The price of ignoring Palestinians' needs

Great article... I recommend it.

By Natan Sharansky
International Herald Tribune

JERUSALEM Hamas's victory in the Palestinian elections is the logical outcome of a "peace process" more than a decade long that completely ignored what was happening within Palestinian society.

Rather than seriously link the peace process to the building of a free society among the Palestinians, the democratic world, including Israel, turned a blind eye as Palestinian civil society was hollowed out, its streets taken over by armed thugs and its youth indoctrinated to glorify suicide bombers and despise Israel and America, Jews and Christians.

The international community repeated its shallow formula for peace like a broken record. International legitimacy, Israeli concessions and billions of dollars in aid were used to strengthen Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority - the "moderates" who had ostensibly renounced violence and accepted Israel's existence - and marginalize extremist groups like Hamas.