World

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Center Point

With moves on Hamas, Israel's Olmert searches for elusive middle ground.

Leslie Susser
Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Jerusalem

I

n imposing sanctions on the
Palestinians now that a
Hamas-dominated
Parliament has been sworn in,
interim Prime Minister Ehud
Olmert faced two acute dilemmas:
How to undermine Hamas with-
out hurting the Palestinian peo-
ple, and how to convince Israeli
voters that he is being tough
enough on Hamas without alien-
ating the international communi-
ty.
The steps he took – freezing
the transfer of tax moneys Israel
collects for the Palestinians,
appealing to the international
community to withhold funds
that could be used for terror,
curbing the freedom of movement
of Hamas officials and stepping
up security checks on Palestinian
workers at border crossing points
– were meant to strike the golden
mean.
The measures, however, failed
to impress Hamas, the interna-
tional community or the Israeli
opposition.
Palestinian Prime Minister-
designate Ismail Haniyeh said
Hamas had funding "alternatives
in the Arab and Islamic world."
The Americans and the European
Union indicated that they would
have preferred Israel to wait until
a Hamas government is formed.
And, predictably, with elections in
Israel less than six weeks away,
Olmert, the head of the Kadima
Party, came under strong criti-
cism from rivals on both the right
and the left. The right said it was
too little too late; the left that it
was too much too soon.
It is still too early to say what
effect all of this is having on the
voters – but if there is any single
issue that could enable the oppo-
sition parties to make inroads on
Kadima Party's huge lead in the
polls, it is the threat Hamas rule
in the West Bank and Gaza Strip
poses to Israel.
By taking relatively mild steps,

Olmert wanted to avoid any possi-
bility of a humanitarian catastro-
phe on the Palestinian side for
which Israel would be blamed.
"The international community
wouldn't tolerate pictures of
starving Palestinian children, and
the address for its complaints
would be Israel," Foreign Minister
Tzipi Livni said.
Nor does Olmert want to do
anything that might spark a new
round of Palestinian terror. That
is probably the one way he could
lose the upcoming election.
Some pundits argue that
Olmert's room for maneuver
against Hamas is extremely limit-
ed any-way, precisely because of
Israel's need to retain the moral
high ground and the international
support that goes with it. By far
the most dramatic measure
Olmert could have taken short of
war would have been to cut Gaza
off from Israel and the West Bank.
But that would have meant violat-
ing a customs agreement Israel
signed with the Palestinian
Authority.
Moreover, as political analyst
Aluf Benn points out in Ha'aretz,
the Oslo accords, the road map,
the disengagement plan and the
agreements governing the border
crossing all stipulate that Israel
must "preserve the status of the
West Bank and the Gaza Strip as a
single territorial unit."
The international community
would have been up in arms and
Israel's trump card – international
backing against an unrepentant
terrorist group in power – would
have been jeopardized.

Reining In?
At the core of the argument inside
the Israeli establishment over how
to deal with Hamas is the ques-
tion of whether or not the organi-
zation can be tamed.
In other words, are the eco-
nomic sanctions designed to pres-
sure Hamas into recognizing
Israel and negotiating a deal, or to
convince the Palestinians to call
new elections and vote an
implacable Hamas out of office?

to re-open peace talks with him.

Ehud Olmert. Some pundits argue that Olmert's room for

maneuver against Hamas is extremely limited anyway, precisely

because of Israel's need to retain the moral high ground and the

international support that goes with it.

There are two schools of
thought – the majority who say
Hamas will never change and that
Israel should move swiftly to curb
its nefarious influence on
Palestinian affairs, and a small
minority who argue that Hamas
should be allowed to fail in gov-
ernment on its own, with as little
Israeli prodding as possible.
The chief of the Shin Bet, Yuval
Diskin, has been the most outspo-
ken voice for the majority. He told
the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and
Defense Committee Monday that
over time, a Hamas — run entity
would constitute a strategic threat
to Israel, and that Israel should
not accept any Hamas offer of a
cease-fire because the organiza-
tion would only use it to bring in
arms and recruit Muslim militia-
men from Al Qaida and other
organizations to fight Israel. His
operative conclusion: Israel must
to do what it can to get Hamas out
of office as soon as possible.
Israel's national security advis-
er, Giora Eiland, takes the minori-
ty view. In the discussions leading
up to Olmert's decision on sanc-
tions, he argued that Israel's main
card in fighting Hamas is interna-
tional support and that, therefore,
Israel should not be seen to be
doing anything that might be con-

strued as not giving Hamas a
chance to embrace moderation.
"Anyone starting sanctions now
could shoot himself in the foot
and lose international support," he
declared.
Eiland maintains that Israel
should let Hanias make the mis-
takes – like turning to Iran for aid
or restarting terror against Israel.
There are more than two voices
on the Palestinian side.
Palestinian Authority President
Mahmoud Abbas, although a
member of the defeated Fatah
party, still wields a great deal of
power, and he is urging Hamas to
honor all previous agreements
with Israel, and calling on Israel

Differing Views
Among the Hamas leadership,
there are differences in tone, too -
- with Haniyeh indicating that the
organization might be ready for a
long cease-fire with Israel; and the
party's Damascus-based leader,
Khaled Meshaal, saying there will
be no compromises with the
"Zionist entity" Meshaal is now in
Tehran seeking Iranian economic
and other support.
The Israeli right, especially the
Likud, is accusing Olmert of
weakness in the face of an exis-
tential threat posed by a Hamas-
Tehran axis. In campaign ads,
they have dubbed the interim
prime minister "Smolmert" – a
play on his name and the Hebrew
word for left wing.
"The Likud is trying to push
him into tough action against the
Palestinian population, and that
would lead to a new wave of terror
from which there would be just
one beneficiary at the polls: the
Likud',' political analyst Nahum
Barnea wrote in Yediot Achronot.
The left argues that instead of
imposing sanctions from which
Israel will eventually have to back
down, the government should
look to Abbas as a potential peace
partner. If there is progress there
and Hamas tries to block it, there
is a possibility that the
Palestinians will hold new elec-
tions and vote Hamas out of
power, they insist. ❑

AnsweringisraersCritics

The Charge: Iran's supreme religious leader, Ayatollah
Ali Khamenei, stated last week that Israel was behind the recent
publication of cartoons in Europe that disparage the prophet
Muhammad, saying the cartoons are a "conspiracy of Zionists
who were angry because of the victory of Hamas" in the recent
Palestinian parliamentary elections.

The Answer:

The ayatollah's charge is a typical anti-
Semitic fabrication, recalling as it does Nazi propaganda claims of
Jewish media control. Such charges will further de-legitimize the
Iranian regime and lower its standing in the world community.

— Allan Gale, Jewish Community Council of Metropolitan Detroit

This is the correct version of last week's column.

February 23 e 2006

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