HAMAS win is the trend not a surprise-ME Faithbased voting

[underpants]

It's like everything you have heard over and over and over about the 2004 vote here in God's own US of A except for two key differences:
1.it is a different faith
2.it is actually happening in the Middle East not just righteous self gratification.



Rising Islamist tide in Middle East politics

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/18f74788-8e9c-11da-b752-0000779e2340,dwp_uuid=99eafd16-a001-11d8-81c6-000e2511c801.html

In Egypt, the Arab world’s most populous country, the Muslim Brotherhood extended its representation more than five times in parliamentary polls last December, forming the largest opposition block. Lebanon’s Shia Hizbollah, the militant group, performed well in last summer’s parliamentary vote, consolidating its position as the most powerful Shia party.

In Saudi Arabia, where political parties are banned, Islamist candidates running as independents won the largest share of the vote in elections to half the seats in municipal elections last year, the first democratic experiment in the kingdom. Even in Iraq, where Saddam Hussein had already been ousted from power, an Islamist Shia coalition has emerged with a near majority in parliament.