A courageous battler for rights and peace is hopeful

washingtonpost.com: This Time, I'm Hopeful: "This Time, I'm Hopeful

By Eyad Sarraj

Sunday, February 13, 2005; Page B02
GAZA
A couple of days after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas declared a halt to hostilities, I met with a few of the many journalists and commentators who roam our streets.
They did not think peace had much of a chance. Hamas had already fired rockets into an Israeli settlement in defiance, and Sharon has long shown he is willing to respond to any provocation with more than equal force. Like all of us here, these journalists had seen many cease-fires and declarations come to nothing. A few of them knew colleagues who had been killed.
The mood was so sour that I -- a children's psychiatrist by profession -- was suddenly struck by the feeling that I was in a counseling session, trying to instill hope in the hearts of traumatized youngsters.
'Do you really trust Hamas to stop terror?' one of the journalists asked me. 'Even when they announce that they are not bound by the agreement?'
To his obvious shock I replied, 'Yes.'
I have spent many years observing Hamas at close range as it has grown from a small Islamic religious movement into a major army. I have been debating politics with its leaders and members for a long, long time. That experience leads me to believe that Hamas will very soon transform into a political party and will seriously contemplate taking over the government by democratic means.
There are sound reasons for my optimism. The first is that Hamas finally has an incentive to halt terrorist activity. For years, its raison d'etre has been military action. But Hamas has just achieved an astounding victory in municipal elections in the Gaza Strip, winning 70 percent of the seats in lo"