Operation Cast Lead
ANALYSIS
Diplomatic Front
As the Gaza fighting rages, diplomats continue to press for a cease-fire.
Leslie Susser
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Jerusalem
I
n the second week of the war in Gaza,
with Israeli ground troops poised to
intensify their actions against Hamas
militants, weapons' stores and rocket-
launching sites, diplomatic efforts to end
the fighting gathered pace.
Israeli analysts said that although the
Hamas military infrastructure has been
dealt a devastating blow, the organization's
fighting force remains largely intact. One
of the goals of the Israeli ground operation
is to hit the militia's fighters hard, which
could entail tough house-to-house combat.
The militiamen have taken up positions
in built-up areas in densely populated
towns and refugee camps, and confronting
them in those conditions could be very
risky for Israeli soldiers and Palestinian
civilians.
Nevertheless, Israel's military planners
say they are determined to break Hamas as
a fighting force by engaging the militiamen
in close combat. In the limited fighting so
far, ground forces say they have killed doz-
ens of militiamen and taken dozens more
prisoner.
The possibility of serious escalation,
however, brought French President Nicolas
Sarkozy and three European foreign min-
isters to Jerusalem last weekend in an
effort to bring the fighting in Gaza to an
end. Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni indicated
Israel's readiness to end the war, but only
if its exit demands were met. Otherwise it
would ratchet up its already intense mill-'
tary pressure on Hamas.
The Israeli dilemma is how to create
conditions on the ground that guarantee
security for southern Israel without grant-
ing Hamas a measure of international
legitimacy.
The Israelis have been warning against a
scenario in which a defeated Hamas makes
enormous political gains merely by being
treated by the international community
as a full partner in cease-fire negotiations.
This, they argue, is totally unacceptable, for
two main reasons:
Hamas gained power through a vio-
lent coup in June 2007 and is dedicated
to Israel's destruction. The Israelis are,
therefore, seeking a new international
A16
January 8 • 2009
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Israeli soldiers receive last-minute instructions before crossing the border into the
Gaza Strip on Jan. 3.
"arrangement" that would address all their
security concerns, as well as the issue of
border crossings to and from Gaza, without
Hamas having any say in the negotiating
process.
In other words, Israel is not interested in
returning to the old formula of third-party
mediation for a cease-fire, or tadiyeh, a
process that would give Hamas a degree of
international recognition.
In their contacts with the Americans and
Europeans, Israeli leaders have outlined
three key elements they would like to see
included in the new arrangements:
• A credible cease-fire to end rocket fire
on Israeli civilians.
• An internationally supervised mecha-
nism to prevent Hamas rearming.
• Joint European Union, Egyptian and
Palestinian Authority supervision at border
crossing points.
To deter Hamas from firing more rockets
after a cease-fire is achieved, Israel wants
to have its right to retaliate written into
the cease-fire terms. The biggest headache
for the Israelis is the possibility of Hamas
rebuilding and even enhancing its rocket-
firing capabilities by smuggling new and
longer-range weapons across the border
with Egypt under cover of a cease-fire.
Israel is, therefore, demanding that the
new arrangements on the ground include
collapsing all the smuggling tunnels under
the Philadelphi route along the Gaza-Egypt
border; erecting a physical barrier on the
Egyptian side of the border that would
make smuggling virtually impossible;
deploying an international force in the
buffer zone between Egypt and Gaza; and
securing a commitment from Egypt to stop
the flow of arms into Sinai, from where
they find their way to the Gaza border.
Hamas' main demand before and during
the fighting has been that Israel allow the
opening of all crossing points in and out of
Gaza. Israel says it is prepared to do so, on
the basis of a 2005 agreement under which
the crossings would be supervised jointly
by Israel, the Palestinian Authority (not
Hamas), Egypt and the European Union.
This is also the Egyptian position with
regard to the Rafah crossing point from
Gaza into Egypt.
One of the difficulties with the uncom-
promising Israeli position against talk-
ing to Hamas is the way it complicates
chances for the return of captured Israeli
soldier Gilad Shalit. Israeli leaders say they
would like to see Shalit's return as part of
the overall cease-fire arrangement, but it
is hard to see how this could be accom-
plished without a prisoner exchange deal
with Hamas.
The Americans and Europeans are split
in their approach to the Israeli cease-fire
terms. The Americans say a cease-fire
should only be put in place when condi-
tions exist for it to be stable and lasting. In
other words, only after something like the
new border reality Israel envisages can be
established.
The Europeans, however, say a cease-fire
should go into effect immediately. After
talks with Livni in Jerusalem, the foreign
ministers of the Czech Republic — the
current holder of the EU's rotating presi-
dency — France and Sweden made it clear
they were against waiting until all Israel's
war aims are achieved. They say these aims
could be secured more easily once a cease-
fire is in place.
So where the Americans and Israelis are
saying new reality first, then cease-fire, the
Europeans are saying the opposite: cease-
fire first, then new reality.
In a briefing Jan. 4 to the Israeli Cabinet,
Shin Bet security agency chief Yuval Diskin
said Hamas was ready for a cease-fire now,
as long it did not feel humiliated by its
terms.
Military intelligence head Maj. Gen.
Amos Yadlin said llamas leaders now
understand that their ending of the previ-
ous cease-fire with Israel on Dec. 19 had
been a major strategic blunder. Hamas was
surprised not only by the scope of Israel's
retaliation, but also by the depth of anti-
llamas feeling among moderate Arab lead-
ers, especially in Egypt.
Egyptian leaders, including President
Hosni Mubarak and Foreign Minister
Ahmad Aboul Gheit, insisted that llamas
had brought the Gaza tragedy on itself
by not heeding their advice to extend the
cease-fire with Israel.
Lawmaker Mohammed Basouni bluntly
accused llamas leaders of hiding in under-
ground bunkers and deserting their people
in their hour of need.
The Egyptians have strong regional and
domestic reasons for their opposition to
llamas. They see Iran as their most danger-
ous regional foe, and Gaza controlled by
Hamas is a forward Iranian base on their
doorstep. They also fear the ideological con-
nection between Hamas and the seditious
opposition Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.
And they realize that the border tun-
nels could support terror and violence in
the opposite direction — from Gaza into
Egypt.
Israel and Egypt thus have a common
interest in weakening llamas and moder-
ating Iranian influence in Gaza. Whether
they can find a common and effective
diplomatic formula to change the reality
on the ground — together with other
key international players — ultimately is
what the Israeli military campaign is all
about. El