A Daily Analysis
By Marc Schulman

June 3, 2008 One Year to Hamas Rule in Gaza

Today marks the one year anniversary of the take over of Gaza by Hamas. Hamas marked the day with arocket attack on Sederot that wounded five people.TheIsraelis responded with an air attack.The Palestinians used a Katusha rocket with a similar range to the Qassam, but with greater accuracy and a larger warhead.

What has one year of Hamas rule brought the Gaza Strip?Gaza is a religious place, where no women dares to go with her head uncovered.It is place where no alchohol is served and video stores no longer exist. It is a place that is under a greater and greater Iranian influence. Even though Palestinians are Sunni, in Gaza they take their spiritual guidance from Shiite Mullahs in Iran.TheGaza Strip has always been very different from the West Bank.Today that difference has been magnified even more. Furthermore, the Hamas government is clearly aligned with Iran, while the West Bank is aligned with the Sunni majority in the Arab world.It looks more and more like a two state solution is much less likely. Rather, now we have three entities: Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.

As Olmert's problems have multiplied, the Shas party is holding an auction.They will support whoever agrees to increase child support payments most. The child support payments were cut in past years and as a result the average number of children in Charidi families have been going down, more are going to work.None of this in the interest of Shas who wants to keep its members dependent.