Israel Update for May 2008

As reported in last month's news report, such an operation is projected to be very costly in terms of IDF casualties. On top of top of that, civilian injuries and deaths on both sides could be quite high. Security experts warn that Hamas and Islamic Jihad will probably launch all available Grad and Kassam rockets and mortar shells at Israeli communities in the initial stages of such an operation, which officials admit could mean many hundreds of hits in the area. The rogue Palestinian groups cynically station most of their fighters and store weapons in the middle of their own civilian neighborhoods, meaning hundreds of Arab non-combatants could be killed in what is projected to be fierce ground combat.

Adding to government concerns is the possibility that Shiite Hizbullah forces in Lebanon might support their fellow Muslim radicals in Gaza by lobbing missiles at Israel from the north, probably under orders from Tehran. Israeli military leaders say the Lebanese group-which emerged politically stronger after launching street battles against anti-Syrian forces in early May-now possesses a massive arsenal around four times larger than at the start of the Second Lebanon War in July 2006, with rockets that can hit as far as Beersheva in the south, along with Israel's nuclear power plant in nearby Dimona.

Give Peace With Hamas A Chance?

It became clear during May that Egyptian-mediated indirect ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas would probably not succeed after both sides spelled out their conflicting requirements to enact a temporary six-month truce. Analysts said failure to reach a truce pact would quickly lead to intensified conflict, although Hamas officials seemed eager to forestall a crushing IDF operation, meaning they still might reverse their stand and accept Israel's ceasefire conditions.

Hamas leaders attending the talks, including former Palestinian Authority (PA) Foreign Minister Mahmoud Zahar, rejected Israel's insistence that abducted IDF soldier Gilad Shalit be set free as part of a temporary truce deal. Hamas officials claimed Israel would not agree to their demand for an immediate opening of all border crossings into the Gaza Strip as soon as an agreement was initialed, but wanted to wait and see if several other terror groups based there, especially the Iranian-controlled Islamic Jihad group, actually stopped firing rockets and mortar shells into Israel over a period of some days. Israel would also not commit to an instant halt to all military operations inside the Palestinian coastal zone, said Hamas leaders.

Media reports said Hamas negotiators who met with Egypt's main mediator, Intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, were angry to discover that Cairo basically backed the Israeli truce positions over their own. In particular, Egypt wants to see the border crossing at Rafah, which connects the Gaza Strip to Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, restored to full PA control, as was the case before PA forces were routed in violent clashes with Hamas gunmen last June. Egypt also agreed with Israel that European Union monitors should be stationed at the crossing-another position Hamas rejected. Hamas leaders maintained the conditions were aimed at "further humiliating the Palestinians and aggravating their suffering."

Israeli Middle East analysts said the American-backed Mubarak regime fears growing Hamas military and economic power in the Gaza Strip, and the radical group's burgeoning alliance with Iran, almost as much as Israel does. They note that the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (from which the Arabic acronym HAMAS is derived) was established in 1988 as a direct offshoot of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood Movement, which seeks to oust the Mubarak government and replace it with an Islamic fundamentalist administration that would revoke the 1978 Camp David peace treaty with Israel and return to the active path of jihad war against the detested "Zionist entity." Therefore it is in Cairo's vested interest to see Israeli forces crush Hamas in the small Palestinian coastal zone, even if Egyptian leaders will dutifully rebuke Jerusalem for any massive IDF action, along with most other Arab states-fanned as usual by strongly anti-Israel Arabic media reports by the Qatar-based Al Jazeera satellite news network.

Give Peace With Syria A Chance?

While indirect ceasefire negotiations with Hamas were struggling in Cairo, it was formally announced in Jerusalem and Damascus that the Muslim nation of Turkey was mediating indirect peace talks between Israel and Syria. Media reports that secret exploratory negotiations were taking place first surfaced last year, as noted at the time in this monthly news summary, but were either denied or at least not confirmed by officials in all three countries. However a joint decision was made by the parties to place the talks on the public record, with simultaneous announcements made in all three capitals on May 21.

The statement from the Prime Minister's office hit the Israeli public like a bombshell. Many politicians from across the political spectrum charged that Ehud Olmert was attempting to deflect attention away from pending criminal charges against him by agreeing to raise the veil surrounding the controversial peace talks. Indeed, the announcement-which reportedly also shocked and angered Syria's main ally, Iran-was made the very same hour as a court imposed gag order restricting publication of some of the details of the charges against Olmert was lifted. However the Premier's aides maintained the timing was decided upon by the three countries some days before, and had nothing to do with the ongoing police investigation.

Whatever the case, it has been clear from public opinion surveys for some time that a large majority of Israelis do not want their leaders to conduct peace talks with Damascus unless the Iranian-allied regime agrees beforehand to break all ties with Tehran and stop actively supporting the Hizbullah movement that is increasing its chokehold over Lebanon and threatening to rain missiles upon Israeli cities once again.

Various opinion surveys taken in the wake of the dramatic announcement revealed that while a slight majority of Israelis are not opposed in principal to holding peace talks with Syria, a significant majority-over 60%-are not willing to abandon the strategic Golan Heights, from where Israel gets a good portion of its vital national fresh water supplies, not to mention some of its best vineyards and its only snow ski resort (on the Mount Hermon peak that towers above the Heights, which also hosts an irreplaceable military outpost that monitors activity in neighboring countries, up to western Iran).

More disquieting to government officials, a full 35% said in one survey that they were "moderately to highly likely" to engage in civil disobedience to disrupt any scheduled Israeli land withdrawal from the verdant high ground that sits like a king directly above the Sea of Galilee's eastern shoreline, the city of Tiberius and the entire Upper Galilee region.

Give Us Your Water!