Israel has one trenchant argument to bolster its maintenance of the blockade of Gaza, namely that free entry of supplies would give opportunity for the further arming of Hamas. It is in American interest as well as Israel's to see that this does not happen.

The classification of Hamas as irreformable enemy is a mistake. Along with Reverend Jesse Jackson and the above mentioned writers have visited Hamas leader Khaled Meshal and four members of his political bureau in Damascus as long ago back as 2006. We discussed with them their attitudes toward Israel, its permanence as a state and society, and the making of peace. We studied all the Hamas positions with care, and concluded that Hamas is really ready to deal positively.

We are not alone in that, as others who have taken the trouble to do this have drawn the same conclusion. Besides Jimmy Carter, there is Lord Raymond Hylton of Britain, a still sitting hereditary member of the House of Lords and a most responsible and peace-minded observer, and Sir John Allardice, whose peacemaker credentials are attested by his having founded Northern Ireland's Alliance Party.

The true solution to our problem, and Israel's, about dangers from Hamas, is to bring Hamas on side. We are firmly convinced, from our conversations that Hamas, if approached respectfully by the United States, would respond very positively to our peace concerns.

The statement, a commonplace of almost every news report from the American media, that Hamas is bent on the destruction of Israel is simply untrue. What is true is that Hamas does not recognize the legitimacy of the state of Israel in advance of agreements. Before doing so they want to see evidence — not merely statements — that Israel accepts a real Palestinian state within "the 1967 borders" (their formulation), and that agreed borders are actually recognized internationally as well as by Israel itself.

There is also a genuinely theological question that also figures in their calculations, that is whether it is religiously legitimate that territory which has "been Muslim" can cease to be so. Territorial claims of the Muslim character of lands is actually no part of Islam, as most Muslim scholars will attest, although the idea has popular appeal. The very bad Christian experience with territorialism — including religious wars, the Inquisition and, of course, the centuries-long persecution of Jews — in fact the whole concept of a Christian entitlement to retain territorial possession has become void and without content since the Second Vatican Council's recognition of religious liberty and freedom of conscience.

Israel's recent formulation of its Zionism as meaning an exclusively Jewish state, in which no others have equal rights, may be linked to the idea of Religious Territorialism. We believe that territorial claims on the Palestinian side have always been entirely based on Palestinian nationalism. The reluctance of Hamas ever to concede a legitimacy to the existence of Israel in the midst of Arab Muslim lands may lead to the impression that it is based on Religious Territorialism, but if so it would truly compromise their Islamic authenticity.

The Arafat/PLO acceptance of the Three Pre-Conditions included the recognition of the legitimacy of the state of Israel, a thing Hamas has not done, but it should be noted that the PLO's legitimacy recognition was of a state of Israel alongside a Palestinian state, a two-state solution, which is still the stance of President Abbas and Fatah. They and Hamas are not in fact divided on this point. Neither will consent to Israel's simply taking what it wants and ignoring Palestinian rights. It should be noted, too, that Israel was not, in the 1980s, defining "Jewish State" in terms of utter exclusionism, as it is now under the current government.

The entire policy of Israel blockading the Gaza Strip, with its terrible and unsustainable consequences including the reduction to misery of one and a half million people and Israel's storming of a ship of its long-time ally, Turkey, at sea and killing of persons on board, is based on that one proposition, affirmed by the United States since the time of George Bush and imposed on America's European allies, that Hamas is implacable enemy to Israel. It is simply untrue, and American demand for conformity to that proposition is one of the principal causes of inertia in the process of seeking peace.   

The United States has also prohibited President Abbas and his Fatah government from making any outreach for reconciliation with Hamas, although that is the first requirement for serious Palestinian participation in a peace process. The United States has tried to convince Abbas and his colleagues that it is to their advantage to come to agreement with Israel in the total absence of Hamas. In that way they promote an agreement that has no possibility of holding and try to force Abbas and Fatah into negotiating with Israel at such a disadvantage that they can only be cheated, as well as discredited when the agreement fails. Thus the initial false premise poisons the entire process. We all need to correct it.  

That Hamas should be "on board" and a participant, promoter of a peace solution with Israel is the one real protection against the opening of blockaded Gaza leading to further arming of Israel's enemies. Accomplish this and the danger of Hamas violence against Israel is over. We would even be able to count on help from Hamas in policing this.

It may be unusual for anyone in US to hear that there are intelligent and conscientious people among the Hamas leadership yet among them there are those who recognize the importance of dialogue and the necessity for peace in the region.

How then can the United States bring Hamas on side?

This would best be done by some initial Track II diplomacy, unofficial go-betweens who could assure Hamas that the United States was not going to try to exclude them. After all at one time it was not permitted by US to communicate with anyone of the PLO themselves but this was subsequently achieved by efforts of many individuals including one of the authors of this paper in intense conversations and correspondence with Yasser Arafat that went from June 1985 to the late 1988. This contributed toward PLO acceptance of what were then the Three Pre-Conditions for dealing with the US and Israel and the institution at that time of the US/PLO dialogue. At that time this was of interest to the State Department and White House.

The Palestinians are no longer a single-party system. Hamas has become another voice with legitimacy among the Palestinian people. There is no reason why the rival parties cannot cooperate for the primary interests of their people. Adequate leadership is needed urgently if the peace process is to succeed.