash in via smuggling.

While I'm not especially sympathetic to the Palestinian Cause (big surprise to longtime CIT readers, I know), the Palestinian people deserve a hell of a lot better leadership than they've received since 1948. Whether they're elected like Hamas or defacto like Fatah, Palestinian leaders have done absolutely zero to improve their peoples' lives.

No comments: