On Day One

Obama told USA Today that he plans, "on day one," to appoint a special team of diplomats to tackle the Israel-Gaza conflict.

Obama acknowledged the issue is interwoven into the politics of the entire Middle East, signaling a departure from Bush's strategy, which tended to isolate the issue.

More Talk

Diplomatic efforts to end the war in Gaza have intensified yet again, but I'd put my money on Israel stopping whenever she feels ready.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon is in the West Bank, Israeli Defense Minister Tzivi Lipni is in Washington, and new Arab leadership meetings are being held in Kuwait and Qatar.

Egyptian and Saudi Arabian officials declined the Doha, Qatar talks and are headed to Kuwait -- a sign of a major rift in the Arab world, say some.

The leadership in Doha recognizes Palestinian political factions Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), whereas Egypt, Saudi Arabia (both meeting in Kuwait) and Western nations have sidelined such factions in cease fire talks, seeking to delegitimize the groups. The former want to condemn Israel, show solidarity with Palestine and keep the US and the West out of the Middle East; the latter seek to find a so-called moderate solution and keep Iran -- Hamas' main sponsor -- out of their region.

Concrete Jungle

Israel pushed deep into the heart of Gaza City today, hitting a UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building where hundreds were taking shelter, though only three were confirmed injured.  Also hit was a foreign press office and a hospital.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert expressed regret, but told reporters that a Hamas militant fired from beside the compound and then ran in for cover.  Ban Ki-Moon, however, said Defense Minister Ehud Barack told him the shelling of the compound was a "grave mistake."  Ban is "outraged" at Israel.  

UNRWA officials told the NY Times the IDF were given GPS coordinates for all UN buildings.  

The heavy urban raids come as negotiations in Egypt are stepping up, reports just about every major paper (FT), but they have also described the peace talks as "stepping up" every day of this conflict.  

In the midst of the aggression, the European Commission has canceled plans to increase economic and diplomatic relations with Israel.   

Abdullah

Suadi Arabian King Abdullah supports the Egyptian peace talks and urged both sides to come to the table to stop the fighting. Meanwhile, reports the Arab News, cemeteries in Gaza are increasingly over-filling with nowhere to bury the newly dead.

A US ship carrying ammunitions from a Greek port to a US warehouse in Israel was canceled after Athens objected to the arrangement, in place before the war in Gaza, says the Pentagon.

Towards Gaza City

Israel continues to push further into Gaza City. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon arrived today, though diplomatic efforts to reach a cease fire still seem slow to come. Previous attempts at an Egyptian-led cease fire proposal were side-lined by bickering within Hamas, reports the NY Times, where Gazan Hamas officials wanted a cease fire but saw opposition from their Syrian counterparts.

Support for the effort runs high in Israel, where 10 soldiers and three civilians were killed by Hamas rocket fire. The Palestinian death toll stands just below 1,000.

All the while, Israel says that after two weeks of heavy bombardment, their main objectives remain unfulfilled.

Osama bin Laden released a voice recording calling for jihad against Israel, his first such recording since May.

Peace Talks

The Khaleej Times reports on the ongoing Egyptian cease fire talks, saying that while Egypt is eager to end the fighting and Israel has shown interest in signing the current plan, Hamas leadership from Damascus and Gaza are having a tough time coming together and signing the agreement.  

The Cairo talks involve five Hamas delegates, three from Damascus and two from Gaza.  

Meanwhile, Qatar has requested an emergency Arab League summit to find a solution to the conflict, to which no Arab countries have as of yet signed on to.  Some are afraid that the meeting will prove ineffective, making Arab states look helpless, while others can't get passed certain divisions in the Arab world, a Reuters report makes clear.  

Egypt and Saudi Arabia are opposed to Hamas militants, while Syria and Qatar are sympathetic to them.  Egypt sees Qatar's announcement as a means of embarrassing or undermining talks in Cairo.

Protesters in Syria, Yemen and Iran have excoriated Egypt's refusal to open their border crossings with Gaza to allow civilians to flee the war torn area.  Egypt won't do it without support from the PA government in the West Bank.  

Phase 3

Israeli air strikes intensified as ground troops pushed into the suburbs of Gaza City, reports the BBC, and Hamas rocket fire into Israel continues.  

PA President Mahmoud Abbas decried Israel for attempting to "wipe out" his people.  The PA used to hold power in Gaza before elections in 2006 put Hamas in power, and many predicted the outcome of the current conflict would put Abbas's PA back in power there.  

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon is headed to Gaza to push for an immediate truce.    

Thus Spoke Walt

For a nice sampling of a variety of viewpoints on the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict, with all its vitriol, see famed co-author of The Israel Lobby and professor of International Relations at Harvard University Stephen Walt's recent blog on ForeignPolicy.com, in which he imagines a different outcome of the Six Day War, and all of the comments that follow.  

Inexcusable

Some very dim-witted Frenchmen attacked a synagogue north of Paris over the weekend.  The attackers threw "petrol bombs" into the synagogue, reports the BBC, a week after a similar attack on another French synagogue.  

The protests starkly illustrate a strain of anti-semitism that blinds some protesters to the realities of the international system.  Diasporan Jews have about as much to do with Israeli foreign policy as I do with American foreign policy.  Attacking a French synagogue because of Israeli actions in the Gaza strip is nothing if not blatantly racist.  I imagine if any westerner were to attack a mosque because of the act of a Muslim terrorist, they would be deemed racist and condemned, rightfully, by all parties involved.  

Protesting in the streets of cities across the world allows one's voice to be heard, and though it may seem ineffective, it is far more justifiable and relevant to their cause than violent attacks aimed at unaffiliated parties -- as unjustifiable as Katyusha rockets into Israel or Israeli cluster bombs in Gaza city.   

As Ugly as Reality

Israel has slowed its air assault on Gaza overnight, though ground forces have been stepped up, reports the BBC.  Reserve forces have been sent into Gaza via ground.  While Prime Minister Ehud Olmert denies any increase in ground fighting, some reports claim reservists are being sent in to secure already won areas while front-line troops move further inward.  With no international reporters allowed on the ground, such reports can neither be confirmed nor denied. 

A military spokesman said that while reservists are being called in mostly to provide relief for engaged soldiers, this does not signal an escalation in ground fighting.  Forces in Israel continue training in the case of an expanded ground invasion.  

Olmert says Israel is nearing its goals in Gaza, and some claim an Egyptian-brokered cease fire is progressing, though we've heard this before.  

Meanwhile, the Washington Post seems to sound a more alarming note, saying that with the strong back-up from the reserve units, Israel is bracing for what may be the "fiercest fighting yet" as they push into the major population centers in the so-called "phase three" of the operation.  

Talks in Cairo hinge on Israeli calls for an Egyptian monitor at the Gaza-Egypt border to ensure that no more weapons are smuggled into Gaza -- a request which Egypt has so far balked at.  

An all-out push into Gaza City will mean increased death tolls and heavy destruction on both sides.  The question seems to be whether or not Israel should use the position they've gained in weakening Hamas to negotiate (yet another) cease fire, or should move to debilitate Hamas to such an extent they cannot fire rockets, if not wipe them out completely -- a question that Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barack, both of whom are vying to be the next PM, disagree on.  

In a strictly military-strategic perspective, as ugly as it may sound, I think their only option is to push ahead.  Any cease fire will prove as transient as any in the past.  True, the elimination of Hamas will by no means mean peace in the Middle East, but it will reduce Iranian influence in the area and restore a (perhaps only slightly) longer peace in the area from which to build. Israel's reputation is as bad as it will be -- a further offensive will probably not change that.  

One note to add -- if any traces of phosphorous munitions are found in an area like Gaza City, that will and ought to be the end of Israel's bargaining position.  UNHRC has already declared Israeli actions have "resulted in massive violations of human rights."

Concision

In what is perhaps the shortest news article I have ever seen, Hamas claims to have hit an Israeli Air Force base outside of Tel Aviv today with rockets fired from the Gaza strip.  As Josh Nanus points out, this might be the first time Hamas' has targeted something other than defenseless civilians.  

Unworkable

Israel released a statement on what they called the 'unworkable' U.N. cease fire proposal, saying "the IDF will continue to act in order to obtain the objectives of the operation -- to bring about a change in the security situation in the south of the country -- this in accordance with the plans that have been approved upon embarking on this mission."

Sounds a lot like they're moving on to phase 3, as earlier predicted by Norman's International.

. . . part 3

The NY Times is painting a pretty grim portrait.  UN Food Relief has ended deliveries into Gaza after the death of (another) food-truck driver, claiming the most minimum requisite security is not there.  All the while, peace negotiations seem to be deadlocked, though the UN Security Council may be close to a cease fire resolution sponsored by many Arab states -- albeit one that may make a US veto likely.     

Shit! part 2

Heres a BBC rundown on the rockets.  Hizbullah, they say, has a much more powerful arsenal to attack with than the rockets that were fired, and would likely have used them if they wanted to stage another theater to the north. Also a factor is Hizbullah's political situation; now a bona fide partner in Lebanese government, they likely would not want to jeopardize that status.  

But, the BBC says, "not a leaf can move in southern Lebanon without its people knowing about it."  Perhaps they were complicit, were their finger not on the trigger.    

The BBC also points out the ease with which just about any small extremist group could smuggle missiles into and fire from southern Lebanon.  There are 400,000 Palestinian refugees in the area who claim Israel as their homeland.  

Shit!

Three rockets were fired into Israel from Lebanon in the north.  Israel responded with five mortar shells.  

This comes after Lebanese Information Minister Tarek Mitri told reporters the other day he did not think Hizbullah would fire at this time.  

He did say that Hizbullah was not involved and some in Israeli intelligence believe it is the work of Palestinian groups in the region.  Border patrols have been stepped up by UN, Israeli and Lebanese forces.  

The Daily Star says that Hizbullah has more than 40,000 rockets "ready to be fired at Israel," should the situation escalate.  Some feel that Israel's mortar response could push Hizbullah -- whether they fired or not -- into a response.  

Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah sounded a defiant tone towards Israel and declared that "all options are on the table."

Despite the fierce talk, I don't foresee armed conflict between Israel and Hizbullah right now. The situation in Gaza is probably weakening Israeli forces to a far weaker extent than would prevent them from leveling southern Lebanon should the need arise, and Hizbullah and Lebanon in general probably know this.  

European Sentiments

The CS Monitor reports that pro-Arab sentiment throughout Europe, once dominated by French diplomacy, is dwindling.  

Support for the Palestinian plight, once seen as a struggle for independence and a right of return, is now seen in "shallower emotional and humanitarian grounds . . . forgetting the old issues of substance and Israeli occupation," said one European diplomat.  

Among other factors, many contribute the decline to the friction caused throughout much of Europe in the past decade or so brought on by abrupt increases of Arab and Muslim immigration into Europe, as well as a reaction to 9/11.  

Some are rehashing the "Clash of Civilizations" theory put out by Samuel Huntington, as if this were an inevitability. For those unschooled, please read Huntington's 1993 Foreign Affairs article "The Clash of Civilizations."

I think the thing to remember is that there are moderate groups and extreme groups in every civilization, and there is a fundamental common humanity that need not clash; this is the basis of diplomacy.  

Anyway, read the CSM article, an excellent piece on the worldview of Gaza.    

View from the Left

Here's how Tariq Ali sees the situation in Gaza. Tariq Ali is editor of the New Left Review, a widely published writer and human rights activist.

Tariq says that Israel and other powers in the region sought to subvert the democratic process in an effort to keep Hamas from rising to power in Gaza. When that didn't work, they tried to bend Hamas to their own will. With support from the people in Gaza because of the many humanitarian projects they engaged in, Hamas became even more defiant. These are the roots of the current conflict, and with this view he draws his own conclusions about what ought to be done now.

An interesting point of view, and certainly worth reading whether you agree or not.

Onward Ho?

Israel is still debating whether or not to continue on with the third stage of their plan, which would include further incursions into major strategic points in Gaza. Diplomats involved in the discussions are working closely with Egypt to find another way to assuage Israeli strategic concerns, thereby founding a cease fire.

The strategic concern centers on the Philadelphi route, a point on the Gaza-Egypt border Hamas has been smuggling weapons through. Egypt says they have destroyed many tunnels already and that the long range missiles may be coming to Gaza by sea. Diplomats are looking at ways to deal with that scenario as well.

My guess is that Israel's concerns about its own defense will not be quelled in the near-term. There seem to be too many variables, a lack of transparency and an inability to monitor the area effectively enough to appease Israel. Israel will likely move on with phase three.

Two Wrongs

An AP report seems to back the notion that militants were firing on Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) from within the UN school that came under attack yesterday. Unfortunately, this means little to the conscience when the aftermath is this gruesome.

My mind is entirely lost somewhere in the equation of wrongs equaling rights at this point. And it doesn't help that I just watched Full Metal Jacket for the first time in my adult life the other day.

Sweet Reprieve!

Israel has halted operations in Gaza for a three-hour window to allow humanitarian aid in. Sweet reprieve! And it appears that this three-hour reprieve will be a daily thing, during which a Hamas spokesman said the group WILL NOT fire on Israel. This is a great move on Israel's part, and a great step forward for the whole situation.

Some aid workers say the humanitarian situation in the area while not be changed in the least by a three hour window. "When you are trying to feed 750,000 people a day in Gaza as we are, you need a permanent ceasefire. You can't do that in a three-hour window," said one. It still seems a positive move to me.

Major powers in the region continue working on a cease fire. Hamas has been largely boxed out of the dialog, for better or worse. My guess is, in the end, negotiating parties (Egypt and France, the United States in the background) are going to deal directly with the Palestinian Authority (PA) and guide them into a controlling position in the area. This may be a very good thing for the area for at least a little while.