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A STATE! A STATE WOULD SORT THIS LOT OUT

Hamas and Fatah can’t even agree on which days end the week:

As if life was not already difficult enough for the 1.4 million people living in the impoverished and war-torn Gaza Strip, they have now been presented with an almost impossible dilemma. They can either take off the Hamas weekend of Thursday and Friday - and risk not being paid by Fatah - or face the wrath of the all-powerful Hamas gunmen by observing the Fatah weekend on Friday and Saturday.

(Via Alan R.M. Jones, who urges the adoption of combined three-day Hamas-Fatah weekends - in Australia.)

Posted by Tim B. on 07/08/2007 at 05:25 AM
  1. I support the Hammock-Fatter Weekend!

    Posted by blogstrop on 2007 07 08 at 06:08 AM • permalink

  2. What sort of religion has only two days for weekends?

    Posted by rhhardin on 2007 07 08 at 06:19 AM • permalink

  3. “It is a grave error to suppose that a dictatorship rules a nation by means of strict, rigid laws which are obeyed and enforced with rigorous, military precision.  Such a rule would be evil, but almost bearable; men could endure the harshest edicts, provided these edicts were known, specific and stable; it is not the known that breaks men’s spirits, but the unpredictable.  A dictatorship has to be capricious; it has to rule by means of the unexpected, the incomprehensible, the wantonly irrational; it has to deal not in death, but in sudden death; a state of chronic uncertainty is what men are psychologically unable to bear.”

    Ayn Rand

    Posted by saltydog on 2007 07 08 at 06:35 AM • permalink

  4. If it was up to me, I’d just go ahead and take Thursday through Saturday off, plus Sunday, just to be sure.  I already get Saturday and Sunday off, but, what the hell, I’d better take Monday through Wednesday off just to make sure that nobody’s god is offended.

    Now, is there any way that I can get paid by the government while I’m taking time off?

    Posted by Sean M on 2007 07 08 at 06:39 AM • permalink

  5. Sundays however - back to work.

    Posted by Dan Lewis on 2007 07 08 at 06:48 AM • permalink

  6. Krudd may have made a serious strategic error in stating we can stop terrorism in Oz by getting out of Iraq.

    My apolitical wife loudly scoffed when he said this on the evening news.

    Clarification: The phrase ‘my apolitical wife’ shouldn’t be taken to mean I also have a political wife, a semi-political wife, and a wife who doesn’t speak enough English to understand wtf is going on.

    Posted by phil_b on 2007 07 08 at 07:00 AM • permalink

  7. #4

    is there any way that I can get paid by the government while I’m taking time off?


    Sure is Sean.
    Just get Centrelink to pay it straight into your bank account while you are enjoying your time off.

    Posted by Skeeter on 2007 07 08 at 07:29 AM • permalink

  8. In matters of spiritual direction, I always ask: WWFD?

    What would Farfour do?

    Posted by fidens on 2007 07 08 at 07:33 AM • permalink

  9. What would Farfour do?

    Pretend to be holding his face in shock, while in reality straightening up his head?

    Posted by AlburyShifton on 2007 07 08 at 07:37 AM • permalink

  10. #3

    A dictatorship has to be capricious; it has to rule by means of the unexpected, the incomprehensible, the wantonly irrational;

    Salty, I have spent the last 2½ years trying to subdivide my farm into 4 house-blocks for the kids. My dealings with the local government bureaucracy are exactly described by your Ayn Rand quote.

    Posted by Skeeter on 2007 07 08 at 07:43 AM • permalink

  11. To paraphrase an old joke: 

    “I’ll take the Hamas weekend.” 

    “OK then.  Weekend’s over - everyone back on their heads”...

    Posted by anthony_r on 2007 07 08 at 07:44 AM • permalink

  12. Sunday, Monday, Hamas Days.
    Tuesday, Wednesday, Hamas Days.
    Thursday, Fri… Uh…
    [Kabooooooooom]

    Posted by Dan Lewis on 2007 07 08 at 08:01 AM • permalink

  13. This is all supposing that the office hasn’t been bombed before the weekend even begins.

    Posted by Ian Deans on 2007 07 08 at 08:03 AM • permalink

  14. They could all become local council employees. Then the argument simply disappears. Mind you, I’d prefer they had a thorough debate first.

    Posted by Jim Geones on 2007 07 08 at 08:24 AM • permalink

  15. I love this part:

    The Fatah-aligned government decided not to pay some 25,000 workers who it said were taking instructions from the Hamas government.

    Hamas hit back with a statement saying Allah would provide for the Hamas-aligned civil servants. “Be aware that daily bread is in the hands of God and that God-given release from suffering is near.


    Translation:  When you’re all dead of starvation, we’ll have no more of these silly arguments about weekends.  Allahu Akhbar!

    Posted by RebeccaH on 2007 07 08 at 08:57 AM • permalink

  16. They can either take off the Hamas weekend of Thursday and Friday - and risk not being paid by Fatah - or face the wrath of the all-powerful Hamas gunmen by observing the Fatah weekend on Friday and Saturday.

    For some reason, this reminds me of the old Jack Benny routine:

    Robber: “I said: Your money….or your life!”

    Benny: “I’m thinking! I’m thinking!”

    Posted by rinardman on 2007 07 08 at 10:43 AM • permalink

  17. What would happen if someone only took Friday off?

    Posted by Ash_ on 2007 07 08 at 10:51 AM • permalink

  18. The EU looks at this and tut-tuts about the Israelis.

    Posted by Lonetown on 2007 07 08 at 11:05 AM • permalink

  19. It’s like a Jonathan Swift satire with big piles of corpses on every page…

    Posted by richard mcenroe on 2007 07 08 at 11:34 AM • permalink

  20. Employees?  They have employees?  They have to actually PAY people to keep the place that f***ed up?

    Posted by SwampWoman on 2007 07 08 at 11:40 AM • permalink

  21. Here’s an idea: why don’t all these confused Gazans get off the freaking Fatah-Hamas dole and work for a living?

    Posted by Patricia on 2007 07 08 at 02:25 PM • permalink

  22. A STATE! A STATE WOULD SORT THIS LOT OUT

    Fine.  Give them Massachusetts.  But they have to keep the Kennedies.  Except the hot lezbian one from Buffy.

    Posted by richard mcenroe on 2007 07 08 at 02:35 PM • permalink

  23. There are people who work in Gaza?

    Posted by blogagog on 2007 07 08 at 03:39 PM • permalink

  24. They are already in quite a state.

    Posted by kae on 2007 07 08 at 05:51 PM • permalink

  25. #19 So true.  But at least worrying about which days constitute the weekend keeps their minds off the you-know-who’s.

    Posted by Patricia on 2007 07 08 at 07:29 PM • permalink

  26. Well, they’ve finally achieved their state - a state of unutterable, undeniable and inescapable confusion.

    We should thank the Peripatetic Airborne Confusion Osmosis diffuser for this!

    Posted by carpefraise on 2007 07 09 at 04:47 AM • permalink

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