Hamasistan

...the size of a misfortune is not determinable by an outsider's measurement of it, but only by the measurement applied to it by the person specially affected by it. The king's lost crown is a vast matter to the king, but of no consequence to the child. The lost toy is a great matter to the child, but in the king's eyes it is not a thing to break the heart about.
- Mark Twain's Autobiography

There seems to be some hand wringing in Gaza these past few days. Hamas was voted in with an overwhelming majority but, as has frequently been the case in the past there, the electorate failed to evaluate all possible options from a balanced perspective. Somehow during all the fun, it was overlooked that Hamas is listed as a terrorist organization by the European Community and The United States too, and actions have consequences. In this case the consequence is going to be no more mooching off Uncle Sugar.

So now as the celebratory gunfire fades and as they queue up for their daily handouts of rice, flour and powdered milk, courtesy of Uncle Sugar (380 million semolians a year) and the EU (another 300) the realization slowly dawns upon the primitives that the endgate for the gravytrain could be nigh. Secretary Rice has made it clear that they will have to look elsewhere for their handouts. Saudi Arabia would be a good start.

"There's no work here," says Mustapha Baqer in a recent interview with a eurosimp. Well, no, Mustapha, you're right. There aren't as many jobs in Gaza today as there were before the Israelis pulled out, leaving behind functioning greenhouses which previously had provided 3500 jobs for the primitives. The market for the produce from that enterprise was the Jewish settler community, now back in safer territory. The greenhouses were looted of everything that made them work the very day after the Israeli retrenchment. http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-09-13-mideast_x.htm

Let them eat their gelignite.