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Alastair Crooke

Alastair Crooke, who helped facilitate a number of ceasefires in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict between 2001 and 2003, was a member of the Mitchell Commission on the causes of the second intifada and a special adviser to Javier Solana.

From the London Review dated 5 July 2007

Our Second Biggest Mistake in the Middle East

  • Hamas: Unwritten Chapters by Azzam Tamimi  Buy this book
  • Where Now for Palestine? The Demise of the Two-State Solution edited by Jamil Hilal  Buy this book
  • Failing Peace: Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict by Sara Roy  Buy this book

‘The situation in Gaza is dangerous, and the danger is that Hamas will take over and turn Gaza into “Hamastan” – into a kingdom of thugs, murderers, terrorists, poverty and despair.’ This was the reaction of Ephraim Sneh, Israel’s deputy defence minister, to Hamas’s seizure of a number of key security institutions in Gaza in the days leading up to 14 June, when Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority and leader of Fatah, dismissed the unity government. But, despite what much of the media says, this is not a ‘civil war’, and Hamas is not made up of ‘gangs beyond the control of their leaders’. [ read more . . . ]

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In the LRB archive

Our Second Biggest Mistake in the Middle East · 5 July 2007

  • Hamas: Unwritten Chapters by Azzam Tamimi  Buy this book
  • Where Now for Palestine? The Demise of the Two-State Solution edited by Jamil Hilal  Buy this book
  • Failing Peace: Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict by Sara Roy  Buy this book