Israel Update for November 2008

A public rally was held at the main road entrance into the city of Ashkelon on November 20 to protest what many citizens said was a relatively weak government response to the renewed assaults upon their large coastal city. Speakers noted that the longer range Grad rockets striking the popular resort city were supplied by Iran, the main regional political and military backer of Hamas. Some held signs featuring pictures of a local shopping mall that was struck by such a rocket last spring, leaving death and destruction in its wake.

Several protestors said Olmert and Barak seemed most concerned with not doing anything to further weaken Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, who is under scathing criticism and threats of violence from Hamas and its radical allies for holding peace talks this year with Israel, under American tutelage. Indeed Abbas repeatedly called upon Israeli leaders to "show restraint" in the face of the renewed rocket blitz, while pressing for the adoption of the 2002 Saudi peace plan as the basis for continuing negotiations.

Urgent Meeting

The near collapse of the six month ceasefire prompted Jordan's King Abdullah to urgently invite acting Prime Minister Olmert and Barak for unannounced consultations in Amman on November 18. Officials later confirmed that the unusual clandestine summit took place at the royal palace in Amman. It came after Jordanian officials allegedly learned that Israeli leaders were planning a large scale military operation before the Israeli elections, designed to entirely weed out Hamas militiamen from the Gaza Strip.

Israeli media reports said the worried Hashemite Monarch told the two Jewish leaders that any large IDF military operation designed to overturn Hamas rule could result in massive unrest in his own country and surrounding areas. Olmert and Barak reportedly assured King Abdullah that only relatively limited military measures are being considered at this time, understanding that the moderate Jordanian leader was hinting that his own rule could be threatened by a full frontal assault upon the Iranian and Syrian-backed Islamic movement.

However Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni-with her eyes apparently firmly fixed on the upcoming national elections that she hopes to win-stated several days later that while Israel would "respect the needs and wishes" of its Arab peace partners," it would also continue "to act according to the interests of Israel's citizens."

King Abdullah is also understood to have relayed to Olmert and Barak a message from Hamas officials in which they supposedly emphasized their firm desire to maintain the timeout truce with Israel. Media reports said Jordanian security officials had been holding ongoing discussions with Hamas representatives in an attempt to prevent the complete collapse of the June 19 ceasefire.

In The Spotlight

In response to the major Hamas truce violations, the Defense Minister entirely sealed off border crossings from Israel into the Gaza Strip, as happened in the rocket-filled months leading up to the June 17 ceasefire accord. However some food and fuel supplies were allowed in for humanitarian reasons, as also occurred earlier this year. Although Barak admitted after two weeks that the blockade had only "minimal effect" in halting the rocket onslaught, he added that it would be maintained for the time being since "we cannot allow the Palestinians to fire rockets upon our cities without a response."

As before, Hamas leaders blasted the Israel border crossing closures, staging rallies against them while claiming they were causing great hardship approaching starvation to many residents of the Gaza Strip. They averred that widespread electricity blackouts were made necessary by Israeli fuel curtailments, a contention that Israel denied.

Officials said the militant Muslim group was simply trying to steal world sympathy while imposing additional hardships on its own uninvolved people. And they noted that once again, Israeli civilian communities were being deliberately targeted by rocket squads, while the IDF was trying its best to limit military responses to active Islamic fighters.

An army assessment presented to Barak on November 19 stated that Hamas leaders remain in full control of the Gaza Strip despite the closures and IDF military action. The report added that Hamas is able to supply almost all of the food and medical supplies local residents need via the dozens of hidden tunnels that operate illegally under Gaza's southern border with Egypt.

However this assessment did not stop United Nations officials from maintaining that a "humanitarian catastrophe" was in the making due to Israel's closure policy. The November 20 statement was made by Karen Abu Zayd, who heads the UN's Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) which provides food and medical rations to some 820,000 Palestinians classified by the UN as "refugees" in the Gaza Strip, even though most were born there.

The UN official claimed the Israeli blockade was "the gravest since the early days of the Palestinian uprising" eight years ago, adding that the border crossings "have been closed for so much longer than ever before." Speaking at UNRWA's Amman headquarters, she insisted that the relief agency had "nothing in our Gaza warehouses." However, Abu Zayd did not note that a large convoy of trucks had been allowed into the sealed off zone just a few days before she spoke carrying vital food and medical supplies to needy Palestinians.