Posted on 02/07/2006 5:28:57 PM PST by Virginia Ridgerunner
The U.S. intelligence community has been shaken in its failure to predict Hamas's victory in Palestinian legislative elections.
The intelligence failure came despite a Saudi assessment relayed to the United States that Hamas would win the elections. Officials said the CIA was influenced by an Israeli assessment that predicted a victory by the ruling Fatah movement led by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
"There are a lot of questions going to be asked when the dust settles," an official said. "The biggest question is: do we really know what's going on out there?"
Officials said the U.S. intelligence community detected the rise in Hamas support in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. But they said the State Department, particularly outgoing security coordinator Gen. William Ward, assured the president that U.S. support for Mr. Abbas would help swing the election to Fatah.
Over the last four weeks of the election campaign, the State Department's Agency for International Development spent more than $2 million in a propaganda campaign meant to bolster Fatah. Most of the campaign consisted of ads in the newspapers of U.S. projects in the Palestinian Authority (PA).
Officials said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been the one most embarrassed by the Hamas victory. They said Miss Rice pushed Israel hard to enable Hamas, an organization on the State Department's terrorist list, to participate in the elections and campaign in Jerusalem, deemed the capital of the Jewish state.
"Maybe we didn't have a good feel for the political pulse of the Palestinian people," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said. "So she's asked her staff to take a look at that, why it is that that happened, why it is that this was missed."
(Excerpt) Read more at insightmag.com ...
Well, she ought to be embarrassed! Also, I don't think it was all the CIA's fault as this article's headline claims, but that of the State Department's own little known Bureau of Intelligence and Research (http://www.intelligence.gov/1-members_state.shtml), which apparently is not worth a d@mn, based on what happened with the Palestinian elections!
I don't know why it is such a surprise to Condi. She's a smart woman. She's very well educated and prepared for her job. She must know that Foggy Bottom has a long, long record of failures in the Middle East, and that the Arabists are all expecting generous retirement incomes from the Saudis.
Even an amateur on the sideline can see the basic dynamic of the Palestinians. The more you give in to them, the more they calculate that terror works. Even one of Pavlov's dogs could have figured that one out.
Democracy itself is more important than who wins; one ought to congradulate the opposition. Regardless- there are opportunities presented by Hamas, a true enemy, coming to power.
Have some vision.
It does present some more clear cut choices doesn't it.
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