Hamas ceasefire?
After one day to show their defiance, Hamas backed down and announced their own ceasefire a day after Israel announced it's unilateral ceasefire. In a formal statement read in Damascus their spokesman announced a separate unilateral ceasefire, starting today but lasting for one week only. Their condition is that if the IDF are not out of Gaza by then they will re-start hostilities. Since Israel does not recognize Hamas, this announcement will have no effect on Israel Government decisions.
Meanwhile an international conference, minus the USA that is right in the middle of the transfer from Bush to Obama, met in Sharm-al-Sheikh, under the co-sponsorship of Egypt and France. You could consider this Egypt's response to the rump Arab League session held in Doha last week that was dominated by Iran and its allies.
Although I do not know what was accomplished at this session other than a photo op, the main Heads of State (Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Czech) will stop over in Jerusalem tomorrow to meet with Israel Govt. officials. No doubt they will discuss the MoU signed by FM TZipi Livni and Secty of State Rice, her last official act, to jointly act to stop the smuggling of arms and rockets into Gaza from Iran. It should be remembered that Egypt signed a pact with Israel in 2005 to do just that, but failed miserably to carry out its responsibility. However, now that the US and the other nations have joined the fray, maybe there will be a more serious Egyptian effort. There is soemthing in the offing about building a high concrete fence (like the Israeli security fence) to stop infiltration from Gaza and dug deep enough into the sand to prevent tunnels being dug under it. I doubt that they can stop them altogether, but at least there's a more serious intent this time, after Israel has shown what it will do if the rockets continue. Also, George Brown of Britain has suggested setting up an international flotilla to patrol the Gaza coast to prevent the smugglng of weapons by sea. Unfortunately, it takes a war before they notice the situation, then they all reush to get in on the act.
If all of these meetings end in an agreement that satisfies Israel's conditions that there must be an unconditional ceasefire with no rockets being fired into Israel (two were fired today) and a cessation of smuggling of weapons into Gaza, and if a sufficiently long duration of the ceasefire can be indirectly agreed, then Operation Cast Lead will have resulted in peace of a kind for a while. Note, it is Israel that wants peace while Hamas wants eternal and continuous war against Israel.
Meanwhile an international conference, minus the USA that is right in the middle of the transfer from Bush to Obama, met in Sharm-al-Sheikh, under the co-sponsorship of Egypt and France. You could consider this Egypt's response to the rump Arab League session held in Doha last week that was dominated by Iran and its allies.
Although I do not know what was accomplished at this session other than a photo op, the main Heads of State (Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Czech) will stop over in Jerusalem tomorrow to meet with Israel Govt. officials. No doubt they will discuss the MoU signed by FM TZipi Livni and Secty of State Rice, her last official act, to jointly act to stop the smuggling of arms and rockets into Gaza from Iran. It should be remembered that Egypt signed a pact with Israel in 2005 to do just that, but failed miserably to carry out its responsibility. However, now that the US and the other nations have joined the fray, maybe there will be a more serious Egyptian effort. There is soemthing in the offing about building a high concrete fence (like the Israeli security fence) to stop infiltration from Gaza and dug deep enough into the sand to prevent tunnels being dug under it. I doubt that they can stop them altogether, but at least there's a more serious intent this time, after Israel has shown what it will do if the rockets continue. Also, George Brown of Britain has suggested setting up an international flotilla to patrol the Gaza coast to prevent the smugglng of weapons by sea. Unfortunately, it takes a war before they notice the situation, then they all reush to get in on the act.
If all of these meetings end in an agreement that satisfies Israel's conditions that there must be an unconditional ceasefire with no rockets being fired into Israel (two were fired today) and a cessation of smuggling of weapons into Gaza, and if a sufficiently long duration of the ceasefire can be indirectly agreed, then Operation Cast Lead will have resulted in peace of a kind for a while. Note, it is Israel that wants peace while Hamas wants eternal and continuous war against Israel.
posted by Jack Cohen at 1:47 PM
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