We blame Israel

I spoke to a university student in Gaza City who sometimes works with foreign journalists. His name is Nasser Barakat and I reached him on the phone last Friday. We spoke about the conditions in Gaza after the war. One of the most interesting things he said, although this will probably not surprise anybody, was that not only were people not blaming Hamas for the war, the Islamists' support and popularity has actually grown since the Israeli agression, as he called it. (Obviously, I cannot say whether these opinions are representative but they are still interesting.)

"Hamas was not very popular before the war because many blamed them for the Israeli siege [the blockade Israel imposed after the 2007 Hamas takeover] which made life very difficult for people here. Everybody was fed up. But the war was an Israeli agression and people blame Israel for it. Hamas was only rocketing Israel to show them we are still here and we are not going to give up our rights," he said.

So did Hamas become more popular as a result of the war? "Yes. Most people think that they weren't hiding like Fatah but resisted the Israeli agression, tried to protect us. Fatah couldn't even negotiate with Israel to try and get some aid in," he said.

I also asked him what people thought about the rocketing of Israel by Hamas and whether there was much taste for more fighting. He said people were thinking all sort of things about the rockets. "They don't really like them when Hamas is shooting from somebody's garden," he said grimly, adding that "these rockets are our only weapons and if Israel will not stop the siege, then we might still need them. What are they compared to Israel's weapons?"

How about people' expectations? "Right now everybody just wants peace and calm ... We used to say things could only get better but they always got worse ... The war is now over but Hamas and Israel are still here. The siege has not ended. They should sit down and talk ... The Israelis will have to lift the siege and Hamas will have to stop rocketing. Otherwise civilians, Palestinians and Israelis, will continue to suffer," he said.