THE RULES OF HAMA

Submitted by Bruce Josloff (United States), Aug 7, 2002 at 19:49

In the early days of February, 1982 Hafez al Assad and his Alawite Generals convened a meeting, and in that meeting a decision was made to obliterate the Sunni fundamentalist movement, spearheaded by the Muslim Brotherhood, in the City of Hama (the 4th largest and oldest city in Syria) because this group was posing a challenge to the stability of Assad's secular regime. You don't hear about this massacre because, like the massacre of the Kurds by Saddam Hussein in March 1988 and the massacre of 5,000 Palestinians by King Hussein's Beduoin Armies in 1970, and the massacre of 3,000 Palestinians at Sabra and Shatilla between 1985 and 1989 by the Shiite Amal Militia (3 years after the Maronite massacre of the Palestinians), they are merely footnotes in the history of Arab "intramural corrective actions."

In the course of 3 weeks Assad's tanks, helicopters, and soldiers deciminated 1/4 of Hama and killed and executed 20,000 Muslim Sunni fundamentalists and fighters. The Syrians decided that instead of going from house to house they would simply blow up the buildings and houses with their tanks and crush the Sunni Fundamentalists with cement and Reinforcement bar.

This massacre came to be known as the "Rules of Hama" by middleast journalists. It is emblematic of the Tribal War that is fought in the mideast. Essentially, "If we are too weak we cannot negotiate and if we are strong, we don't have to negotiate." What is happening between Israelis and Palestinians is a tribal war and the Israelis have the power and may be compelled to resort to the "Rules of Hama" before the end of this year.

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