The victors seem to be acting a little less like victors these days, in spite of their rhetoric. According to this, Israel is going to get at least some of what it wants.
Hamas is prepared to agree to the deployment of Fatah forces at the crossings between the Gaza Strip and Israel, London based newspaper Asharq Alawsat reported on Saturday morning.
The group’s delegation in Cairo apparently told diplomats that the group would authorize such a move with the opening of the Rafah crossing on the condition that the personnel of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas were themselves residents of the Strip.
They only want Fatah forces who live in Gaza, presumably so they can threaten their families if they stray off the Hamas line. Of course, it’s still not good enough. Meantime, Europeans are promising to help.
But it all boils down to one thing: Egypt refuses to have foreign troops on her soil, and Egypt also refuses to truly stop the smuggling.
Egypt may be holding out on the nature of a foreign presence on its soil as a way to negotiate for increasing its own troops in Sinai; their numbers are limited by the 1979 Israel-Egypt peace treaty. For now, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and senior officials say a foreign presence on Egyptian soil is a “red line” they are not willing to cross.
No amount of help is going to do anything but reinforce the status quo. Europeans refuse to send in troops that will have the power to fire on smugglers if necessary—you’ll get exactly what you have in Lebanon, instances where Hezbollah threatens UNIFIL troops and UNIFIL runs away and then rarely bothers filing an official report.
Hamas violated the cease fire again this morning by firing a mortar at Israel that fell short.
Moshe Ya’alon says it will take Hamas only a year to restock its weapons. The tunnels are already back in operation. And Israel is considering letting some of the worst Hamas murderers go in exchange for Gilad Shalit.
So one has to ask: What was the war for, again? Because I’m starting to come down on the side of the cynics who say it was launched to keep Kadima in charge of Israel.
If it looks like the fighting accomplished nothing much for Israel, I can think of few better ways to ensure that Netanyahu wins the election. And that despite whatever the Obama administration does to prevent it, in the tradition of Clinton’s interference against Netanyahu a decade ago.
I wrote that they had to kill all the Hamas scum and reorganize governance in Gaza. Well they didn’t, now Israel will reap the rewards of not finishing the job. Hamas will rearm and start the war again at its own convenience, probably when Israel is preoccupied with something else (like Hezbollah in Lebanon). Meanwhile the daily rockets and mortats will continue. In the eyes of the world those attacks don’t constitute warmaking after all, I suppose because Arabs and not Jews are making the attacks. Jews killed by Hamas don’t count, only Arabs killed by Jews are worthy of notice to our oh-so-moral betters. Feh.
“In war there is no substitute for victory.” Douglas MacArthur.
Think of it this way, and everyone here knows I support Israel, but… (Things in quotes are perceptions, NOT my opinions…)
For three years, Israel stood by and did nothing, just took the rockets as part of daily life – then suddenly hit Gaza with an “excessive” amount of force. Why didn’t Israel just answer each rocket attack, say, an artillery barage on the exact spot it originated from? If Israel knew where the tunnels were, why didn’t the IDF take them out, one for every rocket attack? See where I’m going? The attack on whatever-it-was in Syria blew over in a couple of days, the IDF should have spread their efforts over the past three years, instead of doing it all in three weeks. Why not Commando raids – that the IDF is famous for – on rocket locations, take pics, get the evidence, blow the whole dump?
You see, public opinion isn’t based on the one response, but on the fact that Israel did nothing for three years, than unleashed everything. Bad PR. Of course, we all know why it happened, which is what so sad about it.
Politicians in Israel only care about protecting their people when an election looms…
With one exception, and he’s almost universally hated for it, even though he’s kept this country safe from terrorism for seven years. I look for that to change soon, however.
Robert
That next to last sentence is a little unclear, it should read “Politicians in general…”