Wednesday, March 05, 2008

War and negotiations

Yesterday, Pres. Mahmud Abbas of the PA announced in the presence of US Secty. of State Condoleeza Rice that he would suspend talks with Israel until there was a truce in Gaza. As it happens the IDF had already withdrawn from Gaza, but such facts don't seem to matter to the Palestinians. But, today he reversed himself and after another visit with Rice announced that the PA would continue to talk to Israel.
Rice apparently strong-armed him, probably threatening to cut off the PA from all US largesse and to persuade the EU to do the same. Since a truce with Hamas in Gaza is essentially impossible now, Abbas' earlier decision would have meant that there would be no further progress in the Annapolis peace talks. Hamas refuses to deal with Israel, and vice versa, Khaled Mashaal, Head of Hamas in Damascus, said that Hamas would not stop the rocket attacks, and criticized Abbas for talking to Israel and the US. Since Hamas does not speak to anyone with ties to the US but Egypt, and Rice came to Israel/Palestine after Cairo, there is no doubt that messages were also sent to Hamas.
Hamas refuses to stop rocket firing at Israel and today at least 7 were noted, notwithstanding the beating that Hamas militas took in the few days that the IDF was in Gaza (ca. 120 Palestinans were killed, ca. 80-90% of them gunmen, against two Israeli soldiers killed).
But, clearly such "in/out" operations do not stop the rockets, and now that Ashkelon is threatened Israel cannot allow this to continue. Consequently the Security Cabinet met today and decided that the IDF should be given a free hand to operate constantly in Gaza to stop the rockets! Hopefully this will be an "in" rather than an "in/out" operation. Apparently the IDF found the Hamas militias it fought in Jabalya much less formidable than it expected since they have rearmed themselves. Also, having learnt from the mistakes of the Second Lebanon war, many things were different this time, there were plenty of supplies of armaments and food, the liason between the infantry and tanks was excellent as was that between the army and the air force. If one considers Operation Warm Winter a success, then it was an excellent live training exercise for the IDF against some of the best Hamas fighters.
So now we expect to have the unexpected situation of negotiations continuing between Abbas and Olmert in Jerusalem while the IDF is fighting in Gaza. In the final analysis, nothing can come of the peace talks while the PA is split between supposedly pro-peace Fatah and anti-peace Hamas. Only when this schism is resolved can real progress be made, and it is questionable that Israel should be the instrument of ending this schism. However, the existence of a terrorist mini-state in Gaza on our doorstep has become intolerable.

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