Nobody Saw It Coming?

I'm still shocked that everyone is shocked. I can't say that I was paying all that much attention to their pending vote, but the fact that this administration was totally blindsided, is kind of scary.

'I've asked why nobody saw it coming,' Ms. Rice said, speaking of her own staff. 'It does say something about us not having a good enough pulse.'

Immediately after the election, Bush administration officials said the results reflected a Palestinian desire for change and not necessarily an embrace of Hamas, which the United States, Israel and the European Union consider a terrorist organization sworn to Israel's destruction. But Ms. Rice's comments seemed to reflect a certain second-guessing over how the administration had failed to foresee, or factor into its thinking, the possibility of a Hamas victory.

Indeed, Hamas's victory has set off a debate whether the administration was so wedded to its belief in democracy that it could not see the dangers of holding elections in regions where Islamist groups were strong and democratic institutions weak.

'There is a lot of blame to go around,' said Martin Indyk, a top Middle East negotiator in the Clinton administration, referring to Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, and his Fatah party. 'But on the American side, the conceptual failure that contributed to disaster was the president's belief that democracy and elections solve everything.'

Ms. Rice pointed out that the election results surprised just about everyone. 'I don't know anyone who wasn't caught off guard by Hamas's strong showing,' she said on her way to London for meetings on the Middle East, Iran and other matters. 'Some say that Hamas itself was caught off guard by its strong showing.'

Personally, I think we ought to stop posturing and threatening this new, democratically elected government. How ridiculous is it to come out of the gate screaming about the very thing we've been promoting as part of our Middle Eastern foreign policy. I'm not sure I believe that the common, everyday Palestinian wants to participate in the destruction of Israel. Hamas was providing citizens with basic things that the other party wasn't. That is why they won. I think most citizens are tired of conflict and would just like to co-exist with some semblance of normalcy and peacefulness. However, if we come out shooting, calling them terrorists, being unwilling to meet with them, we just may contribute to a bigger problem.