First of the Year

The State Department held its first daily press briefing of the new year earlier this morning.

Not surprisingly, Gaza was at the top of State Department Spokesman Sean McCormack's brief. McCormack expressed concern with finding what he called a "sustainable, durable cease fire." "Of course everybody would like to see violence end immediately, but you also don't want it to end so that it recurs again in the same, if not, worse fashion in the future," he said.

McCormack highlighted three pillars of what the department sees as necessary for such a resolution; an end to the Gazan rockets, the opening of crossings into and out of the strip, "and also," he said, "the issue of the tunnels would be addressed," whatever the hell that means.

McCormack sees an opportunity to build negotiations with regards to the crossings upon the 2005 Movement and Access Agreement, a previous agreement to which the Palestinians (before Hamas came to power) and the Israelis were signatories.

When asked if Mr. McCormack would call the humanitarian situation a crisis, he opted for a slightly more ambiguous adjective.

"Well, the humanitarian situation is dire," he said. "I don't want to rehash for you all the reasons behind that, but they have primarily to do with Hamas and their management of the situation there." (Which is odd. I thought the stray Israeli bullets and missiles would prove a more pressing humanitarian concern at the moment.)

When asked if getting to a more immediate cease fire was more important in the short term, from which point something more lasting could be built, McCormack slyly placed one hand over his mouth to itch his upper lip and made a "KKsshhHH, SHkkkhh," noise, then said "I'm sorry, I think your microphone is getting some feedback. Someone please check that out. Next question."

Cutting through the obtuseness of his language, McCormack basically said that Gaza made a decision to increase rocket fire, which provoked Israel to come with full force, a sort of "final solution," if you will. Not in so many words, he said the State Department thinks the best shot at reaching an agreement is to allow the Israelis to continue their campaign until Hamas loses all power or is ready to surrender. "Look, Hamas made a calculation to provoke this - provoke the crisis," he said (oops, I bet he didn't mean to say crisis). "They can make - you know, they can make the opposite calculation."

When asked directly, was it a good idea for Israel to go in with ground forces, all McCormack would say is "Look, I'm not going to comment on that . . . every sovereign state needs to decide for itself how best to defend itself."

Thats basically a pass, right? Couldn't Russia have been said to be making a sovereign decision to defend herself in August? We did veto a U.N. cease fire and statement condemning Israel's actions.

Heres a tasty little exchange from the briefing:

QUESTION: Is it fair for us to conclude, though, that from this statement that the United States supports the Israeli decision to move from the aerial bombardment to a ground invasion?
MR. MCCORMACK: Well, this is – you know, this is a question that always comes up. We don’t give green lights, red lights, yellow lights. I think you heard from the Vice President they’re – they didn’t seek our permission or advice, and we didn’t seek to offer any of that. As I – as I said --
QUESTION: You know, that’s not – that’s just manifestly not true.
MR. MCCORMACK: As I – yes, it is.
QUESTION: No, no – maybe in – maybe in this, but all over the world you are involved in giving green lights, red l lights and yellow lights. I remember when –
MR. MCCORMACK: Am I talking --
QUESTION: -- when Musharraf --
MR. MCCORMACK: Am I talking about anywhere else in the world, Matt? Am I talking about a specific circumstance?

You can watch a video of the briefing, or read the transcript here.