Many groups who the international community refused to communicate with embraced democracy and were pivotal in promoting reconciliation with former enemies.Examples range from the Provisional Irish Republican Army, the African National Congress and the Palestine Liberation Organization under Mahmoud Abbas.
Scott Atran an anthropologist at France’s National Center for Scientific Research and the University of Michigan and Robert Axelrod, a professor of political science and public policy at the University of Michigan have noted that often it was civil-society whose make-up often included private citizens ranging from clergymen, academics, to scientists who brought these groups into the fold. Direct interaction with terrorist groups often is essential as listening to them equips Western governments to appreciate the roots of their discontent. It is private individuals that have caused Hamas and Hezbollah to increasingly reject violence as a policy option and instead embrace new strategies that incorporate non-violent tactics, including protests, civil disobedience, lawsuits against Israeli officials and boycotts of Israeli goods.
The Gaza-bound flotilla was also initiated by private individuals supported by Hamas in the same manner that private individuals supported lawsuits against Israeli officials in American, Belgian, British and Spanish courts rather than to commit acts of terrorism. This led Hamas and Hezbolla officials to realize that rather than violence, these activities caused Israel to be subjected to greater pressure to ease conditions in Gaza. To this end, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah called on supporters to join the next flotilla bound for Gaza. Hezbollah political official Ghaleb Abu Zeinab observed that this marked the first time that Nasrallah embraced such tactics against Israel.
In the West Bank, the Palestinians have embraced non-violent protests ranging from Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s boycott campaigns against products made in Israeli settlements from being sold in Palestinian Authority-controlled territory.
This softer form of conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is ‘manageable’ and reveals an increasing willingness on the part of Hamas to embrace Western norms. This can only assist in a future Palestinian state taking a seat in the international community. Furthermore, Hamas’s shift in tactics provides Western governments a wide opening to engage in a peace-process between the two sides as it is challenging to engage with entities while they are lobbing rockets against another side prompting an Israeli military response which leads to a never-ending cycle of violence. Instead, soft forms of protests can lead to a cycle of soft tensions in which positions are reasoned between one another and deadlocks are avoided. Indeed Hamas’s new approach is so cutting-edge in the region, and if swiftly taken up by the international community, a new precedent can be set for the Middle East at large. If centuries-old religious, cultural and nationalist conflicts waged throughout the region can be waged in a soft and reasonable manner, they can ultimately be resolved.