Thank good­ness. After 16 weeks, BBC jour­nal­ist Alan John­ston has gone free. I can now remove that logo to the right.
Thanks to nego­ti­a­tions between Hamas and his kid­nap­pers, John­ston wasn’t killed in a cow­boy raid. Good to Hamas for that wise tack. While there are many con­cerns about Hamas’ takeover of Gaza, there is no deny­ing the secu­rity sit­u­a­tion seems to be improv­ing now that Fatah and Hamas aren’t shoot­ing at each other. I hear the clans in Gaza, who had run the place for a while and one of which was respon­si­ble for Johnston’s kid­nap­ping, are run­ning scared now that Hamas is in charge. That may be a good thing.
Hamas says it will pro­tect for­eign­ers and enforce the rule of law. This release should be taken as a sign that per­haps that’s not an empty claim. Time will tell.