PEN-L message, Re: [Pen-l] Gaza

Here is a caption by someone who lives under bombardment in Gaza:

After five days

Gaza Strip

After five days of the Israeli aggressive Cast Lead military operation on the Gaza Strip which aims at destroying Hamasʼs control, I can claim easily that it is stronger. The movement, its leadership, and popular sympathy ʽSOCIAL CAPITALʼ is more solid. The Cast Lead operation started with what was called shock and awe, or shock treatment, by targeting more than 40 premises in one air strike. During the last five days, Israel committed grave breaches to International Humanitarian Law resulting in more than 400 deaths and 2000 injuries, most of them are civilians, including the blue police who are Law Enforcement Officials rather than combatants. Yes we were shocked by the number of casualties as Gaza has been saturated with civilian blood. None of the Hamas military or political leaders were among the dead and injured.

In Gaza, Hamas has one front to lead the operation, but on the Israeli side there is a triangular front. It is composed of the Israelʼs Premier, its Minister of Foreign Affairs, and its Defense Minister with each one of them having a different political agenda and goals to achieve by Cast Lead. Gaza has one unified and coherent goal and one agenda; to simply survive.

Within the last five days Israelʼs Air Force demonstrated its superiority in a very immoral way in Gaza. It bombarded the same targets, which became rubble after the first bombardment, three or four more times. It demolished these targets, and then after destroying them completely, it continued to target them simply to shake our homes and destroy innocent peopleʼs shelters. Now, the air strike phase and the bank of targets have reached its end and the locally made Palestinian rockets still reach the same number, or more, of southern Israel cities. Hamas is not under shock but is still in control, and the main question facing the triangle is what would be next? Is the incursion into the Gaza Strip inevitable? Who will control Gaza afterwards? These questions face the triangle after five days of the operation as it also hesitantly rejected the crappie French proposal for a 48 hour humanitarian ceasefire.

If Israel is to push its troops into the most populated area in the globe, casualties among innocent civilians will definitely be countless as a result. After the last five days, Israeli forces had proven that targeting innocent civilians is an integral part of their military doctrine. If an incursion happens, Israeli troops will be visible targets for Palestinian combat teams in the heart of unfriendly territory.

Most probably, the current Israeli military aggression on Gaza has internal and competitive electoral goals for the triangle within Israel, and merely one external goal. The external is to strengthen Hamasʼs political control in Gaza, since it will continue to be in power regardless of the price civilians will pay. Moreover, the ongoing Cast Lead is the mercy bullet ending a clinically dead process; the two state solution, and to moderates in the region.

The surviving Hamas will not accept a truce without dictating its conditions of lifting the closure imposed on the Gaza Strip, including the Rafah border with Egypt. This will be an absolute triumph for Hamas, and if not, it will win the social capital and sympathy of all Gazans. Hamasʼs social capital will also come from the region which is rapidly moving toward extremism and is asking for the withdrawal of the Arab Peace initiative. This will not be helpful for the triangleʼs electoral agenda even inside Israel. The irony today for Gazans is that the triangle attacks them from the sky while Hamas came out of the ballot boxes.

Currently, after five days it became more obvious that the Cast Lead operation and its triangle have no political goals, but rather unachievable military ones. On the other side, Hamas has no military goals, but rather achievable political goals. Today all world capitals, including Israeli cities, are full with demonstrators against the Israeli war crimes in Gaza. This will lead to the isolation of Israel and its triangle, and most probably some of the triangleʼs heads will be prosecuted before some European national courts if not the International Court of Justice.

Finally, on the sunset of the sixth day, heading toward the New Year, in which the triangle had a meeting for more than six hours to decide whether they will widen the Cast Lead operation on Gaza or not, Gazans and Hamas are asked to prepare for the triumph rallies. I can assure you that this is not wishful thinking, but rather realistic since the structure of Hamas, its control and leadership are still operating on all levels and spheres. In Israel, the triangle would face a new Winograd Commission and may be losing the coming election.