Israelis and Gazans awoke Monday morning to an unsettling and familiar silence – quiet on both fronts as their governments agreed to a new 72-hour truce aimed at reaching a permanent cease-fire and a security arrangement for the Gaza Strip, one that will inevitably ease Hamas' iron hold over the coastal territory.
Both sides are well versed in what these heretofore redundant lulls mean: hourly countdowns as the truce holds - awaiting one false move - and come midnight on day three, the very real chance that the negotiations will prove fruitless and the fighting will resume. If this round of talks fails, the trade of fire will be harsher than before, and the consequences will be all the more devastating: Nothing will stop Hamas from launching the thousands of rockets and mortar shells still in its cache at rapid rate until they run out; Israel will make good on its promise to respond with relentless force, and a full-out invasion of the Gaza Strip will likely be its next desperate battle move.
This is the last chance for both Israel and Hamas. One more failed truce and the Egyptian mediators will have no further recourse to negotiate a future arrangement. Rejection of this draft, which awards unprecedented concessions to Hamas with guarantees for Israel's security, would be a suicidal move for both, setting the region back at least 10 years and ensuring an indefinite state of war with innumerable casualties and losses on either side.
Hamas has won Cairo's assurances that most of its demands will be met: Israel will halt fire, border crossings will open under Palestinian Authority and Egyptian supervision, Gaza will be rehabilitated through billions of dollars provided by international and inter-Arab forces (to be discussed in the next stage of talks), its fishing zone will be extended significantly, more monthly permits will be granted to allow Gaza residents to pass through Israel into the West Bank, and a prisoner release plan will be set with Israel at later stages of negotiations.
Israel has refused to relent on the opening of air and sea ports in the Gaza Strip. but has eased its firm demand for the demilitarization of Gaza, expressing willingness in internal deliberations to settle on assurances that the militant groups will not be rearmed. Hamas' main demand – that the blockade on Gaza be lifted – can only be achieved through this Egyptian draft, which enables the opening of land crossings via external monitoring and within guidelines amenable to Israel's security concerns. Even without direct sea and air access, Gaza will no longer be cut off from the world and if the transfer of goods and people across the land crossing is respected, may well see establishment of these ports in the not so distant future.
Israel, which refused to send its own delegation back to Cairo until the Palestinian factions agreed to the temporary truce, did not resume its end of the negotiations blindly. The team was in direct contact with Egyptian and international officials throughout, well-updated on the arrangements being made to simultaneously enable these gestures to Hamas without sacrificing Israel's own conditions for a future security agreement.
Saudi Arabia and the UAE were enlisted to fund the rehabilitation of Gaza, in addition to Hamas' main benefactor Qatar, to ensure that any flow of money and material through the soon-to-be-eased borders is not used for terror or military means. Millions of dollars were transferred to Hamas' leadership in the hours before the Islamist organization officially agreed to the temporary truce, to pay the salaries of its military men and government clerks – a factor that no doubt sweetened its resolve to agree to the cease-fire.
The Israeli delegation returned to Cairo before noon on Monday, after nearly 12 hours of quiet. The negotiations over the next two days will be tense and technical, as the mediators attempt to tune their draft to exactly the pitch both the Israeli and Palestinian sides want to hear. Back at home, Israelis and Gazans will just as tensely await the verdict: Will the cease-fire be extended? Will the blockade be lifted? Or will war resume again?
If this round of negotiations and the temporary truce holding it upright falter, there will be no chance for revival. Hamas will remain isolated, without avenue of repair for the destruction in the Gaza Strip or support for the thousands of residents orphaned, displaced and disabled by the war. It will fire its waning arsenal at Israel at rapid rate and find itself under full occupation again, with no end to the blockade in sight. Israel will be left to deal with the welfare of 3 million people and the rise of even more hostile jihadist militancy. The Egyptian outline must still be fine-tuned, but even in its unfinished draft, offers a win-win solution for both Israel and Hamas. It is the final frontier for any semblance of peace and security in this region and the only mechanism left to prevent a reoccupation of the Gaza Strip.
Monday, August 11, 2014
Thursday, August 7, 2014
The Gaza-Israel war isn't over yet
Israel withdrew all of its forces from the Gaza Strip on Tuesday morning, at the exact moment that the 72-hour Egyptian-brokered truce was scheduled to begin and just as Hamas finished firing its last punctuating barrage of rockets, at the second the clock ticked 8 A.M. The cease-fire has held for nearly 48 hours now, but the war is not quite over, and this never-ending conflict between neighbors in such close quarters is even further from being resolved.
Both Hamas and Israel want this fragile truce, hinging on the current talks in Cairo, to extend beyond the Friday morning deadline – neither is prepared to return to war at this moment, but rifts are clear in the negotiations. Aside from the demands posed by Hamas, toward which both Israel and the external mediators are willing to show flexibility, there is one post-truce outcome that Israel is not prepared to abandon and that Hamas refuses to accept: demilitarization.
Hamas and the Palestinian factions of Gaza knelt this week in unconditional surrender to the Egyptian cease-fire draft, stipulating a 3-day lull in fighting before resumption of negotiations on any future agreements. It was the same exact same offer they rejected three weeks ago, before Israel embarked on its ground operation, and that they nixed once again last Friday after accepting and then rescinding with attacks on Israeli forces 90 minutes into that truce. They finally realized that there is no alternative to this offer they could not refuse and had refused twice already. Israel, which declared unilateral withdrawal and boycotted the Cairo truce talks earlier this week, emerged the strategic victor: the outline it drafted with Egypt at the beginning of the war is nearly one in the same as that which Hamas agreed to, the failed interventions of Qatar, Turkey and the U.S. in the last weeks filed and forgotten.
Hamas presented a 10-point list of demands in Qatar last month, as that aspiring political power attempted to mediate, including inter alia a withdrawal of Israeli forces, a cessation of operation on the tunnels, the opening of border crossings, the establishment of sea and air ports, a 6-12 nautical mile fishing zone, a lifting of the blockade, and the release of prisoners. Save the first two demands – which Israel carried out unilaterally – the subsequent clauses were omitted from the Egyptian outline, which in its presentation to Hamas is nearly identical to its initial form. Each of the following demands is still up for negotiation, and proposals on how to meet them in a way amenable to Israel and the international community are under discussion.
Israel has already begun to repair the border fence with Gaza and has lifted both the roadblocks in southern communities and the Home Front guidelines on safety during wartime, calling on citizens to resume routine; residents are free to return home, though most are reticent, filled still with the fear of a monster emerging from a tunnel under their children's beds, a real and concrete threat while the tunnels remained unmonitored.
In Gaza, the devastation is extreme. Nearly 1880 people have been killed, almost 10,000 wounded, and a quarter of the population has been displaced. The damage is estimated at some $5 billion. Aid has already begun flowing in: international entities from the UN to member countries, including Italy, U.S., Turkey, and the International Red Cross have sent tons of assistance; Israeli electric teams are working to repair the destroyed power lines and hundreds of truckloads of aid have passed through the Israeli border to Gaza. This rehabilitation will take years to conclude.
A generation of Palestinians in Gaza will not forget this war. Like their neighbors on the Israeli side, there is no guarantee that a monster will not attack in the middle of the night. Their parents have been killed, they have been dismembered, and their homes have been destroyed. A generation of Israelis is filled with the same hatred, not just toward Gazans, but toward all Arabs and Palestinians: these are their monsters, not innocent children, nor women, nor civilians; monsters that must be destroyed. The hatred the world hoped had been eradicated in the 10 years since the second intifada is stronger than ever.
Israel's hidden agenda, unsaid amid the very real rhetoric of destroying tunnels and halting rocket attacks, was to imbue in Gazans the realization that Hamas was a political force capable only of devastation and self-destruction, and thus lead to a democratic choice to let the Palestinian Authority resume control of the territory.
"Israel is hoping that external pressure from the outside might be combined with the internal pressure of people from Gaza when they realize the devastation [the Hamas leadership causes]," a former Israeli security official told me. "They might resist or at least complain, and these two pressures might bring a regime change, political change that might guarantee no more attacks [against Israel]."
This hope is optimistic at best and catastrophically self-defeating at worse. Hamas' popularity, as a resistance army capable of standing its own against one of the great militaries in the world for nearly a month, is higher than it was before the war. Even if the PA assumes control of the border crossings, and even if the unity agreement is reworded with Hamas to enable a democratic realization of this security situation, most Gazans do not see Hamas as the enemy Israel had hoped they would – they are disillusioned by war, and eager to live in peace and quiet, but they do not embrace Israel's rhetoric of Hamas as their primary monster.
If this cease-fire indeed manages to hold for the three days stipulated and beyond, it will be very difficult for Hamas to return to war. Israel has publicly disengaged, on alert in the area, but not in war mode. Hamas has lost nearly 2/3 of its arsenal and its tunnel operations are under tight Israeli surveillance.
The first two days of cease-fire have left Israelis and Gazans alike unsettled: there is no guarantee that the other side won't attack or that this respite is anything more than just biding time until the next war. For many Israelis, the disappointment stems from a sentiment that the goal of wiping out Hamas' capabilities has not been achieved. Infiltrations and rocket attacks are still possible: Gaza militants have 3,000 rockets and 10,000 mortar shells and Israeli intelligence on the tunnels is better than ever, but still limited. The army announced that its operation on the tunnels had ended after 32 were located and destroyed – but it is well aware that more exist beyond their intelligence.
For both Israelis in the south and Gazans, the basic activities of sleep, shopping, and going about daily life still just a cautious dream; for Gazans, the world as they knew it is devastated beyond belief.
A third intifada will emerge quicker than its predecessors unless the negotiations in Egypt following this quick truce stamp it down. Gazans, mainstream Israelis, and West Bank Palestinians are war-worn and hateful of their enemies. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose calculated decisions over the last month have won him enormous ratings in Israel, must take this final and waning opportunity to negotiate a settlement with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the caretaker of not only the West Bank and East Jerusalem, but now also the Gaza Strip, as its unity agreement with Hamas unfolds in the most concrete terms amid the Islamist leadership's loss of functional control over its territory.
The stakes are higher than ever. The future of both Palestinian and Israeli security now rest in the hands of Egypt, which has sidestepped the U.S. as the strongest mediatory force in the region; months of negotiations, rehabilitation, and security arrangements are still ahead. Anyone quick enough to say this war is over will find themselves just as quickly back in battlefield again.
Both Hamas and Israel want this fragile truce, hinging on the current talks in Cairo, to extend beyond the Friday morning deadline – neither is prepared to return to war at this moment, but rifts are clear in the negotiations. Aside from the demands posed by Hamas, toward which both Israel and the external mediators are willing to show flexibility, there is one post-truce outcome that Israel is not prepared to abandon and that Hamas refuses to accept: demilitarization.
Hamas and the Palestinian factions of Gaza knelt this week in unconditional surrender to the Egyptian cease-fire draft, stipulating a 3-day lull in fighting before resumption of negotiations on any future agreements. It was the same exact same offer they rejected three weeks ago, before Israel embarked on its ground operation, and that they nixed once again last Friday after accepting and then rescinding with attacks on Israeli forces 90 minutes into that truce. They finally realized that there is no alternative to this offer they could not refuse and had refused twice already. Israel, which declared unilateral withdrawal and boycotted the Cairo truce talks earlier this week, emerged the strategic victor: the outline it drafted with Egypt at the beginning of the war is nearly one in the same as that which Hamas agreed to, the failed interventions of Qatar, Turkey and the U.S. in the last weeks filed and forgotten.
Hamas presented a 10-point list of demands in Qatar last month, as that aspiring political power attempted to mediate, including inter alia a withdrawal of Israeli forces, a cessation of operation on the tunnels, the opening of border crossings, the establishment of sea and air ports, a 6-12 nautical mile fishing zone, a lifting of the blockade, and the release of prisoners. Save the first two demands – which Israel carried out unilaterally – the subsequent clauses were omitted from the Egyptian outline, which in its presentation to Hamas is nearly identical to its initial form. Each of the following demands is still up for negotiation, and proposals on how to meet them in a way amenable to Israel and the international community are under discussion.
Israel has already begun to repair the border fence with Gaza and has lifted both the roadblocks in southern communities and the Home Front guidelines on safety during wartime, calling on citizens to resume routine; residents are free to return home, though most are reticent, filled still with the fear of a monster emerging from a tunnel under their children's beds, a real and concrete threat while the tunnels remained unmonitored.
In Gaza, the devastation is extreme. Nearly 1880 people have been killed, almost 10,000 wounded, and a quarter of the population has been displaced. The damage is estimated at some $5 billion. Aid has already begun flowing in: international entities from the UN to member countries, including Italy, U.S., Turkey, and the International Red Cross have sent tons of assistance; Israeli electric teams are working to repair the destroyed power lines and hundreds of truckloads of aid have passed through the Israeli border to Gaza. This rehabilitation will take years to conclude.
A generation of Palestinians in Gaza will not forget this war. Like their neighbors on the Israeli side, there is no guarantee that a monster will not attack in the middle of the night. Their parents have been killed, they have been dismembered, and their homes have been destroyed. A generation of Israelis is filled with the same hatred, not just toward Gazans, but toward all Arabs and Palestinians: these are their monsters, not innocent children, nor women, nor civilians; monsters that must be destroyed. The hatred the world hoped had been eradicated in the 10 years since the second intifada is stronger than ever.
Israel's hidden agenda, unsaid amid the very real rhetoric of destroying tunnels and halting rocket attacks, was to imbue in Gazans the realization that Hamas was a political force capable only of devastation and self-destruction, and thus lead to a democratic choice to let the Palestinian Authority resume control of the territory.
"Israel is hoping that external pressure from the outside might be combined with the internal pressure of people from Gaza when they realize the devastation [the Hamas leadership causes]," a former Israeli security official told me. "They might resist or at least complain, and these two pressures might bring a regime change, political change that might guarantee no more attacks [against Israel]."
This hope is optimistic at best and catastrophically self-defeating at worse. Hamas' popularity, as a resistance army capable of standing its own against one of the great militaries in the world for nearly a month, is higher than it was before the war. Even if the PA assumes control of the border crossings, and even if the unity agreement is reworded with Hamas to enable a democratic realization of this security situation, most Gazans do not see Hamas as the enemy Israel had hoped they would – they are disillusioned by war, and eager to live in peace and quiet, but they do not embrace Israel's rhetoric of Hamas as their primary monster.
If this cease-fire indeed manages to hold for the three days stipulated and beyond, it will be very difficult for Hamas to return to war. Israel has publicly disengaged, on alert in the area, but not in war mode. Hamas has lost nearly 2/3 of its arsenal and its tunnel operations are under tight Israeli surveillance.
The first two days of cease-fire have left Israelis and Gazans alike unsettled: there is no guarantee that the other side won't attack or that this respite is anything more than just biding time until the next war. For many Israelis, the disappointment stems from a sentiment that the goal of wiping out Hamas' capabilities has not been achieved. Infiltrations and rocket attacks are still possible: Gaza militants have 3,000 rockets and 10,000 mortar shells and Israeli intelligence on the tunnels is better than ever, but still limited. The army announced that its operation on the tunnels had ended after 32 were located and destroyed – but it is well aware that more exist beyond their intelligence.
For both Israelis in the south and Gazans, the basic activities of sleep, shopping, and going about daily life still just a cautious dream; for Gazans, the world as they knew it is devastated beyond belief.
A third intifada will emerge quicker than its predecessors unless the negotiations in Egypt following this quick truce stamp it down. Gazans, mainstream Israelis, and West Bank Palestinians are war-worn and hateful of their enemies. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose calculated decisions over the last month have won him enormous ratings in Israel, must take this final and waning opportunity to negotiate a settlement with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the caretaker of not only the West Bank and East Jerusalem, but now also the Gaza Strip, as its unity agreement with Hamas unfolds in the most concrete terms amid the Islamist leadership's loss of functional control over its territory.
The stakes are higher than ever. The future of both Palestinian and Israeli security now rest in the hands of Egypt, which has sidestepped the U.S. as the strongest mediatory force in the region; months of negotiations, rehabilitation, and security arrangements are still ahead. Anyone quick enough to say this war is over will find themselves just as quickly back in battlefield again.
Friday, August 1, 2014
Hamas can't lose this war, because it has nothing to lose
Ninety minutes into a 72-hour humanitarian truce facilitated by Egypt and reluctantly agreed to by Hamas, the calm was shattered and the fighting resumed. Palestinian militants opened fire on Israeli forces in south Gaza, prompting an artillery response from the Israel Defense Forces; rockets were fired at southern Israel and fierce battles ensued in the Strip. The fighting continued to escalate over the course of the morning and afternoon, with at least 90 Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers killed, a third said kidnapped by Hamas; the temporary truce, the longest scheduled lull to date in this operation, was halted in its infancy and forgotten - back to the battlefield and back to the drawing board.
By agreeing to the lengthy truce, Hamas in effect surrendered – to Israel's military pressure, to the superiority of the Palestinian Authority pushing it into negotiations, and to the Egyptian mediators drafting the terms of the proposal. It is not known whether the breach of truce on Friday morning was carried out by Hamas local militants at their own discretion or upon orders of the top echelon. The latter is unlikely, but regardless of which militants attacked and on what level, it is Hamas' political leadership that ultimately answers to and accepts responsibility for every military action, as the rulers of the Gaza Strip.
Egypt told the Palestinians this week, following the snub of its exclusion from U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's intervention, that they would not be invited back to Cairo for further negotiations until a temporary cease-fire had been set in place. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas met with Hamas political leader Khaled Meshal on Thursday in a furious bid to convince him to agree to Egypt's terms and to a temporary lull, as the only way to set into motion negotiations for an actual end to the war. Hamas is a serious organization with a calculated political echelon. Meshal's word to abide by the truce was solid, indicating the Hamas political echelon's readiness to take the next step and move toward a permanent agreement.
The 72-hour truce was intended to give the sides the necessary time to hash out the details of Egypt's revised draft – one that included numerous changes acquiescing to Hamas' demands, particularly freedom of movement through Gaza's southern border crossing. With calm on the battle front, an amenable agreement could be determined and the real negotiations – on the future security arrangements in Gaza and on its borders – could begin. Following the breach of truce, Egypt informed Israel and the Palestinians that its delegations were no longer expected in Cairo on Friday, its conditions firm and unchanged: No negotiations until a temporary cease-fire is in place.
The Hamas leadership is divided into three hierarchical but highly coordinated governing bodies: the Majlis al-Shura, a religious council nominally in charge of the movement's strategic decisions and supervision of its activities; followed by the political bureau, run by Khaled Meshal from Qatar and Ismail Haniyeh, his chief deputy in Gaza; and the subordinate Iz A-din Qassam Brigades, the movement's military wing.
Hierarchy aside, the three bodies' decisions are made in tandem with one another. The military wing is not a renegade branch free to act of its accord. Every decision on the military front must be made with the knowledge and blessing of the political wing and the ruling council. There are cracks in communication, however, and not all orders are carried out; a likely explanation of the initial breach of truce on Friday morning: This is particularly true among the rank-and-file of Hamas' military command, where there is a growing sense of distance and abandonment from the political leadership. If it was Hamas that breached the truce on Friday – and not members of a separate Palestinian faction – it was a decision made within the mid-level military command, either by militants in the trenches unaware that a cease-fire had been declared or by those acting in defiance of political order. Regardless of why and how the breach of truce emerged, however, Hamas has in its wake withdrawn from its agreement and returned to battle mode.
Hamas opened this war three weeks ago because it had nothing to lose: it knew that firing rockets on Israel would draw fierce aerial attacks and likely lead to a ground invasion, along with a serious death toll among its civilian population; it knew that its long-range rocket supply would be wiped out by rapid fire and Israeli strikes, and it knew that even if it won back its former allies Hezbollah and Iran, there was no way they could help replenish its arsenal or that arms would flow again into its tightly secured borders.
Hamas also knew that it had surprise weaponry and strategies capable of inflicting more harm than either Israel or the world could have anticipated. Through its labyrinth of tunnels it managed to store hundreds of mid-range and dozens of long-range rockets (far beyond Israeli intelligence estimates), and beyond that, its greatest weapon of all: the ability to infiltrate Israel and launch its own ground incursion on enemy territory.
Hamas militants have managed to enter Israel through these tunnels at least five times in three weeks, a number of ambushes into Israeli territory unseen since the war in 1948. A 3 km security zone has been demarcated along the border inside Gaza, but no such buffer is in place inside Israel – civilians and soldiers sit meters from the border, on top of the tunnel openings. Israeli forces have located and destroyed dozens of the tunnels inside Gaza, but many remain hidden, including the openings into Israeli territory. The infiltrations can and will continue until either a cease-fire is secured or Israel is forced to evacuate its border towns and create a security strip of significant radius – a complicated and strategically difficult endeavor.
In battle terms, Israel has already won this war: 63 soldiers killed and three civilians, compared to more than 1,450 Palestinian fatalities, among them 400-500 combatant according to IDF estimates, and unimaginable destruction of Gaza's cities and villages. Hamas' leaders have already bent to political pressure, prepared to negotiate, but are of the same mind as their militants and those of the other Palestinian factions – no surrender and no end except on their own terms. Hamas can't lose this war, because they have nothing to lose. Its militants are prepared to fight until Israel, military power or not, cries uncle – or until the powers negotiating a permanent agreement relent, and include its terms in their entirety, an unlikely scenario at this point. Gaza may be demilitarized in the end, as Israel and Egypt hope, but it may well be through Hamas' own self-destruction, in months and countless deaths ahead. Without a quick and immediate cease-fire, this war will continue indefinitely.
By agreeing to the lengthy truce, Hamas in effect surrendered – to Israel's military pressure, to the superiority of the Palestinian Authority pushing it into negotiations, and to the Egyptian mediators drafting the terms of the proposal. It is not known whether the breach of truce on Friday morning was carried out by Hamas local militants at their own discretion or upon orders of the top echelon. The latter is unlikely, but regardless of which militants attacked and on what level, it is Hamas' political leadership that ultimately answers to and accepts responsibility for every military action, as the rulers of the Gaza Strip.
Egypt told the Palestinians this week, following the snub of its exclusion from U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's intervention, that they would not be invited back to Cairo for further negotiations until a temporary cease-fire had been set in place. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas met with Hamas political leader Khaled Meshal on Thursday in a furious bid to convince him to agree to Egypt's terms and to a temporary lull, as the only way to set into motion negotiations for an actual end to the war. Hamas is a serious organization with a calculated political echelon. Meshal's word to abide by the truce was solid, indicating the Hamas political echelon's readiness to take the next step and move toward a permanent agreement.
The 72-hour truce was intended to give the sides the necessary time to hash out the details of Egypt's revised draft – one that included numerous changes acquiescing to Hamas' demands, particularly freedom of movement through Gaza's southern border crossing. With calm on the battle front, an amenable agreement could be determined and the real negotiations – on the future security arrangements in Gaza and on its borders – could begin. Following the breach of truce, Egypt informed Israel and the Palestinians that its delegations were no longer expected in Cairo on Friday, its conditions firm and unchanged: No negotiations until a temporary cease-fire is in place.
The Hamas leadership is divided into three hierarchical but highly coordinated governing bodies: the Majlis al-Shura, a religious council nominally in charge of the movement's strategic decisions and supervision of its activities; followed by the political bureau, run by Khaled Meshal from Qatar and Ismail Haniyeh, his chief deputy in Gaza; and the subordinate Iz A-din Qassam Brigades, the movement's military wing.
Hierarchy aside, the three bodies' decisions are made in tandem with one another. The military wing is not a renegade branch free to act of its accord. Every decision on the military front must be made with the knowledge and blessing of the political wing and the ruling council. There are cracks in communication, however, and not all orders are carried out; a likely explanation of the initial breach of truce on Friday morning: This is particularly true among the rank-and-file of Hamas' military command, where there is a growing sense of distance and abandonment from the political leadership. If it was Hamas that breached the truce on Friday – and not members of a separate Palestinian faction – it was a decision made within the mid-level military command, either by militants in the trenches unaware that a cease-fire had been declared or by those acting in defiance of political order. Regardless of why and how the breach of truce emerged, however, Hamas has in its wake withdrawn from its agreement and returned to battle mode.
Hamas opened this war three weeks ago because it had nothing to lose: it knew that firing rockets on Israel would draw fierce aerial attacks and likely lead to a ground invasion, along with a serious death toll among its civilian population; it knew that its long-range rocket supply would be wiped out by rapid fire and Israeli strikes, and it knew that even if it won back its former allies Hezbollah and Iran, there was no way they could help replenish its arsenal or that arms would flow again into its tightly secured borders.
Hamas also knew that it had surprise weaponry and strategies capable of inflicting more harm than either Israel or the world could have anticipated. Through its labyrinth of tunnels it managed to store hundreds of mid-range and dozens of long-range rockets (far beyond Israeli intelligence estimates), and beyond that, its greatest weapon of all: the ability to infiltrate Israel and launch its own ground incursion on enemy territory.
Hamas militants have managed to enter Israel through these tunnels at least five times in three weeks, a number of ambushes into Israeli territory unseen since the war in 1948. A 3 km security zone has been demarcated along the border inside Gaza, but no such buffer is in place inside Israel – civilians and soldiers sit meters from the border, on top of the tunnel openings. Israeli forces have located and destroyed dozens of the tunnels inside Gaza, but many remain hidden, including the openings into Israeli territory. The infiltrations can and will continue until either a cease-fire is secured or Israel is forced to evacuate its border towns and create a security strip of significant radius – a complicated and strategically difficult endeavor.
In battle terms, Israel has already won this war: 63 soldiers killed and three civilians, compared to more than 1,450 Palestinian fatalities, among them 400-500 combatant according to IDF estimates, and unimaginable destruction of Gaza's cities and villages. Hamas' leaders have already bent to political pressure, prepared to negotiate, but are of the same mind as their militants and those of the other Palestinian factions – no surrender and no end except on their own terms. Hamas can't lose this war, because they have nothing to lose. Its militants are prepared to fight until Israel, military power or not, cries uncle – or until the powers negotiating a permanent agreement relent, and include its terms in their entirety, an unlikely scenario at this point. Gaza may be demilitarized in the end, as Israel and Egypt hope, but it may well be through Hamas' own self-destruction, in months and countless deaths ahead. Without a quick and immediate cease-fire, this war will continue indefinitely.
Sunday, July 27, 2014
The UNHRC farce must not undermine an Israel-Gaza truce
Of all the United Nations agencies, the most obscure and self-defeating is the Human Rights Council. There are many organizations and bodies under UN auspices, some of them important for world peace – such as the Security Council and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) – and those whose mandate is to clean the world of hunger and human injustices – the World Health Organization, the International Children's Fund, the Food and Agricultural Organization, the Refugee Agency and the Relief and Works Agency, tailor-made to deal with Palestinian refugees.
Each of these contributes to the betterment of humanity. The only UN body with the word human in its name, the UNHRC, is the most detached from humanity.
The UNHRC in Geneva returned last week to its favorite topic, one which it has focused on intensively from its very first session in 2006: Israeli crimes against humanity. To call it anti-Israel is an understatement, and one need not be pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian to deduce such from its track record.
In the 21 sessions since its inception in 2006 as the successor to the heavily criticized Commission on Human Rights, the UNHRC has released seven resolutions calling for investigation of Israeli human rights violations – one-third of its efforts. Four resolutions have been opened in that time against Syria (170,000 dead), two on Darfur (300,000 killed), and one on Libya (25,000 fatalities at the height of its 2011 civil war) – each of these countries guilty of extreme crimes against humanity. None of these resolutions or commissions of inquiry have yielded results other than deploring certain actions and a declaration of intent to investigate. None too, will its latest resolution on Israel.
The UNHRC's resolution on July 23 called for an urgent commission of inquiry into Israel's war crimes in the Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem. It expressed "grave concern" over the lack of implementation from its previous commission charged with investigating human rights violations, led by Richard Goldstone, following the 2009 Gaza war, "convinced that lack of accountability for violations of international law reinforces a culture of impunity, leading to a recurrence of violations and seriously endangering the maintenance of international peace."
In the five pages of its latest resolution, Israel was noted 18 times – once calling for an end of attacks against civilians, including Israeli, and the rest deploring Israeli military aggressions, the incitement of extremist and illegal Israeli settlers, Israeli occupation, Israeli arrests of Palestinians, and Israeli failures to protect Palestinian civilians in accordance with international law. All important, all ignorant of the other side's own activities.
Hamas was not mentioned even once, not even in the brief clause demanding attention to the attacks against Israeli civilians. There was no clause recommending investigation into the Gazan government's use of civilian buildings as cover for its illegal tunnels housing weapons depots and launchers, nor into the widespread reports of its urging residents to ignore Israeli military warnings to evacuate – the word 'human shield' has never once been used in eight years of resolutions.
Twenty-nine of 46 member states voted in favor of the UNHRC's latest resolution, including India, in what has been seen as a major policy shift, as part of its alliance with the BRIC countries. Only the United States voted against the resolution; 17 countries abstained – all European. Their abstention, as the major voting bloc in the council, was tantamount to approval; in the UNHRC there is an automatic majority against Israel.
The resolution, as in most of the UN bodies – including the General Assembly and the Security Council - is not binding. It is a recommendation alone, one that reflects the "resolve" of a particular body, enforcing the views of its member states. There is little chance of legal intervention and unless the International Criminal Court or member states of the UNHRC choose to adopt the body's decision as legally binding nationally, the resolution will have no official impact on Israeli actions, nor can it threaten its legal status in international law.
What this resolution does, in effect, is isolate Israel as a violator of human rights, regardless of circumstance. In expressing its concern over the "lack of findings" in Goldstone's 2009 report, it neglects to mention that Goldstone himself retracted his findings of Israeli guilt of war crimes and possible crimes against humanity [an investigation which Israel refused to cooperate with]: "While the investigations published by the Israeli military and recognized in the UN committee's report have established the validity of some incidents that we investigated in cases involving individual soldiers, they also indicate that civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy," Goldstone said in his retraction.
Goldstone, who also served as chief prosecutor in the international tribunals of Yugoslavia and Rwanda following those genocides, criticized the UNHRC at the time of his retraction as a body that "repeatedly rush[es] to pass condemnatory resolutions in the face of alleged violations of human rights law by Israel but ... have failed to take similar action in the face of even more serious violations by other States. Until the Gaza Report they failed to condemn the firing of rockets and mortars at Israeli civilian centers."
The pattern is clear. The United Nations Human Rights Council has no bearing on international law, only on opinion. International efforts to determine crimes against humanity must not be left to an obscure council to determine – particularly not one in which nearly half of its members abstain in vote. There are tribunals for these prosecutions, obliged by international law to take into context the full picture – in this case, not just Israeli violations, but those of Hamas too. Any tribunal that fails to mention the crimes of Gaza's rulers has failed in its task of adhering to international law, regardless of its findings on Israeli actions.
The United Nations Human Rights Council should focus its efforts on the massacres still happening in Syria and in Iraq's Mosul region – where militias unbound by international law are at relentless and unsupervised war.
The conflict between Israel and Hamas – the latter which wishes to be seen as a viable regime with nearly three million people under its authority, with little military and political support – must first be concluded in a cease-fire between the two governments and then in a political agreement involving either the Palestinian Authority or an international supervising force, to ensure a long-standing cease-fire. Declarations of crimes against humanity on the part of Israel are premature, preconceived, and ignorant of the facts on the ground.
Each of these contributes to the betterment of humanity. The only UN body with the word human in its name, the UNHRC, is the most detached from humanity.
The UNHRC in Geneva returned last week to its favorite topic, one which it has focused on intensively from its very first session in 2006: Israeli crimes against humanity. To call it anti-Israel is an understatement, and one need not be pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian to deduce such from its track record.
In the 21 sessions since its inception in 2006 as the successor to the heavily criticized Commission on Human Rights, the UNHRC has released seven resolutions calling for investigation of Israeli human rights violations – one-third of its efforts. Four resolutions have been opened in that time against Syria (170,000 dead), two on Darfur (300,000 killed), and one on Libya (25,000 fatalities at the height of its 2011 civil war) – each of these countries guilty of extreme crimes against humanity. None of these resolutions or commissions of inquiry have yielded results other than deploring certain actions and a declaration of intent to investigate. None too, will its latest resolution on Israel.
The UNHRC's resolution on July 23 called for an urgent commission of inquiry into Israel's war crimes in the Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem. It expressed "grave concern" over the lack of implementation from its previous commission charged with investigating human rights violations, led by Richard Goldstone, following the 2009 Gaza war, "convinced that lack of accountability for violations of international law reinforces a culture of impunity, leading to a recurrence of violations and seriously endangering the maintenance of international peace."
In the five pages of its latest resolution, Israel was noted 18 times – once calling for an end of attacks against civilians, including Israeli, and the rest deploring Israeli military aggressions, the incitement of extremist and illegal Israeli settlers, Israeli occupation, Israeli arrests of Palestinians, and Israeli failures to protect Palestinian civilians in accordance with international law. All important, all ignorant of the other side's own activities.
Hamas was not mentioned even once, not even in the brief clause demanding attention to the attacks against Israeli civilians. There was no clause recommending investigation into the Gazan government's use of civilian buildings as cover for its illegal tunnels housing weapons depots and launchers, nor into the widespread reports of its urging residents to ignore Israeli military warnings to evacuate – the word 'human shield' has never once been used in eight years of resolutions.
Twenty-nine of 46 member states voted in favor of the UNHRC's latest resolution, including India, in what has been seen as a major policy shift, as part of its alliance with the BRIC countries. Only the United States voted against the resolution; 17 countries abstained – all European. Their abstention, as the major voting bloc in the council, was tantamount to approval; in the UNHRC there is an automatic majority against Israel.
The resolution, as in most of the UN bodies – including the General Assembly and the Security Council - is not binding. It is a recommendation alone, one that reflects the "resolve" of a particular body, enforcing the views of its member states. There is little chance of legal intervention and unless the International Criminal Court or member states of the UNHRC choose to adopt the body's decision as legally binding nationally, the resolution will have no official impact on Israeli actions, nor can it threaten its legal status in international law.
What this resolution does, in effect, is isolate Israel as a violator of human rights, regardless of circumstance. In expressing its concern over the "lack of findings" in Goldstone's 2009 report, it neglects to mention that Goldstone himself retracted his findings of Israeli guilt of war crimes and possible crimes against humanity [an investigation which Israel refused to cooperate with]: "While the investigations published by the Israeli military and recognized in the UN committee's report have established the validity of some incidents that we investigated in cases involving individual soldiers, they also indicate that civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy," Goldstone said in his retraction.
Goldstone, who also served as chief prosecutor in the international tribunals of Yugoslavia and Rwanda following those genocides, criticized the UNHRC at the time of his retraction as a body that "repeatedly rush[es] to pass condemnatory resolutions in the face of alleged violations of human rights law by Israel but ... have failed to take similar action in the face of even more serious violations by other States. Until the Gaza Report they failed to condemn the firing of rockets and mortars at Israeli civilian centers."
The pattern is clear. The United Nations Human Rights Council has no bearing on international law, only on opinion. International efforts to determine crimes against humanity must not be left to an obscure council to determine – particularly not one in which nearly half of its members abstain in vote. There are tribunals for these prosecutions, obliged by international law to take into context the full picture – in this case, not just Israeli violations, but those of Hamas too. Any tribunal that fails to mention the crimes of Gaza's rulers has failed in its task of adhering to international law, regardless of its findings on Israeli actions.
The United Nations Human Rights Council should focus its efforts on the massacres still happening in Syria and in Iraq's Mosul region – where militias unbound by international law are at relentless and unsupervised war.
The conflict between Israel and Hamas – the latter which wishes to be seen as a viable regime with nearly three million people under its authority, with little military and political support – must first be concluded in a cease-fire between the two governments and then in a political agreement involving either the Palestinian Authority or an international supervising force, to ensure a long-standing cease-fire. Declarations of crimes against humanity on the part of Israel are premature, preconceived, and ignorant of the facts on the ground.
Friday, July 25, 2014
Flight ban to Israel was a Hamas victory, and that battle is not over yet
When most of the world's leading airlines canceled their scheduled flights to Tel Aviv this week, Israel rushed to dispel security concerns and Hamas claimed victory. But Israel's assurances were haste and the Islamist organization's crow was in place: It was indeed a strategic advance for Hamas, both in security terms and in psychological warfare.
The U.S. and EU aviation authorities issued their ban because they have no way of ensuring that a rocket aimed at Ben Gurion Airport or anywhere in central Israel does not hit one of their national carriers over Israel's airspace. Thirty-six hours after releasing the recommendations, both agencies reversed their decisions and flights were resumed, yet the damage was already done.
The initial decision to suspend flights was made just days after the Malaysia-bound MH-17 commercial jet was hit by a missile fired over East Ukraine and hours after a house in the central Israeli city of Yehud was completely demolished by a direct hit from a rocket aimed at the airport just a short distance away.
These authorities have flight advisories over just about every war zone on earth – from Mali to Libya and Syria, Iraq to East Ukraine. The recommendation to restrict flights over Israel – where dozens of rockets fly directly into the commercial air corridor on a daily basis – was sound, made in line with legitimate safety concerns. It was not, as some critics posit, a boycott of Israel or a deliberate bow by the international communities in Hamas' favor.
American and European carriers resumed their flights Friday after receiving Israeli security assurances, but the lifting of the ban might be short-lived: Two commercial planes, Air Canada and Easy Jet, were within minutes of landing at Ben Gurion the morning the flights resumed, when three Hamas M-75s were fired at Ben Gurion. Both flights quickly rerouted back over the sea, waiting for the all-clear sign before returning toward Israel and continuing their descent.
Thousands of internet enthusiasts followed the action on the live tracker flightradar24.com – there is no guarantee that Hamas is not doing the same, launching their rockets the moment incoming flights enter the radar.
Despite the sense of normalcy that abounds in Tel Aviv as rockets are intercepted mid-air close to the airport, the fact is that Israel is under rapid rocket fire from the Gaza Strip. Israel has pled with the international community to recognize the constant barrage of explosives targeting its citizens, yet rushed to assure the same countries that the security concerns should not affect air traffic. In terms of both international opinion and safety, Israel would have done well to hold off on these assurances.
Hamas has scored two main victories on this front: The first – strategic – was in successfully creating a volatile security trap. The threat to human life on the ground is minimal, especially considering the inaccuracy of the long-range rockets, but it is not foregone. Most of these rockets have been intercepted by the Iron Dome, with the main danger being falling shrapnel, but the defense system's success rate stands only at around 70 percent now, 20 percent less than at the beginning of the war. Commercial planes flying overhead at the moment a rocket is fired or explodes on interception impact are even more vulnerable than vehicles, buildings or living beings in Tel Aviv. The security threat mid-air is real and it is immediate.
Hamas' second victory – psychological - was imbuing in Israelis a sense of siege, first from the constant rocket fire and then from the realization that freedom of movement outside of our Middle Eastern island was suddenly restricted by the cancelation of flights. El Al and Arkia added flights to their schedule to accommodate stranded passengers, but at prices boosted some 150 percent. British Airways was one of the only international airlines to continue its regularly scheduled traffic to Israel, as did Turkish and Ukrainian airlines – neither of the latter particularly desirable destinations for Israelis at this point. Hamas, whether intentionally or not, has shown Israelis what it means to be under blockade.
Neither of these military advances by Hamas trumps the severity of the Israeli operation in Gaza. The IDF's goal was to demolish the tunnels housing rockets and launchers, and it is succeeding in that operation. Nearly 900 Palestinians, mostly civilians, have been killed and more than 4,000 wounded; 35 Israeli soldiers and three civilians have died over the course of the war. Cease-fire negotiations are progressing, with indications that Hamas is willing to agree to an amended version of the Egyptian proposal offered two weeks ago.
Israel will win this war, but Hamas will declare itself victor – much as Hezbollah did in 2006, when it succeeded in showing Israel that the rules of the game have changed, regardless of the number of casualties or the impact on weapons strongholds. Militant organizations no longer rely on the guerilla warfare that once characterized them. Their strategies are improving, their training is tighter, and regardless of the body count at the end of the battles, their victories are real and they are immediate. In war, every battle counts.
Thursday, July 24, 2014
The IDF's moral and legal dilemma in defining a 'kidnapped' soldier as MIA or fallen
The Israel Defense Force's official death toll in the Gaza Strip is now 32 – with a 33rd name released to the public and marked in red on its list of fallen, awaiting confirmation: Sgt. Oron Shaul, who Hamas claims to have kidnapped after attacking his APC in Gaza and killing the other six soldiers on board.
Shaul's status is in limbo. In a carefully worded announcement, the IDF said that the identification process of his remains was still in progress and that the inquiry would continue. The army has not released an official declaration defining Shaul as missing in action, nor whether he is dead or alive. This ambiguous statement reflects the sensitivity of the situation. Without saying so - except in hinted leaks to the media - the IDF estimates that there is no chance that Shaul survived the deadly attack on his APC. The vehicle was seen as a ball of fire, so one could only imagine the condition of those trapped inside. It took the army two days to identify the bodies of Shaul's six comrades and to confirm their deaths. So why the ambiguity on the part of the IDF?
The careful official wording of Shaul's status is rooted in the IDF's practice of categorization, which incorporates military and Jewish traditions, thus taking the problem beyond just a legalistic realm into a question of religious ethics and morality.
The IDF uses three main categories to define such cases. The first one is obvious: that the soldier was killed. This means that a body or body parts have been carefully identified, nowadays using DNA samples (though in the past only dental x-rays were used), and the soldier's remains are buried.
The second category is defined as "a fallen soldier whose burial place is unknown." This means that sufficient evidence has been collected verifying the soldier's death, either from intelligence sources or eyewitnesses confirming that he had died in battle, but that the body itself has not been found and recovered. There is a special plot in the military cemetery on Mount Herzl dedicated to these soldiers, most of them unidentified fallen from the 1948 Independence Day War.
The third category used by the IDF is defining the soldier as "missing in action," which, simply put, means there is no indication of his whereabouts or what happened to him.
In this case, the IDF is still trying to determine what exactly happened to Sgt. Oron Shaul.
Most of the inquiries into the circumstances of Shaul's disappearance are based on intelligence, with the hope – though without high expectations – that Hamas will make an official announcement declaring the soldier alive or dead, and if dead whether they are holding his body, parts of his body, or just the identification tag they displayed when declaring that he had been kidnapped following the attack.
Until the mystery is lifted, the IDF cannot and will not officially define Shaul's status – neither as missing in action or as dead.
There have been several cases in the past in which it was quite clear to the IDF that a soldier or soldiers had died, but the families refused to accept that definition, and battled the army in court to prevent the declaration of their sons as a fallen soldier or as a fallen soldier whose place of burial is unknown.
The most well-known example followed the battle of Sultan Yaakoub during the First Lebanon War in 1982, pertaining to three soldiers most probably killed in that battle, but whose bodies were not found.
Despite eyewitness testimonies describing the soldiers' tank as hit and obliterated, the families – who were religious – refused to allow the IDF to declare them as killed in action.
A more recent case involved the status of Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, the two soldiers whose abduction by the Hezbollah sparked the Second Lebanon War in 2006, and whose bodies were returned to Israel after two years of lengthy negotiations. Hezbollah never revealed whether they had been killed before the kidnap or died in the militants' hands.
As it stands, the IDF has neither the intelligence, pathological or medical evidence proving Shaul's death, and as such cannot - due to tradition and army regulations - define him as killed in action or as fallen soldier whose burial place is unknown. But it also cannot yet define him as missing in action.
Shaul's status is in limbo. In a carefully worded announcement, the IDF said that the identification process of his remains was still in progress and that the inquiry would continue. The army has not released an official declaration defining Shaul as missing in action, nor whether he is dead or alive. This ambiguous statement reflects the sensitivity of the situation. Without saying so - except in hinted leaks to the media - the IDF estimates that there is no chance that Shaul survived the deadly attack on his APC. The vehicle was seen as a ball of fire, so one could only imagine the condition of those trapped inside. It took the army two days to identify the bodies of Shaul's six comrades and to confirm their deaths. So why the ambiguity on the part of the IDF?
The careful official wording of Shaul's status is rooted in the IDF's practice of categorization, which incorporates military and Jewish traditions, thus taking the problem beyond just a legalistic realm into a question of religious ethics and morality.
The IDF uses three main categories to define such cases. The first one is obvious: that the soldier was killed. This means that a body or body parts have been carefully identified, nowadays using DNA samples (though in the past only dental x-rays were used), and the soldier's remains are buried.
The second category is defined as "a fallen soldier whose burial place is unknown." This means that sufficient evidence has been collected verifying the soldier's death, either from intelligence sources or eyewitnesses confirming that he had died in battle, but that the body itself has not been found and recovered. There is a special plot in the military cemetery on Mount Herzl dedicated to these soldiers, most of them unidentified fallen from the 1948 Independence Day War.
The third category used by the IDF is defining the soldier as "missing in action," which, simply put, means there is no indication of his whereabouts or what happened to him.
In this case, the IDF is still trying to determine what exactly happened to Sgt. Oron Shaul.
Most of the inquiries into the circumstances of Shaul's disappearance are based on intelligence, with the hope – though without high expectations – that Hamas will make an official announcement declaring the soldier alive or dead, and if dead whether they are holding his body, parts of his body, or just the identification tag they displayed when declaring that he had been kidnapped following the attack.
Until the mystery is lifted, the IDF cannot and will not officially define Shaul's status – neither as missing in action or as dead.
There have been several cases in the past in which it was quite clear to the IDF that a soldier or soldiers had died, but the families refused to accept that definition, and battled the army in court to prevent the declaration of their sons as a fallen soldier or as a fallen soldier whose place of burial is unknown.
The most well-known example followed the battle of Sultan Yaakoub during the First Lebanon War in 1982, pertaining to three soldiers most probably killed in that battle, but whose bodies were not found.
Despite eyewitness testimonies describing the soldiers' tank as hit and obliterated, the families – who were religious – refused to allow the IDF to declare them as killed in action.
A more recent case involved the status of Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, the two soldiers whose abduction by the Hezbollah sparked the Second Lebanon War in 2006, and whose bodies were returned to Israel after two years of lengthy negotiations. Hezbollah never revealed whether they had been killed before the kidnap or died in the militants' hands.
As it stands, the IDF has neither the intelligence, pathological or medical evidence proving Shaul's death, and as such cannot - due to tradition and army regulations - define him as killed in action or as fallen soldier whose burial place is unknown. But it also cannot yet define him as missing in action.
Monday, July 21, 2014
Hamas' terms for a cease-fire could be the answer for Israel
As Israel's operation in Gaza reaches into its third week, it can already be called a war, one with a life-expectancy of at least another week or two. Unless a cease-fire agreement is consolidated in the next few days that meets the terms of both Israel and Hamas, as well as those of Egypt, the ground incursion will continue and the number of casualties on both sides will triple.
This operation bears more similarities to the Second Lebanon War than either of Israel's actions in Gaza in 2009 or 2012, both in the alarming numbers of casualties among Palestinian civilians and Israeli soldiers, and in Hamas' well trained combat strategies and infiltrations, reminiscent of those undertaken by Hezbollah in 2006.
Hamas has made good on its promise of turning the Gaza Strip into a graveyard for Israeli soldiers, with at least 25 IDF deaths confirmed so far. The death toll among Palestinians has reached nearly 550, and though there are is no exact count of women and children among this number, the vast battles in crowded civilian neighborhood as well as the air strikes on hospitals, mosques and schools concealing Hamas' weaponry indicates a percentage far higher than the number of militant casualties.
Over 1,100 Lebanese civilians were killed in the 31 days of fighting in 2006, and 121 Israeli soldiers, with 4,000 rockets fired at Israeli civilians – at the rate this operation is going, half the time so far of Lebanon, the 2014 Gaza war will produce far more devastation. Hamas has insisted that it will keep on fighting, and its ground battles against Israel in the center of the Gaza Strip have been relentless, as has its rocket attacks against southern and central Israel. No long-range M-302 has been fired at northern Israel in nearly a week, signaling that either Israel has demolished this supply or that Hamas has hidden it well while it focuses on head-to-head combat and close range accuracy.
Hamas has lured the IDF into crowded neighborhoods in Gaza, increasing the casualties on both sides and surprising the Israeli troops with its tactics of ambush, particularly using anti-tank missiles, but its greatest surprise so far has been its infiltration through Gaza tunnels into populated Israeli territory. At least three infiltrations have been successful so far, begging the question of why the IDF does not focus its battles along the border to strike their openings, rather than being lured by Hamas into the crowded neighborhoods of Gaza City where these tunnels are based to hide headquarter operations and rocket depots.
Two channels of cease-fire negotiations are currently underway. Former National Security Adviser Giora Eiland defined them to me in our conversation tonight as such: the first, in Cairo, where the Egyptian mediators of the first proposal offered last week are negotiating with Israeli, Hamas, Palestinian Authority and international officials. UN Chief Ban Ki-moon arrived Monday for talks and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was due to land tonight with a message from his boss Barack Obama to reach a cease-fire as soon as possible.
On the other channel, Hamas is negotiating with Turkey and Qatar, and solidifying its stance that it will not bend to demands, telling Arab media outlets that its mediators on that end support its stance.
These two channels represent two possible outcomes: the first is the one offered and accepted by Israel and rejected by Hamas, which stipulates two phases of a cease-fire, beginning with a halt in hostilities followed by a negotiations process of future security arrangements. The second is coordinated by Hamas, with the apparent support of Qatar – its main and only benefactor – and Turkey, which calls for a one-phase cease-fire that encompasses all demands in one swift agreement.
Israel and Egypt are coordinated in the two-phase proposal, and even in the initial decision of the IDF to enter Gaza to locate the tunnels in an effort to wipe out Hamas' military capabilities and bring about the inevitable demilitarization of Gaza, be its future government run by Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, or an international entity.
Considering Hamas' refusals, it is likely that Turkey and particularly Qatar – tasked as the overseer of any rehabilitation in Gaza post-truce – will yield the upper hand in the actual cease-fire to come. Israel has made clear that it will not interject in political decisions in Gaza, and has allied itself with Egypt to dismantle the military regime in Hamas. Israel is open to the Qatari proposals, however, and like Hamas, sees a benefit in the Islamist organization's main demand of opening the Rafah crossing - something Egypt is less inclined to agree to.
There are indications, however, that Egypt is willing to amend its cease-fire draft to accommodate this Hamas request, so long as the Islamist organization surrenders its military capabilities.
Despite Egypt's hesitation, Israel is likely to take a Qatari proposal based on Hamas demands into consideration. As long as the cease-fire stipulates a total halt to hostilities and demilitarization, Israel is amenable to the flow of international or Arab funds to rebuild Gaza (with a guarantee of no weapons influx), the complete opening of Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt, and temporary eases on seaports and the crossing with Israel to ensure the rehabilitation of civilian life in the strip.
The international heavyweights now in Gaza, the UN Secretary General and U.S. President Barack Obama's top diplomat, want to see a quick a swift resolution. Should their negotiations yield willingness with Egyptian President Abdel al-Sissi to negotiate with the Qatari and Turkish drafts as demanded by Hamas, a viable cease-fire proposal could emerge by tomorrow morning – though will likely take more than a few days of deliberations before presentation.
The ball is in Egypt's court tonight, and Israel's immediately thereafter, once an outline of the proposal has been presented. Otherwise, the casualty and refugee numbers of the 2014 Gaza war will far surpass those of Lebanon. Israel is not willing to take that chance, particularly now as the negotiations with the Palestinian Authority have been put far on hold and the Iran nuclear talks have passed their deadline with barely any media attention.
Israel has no interest in seeing this war escalate, and neither does Hamas – no matter what gains it thinks it has reached, it depends on international support, funding, and moreover recognition, and with the rising number of casualties on both sides along with the demolition of its rocket depot, it knows it has little chance of surviving beyond the next two weeks, unless a cease-fire is reached.
This operation bears more similarities to the Second Lebanon War than either of Israel's actions in Gaza in 2009 or 2012, both in the alarming numbers of casualties among Palestinian civilians and Israeli soldiers, and in Hamas' well trained combat strategies and infiltrations, reminiscent of those undertaken by Hezbollah in 2006.
Hamas has made good on its promise of turning the Gaza Strip into a graveyard for Israeli soldiers, with at least 25 IDF deaths confirmed so far. The death toll among Palestinians has reached nearly 550, and though there are is no exact count of women and children among this number, the vast battles in crowded civilian neighborhood as well as the air strikes on hospitals, mosques and schools concealing Hamas' weaponry indicates a percentage far higher than the number of militant casualties.
Over 1,100 Lebanese civilians were killed in the 31 days of fighting in 2006, and 121 Israeli soldiers, with 4,000 rockets fired at Israeli civilians – at the rate this operation is going, half the time so far of Lebanon, the 2014 Gaza war will produce far more devastation. Hamas has insisted that it will keep on fighting, and its ground battles against Israel in the center of the Gaza Strip have been relentless, as has its rocket attacks against southern and central Israel. No long-range M-302 has been fired at northern Israel in nearly a week, signaling that either Israel has demolished this supply or that Hamas has hidden it well while it focuses on head-to-head combat and close range accuracy.
Hamas has lured the IDF into crowded neighborhoods in Gaza, increasing the casualties on both sides and surprising the Israeli troops with its tactics of ambush, particularly using anti-tank missiles, but its greatest surprise so far has been its infiltration through Gaza tunnels into populated Israeli territory. At least three infiltrations have been successful so far, begging the question of why the IDF does not focus its battles along the border to strike their openings, rather than being lured by Hamas into the crowded neighborhoods of Gaza City where these tunnels are based to hide headquarter operations and rocket depots.
Two channels of cease-fire negotiations are currently underway. Former National Security Adviser Giora Eiland defined them to me in our conversation tonight as such: the first, in Cairo, where the Egyptian mediators of the first proposal offered last week are negotiating with Israeli, Hamas, Palestinian Authority and international officials. UN Chief Ban Ki-moon arrived Monday for talks and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was due to land tonight with a message from his boss Barack Obama to reach a cease-fire as soon as possible.
On the other channel, Hamas is negotiating with Turkey and Qatar, and solidifying its stance that it will not bend to demands, telling Arab media outlets that its mediators on that end support its stance.
These two channels represent two possible outcomes: the first is the one offered and accepted by Israel and rejected by Hamas, which stipulates two phases of a cease-fire, beginning with a halt in hostilities followed by a negotiations process of future security arrangements. The second is coordinated by Hamas, with the apparent support of Qatar – its main and only benefactor – and Turkey, which calls for a one-phase cease-fire that encompasses all demands in one swift agreement.
Israel and Egypt are coordinated in the two-phase proposal, and even in the initial decision of the IDF to enter Gaza to locate the tunnels in an effort to wipe out Hamas' military capabilities and bring about the inevitable demilitarization of Gaza, be its future government run by Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, or an international entity.
Considering Hamas' refusals, it is likely that Turkey and particularly Qatar – tasked as the overseer of any rehabilitation in Gaza post-truce – will yield the upper hand in the actual cease-fire to come. Israel has made clear that it will not interject in political decisions in Gaza, and has allied itself with Egypt to dismantle the military regime in Hamas. Israel is open to the Qatari proposals, however, and like Hamas, sees a benefit in the Islamist organization's main demand of opening the Rafah crossing - something Egypt is less inclined to agree to.
There are indications, however, that Egypt is willing to amend its cease-fire draft to accommodate this Hamas request, so long as the Islamist organization surrenders its military capabilities.
Despite Egypt's hesitation, Israel is likely to take a Qatari proposal based on Hamas demands into consideration. As long as the cease-fire stipulates a total halt to hostilities and demilitarization, Israel is amenable to the flow of international or Arab funds to rebuild Gaza (with a guarantee of no weapons influx), the complete opening of Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt, and temporary eases on seaports and the crossing with Israel to ensure the rehabilitation of civilian life in the strip.
The international heavyweights now in Gaza, the UN Secretary General and U.S. President Barack Obama's top diplomat, want to see a quick a swift resolution. Should their negotiations yield willingness with Egyptian President Abdel al-Sissi to negotiate with the Qatari and Turkish drafts as demanded by Hamas, a viable cease-fire proposal could emerge by tomorrow morning – though will likely take more than a few days of deliberations before presentation.
The ball is in Egypt's court tonight, and Israel's immediately thereafter, once an outline of the proposal has been presented. Otherwise, the casualty and refugee numbers of the 2014 Gaza war will far surpass those of Lebanon. Israel is not willing to take that chance, particularly now as the negotiations with the Palestinian Authority have been put far on hold and the Iran nuclear talks have passed their deadline with barely any media attention.
Israel has no interest in seeing this war escalate, and neither does Hamas – no matter what gains it thinks it has reached, it depends on international support, funding, and moreover recognition, and with the rising number of casualties on both sides along with the demolition of its rocket depot, it knows it has little chance of surviving beyond the next two weeks, unless a cease-fire is reached.
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