James Baker: The problem isn't that Hamas is terrorist, it is that we are calling Hamas 'terrorist'

Some things are so stupid, it takes a former diplomat to state them:

One solution to promote peace between Palestinians and Israelis is to have non-Hamas members from the Gaza Strip negotiating peace, a former U.S. official told Al Arabiya.

“Israel and the United States will not work with Hamas because it is seen to be a terrorist organization,” James Baker, who served as the Chief of Staff in the final year of the administration of President George H.W. Bush said.

Baker, also the Secretary of State during H. W. Bush’s era, cited strategies used in the Madrid Conference in 1991, where Palestinians who were not members of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) – listed as a terrorist organization by Washington and Tel Aviv at the time – to negotiate peace with the Israelis.

“To promote peace we used the construct of Palestinians from within the territories because we couldn’t work with the PLO,” he said.

However, in spite of Israel, the PLO brought an unofficial “advisory delegation,” to act as liaison with the Palestinian representatives.

So, Baker has advised finding Palestinians from Gaza, not members of Hamas to represent people from the enclave.

Hamas, an Islamist movement, who doesn’t recognize the Jewish state yet, has functioned as the de facto ruler of Gaza from 2007.

Hamas' targeting civilians and implacable stated desire to eradicate Israel isn't the problem. No, the problem is that the West and Israel stupidly fail to ignore Hamas' support for terror and insistence that Israel be destroyed.

Smart people like Baker, on the other hand, know that the more Hamas insists on - and acts upon - destroying the Jewish state, the more important it is to make them part of the "peace process."

The full interview with Al Arabiya hasn't yet aired, so we will have to wait if more examples of Baker's pure genius will be evident.