WHEN CANADIANS went to the polls earlier this year and elected a government led by the Conservative Party, relations between Canada and America barely skipped a beat. After all, in addition to coming to power by means of a democratic election, the new Canadian government gave no indication that it would do anything other than follow the norms of international relations.
Now, join me in a theoretical exercise. Rather than a mild-mannered Conservative government taking the reins in Canada, suppose that instead the democratic elections there had been won outright by the political wing of Al-Qaeda of Canada, a terrorist organization publicly committed to the destruction of the United States. This organization refuses to recognize both America's right to exist as a state and agreements made by previous Canadian governments. Additionally, the radical Canadian government refuses to renounce the tactics of terror. It is fairly safe to say that in these circumstances the United States would neither recognize nor tolerate such a government and would more likely effect its immediate removal.
What seems so clear in our own backyard, however, becomes complicated and murky when it takes place in the quagmire of the Middle East. With the election of Hamas in the Palestinian territories, Israel has found itself with a neighboring government that neither recognizes its right to exist nor the previous agreements between Israel and the Palestinians. Additionally, Hamas has persisted in organizing the militant activities that led Australia, the European Union, the United States and good old Canada to all label it a terrorist organization. Following our theoretical example, Israel has taken the steps necessary to ensure its security by refusing to recognize the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority or support the new government with tax revenues it collects on the PA's behalf.
When it comes to America's position on the issue, however, there are those who would portray the dilemma as more vexing than it actually is. America's commitment to the establishment of democratic regimes in the Middle East, they argue, would be rendered hollow if the democratic choices of the Palestinian people were not respected. They further press that denying foreign aid to the Palestinian government, as America has tried vigorously to do, will inevitably harm the Palestinian people.
The problem with the first argument is that when America says that its intention is to spread democracy to the Middle East, it means more than simply installing plebiscites. The true objective is to install liberal democracies, or governing regimes that not only draw their power from the citizenry but also are willing to work within the international framework by which states settle disputes.
A government that has met only the first of these criteria, while a democracy in the dictionary sense of the word, should not necessarily qualify as legitimate in the eyes of the United States. This is especially true in the case of Hamas, which largely was voted into power not by Palestinians who support its violent ideology but by citizens who were sick and tired of the poor leadership and corruption of Fatah, the previous ruling party. Hamas would like to have it both ways: They want the legitimacy of a nation state while keeping the tactics and rhetoric of a terrorist group. Such a government defies all liberal principles and norms, and if the United States is serious about instilling healthy democracy in the Middle East it must continue to neither support nor recognize this aberration until it renounces its denial of another democratic state's right to exist.
Proponents of the second argument are quite likely right that cutting off aid to the PA will have some deleterious effects on the Palestinian citizenry even if humanitarian aid is continued, as the United States, Israel and others advocate. However, letting Hamas off the hook with that excuse would allow it to use the suffering of the Palestinian people as a shield in order to maintain its militant ideology. Hamas is gambling with the lives of its people to achieve its minority aims. Any leeway given to their government in the form of official recognition or monetary aid will only encourage them to continue their unworkable policies to the detriment of the Palestinian people. For America to settle for this poor substitute for a true liberal democracy is to cripple its own efforts to foster stability in the Middle East and prosecute the war on terror.
A.J. Kornblith's column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at akornblith@cavalierdaily.com.
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