Who's in charge

It's very frustrating to hear an Israeli politician say that although the rockets are shot by Islamic Jihad, nonetheless "Hamas is in charge of Gaza."

Without going into (at least not right now) the ins and out of Israel's existence its historical relationship with Gaza, and its -and our- relationship with Hamas (whose democratic election was a blow to our notion of "spreading democracy" across the Mid East), let's admit right now: Israel is in charge of Gaza. They control all movement into and out of it, including fuel and staples; they have the borders closed; they control the electricity supply; and they control internal movement; they "routinely" (their word) move in with bulldozers and tanks to demolish neighborhoods; and their "withdrawal" was only to the borders, from where they continue to retaliate with artillery shelling and aviation strikes against Gazan provocations. They will not deal at all with Hamas, thus denying Gaza any sort of political standing or autonomy. That Gazans manage to fire rockets into Israel in no way means that Gazans control their territory; it only means that they have a resistance movement; who would argue that the Moros or Tausugs were "in charge of" the Philippines in the early twentieth century?

Again, the rights and wrongs are not my point here. What is, is Israeli pretense that Hamas is in any meaningful way "in charge of Gaza."