Hamas’ brutal attacks in Israel on October 7 killed at least 1,400 people and the group took more than 200 hostages, according to Israeli authorities. In the wake of the assault, Israel launched an aerial bombardment of Gaza that Palestinian health officials say has killed more than 5,000 people. Israel also announced a “complete siege” on the enclave, withholding vital supplies of water, food and fuel.

  • jetA
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    23
    arrow-down
    3
    ·
    1 year ago

    This is a difficult socioeconomic problem. The majority of the Palestinians in the Gaza strip are under 18. They’ve lived a life of nothing but oppression. For the vast majority of people there now, this is the only life they’ve known. And for the adults, they saw a more conciliatory government not give them the life they want.

    So within living memory of the population, Hamas won the popular vote, the Palestinian authority was setting up for coup inside of the Gaza strip, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatah–Hamas_conflict

    And since that coup attempt, there have been no elections in the Gaza strip.

    Even presupposing the majority of the children in Gaza wanted to overthrow Hamas, it’s a collective action problem, how many of them are willing to throw their lives away to affect a political change, when they see the real threat as an external one.

    Historically, religious fundamentalists thrive in adverse conditions. When the population loses all hope, religion tends to step in, and extreme religion tends to dominate.

    Being realistic, the first step to removing Hamas support is giving the population better options. Economic options, education options, religious freedom options. And that’s going to require a lot of work that isn’t military as the ground work