News Update - August 13

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Israel and the Middle East News Update ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Wednesday, August 13 ------------------------------------------------------------ Headlines: * Israel Won’t Cooperate with UN Commission of Inquiry * Lieberman: Israel Must Defeat Hamas * Opposition to Netanyahu Strengthens After Gaza War * After Month of Fighting, Gazans Questioning Hamas Decisions * Hamas Official Says Group Preparing for ‘Long Battle’ * IDF to Line Gaza Border with Tunnel Detection Systems * Month of War Leaves Israel with Tricky Economic Outlook * Islamic State Seizes More Territory in Syria Commentary: * New York Times: “Role in Gaza Talks Signals a Comeback for Abbas" - By Isabel Kershner * Yedioth Ahronoth: "We've Seen This Bad Movie Before" - By Aviad Kleinberg ** Israel Radio ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Israel Won’t Cooperate with UN Commission of Inquiry ------------------------------------------------------------ Israel is expected to form an independent investigative committee for Operation Protective Edge, and will not cooperate with the Schabas commission. The political echelon in Jerusalem is drawing up a plan not to cooperate with the commission of inquiry formed by the UN Human Rights Council, but will form an Israeli investigative committee headed by a retired Supreme Court justice who is held in high regard by the international legal community. This committee will be given a mandate to investigate whether the use of force by IDF forces in the operation was proportional. See also, “State comptroller to investigate whether Israel violated int'l law during Gaza op” (Ha’aretz) (http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/1.610283) ** Ha'aretz ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Lieberman: Israel Must Defeat Hamas ------------------------------------------------------------ Israel must defeat Hamas even at the price of a further escalation of the conflict with Gaza, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said Wednesday, adding that no peace deal is possible until Hamas is vanquished. Speaking to local politicians in the south, Lieberman said Operation Protective Edge must not be halted until Hamas returns the bodies of Israeli soldiers killed in Gaza. He threatened that Israel would assassinate top Hamas leaders if Hamas did not return the bodies. See also, “Peres tells BBC: World must reinstall Abbas, Palestinian Authority as ruler in Gaza” (Jerusalem Post) (http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Peres-tells-BBC-World-must-reinstall-Abbas-Palestinian-Authority-as-ruler-in-Gaza-370929) ** Jerusalem Post ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Opposition to Netanyahu Strengthens After Gaza War (http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/Opposition-to-Netanyahu-strengthens-after-Gaza-war-370875) ------------------------------------------------------------ Prime Minister Netanyahu was not honest with the people of Israel regarding the fate of the Gaza Strip, opposition leader Herzog said in a speech to residents of Netiv Ha’asara, a moshav on the Gaza border, on Tuesday. Herzog backed Netanyahu throughout Operation Protective Edge, but he has been increasingly critical since IDF troops pulled out last week. “The real victory will only come in a diplomatic agreement and not in any other way,” Herzog said. Netanyahu also faced criticism from right-wing MKs inside the Likud ahead of a possible agreement with Hamas to extend ceasefire. See also, “Opposition leader Isaac Herzog: We must start a political process to create a Palestinian state” (BICOM) (http://www.bicom.org.uk/quote/22038/) . ** Ynet News ------------------------------------------------------------ ** After Month of Fighting, Gazans Questioning Hamas Decisions ------------------------------------------------------------ Gazans are starting to be vocal in their criticism of Hamas, the Washington Post reported Wednesday. Rafaat Shamiya, 40, a resident of Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, condemned the rocket fire from residential areas, as it inevitably resulted in an IDF reaction. “When they fire from here, Israel repays us with an F-16 airstrike,” Shamiya told the newspaper. “We don’t have the power to fight the Israeli. While he is sitting in his office in Israel, he can destroy all of Gaza by remote control.” Meanwhile, the paper said, other Gazans are criticizing Hamas for not accepting an Egyptian ceasefire proposal after the first week of the IDF operation. “All the people are whispering, ‘Why didn’t Hamas accept the Egyptian initiative in the beginning of the war when the casualties were still low?’ ” the Post quoted Palestinian journalist and political analyst Hani Habib as saying. See also, “As ware with Israel shatters lives, more Gazans questions Hamas decisions” (Washington Post) (http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/as-war-with-israel-shatters-lives-more-gazans-question-hamas-decisions/2014/08/12/71e3381e-e0a1-4243-ad49-09aef0656d2c_story.html?elq=b7d0b4c832c743378a7e80ddd5bb0d8c&elqCampaignId=2263) ** Jerusalem Post ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Hamas Official Says Group Preparing for 'Long Battle' (http://www.jpost.com/Operation-Protective-Edge/Hamas-says-group-preparing-for-long-battle-as-three-day-truce-nears-end-370885) ------------------------------------------------------------ The 72-hour cease-fire is to expire at midnight Wednesday, with Israeli officials unable or unwilling to predict whether it will be extended or the fighting will start anew. Finance Minister Yair Lapid, part of the eight-member security cabinet, said the gaps between Israel and Hamas in indirect talks in Cairo were “wide.” Yehya Musa, a senior Hamas official in the Gaza Strip, said his movement was preparing for a “long battle” with Israel. The Palestinians “won’t accept humiliation,” Musa said, during a pro-Hamas rally in Khan Yunis. See also, “Amidror: Reoccupation of Gaza ‘only military way’ to stop rockets” (Jerusalem Post) (http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Amidror-says-reoccupation-of-Gaza-only-military-way-to-stop-rockets-370894) ** Israel Hayom ------------------------------------------------------------ ** IDF to Line Gaza Border with Tunnel Detection Systems (http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=19409) ------------------------------------------------------------ Israel is preparing to build a network of sensors to try to detect tunnel building by terrorists along the 68-kilometer (42-mile) Israel-Gaza Strip border, and also plans to place physical obstacles in some of the more sensitive places along the border, a senior military official said Monday. According to the official, the system in question has successfully graduated its initial testing stages and will now be deployed on the ground for an operational trial. Should the trial prove successful, the military would have to invest between 1.5 and 2.5 billion shekels ($430 million to $720 million) in deploying the system along the border. He noted that it could take up to a year for the system to be fully in place and operational. The past few years have seen the Israel Defense Forces test some 700 pilot programs as part of its effort to counter the threat posed by terror tunnels along the southern border. ** Reuters ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Month of War Leaves Israel with Tricky Economic Outlook ------------------------------------------------------------ Israel's month-long war with Hamas in Gaza has added fuel to a Palestinian boycott movement and may damage investor sentiment towards Israel (http://www.reuters.com/places/israel?lc=int_mb_1001) at the margins, even if the $250 billion hi-tech economy (http://www.reuters.com/finance/economy?lc=int_mb_1001) looks set to emerge largely unscathed. Analysts expect the war to have dented growth and cost several billion dollars - foreign tourism alone fell by 25 percent in July. But Israel (http://www.reuters.com/places/israel?lc=int_mb_1001) has weathered such storms in the past and tends to rebound within a few months, with output expanding at around 3-4 percent a year in recent years. The additional concern this time is that unrest in the West Bank has become more frequent and intense, the threat of a resumption of war in Gaza - the fourth in eight years - is very real, and international criticism of Israel has been loud, particularly in Europe, fuelling those who support a boycott. . ** Reuters ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Islamic State Seizes More Territory in Syria (http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/13/us-syria-crisis-islamicstate-idUSKBN0GD0NR20140813?elq=b7d0b4c832c743378a7e80ddd5bb0d8c&elqCampaignId=2263) ------------------------------------------------------------ Islamic State insurgents have seized several towns and villages from rival Islamist groups in the Syrian province of Aleppo, opening the way for further westward advances. Islamic State's advance in Syria has accelerated since the group seized control of the Iraqi city of Mosul in June, declaring a caliphate in areas under its control in a bid to redraw the borders of the Middle East. Islamic State is tightening its grip over areas of Syria under its control, including the city of Raqqa on the Euphrates river. Raqqa has become Islamic State's Syrian power base. ** New York Times – August, 12, 2014 ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Role in Gaza Talks Signals a Comeback for Abbas ------------------------------------------------------------ By Isabel Kershner For months Israel called on President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority to break with Hamas, the Islamic group that controls Gaza, and to dismantle the new government that resulted from the reconciliation agreement. That April deal scuttled the American-backed Middle East negotiations as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly declared, “Whoever chooses the terrorism of Hamas does not want peace.” But Mr. Abbas is making a comeback as a major player in the Egyptian-mediated talks in Cairo to end the latest war in Gaza, and he is emerging as a potential linchpin for Israel, Egypt and Hamas as they seek new and lasting arrangements for that Palestinian coastal enclave.· Israel has no direct dealings with Hamas, which refuses to recognize Israel’s right to exist, and Egypt under President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has turned hostile to the group. So Mr. Netanyahu told reporters here last week that cooperation with the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority was “important” for the reconstruction of Gaza and the flow of humanitarian aid. He praised the authority for helping coordinate the second 72-hour cease-fire, which held for another day (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/11/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-strip-conflict.html) on Tuesday. And he has dropped his public condemnations of the Palestinian government. “Things have changed, don’t you agree?” Yair Lapid, Israel’s finance minister and the leader of the government’s second-largest party, Yesh Atid, said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “One of the problems we had with what they called the technocratic government was that everyone felt Hamas was too strong and might take over,” Mr. Lapid said. “Hamas has weakened since then, both militarily and policywise.” If Israel had worried before that the Palestinian reconciliation government supported by Hamas was “a tool for Hamas to go to the West Bank, now it can be a tool for bringing the West Bank to Gaza,” he added. Udi Dekel, a former lead Israeli negotiator with the Palestinians who is now a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, said that most of the Israeli government supported this idea of “turning the reconciliation inside out.” “The direction, without saying it loud and clear, is that Israel is reconciling itself to the reconciliation and trying to reap some benefits,” Mr. Dekel said. Evidence of a change in Israeli policy came with the arrival of Ziad Abu Amr, the deputy prime minister of the Palestinian Authority, in Gaza on Tuesday. Mr. Abu Amr said that the Israelis had repeatedly denied him a travel permit from the West Bank during the fighting, but that word came around 10 a.m. that he could enter Gaza through Israel’s Erez crossing. “I hope the Israelis are changing their mind and lifting the ban on the national reconciliation government,” he said in an interview. “I think Cairo is having a sobering effect. It’s going to bring everyone back to see reality and to be realistic.” Mr. Lapid and other centrist ministers have put forward their own plans in recent days for an ambitious new order, including the restoration of Palestinian Authority control in Gaza. That ended in 2007, when Hamas routed Mr. Abbas’s forces, leading to a bitter seven-year schism between the Palestinian factions. But Mr. Abbas remains politically weak among his people, and few of the Israeli ministers have an immediate prescription for restoring his rule in Gaza, beyond allowing the Palestinian Authority’s forces to supervise the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt. In addition, the fractious Israeli government coalition remains divided on the broader issue of peace and, some critics said, appears to lack any unified vision. The fact that several ministers have put forward plans “means the government has no plan,” Mr. Dekel said. Hamas has demanded the lifting of the economic blockade of Gaza, an expansion of the permitted fishing zone in the Mediterranean, a new seaport, (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/12/world/middleeast/palestinians-revive-dream-of-a-gaza-seaport.html?ref=world) the reconstruction of Gaza’s airport and the release of Palestinian prisoners, possibly in exchange for the remains of Israeli soldiers killed in the recent fighting. Israel backs the idea of an internationally financed reconstruction package for Gaza funneled through Mr. Abbas, to enable supervision and bolster his influence and standing among the Palestinians. Israel also wants measures to prevent Hamas from rearming. Mr. Lapid’s diplomatic initiative calls for an international conference, hosted by Egypt, to include the United States, Europe, Russia, Jordan, the Palestinian Authority, Israel and “moderate Arab states including Saudi Arabia,” to work for the demilitarization of Gaza and the return of the Palestinian Authority there. Mr. Lapid said that the plan was being discussed in the Israeli government and that there had been “some very interesting reactions from the Arab world,” though he refused to elaborate. “Everyone understands that the point is not to have some extended cease-fire for Gaza that will collapse in a few months or a year and a half at best. Something deeper needs to be achieved, and so there is a need to get the Arab world involved.” Another senior member of Mr. Lapid’s party, Yaakov Peri, the government’s minister for science and technology, went further, telling The Washington Post this week (http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/israel-palestinians-agree-to-new-cease-fire/2014/08/10/b198b6e0-20bd-11e4-8593-da634b334390_story.html) that the scope of the talks could expand to include a permanent Israeli-Palestinian peace deal based on the Arab Peace Initiative (http://www.al-bab.com/arab/docs/league/peace02.htm) , a plan first proposed in 2002 that offered Israel normalized relations throughout the Arab world. Tzipi Livni, the justice minister and the government’s chief negotiator with the Palestinians, last weekend presented her parameters for talks that include the restoration of the Palestinian Authority in Gaza. Issues like the seaport and airport should be discussed with Mr. Abbas’s Palestine Liberation Organization, she said, “as part of a final status agreement.” Asked if Mr. Netanyahu had adopted her proposal, she said cryptically, “The principles represent most of my friends in the government.” They presumably do not include Naftali Bennett, the leader of the right-wing Jewish Home party, who said in an interview on Israeli television on Monday that Mr. Abbas was “a partner for terror” and that the idea of a Palestinian state was over. “That line that Abu Mazen is some kind of Mama Teresa — we are deluding ourselves,” he said, referring to Mr. Abbas by his popular name. Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s foreign minister and the leader of the ultranationalist Yisrael Beiteinu party, has called for a “decisive victory over Hamas.” Prof. Efraim Inbar, the director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University, said that Israel did not view Mr. Abbas as powerful enough to take over Gaza in practice but that Israel was reluctant to re-invade Gaza. “What Israel wants is quiet at a minimum price,” Professor Inbar said. “For now the Egyptians say let him send a few soldiers to Gaza, and we are saying O.K. I don’t think it will go beyond that.” ** Yedioth Ahronoth – August 13, 2014 ------------------------------------------------------------ ** We’ve Seen this Bad Movie Before ------------------------------------------------------------ By Aviad Kleinberg Ostensibly, the State of Israel’s goal is the elimination of Hamas, and the means of obtaining this goal is the use of more and more force, until Hamas yields. But there seems to be confusion here between the means and the end. Israel’s true end goal is not the elimination of Hamas—that is a means, at most—but rather to minimize the loss of lives and property damage to its citizens and to improve its standing in the geopolitical arena. Once this goal has been defined, it appears that the idea of the takeover of Gaza—which is presented by some right wing spokespersons as a victory—becomes a questionable move. The takeover of Gaza and the ongoing control of Gaza will not give Israel greater security, and will certainly not strengthen its international standing. It will entail many losses for Israel and even greater losses for the Palestinians. These will give rise to much greater international opposition than was created by Operation Protective Edge. But even after the takeover, the problems will not end. It is possible that no more rockets will be fired at Israel, but the number of fatalities among the IDF soldiers will rise dramatically, as shown by the Israeli experience in southern Lebanon. It is also not at all certain that our presence in the Gaza Strip will completely stop the terrorism. After all, we have already been through this story. We have already controlled Gaza, we have killed and have been killed. There is no place that Israel left with a greater sense of relief than Gaza. The wise, so it is said, learn from others’ experience. We should learn from the American experience in Iraq. The Americans did not make do with limited operations like Israel. They went for broke: They occupied all of Iraq and “chopped off the head of the snake” (Saddam Hussein and the Baath Party). The outcome was catastrophic by any measure. Not only did the American rule lead to great bloodshed and an increase in terrorism in Iraq, but when the Americans left (since they did not want to rule Iraq, only to solve the problem of its “Hamas-like” regime), the entire region went up in flames. I am aware, of course, of the differences between Iraq and Gaza, but they should not hide the commonalities from us: A military victory without policy (The US completely ignored any non-military aspect of its actions in Iraq, such as strengthening Iran by neutralizing its greatest enemy) is no guarantee of stability. When you enter a swamp, you have to take into account that you will have to stay there and take full responsibility for it for a long time. It is no surprise that the Egyptians do not want to control Gaza. Whoever controls Gaza gains little and pays a great deal. Hamas is an organization that is fueled by the continuation of the “struggle.” It is in Hamas’s interest to drag us into using force. It is not deterred by losses. The language of violence and death is Hamas’s language. It speaks it well. When we speak this language, it is not weakened, it gains strength. Again and again we are surprised by the fact that painful blows do not destabilize it. The opposite is true. What can weaken Hamas is to take steps that will throw it off balance, create internal opposition to it or force it to change. The necessary step to take, therefore, is not military but rather diplomatic—to place on the table a serious Israeli offer for ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which will receive Arab and international support. And why are we incapable of taking such a step? Naftali Bennett tells us that the reason is security. In the name of security they oppose any diplomatic initiative. The opposition is in the best case an expression of conceptual fixation and in the worst case, deception. The reason that Bennett and his friends are opposed to a diplomatic initiative is not Israel’s security, but rather preserving the settlements, and specifically preserving the settlement outposts. The State of Israel is clinging to the settlement dream and paying a heavy security and political price. The time has come to wake up. ============================================================ S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace 633 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, 5th Floor, Washington, DC 20004 ** www.centerpeace.org (http://www.centerpeace.org) 2014 S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace, All rights reserved. YOU ARE RECEIVING THIS EMAIL BECAUSE YOU SIGNED UP FOR OUR NEWS UPDATES. ** unsubscribe from this list (http://centerpeace.us7.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=232a4a45176fccacab865e520&id=929d521884&e=a7f9100a75&c=7222bf8e29) ** update subscription preferences (http://centerpeace.us7.list-manage.com/profile?u=232a4a45176fccacab865e520&id=929d521884&e=a7f9100a75)