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By Jinjirrie, on January 25th, 2009% With George Mitchell, negotiator extraordinaire arriving in the region on Wednesday, preliminary manouevrings have commenced.
25th January 2009
Beit Lahiya in the far north of the Gaza Strip was badly hit during the Israeli attacks. This image shows some of the aftermath in a residential area.
– Photo & text courtesy of Rafahkid Hamas and other Palestinian factions are set to hold talks in Cairo with Egyptian and European mediators to cement the ceasefires in the Gaza Strip and Israel.
They are also seeking to secure a deal to re-open the border crossings into Gaza and end Israel’s 18-month economic blockade of the strip, which it says is a necessary measure to combat weapon smuggling.
The fate of Gilad Schalit, an Israeli soldier captured by Palestinian fighters in June 2006, was also reported to be on the meeting’s agenda.
Tipsy Livni has linked Schalit’s release to border openings, whereas Hamas has expressed interest in the release of Palestinian prisoners – now might be a very good time for democratically elected Hamas parliamentarians, 41 of them, to be released.
Abu Shahla, a supporter of Fatah, urged reconciliation between the two parties, saying anything less would be to ignore the will of ordinary Palestinians.
“The people of Gaza sent a message to politicians: we want you to be unified, and to have unity. Any talk about the sake or benefit of Hamas or Fatah is [a] failure, and not representative of the people,” he said.
Ghazi Hamad, the former spokesman for Hamas leader Ismail Haniya, joined the renewed calls for unity, saying it was “a disaster” that Fatah and Hamas remained divided.
“We have to sit together, to talk together, in order to face the Israeli plan in our land,” he said.
“This is very important, because the main conflict is not between Fatah and Hamas, it is between Palestinians and Israel.”
How far will Hamas go to achieve the appearance of unity? Israel’s massacre has strengthened it’s image on the West Bank as well as Gaza. While Abbas’ term expired on the 9th January, Ismail Haniya remains legitimate.
Mitchell may offer the best chance Palestinians have ever had to achieve land rights in decades. A united front will also appeal to Arabs and rulers throughout the Middle East. How will Mitchell manage, if his peace process is to be akin to that used in Northern Ireland, to bring the political wing of Hamas in ‘from the cold’ to sit at the negotiating table with Israelis who have no real intent for peace? Will Israel attempt to sabotage the process and how?
International monitors at Gaza’s borders,as suggested by Hamas, would seem to be urgent and wise at this juncture.
UPDATES
26 Jan
Gabrielle Rifkind: The man to sell peace to the Middle East
Key to the negotiations in Northern Ireland was the establishment of a standing conference. The parties met three days a week for seven years. Such a structure is just as necessary in this conflict, but a tighter time-frame is needed. This would have to be done in consultation with all those involved. Time is running out, and any long-term horizon would make all the parties despair. The international community has a responsibility to put this framework for talks in place. A long-term ceasefire needs to be negotiated before the talks both in the West Bank and Gaza, and the presence of international troops may be necessary on the borders.
In Northern Ireland, economic regeneration was central to ending the conflict and ensuring long-term stability. A smart move by the international community would be to actively support the rebuilding of Gaza as a model Islamic state. A failed state on Israel’s border spells grave danger for the whole region. Turkey has demonstrated an active and positive role in this recent round of fighting, and has the capacity to work closely with Hamas. It could play a critical third-party role in Gaza’s reconstruction.
This recent war has made the atmosphere more toxic, bankrupted the peace process and exacerbated the climate of hatred. But with the appointment of Mitchell, at last the peace process may be in good hands. The crucial question is whether his skills will cajole the Israelis to participate and make them understand that their security will depend on the security and prosperity of their neighbours – a far cry from the current devastation in Gaza.
Hamas offers Israel a one-year truce in Gaza
Ayman Taha, a Hamas official, said in Cairo that his delegation was briefed by the Egyptians on an Israeli proposal for an 18-month truce with only a partial opening of the border, which they rejected.
Instead, Mr Taha said the group made a counter offer of a year with open borders, which they now must discuss with their leadership in Damascus.
“We will study the matter again and it will be brought back to the Egyptians,” he said.
Gaza’s borders are its lifeblood as it is dependent on the outside world for almost all of its services.
…
A former US diplomat and adviser to Mr Obama said that any efforts to sideline Hamas – a radical Islamic organisation that refuses to recognise Israel’s right to exist – by concentrating on mainstream Palestinian factions were doomed.
Robert Malley, the head of Middle East research for the International Crisis Group, said future peace drives must include efforts to engage Hamas. “It’s unrealistic to think that you can defeat it with an economic blockade, that you can defeat it with more ‘moderate’ forces or that you can defeat it militarily,” he said.
“That doesn’t necessarily mean you have to start a direct dialogue with Hamas, but you have to think about how to deal with this question in a more intelligent way, by using all political and diplomatic instruments.”
Egypt urges EU to offer fast aid to Palestinians
“I ask the European Union to do (things) very, very quickly to rebuild to help the Palestinians to get out of this crisis,” Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said before talks with European and Palestinian counterparts.
“We need to force the Israelis to negotiate and also tell them to open crossings and to give Palestinians a chance to live in a normal way,” he told reporters.
The EU has said it is ready to reactivate and expand a mission launched in 2005 to monitor the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, but says agreement on that is hampered by the split between Hamas and President Mahmoud Abbas’s rival Fatah, which lost control of Gaza to Hamas amid fighting in 2007.
“The reunification of the Palestinians under the recognised and cherished voice of President Abbas is so important,” said British Foreign Secretary David Miliband.
Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn called for a Palestinian national unity government.
“When this government of consensus does not come about, I do not know how we can get out of this vicious circle,” he added of the repeated failure of efforts to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
…
France is sending a naval mission to the region to pre-empt arms supplies coming into Gaza, and there are discussions among EU states about the possibility of a further maritime mission in the Red Sea.
However, officials say they do not expect concrete decisions to emerge from Sunday’s discussions, which also involve Turkey and Jordan.
More updates on Hamas negotiations:
Hamas Monday rejected an Israeli offer that linked the opening of Gaza’s border crossings to the release of kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit. Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum told Haaretz that under no circumstances would the organization accept such a linkage. First, Israel must open the crossings, he said; then the parties can talk about Shalit.
A senior Hamas official in the Gaza Strip, Ayman Taha, told the Egyptian paper Al-Ahram that Israel had offered to free 1,000 Palestinian prisoners and open the crossings in exchange for a cease-fire and Shalit’s release. The Lebanese paper Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, citing Israeli sources, said the offer was for 1,050 prisoners, including 280 of the 350 senior terrorists whose release Hamas has demanded by name. Prior to the Gaza operation, Israel had agreed to release only some 220 people on this list.
In practice, the talks have been stalled in any case by a dispute between Hamas and Egypt, the chief mediator, over the former’s rejection of the latter’s proposals for a Fatah-Hamas reconciliation and a long-term truce with Israel. And defense sources said it was “not certain” that the figures given by the Arab newspapers would indeed be the final formula.
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If it is, however, the deal will provide Hamas with significant gains. The organization’s main rationale for ending its last truce with Israel, in December, was to end Israel’s blockade of Gaza, so Israel’s offer allows Hamas to achieve the primary goal for which it went to war.
Additionally, Hamas would receive a massive prisoner release, including many of the people it specifically demanded. It would thereby have bested the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in terms of both the number and the “quality” of the prisoners whose freedom it was able to secure. While Israel has released prisoners to the PA several times in recent years, it has always decided whom to release, rejecting any input from the PA.
Finally, the prisoner release, coupled with the reopened border crossings, would essentially constitute de facto Israeli recognition of “Hamastan,” since it would bolster Hamas’ grip on Gaza by giving it the image of a winner. It would also boost Hamas’ popularity in the West Bank. Effectively, therefore, it would constitute an Israeli recognition that its three-year-old effort to topple Hamas has failed.
By Jinjirrie, on January 16th, 2009%
Channel 4 nails the truth with an Israeli intelligence document from the Intelligence and Terrorist Information Center at the Israel Intelligence and Heritage Commemoration Center which says there were no Hamas rockets fired during the cease fire last year. Former Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom squirms – a delight to watch.
20 rockets only were fired from June to November and NONE were fired by Hamas – this was confirmed by Mark Regev, Olmert spokesperson.
So now we know Israel planned the Gaza Inferno at least 7 months ago as part of a larger strategy whilst maintaining an illegal blockade and Occupation of Gaza, then truced with Hamas under false pretences, and finally breached the cease fire on November 4, blaming Hamas.
The callous, calculating mass murderers then created the myth of Hamas rockets being fired during the cease fire to orchestrate a collective sanctimonius, abhorrent rage against the innocent people of Gaza, its infrastructure, the UN, journalists, hospitals, aid workers and whatever else stood in the way of their cynical pre-electoral blood lust and drive for war. At the moment, 1133 people are dead, and 5200 injured. The terror that Israel is inflicting on the Palestinian population cannot be justified as self-defence.
British MP Sir Gerald Kaufman “compared the Israeli offensive in Gaza Thursday to the Nazis who forced his family to flee from Poland.” In his scathing Parliamentary address, Sir Gerald called for an arms embargo on Israel.
I was brought up as an orthodox Jew and a Zionist. On a shelf in our kitchen, there was a tin box for the Jewish National Fund, into which we put coins to help the pioneers building a Jewish presence in Palestine.
I first went to Israel in 1961 and I have been there since more times than I can count. I had family in Israel and have friends in Israel.
One of them fought in the wars of 1956, 1967 and 1973 and was wounded in two of them. The tie clip that I am wearing is made from a campaign decoration awarded to him, which he presented to me.
I have known most of the Prime Ministers of Israel, starting with the founding Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. Golda Meir was my friend, as was Yigal Allon, Deputy Prime Minister, who, as a general, won the Negev for Israel in the 1948 war of independence.
My parents came to Britain as refugees from Poland. Most of their families were subsequently murdered by the Nazis in the holocaust. My grandmother was ill in bed when the Nazis came to her home town of Staszow. A German soldier shot her dead in her bed.
My grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers in Gaza. The current Israeli government ruthlessly and cynically exploits the continuing guilt among Gentiles over the slaughter of Jews in the holocaust as justification for their murder of Palestinians. The implication is that Jewish lives are precious, but the lives of Palestinians do not count.
On Sky News a few days ago, the spokeswoman for the Israeli army, Major Leibovich, was asked about the Israeli killing of, at that time, 800 Palestinians-the total is now 1,000. She replied instantly that “500 of them were militants.”
That was the reply of a Nazi. I suppose that the Jews fighting for their lives in the Warsaw ghetto could have been dismissed as militants.
The Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni asserts that her government will have no dealings with Hamas, because they are terrorists. Tzipi Livni’s father was Eitan Livni, chief operations officer of the terrorist Irgun Zvai Leumi, who organized the blowing-up of the King David hotel in Jerusalem, in which 91 victims were killed, including four Jews.
Israel was born out of Jewish terrorism. Jewish terrorists hanged two British sergeants and booby-trapped their corpses. Irgun, together with the terrorist Stern gang, massacred 254 Palestinians in 1948 in the village of Deir Yassin. Today, the present Israeli government indicates that they would be willing, in circumstances acceptable to them, to negotiate with the Palestinian President Abbas of Fatah. It is too late for that. They could have negotiated with Fatah’s previous leader, Yasser Arafat, who was a friend of mine. Instead, they besieged him in a bunker in Ramallah, where I visited him. Because of the failings of Fatah since Arafat’s death, Hamas won the Palestinian election in 2006. Hamas is a deeply nasty organization, but it was democratically elected, and it is the only game in town. The boycotting of Hamas, including by our government, has been a culpable error, from which dreadful consequences have followed.
The great Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban, with whom I campaigned for peace on many platforms, said: “You make peace by talking to your enemies.”
However many Palestinians the Israelis murder in Gaza, they cannot solve this existential problem by military means. Whenever and however the fighting ends, there will still be 1.5 million Palestinians in Gaza and 2.5 million more Palestinians on the West Bank. They are treated like dirt by the Israelis, with hundreds of road blocks and with the ghastly denizens of the illegal Jewish settlements harassing them as well. The time will come, not so long from now, when they will outnumber the Jewish population in Israel.
It is time for our government to make clear to the Israeli government that their conduct and policies are unacceptable, and to impose a total arms ban on Israel.
It is time for peace, but real peace, not the solution by conquest which is the Israelis’ real goal but which it is impossible for them to achieve. They are not simply war criminals; they are fools.
Amnesty International is calling for an arms embargo on both parties. With the world in an economic slump and weapons sales such a dominant sector within major economies, chances of this may be slim, particularly for the infinitely wealthier party.
Boycott Israel and any who support it. We haven’t seen such calumny since Bush destroyed Iraq on false pretences.
By Jinjirrie, on January 7th, 2009%
Keith Ellison, a US congressman for the state of Minnesota and the only Muslim to be elected to US congress, talks to Al Jazeera’s Shihab Rattansi about the Israeli offensive in Gaza and why he feels so few US politicians understand the Middle East.
Ellison also draws attention to possible US complicity in war crimes through the use of US supplied weaponry by Israel.
In further updates, Hugo Chavez has expelled the Israeli Ambassador.
Israel will halt its bombardment of Gaza for three hours daily to allow residents of the Gaza to obtain much-needed supplies.
However, Israel insists it has already allowed enough supplies into Gaza during the conflict, although the UN says there is a humanitarian crisis because of shortages of food, fuel and medicines.
Heba, a Gaza resident and mother of two, told Al Jazeera there was no place left in Gaza that can be considered safe.
“What happened in the school was a hugely offensive and inhumane thing. We never expected that people who sought refuge in a UN building would be attacked and killed,” she said.
Randa Seniora, from the Independent Commission on Human Rights, told Al Jazeera: “What is happening in Gaza are crimes against humanity.
“Israel cannot claim, as an occupying authority, that it is acting in self defence because simply it is considered a war crime to create harm and damage among civilian populations.”
@AJGaza Hamas says it will not fire rockets into Israel during the same period of time, Al Jazeera’s correspondent reports.
@AJGaza Shelling heard in #Gaza during Israel’s three hour ceasefire to allow Palestinians access to aid, Al Jazeera’s Sherine Tadros reports.
@AJGaza Five houses in #Gaza hit by Israeli air attacks ten minutes into Israel’s three-hour pause in hostilities, Al Jazeera’s correspondent says.
@AJGaza One rocket and two mortars fired from #Gaza by Izz al-Din Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, thirty minutes into hostility pause.
@AJGaza Israeli apache helicopters open fire in Beit Lahiya, Al Jazeera’s correspondent reports.
@AJGaza Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, says Israel and the Palestinian Authority had accepted a truce plan for #Gaza announced by Egypt.
Are Hamas being marginalised in this pseudo-truce? – Israel and the PA are already in cahoots, there hasn’t needed to be a truce between them. Has Abbas received the nod from the big boys?
Has Al Qaeda been taking lessons from neocons? or from Israel and their “proportionate responses”?
(CNN) — An audio message reportedly from al Qaeda’s deputy chief vows revenge for Israel’s air and ground assault on Gaza and calls the Jewish state’s actions against Hamas militants “a gift” from U.S. President-elect Barack Obama.
Al Qaeda’s Ayman al-Zawahiri is said to address Muslims in Gaza in an audio message released Tuesday.
The speaker, identified as Ayman al-Zawahiri, addresses Muslims in Gaza. He said the violence “is one part of a series of a crusade war against Islam and these air strikes are a gift from Obama before he takes office, and (Egyptian President) Hosni Mubarak, that traitor, is the main partner in your siege and killing.”
The message, posted Tuesday on various Islamist Web sites with a picture of al-Zawahiri next to an image of a wounded child, urges militants to rally against Israel.
“My Muslim brothers and mujahedeens in Gaza and all over Palestine, with the help of God we are with you in the battle, we will direct our strikes against the crusader Jewish coalition wherever we can.”
@AJGaza Osama Hamdan, Hamas representative in Lebanon, says Franco-Egyptian peace initiative “still being discussed”.
@AJGaza Israel’s pause in hostilities to allow Palestinians access to aid only applied to #Gaza City in the #Gaza strip, Israel says.
Even to say Hamas is the cause of this is to blame the rape victim for what she was wearing.
@rafahkid Binational state? Not a chance because Israel has to be Jewish. Two states? Not a chance because Palestine has the resources. So, we die.
The UNHRC is holding a special session on Friday on Gaza
at the request of Islamic and developing countries as well as Russia.
The formal request — from 29 members of the 47-nation body — says the session should discuss “the grave violations of human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory including the recent aggression in the Occupied Gaza Strip.”
Resolutions issued by the Council are not binding.
Still, a resolution now might add to the weight of proceedings at Le Hague later on when the war criminals are tried.
@AJGaza Israel’s halt in fire agreement applies to whole of #Gaza and not just #Gaza City, correcting earlier statement, Israeli military says.
FURTHER UPDATES
Hamas will not accept a permanent truce without an end to the occupation and opening of the crossings i.e. end to the terrible blockade which Israel has inflicted on its less than model concentration camp for nearly 2 years. Sounds reasonable. Perhaps Hamas feels the world is paying attention, and now is as good a time as any to make a stand?
By Jinjirrie, on January 5th, 2009% To cover the advances of its illegal, barbaric incursion into Gaza, is Israel is deploying white phosphorus shells?
Gaza is one of the most densely populated areas on the planet, and the use of white phosphorus (Willy Pete) in civilian areas is forbidden. Israel, which is a serial violator of international conventions in ‘defence’ of its apartheid, racist state, used white phosphorus in its attack on Lebanon in 2006.
The Geneva Treaty of 1980 stipulates that white phosphorus should not be used as a weapon of war in civilian areas, but there is no blanket ban under international law on its use as a smokescreen or for illumination. Charles Heyman, a military expert and former major in the British Army, said: “If white phosphorus was deliberately fired at a crowd of people someone would end up in The Hague. White phosphorus is also a terror weapon. The descending blobs of phosphorus will burn when in contact with skin.”
Israel continues to refuse a cease fire which would allow humanitarian aid into Gaza and medical supplies are running dangerously low.
By Jinjirrie, on January 5th, 2009% Physicians for Human Rights-Israel documents contraventions to the Geneva Conventions and human rights violations as Israel attacks beleaguered, impoverished Gaza on false pretexts. In fact Israel breached the cease fire with Hamas on November 4 in several instances.
Israeli propaganda site Israel Politik, run by the Israeli Consulate in New York, has still failed to publish our refutation of their lies that Hamas breached the cease fire.
Yoram Cohen, till recently Deputy Directory of the Shin Bet confirmed Israel breached the cease fire. He wrote:
a similar account for the Washington Institute.
“Last week, Israeli forces entered Gaza, destroyed an underground border tunnel, and battled Hamas fighters, leaving several militants dead. In response, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fired around eighty rockets into southern Israel, including the Israeli city of Ashkelon,” he wrote
“On June 19, 2008, Israel and Hamas began observing an Egyptian-mediated ceasefire, which was intended to last six months with an option to extend. In general, Hamas has observed the ceasefire; the number of attacks and rocket launches has decreased significantly, and Hamas has prevented other Gaza militant organizations from striking Israel,” wrote Cohen.
CNN confirms Israel broke the truce in the video below:
On Jan 2, PHR-Israel said:
Since fighting began in the Gaza Strip, PHR-Israel has received 6 reports of Israeli Air Force attacks on medical insfrustructure and personnel.
On Jan 4, the UN alerted the world to further Israeli attacks on medical infrastructure.
This morning, an ambulance of Al Awda hospital in the north was shelled, seriously injuring 4 medical staff. Palestine Square in central.
In addition:
It is essential that patients and ambulances are able to reach hospitals, that agencies are able to access warehouses in order to conduct distributions. Currently movement within the Strip is severely challenged.
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