US President George W. Bush is said to have approved a covert initiative to overthrow the Hamas government shortly after Hamas won the January 2006 parliamentary election, according to confidential documents obtained by Vanity Fair magazine.
The documents, which have been corroborated by sources at the US State Department and Palestinian officials, reveal that the plan was supposed to be implemented by the State Department.
The report confirms allegations by Hamas and other Palestinians that the US has been supplying Fatah with weapons and money so that its forces could bring down the Hamas government. Some senior Fatah officials have also accused the US of "meddling" in Palestinian affairs by encouraging Fatah to work toward toppling the Hamas government.
The magazine said that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Deputy National Security Adviser Elliott Abrams were entrusted with provoking a Palestinian civil war, in which forces led by Fatah strongman Muhammad Dahlan - fortified with new weapons supplied at America's behest - would remove the democratically elected, Hamas-led government.
...
Meanwhile, the magazine said, US officials led by Rice had spent several months begging Arab governments for money in order to supply Fatah's forces with new weapons from Egypt under a previously undisclosed covert US program - a scheme described by some sources as "Iran-Contra 2."
Read more:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite? ... 2FShowFull
VF article:
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/feat ... gaza200804
