Islamist Tactics

Was cleaning out my email account, came across this news piece about a new strategy for naming successors in Islamist organizations. It is fortunate that the strategy has yet to be implemented.

With Rantisi dead, Hamas is holding their cards close to the proverbial (suicide) vest. Speculation is that the organization has already named a new leader but is trying to keep it quiet lest he, too, be immediately targeted by Israel.

I have it on good sources that the truth is a bit more complicated. Hamas is indeed weighing its options concerning the appointment of a new leader. However, the real debate amongst Hamas bigwigs is whom to appoint as their supreme leader; at present, the two contenders are Ariel Sharon and George W. Bush. According to one Hamas official, who spoke on condition that he be identified as someone else, "We have concluded that Israel intends to eliminate anyone whom we name as our leader. Therefore, we have devised the ingenious strategy of naming the criminal Sharon or the evil Bush as our leader, which will, of course, force Israel to kill the person we select."

The official further noted that if the strategy proved successful, it would be adopted on a permanent basis. "If need be," he said, "We will employ this tactic indefinitely. We will certainly kill Sharon and Bush in this fashion, but we will likely extend its use to rid ourselves of Olmert, Netanyahu, Cheney, Rice, and the Jew Wolfowitz. In fact, if my wife does not silence herself about the leak in the guest tent, she may find herself the head of Hamas as well, Allah willing."

No Palestinians were willing to comment on the new tactic on the record, but the thousands of demonstrators who took to the streets today in Gaza City may have been alluding to it as they chanted in unison: "Sharon and Bush, your day of reckoning will come, on the day of Allah, when the eagle and fat bird will die, possibly killed by the Israeli menace who are their own brethren, who have terrorized Palestinians for generations, and you are probably wondering who the new leaders of Hamas are, but we will not tell you this until we feel like it, but by then it will be too late for the Zionist devil, who are the sons of pigs and monkeys, reviled by Allah and the prophet Mohammed."