Gaza on my mind

I’ve got Gaza on my mind!

Last week three Palestinians were killed in the Gaza Strip when the car they were travelling in was strafed by an IAF jet fighter. A few days later two Palestinians were shot by an Israeli patrol near the Gaza security fence.

Given the bare and incomplete details of these two incidents a casual observer might be tempted to assume that Israel is engaged in a series of unprovoked attacks on Gaza's helpless citizens.

However, If I mention that the three men in the car were members of the Hamas military wing en route to kidnap Israeli tourists in Sinai, it's clear that their timely demise came not a moment too soon.

Likewise the two men shot by the security fence were also Hamas operatives. trying to set roadside bombs near the border.

In addition Israeli planes bombed smuggling tunnels in Gaza twice during the week.

It seems that IDF actions weren't restricted to Gaza alone. On Tuesday two people were killed near the airport in Port Sudan when the car they were travelling in was hit by rocket fire.

Sudan’s foreign minister claimed Israeli planes carried out the attack.

At this juncture it’s important to mention that whenever the "boys" go abroad to Dubai, Damascus, Port Sudan and other exotic places reports of their activities in the Israeli news media are invariably prefaced by the phrase “according to foreign sources.”

Maybe we have begun to take responsibility for our actions because TIME Magazine claimed a senior IDF official confirmed that Israeli forces carried out the air strike.

"It's not our first time there," the official was quoted as saying, apparently referring to the 2009 airstrike that demolished an arms convoy near the border with Egypt.

The Al-Arabiya news channel reported that one of the two men killed in the airstrike was an Arab national responsible for arming Hamas.

In the meantime Hamas leaders in Gaza said that one of the men alleged to have been killed in Port Sudan is alive and well. The Iranians also denied being involved in the Sudanese gun running for Hamas.

The bottom line is that Israel and Hamas plead guilty as charged.

A lot of well intentioned people as well as the cynics who never miss an opportunity to malign Israel condemn the IDF’s preemptive action policy.

They argue that the preemptive gunning down of militants/terrorists is unwarranted. Some of them claim that the incidents referred to and others like them don’t meet the requirements of the “Caroline Test.”

Caroline Who? In 1837, settlers in Canada rebelled against the British colonial government.

The United States remained officially neutral regarding the rebellion, but American sympathizers assisted the rebels with men and supplies, transported by a steamboat named The Caroline. In response, a British force from Canada entered United States territory at night, seized The Caroline, set the ship on fire, and sent it over the Niagara falls. At least one American was killed in the incident.

The British claimed that the attack was an act of self–defence.

In a letter to the British Ambassador, Secretary of State Daniel Webster argued that the British would have to show that: "the necessity to act in self–defence was instant, overwhelming, leaving no choice of means, and no moment of deliberation."

Our defence establishment bases its preemptive actions less on Daniel Webster’s formula and more on a Talmudic inference deduced from Exodus 22:2 which states “ If a thief be found breaking in, and be smitten so that he die, there shall be no blood shed for him,” The Talmudic deduction says “ If a man comes to kill you, rise early and kill him first.”

Some Israelis have questioned the efficacy of some preemptive strikes claiming that they lead to Hamas reprisals and result in a vicious circle of violence.

Indeed following this week’s Israeli attacks Islamic militant groups in the Gaza Strip declared the de-facto two-year-old ceasefire with Israel null and void.

Admittedly since the Gaza moratorium the firing of rockets and mortars from Gaza have been more low key, but the declared ceasefire has never been fully adhered to.

In fact the preemptive actions taken this week followed the biggest upsurge of violence since Operation Cast Lead.

Cutting off Gaza’s weapons supply line is Hamas’ biggest nightmare.

Military affairs analyst Ron Ben-Yishai predicted another flare-up following this week’s preemptive actions. “In the coming days, we will likely see yet another escalation in the south. Hamas will seek to avenge the IDF operation early Saturday where three members of the group’s military wing were assassinated and a fourth was gravely wounded. We can assume that Hamas’ retribution will be joined by Islamic Jihad, the Popular Resistance Committees, and the Popular Front.”

Late this afternoon a 16-year boy was critically injured when the school bus he was riding in near the Saad junction in the Gaza periphery area was hit by an anti-tank missile fired from the Gaza Strip. He is currently being treated for severe trauma to the head, after sustaining shrapnel injuries.

As expected there was an immediate response by IDF units in the area, however the response is never an ill considered kneejerk reprisal. IDF southern command has a limited immediate response. The secondary response is the result of tactical decision making at a higher level.

Ben Yishai says “Both sides have an interest in restoring the calm that prevailed in the region following Cast Lead, but they lack the ability to control the height of the flames, and therefore may end up being dragged into a major confrontation against their will.”

Hamas’ political leadership has lost some of its control over other organisations, and also over its own military wing. Observers report that there is an atmosphere of partial anarchy in the Strip, a situation exploited by “rogue” factions to serve their own purpose.

Ron Ben Yishai and others emphasise that Iran’s leadership is eager to cause a major Gaza confrontation. Such a flare-up would help ease the pressure on Assad in Syria, divert public anger in Iran, and focus al-Jazeera’s attention on events in the Strip. This will also create an opportunity for Ahmadinejad to tighten his ties with Egypt and other Muslim countries. “ Tehran is encouraging Islamic Jihad, which follows Iran’s orders, to provoke Israel.

Lately Tehran appears to be boosting its mortar shell deliveries to Islamic Jihad in Gaza. This may stem from estimates that the deployment of the Iron Dome anti-rocket system may render rocket fire from the Strip ineffective. Yet Iron Dome cannot prevent massive mortar fire at Israeli communities adjacent to the border fence – such attacks have proven lethal in the past.

As result of all these reasons, Hamas and the other large groups operating in Gaza are increasingly bolder. Hence, they are now attempting to impose new ‘rules of play’ on the IDF and Israel’s political leadership – rules that would enable them to maintain a limited war of attrition against southern communities, while restoring relative calm whenever they see fit, in order to serve their own interests, “says Ben Yishai.

Well it happened! The first of its kind, a grad rocket fired at Ashkelon from Gaza was following a trajectory heading it to a populated area when it was destroyed by an interceptor fired by the Iron Dome system positioned close to the city. All the doubters and cynics can eat their hats now.

The cloak and dagger operation in the Ukraine involving the abduction of a Palestinian engineer Dirar Abu Sisi I mentioned last week has veered off in a different direction. Der Spiegel reported that Abu Sisi was kidnapped because he had information concerning the whereabouts of Gilad Shalit. However when he was indicted this week it seems that the innocuous electrical engineer who claimed he worked at the Gaza power plant was Hamas’ top rocket engineer. Abu Sisi studied with a leading Ukrainian rocket engineer and when he returned to Gaza he upgraded the Qassam rocket improving its range considerably.

Undoubtedly the story of the week was Judge Richard Goldstone’s recantation.

In an extraordinary article in the Washington Post, Richard Goldstone has now admitted that his infamous report was wrong. Having fuelled the blood libel that in Operation Cast Lead in Gaza Israel had targeted civilians and possibly had committed crimes against humanity, he now says that, as a result of the final report of the UN committee of independent experts and other evidence that has emerged since his report was published, he accepts that civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy and further states that if I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document.

Melanie Phillips commenting in the Spectator said “What self-serving rubbish. There was ample evidence at the time from numerous sources that Hamas was telling lies about the number of civilians who were killed by Israeli fire. There was ample evidence that Hamas was deliberately putting civilians in harm’s way. There was ample evidence that Hamas does not operate under the rule of law or uphold human rights. There was ample evidence that Israeli rules of engagement required the IDF to avoid hitting civilians wherever possible. There was ample evidence that Israel always investigates allegations of misconduct made against its soldiers and holds them to acount under the rule of law. Yet Goldstone, having accepted the poisoned chalice from the UN Human Rights Council to subject Israel to a show trial whose verdict preceded the evidence (despite his protestations that he modified this odious remit), chose to believe the propaganda put out by Hamas and its proxies among NGOs with a long track record of malevolent hostility to Israel.”

Columnist Mona Charen also commented on Goldstone’s “not knowing”

“All of this was not just knowable when Goldstone signed on as front man for the U.N. lynch mob, it was known. The Goldstone Report was intended, and has since been employed, to stigmatize any Israeli self-defense as a war crime.”

Jeffrey Goldberg in the Atlantic Magazine summed up the practical implications of Goldstone’s mea culpa “Well, I'm glad he's cleared that up. Unfortunately, it is somewhat difficult to retract a blood libel, once it has been broadcast across the world.”

A lead article in The Economist written in a cynical vein chose to highlight Israel’s response to Goldstone’s “change of heart.” There is no joy like schadenfreude, say Israelis. The paper advised us to heed Proverbs 24:17

“Rejoice not when thine enemy falleth, and let not thine heart be glad when he stumbleth.”:

I reserve a measure of schadenfreude for Goldstone because he deserves it. Nevertheless, his remorse, incomplete as it is, should be treated as the author of Proverbs suggests.

Have a good weekend.

Beni 7^th of April, 2011.