Category Archives: Israel-Palestinian conflict

U.S. airlines determine it’s not safe to operate flights to Israel

Adam Chandler: The Associated Press is reporting that Delta has decided to indefinitely suspend all of its flights to Israel amid rocket fire from Gaza upon the nearby Tel Aviv area and, most recently, the area surrounding Israel’s lone international airport.

Delta Air Lines is canceling all flights to Israel until further notice, citing reports that a rocket landed near Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport.


The precedent set by Delta’s decision could potentially cripple Israel’s economy.


Throughout decades of peace negotiations, the greatest fear about an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank was that it would place its only international airport in the crosshairs of rocket fire. But in the past two weeks, Hamas has unveiled rockets capable of firing greater distances, allowing it to target cities once unfathomable to Israeli security forces, including its largest city, Tel Aviv. [Continue reading…]

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Israel, not Hamas, orchestrated the latest conflict in Gaza

Musa al-Gharbi writes: In the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, the dominant discourse is that the Palestinian militants provoked the hostilities — while Israel, as President Barack Obama affirmed last week, is acting in legitimate self-defense. Many have attempted to problematize this narrative, for instance by arguing that Israel, as an occupying power, does not have a legitimate legal or moral claim to self-defense. Others have argued that rockets fired by Hamas do not constitute an existential crisis for Israel or its citizens and certainly did not warrant the killing of more than 500 Palestinians, mostly civilians, including women and children.

While these are all valid and important points, the broader narrative remains largely unchallenged: Hamas began firing rockets at Israel first, triggering Israel’s latest military incursion. This is not true. In fact, far from acting in self-defense, the crisis is the result of deliberate actions by Israel over the last few weeks — first to stir up anti-Arab sentiment among the Israeli population and then to provoke Hamas into open conflict.

The current escalation began with the abduction of three teenage Israeli settlers from the West Bank. The fact that the three were settlers is an important detail that is often passed over far too quickly or overlooked altogether. The settlements, what they represent and how the settlers interact with the Palestinian population form a critical part of the episode’s context.

After the kidnapping, for more than two weeks Israeli authorities put on a show of looking for the missing settlers — the whole time whipping up anti-Arab sentiment, raising hopes of a recovery and marginalizing voices of dissent. When the abductees were found murdered, the Israeli public was outraged and demanded vengeance. Shortly after the funerals for the youths, another group of Israeli settlers beat and burned to death a 16-year-old Palestinian teen, Mohammed Abu Khdeir. This incident was followed by a brutal assault on Tariq Khdeir, a 15-year-old U.S. citizen and cousin of Mohammed’s by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). [Continue reading…]

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Obama’s foreign policy and the future of the Middle East

Speaking in Washington DC on Monday afternoon, Chas Freeman said: In April, our four-decade-long effort to broker a secure and accepted place for a Jewish state in the Middle East sputtered to a disgraceful end. In the tragicomic final phase of the so-called “peace process,” instead of mediating, the United States negotiated with Israel about the terms of Palestinian capitulation, not with the Palestinians about self-determination. The U.S. effort to broker peace for Israel is now not just dead but so putrid it can’t be shown at a wake. Israel didn’t believe in it, so it killed it. May it rest in peace.

From the outset, Israel used the “peace process” as a distraction while it created facts on the ground in the form of illegal settlements. Israeli expansionism and related policies have now made Israel’s peaceful coexistence with the Palestinians– and, thus, with Israel’s Arab neighbors – impossible. The United States created the moral hazard that enabled Israel to put itself in this ultimately untenable position. Forty years of one-sided American diplomacy aimed at achieving regional and international acceptance for Israel have thus perversely produced the very opposite – increasing international isolation and opprobrium for the Jewish state.

We will now “cover Israel’s back” at the United Nations as its ongoing maltreatment and intermittent muggings of its captive Arab population complete its international delegitimization and ostracism. We will pay a heavy political price for this stand globally, in the Middle East, and very likely in escalating terrorism against Americans abroad and at home. It may satisfy our sense of honor. But it more closely resembles assisted suicide than a strategy for the survival of Israel and our own position in the Middle East. [Continue reading…]

Freeman spoke at the Middle East Policy Council, preceded by Kenneth Pollack, Paul Pillar, and Amin Tarzi — the 77th Capitol Hill Conference can be viewed here.

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Why John Kerry’s Israel-Palestine peace plan failed

The New Republic reports: The depth of Palestinian alienation became clear to Kerry and his team only on February 19, when the two sides met for dinner at Le Maurice Hotel in Paris — the kickoff to a three-day parley. As the Palestinians walked in the door, each American was struck with the same thought: These guys do not look like they’re in a good mood. Following dinner, Kerry met alone with Abbas while [the Palestinians’ chief negotiator Saeb] Erekat and [Kerry’s envoy to the talks, Martin] Indyk spoke in a separate room. Afterward, Kerry and Indyk got in the car that would take them to their rooms at the Grande Hotel. The secretary turned to his envoy: “That was really negative.” At around the same time, Abbas, who was nursing a terrible cold, saw Erekat in the hall and told him that he was going straight to sleep. “It was a difficult meeting,” he said. “I’ll brief you tomorrow.”

The next morning, at around 7:30, Indyk called Erekat. “The secretary wants to see you,” he said. Erekat was surprised at the early time of the summons. This must be important. He put on a suit and took a cab to the Grande. When he and Indyk got to Kerry’s Louis XIII-style suite, the secretary answered the door. He was dressed casually: hotel slippers, no jacket or tie. He looked concerned. After a moment of silence, the first words came out of Kerry’s mouth. “Why is Abu Mazen so angry with me?”

Erekat responded that he hadn’t yet been briefed on the meeting, so Kerry offered to get his notes. “I barely said a word, and he started saying, ‘I cannot accept this,’” Kerry grumbled, going through some of Abbas’s red lines.

“What do you want?” Erekat said. “These are his positions. We are sick and tired of Bibi the Great. He’s taking you for a ride.”

“No one takes me for a ride!”

“He is refusing to negotiate on a map or even say 1967.”

“I’ve moved him,” Kerry said, “I’ve moved him.”

“Where?” Erekat said, raising his voice. “Show me! This is just the impression he’s giving you.”

The next month, Abbas led a Palestinian delegation to Washington. At a March 16 lunch at Kerry’s Georgetown home, the secretary asked Abbas if he’d accept delaying the fourth prisoner release by a few days. Kerry was worried that the Israelis were wavering. “No,” Abbas said. “I cannot do this.” Abbas would later describe that moment as a turning point. If the Americans can’t convince Israel to give me 26 prisoners, he thought then, how will they ever get them to give me East Jerusalem? At the meal, Erekat noticed Abbas displaying some of his telltale signs of discomfort. He was crossing his legs, looking over at him every two minutes. The index cards on which he normally took notes had been placed back in his suit pocket. Abbas was no longer interested in what was being said.

The next day at the White House, Obama tried his luck with the Palestinian leader. He reviewed the latest American proposals, some of which had been tilted in Abbas’s direction. (The document would now state categorically that there would be a Palestinian capital in Jerusalem.) “Don’t quibble with this detail or that detail,” Obama said. “The occupation will end. You will get a Palestinian state. You will never have an administration as committed to that as this one.” Abbas and Erekat were not impressed.

After the meeting, the Palestinian negotiator saw Susan Rice — Abbas’s favorite member of the Obama administration — in the hall. “Susan,” he said, “I see we’ve yet to succeed in making it clear to you that we Palestinians aren’t stupid.” Rice couldn’t believe it. “You Palestinians,” she told him, “can never see the fucking big picture.” [Continue reading…]

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Call for an international military embargo on Israel

Israel has once again unleashed the full force of its military against the captive Palestinian population, particularly in the besieged Gaza Strip, in an inhumane and illegal act of military aggression. Israel’s ability to launch such devastating attacks with impunity largely stems from the vast international military cooperation and trade that it maintains with complicit governments across the world. Over the period 2008-19, the US is set to provide military aid to Israel worth $30bn, while Israeli annual military exports to the world have reached billions of dollars.

In recent years, European countries have exported billions of euros’ worth of weapons to Israel, and the EU has furnished Israeli military companies with research grants worth hundreds of millions. Emerging economies such as India, Brazil and Chile are rapidly increasing their military trade and cooperation with Israel, despite their stated support for Palestinian rights. By importing and exporting arms to Israel and facilitating the development of Israeli military technology, governments are effectively sending a clear message of approval for Israel’s military aggression, including its war crimes and possible crimes against humanity.

Israel’s military technology is marketed as “field-tested” and exported across the world. Military trade and joint military-related research relations with Israel embolden Israeli impunity in committing grave violations of international law and facilitate the entrenchment of Israel’s system of occupation, colonisation and systematic denial of Palestinian rights. We call on the UN and governments across the world to take immediate steps to implement a comprehensive and legally binding military embargo on Israel, similar to that imposed on South Africa during apartheid.

Adolfo Peres Esquivel Nobel Peace Laureate, Argentina, Archbishop Desmond Tutu Nobel Peace Laureate, South Africa, Betty Williams Nobel Peace Laureate, Ireland, Jody Williams Nobel Peace Laureate, US, Mairead Maguire Nobel Peace Laureate, Ireland, Rigoberta Menchú Nobel Peace Laureate, Guatemala, and others.

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Hamas leader says Israel must ‘lift siege’ of Gaza before any ceasefire

The Telegraph reports: Hamas has ruled out a ceasefire deal unless Israel “lifts the siege” on Gaza, the organisation’s political chief has told The Telegraph.

In his first interview since the recent conflict in Gaza, Khaled Meshaal has said his organisation will not accept a simple cessation of fire by both sides, and that the deal must include long term commitments to improve the “rights of the Palestinian people”.

With mediators gathered in Cairo in an effort find a solution to a conflict that has already seen more than two hundred Palestinians killed in Israeli air strikes, Mr Meshaal, for the first time, laid out the demands of his organisation.

He said that Israel must “stop the aggression” of air strikes against targets in Gaza, release the dozens of Palestinians detained in response to last month’s kidnapping of three Israeli students in the West Bank, and “end the siege on Gaza permanently”.

“These are our clear demands,” said Mr Meshaal. “We won’t accept an agreement that prolongs the suffering of our people anymore. In Gaza, for the past seven years of siege, its 1.8 million people have been living in a prison.”

The demands go much further than a return to the truce brokered in Cairo in 2012, to put an end to eight days of fighting in the Gaza strip.

That truce included a pledge to open a border crossing, intending to ease the blockade of the coastal enclave.

On Thursday, Mr Meshaal said that an easing of the restrictions was no longer acceptable and that Hamas would stop at nothing short of a “full and permanent” lifting of the blockade that, as well as regulating the traffic of people and goods at the border crossing, forbids trade from Gaza’s port.

Since General Abdul Fatah Sisi, who considers Hamas a terrorist organisation, became president of Egypt earlier this year, Gaza’s Rafah border crossing with Egypt has also remained mostly closed. [Continue reading…]

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For Netanyahu, Gaza proves why Palestinians cannot be allowed to govern themselves

In a news conference held on Friday in which Benjamin Netanyahu spoke only in Hebrew, the Israeli prime minister spelled out why he believes a two-state solution is impossible:

The priority right now, Netanyahu stressed, was to “take care of Hamas.” But the wider lesson of the current escalation was that Israel had to ensure that “we don’t get another Gaza in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank].” Amid the current conflict, he elaborated, “I think the Israeli people understand now what I always say: that there cannot be a situation, under any agreement, in which we relinquish security control of the territory west of the River Jordan.”

Not relinquishing security control west of the Jordan, it should be emphasized, means not giving a Palestinian entity full sovereignty there. It means not acceding to Mahmoud Abbas’s demands, to Barack Obama’s demands, to the international community’s demands. This is not merely demanding a demilitarized Palestine; it is insisting upon ongoing Israeli security oversight inside and at the borders of the West Bank. That sentence, quite simply, spells the end to the notion of Netanyahu consenting to the establishment of a Palestinian state. A less-than-sovereign entity? Maybe, though this will never satisfy the Palestinians or the international community. A fully sovereign Palestine? Out of the question.

He wasn’t saying that he doesn’t support a two-state solution. He was saying that it’s impossible. This was not a new, dramatic change of stance by the prime minister. It was a new, dramatic exposition of his long-held stance. [Continue reading…]

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Amnesty: Israel/Gaza — U.N. must impose arms embargo and mandate an international investigation as civilian death toll rises

Amnesty International is calling for a UN-mandated international investigation into violations committed on all sides amidst ongoing Israeli air strikes across the Gaza Strip and continuing volleys of indiscriminate rocket fire from Palestinian armed groups into Israel.

Since Israel launched Operation “Protective Edge” in the early morning of 8 July, more than 100 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip, most of them civilians who were not directly participating in hostilities. This includes at least 24 children and 16 women as of Friday morning. More than 600 people have been wounded, many of them seriously. More than 340 homes in Gaza have been completely destroyed or left uninhabitable and at least five health facilities and three ambulances have been damaged. In Israel, at least 20 people have been wounded by rocket attacks and property has been damaged.

“As the violence intensifies there is an urgent need for the UN to mandate an international independent fact-finding mission to Gaza and Israel to investigate violations of international humanitarian law by all parties to the conflict. This is the first crucial step towards ensuring that those who have committed war crimes or other serious violations can be held accountable,” said Philip Luther, Director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Amnesty International. [Continue reading…]

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On Gaza, the Security Council finally speaks, calls for cease-fire

The Jerusalem Post reports: The UN Security Council on Saturday called for a cease-fire in Gaza, and expressed their “serious concern” for the crisis in Gaza, particularly as pertains to the situation of Israeli and Palestinian civilians.

In a short four-sentence statement, the Council called for a reinstitution of the November 2012 ceasefire put in place after Operation Pillar of Defense, and said they would support a resumption of peace negotiations toward a two-state solution. The statement also called for “immediate calm and ending the hostilities in Gaza including the launching of rocket attacks,” and for an “immediate, durable, and fully respected cease-fire.”

There was no word on the state of any Security Council draft resolution on the situation. The release of the statement was delayed by the Jordanians, who said on Friday that they wished to look over some “elements” with the American delegation.

After the Security Council president Eugène-Richard Gasana of Rwanda read the statement on Friday, Palestinian ambassador Riyad Mansour, alongside Saudi representative Abdullah Al-Mouallimi, spoke to the press and said that Israel had killed more than 130 civilians, injured more than 900 in the last week. “Israel must stop this aggression immediately,” he said. Mansour said he was privy to a slew of emergency meetings on Friday, in which much frustration was expressed over the “international community dragging its feet.”

“The immediate objective is to have a cease fire,” Mansour said, and then threatened: “If the Israreli side is not going to listen from this position from the UNSC, then there is the possibility of a draft resolution. All options are on the table.”

Israel’s UN envoy Ron Prosor on Thursday told reporters that Israel would not support a cease-fire, as Operation Protective Edge was intended to fully dismantle Hamas’s bases in Gaza. [Continue reading…]

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Why I’m on the brink of burning my Israeli passport

Ayelet Shaked -- "Angel of Death"

Ayelet Shaked — “Angel of Death”

Mira Bar Hillel writes: She is young. She is pretty. She is a university graduate and a computer engineer. She is also an Israeli Parliamentarian – and the reason why I am on the brink of burning my Israeli passport. Because behind that wide-eyed innocent face lurks the Angel of Death.

Ayelet Shaked represents the far-right Jewish Home party in the Knesset. This means she is well to the right of Benyamin Netanyahu, just in case you thought such a thing was not possible.

On Monday she quoted this on her Facebook page: “Behind every terrorist stand dozens of men and women, without whom he could not engage in terrorism. They are all enemy combatants, and their blood shall be on all their heads. Now this also includes the mothers of the martyrs, who send them to hell with flowers and kisses. They should follow their sons, nothing would be more just. They should go, as should the physical homes in which they raised the snakes. Otherwise, more little snakes will be raised there.”

A week earlier, just before 17-year-old Mohammed Abu Khudair was snatched and burned alive, Shaked wrote: “This is not a war against terror, and not a war against extremists, and not even a war against the Palestinian Authority. The reality is that this is a war between two people. Who is the enemy? The Palestinian people. Why? Ask them, they started it.”

So even before the boy died horribly she declared him to be the enemy, and afterwards, without any apparent hint of guilt or remorse, she was calling for the deaths of innocent women and their unborn babies. [Continue reading…]

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How Israeli soccer hooligans fanned flames of hate

Ishaan Tharoor writes: Earlier this week, Israeli authorities arrested six men in connection with the ghastly killing of Palestinian teen Mohammed Abu Khieder, who, according to reports, was forced into a car and then beaten and burned to death. The killing has been cast as a reprisal attack for last month’s abduction and slaying of three Israeli teens studying at seminaries in the West Bank. Their deaths form the backdrop to the ongoing exchange of rocket fire and missile strikes in the Gaza Strip that has led to about 80 Palestinians being killed.

A gag-order on Israeli media has led to rumor and innuendo surrounding the case. Initial reports suggested that some of the suspects in Abu Khieder’s killing were connected to La Familia, a notorious wing of soccer fans connected to Beitar Jerusalem, one of Israel’s more prominent soccer clubs. La Familia is known for its noxious brand of far-right, Islamophobic politics. While La Familia represents a minority of Beitar’s fan base, it has come to define the club to outside observers as a bastion of xenophobia and racism in Israel.

Unlike many other Israeli soccer clubs, Beitar has never had an Arab player on its books. Last year, when the team signed two Chechen Muslim players, fans, led by La Familia, revolted. They displayed a massive yellow banner that declared “Beitar Will Be Pure Forever” — a chillingly fascistic message — and a small group went on to torch the club’s office, destroying treasured memorabilia. At the time, as Buzzfeed notes, Beitar’s assistant coach said, “They’re burning buildings now… [they might] burn people next.” [Continue reading…]

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Arab foreign ministers slowly convene for ‘urgent’ meeting on Gaza

AFP reports: Arab foreign ministers are to meet in Cairo on Monday to discuss the escalating conflict between Hamas militants in Gaza and Israel which has already killed more than 120 Palestinians, a diplomat said.

Kuwait, which holds the rotating leadership of the Arab League headquartered in the Egyptian capital, had demanded the “urgent” meeting, the diplomat told AFP on Saturday.

There has been no coordinated Arab response to the conflict which erupted on Tuesday when Israel launched waves of air strikes against Gaza aimed at halting rocket fire across the border.

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Israel accused of war crimes in Gaza

Asmaa al-Ghoul writes: Ashraf al-Qadra, the spokesman for the Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip, confirmed to Al-Monitor that the number of martyrs in the Israeli war on Gaza had risen to 101, in addition to more than 700 injured. He added that the martyrs included 21 children, 19 women and six senior citizens.

The Israeli occupation continued to target civilian houses in various areas of Gaza, and the number of homes completely destroyed by the occupation’s aircraft reached more than 120. Among these was the home of the Hajj family, located in the refugee camp in Khan Yunis. Eight members of the family died at dawn on July 10, in the strike that destroyed their home.

Mahmoud al-Hajj, 27, a relative of the martyrs, told Al-Monitor, “I heard a terrifying explosion. I never expected that [it had hit] my uncle’s home. They are a very normal family, none of the family members are involved in military activity. I ran to the area and found people in a state of hysteria, crying and screaming. I discovered that eight members of my uncle’s family had died under the rubble.” [Continue reading…]

Reuters reports: The United Nations human rights chief on Friday voiced serious doubts that Israeli’s military operation against Gaza complied with international law banning the targeting of civilians, and called on both sides to respect the rules of war.

International law requires Israel to take all measures to ensure that its attacks are proportional, distinguish between military and civilian objects, and avoid civilian casualties, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said.

“We have received deeply disturbing reports that many of the civilian casualties, including of children, occurred as a result of strikes on homes. Such reports raise serious doubt about whether the Israeli strikes have been in accordance with international humanitarian law and international human rights law,” Pillay said in a statement. [Continue reading…]

Al Jazeera reports: With tearful eyes, the Al-Aqsa TV anchorman announced the death of Palestinian journalist Hamed Shehab on Wednesday evening, hit by an Israeli air strike while driving home on Omar al-Mukhtar street.

Shehab, 27, was working for local press company Media 24. He was driving a car that had the letters “TV” affixed to it in large, red stickers when it was struck by an Israeli missile. The bombing, carried out on one of Gaza City’s busiest streets, has triggered fear and rage among journalists in Gaza.

“Such [an] attack is meant to intimidate us. Israel has no bank of targets anymore, except civilians and journalists,” Abed Afifi, a cameraman for the Beirut-based Al Mayadeen TV channel, told Al Jazeera. [Continue reading…]

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This renewed violence suggests a bleak future for Palestinians and Israelis

Daniel Levy writes: The absence of determined mediation between Israel and Hamas was one reason that Israeli operation Cast Lead against Gaza in the winter of 2008-9 lasted so long: 22 days. Rapid Egyptian and US-led ceasefire efforts in November 2012 helped ensure that the then Israeli operation “Pillars of Defence” would last only eight days and with far less devastating consequences. But that was under President Morsi, who had good relations with Hamas and included high-level Egyptian and Arab League delegations to Gaza, which also helped ease tensions. This time, the Egyptian and Hamas leadership are at loggerheads, inter-Arab divisions are more rife, and hostility to the Muslim Brotherhood (to which Hamas is affiliated) is a defining faultline and mediators are scarce – all of which may embolden Israel further. Any international mediation will need regional interlocutors with good enough ties to Hamas.

And finally there is Binyamin Netanyahu himself. The Israeli prime minister tends to avoid military adventures, but that has more to do with risk aversion than Solomonic wisdom. Netanyahu is sometimes mistakenly credited with being a pragmatist. He is an ideologue. He is also facing a domestic political challenge (mostly from the right) unprecedented since his return to power in 2009. Netanyahu has little to show for his cumulative eight years in office and his endless un-acted-on military threats against Iranians and Palestinians are beginning to ring rather hollow. Netanyahu may decide that the political risks associated with inaction trump all other considerations.

This past April, nine months of US-led peace talks predictably failed. Israel was again not budged from its settlements and occupation. Those talks have now been replaced by a new round of violence and killing. If the alternatives to meaningless talks and tragic violence – namely peaceful resistance, Palestinian recourse to international law and sanctioning of Israel in response to continued occupation – are given short shrift, then expect more of the same and a continued bleak outlook for both Palestinians and Israelis.

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Israel’s failure to make the right choices

Noam Sheizaf writes from Tel Aviv: When Hamas or any other organization fires rockets on Be’er Sheva or Tel Aviv, it supposedly doesn’t leave Israel with much choice but to retaliate. At least that’s how the argument goes.

But things also have a certain context that the Israeli public simply ignores. Hamas is weaker than ever. The tunnels to Gaza were destroyed and Egypt closed the border. Israel is preventing Hamas government employees from receiving their salaries, and has even threatened to deport the UN official who tried to solve the latest crisis. In recent weeks, Hamas’ politicians in the West Bank were also arrested.

Hamas isn’t just a militant organization. It is also a movement that represents half of the Palestinian people in the occupied territories and runs the lives of 1.8 million people in Gaza. Leaving Hamas with its back to the wall gives the organization an interest for this kind of escalation, despite the fact that Hamas knows that Palestinians will pay a much greater price than Israelis.

Some questions need to be asked: maybe the months and years of relative calm before this escalation were a good time to lift the siege on Gaza? Perhaps Israel should have recognized the new Palestinian technocratic government? Maybe there was a way for Hamas to undergo a process of politicization, similar to that which Fatah went through?

All these issues were never discussed in Israel; raising them now, in the current atmosphere, is seen as “giving in to terror.”

“They left us no choice” is the ultimate Israeli argument. Yes, it makes sense that when Palestinians hurl stones on Israeli cars at night, in the West Bank or within the Green Line, Israeli security forces will be sent to make them stop, just as they are sent to treat any issue of law and order. When a protester throws a stone at a soldier near the West Bank village of Bil’in, the soldier is left with no choice but to respond. But what was this soldier doing on the village’s confiscated land in the first place?

The West Bank has been relatively calm for the past five years, yet Israel has never bothered to conduct a much-delayed national conversation on ending the occupation. Instead, it waged propaganda wars on the Palestinians, built settlements and confiscated more land.

Almost five years after Operation Cast Lead, Israel’s Gaza policy – from the naval blockade to the “no go zone” it maintains at the edges of the strip – has never been questioned. Five years in which people have been warning this government that things will eventually blow up, and when they finally did, the same government responds with military force, because “we are left with no choice.”

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Egypt silent as Israel attacks Gaza

The New York Times reports: Again and again over decades, Egypt has leapt in to play the role of mediator during hostilities between the Palestinians and the Israelis, including the time two years ago when Egypt’s president, Mohamed Morsi, helped broker a cease-fire after eight days of bloodshed in the Gaza Strip.

But in the latest battle, the Egyptians appear to be barely lifting a finger, leaving the combatants without a go-between as the Palestinian death toll mounts.

Officials with Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement in Gaza, said on Wednesday they had seen almost no sign of an Egyptian effort to defuse the crisis, in sharp contrast to previous conflicts under Mr. Morsi and President Hosni Mubarak. Making matters worse, according to Palestinian officials, Egypt continued to keep its side of the border all but sealed on Wednesday, barring even humanitarian aid.

Egypt’s apparent willingness to sit out the crisis reflected shifts in its foreign policy under its new president, Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi, who led the military ouster last summer of Mr. Morsi, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and a close ally of Hamas. The Brotherhood was outlawed after Mr. Morsi’s ouster, and accused by Egyptian officials of terrorism during a crackdown on the government’s opponents. In various plots against Egypt described by the authorities, Hamas was often cast as the Brotherhood’s menacing accomplice. [Continue reading…]

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