Category Archives: Issues

EDITORIAL: Will Clinton allow Israel to violate US sovereignty?

Will Clinton allow Israel to violate US sovereignty?
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, March 3, 2009

A few weeks ago Ehud Olmert was bragging about his ability to dictate to President Bush how the US should vote in the UN Security Council. Now Israel is laying down “red lines” on how the US should negotiate with Iran.

What is surprising is not the degree of influence that Israel assumes it has over US foreign policy but that the Israelis choose to parade their power so publicly. Israel’s leaders are embarrassing the Israel lobby!

“I have no problem with what Olmert did,” Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, told The Forward in January. “I think the mistake was to talk about it in public.

“This is what friendships are about. He was not interfering in political issues. You have a relationship, and if you don’t like what is being done, then you go to the boss and tell him.”

And this is exactly how the lobby wants to frame US-Israeli relations: that they are based on a level of intimacy that allows Israel to discreetly petition its powerful friend.

Start telling “the boss” what to do and you risk becoming a cause of embarrassment. Keep doing it repeatedly and more and more Americans will understand why President Clinton once said in reference to then-Prime Minister Netanyahu: “Who the fuck does he think he is? Who’s the fucking superpower here?”

If anyone should be laying down red lines at this particular time — a time when it’s not clear whether the two-state solution is being rushed to the emergency room or the morgue — it is the US that should unequivocally be telling the Israelis: no more settlements.

Instead, it’s being reported that Israel has plans to double the number of Jewish settlers in the occupied territories.

When Hillary Clinton should be threatening to withdraw the diplomatic cover that the US provides Israel by perpetuating a phony peace process, instead, the Israelis are attempting to set ground rules on how the US should approach Iran.

Ironically, there is so far little indication that Israel need harbor much fear of rapprochement between the US and Iran. Clinton has already made it known that she sees little chance of talks being productive and the Obama administration in spite of having successfully used diplomatic engagement as an effective campaign gambit, has yet to demonstrate that it has a radically different perspective from the Bush administration. How so?

Whereas Bush treated talks with Iran as a reward that must be withheld, Obama is treating them as a reward that can be offered. The presupposition that in and of itself an opportunity to talk directly to Washington has inherent value, has not been questioned.

If talks are used as a bait, when Iran refuses to swallow the bait, the US and its allies will turn around and declare that Iran is unwilling to negotiate. While that might serve Israel and the US in persisting to cast Iran as a rogue state, it will merely confirm to the Iranians that there has never been a genuine interest in diplomatic engagement.

Real engagement hinges on the US credibly offering Iran positive rewards — not merely the offer that it can avoid being punished.

Effective diplomacy is driven by the belief that talking has the power to yield positive results; not the idea that failed talks can provide useful leverage.

In Israel’s efforts to circumscribe the reach of US diplomacy, items three and four of its “red lines” are particularly interesting:

3. A time limit must be set for the talks, to prevent Iran from merely buying time to complete its nuclear development. The talks should also be defined as a “one-time opportunity” for Tehran.

4. Timing is critical, and the U.S. should consider whether it makes sense to begin the talks before Iran’s presidential election in June.

Israel is terrified that the clock is running out — but it’s not the clock leading to a nuclear Iran; it’s the horrific prospect that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad could lose his position as a president who is easy to demonize and be replaced by Mohammad Khatami — the face of moderation.

If Khatami returns to the presidency, Benjamin Netanyahu is going to find it incredibly difficult to persuade anyone that the world faces a greater threat from Iran than it does from Great Depression II. Time is indeed running out.

STATE OF THE NATION

The power of Obama’s oratory
By Doyle McManus, Los Angeles Times, February 25, 2009

He needed to spell out and defend his plan for stimulating the economy, which his administration has sometimes stumbled in explaining. He wanted to rally support for the rest of his ambitious domestic program, including expensive investments in healthcare, energy and education. And he sought to lift the mood of the nation by promising that better times lie ahead.

The least concrete of those goals, lifting the nation’s mood, was actually the most important — because it will be difficult for Obama to implement any of his plans if Americans lose hope.

That’s why the first lines from the speech that the White House released in advance Tuesday were these: “While our economy may be weakened and our confidence shaken, though we are living through difficult and uncertain times, tonight I want every American to know this: We will rebuild, we will recover, and the United States of America will emerge stronger than before.”

The obvious comparison is to Franklin D. Roosevelt, who rallied Americans during the Great Depression with his fireside chats, broadcast on the still-new medium of radio.

“There is an element in the readjustment of our financial system more important than currency, more important than gold, and that is the confidence of the people,” Roosevelt said in his first radio speech to the nation in 1933.

But FDR enjoyed a massive, obedient majority in Congress that passed his banking bill in a single day with a minimum of dissent. (As Will Rogers quipped at the time: “Congress doesn’t pass legislation anymore. They just wave at the bills as they go by.”)

With that kind of support, Roosevelt had an easier job, and could aim his speech mostly at persuading citizens to be patient and avoid the urge to withdraw their money from banks.

Obama, in contrast, is asking the public for help in putting pressure on his opponents in Congress.

That’s why the best analogy may not be to Roosevelt but to Ronald Reagan, who turned his presidency into a permanent campaign to rally public support to his side, even when Congress was skeptical. [continued…]

Editor’s Comment — In a similar sense that Marx understood religion as a product of human suffering, Obama recognizes that his own huge popularity right now is comensurate with the level of fear that pervades America.

Fear is fueling faith as we gamble that our inspirational president is the only hope we have that someone (more than well-crafted policy) can serve as an instrument for our economic salvation.

And since, en masse, human beings have a greater capacity to believe than to doubt, and since an economic turnaround hinges to a significant degree in shifting the balance between pessimism and optimism, there is indeed something extraordinarily fitting that by a simple stroke of luck, America at this particular moment has this particular president.

How spending stimulates
By Brad DeLong, The Week, February 25, 2009

Will the Obama deficit-spending plan work? Will throwing $800 billion—$500 billion in extra government spending, and $300 billion in tax cuts—at the economy produce a world in which production and employment are higher and unemployment lower than would otherwise have been the case?

The short answer is yes. The short reason is that spending works—eras in which some group or other gets excited about future prospects and starts madly spending money are eras in which production and employment are high and unemployment is low. And the government, in this respect, is just like any other group of starry-eyed optimists whose eagerness to spend pulls the economy into a high-employment, high-pressure boom. [continued…]

‘There will be blood’
Niall Ferguson interview, Globe and Mail, February 23, 2009

Heather Scoffield: Will globalization survive this crisis?

Niall Ferguson: It’s a question that’s well worth asking. Because when you look at the way trade has collapsed in the world in the last quarter of 2008 – countries like Taiwan saw their exports fall 45 per cent – that is a depression-style contraction, and we’re in quite early stages of the game at this point. This is before the shock has really played out politically. Before protectionist slogans have really established themselves in the public debate. Buy America is the beginning of something I think we’ll see a lot more of. So I think there’s a real danger that globalization could unravel.

Part of the point I’ve been making for years is that it’s a fragile system. It broke down once before. The last time we globalized the world economy this way, pre-1914, it only took a war to cause the whole thing to come crashing down. Now we’re showing that we can do it without a war. You can cause globalization to disintegrate just by inflating a housing bubble, bursting it, and watching the financial chain reaction unfold.”

Heather Scoffield: Is a violent resolution to this crisis inevitable?

Niall Ferguson: “There will be blood, in the sense that a crisis of this magnitude is bound to increase political as well as economic [conflict]. It is bound to destabilize some countries. It will cause civil wars to break out, that have been dormant. It will topple governments that were moderate and bring in governments that are extreme. These things are pretty predictable. The question is whether the general destabilization, the return of, if you like, political risk, ultimately leads to something really big in the realm of geopolitics. That seems a less certain outcome. We’ve already talked about why China and the United States are in an embrace they don’t dare end. [continued…]

The Obama code
By George Lakoff, The Washington Note, February 24, 2009

For the sake of unity, the President tends to express his moral vision indirectly. Like other self-aware and highly articulate speakers, he connects with his audience using what cognitive scientists call the “cognitive unconscious.” Speaking naturally, he lets his deepest ideas simply structure what he is saying. If you follow him, the deep ideas are communicated unconsciously and automatically. The Code is his most effective way to bring the country together around fundamental American values.

For supporters of the President, it is crucial to understand the Code in order to talk overtly about the old values our new president is communicating. It is necessary because tens of millions of Americans–both conservatives and progressives–don’t yet perceive the vital sea change that Obama is bringing about.

The word “code” can refer to a system of either communication or morality. President Obama has integrated the two. The Obama Code is both moral and linguistic at once. The President is using his enormous skills as a communicator to express a moral system. As he has said, budgets are moral documents. His economic program is tied to his moral system and is discussed in the Code, as are just about all of his other policies. [continued…]

Obama’s faith in ‘non-believers’
By Michael Felsen, The Forward, February 18, 2009

Much has already been said about the reference in Obama’s inaugural address to America as “a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus — and non-believers.” In light of the views of a majority of Americans — who, according to survey data, believe that the United States is a “Christian nation”; feel that it is necessary to believe in God to be a moral person, and say they would not vote for an atheist to serve in our highest public office — the president’s assertion was, in a word, astonishing.

At the February 5 National Prayer Breakfast, the president expanded on this theme. Acknowledging that faith has too often been used as a pretext for prejudice and intolerance, he focused on “the one law that binds all great religions together… the Golden Rule — the call to love one another; to understand one another; to treat with dignity and respect those with whom we share a brief moment on this earth.”

He pointed out that he wasn’t raised in a particularly religious household. His father was born a Muslim and by adulthood had become an atheist; his maternal grandparents were non-practicing Methodists and Baptists; and his mother was “skeptical of organized religion.” Nevertheless, he revealed that this non-religious mother was “the kindest, most spiritual person I’ve ever known,” and was the one who taught him to love, to understand and to do unto others as he would want done unto him. [continued…]

Obama wants to move the center left
By Matt Miller, Wall Street Journal, February 24, 2009

President Barack Obama is taking a beating from liberal critics who think his attempt to court Republican support is a political failure and a policy disaster. Yet this assault on Mr. Obama’s bipartisan instinct is misguided and, ironically, threatens to undermine liberal goals.
[Commentary] Martin Kozlowski

The president has his eye on a bigger prize than winning a few Republican votes for his stimulus package or having a conservative in his cabinet. He aims to move the political center in America to the left, much as Ronald Reagan moved it to the right. The only way he can achieve this goal is to harness the energies and values of both parties.

Left and right mean less nowadays, especially to Americans outside Washington. But broadly speaking, Mr. Obama seeks to use government in new ways to bolster opportunity and security in an era when financial crisis, global competition and rapid technological change are calling into question the political and business arrangements on which our prosperity has rested for decades. This is the task that history has assigned this president. The spat between him and his liberal critics is about the way one makes this happen. [continued…]

Netanyahu to form new Israeli government; US Congressmen visit Gaza

Netanyahu handed reins of a jittery Israel
By Dan Williams, Reuters, February 20, 2009

A decade after being ousted by Israelis entranced by his then rival’s pledges of peace accords and modest governance, Benjamin Netanyahu has won a new lease on power over a country now more given to disaffection and fears of war.

President Shimon Peres on Friday handed him a mandate to form Israel’s next government, and the right-wing Likud leader now has 42 days to put together a coalition. He should manage that with like-minded allies, even if his appeal to centrist and left-wing rivals for a unity government falls on deaf ears. [continued…]

Mitchell: Palestinians’ financial buildup cannot replace diplomatic route
By Yitzhak Benhorin, Ynet, February 19, 2009

George Mitchell, the US special envoy to Mideast said Thursday that while the development of the West Bank’s economy remains important, it cannot take precedent to the diplomatic route.

Mitchell, who held a conference call with the heads of various Jewish groups in the United States, refrained from answering questions regarding the political situation in Israel, saying he would not address the subject before President Shimon Peres’ tasked one of the parties’ leaders with forming the government. Continue reading →

GUEST CONTRIBUTOR – John Robertson: Mr Obama and Israel’s nuclear arsenal

Mr. Obama and Israel’s nuclear arsenal
By John Robertson, War in Context, February 14, 2009

In a recent essay, Grant Smith very appropriately hammered President Barack Obama for an omission — or perhaps, a dodge — when he was asked a question by the venerable Helen Thomas during Monday night’s big press conference. (Obama actually recognized the moment as a big one when he called on her, saying with a smile that this was his “inauguration.” She is the dean of White House correspondents, and is well known for asking tough questions and then doggedly pursuing with follow-ups.) Ms Thomas asked him: “Mr President, do you know of any Middle Eastern country that has nuclear weapons?” (This, by the way, after a longish Obama soliloquy on Iran’s pursuit of a nuclear weapon – a pursuit that the Iranian government denies.)

The obvious answer — the ka-zillion-ton gorilla in the room — was, “Yes, Helen, of course — Israel.” Israel has never admitted it up front, but as Smith notes, Jimmy Carter (who certainly was in a position to know) divulged only a few months ago that the Israelis have an arsenal of at least 150 nuclear weapons (not to mention the most powerful military in the Middle East, largely thanks to US taxpayers). But because Israel has never owned up to it, the US has preferred to ignore it, at least in public discussion. All very silly, really, except for the transparent dishonesty. And as Smith also notes, Obama (as well as a long string of his presidential predecessors) conceivably stands in violation of the 1976 Symington Amendment, which, Smith notes,

prohibits most U.S. foreign aid to any country found trafficking in nuclear enrichment equipment or technology outside international safeguards. Israel has never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). If U.S. presidents complied with the Symington Amendment, they would not deliver yearly aid packages to Israel totaling billions of dollars. Presidents make-believe that Israeli nuclear weapons don’t exist so Congress can legally continue shoveling the lion’s share of the U.S. foreign aid budget to Israel.

Perhaps the president wasn’t ready for the question. Perhaps he sensed that Thomas meant to corner him with that ka-zillion-ton gorilla — I suspect she did — and he may have refused to respond honestly because he didn’t want to deal with any follow-up — which she tried to do (it was quite audible, even over my muttering disbelief as I watched the scene unfold). Or perhaps Obama doesn’t consider Israel to be a country in the Middle East. Evidently the Pentagon doesn’t. In DoD organizational terms, all of the Middle Eastern countries come under CENTCOM’s scope, except Israel, which is included under the European command. (Edward Said would be smiling).

But the bottom line here is that Israel does indeed have a nuclear arsenal. Add to that the following considerations:

some commentators have advocated the use of “tactical nuclear weapons” to eliminate Iran’s nuclear installations;
Israel has a track record of launching surprise aerial attacks to destroy them in other countries (think of their destruction of Iraq’s Osirak reactor in 1981 — which the US applauded — or their destruction last year of a probable nuclear installation that was being built in Syria);
this week’s elections in Israel will most likely bring to power a hard-right government under a prime minister who has railed long and loud against Iran’s alleged intention to inflict a second Holocaust upon the Jewish people, and the need to take steps to prevent it;
Israel (in distinct contrast to Iran) has never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty;
Iran for several years now has found itself bracketed with powerful US forces to its west (in Iraq), and with the US’s most militarily powerful ally (Israel) just over the horizon; to its east (Afghanistan); and to its south (the US bases and naval forces in the Persian Gulf) — and the US military presence in Afghanistan is even now being ramped up to unprecedented levels, and is likely to remain there for many years;
for the past 8 years (at least) the US was intoning a mantra about the need for “regime change” in Iran (where, it was said, “real men” were destined to go after Iraq had been disposed of).

Well, connect the dots. And then maybe we all ought to invite Helen Thomas to confront Mr Obama with another question — in fact, with two of them:

“Mr President, which country or countries have done the most in recent years to destabilize the Middle East?

“Mr President, which country or countries are poised to destabilize the Middle East the most in the next few years?”

I would hope that our president would think long and hard about the correct answer — and this time, not dodge her question.

John Robertson is a professor of Middle East history at Central Michigan University and has his own blog, Chippshots.

NEWS & VIEWS & EDITOR’S COMMENT: Time running out for a two-state solution

Only Obama offers change for Israel
By Gideon Rachman, Financial Times, February 9, 2009

The Israelis are understandably nervous about the prospect of pressure from the US. But if the Obama administration does push Israel much harder to move towards a peace agreement with the Palestinians, it will in fact be doing the country a favour.

For the biggest existential threat to Israel is not Iran or Hamas – it is the prospect that Jews will eventually be outnumbered by Arabs in the combined territory of Israel and Palestine. The long-term existential choice is between three alternatives: two states; one state without a Jewish majority; or an undemocratic state, with Israel as a permanent occupying power over a voteless, violent and anarchic Palestine.

Israel’s election campaign suggests the country is not yet ready to face up to that choice. So it may need the Obama administration to frame the choice for it. [continued…]

Hamas leader ready for truce with Israel
By Damien McElroy, Daily Telegraph, February 9, 2009

In the first Hamas interview with the Western media since last month’s ceasefire in Gaza, its deputy leader Musa Abu Marzouk told The Daily Telegraph that the Palestinian group was ready for a period of “calm”.

A chandeliered room in the Syrian capital Damascus – where several Hamas leaders live in exile – is a long way from the ruins of the Gaza Strip but a weary frustration with the deprivations of war was pervasive.

“We need to rebuild the buildings destroyed in the aggression,” said Mr Marzouk. “We need to treat the wounded – more than 5,000 need serious treatment. We need to help all the families without food and shelter. We need the gates of Gaza to open to lift the siege.

“All this can only be dealt with by period of calm between the two sides.”

Hamas negotiators have been instructed to accept the terms of a ceasefire pact negotiated by Egyptian mediators in Cairo.

Hamas regards its offer as a Tahdia, an Arabic word indicating non-aggression in a stand-off, usually described as a “calm”. A longer-term Hudna, or ceasefire, would be withheld until a peace agreement that would see Israel withdraw from Palestinian territory.

“Israel owns the West Bank and Gaza Strip right now but if it withdrew from these and let the Palestinians have access to Jerusalem, we would turn our face to rebuild our lives and live alongside as in other parts of the world,” said Mr Marzouk. [continued…]

Editor’s Comment — When Shimon Peres feels compelled to pen an op-ed in the Washington Post arguing against the one-state solution, there are two obvious conclusions we can draw:

1. The viability of the two-state solution has become transparently flimsy.
2. Whereas the one-state solution has for a long time only garnered only marginal attention it is now not only being taken seriously but it increasingly is acquiring the appearance of being the unavoidable conclusion of a historical trend.

For those Israelis and Jews outside Israel who still cherish the concept of a Jewish state, here’s a message that may sound unbelievable yet needs to be considered carefully: the best hope for preserving the Jewish state is being offered by Hamas.

Hamas is not in the habit of crafting its statements merely to meet the expectations of others. So, when they say, end the occupation, allow Palestinians access to Jerusalem and then we can live side by side, this is not a statement that should casually be dismissed.

Obama is sounding like Bush

On state secrets, Obama is sounding like Bush
By John Schwartz, New York Times, February 10, 2009

In a closely watched case involving rendition and torture, a lawyer for the Obama administration seemed to surprise a panel of federal appeals judges on Monday by pressing ahead with an argument for preserving state secrets originally developed by the Bush administration.

In the case, Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian native, and four other detainees filed suit against a subsidiary of Boeing for arranging flights for the Bush administration’s “extraordinary rendition” program, in which terrorism suspects were secretly taken to other countries, where they say they were tortured. The Bush administration argued that the case should be dismissed because even discussing it in court could threaten national security and relations with other nations.

During the campaign, Mr. Obama harshly criticized the Bush administration’s treatment of detainees, and he has broken with that administration on questions like whether to keep open the prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. But a government lawyer, Douglas N. Letter, made the same state-secrets argument on Monday, startling several judges on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

“Is there anything material that has happened” that might have caused the Justice Department to shift its views, asked Judge Mary M. Schroeder, an appointee of President Jimmy Carter, coyly referring to the recent election.

“No, your honor,” Mr. Letter replied.

Judge Schroeder asked, “The change in administration has no bearing?”

Once more, he said, “No, Your Honor.” The position he was taking in court on behalf of the government had been “thoroughly vetted with the appropriate officials within the new administration,” and “these are the authorized positions,” he said.

That produced an angry response from Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing the plaintiffs.

“This is not change,” he said in a statement. “This is definitely more of the same. Candidate Obama ran on a platform that would reform the abuse of state secrets, but President Obama’s Justice Department has disappointingly reneged on that important civil liberties issue. If this is a harbinger of things to come, it will be a long and arduous road to give us back an America we can be proud of again.”

A Justice Department spokesman, Matt Miller, said the government did not comment on pending litigation, but he seemed to suggest that Mr. Obama would invoke the privilege more sparingly than its predecessor.

“It is the policy of this administration to invoke the state secrets privilege only when necessary and in the most appropriate cases,” he said, adding that Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. had asked for a review of pending cases in which the government had previously asserted a state secret privilege.

“The attorney general has directed that senior Justice Department officials review all assertions of the state secrets privilege to ensure that the privilege is being invoked only in legally appropriate situations,” he said. “It is vital that we protect information that, if released, could jeopardize national security.”

The court papers describe horrific treatment in secret prisons. Mr. Mohamed claimed that during his detention in Morocco, “he was routinely beaten, suffering broken bones and, on occasion, loss of consciousness. His clothes were cut off with a scalpel and the same scalpel was then used to make incisions on his body, including his penis. A hot stinging liquid was then poured into open wounds on his penis where he had been cut. He was frequently threatened with rape, electrocution and death.”

Ben Wizner, a lawyer for the A.C.L.U., told the judges that many of the facts that the government is trying to keep secret are scarcely secret at all, since the administration’s rendition program and the particulars of many of the cases have been revealed in news reports and in the work of government investigations from around the world. “The only place in the world where these claims can’t be discussed,” Mr. Wizner said, “is in this courtroom.”

What the A.C.L.U. is asking, he said, is that the case be allowed to go forward, giving the courts a chance to decide, based on classified information revealed solely to the judge, what should be allowed to be discussed.

But Mr. Letter said that the lower court judge, James Ware, did receive classified information and came to the correct conclusion in dismissing the case last year. He urged the judges to pore over the same material, and predicted “you will understand precisely, as Judge Ware did, why this case can’t be litigated.”

In a related matter, Patrick J. Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who is chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, on Monday proposed the establishment of a “truth commission” to investigate the Bush administration’s treatment of detainees and other issues, like the firings of United States attorneys by the Justice Department. The commission, he said, could grant immunity to witnesses to explore the facts without the threat of criminal prosecution.

Obama fails his first test on civil liberties and accountability — resoundingly and disgracefully
By Glenn Greenwald, Salon, February 9, 2009

What this is clearly about is shielding the U.S. Government and Bush officials from any accountability. Worse, by keeping Bush’s secrecy architecture in place, it ensures that any future President — Obama or any other — can continue to operate behind an impenetrable wall of secrecy, with no transparency or accountability even for blatantly criminal acts. [continued…]

Leahy seeks ‘truth commission’ to investigate Bush administration
By Ariane de Vogue, ABC News, February 9, 2009

The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee said the government should look into creating a “truth commission” to investigate the Bush administration’s Department of Justice.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said that such a commission, which would answer to both Congress and the executive branch, could probe Bush administration policies on torture, interrogation and surveillance and “get to the bottom of what happened” during the eight years the Bush administration grappled with the legal war on terror.

Leahy called his proposal a “middle ground” between those critics of the Bush administration seeking to prosecute officials, and others wishing to concentrate on the future as opposed to investigating the past. “We need to be able to read the page before we turn it,” said Leahy. [continued…]

THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN WAR: February 1

“It’s very difficult when a democratic country has to confront an illegal terroristic group. Whatever we do is being photographed,” said Israeli president, Shimon Peres, after the war on Gaza, throughout which foreign journalists were prevented from photographing what Israel was doing.

Life in Gaza is not ‘back to normal’
By Amira Hass, Haaretz, February 1, 2009

“Only aerial photographs of the Gaza Strip will make it possible to show and to comprehend the extent of the destruction,” a number of Western civilians said this week. They added: “But there isn’t a chance that Israel will allow anyone to come with a light plane and do aerial photography.”

The talk of aerial photography reveals the frustration felt by everyone who has managed to come here. The frustration derives from the conclusion that the real dimensions of the Israeli attack on Gaza are not being fully comprehended in the West and in Israel. They go beyond the physical destruction, beyond the numbers of the dead and the wounded, beyond the deadly encounter between a bomb dropped from an F-16 and the hollow concrete and gravel house in the Yibneh refugee camp in Rafah. Three siblings aged 4 to 12 were killed there. Parents and two sisters were injured. The mother – who was nursing her infant daughter and heard and saw the bomb rushing towards them – is in a state of shock. She stares out at the world from her hospital bed in Egypt, and does not speak. The physical injuries can be treated.

Volunteer doctors, architects who specialize in the rehabilitation of disaster zones, jurists whose aspirations reach into international courts for the investigation of war crimes, Red Cross teams, international human rights organization investigators with battle experience behind them, directors of government and independent development agencies, which transfer funds from development budgets to budgets for rehabilitation and rescue: All of them – not only journalists – are flooding the Strip, taking notes, taking pictures, exchanging information, documenting and carefully cataloguing what are emerging as patterns, phenomena that repeat themselves: shelling and bombing of buildings and enterprises that have no connection to the Hamas infrastructure – politically or militarily, the prevention of the evacuation of wounded, unfamiliar kinds of injuries, vandalism in homes that became Israel Defense Forces positions, destruction of agricultural areas and, above all, families – almost in their entirety – that were killed in their homes or as they tried to flee from the approaching tanks. This is the hardest work of documentation. Continue reading →

EDITORIAL: Obama assists in the general atmospherics of Middle East diplomacy

Obama assists in the general atmospherics of Middle East diplomacy
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, January 28, 2009

Remember back on the campaign trail when Hillary Clinton said she helped bring peace to Northern Ireland? A bit of fact checking soon revealed that her rather minor role amounted to no more than assisting with “the general atmospherics.” That’s worth keeping in mind while Washington’s foreign policy elite smothers Obama with praise after his appearance on Al-Arabiya.

“It’s impossible to exaggerate the symbolic importance of Barack Obama choosing an Arabic satellite television station for his first formal interview as President,” gushed Marc Lynch in response to the implementation of his own recommendations.

“By most accounts, Obama’s decision — shocking to some, refreshing to others — to talk to the Muslim world in his first formal, sit down press interview hit the ball out of the park,” Steve Clemons said in an equally enthusiastic review.

“We support Israel’s right to self-defence. The (Palestinian) rocket barrages which are getting closer and closer to populated areas (in Israel) cannot go unanswered,” Hillary Clinton said in her first news conference at the State Department.

And there’s the rub. How does the US marry it’s “we can feel your pain” message, with “but it’s OK if Israel inflicts some more”?

For Obama to give his first interview to Al-Arabiya was a positive step in changing the tone of US relations with the Muslim world, but let’s not get carried away. Soothing words provide no relief to the victims of Israeli atrocities committed in Gaza.

Talking to a Saudi-owned television station no doubt went down well with Saudi Arabia’s rulers, but if Obama wants to engage with the largest audience he’ll need to have the courage to go on Al Jazeera. The response of the most widely watched network to Obama’s first step was quite telling. They barely mentioned it.

But if Washington wants to remain close to its old friends in Riyadh, it should also head their advice. Just a few days ago, Prince Turki al-Faisal directed a passionate plea at the new president:

Let us all pray that Mr Obama possesses the foresight, fairness and resolve to rein in the murderous Israeli regime and open a new chapter in this most intractable of conflicts.

It’s nice that Obama has had the experience of living in a Muslim country, that he has Muslim relatives, and that he wants to pursue relations with the Muslim world based on mutual respect. But beyond the atmospherics, the people of the Middle East are looking for substance from America’s new celebrity president. He has a receptive audience, but they’ll only remain open if he can deliver.

Prince Turki laid out what is expected:

President Barack Obama must address the disaster in Gaza and its causes. Inevitably, he will condemn Hamas’s firing of rockets at Israel. When he does that, he should also condemn Israel’s atrocities against the Palestinians and support a UN resolution to that effect; condemn the Israeli actions that led to this conflict, from settlement building in the West Bank to the blockade of Gaza and the targeted killings and arbitrary arrests of Palestinians; declare America’s intention to work for a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction, with a security umbrella for countries that sign up and sanctions for those that do not; call for an immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces from Shab’ah Farms in Lebanon; encourage Israeli-Syrian negotiations for peace; and support a UN resolution guaranteeing Iraq’s territorial integrity.

Mr Obama should strongly promote the Abdullah peace initiative, which calls on Israel to pursue the course laid out in various international resolutions and laws: to withdraw completely from the lands occupied in 1967, including East Jerusalem, returning to the lines of June 4 1967; to accept a mutually agreed just solution to the refugee problem according to UN resolution 194; and to recognise the independent state of Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital. In return, there would be an end to hostilities between Israel and all Arab countries, and Israel would get full diplomatic and normal relations.

What the Saudis know is that they — and the US — are running out of time. George Mitchell’s patience may be an indispensable negotiating skill, but what the Middle East is looking for is Obama’s “fierce urgency of now” — not just the borrowed slogan but words embodied in actions.

THE BBC’S CAMPAIGN TO BLOCK HUMANITARIAN AID REACHING GAZA

The BBC’s campaign to block humanitarian aid reaching Gaza
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, January 27, 2009

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a publicly-funded media network. Under Director General Mark Thompson it has now assumed a governmental role in attempting to stem the flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza.

The Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), a group of major British charities, wants the BBC to broadcast the following appeal for donations to provide relief for victims of the war:

Thompson says that if the BBC ran the appeal, “this could be interpreted as taking a political stance on an ongoing story,” but Thompson’s own impartiality can be questioned.

Just over two years ago, this short item appeared in The Independent:

The BBC is often accused of an anti-Israeli bias in its coverage of the Middle East, and recently censured reporter Barbara Plett for saying she “started to cry” when Yasser Arafat left Palestine shortly before his death.

Fascinating, then, to learn that its director general, Mark Thompson, has recently returned from Jerusalem, where he held a face-to-face meeting with the hardine Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

Although the diplomatic visit was not publicised on these shores, it has been seized upon in Israel as evidence that Thompson, who took office in 2004, intends to build bridges with the country’s political class.

Sources at the Beeb also suspect that it heralds a “softening” to the corporation’s unofficial editorial line on the Middle East.

“This was the first visit of its kind by any serving director general, so it’s clearly a significant development,” I’m told.

“Not many people know this, but Mark is actually a deeply religious man. He’s a Catholic, but his wife is Jewish, and he has a far greater regard for the Israeli cause than some of his predecessors.”

Understandably, an official BBC spokesman was anxious to downplay talk of an exclusively pro-Israeli charm offensive.

Apopros this month’s previously undocumented trip, he stressed that Thompson had also held talks with the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas.

The position that the BBC has taken on the DEC Gaza appeal has drawn a huge amount of criticism in the UK. Critics include Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, Scottish first minister Alex Salmond and justice minister Shahid Malik and several other ministers in the British government, 120 members of parliament from all parties.

Former Labour minister, Tony Benn, launched his own protest by making the appeal directly to BBC viewers:

In an editorial, the Financial Times, referring to Thompson’s decision, said:

Ordinary people, informed not least by the BBC’s own coverage of the destruction of the lives and livelihoods of Gazans, can distinguish for themselves the difference between acute humanitarian need and propaganda – on behalf of either side. For a man who is, ultimately, a public servant financed by a public levy to suggest otherwise is patronising.

The BBC should instead re-examine its oversensitivity to allegations of bias. Such allegations come with the territory for anyone who attempts detailed reporting and reasoned, contextual analysis of the Middle East. The BBC at times gives the impression it has lost its collective nerve in covering this region.

An independent panel on BBC coverage of the conflict, published in 2006 reported shortcomings that objectively favoured Israel: more coverage of Israeli fatalities; more Israeli spokesmen; and, above all, “the failure to convey adequately the disparity in the Israeli and Palestinian experience, reflecting the fact that one side is in control and the other lives under occupation”.

The British public is perfectly able to grasp this disparity without Auntie [the BBC] getting overwrought. It may even conclude that the BBC’s mechanical application of “balance” in the present controversy appears so to outweigh the normal considerations of accuracy, fairness and impartiality as to be detached from fundamental principles.

EDITORIAL: The peace process is irreversibly over

The peace process is irreversibly over
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, January 26, 2009

If you did not see it already, watch Bob Simon’s report (below), “Is Peace Out Of Reach?” from last night’s edition of 60 Minutes. In the history of American reporting on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, this is an exceptional piece of journalism. But don’t just watch it — share it by email, embed it on your web site and do whatever else you can to enlighten other Americans who at this time understand so little about the core issues behind the conflict. (The following video is preceded by a 30-second commercial.)

Watch CBS Videos Online

As President Obama’s Middle East Envoy for Peace, George Mitchell, makes his way to the region this week, he should keep in mind a statement that Osama Hamdan, Hamas’s representative in Lebanon, made in a speech in Beirut yesterday. Hamdan said, “the peace process is irreversibly over.”

This bears repeating:

…the peace process is irreversibly over.

There are commentators who will say that this statement is an expression of intransigence and belligerence coming from a resistance movement dedicated to the destruction of Israel.

Far from it — it is merely a statement of fact. Indeed, it is an assessment of an objective reality that is remarkably lacking in venom.

Just suppose that we were at a juncture where 1,300 Israelis had just been brutally killed, 5,000 were wounded, many in a grave condition, 20,000 houses had been destroyed and tens of thousands were now homeless.

Suppose in such a situation Israel’s leaders were to declare that the peace process was irreversibly over, we would now be commenting on their remarkable composure. We would marvel that they would bother making a political statement and not simply a blood-curdling cry of vengeance.

Hamas on the other hand, in spite of the devastation of Gaza, is still committed to politics.

The political imperative of the moment is one of clarification. Hamas sees that Palestinian unity and a Palestinian national movement cannot be built on an illusory foundation.

Meanwhile, Tzipi Livni claims that the carnage in Gaza has advanced the peace process. This is an Orwellian, obscene, and outrageous insult to common sense. It displays a sociopathic view of human suffering.

But it also serves as a reminder and confirmation that Osama Hamdan is right: the peace process is irreversibly over.

If this is a conclusion which can commonly be agreed upon, where do we go from here? Is this not a conclusion that will feed utter despair or a justification for endless conflict?

I believe not.

Political change can only gain traction when it is rooted in objective reality. We can only advance from the conditions we actually inhabit.

For several years now the peace process has floundered because of a glaring contradiction between Israel’s stated aim — a two-state solution — and its actions, which consistently advanced in the opposite direction.

By its own choice, Israel has abandoned the goal of a two-state solution. The so-called peace process has provided the water and the sustenance that has allowed the occupation to flourish.

America has been the enabler. It has provided a stage upon which a pantomime of peace could be performed. It has quite effectively silenced those who would disrupt the performance and insisted that we all silently enjoy a show whose tedious enactment perpetually held out the promise of a happy ending.

“When Israel supports a solution of two states for two people, the pressure won’t be on Israel,” Tzipi Livni correctly observed over the weekend.

George Mitchell’s duty, the duty of the international community and of all Palestinian leaders, is to say: the game is up, the show is over. The charade has gone on for long enough. Israel has stated its position on the ground. It’s words have proved to be of no consequence.

Given the realities and ignoring the empty declarations, where does Israel want to go from here?

Democracy: a one-state solution in which Jews and Palestinians have equal rights;
Ethnic cleansing: a state that solidifies its Jewish identity by purging itself of every non-Jewish element; or
Apartheid: the explicit formalization of what is already a practical reality.

These, as Bob Simons correctly observers, are Israel’s choices. America can no longer serve as Israel’s shield in its efforts to conceal a painful reality.

GUEST CONTRIBUTOR – John Robertson: Surging into a perfect storm?

Surging into a perfect storm?
By John Robertson, War in Context, January 25, 2009

The British Independent‘s report Friday that new President Obama may be about to cut Afghan president Karzai adrift ought to be enough to make any informed observer physically ill – not because Karzai has been any great shakes as a leader (rampant corruption, plus a brother up to his neck in the Afghan narco-trade), but because it provides evidence of yet one more piece of a huge train-wreck – or maybe a perfect storm – that is slowly but surely approaching. And it has the potential to make the debacle in Iraq pale in comparison. Continue reading →

The aftermath of the war on Gaza

Out of the rubble
By Mouin Rabbani, The National, January 23, 2009

Speaking to his people on January 18, hours after Hamas responded to Israel’s unilateral suspension of hostilities with a conditional ceasefire of its own, the deposed Palestinian Authority prime minister Ismail Haniyeh devoted several passages of his prepared text to the subject of Palestinian national reconciliation. For perhaps the first time since Hamas’s June 2007 seizure of power in the Gaza Strip, an Islamist leader broached the topic of healing the Palestinian divide without mentioning Mahmoud Abbas by name.

At a press conference the following day convened by Abu Ubaida, the spokesperson of the Martyr Izz al Din al Qassam Brigades, the Hamas military wing, the movement went one step further. “The Resistance”, Abu Ubaida intoned, “is the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people”.

What these statements make clear is that Hamas will no longer engage with Abbas, and is even less inclined to throw him a lifeline in the form of a national unity government he would appoint. These statements are not so much a direct challenge to his leadership as a confirmation that his legitimacy has been fatally damaged by the Gaza war. Even his hand-picked prime minister, Salam Fayyad, told journalists that the PA in Ramallah has been “marginalised”.

Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip has produced a transformational moment in Palestinian politics. It is a moment all too reminiscent of the period succeeding the 1967 War when the credibility of the prevailing Arab order collapsed and – deriving their legitimacy from the barrel of a gun – Yasser Arafat and a coalition of Palestinian guerrilla organisations seized control of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO). [continued…]

The next step
By Gideon Levy, Haaretz, January 24, 2009

The vast majority cheered loudly, the negligible minority shouted in silence, like a whistler in the dark. The overwhelming majority only wanted more and more, the inconsequential minority wanted only to stop. The absolute majority gorged, ordering pizzas and scenes of the bombing by VOD, and some stood on the rooftops opposite Gaza with their children to watch the massacre with their own eyes. The trifling minority tried to protest, cringing with shame and feelings of guilt at every image that arrived from Gaza.

Not since the summer of 1967 have we had such a uniform, brainwashed chorus – and back then it was not so nationalist and bestial, insensitive and blind. But now, as the dust clears over the ruins and there are not enough bandages to cover all the wounds; with the cemeteries full and the hospitals bursting; as the cripples, the incapacitated, the amputees, the traumatized and the bereaved, the thousands of wounded and tens of thousands of newly homeless try helplessly to rehabilitate whatever they can, the time has come to respond and say what can be done. Now it is time to elaborate on the alternative to the cruelest and most brutal war in Israel’s history, and one of the most unnecessary.

First, there is a different path, which Israel has never embarked on. Neither Oslo nor the disengagement was a sufficient step. With war the initial means and unrestrained violence the preferred choice, we have almost always spoken only with force, our only language. By force and stratagems we made war, another war. The force was supplied by the Israel Defense Forces, the stratagems by the media. Alternative proposals were inevitably condemned. Second, it is impossible to start from today. We have to remember the context, and the context is always twisted and distorted out of all recognition. [continued…]

No moderates left
By Gideon Levy, Haaretz, January 25, 2009

he three leading candidates for prime minister are extremists. Tzipi Livni and Ehud Barak went to war in Gaza and are therefore as radical as can be. Benjamin Netanyahu is more radical in rhetoric only.

We must not be led astray in this election campaign and consider both Livni and Barak as moderates, in contrast to the “extremist” Netanyahu. This is a deception. Kadima and Labor, the center and left-wing parties, have led Israel to two awful wars within two years. Netanyahu has yet to go to war once. True, he speaks more radically than the other two, but so far it has only been words, while the “moderates” have taken radical, aggressive action.

“Bibi is unreliable and terribly right-wing,” Kadima’s electoral broadcast asserts. Is he? Livni and Barak are just the same. None of the people involved in the Gaza war can speak of peace now. Those who delivered such a brutal blow to the Palestinians, only to sow more hatred and fear among them, have no intention of making peace with them. Those responsible for firing white phosphorous shells into a civilian population and destroying thousands of homes cannot talk the following day about two states living peacefully side by side. [continued…]

A new Mideast approach
By Yousef Munayyer, Washington Post, January 24, 2009

Rather than seeking to bolster the moderates in this conflict, the Obama administration should focus on moderating the extremists. The idea of eliminating Hamas could not be seriously proposed by anyone with any knowledge of domestic Palestinian politics. The notion that Hamas is a primarily militant organization based in Gaza ignores the movement’s vast support in the West Bank and elsewhere.

Dealing with Hamas and groups such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Islamic Jihad in arenas of legitimacy, such as elections, negates the possibility that outside parties will spoil peace negotiations.

Those who would resolve the conflict must understand that such parties and groups, often labeled rejectionist, are not primarily ideologically based and are not monolithic. They, like most political parties, are beholden to a constituency. [continued…]

Report: Turkey says Israel must really want peace for it to broker Syria talks again
Haaretz, January 25, 2009

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has said that Ankara will only resume mediating Israel-Syria negotiations when Israel shows a real desire for peace, the pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat reported Sunday.

Turkey brokered indirect peace talks between the two enemy states last year, although their future has been unclear as Israel prepares to elect a new government that may break then off.

The paper also quoted Erdogan as saying that harsh comments he made during the recent hostilities in Gaza were not against Israel but merely expressed a principled position in opposition to the killing of civilians. [continued…]

Hamas ‘set for Gaza truce talks’
BBC News, January 25, 2009

Members of the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas are due to meet Egyptian officials to discuss ways to shore up a fragile ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. [continued…]

EDITORIAL: Does Israel fear its friends more than its enemies?

Does Israel fear its friends more than its enemies?
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, January 22, 2009

On December 18, 2008, Tel Aviv’s Institute for National Security Studies welcomed an honored American guest who participated in the 2nd Annual International Conference: Security Challenges of the 21st Century.

Former US Senator George Mitchell presented, “The American Perspective.” Note the definite article — Mitchell was not simply presenting an American perspective. Indeed, Haaretz reported yesterday that the institute’s director, Oded Eran, “found out on the eve of the conference that Mitchell had been chosen as the next Mideast envoy, though the envoy-designate did not discuss his new position.”

Did Mitchell’s anticipated imminent return to the region as President Obama’s Middle East envoy provide an added incentive for Israel to launch its assault of Gaza? After January 20 the strain on US-Israeli relations would have been severe.

But what could be so threatening about such a renowned American elder statesman? How could someone with Mitchell’s track record — a pivotal role in bringing peace to Northern Ireland — not provide an invaluable contribution to a moribund peace process?

Among Israel’s leaders and some of its most influential supporters it is Mitchell’s virtues that present the most ominous threat.

In The Jerusalem Post, under the headline, “Mitchell: Every conflict can be solved,” Herb Keinon candidly exposes Israel’s fear of an honest broker. Citing the findings of Mitchell’s 2001 report on the causes of the Second Intifada, Keinon writes:

The Mitchell Report called for an immediate cessation of violence and a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian Authority security cooperation, and a series of “confidence-building measures” to follow the cease-fire. The two key measures were that the PA had to “make clear through concrete action to Palestinians and Israelis alike that terrorism is reprehensible and unacceptable and that the PA will make a 100-percent effort to prevent terrorist operations and to punish perpetrators”; and that Israel had to “freeze all settlement activity, including the ‘natural growth’ of existing settlements.”

One government official said Mitchell’s position on zero settlement construction, together with new National Security Adviser James Jones’s previous articulation of frustration at Israel’s inability to dismantle outposts, would likely put Israel and the new administration on a collision course.

The official said that while Mitchell had been considered “a friend of Israel” when he was Senate majority leader from 1989-1995, his tenure as head of the Mitchell Committee left some in Jerusalem with the feeling that he was trying to be “too balanced.”

The official said the apparent selection of Mitchell as special envoy, over more high-profile Jewish Middle East experts surrounding Obama – such as Dennis Ross, Daniel Kurtzer, Martin Indyk and Richard Holbrooke – might indicate that for the sake of balance, Obama did not want a Jew in that position.

Echoing the same fear that Mitchell’s appointment puts Israel at risk because he will be “too” fair, one of Israel’s most prominent American defenders was equally frank in revealing his doubts:

Abraham Foxman

“So I’m concerned,” Foxman continued. “I’m not sure the situation requires that kind of approach in the Middle East.”

In as much as George Mitchell provokes fear among Israelis, he also crystallizes what should now be under debate.

The peace process has become a facade. Behind this facade, inside Israel, there has arisen a hardening conviction that peace is not possible. Mitchell poses a direct challenge to that conviction because he comes in with the opposite view:

…from my experience in Northern Ireland I formed the conviction that there is no such thing as a conflict that can’t be ended. Conflicts are created and conducted by human beings. They can be ended by human beings. I saw it happen in Northern Ireland although admittedly it took a very long time. I believe deeply that with committed, persevering and active diplomacy it can happen in the Middle East.

The real question that confronts Israel is not, what can advance the peace process? The question is much starker: does Israel still believe in the possibility of peace or has it become resigned to existing in a perpetual state of war?

Yet to pose this question is to expose the fragility of the security bubble inside which Israel currently chooses to reside. For as much as Israel likes to assume the posture of an indomitable military power, the simple truth is that Israel’s military might is utterly dependent on America’s patronage — hence the threat posed by America as honest broker, as opposed to loyal defender. As honest broker, America cannot perpetually provide Israel with the option of choosing war instead of peace.

GEORGE MITCHELL: The American Perspective

The American Perspective
George Mitchell, Institute for National Security Studies, Tel Aviv, December 18, 2008

The following speech was delivered by former Senator George J Mitchell at the 2nd Annual International Conference: Security Challenges of the 21st Century held at the Institute of National Security Studies in Tel Aviv on December 18, 2008. The focus of the conference was “The US and Israeli Roles in the Middle East under Changing Political Circumstances.” On January 22, 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton named Mitchell as Special Envoy for Middle East Peace

Thank you, Professor. Mr. Lowy, distinguished guests, members of the Institute, it is an honor for me to be with you today to discuss the subject of this conference, the US-Israeli Alliance Under New Administrations. As we all know, on January 20th the United States will have a new president. Three weeks later Israel will elect a new Knesset and begin the process of forming a government. Whatever the administrations, the US-Israeli relationship will remain strong. As President Elect Obama said recently, “Our alliance is based on share interests and shared values. Those who threaten Israel threaten us. I will bring to the White House an unshakable commitment to Israel’s security”. This of course reaffirmed many similar statements by his predecessors. A strong relationship has always been America’s objective and policy.

As he takes office Obama confronts very serious problems at home. The United States currently faces its worst economic crisis since the great depression. Unemployment is surging, home prices have fallen sharply, and the federal budget deficit this fiscal year will be the largest ever by far. But even as he deals with these problems he will have to confront several difficult foreign policy issues. In this region, as he has made clear, he will give high priority to a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian issue. He also will have to manage the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq and an increase in our focus on Afghanistan, including higher force levels there. Iran’s continuing ambitions in this region, including its drive to acquire nuclear weapons. Continuing tensions between India and Pakistan. And the ongoing threat of terrorism against the United States, its citizens and its allies. Of course, Israel has its own concerns. Among them are that the president of Iran continues to threaten Israel’s existence. Hamas controls Gaza and continues both its rocket attacks and its refusal to recognize Israel’s right to exist. Hizbullah has rearmed with weapons supplied by Iran and Syria. And there is growing pessimism among Israelis and Palestinians that a peace agreement can be reached in the near future.

As our two countries confront these challenges in a region filled with both peril and opportunity, it is essential that our president and your prime minister have a relationship of trust and confidence. Matters of tactics and timing are often subjects of disagreement, debate, of give and take between sovereign countries. This is inevitable, understandable and should trouble no one. But on the major issues, including a comprehensive and sustainable peace between Israel and its neighbors, and turning Iran away from nuclear weapons, it is important that our leaders work together and agree on objectives and strategy.

Much has happened in this region since I chaired the Sharm e-Sheikh fact finding committee in 2001. Seven years, or even sixty years, is a long time. But consider Northern Ireland, where last year the ancient conflict known as the troubles ended, when long time enemies came together to form a power-sharing government. This was almost eight hundred years after Britain began its domination of Ireland, eighty-six years after the partition of Ireland, thirty-eight years after the British Army formally began its most recent mission in Ireland, eleven years after the peace talks began and nine years after the peace agreement was signed. In the negations which led up to that agreement we had seven hundred days of failure and one day of success. I spent five years going to, coming from and working in Northern Ireland during which I chaired three separate sets of negotiations. For almost all of that time progress was very slow or mostly non-existent. So, for those of you in the Middle East who are discouraged, I understand your feelings. But from my experience in Northern Ireland I formed the conviction that there is no such thing as a conflict that can’t be ended. Conflicts are created and conducted by human beings. They can be ended by human beings. I saw it happen in Northern Ireland although admittedly it took a very long time. I believe deeply that with committed, persevering and active diplomacy it can happen in the Middle East.

It has been nearly a decade since the effective end of the Oslo Process. Thousands have died. Israel’s economy, despite impressive growth, is nevertheless not as strong as it would be without this conflict. The Palestinian economy has been very severely damaged. There are of course many many reasons to be doubtful, even skeptical, about the possibilities of an agreement here. But the pursuit of peace is so important that it demands our continued effort, no matter what the difficulties or the setbacks.

One key is the mutual commitment of the parties and the active participation of the United States Government, and the many other governments and institutions who want to help. Much is required of leaders who wish to achieve the goal of two democratic independent states living in peace. They must first reconcile the fact that the circumstances and the objectives of the two sides are different. Israel has a state but its people live in unbearable anxiety, so security for the people is an overriding objective. The Palestinians don’t have a state and they want one, an independent, economically viable and geographically integral state; that is their overriding objective. I believe that neither can attain its objective by denying to the other side its objectives. Israelis are not likely to have sustainable security if the Palestinians don’t have a state and Palestinians will never achieve a state until the people of Israel have some security. So with each launched missile or suicide bomb attack the prospect of a Palestinian state is delayed, not advanced. But there must be available to Palestinians the clear alternative, an alternative which they must seize of a non-violent path to a Palestinian state living in peace alongside a Jewish state. Palestinians in turn must accept that the Israeli demand for security is as real and as necessary as is their demand for a state.

Of course this has been and remains American policy. President Bush reiterated that earlier this year in Jerusalem when he said, and I quote: “The point of departure for permanent status negotiation to realize this vision seems clear. There should be an end to the occupation that began in 1967. The agreement must establish Palestine as a homeland for the Palestinian people, just as Israel is a homeland for the Jewish people. These negotiations must ensure that Israel has secure, recognized and defensible borders, and they must ensure that the state of Palestine is viable, continuous, sovereign and independent. It is vital that each side understand that satisfying the other’s fundamental objective is key to a successful agreement. Security for Israel and viability for the Palestinian state are the mutual interests of both parties”.

Unfortunately the positive attitude so carefully nurtured during the previous decade appear to have largely dissipated, replaced by a growing sense of futility, of despair, of the inevitability of conflict. Hamas’ electoral victory and its takeover of Gaza create political instability and increasing anxiety. Here in Israel there is political uncertainty as you look toward elections and a new government.

President Elect Obama also said recently that he intends to make progress on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict a key diplomatic priority. He went on to say that his administration will make a sustained push, working with Israelis and Palestinians, to achieve the goal of two states, a Jewish state in Israel and a Palestinian state living side by side in peace and security. I believe that this effort must be determined and persevering, backed up by political capital, economic resources and focused attention at the highest levels of government. This does not mean that it should be an American process or an American agreement. To the contrary, it must be firmly rooted in a shared vision of the people who live here for a peaceful future. But experience has shown that firm, constant and creative US diplomacy can be helpful. No two countries, no two conflicts are the same. So what happened in Northern Ireland cannot be precisely replicated here or anywhere else. But it does offer an example of what can happen when peace makes a better life possible.

I know that cynicism and fear are on the rise and that it will be very difficult to overcome the obstacles that are many and large. There is much history here to overcome. But there also was a lot of history in Northern Ireland. There decades of bitter, brutal sectarian warfare had created public attitudes that were deeply negative and filled with despair. Just four days before the agreement was reached, a public opinion poll reported that 83% of the public believed that no agreement was possible. Only 7% thought it possible; 10% had no opinion. But four days later we did get an agreement and it has held.

Competing claims, religious differences and many other factors have led to a grinding, demoralizing and destructive conflict here. The two sides can continue in conflict indefinitely, or they find a way to live side by side in peace and with stability. I believe with all my heart and soul that it can be done and it must be done, for the alternative is unacceptable and should be unthinkable.

Thanks for inviting me here to join with you. I look forward to your questions and comments. Thank you very much.

INAUGURATION DAY, JANUARY 20, 2008

Thank you Mr Bush – really
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, January 20, 2009

As America and much of the world now celebrates, let’s not forget the man who made all this possible: George W Bush. Had he been he merely been mediocre, merely a below-average president, America in its caution, America who — let’s not forget re-elected Bush and just a few months ago, at least for a few weeks, was quite enamored with Sarah Palin — this America, the one we’re still living in, might not have been ready to make the bold leap of electing an exceptional man of unquestionable talent. So let’s give thanks that George Bush really was the worst president ever and let’s give thanks that desperate times have become the catalyst for an imaginative leap.

On first full day, Obama will dive into foreign policy
By Michael D. Shear and Karen DeYoung, Washington Post, January 20, 2009

President-elect Barack Obama will plunge into foreign policy on his first full day in office tomorrow, finally freed from the constraints of tradition that has forced him and his staff to remain muzzled about world affairs during the 78-day transition.

As one of his first actions, Obama plans to name former senator George J. Mitchell (D-Maine) as his Middle East envoy, aides said, sending a signal that the new administration intends to move quickly to engage warring Israelis and Palestinians in efforts to secure the peace.

Mitchell’s appointment will follow this afternoon’s expected Senate vote to confirm Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. And tomorrow afternoon, aides said, Obama will convene a meeting of his National Security Council to launch a reassessment of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. [continued…]

Editor’s Comment — Here’s a comment on George Mitchell’s appointment from my colleague, the co-director of Conflicts Forum, Mark Perry:

Barack Obama has said that he would make Middle East peace a priority. George Mitchell’s appointment is a reflection of that commitment. There couldn’t be a better person to do this job.

He couldn’t have made a better appointment.

Israel wanted a humanitarian crisis
By Ben White, The Guardian, January 20, 2009

The scale of Israel’s attack on the Gaza Strip, and the almost daily reports of war crimes over the last three weeks, has drawn criticism from even longstanding friends and sympathisers. Despite the Israeli government’s long-planned and comprehensive PR campaign, hundreds of dead children is a hard sell. As a former Israeli government press adviser put it, in a wonderful bit of unintentional irony, “When you have a Palestinian kid facing an Israeli tank, how do you explain that the tank is actually David and the kid is Goliath?”

Despite a mass of evidence that includes Israel’s targets in Operation Cast Lead, public remarks by Israeli leaders over some time, and the ceasefire manoeuvring of this last weekend, much of the analysis offered by politicians or commentators has been disappointingly limited, and characterised by false assumptions, or misplaced emphases, about Israel’s motivations.

First, to what this war on Gaza is not about: it’s not about the rockets. During the truce last year, rocket fire from the Gaza Strip was reduced by 97%, with the few projectiles that were fired coming from non-Hamas groups opposed to the agreement. Despite this success in vastly improving the security of Israelis in the south, Israel did everything it could to undermine the calm, and provoke Hamas into a conflict. [continued…]

The myth of Israel’s strategic genius
By Stephen M Walt, Foreign Policy, January 19, 2009

Many supporters of Israel will not criticize its behavior, even when it is engaged in brutal and misguided operations like the recent onslaught on Gaza. In addition to their understandable reluctance to say anything that might aid Israel’s enemies, this tendency is based in part on the belief that Israel’s political and military leaders are exceptionally smart and thoughtful strategists who understand their threat environment and have a history of success against their adversaries. If so, then it makes little sense for outsiders to second-guess them.

This image of Israeli strategic genius has been nurtured by Israelis over the years and seems to be an article of faith among neoconservatives and other hardline supporters of Israel in the United States. It also fits nicely with the wrongheaded but still popular image of Israel as the perennial David facing a looming Arab Goliath; in this view, only brilliant strategic thinkers could have consistently overcome the supposedly formidable Arab forces arrayed against them.

The idea that Israelis possess some unique strategic acumen undoubtedly reflects a number of past military exploits, including the decisive victories in the 1948 War of Independence, the rapid conquest of the Sinai in 1956, the daredevil capture of Adolf Eichmann in 1960, the stunning Israeli triumph at the beginning of the 1967 Six Day War, and the intrepid hostage rescue at Entebbe in 1976.

These tactical achievements are part of a larger picture, however, and that picture is not a pretty one. Israel has also lost several wars in the past — none of them decisively, of course — and its ability to use force to achieve larger strategic objectives has declined significantly over time. This is why Israelis frequently speak of the need to restore their “deterrent”; they are aware that occasional tactical successes have not led to long-term improvements in their overall security situation. The assault on Gaza is merely the latest illustration of this worrisome tendency. [continued…]

Gazans rally behind Hamas
By Charles Levinson, Wall Street Journal, January 20, 2009

sraeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, as he announced a cease-fire in Gaza over the weekend, said Israel’s military objectives against Hamas had been met. But at least initially, the militant group appears to have gained what Israel and its Bush administration allies had long hoped they could damp: popular support.

“Hamas is now our army, the only ones fighting to defend the Palestinian people,” said Gaza resident Ahmed al-Sultan, standing outside the rubble of the north Gaza City home his family has lived in for 40 years. “I saw how they fight, their courage and their sacrifice, and so I’ve changed my opinion about them.”

Israeli tanks and troops continued to pull out of Gaza on Monday, the first full day of a truce between the Jewish state and Hamas, which rules the enclave. Gazans emerged from their homes seeking drinking water, firewood and missing relatives.

Mr. Sultan’s neighborhood of Toam was a sprawling landscape of destruction. Blocks of Palestinian homes have been leveled. His mother and sisters sat despondently at his feet in the deep ruts left by an Israeli tank.

Eighteen months ago, Mr. Sultan fought against Hamas during the group’s bloody takeover of the coastal territory. He’s a longtime member of the Palestinian Authority’s security services, which are controlled by the Fatah party, now led by moderate and Western-leaning Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

After it won control in Gaza, Hamas sentenced Mr. Sultan to death. He won a reprieve through a connected relative. Today, he calls the Palestinian Authority leaders he once served, who are based in the West Bank, “donkeys” and says Hamas, his onetime nemesis, are “rightful defenders of the Palestinian people.” [continued…]

Gaza operation weakens Palestinian Authority
By Richard Boudreaux, Los Angeles Times, January 20, 2009

With Israel and Hamas both claiming victory in the Gaza Strip, there is one clear loser: the U.S.-backed Palestinian Authority, which desperately wants a peace accord with Israel and a unified Palestine in Gaza and the West Bank.

Israel’s 22-day assault on Hamas-ruled Gaza made the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority look ineffective and marginalized, unable to stop the carnage. Popular support for its peace talks with Israel, already declining, now seems weaker than ever.

And a tentative cease-fire that left Hamas still in charge of Gaza threatens to reinforce the rift between the Palestinian territories, further setting back hopes for a settlement of the decades-old Middle East conflict.

At an Arab summit in Kuwait on Monday, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas pleaded for a revival of the power-sharing arrangement that broke apart in 2007 when Hamas, an armed Islamist movement, ousted his secular Fatah forces from Gaza in a ruthless factional fight. [continued…]

Israel speeds withdrawal from Gaza
By Ethan Bronner, New York Times, January 20, 2009

Israel accelerated its troop withdrawal from Gaza on Monday with the aim of finishing by the inauguration of Barack Obama on Tuesday, as Hamas reasserted control over the rubble-filled streets and tens of thousands of Palestinians sought to cope with destroyed homes and traumatized lives.

Decomposing bodies continued to be uncovered in the worst-hit areas, with the death toll for the 23-day conflict that ended on Sunday passing 1,300, according to health officials here, as the fragile cease-fire between Israel and Hamas held. Policemen took up positions directing traffic and a few bulldozers began the enormous task of clearing the ruins. Garbage was everywhere, devastation rampant.

Hamas held its first news conference since the war began on Dec. 27, with two government spokesmen standing in front of a destroyed compound that had housed a number of ministries and asserting that their movement had been victorious. [continued…]

NEWS & VIEWS & EDITOR’S COMMENTS: January 19

Saudi Arabia to donate $1 billion to rebuild Gaza
By Diana Elias, AP, January 19, 2009

The Saudi king said Monday his country will donate $1 billion to help rebuild the Gaza Strip after the devastating Israeli offensive and told Israel that an Arab initiative offering peace will not remain on the table forever.

King Abdullah’s comments at an Arab economic summit in Kuwait City were his first since Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas declared a fragile cease-fire to halt three weeks of violence in Gaza that killed more than 1,250 Palestinians.

“Israel has to understand that the choice between war and peace will not always stay open and that the Arab peace initiative that is on the table today will not stay on the table,” said Abdullah during a speech. [continued…]

Editor’s Comment — Will Israel’s leaders be troubled by King Abdullah’s warning? I doubt it. What Saudi Arabia, Jordan (whose own Abdullah still insists the 18-year old peace process should not be abandoned) and Egypt have showcased over the last three weeks — whatever they might assert — is their own political impotence. If there is going to be any new initiative it seems more likely it will come from Ankara, Damascus of Doha.

Note:

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan criticized world leaders for leaving Hamas out of the peace process, saying it was a democratically elected political party.

He also warned that the situation in Gaza could take on a very different dimension if “Western countries” did not show appropriate sensitivity toward Hamas.

“This political party Hamas won an election with nearly 75 percent of the vote. The West, which has shown no respect for this embracing of democracy, is responsible for this situation,” Erdogan told a news conference.

And:

Syrian President Bashar Assad says he’s prepared to work with US President-elect Barack Obama. “The new American government must be prepared to engage in a serious peace process. We are prepared for any form of cooperation,” Assad told Spiegel in an interview. But he has a few conditions.

Until now, Bashar Assad says, his country has waged war against Israel, viewed Americans as its opponents and offered Hamas political chief Khaled Mashaal and other top leaders exile as well as employment opportunities. Nevertheless, Assad says, he sees opportunities for less violence. “We would be happy to do our part to stabilize the region,” he told Spiegel in an interview to be published on Monday.

But he also insisted that his country’s relations with Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran would not be dictated by outsiders.

“Good relations with Washington cannot mean that we have bad ones with Tehran,” he said.

Parsing gains of Gaza war
By Ethan Bronner, New York Times, January 19, 2009

The Israeli theory of what it tried to do here is summed up in a Hebrew phrase heard across Israel and throughout the military in the past weeks: “baal habayit hishtageya,” or “the boss has lost it.” It evokes the image of a madman who cannot be controlled.

“This phrase means that if our civilians are attacked by you, we are not going to respond in proportion but will use all means we have to cause you such damage that you will think twice in the future,” said Giora Eiland, a former national security adviser.

It is a calculated rage. The phrase comes from business and refers to a decision by a shop owner to cut prices so drastically that he appears crazy to the consumer even though he knows he has actually made a shrewd business decision.

The Palestinians in Gaza got the message on the first day when Israeli warplanes struck numerous targets simultaneously in the middle of a Saturday morning. Some 200 were killed instantly, shocking Hamas and indeed all of Gaza, especially because Israel’s antirocket attacks in previous years had been more measured.

When Hamas’s prime minister, Ismail Haniya, appeared on Hamas television from his hiding spot last Monday, he picked up on the Israeli archetype, referring in Arabic to the battle under way as “el harb el majnouna,” the mad or crazy war.

For most, of course, feeling abused like this has created deep rage at Israel.

“If you want to make peace with the Palestinians, they are tired of bombs, drones and planes,” said Mohammad Abu Muhaisin, a 35-year-old resident of the southern city of Rafah who is affiliated with Fatah, the rival to Hamas that rules in the West Bank and was ejected from Gaza in June 2007. “But a guy whose child has just been killed doesn’t want peace. He wants war.” [continued…]

Editor’s Comment — As Tzipi Livni makes her own personal assessment of gains from the war, she cannot have failed to notice that despite frequent reports that Kadima was being bolstered by the military campaign, their polling numbers have actually got worse. On December 27, AP reported:

A poll by the Dahaf Research Institute showed Livni’s Kadima Party winning 29 of parliament’s 120 seats — the same number it has now — and Netanyahu’s Likud taking 26 if elections were held today. A TNS Teleseker survey gave Kadima 31 seats to Likud’s 29.

The Jerusalem Post today reports that a Channel 2/Ma’agar Mohot poll predicted a 31-23 Likud victory over Kadima, while a Channel 10/Dialog poll said Likud would win 29-26.

As for what Ehud Olmert hopes to gain from the war, perhaps it could be viewed as one of the most audacious efforts at jury tampering in history.

A return to square one
By Alastair Crooke, The Guardian, January 19, 2009

On Saturday evening, Israel announced not a ceasefire – in the sense of an agreement between the parties to end a conflict – but a decision that its forces will unilaterally halt their fire. It said it would await the Hamas response, any timetable for a withdrawal of Israeli forces being contingent on an end to rocket fire from Gaza.

Yesterday, the resistance movements in Gaza, including Hamas, unilaterally announced a cessation of military action for one week, by the end of which time they demand that all Israeli forces should have departed Gaza. Implicit in this initiative is the threat that, were they to fail to leave within seven days, Hamas and the other groups would resume the firing of rockets into Israel.

At one level, this unilateralist outcome resolves none of the core problems that were at the source of the conflict in the first place. Hamas remains in control in Gaza; its military capacity has not been substantially degraded: 40 missiles were fired at Israel on Saturday, and at least a further 16 were launched before Hamas announced the ceasefire yesterday. And nothing has been settled in terms of the opening of the crossings from Israel into Gaza, or in respect of the Rafah crossing from Egypt into Gaza. The release of Gilad Shalit, the Israeli captive, has not advanced. [continued…]

Israel fears wave of war crimes lawsuits over Gaza offensive
By Aluf Benn, Haaretz, January 19, 2009

Israel is preparing for a wave of lawsuits by pro-Palestinian organizations overseas against Israelis involved in the Gaza fighting, claiming they were responsible for war crimes due to the harsh results stemming from the IDF’s actions against Palestinian civilians and their property.

Senior Israeli ministers have expressed serious fears during the past few days about the possibility that Israel will be pressed to agree to an international investigation of the losses among non-combatants during Operation Cast Lead; or alternately, that Israelis will be faced with personal suits, such as happened to Israeli officers who were accused of war crimes in Britain for their actions during the second intifada.

“When the scale of the damage in Gaza becomes clear, I will no longer take a vacation in Amsterdam, only at the international court in The Hague,” said one minister. It was not clear whether he was trying to make a joke or not. [continued…]

‘Tungsten bombs’ leave Israel’s victims with mystery wounds
By Raymond Whitaker, The Independent, January 19, 2009

Erik Fosse, a Norwegian doctor who worked in Gaza’s hospitals during the conflict, said that Israel was using so-called Dime (dense inert metal explosive) bombs designed to produce an intense explosion in a small space. The bombs are packed with tungsten powder, which has the effect of shrapnel but often dissolves in human tissue, making it difficult to discover the cause of injuries.

Dr Fosse said he had seen a number of patients with extensive injuries to their lower bodies. “It was as if they had stepped on a mine, but there was no shrapnel in the wounds,” he said. “Some had lost their legs. It looked as though they had been sliced off. I have been to war zones for 30 years, but I have never seen such injuries before.” However, the injuries matched photographs and descriptions in medical literature of the effects of Dime bombs.

“All the patients I saw had been hit by bombs fired from unmanned drones,” said Dr Fosse, head of the Norwegian Aid Committee. “The bomb hit the ground near them and exploded.” His colleague, Mads Gilbert, accused Israel of using the territory as a testing ground for a new, “extremely nasty” type of explosive. “This is a new generation of small explosive that detonates with extreme power and dissipates its power within a range of five to 10 metres,” he said.

According to military databases, Dime bombs are intended for use where conventional weapons might kill or injure bystanders – to kill combatants in a house, for example, without harming people next door. Instead of being made from metal, which sprays shrapnel across a wide area, the casing is carbon fibre. Part of the motive for developing the bombs was to replace the use of depleted uranium, but Dr Fosse said the cancer risk from tungsten powde was well known. “These patients should be followed up to see if there are any carcinogenic effects,” he said. [continued…]

Gazans confront shattered lives
By Hamada Abu Qammar, BBC, January 19, 2009

All day, thousands of Gazans have been rushing back to their neighbourhoods to see what is left after Israel’s campaign of bombing and shelling.

Gaping holes and fire-blackened cars litter the streets in the areas hit hardest by the fighting.

I have spoken to some people who say they have not even been able to find their way round their bomb-damaged neighbourhoods, never mind find the remains of their homes.

Many simply turned round and returned to the UN-run schools they fled to amid the fighting.

But for some Gazans even attempting to return home is virtually unimaginable. [continued…]

Scale of Gaza destruction emerges
BBC, January 19, 2009

The full scale of devastation in Gaza following Israel’s three-week offensive is becoming clear, after both Israel and Hamas declared ceasefires.

UN official John Ging said half a million people had been without water since the conflict began, and huge numbers of people were without power.

Four thousand homes are ruined and tens of thousands of people are homeless. [continued…]

Another war, another defeat
By John J. Mearsheimer, The American Conservative, January 26, 2009

Even before Hamas came to power, the Israelis intended to create an open-air prison for the Palestinians in Gaza and inflict great pain on them until they complied with Israel’s wishes. Dov Weisglass, Ariel Sharon’s closest adviser at the time, candidly stated that the disengagement from Gaza was aimed at halting the peace process, not encouraging it. He described the disengagement as “formaldehyde that’s necessary so that there will not be a political process with the Palestinians.” Moreover, he emphasized that the withdrawal “places the Palestinians under tremendous pressure. It forces them into a corner where they hate to be.”

Arnon Soffer, a prominent Israeli demographer who also advised Sharon, elaborated on what that pressure would look like. “When 2.5 million people live in a closed-off Gaza, it’s going to be a human catastrophe. Those people will become even bigger animals than they are today, with the aid of an insane fundamentalist Islam. The pressure at the border will be awful. It’s going to be a terrible war. So, if we want to remain alive, we will have to kill and kill and kill. All day, every day.”

In January 2006, five months after the Israelis pulled their settlers out of Gaza, Hamas won a decisive victory over Fatah in the Palestinian legislative elections. This meant trouble for Israel’s strategy because Hamas was democratically elected, well organized, not corrupt like Fatah, and unwilling to accept Israel’s existence. Israel responded by ratcheting up economic pressure on the Palestinians, but it did not work. In fact, the situation took another turn for the worse in March 2007, when Fatah and Hamas came together to form a national unity government. Hamas’s stature and political power were growing, and Israel’s divide-and-conquer strategy was unraveling.

To make matters worse, the national unity government began pushing for a long-term ceasefire. The Palestinians would end all missile attacks on Israel if the Israelis would stop arresting and assassinating Palestinians and end their economic stranglehold, opening the border crossings into Gaza. [continued…]

The violence network
By Eric Calderwood, Boston Globe, January 19, 2009

After several days of following the Al-Jazeera coverage of Gaza, I’ve never seen a live interview with an Israeli, neither a politician nor a civilian. In the Al-Jazeera version, the Gaza conflict has only two participants: the Israeli army – an impersonal force represented as tanks and planes on the map – and the Palestinian civilians, often shown entering the hospital on makeshift stretchers. There are few Hamas rockets and no Israeli families. It’s not hard to see why Al-Jazeera is accused of deliberately inflaming regional enmity and instability.

But in a larger sense, Al-Jazeera’s graphic response to CNN-style “bloodless war journalism” is a stinging rebuke to the way we now see and talk about war in the United States. It suggests that bloodless coverage of war is the privilege of a country far from conflict. Al-Jazeera’s brand of news – you could call it “blood journalism” – takes war for what it is: a brutal loss of human life. The images they show put you in visceral contact with the violence of war in a way statistics never could.

For an American, to watch Al-Jazeera’s coverage of Gaza is to realize that you’ve become alienated not just from war, but even from the representation of war as a real thing. As Americans, we’re used to hearing the sound of heavy artillery, machine guns, and bombs in action films and video games. Yet here on the news, they seem strangely out of place. You could argue that Al-Jazeera uses images of civilian violence to foment public outrage against Israel. This might well be true. At the same time, these images acknowledge human suffering and civilian death and stand strongly against them – and in doing so, foment outrage against war itself. [continued…]

Hamas rising
By Fawaz A. Gerges, Middle East Online, January 17, 2009

I have just returned from the Middle East and witnessed how Israel’s assault on Gaza is radicalizing mainstream Muslim opinion. Shown endlessly on Arab and Muslim television stations, the massive killing of civilians is fueling rage against Israel and its superpower patron, the United States, among mainstream and moderate voices who previously believed in co-existence with the Jewish state. Now, they are questioning their basic assumptions and raising doubts about Israel’s future integration into the region.

Many professionals, both Christian and Muslim Arabs, previously critical of Hamas, are bitter about what they call Israel’s “barbaric conduct” against Palestinian noncombatants, particularly women and children. No one I have encountered believes Israel’s narrative that this is a war against Hamas, not the Palestinian people. A near consensus exists among Arabs and Muslims that Israel is battering the Palestinian population in an effort to force it to revolt against Hamas, just as it tried to force the Lebanese people to revolt against Hezbollah in the summer of 2006. But Hezbollah weathered that Israeli storm, acquired a sturdier immune system and became the most powerful institution in Lebanon. In so doing it shattered Israeli deterrence, delivered a blow to US Mideast policy and expanded the influence of Iran, Hezbollah’s main supporter in the region.

In my recent travels I was struck by the widespread popular support for Hamas — from college students and street vendors to workers and intellectuals. Very few ventured criticism of Hamas, and many said they felt awed by the fierce resistance put forward by its fighters. Israel’s onslaught on Gaza has effectively silenced critics of Hamas and politically legitimized the militant resistance movement in the eyes of many previously skeptical Palestinians and Muslims. Regardless of how this war ends, Hamas will likely emerge as a more powerful political force than before and will likely top Fatah, the ruling apparatus of President Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority. [continued…]

HAMAS DECLARES A COUNTER-CEASEFIRE – Updated

Hamas announces cease-fire in Gaza, gives IDF week to leave
By Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz, January 18, 2009

Hamas announced an immediate ceasefire by its militants and allied groups in Gaza on Sunday, giving Israel a week to pull out its troops from the coastal territory.

The move came after Israel announced a unilateral cease-fire late Saturday, ending its offensive against the Palestinian Islamist group in Gaza.

“Hamas and the factions announce a ceasefire in Gaza starting immediately and give Israel a week to withdraw,” said Ayman Taha, a Hamas official in Cairo for talks with Egypt on a truce deal.

Hamas also demanded that Israel open all of the Gaza Strip’s border crossings to allow in food and other goods to meet the “basic needs for our people.”

Damascus-based Hamas official Moussa Abu Marzouk confirmed the cease-fire on Syrian television. [continued…]

Editor’s Comment (updated) — It looks like Hamas has succeeded in grabbing the diplomatic initiative here by turning the tables on Israel. Israel said it will pull out of Gaza if the rocket fire stops but now Hamas is going to demonstrate that it retains command and control of Gaza by giving Israel a week to clear out. That leaves Israel in a bind. If they start pulling out right away they will appear to be complying with Hamas’ terms. If they drag their feet and as a consequence rocket fire resumes, they will appear to have squandered an opportunity to end the fighting.

The crucial element — from Hamas’ point of view — is that by maintaining a disciplined truce it provides a very visible demonstration that it retains control on the levers of power in Gaza. This sends a strong message to Israel and the rest of the world: Hamas was not crushed and it has the capacity and willingness to engage in a truce.

And the underlying message is the message that Israel and its allies have thus far been extraordinarily obstinate in refusing to learn: Hamas is not going away. They can either be fought or engaged but those who still cling to the fantasy of Hamas’ annihilation are nursing a destructive delusion.

UPDATE: Although Israel initially said it wanted “to allow the dust to settle and see how Hamas reacts” before it would start pulling troops out of Gaza, the fact that Israel began pulling troops back almost immediately after Hamas made its own ceasefire declaration, suggests — even if Israel won’t admit it — that they are implementing a deal. Both sides have a stake in maintaining an uncompromising posture but what we are witnessing now is mutually understood language being translated into actions.

CALLING FOR A BOYCOTT, DIVESTMENT AND SANCTIONS AGAINST ISRAEL

British academics take a stand against the Israeli occupation
The Guardian, January 16, 2009

The massacres in Gaza are the latest phase of a war that Israel has been waging against the people of Palestine for more than 60 years. The goal of this war has never changed: to use overwhelming military power to eradicate the Palestinians as a political force, one capable of resisting Israel’s ongoing appropriation of their land and resources. Israel’s war against the Palestinians has turned Gaza and the West Bank into a pair of gigantic political prisons. There is nothing symmetrical about this war in terms of principles, tactics or consequences. Israel is responsible for launching and intensifying it, and for ending the most recent lull in hostilities.

Israel must lose. It is not enough to call for another ceasefire, or more humanitarian assistance. It is not enough to urge the renewal of dialogue and to acknowledge the concerns and suffering of both sides. If we believe in the principle of democratic self-determination, if we affirm the right to resist military aggression and colonial occupation, then we are obliged to take sides… against Israel, and with the people of Gaza and the West Bank.

We must do what we can to stop Israel from winning its war. Israel must accept that its security depends on justice and peaceful coexistence with its neighbours, and not upon the criminal use of force.

We believe Israel should immediately and unconditionally end its assault on Gaza, end the occupation of the West Bank, and abandon all claims to possess or control territory beyond its 1967 borders. We call on the British government and the British people to take all feasible steps to oblige Israel to comply with these demands, starting with a programme of boycott, divestment and sanctions. [See the over 300 academic signatories]