[...]
[Syria's government] used to treat the Palestinians well. They were provided with health care and education and allowed to own homes. Many worked for the government. President Bashar al-Assad gave Palestinian security forces arms and training to police their camps. Khaled Meshal, the leader of Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement, had more access to the president than most of the cabinet.
But when Mr Meshal sided with his Qatari financiers, who backed Syria’s Islamist rebels after the uprising in 2011, Mr Assad and his men fumed at the treachery. They blasted Hamas for using its tunnelling skills to dig escape routes for the rebels.
[...]Fumed? Fumed? A national leader less overextended than Assad would have told the Israelis, 'Get out of the way' then bombed Hamas in Gaza until there was no more Hamas left above-ground.
The Economist, however, doesn't dwell on the level of treachery committed by Hamas against not only the Syrian government but also the Palestinian refugees in Syria. Instead, the Economist takes Assad to task for not thinking enough of the Palestinians since al Qaeda and Islamic State took over the sprawling Yarmouk refugee camp -- more a city than a camp -- and used it as a battleground, until the Syrian Air Force ended the squabbles late last month by pretty much bombing Yarmouk to smithereens.
Many Palestinians believe the regime wants to redevelop Yarmouk—for use by Syrians. In March the government unveiled the second stage of a plan to rebuild southern Damascus, including areas that run along the camp’s edge. Businessmen eye opportunities. Some suggest relocating the Palestinians to distant scrubland.Well. It is sad that Syria's government will have to practice triage in deciding how best to aid all the survivors of the Syrian war. Say, maybe if the British regime hadn't given so much aid to Syrian 'rebels' and looked the other way about Hamas trepidations, the aftermath of the war in Syria wouldn't have imposed so many hard choices?
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