If ever American foreign policy looked like a tacky brochure from a dodgy car dealer, then U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivered on the image with his trip to the Middle East this week.

Washington’s top diplomat flew to the region to flog the “two-state solution” for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, asserting that it was the only way to find peace. This was after nearly two weeks of an Israeli blitzkrieg on the Gaza Strip, the coastal enclave where two million Palestinians subsist in chronic poverty. Blinken said the purpose of his trip was to shore up a ceasefire and to jump-start a long-defunct peace process predicated on a two-state solution.

The fact is that the American model of peace is long dead. For more than three decades since Washington brokered the Oslo Accord the endless talk about two states coexisting has been a chimera and a fallacy. The Israelis never believed in such a settlement, despite occasional cynical lip service. And the Americans never seriously held the Israelis to their supposed commitments. Occupation and annexation of the Palestinian homeland have been allowed to continue unabated with Washington’s acquiescence.

Blinken’s itinerary speaks of the systematic and flawed bias. He first arrived in Israel this week where his priority was to hold a high-profile meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Blinken reiterated “America’s ironclad commitment to Israeli security”, while Netanyahu thanked the United States for “firmly supporting Israel’s right to self-defense”. The nauseating spectacle of fawning followed an onslaught of Israeli bloodletting against a civilian population whose right to self-defense is never mentioned by Washington nor its controlled corporate media.

Almost like an after-thought, the American diplomat then visited Ramallah in the West Bank where he met with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in a low-key setting in stark contrast to the glad-handing offered to the Israelis.

“I am here to underscore the commitment of the U.S. to rebuilding a relationship to the Palestinian Authority and with the Palestinian people,” Blinken said with a straight face.

This is part-and-parcel of the obsolete American policy to build up the PA and Abbas as the Washington-designated representatives of the Palestinians which is essential to the continuance of the U.S. two-state solution charade.

Blinken did not visit Gaza, the coastal ring-fenced ghetto where the Israelis razed over 1,000 homes and businesses in their latest onslaught with U.S.-supplied warplanes and bombs. The PA in Ramallah and Abbas are redundant like so much of the model of U.S. policy.

The Hamas Palestinian faction which is dominant in Gaza is viewed by most Palestinians, including those living in former PA strongholds of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, as the legitimate leadership. That view has been reinforced after the two-week conflict during which Hamas fired thousands of rockets into Israeli areas – albeit most of them intercepted by air defenses. Hamas’ hostilities came after weeks of provocative repression by the Israeli security forces at the Palestinian places of worship in East Jerusalem, as well as moves to evict Palestinian residents from areas near the Old City.

Hamas is labeled a terrorist organization by the United States and European Union, partly because it refuses to recognize the Israeli state as a legitimate entity. Hamas by definition does not subscribe to the two-state solution. It views Palestine as the whole area between the Jordan River and Mediterranean Sea – the historic homeland of all Semitic people, including Jews and Arabs.

Blinken offered to rebuild Gaza with a paltry donation of $5.5 million. He talked about more money coming in the future from Congress, but with no guarantees. That is an insult upon massive injury. The American-fueled Israeli blitz killed over 240 Palestinians, including 66 children. According to the United Nations, over 400 buildings were destroyed, as well as six hospitals and dozens of health centers and schools razed.

Blinken did not explain how the United States would repair such appalling damage in an area that was already a humanitarian crisis before the latest blitz. But he did say adamantly that Washington would not be working with Hamas.

America’s two-state solution model is a clapped-out vehicle that was never really intended to arrive at delivering viable Palestinian statehood. It has been a cynical cover for the Israeli occupation machine to continue grinding down Palestinian territory and spitting out broken homes and lives through sporadic bouts of violent ethnic cleansing. Each time the violence erupts – 2021, 2014, 2009, and so on – the Palestinians end up losing ever more of their historic rights.

The time has come to recognize that the two-state solution is a dead-end for Palestinians. The Americans and their Israeli surrogates should not be allowed to impose their cynical deception any longer.

The Zionist project which the British empire launched with the Balfour Declaration in 1917 on Palestine has created a destructive and unsustainable colonial occupation known as Israel. The only viable and just solution is for all people to live in one land from the river to sea provided that their rights are equally respected, whether Muslim, Christian, Jew, or no religion. Israel is an apartheid state predicated on repression, discrimination and Zionist illegal occupation.

Since the Second World War and the inception of the Israeli state in 1948, the Americans have succeeded the British as the guarantors of this illegal colonial project under the guise of politically correct platitudes about “dignity for all”. In the real world, however, the established American foreign policy is part of the problem, not the solution.

Blinken’s used-car-sales trip to the Middle East is proof that the American model is on the scrap heap of history.

The acclaimed novel Birdsong tells a story from inside the gruelling trench warfare of 1914-18. The trenches – mere mud, and rain-soaked corridors – were separated from the German lines, by the desolate hell of ‘no man’s land’ – an indescribable flat wilderness of mud, mud and more mud, littered with broken bits of what once were men, whose remains no one dared retrieve, and the surreal black art of coiled razor wire twisted out into every imaginable shape and angle.

Across this Hieronymus Bosch landscape, the Germans laid down rolling wave after wave of intense high explosive artillery shells sending plumes of earth high up into the sky. Yet, in counterpoint to this dark and demonic backdrop, Birdsong unfolds a story of human struggle, near death and deep compassion for injured fiends. But at the core, it is a story about tunnels – those who dug them; those buried in them, as they fell in; and those who sprung out from them – as earth-worms rising – to surprise and kill the enemy.

Tunnels were the secret weapon of WW1. They was the answer to the merciless aerial bombardment unleashed by the crushing mass of a superior military machine. Battalions would enter the trenches 800 strong, and emerge after the barrage, with a mere 100-200 living men. Yet on they went – volunteers digging tunnels through the mud to rise, like ghosts, upon a sleeping enemy.

The western doctrine of overwhelming fire-power was born there. In the next war (WWII), it was all about the (indiscriminate) bombing of civilian populations (in Germany and Japan) to break – psychologically – their will to fight. This approach dug in. It became the principal tool in the western tool box. Churchill used airborne firepower in the Middle East between the wars, and absolute air superiority remains the inner heart to current U.S. and NATO strategy.

What is the point here? It is that this whole ark of military strategy rooted in massive aerial bombardment – reaching back to the 1920s, and pushing forward until today in Gaza, is expiring. It has become obsolescent (at least in the Middle East), just as did trench warfare in the wake of 1918.

Tunnels (now, much more sophisticated ones), have gained renewed life as the answer to massive aerial bombardment on civilian terrain as a prime psychological tool of war. They mark the end of a strategy. Swarm missiles, and smart drone clusters are today’s inflection points: the ‘new’ warfare – just as much a game-changer as was the advent of the longbow (in the 1300s). They have become, as it were, somehow Hamas’, Hizbullah’s, the Houthi’s and Iran’s ‘alt’ Air force.

It is clear that the Hamas rocket barrage took Israel (and Washington) by surprise. t may not have sunk in fully, but the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will never be the same again. Why?

To be very clear, what has happened is firstly, that just as WWI troops found a partial response to the rolling German artillery bombardments of their positions through their shallow, collapse-prone tunnels, so Iran, Hizbullah, the Iraqi resistance and the Houthis have upgraded the strategy to deep (30 meter), fortified underground positions – effectively to emasculate Israel’s Air Power – and, if anything, to turn the Israeli air power in-on-itself , damaging Israel’s image, whilst burnishing that of the Palestinians.

Secondly, Israel’s onslaught in Gaza, killing 230 Palestinians, including 65 children precisely has turned the outside world against it. And, for the first time, there is a serious debate in the U.S. about support for Israel’s entrenched system of control over the Palestinian territories, and its creeping annexation of Palestinian lands – unchecked for years by an acquiescent United States.

But why should this time different from previous episodes? What has changed? In a word: the woke revolution – a “new Democratic normal”. With America and parts of Europe now viewing their own histories of settlement, ethnic cleansing and colonialism as toxic aberrations that should be redeemed, it has become possible to say things today in the U.S. about Israel long thought, but held hitherto in pectore; that earlier would have brought heaven and earth crashing down upon the career of anyone uttering them. No more.

Thirdly, a growing number of politicians who staked their careers on building the Oslo two-state solution, finally are coming to acknowledge that the facts on the ground make Oslo a fantasy. “The Oslo framework is done, it’s over,” said Marwan Muasher, a former Jordanian diplomat and politician who played a lead role in the Arab Peace Initiative two decades ago: “I’m a two-stater by training. I’m a one-stater by reality”.

The key pillars to Oslo have been seen as chimaera: That demography alone would compel Israel to implement a two states outcome; that Palestinian security co-operation would assuage Israeli hesitations to endorse a Palestinian state; and thirdly that a Palestinian state would bring an end to occupation. All these key assumptions have proved false.

The U.S. and the Europeans however have no idea what to do about the situation, beyond calling for a return to ‘normality’ – one that permits Israelis ‘to return to the beach’, and the Palestinians ‘to their cage’, as one commentator, caustically remarked about the meaning of ‘normal’.

Possibly, the western daze about what to do goes someway to explaining their surprise at the Gaza events. Whilst the West looked for its liberal, secular solution, Iran, Hamas and Hizbullah quietly were forging a quite different response – one that would change the whole paradigm. In practice, the 2006 Lebanon war was a ‘dress rehearsal’. It marked the ‘end of the beginning’ of this new mode of swarm drone and missile warfare; and this latest Gaza war (together with the more sophisticated, smart missiles and drones now surrounding Israel) represents its coming into maturity. It is a concerted, closely co-ordinated move. Hamas though, preferred to make its Gaza début a wholly Palestinian move.

In 2006, Israel was also taken by surprise. Amos Harel recalls that anyone present in the room when “Dan Halutz, the proud IDF chief of staff at the beginning of the Second Lebanon War, will never forget his briefing to the press on the eve of Friday, July 14, 2006. Halutz ticked off the list of the IDF’s achievements, headed by a massive hit on the Hezbollah mid-range missile system (the details of which were minimal at the time). He was attempting to convince the reporters that the army had reacted suitably to the abduction of two reserve soldiers two days earlier. All of a sudden, a note was brought to him with news of the [Hizbullah cruise missile] hit on the Israeli navy missile ship INS Hanit opposite the shores of Beirut. In a war, surprises aren’t only chalked up in one direction.”

In fact, the IDF in 2006 were bombing a feint. Hizbullah had built those tunnels to fool the IDF. They leaked false intelligence that Israel absorbed. The real missile silos were safe and intact – and the missile volleys continued for nearly a month. Is it probable that Hizbullah passed on such strategic advice to Hamas? Of course they did.

Today, it is a similar story. Israel is spinning victory (rooted in its destruction of Hamas tunnels), yet facing failure – as in 2006. Credible reports suggest that the IDF strategy hinged on its confidence that they had mapped the Gaza tunnels. So that when the army deliberately launched the rumour of an impending Gaza ground invasion, they calculated that the Hamas leadership immediately would take to the tunnels, which the Israeli Air Force would then bomb, thus burying the movement alive. Only it didn’t happen – Hamas’ leadership were not in those tunnels, and the missiles did not cease.

Aluf Benn sums it up, in Haaretz (where he is editor-in-chief):

“You can feed the public with news broadcasts arrogantly talking about “the painful blows we’ve delivered to Hamas” and showcase the pilot who killed an Islamic Jihad commander – while forgetting that this was an advanced fighter jet with precision armaments attacking an apartment building – as a modern-day version of Judah the Maccabee or Meir Har-Zion. But all these layers of makeup can’t cover up the truth: The military has no idea how to paralyze Hamas’ forces and throw it off balance. Destroying its tunnels with powerful bombs revealed Israel’s strategic capabilities without causing any substantive damage to the enemy’s fighting abilities.

Assuming 100, 200 or even 300 fighters were killed, would this bring down Hamas rule? Or its command and control systems? Or its ability to fire rockets at Israel? The shrinking number of quality targets is evident in the growing number of civilian casualties as the campaign has continued…”.

Well, there was one Israeli contrarian who was not locked into the prevailing mindset: “The sharpest critic of the army brass in recent years, warned that the next war would be fought on the home front – [and] that Israel had no answer to attacks involving thousands of missiles – and which its land forces aren’t able to fight”. That was Maj. Gen. Yitzhak Brik’s warning, but as so often with contrarians, he was ostracised and ignored.

The long ark of the strategy of bombing civilian terrains (justified by saying that terrorists are hiding there), may be reaching its ‘sell-by’ date, as Human Rights become the touchstone of foreign policy (as well as commanding domestic U.S. policy).

This carries implications for the U.S. and NATO, as much as for Israel. Would the NATO bombing of Belgrade with full impunity for 78 days be feasible again in today’s ‘values’ climate?

A ceasefire has been ‘agreed’ (though, as what often occurs with Egyptian ‘mediation’, the parties already dispute what purportedly was agreed between them). A ceasefire may mark a pause in the Gaza battle, but by no means the end to a war.

The last reason why the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will not be same again is that the collective eruption across historical Palestine has unified and mobilised the Palestinian people – under Hamas’ military leadership. The latter are perceived as the only force capable of protecting Al-Aqsa mosque – threatened by settler attempts to seize it; or burn it – a real threat with the potential to inflame Muslims across the globe.

As Gaza quietens for now, the next phase to this war likely will centre around Al-Aqsa, Jerusalem and the 1948 Palestinian communities within Israel. Israelis face a new reality: Hamas is not ‘over there’, but is everywhere around them; and furthermore, they also know that the possibility of the (likely) coming Right-wing coalition in Israel acquiescing to this new paradigm is zero.

“We will aim for the toppling of Hamas, take action to assassinate all Hamas leaders and go in with ground forces for however long we want,” Gantz remarked during a press conference in Sderot.

As the IDF Chief of Staff during Operation Protective Edge in 2014, Gantz oversaw the scale of bombardment and massacres against Palestinians civilians. The deliberate violence, which also targeted Gaza’s infrastructure, left thousands of Palestinians displaced. Over 2,000 Palestinians were killed and 11,231 injured, according to UN reports.

Netanyahu has so far refrained from another large-scale aggression against Gaza. While his strategic, intermittent bombing has earned him widespread criticism in within Israel’s settler-society, Netanyahu has merely changed tactics but not ideology. Without any overt declarations of targeting Gaza, Netanyahu is normalising the Israeli agenda and deflect criticism from the international community. The latter was put to the test a few months ago last May, when Israel’s airstrikes on Gaza elicited rhetoric from the international community justifying Israel’s purported right to “defend itself” while blaming Hamas.

While attempting to portray himself as different from Netanyahu, Gantz is merely offering another trajectory of implementing Zionist colonial violence. Israeli media is already running reports of a possible coalition government between Likud and the Blue and White party, thus signalling that despite alleged differences, Netanyahu and Gantz are still in accordance over political issues, notably Gaza, settlement expansion and the prevention of any form of a Palestinian state.

Gantz’s party is proposing the elimination of the Hamas leadership and destruction of its “headquarters, warehouses, operatives,” after which it would “fix the humanitarian situation in Gaza.” This plan of action was outlined by Gabi Ashkenazi, under whose direction as IDF Chief of Staff Operation Cast Lead unfolded in 2008.

Such exploitative comments illustrate Gaza’s vulnerability. In recent years, Palestinians in Gaza have suffered increasing deprivation as a result of endeavours by Israel, the Palestinian Authority and the international community to render humanitarian aid conditional. UN officials have even stated their preference for a return to PA rule in Gaza to facilitate their humanitarian operations. Again, depriving Gaza of basic necessities is also blamed upon Hamas.

Gantz’s solution is to eliminate a political leadership and resistance movement in a large scale, drawn out aggression that will affect Palestinians in Gaza who are still suffering the consequences of the previous Israeli bombardments. Humanitarian aid, according to Gantz, is conditional upon Hamas’s elimination. As Gaza is rendered fragile to Israeli threats and their implementation, the manipulation of humanitarian aid for Palestinians, already a plan in action, will be consolidated.

Furthermore, Gantz is proposing is the re-establishment of Israeli presence in the enclave – a notion which is prevalent among other Israeli candidates, albeit with different interpretations.  The ground invasion, therefore, must not be thought of merely as a military action tied to a specific operation, but as a possible prelude envisaged by the former IDF chiefs to contain Gaza from within – along with the illegal blockade that continues to threaten the wellbeing of Palestinians.

Once again, the Israeli electorate is facing propaganda that pits Netanyahu’s refined and brutal strategy against the violent “deterrence” promoted by Gantz. Yet, talk of a possible coalition only highlights how close both agendas are in terms of destroying Gaza.  Netanyahu has prepared the groundwork in terms of influencing the international community to turn a blind eye to Israel’s assaults on Gaza. A prospective Israeli government with Netanyahu and Gantz at the helm will build upon what Israel has so far accomplished in generating oblivion when it comes to Palestinians in Gaza.

Jacob Kedmi, former head of Nativ special service, is an experienced political analyst and commentator. He tried to explain the behavior of the government. According to him, before the decision to start the operation the cabinet members had been informed on possible losses in case of complete occupation of the Gaza Strip. The predicted figures were stunning, so the ministers did not even bother to vote. ¹ The hopes to undermine the morale of HAMAS fighters were in vain.

Tsahal evidently tries to evade urban warfare. The scenario of conquering the entire Gaza Strip, said to have been put before the security cabinet in the debate on tactics for the next phase of the operation, would have cost hundreds of lives of Israel soldiers and led to a five-year Israeli occupation for purging the territory of 20,000 terrorists and disabling their military machine.

The difficulty of eliminating the numerous tunnels in Gaza was confusing. The myth has it that the tunnels lead to Israeli populated areas to commit terrorist acts there. It’s not true because the nearest towns and villages are situated at the distance of 7-10 kilometers from the Palestinian sector’s edge; one needs a real subway train to reach the place of destination. There are only desert or rare kibbutzim with few workers, mainly coming from Thailand, on the Israeli side of the border. The tunnels are dug and well equipped since a long time ago. Initially the purpose was to overcome the blockade. Mainly the heavy weapons, including rockets, were transported not through tunnels but using ground routes at the time of unrest in Egypt as the Arab Spring unleashed by the president Obama’s Cairo speech was in full swing. It’s him the Israelis have to thank to having their cities bombed. By the way Israeli military destroyed the tunnels leading to Egypt and did it with delay. Cairo did it earlier because it was gravely concerned over close ties between Muslim Brothers and HAMAS. According to Israeli media, the military were surprised to find a real underground city in Gaza, something Israeli special services had failed to inform about.

The long history of stand-off with Palestinians has taught Israelis to effectively fight as they enter narrow streets with housed built close to each other and high fences hard to climb. Israel has the whole range of special weapons and equipment for such urban warfare. For instance, armed bulldozers to break through to the place of destination along the shortest way, curbed barrel weapons to shoot (corner shots) safely from around the corner, air and sea intelligence gathering equipment, ground radars immediately offering a bearing in case a target pops up. The entire staff happened to be useless this time. The fighters moving underground can get to the enemy’s rear positions undetected or lay explosives on the way of armor and vanish underground. The tunnels leading to Israel are dug to allow fighters approach Tsahal block posts and bases along the Gaza perimeter. Israeli experts say the tunnels are like an underground submarine going deep into the enemy’s positions.

Abu Leit, one of commanding officers of the Izz ad–Din al–Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, said the group learned well the lessons of the operation Cast Lead in 2008. Under the Israeli’s air strikes a strategic decision was taken to relocate the warfare underground. HAMAS started to use timers to launch rockets from special camouflaged launchers. To prevent treason the majority of fighters don’t know each other. HAMAS has a 30 thousand strong force. The tactics envisage actions with forces divided into small groups. Only group members know each other personally. Few top commanders, like Muhammed Deif, for instance, are known. It complicates the mission for Israeli intelligence. Even if there is a traitor inside a group he cannot provide information on the fighters of other groups. Only a few engineers have access to secret maps and know how many tunnels actually exist and where exactly they lead to. The majority of tunnels going beyond the Gaza Strip borders are kept secret till the very last moment before the operation.

Normally experts believe this kind of tactics appeared as the Hezbollah experience in Lebanon was studied. But the combat actions in Lebanon were just a start. The military art greatly evolved in Syria. This tactics are often effectively used by the anti-Assad opposition. HAMAS learnt the lessons well. By the way, in Syria the rebels are advised on underground war by the instructors from the West, or even Israel. He, who sows the wind, reaps the whirlwind. Damascus has spent years to learn the way to counter the tactics but it’s too early to say if there are efficient ways to wage underground war. I wonder how much time Israel will spend to invent countermeasures.

No wonder HAMAS has no plans to surrender under the circumstances. It is adamant insisting on its 10 conditions for cease-fire, including:

1.      Mutual cessation of the war and withdrawal of tanks to previous locations and the return of farmers to work their land in the agricultural border areas.

2.      Release of all the Palestinians detained since 23 June 2014 and improvement of the conditions of Palestinian prisoners, especially the prisoners from Jerusalem, Gaza and Palestinians of the interior [present-day Israel].

3.      Total lifting of the siege of Gaza and opening the border crossings to goods and people and allowing in all food and industrial supplies and construction of a power plant sufficient to supply all of Gaza.

4.      Construction of an international seaport and an international airport supervised by the UN and non-biased countries.

5.      Expansion of the maritime fishing zone to 10 km and supplying fishermen with larger fishing and cargo vessels.

6.      Converting the Rafah crossing into an international crossing under supervision of the UN and Arab and friendly countries.

7.      Signing a 10-year truce agreement and deployment of international monitors to the borders.

8.      A commitment by the occupation government not to violate Palestinian airspace and easing of conditions for worshipers in al-Aqsa mosque.

9.      The occupation will not interfere in the affairs of the Palestinian government and will not hinder national reconciliation.

10.  Restoration of the border industrial areas and their protection and development.

The ongoing talks between Palestinians and Israelis on the situation settlement evoke no great expectations. One of the stumbling blocks is the demand for construction of port to be operated by Turkey and Norway. Israel stands like a real “protective edge” on the way of implementation of such plans. This is another indirect reason for sparking fighting in the region. Tel Aviv wants to maintain monopoly on natural gas extraction in the eastern Mediterranean; it won’t share it with Palestinians. The development of Gaza shelf area could entail a strong competition with Israel and give an impulse for economic development of Palestine. Norway has very rich experience of developing seabed gas fields. Naturally it stokes concern in Israel. The divisions over gas development are becoming one more obstacle on the way of Middle East peaceful settlement.

1http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8uVgVx-ZEw&list=UU_J-5n0COUTOz8XLNSl5J3Q

http://www.debka.com/article/24166/Iran-Al-Qaeda-took-note-of-curbs-on-IDF-vanquishing-Hamas-which-now-has-core-of-a-Palestinian-army-

Today the conflict is exacerbated by extremely complicated regional situation; the tensions are running high enough to implode the whole Middle East. No strategic goal achieved, the Israeli leadership actually boosts the clout of already influential Islamic radicalism in the region. Without making Palestine a full-fledged state, something Israel still opposes, the problem cannot be solved. 

There are many explanations why Israel decided to strike Gaza now. One of the reasons is unexpected advance of jihadist the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). The prospect of HAMAS and ISIL getting together made Israel take a preventive action. It all goes against the plan as it usually does. Palestinians are right saying that striking civilians in Gaza and HAMAS infrastructure, the group that positions itself as another moderate Islamic movement like Muslim Brothers, may result in inveterate jihadists grabbing power in the Strip. No doubt they will strike an alliance with the Islamic State. As a result the strategic situation of Israel will only deteriorate. 

Well-known Israeli writer Etgar Keret says that even when the last HAMAS fighter dies, the idea of establishing a Palestinian state will not fade away. Before HAMAS Israel had fought the Palestinian Organization of Liberation, with HAMAS gone Israel will have to fight another Palestinian group. The Israeli army can win a battle, but only a political compromise can bring Israelis peace and tranquility. The Israeli losses happened to be unexpectedly high. Israeli military experts believe HAMAS is successfully copying the tactics used by Lebanese Hezbollah in 2006. Palestinians, as well as the Lebanese back then, widely use underground tunnels and bunkers, improvised explosive devices (IED), anti-tank missiles and drones against Israeli ground troops. They launch rockets against large cities to weaken the political support for war. 

According to Palestinian sources, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades have killed 52 Israeli servicemen. Unlike previous actions, commissioned officers die too. For instance, Lt. Col. Dolev Keidar (38), from Modiin, Commander (magad) of Gefen Battalion, was killed during terrorist incursion into Israel when terrorists fired a RPG at his jeep. Russian by origin Captain Dmitri Levitas, 26, who commanded a tank company, was shot dead, a Sergeant is taken prisoner and 36 armor vehicles are hit. The other side’s information does not differ much. In narrow streets and labyrinths many Tsahal advantages don’t work. The initiative and reaction decide the outcome in urban warfare. The brigade Golani was involved in fierce fighting inside the city quarters. Israeli experts say HAMAS fighters don’t hide anymore like in the times of Operation Cast Lead, the militants rush to fight headlong like suicide bombers. Anti-tank munitions and shahid's belts (a belt packed with explosives) are the most deadly weapons. They strike unexpectedly from underground hide-outs and tunnels. According to Tsahal, HAMAS sends more strike groups to counter the offensive. The militants regroup underground where they have their warehouses. The underground structure is the main target for Tsahal. The Palestinian main headquarters are supposed to be camouflaged somewhere in an undetected underground. Until now the combat was mainly concentrated in the urban periphery, the Israeli losses may increase as the troops near the heart of the city. 

Many experts don’t share the mainstream opinion of Israeli press that the rockets launched from Gaza either miss the targets or get hit by the Iron Dome missile defense system. HAMAS may be testing the Israeli missile defense capabilities in the conditions of all-out war. The mission is to define the level of Iron Dome’s level of saturation. A few rockets hitting residential areas are not the mission. The real goal was to assess the missile defense capabilities of Tel-Aviv, nuclear reactor in Dimonaа in Negev, Hadera power station, Ben-Gurion international airport, the port cities of Ashdod and Ashkelon.

The operation against HAMAS has made Israel and moderate Arab regimes even more threatened by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. The jihadists recruit young people in the Muslim countries. The peril grows for Jordan, an Israeli neighbor. Not so long ago Israel said it won’t let Jordan be destabilized even it requires sending troops. The events in Gaza diminish the Israeli operational capability to act somewhere else. Receiving Israeli military aid would be as dangerous for the Abdullah II, the king of Jordan, as an intervention of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. 55 % of Jordan’s population are Palestinian refugees. 

Israel may not worry about the condemnation by the United Nations as long as the United States is a permanent member of the Security Council. The tourist season seems to be over. Many companies don’t fly to Israel anymore. The damage is felt being measured in millions, or even billion dollars. 

The reconciliation within Palestinian ranks is hardly a good news for Israel too. For instance, HAMAS leader Khaled Meshaal and Mahmoud Abbas, President of Palestine National Authority, have met in Qatar. 

Hamas senior official Izzat al-Rishk said the parties talked about the Zionist aggression in Gaza in detail, including the steps to stop the intervention and lift the Gaza blockade in cooperation with Egypt, Arab and international organizations. 

Ankara may feel grudge about it, but the Gaza events boosted the regional clout of Egypt. Turkey lost nine people when trying to deliver aid to Gaza. It seeks the role of HAMAS sponsor. But it’s Egyptian president as-Sisi who was chosen to act as an intermediary in the conflict. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, an ardent supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas, is infuriated over the role Egypt is playing in trying to broker a cease-fire in Gaza.

He is questioning Cairo’s role by arguing that Egypt is currently governed by a tyrant, and claiming that Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who led the coup against Morsi and the Brotherhood, is merely using Gaza as a pretext to legitimize his rule. “Sisi is not a party to this. He himself is a cruel perpetrator of a coup. He has blocked Hamas’ access to food and aid by closing the roads to Gaza», Erdogan told reporters after attending Friday prayers on July 18. "Egypt is not a party. … They are trying to legitimize the administration in Egypt," he said.

Erdogan clearly cannot accept that Sisi, whom he has been constantly vilifying since the Egyptian coup, may play a leading role in Gaza. His claim that the Egyptian leader is merely seeking legitimization by using Gaza even forced some diplomats in Ankara to ask whether Erdogan is concerned more about undermining Sisi than about securing an early cease-fire in Gaza.

Egypt is the only another country to have a land border with Gaza. It can offer aid in exchange for more loyalty on the part of HAMAS leadership. 

The growing Israeli death toll increases the chances for cease-fire giving HAMAS a chance to declare victory no matter suffering heavy losses. The Israeli armed forces are also far from being victorious. Israel believes HAMAS may agree to cease-fire in case Egypt promises more check-points between Gaza and Sinai, as well as giving payments to 43 thousand of HAMAS bureaucrats. 

As it has been reported recently, HAMAS has agreed to a five-day truce in case this period of time will be used for launching talks on fundamental change of Gaza status. The only thing left is to hope this fragile cease-fire, if it takes place, will bring positive results. It’s easier to start a war than to find a way out of it. 

Hamas faces acute regional isolation and it literally stares at an existential crisis. The Brotherhood government in Cairo led by President Mohamed Morsi used to provide a vital lifeline for Hamas, which is virtually irreplaceable. Of course, what happened in Egypt was beyond Hamas’ control and it cannot be held responsible for it, either. But the ‘collateral damage’ could nonetheless prove lethal. 

After the overthrow of the Morsi government, the Egyptian military leadership has closed the Rafah crossing and sealed the infamous tunnels through which Gaza carried on its communion with the outside world defying the Israeli blockade. All indications are that the military leadership is closely coordinating with the Israeli security agencies while re-imposing restrictions of various kinds on the Hamas, which of course steams from a back-to-back deal between Cairo and Tel Aviv that inter alia ensures that Washington will not be able to step up pressure on the Egyptian junta, even if it wants to, beyond a mutually agreeable threshold. 

Needless to say, Washington’s criticism of the violent crackdown on the Brotherhood in Egypt lacks real bite. The Obama administration will doubtless try to keep its options open in a future scenario if the Brotherhood – which after all commands huge popular support – does manage to stage a political comeback. But on the other hand, it is also business as usual between Washington and Cairo. The Pentagon just confirmed that the large-scale military exercise it has been planning to hold in Egypt in September remains on course. 

Biting the hand that feeds

But then, the Hamas leadership has been at fault, too. Hamas literally bit the hand that was feeding it when it snapped its longstanding relationship with the Syrian government under President Bashar al-Assad. Over the years Damascus had extended lavish hospitality and political patronage to the Hamas leadership through the thick and thin but all that was forgotten overnight when Khaled Meshaal packed bags and summarily left for Doha when the Turkish – Qatari – Saudi push began for a ‘regime change’ in Syria. 

All sorts of speculations arose as to why Meshaal took such a rash decision, and what was the secret ‘charm offensive’ by Qatar to which he succumbed, but suffice to say, Hamas unwittingly took sides in the sectarian divide that surfaced in Syria and found itself tacitly aligned with Qatar and Turkey. Which, in turn, inevitably impacted on its ties with Iran. For the brief period it lasted – a year or two – Hamas was probably a beneficiary of the regional axis of Turkey, Qatar and Egypt that sought to project the Muslim Brotherhood as the charioteer of the new Middle East. 

But the disintegration of that regional axis following the coup in Egypt – and the cascading pressure on the Brotherhood all across the Middle East and the Maghreb – pushes Hamas into a cul-de-sac. Arguably, Hamas has found itself in dire straits before also – such as when to came to power in Gaza in 2006. 

What has been true at that time and what could turn out to be the case today also is that the pressure from Israel and the US and its regional allies will only strengthen its support locally among the Palestinian people. This is one thing. 

But on the other hand, the US and its key allies – especially Egypt and Israel – have pressed ahead with the Middle East peace talks in Washington with the confidence that Hamas has been reduced to a mere shadow of what it used to be. Of course, the US and Israel will count on the Egyptian military leadership to ensure that Hamas doesn’t easily break out of its isolation. Therefore, the big question is how far Turkey, Qatar and Iran will show interest in reviving the Hamas’ sagging fortunes. 

Turkey will unlikely resort to a strategic defiance of the West by undercutting the US-led efforts to revive the Middle East peace process. Also, Turkey is bogged down with its own Kurdish problem, which has lately exacerbated as a result of the conflict in Syria. The Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan has virtually shelved his plans to visit Gaza. With poor relations with Egypt and Israel and the Obama administration ignoring it as a key protagonist in the Middle Eastern developments and the ties with the Saudis drifting into uncertainties, Turkish diplomacy has been forced on to the back foot. 

As for Qatar, no one quite knows what could be its foreign-policy orientation under the new Emir. Like Turkey, Qatar also used to be a high flier in the regional politics but has ended up overreaching itself. The Brotherhood’s exit from power in Egypt has disoriented the Qatari regional policies. Qatar has neither the will nor the capacity to counter the US-Saudi axis in regional affairs, either. 

Noticeably unwavering

That leaves Iran as the only interlocutor that Hamas can turn to in its hour of distress. Indeed, Iran, too, is caught in the middle of a political transition and the new set-up in Tehran not only will need time to settle down but will also be focusing on the nascent trends toward starting direct talks with the US, which of course will be an awkward time to queer the pitch of the Palestinian resistance and annoy the Obama administration. 

However, a close reading of the Iranian pronouncements show that Tehran’s foreign-policy directions remain unwavering. President-elect Hassan Rouhani exchanged noticeably warm greetings with the secretary-general of Hezbollah Hassan Nasrallah. Rouhani said: «No doubt, your tireless and dedicated efforts and those of Hezbollah warriors on the scene of resistance promise the decisive victory of the resistant Lebanese and Palestinian nations over the Zionist regime, which has always been supported by the Islamic Republic». 

All things taken into account, therefore, a good starting point for Hamas ought to restore its past ties with the Hezbollah. Conceivably, Hamas is thinking on these lines and a three-way meeting of the Hamas and Hezbollah representatives and Iranian officials might have already taken place in Beirut recently. The Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Arghachi has been cited as saying that Hamas and Iran are close to resolving their differences and misunderstandings over Syria.

The Hamas spokesman Ahmad Yusuf also said in a statement: "We have not lost allies; on the contrary, we are keeping all our friends, but there are issues that led to some apathy in the relationship, and we as a movement and government are eager to keep our fraternal relations with all the countries of region, which have a degree of cooperation, coordination, and support because Palestine is the cause of the [Muslim world] and not only the cause of the Palestinians. Therefore, we are eager to iron out all the differences in the interest of our people and cause." Meanwhile, Iran and Hamas have taken an identical stance on the US initiative to ‘revive’ the Middle East peace talks. Both see the talks as a ploy by the Obama administration to safeguard Israel’s interests and mitigate its regional isolation. 

The Iranian regime keeps up with the practice begun by Imam Khomeini to observe the last Friday of the holy month of Ramadan as the International Quds Day. It is an occasion to express solidarity with the Palestinians. The influential political figure Alaeddin Broujerdi, chairman of Iranian parliament’s national security and foreign policy commission, has been quoted as saying, «This year’s Quds Day has a special place due to the ongoing crisis in Muslim countries, especially Syria and Egypt, as well as the futile peace talks». The Hamas’ presence in Tehran on August 2 will provide a clue to assess the realignments following the coup in Egypt. 

Turkey, Iran in chatened mood

The eight-day conflict in Gaza brought to the fore the role of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi who belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood as the sole regional mediator between the Palestinians and Israel. Egypt cannot be easily dethroned from this enviable position in a near future. This has vast implications for the power dynamics in the Middle East.
 
Turkey and Iran are the two most affected regional powers in this shift in the regional dynamics. These two countries found themselves to be at a disadvantage. While Turkish leaders were reduced to alternating between spewing vitriolic rhetoric and shedding helpless tears, Iran was left to watch from the sidelines unsung and unnoticed.

 Turkey may have little to lose except its vanities as a Middle Eastern power but for Iran this is manifestly a high stakes game. Gaza conflict compels both countries to rethink their future strategies. Curiously, although they applauded the political catharsis of the Arab Spring and presupposed inherent advantages in it, TurKey and Iran are startled to find that their regional designs have been upset.

In the ascendancy of Islamism, Turkey visualized the inevitability of its leadership role in the New Middle East, while Iran relished mistakenly that Arab Spring spurred anti-Americanism. Both are in a chastened mood today.

Ankara hardly had any role to play in the diplomatic efforts to broker ceasefire. The negotiations put Egypt on the centre stage. Egypt not only reclaimed its pivotal role in the Arab-Israeli conflict but also combined it with the role of a mediator, which adds up to a measure of regional influence that is way past what Turkey can hope to match.

The sense of frustration must be deep in Ankara, considering that Prime Minister Recep Erdogan had patronizingly welcomed the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt assuming his obligation to groom the new leaders in Cairo. The embarrassment showed in Erdogan’s vitriolic rhetoric calling Israel a “terrorist” state and accusing the Israeli leadership of pursuing a policy of “ethnic cleansing”.

Such rhetoric (and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davitoglu’s tear shedding while visiting Gaza) may have helped to some extent to divert the attention of the Turkish public and the Arab Street from the stark reality that Turkey was sidelined in the search for a resolution of the latest crisis of the Palestinian problem.

Two things emerged for Ankara to ponder over. First, as a perceptive Turkish commentator Semih Idiz noted, “Morsi’s advantage is that he maintains official ties with Israel, even if the level of diplomatic relations has been lowered due to Gaza, while at the same time being close to Hamas. Turkey, on the other hand, has burned its bridges with Israel and the prospects for building new ones currently appear nil.”

Second, no matter the present Turkish leadership’s ambitions to claim the Ottoman legacy in the Middle East, Turkey is an “outsider” as far as the Arab world is concerned. To quote Idiz, “Ankara’s current role in the Middle East is merely that of a ‘strong backer’ and ‘promoter’ of settlements agreed on by its regional and global allies. In other words, it is not involved in any key negotiations.”

In comparison with Turkey’s predicament, Iran may seem better off, but the stakes are actually much higher. The point is, Morsi’s ability to retain power depends on the government’s success on the economic front where it has raised high expectations among the vast impoverished sections of Egyptian society.

The aid from the IMF depends on American goodwill and the huge transfusion of funds from the pro-US regional states is useful and timely as budgetary support. Thus, Morsi’s counseling of the militant Palestinian groups not to further agitate the region with bouts of violence against Israel needs to be seen in perspective.

But Muslim Brotherhood cannot countenance Israeli violence against the Palestinians, either. Morsi’s government has come up for criticism that it is not tightening its border with Gaza and is passively acquiescing with the flow of weapons for Hamas arranged by the smugglers from Libya or Sudan.

On another plane, Morsi is deftly exploiting the Hamas’ need of Cairo. In the absence of Egypt, Hamas today has no other interlocutor to transact business with Israel. Yet, Muslim Brotherhood is also a faction-ridden movement, which needs to address different constituencies. The top leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohammed Badie said in a statement even as Morsi was brokering the ceasefire: “The enemy knows nothing but the language of force. Be aware of the game of grand deception with which they depict peace accords.”

Suffice to say, Tehran views the recent happenings as a passing stage in the inexorable march of the Palestinian resistance. Tehran probably felt disappointed that Hamas leadership failed to acknowledge its crucial role in the latest “victory” over Israel. It was left to Iran to highlight that the technology for the Fajr-5 rockets it transferred to Hamas was the ultimate clincher in the conflict, penetrating Israel’s much-vaunted Iron Dome and hitting Tel Aviv and Herzliya.

Iran claimed that it was Hamas’ “stunning retaliation” with the Fajr-5 that forced Israel to tone down rhetoric about impending ground offensive into Gaza and sue for peace. Iran for the first time disclosed that it rendered financial and military assistance to Palestinian groups.

Meanwhile, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said, “The attitude of Arab and Islamic countries to the events in Gaza was not proper, because some of them felt it is enough to make words, while some others even didn’t condemn the Zionists in words… The Muslim countries and especially the Arab governments should help the oppressed people in Gaza and endeavor to remove the (long-term) siege from that region.”

Unsurprisingly, Iranian rhetoric put the accent on the “reliance on resistance as the only way to liberate Palestine” – to borrow the words of the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Saeed Jalili. The speaker of the Majlis Ali Larijani also said on Friday, “The defeat of the Zionist regime in the eight-day war proved that resistance is the only way to stop the Zionists’ aggression… Today, the regional powers decide on the regional issues; resistance movement’s victory will continue under a united position among all Palestinian groups, stemming from their faith in God’s support and their jihadi efforts.”

Again, in a significant gesture, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad telephoned Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh on Saturday and praised the resistance and perseverance of the people of Gaza and pointed out that resistance led to the “path to dignity and prosperity and freedom of all Palestinians.”

Clearly, Iran pins hopes on Haniyeh’s leadership role. In February Haniyeh visited Iran in a diplomatic drive aimed at realigning Hamas in terms of the upheaval in the Middle East. Addressing a rally in Tehran marking the 33rd anniversary of the Iranian revolution, Haniyeh pledged, “They [West] want from us to stop resistance and acknowledge Israel but I herewith announce that this will never happen. Our message and the message of all those who lost their blood in the Palestinian lands is that all occupied lands will eventually be liberated from Israeli occupation.”
Iran and Syria used to be the principal backers of Hamas but much has changed in the past year or so and Hamas has been forced to adjust its strategies. Tehran has been unhappy with Hamas for its refusal to support the Syrian regime, while Hamas got caught between the crosscurrents of its allegiance to the Syrian government dominated by the Alawite (whose roots lie in Shi’ite Islam) and its allegiance to the Muslim Brotherhood (which faces crackdown by the Syrian regime.)

Khaled Mashal wants Hamas to reassess its alliances, adopt a more conciliatory attitude towards the West and work with the pro-West Arab League states. Of course, Hamas denies any internal dissent over the movement’s future course but the divergences in its collective leadership are too apparent to be ignored.

Quite obviously, how these divergences pan out will be of crucial concern to Iran. Last week, while the conflict in Gaza entered its final phase, Larijani undertook a visit to Beirut where he underscored Iran’s priorities. He said, “The power of the Lebanese and Palestinian resistance movements is essential for the durable peace and security of the region.”

Gaza ceasefire hangs by a thread

At a joint press conference with the Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr, Hillary Clinton said in Cairo last Wednesday: «I want to thank President Morsi for his personal leadership to de-escalate the situation in Gaza and end the violence. This is a critical moment for the region. Egypt’s new government is assuming the responsibility and leadership that has long made this country a cornerstone of regional stability and peace. The United States welcomes the agreement today for a ceasefire in Gaza. For it to hold, the rocket attacks must end, a broader calm return… 

«Now we have to focus on reaching a durable outcome that promotes regional stability and advances the security, dignity, and legitimate aspirations of Palestinians and Israelis alike. President Morsi and I discussed how the United States and Egypt can work together to support the next steps in that process». 

Clinton’s fulsome praise for Morsi and indirectly for the Muslim Brotherhood underscored the phenomenal shift in Washington’s perspective on the Egyptian protagonists during the recent three-month period when US-Egypt ties hit a low point following the large-scale anti-American demonstrations in Cairo in September. Full credit goes to the Qatar emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani and the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan for taming the Sphinx on the Nile banks. The yeomen service rendered by the two «Islamist» leaders in repairing the damage caused to the US-Egypt ties and the western interests in general following the downfall of Hosni Mubarak is without parallels in the region’s muddled history… 

But at the end of the day, Morsi remains an adroit politician. Making him a one-dimensional man is fraught with risks. In August, he showed his true mettle in outmaneuvering the Egyptian generals who dominated the political scene in a single clean sweep that took everyone with surprise – including Washington which misread the situation as one of the Egyptian top brass abdicating from political space in a supreme act of self-sacrifice rather than the wily president cracking the whip and sending them to the barracks. 

Naturally enough, Morsi sees a window of opportunity in a new direction now that he has become the darling of the West. In sum, he has thought it fit now to set out to use his new clout with the «international community» to reap some dividends in the domestic political arena as well for himself and the Muslim Brotherhood since his the consolidation of his presidency is not yet a done thing. 

His latest decree issued last week in the immediate aftermath of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire accord that he brokered, aims at shifting the delicate balance of power between the Brotherhood on the one hand and the nationalists and liberals on the other hand decisively in favor of his presidency at a critical juncture when Egypt is embarking on the momentous task of drafting a new constitution. 

But the big question is whether in the process Morsi hasn’t overreached. His move looks rather clumsy and it doubtless lacks the sophistication of his crackdown on the generals. It has produced an immediate backlash. Surely, there is a massive «silent majority» in Egypt, which abhors the creeping «islamization» of Egypt. Morsi is overlooking that he was elected as president in May in the second round with only 51% of the electorate in a highly polarized political arena. 

There is trouble brewing in Egypt, and it could well turn out to be big trouble, although he is betting that the opposition is hopelessly fragmented and is no match for the Brothers in their organizational capacity, and, besides, the «international community» dared not cross his path by identifying with the opposition. The Muslim Brotherhood has called for a march by one million supporters in Cairo as a show of support. As of now, there is no sign of the Brothers blinking. 

This becomes a truly piquant situation for Washington. As Clinton acknowledged, the US heavily depends on Morsi to see that the fragile Gaza ceasefire holds through the coming period even as Israel puts in place a working relationship at the agency level with the Egyptian security establishment. Morsi’s cooperation and that of the Muslim Brotherhood is also of vital importance for Washington’s unfolding agenda to force regime change in Syria, to stall a regime change in Jordan and, most important, to isolate Iran. 

On the other hand, the western liberal opinion militates against Morsi’s ruthless pursuit of power, which holds the risk of not only derailing Egypt’s democratic transformation but of galvanizing the Islamist forces in the region. Washington’s regional allies like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait where the Brothers are secretly operating also feel nervous. The Obama administration cannot remain impassive if a violent confrontation ensues in Cairo between the Islamists and the secular opposition in the coming days. 

The great irony is that the constituency in Egypt that opposes Morsi’s move also happens to be the US’ «natural ally», and dumping the liberals and secularists in favor of the Islamists so openly in the interests of realpolitik will appear a cynical act that holds broader implications for the region’s tryst with democratic reform. 

Meanwhile, the inner dynamics within the Hamas is also in flux and it is entirely conceivable that the «jihadists» may gain the upper hand. This also would significantly impact on the durability of the Gaza ceasefire. 

Period of bloodshed and the gun 

What is often overlooked is that the Israeli offensive happened at a complex juncture not only in regional politics – civil war in Syria, Hamas’ alienation from Syria and Iran, Sunni-Shi’ite sectarian divides, etc. – but also in the political alignments within Gaza itself. Principally, the leadership question within Hamas remains unresolved. 

In September Khaled Mashal had announced his intention to step down and not to seek a fresh election for the fifth successive time to the position of chairman of the Hamas’ politburo, a position he has held continuously since 1996. Speculation was rife that Mashal might be replaced by either Ismail Haniyeh or Mousa Abu Marzouk. But the indications since then have been that the Muslim Brotherhood leadership in Egypt and Qatar and Turkey are averse to Mashal stepping down. They are afraid that Mashal might be replaced by a radical leadership that is wedded to the resistance. 

Again, the factions within Hamas – and the various Palestinian factions operating in Gaza – hold divergent opinions on such key issues as the firing of rockets at Israel, dealings with the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas, ties with Iran or Egypt, proximity with the Qatari emir and so on. Suffice to say, there is a power struggle within Hamas and there is also rivalry amongst the various Palestinian groups for control of the Gaza Strip. 

The negotiations leading to the brokering of the Gaza ceasefire by Egypt signifies the «return» of Mashal to the centre stage as the Hamas leader. His political stock soared during the eight-day war. But how far Mashal finds acceptance within the Hamas’ power base in Gaza remains to be seen. 

This is important because Mashal is the most ardent votary of the current ceasefire while there are other influential voices within Hamas who are inclined to see the ceasefire as a mere pause. Mashal said last week, «we do not want escalation. Hamas is courageous but not reckless». Clearly, in political terms Mashal is a stakeholder in the current ceasefire – just like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. 

However, on Friday, soon after the Gaza ceasefire was announced, Hamas strongman Mahmoud al-Zahar (who is also a member of the politburo) had an entirely different take on what lies ahead. He said ominously, «We [Hamas] have shown that the option of resistance is the only successful choice in front of us… That period is over when the enemy [Israel] could attack us; we are now at a stage to attack them». He said this is a period of «bloodshed and the gun» and the Palestinian people’s only option is resistance. 

Al-Zahar pointed out that after all it is the «rockets of the resistance» that have brought about a shift in the balance of power vis-à-vis Israel. He called on everyone to use the respite of the ceasefire to review the position and to form a coalition supporting the choice of armed resistance. Al-Zahar claimed that the multitude of Gazans who thronged the streets to celebrate victory represented a referendum favoring the choice of jihad and resistance as the sole path ahead for the Palestinian people. 

All in all, therefore, much depends on how Morsi’s current travails with regard to his decree pan out. If he is compelled to backtrack by the Egyptian popular opinion and international pressure, it will constitute a setback to the Muslim Brotherhood. The weakening of Morsi will throw Egyptian politics into new uncertainties and deprive Washington of a resolute interlocutor in Cairo at this sensitive juncture. In turn, it may also reflect on the factional politics within Hamas and in Gaza as a whole, and impact on the ceasefire as well. 

Herein lies a paradox of the regional alignment. In peacetime when diplomacy is the name of the game, Hamas may feel closer to Egypt than to Iran, but the ties with Iran become more important when Hamas finds itself in the barricades fighting Israel. 

Thus, it comes as no surprise that Iran and Saudi Arabia have finally found something in common, although for vastly different reasons – a shared distaste of the spectre of the regional hegemony of the Muslim Brotherhood. Both Iranian and Saudi media are awash with biting criticism of Morsi for his latest power grab, alleging that the Brothers harbor a secret agenda to establish a new dictatorship in Egypt. 

Iran would have hoped that the new Egypt and the Brothers would strengthen Hamas as a resistance movement, but is dismayed to find that what is happening is exactly to the contrary. Last week Morsi’s government even turned down a request from Tehran for a visit by Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi to Gaza to express Iran’s solidarity with the Palestinians. 

(to be continued)

Is this the end of the «honeymoon» between Obama and the Muslim Brotherhood?

As soon as Obama was re-elected president of the USA, many came to expect that the relationship between Israel and the U.S. would deteriorate sharply, as everybody remembers the swordplay between the head of the White House and the Israeli Prime Minister, as well as the outright bet on the Republican candidate Mitt Romney by Netanyahu. It appears, however, that those who thought so greatly exaggerated. Those who were right were mindful of the strategic nature of relations between the two countries and the enormous influence of the Jewish lobby in the U.S….

According to Israeli analysts, in fact, Netanyahu was quite careful not to «cross the red line». He took to Romney and expressed his words of support, but this has always been acceptable behavior in Israel in relation to the American presidential candidates. Obama, when he was a candidate on a visit to Israel, demanded his photo shots and smiles be with Olmert, Livni and Ehud Barak, though at the time the White House was occupied by a Republican president. In promotional commercials Romney used pictures and compliments of Netanyahu, but also the Obama propaganda campaign used images with Shimon Peres and Ehud Barak. When Romney strongly criticized Obama for having «thrown Israel under the wheels of the bus,» Israeli President Peres met with Obama in Washington, and showed his full understanding. The Israelis have always been able to properly arrange their eggs in different baskets. «Today, Netanyahu knows that Obama has won in the U.S., and Obama knows that Netanyahu will win in Israel. It is what it is, and it is necessary to live and work with it». (1)

Moreover, Obama's entourage almost managed to defend the Jewish president elect who for the most part did not believe the stories from Romney that Obama is going to «throw Israel». Studies have shown that American Jews still retain their traditional focus on the Democratic Party. In the election from representatives of this population group 69% voted for Obama, which is only 5% less than in the previous campaign, which is a very slight drop, given the amount of effort the Republicans put in to represent the current president as an «enemy of Israel». (2) 

Therefore, the announcement of the newly elected president that he remains committed to the strategic alliance with Tel Aviv is apparently true. But in the new reality Obama will have to solve a highly complex strategic problem – how to maintain a relationship with an existing ally and not damage, and if possible, even to strengthen the relationship with his recently acquired new friends from among the «moderate Islamists» as a result of the «Arab Spring». In attempting to sit on two chairs at the same time he will find it hard to stand up to his very first test in connection with the conflict in the Gaza Strip.

From the very beginning of the «revolutionary processes» in the Middle East, Israel was critical of the actions of the strong encouragement of the Americans, especially of Washington's attempt to get close to the Muslim Brotherhood, and one could only wait for the moment when Tel Aviv would start a counter play to thwart this «unholy alliance». And it came. The Israeli «pillar of cloud» fell on top of the Gaza sector, the Palestinians opened up the «gates of hell» before them, and all the masks were ripped off. The White House fully and unconditionally supported Israel, remaining deaf to the calls of the Arab community to somehow influence its ally, which destroyed the whole line up of the cleverly created U.S. strategy in the region, built on the allegedly impartial treatment of all States there.

As it turns out, even before the Israeli attack on Gaza on 12-13 November, a delegation of the Israeli Council for National Security, headed by its leader Jacob Amidror held talks in Washington with the U.S. President's National Security Tom Donilon. It was the first high level meeting between the two sides after the re-election of Obama. According to official reports, they «held consultations on the situations in Gaza, Syria and Iran». In this case, US National Security Council spokesman Tommy Victor said: «The meeting was the latest in a series of consultations in the field of security at the highest level between Israel and the United States and demonstrates our unwavering support for the security of the Jewish state». (3)It is hard to imagine that at the current level of bilateral relations, the Israelis did not inform U.S. officials about the upcoming operation in Gaza. Perhaps this was the main purpose of their mission. Thus, the attack on Gaza, most likely, was made with the full knowledge and approval of Washington.

Immediately after the outbreak of hostilities, U.S. President Barack Obama during a telephone conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed his support to the Israeli authorities and stressed the right of Israel to defend itself. However, the American leader urged Tel Aviv to do everything possible to avoid civilian casualties. (4)

In addition, as reported by the American edition of The Daily Beast, in that telephone conversation the Israeli leader assured his interlocutor that the IDF is not planning a ground operation in the Gaza Strip. The source referenced by the publication, said that Netanyahu gave a personal guarantee to the effect that a ground operation will begin only when and if the Hamas rocket attacks increase dramatically. Two senior U.S. officials, who, according to the publication, received information about the content of the conversation between Obama and Netanyahu claimed that Israel, despite its bellicose statements was allegedly not even considering the option of the invasion of Gaza, and this scenario, will be considered only in the event of significant losses from the Israeli side. At the moment, there is not even a date set for the possible start of the ground operation «a pillar of cloud». However, «if Hamas increases the pressure, the Israeli government may change their point of view,” said the U.S. source. (5)

For his part, the Israeli prime minister said that he had talked with U.S. President Barack Obama and thanked him for his support and contribution to the development of the U.S. missile defense system «Iron Dome». (6) It should be noted that information on the conflict, transmitted from the scene, is replete with praise for this system, and everything at times is just like a large-scale advertising campaign for its promotion. Experts point out that in reality it is not very effective against low-flying targets such as rockets, but its advertising it is of vital interest to the joint US-Israeli military-industrial complex, which is objectively the «third happy party» in the events and in no small part is pushing them forward.

The Arabs had gathered before in meetings in connection with the violent actions of the Israelis against the Palestinians, but observers cannot remember such a strong pitch of anti-Americanism, such as which arose, in an emergency meeting of the League of Arab States (LAS) held on 17th November in Cairo with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. It was felt that the United States is the only power in the world that could not only stop, but also prevent the conflict in Gaza, but they did not do so because of their dependence on Israel. And, therefore, their assurances of support for freedom and democracy in the Middle East are worthless.

Jordan's King Abdullah II, who is generally considered one of the most loyal of the Arab leaders to the West and Washington, warned the White House on its position of non-interference, which he said, «could lead to massive upheaval in the region». (7) 

But Barack Obama did not seem to hear this. During a tour of Asia, speaking on November 18 at a press conference in Bangkok, Obama stressed that no country would tolerate rocket attacks on the civilian population, and expressed confidence that they should make every effort to resolve the conflict with Gaza in a way so that not one more missile fell on Israel. Once again, he said that Israel has every right to protect its citizens from the missiles that fly at them from Gaza.

The U.S. President also noted that the question of a possible truce will be decided in the next two days, stressing that the escalation of violence in Gaza is minimizing the chances of peace in the region. (8)

It is too early to judge how successful the Israeli operation «pillar of cloud» will be in terms of breaking down the resistance of Palestinian radicals. Most likely, everything will repeat itself. But one thing you can say for sure – there is an extra hidden agenda, and that can be, that the basic idea of introducing discord between America and the Arab countries has been effectively activated. The «Pillar» turns into a «wedge».

Washington`s strategy to the Arab Spring is bursting at the seams. The short «honeymoon» between Obama and the Muslim Brotherhood seems to be at an end.

Even more humiliating for the U.S. can be the voting at the UN General Assembly in late November on the status of Palestine, as there is only a small group of tiny countries in favor of Israel and the rest of the world are against, including all the Arab states. This split will become more pronounced. There will be no opportunity to pretend in a «closeness» of interests and aspirations with the «moderate Islamists». In his relations with them Obama will have to set aside his much loved weapon of «soft power», relying only on its hard version and financial handouts, the limits of which are also limited due to the financial crisis. The main lever of influence in Washington for many of the countries of the region, and in particular Egypt, which is key in this situation, remains economic. The experts at the Washington Institute for Middle Eastern Studies recommend, for example, the White House uses for this purpose not only direct assistance to Egypt, but also its position in the IMF, from which the Egyptians requested a loan of $ 4.8 billion. (9) Only is there now enough money and influence? And can the Egyptians find sources of funding outside of Washington, including in its own region the Middle East?

"This will open the gates of hell!"

Hamas (an acronym for Harakat al-Muqāwama al-Islāmiya – the Islamic Resistance Movement) emerged a decade ago as a regional branch of the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt, of which Gaza was a part of until 1967. The founding father is considered to be Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, who was assassinated in 2004. There are indications that the Israeli security forces had a hand in the formation of Hamas, at the time trying to counter the Islamists and the secular socialist-oriented forces in the Palestinian resistance. If only they knew then who they nurtured. This now, however, both sides prefer to forget. It gained political power in the late 80's during the first intifada. After winning the elections in Gaza in 2006, Hamas gained full control of Gaza from 2007, when at the same time, in the West Bank of the river Jordan; power belonged to Fatah, the group founded by Arafat.

Hamas has been on the U.S. list of terrorist organizations since 1997. In addition to being more militant than Fatah, it is known for its attention to the social status of the population and is less prone to corruption. The formal leader of Hamas remains Khaled Meshaal who moved in early 2012 from Damascus to Qatar, the real "prime minister" in Gaza is Ismail Haniyeh, a close ally of Sheikh Yassin. There is a barely concealed rivalry between them. Hamas says it is ready to recognize the borders of 1967 and live in peace with Israel, but it is no hurry to recognize it.

Israeli experts point out that as a result of the "Arab Spring" Hamas has significantly increased in military-technical and political terms. Moreover, in recognizing their responsibility for launching rockets at Israel, which it avoided until recently, Hamas has demonstrated that it no longer fears a direct confrontation with the Israeli military machine.(1)

This increased confidence is based on a number of factors.
Having dealt with the finishing of its dependence on Damascus, Hamas has gained much more powerful patrons in the Islamic world. In October, this year the Emir of Qatar was the first head of state in its entire modern history to visit Gaza, and he granted a gift of $ 400 million to Hamas, which immediately raised their status among Palestinian voters. After him the Turkish Prime Minister T. Erdogan planned to go as well. The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Tunisia visited Gaza, and in the near future in accordance with the decision of the meeting held in Cairo, the Arab League plans to go there with a delegation of Arab ministers.

Given the re-orientation of Hamas from Syria and Iran to what Washington considers more acceptable regimes, voices were heard in the in the United States about the possible admission of informal contact with the movement. This White House is strongly encouraged, in particular, by the leaders of Qatar and Turkey. The prospect looms, even if still distant, of the gradual international legitimization of Hamas.

As a consequence of the post-revolutionary chaos, Cairo largely lost control of the situation in the Gaza Strip adjacent to the Sinai Peninsula. This gave Hamas a vital strategic foundation. It placed in the Sinai its training camps and even workshops for manufacturing and repairing weapons, invulnerable to the Israeli Air Force, which is bound by Camp David peace treaty. Moreover, in recent months there have been cases of actually firing of rockets at Israeli targets from the peninsula territory, though not much damage was inflicted.

Hamas, if not directly challenging the Israeli military machine, does not shy away from a collision with it, causing minor disturbing stings to Israel, and for their own reasons. Just as Israel, in unleashing the conflict and taking on full responsibility, forced Washington to clearly and plainly identify themselves with Tel Aviv, Hamas has made it clear also that Cairo and other Arab capitals take its side.

It is known that before recent events, its parent organization the Muslim Brotherhood, which happens now to be in power in Cairo, had shown some restraint in relation to their own child, based primarily for tactical reasons of gaining legitimacy in the West. Cairo, for example has rejected the Hamas offer to establish a free trade zone between Egypt and Gaza and expressed dissatisfaction with the actions of Islamic extremists who attacked the Egyptian border guards in the Sinai and prevented the unfettered movement of fighters and weapons into Gaza. Israel's actions have removed all the old antagonisms for the Islamists in Cairo not to support their "little brothers."

These calculations have partially materialized. Egyptian President Morsi, having previously tended towards a pragmatic course, sent Prime Minister Hesham Kandil to Gaza, practically under Israeli fire.  Egypt has recalled its ambassador to Israel, condemned the actions of Tel Aviv as naked aggression and promised more support to the Palestinians. The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood has demanded a further tightening in his approach to Israel from the country’s president. They also announced that they are developing a draft law for a unilateral revision of the peace treaty with Israel. (2)Given their dominance in the national parliament, the chances of passing such a law is very high. Not being able to successfully confront Israel militarily, Cairo, for example, might just open the border with Gaza for "refugees", through which in the opposite direction weapons would inevitably flood, which Hamas desperately needs. Fuad Muhammad Jadallah, Egyptian Presidential Adviser on Legal Affairs, speaking on air on one of the Arab TV stations spoke of the need to immediately establish a Palestinian state and to start  supplying arms to the Palestinians to enable them to successfully confront Israel.(3)

Hamas as well as Israel, but for different reasons, are not too interested in the success of the vote promoted by Abbas on the status of Palestine at the UN General Assembly, as they consider it insufficient and believe it will perpetuate the present situation. In addition, it is believed that this whole thing is mainly targeted on improving the personal prestige of Abbas and Fatah. At the same time, opposition to the Israeli war machine enhances the credibility of Hamas among Palestinians and the chances of winning the ever-delayed elections for all of the Palestinians, when they finally take place. Due to the controlling conditions of the Gaza blockade, the movement is not in a position to deliver on the promise to raise the living standards of ordinary Palestinians and is gradually losing its popularity. War can always be attributed to the actions of the enemy, and it unites people around Hamas again.

However, the attack on the commander of the military wing of Hamas'  “İzzeddin Al-Qassam Brigades," Ahmad Jabari, was a surprise to the Palestinians, a day after Egypt announced it had mediated the cessation of all attacks on Israel from Gaza. Jabari was travelling in a car in broad daylight, without expectation of a sudden attack, and not observing any precautions. (4) His murder, as was proclaimed in Gaza, "opened the gates of hell." On the Palestinian side of the operation "a pillar of cloud," got its own name – "Firestone".

The Palestinians in Gaza have never had as many weapons as they have now. The Fajr-3 missile and the Fajr-5, imported by them from Iran, may have little striking effect, but they are the first able to reach the outskirts of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Although Israel announces as false Palestinian claims that they shot down an F-16, but even The New York Times says credible evidence has been provided by them on YouTube. Hamas does not seek an elusive military victory, it needs a "diplomatic victory", which it has already largely achieved. (5)

The Israeli press wrote: "We should not neglect the fact of the launching of missiles at Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Since the 1948 war, no Arab state (except in Iraq in 1991) dared to do something that the Palestinian groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad have been allowed to do. “(6) It does not matter where the missile landed – in the sea or on land, in the park or on the beach. What is important from a psychological point of view is that an imaginary barrier has been overcome. And in any war of attrition the psychological aspect is very important.

In this case, a spokesman of the armed wing of Hamas warned: "The shelling of Tel Aviv, and the Al-Quds (Jerusalem), which did not happen before, is not all of the surprises we have at our disposal."(7)

A ground operation against Hamas in Gaza can be a repeat of the sad experience of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 2006. The Islamists in Gaza are no less powerful, trained and motivated than Hezbollah, which forced the then Israeli army, perhaps for the first time in its history, to withdraw due to high battle losses in southern Lebanon, and without solving any of the objectives… In Hezbollah`s favor was the mountainous terrain, which offers excellent facilities for ambushes and mine laying. Gaza, by contrast, is flat lowland. At the same time, dense buildings prevail there and this does not allow for the deployment of heavy military equipment, without total destruction. Of course, the State of Israel can easily find hot heads, capable of this, but the situation in the world has changed, and such actions may finally blow up the entire Middle East.

According to a statement from the military wing of Hamas, in the case of a ground operation by IDF soldiers entering 300 meters into Palestinian territory, only then will it be resisted.

These concerns and not just the international pressure may possibly explain an obvious hitch in the actions of Israel, which had already announced the start of the ground operation.

Cease-fire negotiations are currently underway in Cairo, with the assistance of Egyptian mediators and experts of the International Crisis Group, and a compromise may end in a tripartite agreement. Hamas will undertake to take "extremist elements" under control, and at the same time Egypt will facilitate the crossing regime of the border with Gaza at Rafah, and Israel will take similar steps at the commercial terminal of Kerem Shalom controlled by them. (8)

However, the strength of such agreements, given the far-reaching strategic intentions of the parties, is hard to believe. Opposites meet. But no matter who wins in this deadly game of blood, the losers will be, as usual, ordinary people, both Arabs and Jews.

(to be continued)
 

1) http://www.israelbehindthenews.com/bin/content.cgi?ID=5142&q=1
20 http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/the-gaza-invasion-will-it-destroy-israels-relationship-with-egypt
3) http://www.newsru.co.il/mideast/18nov2012/sovetnik8012.html
4) http://www.fiammanirenstein.com/articoli.asp?Categoria=5&Id=3003
5) http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/16/world/middleeast/hamas-emboldened-tests-its-arab-alliances.html?_r=0
6) http://cursorinfo.co.il/news/pressa/2012/11/18/gaarec–chto-zhdet-izrail-posle-operacii-oblachniy-stolp-/
7) http://cursorinfo.co.il/news/novosti/2012/11/18/hamas-/
8) http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/16/world/middleeast/hamas-emboldened-tests-its-arab-alliances.html?_r=0