Intro to violence

From an article on how Palestinian authorities are trying to round up loose weapons:

The crackdown came as dozens of Palestinian towns and villages in the West Bank held municipal elections. The powerful Hamas movement was expected to make strong gains, despite a continuing Israeli offensive against Islamic militants.

despite? This is exactly what I'd expect when you turn up the level of violence. I really can't pronounce on whether you create more terrorists than you destroy when you publicly kill a bunch of their leaders, but the electoral consequences of this kind of thing should be pretty obvious. Hamas terrorism makes Israelis run to Likud, and Likud violence makes Palestinians run to Hamas.