Dr. Landis says “All the same, one wonders where the victory leads. A few post ago, I conjectured that Israel’s long term plan must be to drive the unwanted population centers and surrounding territory of Palestine into the hands of Egypt and Jordan. It is hard to imagine a two-state solution anymore.”

So Joshua, was Mubarak right all along? That’s what he has been telling the Palestinians all the time.

And what did Assad and Nejjad do all this time to help the Palestinians when they were massacred? It seems they only paid lip service to the poor Palestinians and did their utmost to prolong the suffering. I’m also curious about the so-called resistance of Hezbollah. It seems they were resisting through speeches and empty talk just like the other Arabs!!

Just like Olmert who sat in Sharm al-Sheikh proud of his ‘achievement’, Meshaal and Assad sat in Doha with equal pride celebrating their impotence at the expense of massacred children, women and the elderly in Gaza. What a pathetic bunch of retros!!

Was it really worth it? Or was it just pure sheer madness?

On balance: Evaluation of the Israeli festival of slaughter and butchery in Gaza

From war to war (which is a title of a book by Nadav Safran), that is the context in which we need to evaluate our century-old conflict with Israel. You can’t isolate each chapter or war or slaughter and analyze it without the larger context of the conflict. The press conference by the Israeli prime minister and his defense minister was remarkable: less triumphalist than usual, and certainly vague about goals and successes. Now we can evaluate the goals within the context of Israel’s declared goals, and within the context of Israel’s strategic plan. For somebody of my age, I can say this at first: that from 1948 until the 1990s, every Israeli military success more smashing the one before: the 1973 was a different story because it was the only Arab-Israeli war that was initiated by the Arab side (remarkable when you think about the propaganda of the “beleaguered Israel”), and it was bungled by the Egyptian (Nazi) dictator, Anwar Sadat (Jimmy Carter’s favorite personality and friend), and Israel (contrary to present-day Arab states’ propaganda) wound up winning overall at the end. So Israel’s strategic posture was predicated on intimidating 1) the armies of the enemy; 2) the population of the enemy. Israeli psychological warfare succeeded for decades in convincing the enemy that Israel is way too mighty and way too invincible to be damaged by any military effort. Arabs reached a mood of defeatism that permeated the political culture, and helped in securing the survival and propaganda of the ruling regimes. Israel’s tactic was meant to discourage any political violence or even defense from the other side. You also need to compare to the times when Israel faced non-state actors: we have different episodes: from Al-Karamah battle in 1968 (a crucial watershed in fida’iyyin recruitment), to the various chapters of Israeli invasions of Lebanon culminating in the 1982 invasion of Lebanon. I am quite familiar and witnessed the responses to Israeli invasions of Lebanon. It is in that context that I find Gaza (under siege and cut off from the world with Egypt playing the role of the ally of Israel) to be an utter failure for the Israeli side. I never expected much from Hamas in terms of military effectiveness, and I think that the Israeli-Egyptian-Saudi-Dahlan plan was based on a low estimation of Hamas’ military effectiveness. In previous confrontations in the West Bank or in Lebanon in the 1980s, the Israeli military would bomb from the air for a day or two, and then advance swiftly. And that was exactly what happened in the invasion of Lebanon in the summer of 1982: now, the lack of stiff resistance back then had to do with many factors, including the lousy leadership of `Arafat (who cared about preserving his little empire more than about resistance and who is not dead enough as far as I am concerned, and may his grave deepen), the gap between people of the South and the resistance, and the financial regularization of the PLO’s fighting force, and the psychological factor that often curtailed the ability of the fighting force, all helped the Israeli plan. True, there was stiff resistance in some places: like Rashidiyyah and `Ayn Al-Hilwah but it was sporadic and disorganized. Only in West Beirut, a strong fighting force was prepared and they were ready for a confrontation with Israel, and that is why Israel never invaded the city: it only waited until the evacuation of the fighters and then supervised the butchery of the women and children in the Sabra and Shatila camps–slaughter of women and children is a classic specialty of the Zionist forces even before the establishment of the state. But Hamas performed far better than the expectations of its enemies and even of its leadership in Syria and Lebanon. Israel would have succeeded if it achieved what it wanted: to achieve an unconditional surrender of Hamas. That’s what it used to get from Fatah in the West Bank: Arafat would negotiate the terms of his surrender with third-parties and that would be that (like in Bethlehem). Yet, Hamas defiance and the launching of rockets continued to the last day–in fact it continues as I write this from what I see on the screen. Hamas leaders did not leave as Fatah leaders and fighters would (in the era under Arafat-Dahlan-Rajjub in the West Bank bantustan after Oslo), but continued in stiff resistance and defiance to the very last end. So Israel failed in 1) achieving a total surrender of Hamas; 2) in propping up the Dahlan-Abu Mazen gangs who are more discredited today than ever. Early in the campaign, Dahlan appeared on Al-Arabiyya and on Egyptian TV and was quite bombastic because he was expecting that the matter would be over in the first week. When that did not happen, he disappeared, and some say that he went back to Montenegro–his news base. 3) Israel failed in achieving a victory that it needed: a victory that would once and for all put to rest the humiliating defeat of Israel in 2006. Hamas knew that its performance was extremely influential in possibly dramatically altering the image of the Israeli soldiers in the eyes of all Arabs: fighters and lay people alike, and it knew that expectations were in building on the performance on Hizbullah in 2006; 4) Israel failed in creating a rift between the Palestinian people and Hamas, just as it failed to create a rift between the population of the South and Hizbullah, its silly SMS messages notwithstanding; 5) Israel failed in putting an end to the rockets; 6) Israel failed in smashing Hamas; 7) Israel failed in creating a new psychological climate in the Middle East: it was expected that Israel would use more massive and indiscriminate violence than before, and that it would try to “shock and awe” more than before because it wanted to kill the image of its humiliation in South Lebanon. That was not accomplished despite the high number of casualties among the civilians. 8) Israeli prime minister today bragged about intelligence successes: but that was inflated. It is true the killing of two Hamas leaders (along with tens of innocent civilians but that is how Israel “assassinates”) was a success for Israel but there are other Hamas leaders. Plus, Israel policy of assuming that an organization would die by killing the leader has always been one of the many dumb Israeli miscalculations. The most recent case was in 1992 when Israeli terrorist leaders killed Abbas Musawi (and his family) and they got…Hasan Nasrallah instead. I have no doubt that they probably now regret killing Musawi. And Hamas now operates on the assumption that all leaders may die and they have most likely structured the organization on that assumption, unlike the centrally run, say, DFLP or Fatah under `Arafat. 9) Israel failed to build on the years-old Saudi policy of mobilizing Arab public opinion against Iran, instead of Israel. That clearly failed miserably. If anything, Arab public opinion is more mobilized against Israel than any other time in memory. 10) Israel failed to sell its slaughter as a legitimate contribution to the “war on terrorism”. Clearly, the scenes of carnage offended public opinion around the world with the exception of the US and the UN embassy of Micronesia. But there are successes: if Israel was aiming to kill a very large number of women and children, that was achieved to a large measure. Very knowledgeable sources in Beirut tell me that only 5% of Hamas’ fighting abilities were damaged in this war thus far, and there will be another round no doubt. But think about Karamah battle. In Karamah: a lot of the lore was built by Arafat’s bombast and a unit of the Jordanian army fought with the Palestinian resistance. This time around, Arab and particularly Palestinian public opinion will look with admiration at the performance of Hamas during this 22 days. It is commonly estimated that some 20,000 Palestinians volunteered in the resistance movement after Karamah, and I expect a region-wide campaign of recruitment to the benefit of Hamas. Israel’s choice of Palestinian leadership (supported by Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt), i.e., Dahlan gangs, are discredited beyond repair. I mean, when I read in Saudi newspapers description of Dahlan as an Israeli stooge, you know how Palestinian opinion will regard him–and the fleeing of his men in their underwear did not help either. From 1968 to 1978, the Fatah movement transformed from a band of fighters in Jordan to an army (badly run to be sure by Arafat) with all sorts of heavy weapons. There is now a point of no-return: Arabs are no more afraid of Israeli soldiers. From that loss, Israel shall never recover and it will expedite the inevitable process of the elimination of Zionism from Palestine. The confrontation with Israel is cumulative, and this culmination is now not in the interests of Israel. Many Arabs now talk about the defeat of Israel: I rarely heard those sentiments before 2006.
Posted by As’ad at 2:20 PM

—
http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2009/01/on-balance-evaluation-of-israeli.html

Majid

Am i to assume that you believe that Israel was reacting to Hamas-Syria-Hezbulla and not simply ocntinuing a policy of terrorism and violence to subjugate the palestinians. This murder has been in planning for 18 months, as was the war on Lebanon. Is it worth it?, Ask the Israelis, not their victims. And on your way, Ask Mubarak, who along with the two Abduallas, and some others have drank the fear of Shia cool aid to a point that blinded their already thin morality.

I do not care what Asad, Mashal, or Nejad did or said at Doha. But i hope you recognize that the past thee weeks have demonstrated that either Egypt, KSA, and Jordan can not make a soverign decision when it comes to Israel, or it showed that Israel is a pupet of the three stooges as it sent its soldiers on a murder rampage to save their throwns. The latter is abviously not true, and we are left with the former as the only explanation.

I understand the bind in which egypt finds itself, but the $3 billion US and EU aid does not cover much of Egupt’s needs, unless, and the amount jordan gets is as meager. The two have much better chance avoiding the Israeli plan with a legitinate palestinian government, not a government which refused to abide by the results of election.

Robert Fisk noted that al-Arish meeting comes on the 90th anniversary of the Paris conference that started the whole tragedy. The countries present are almost the same, with the exception of the three ….., you fill the blank.

No single drop of a child, Israeli or Palestinian is worth maintaining these monarchs and presimarchs, not Assad, not Mubarak, or the two abudls. Not a single drop should be worth an electoral victory, or paving the road for yet another heriditary president, infested with the virus of corruption.

Egypt is in dire situation, Mubarak’s policies are unsustainable, and the country is heading into an abyss. And what does he do, he spends his time defending the so-called egypt leadership role of a bunch of corrupt fossils. I wonder how much will he get for the photo op with the leaders of the Colonial powers. Or perhaps he paid the cost of hosting them. Funny though, his heroism was manifested by not inviting Israel to the meeting. I say, what a victory. I wonder, was it worth it?

To All,

I think we should stop crying and start doing and preparing for a long term war , Rights are taken not given , Israel never gave the weak Arabs anything , they only left Lebanon and Gaza because it was costly and that is how we can get the Golan and the West bank.

Shlaim does not have a finance background and apparently missed Jabotinski’s ideology of ethnonational financial warfare when he was researching The Iron Wall.

Who Won the War in Gaza?

Hamas: 3 Zionists: 30

It was a hard fought game, but the Zionists caused more death and destruction.

I wonder if they’ll play again? I’m thinking Hamas wants another rematch.

Apparently, Norman agrees.

No single drop of a child, Israeli or Palestinian is worth maintaining these monarchs and presimarchs, not Assad, not Mubarak, or the two abudls.

OTW,

How did Assad’s name get into the mix. I thought he was “special”!

And what did Assad and Nejjad do all this time to help the Palestinians when they were massacred? It seems they only paid lip service to the poor Palestinians and did their utmost to prolong the suffering. I’m also curious about the so-called resistance of Hezbollah. It seems they were resisting through speeches and empty talk just like the other Arabs!!

Majid,

Has it ever occurred to you that maybe these despots don’t want to turn their countroes iinto antoher Gaza??

(It was a hard fought game, but the Zionists caused more death and destruction.)
Sick comment…Keep dancing!

Akbar said,

“Majid,
Has it ever occurred to you that maybe these despots don’t want to turn their countroes iinto antoher Gaza??”

Akbar, are you referring to the Assad exchange with the Moroccan delegate at the Doha meeting?

The Moroccan delegate ridiculed Assad for continuing to use proxy groups to conduct his wars from afar while his so-called Golan front has been quite for 40 years. Assad’s reply was very pragmatic and realistic as a matter of fact: “We will not risk destroying 180,000 Sq. Km. (area of Syria) for the sake of 1000 Sq. Km. (the area of the Golan).” I think the guy knows what he is talking about.

LOL

AP, AIG and Chris, support is on its way!

“05:41 Israel forms `army of bloggers` to combat anti-Zionist Websites (Haaretz)”

AP
Add to that list the racist regime of Israel. I did not write explicitly, but you seem to have missed my reference to “electoral victory”. This is the most dirty election campaign and all participants including their enablers should be tried for this crime.

One day, your descendents will curse you and your ideology for it will cost them and ours very very dearly.

Majid,

Don’t worry dude, I understand your hang-ups about proxy war tactics. You’ve sent your Mujahedeen to Afghanistan in the 80s to fight the Jihad akbar (not palace) against the soviets but the whole thing has backfired.

Except that here Syria is not fighting through proxy. There is an indigenous resistance movement (not like the Mujs who were shipped to Kabul under the auspices of the CIA). And Syria does nothing but support this indigenous movement. How could Syria force the people of Gaza to die for Syria? Sounds illogical no?

Livni’s press conference at the press club in Washington.

Alex, did I hear her correctly? Did she say there are arab states supporting Israeli war on Hamas because they don’t want to embolden extremist elements back home?

Who Won the War in Gaza?

It was a hard fought game, but the Zionists caused more death and destruction.

I would say
Hamas: 30 Zionists: short term 0 long term -300

Israel lost its Capo organizations influence to which it invested millions and much time and hopes.
Israel lost the support of Turkey.
Israel lost the so called “moderate Arab leaders” ability to support Israel in future.
Israel lost hundreds millions of supporters and neutrals around the world. Moderate Arabs became less moderate against Israel.
Diplomatically Israel has to show fast results with the “road map” or it is in great difficulties.

Hamas showed like Hizbollah that Israeli Attack Forces are rather poor in fighting against guerilla armies. Three weeks without any real results for Israel. Tunnels are back in business, rockets are flying, tens of thousands of new candidates as soldiers are queuing behind Hamas doors.

Hamas got international respect and most probably new “financial opportunities”.

Having only heard the IDF’s side of the story, perhaps everyone should have waited for this morning’s Qassam Brigades’ press conference, before pronouncing their final judgement and score of the war…!

The multitude of summits, conferences, and initiatives… and what actually sticks out of all that, has to also be counted into any final assesment.

This is a difficult undertaking, but perhaps not impossible. many will point to the success the US has had in defeating its autochthonous peoples, but, of course the US was willing to absorb native Americans and permit them equal rights. Israel cannot do this, which makes it hard to see a final solution.

Josh,

First, we’re Indians or Native Peoples or something but not “autochthonous”.

Second, the Contact Period with Europeans didn’t just bring human agency, it also brought non-human agency (dual-host pathogens in particular, along with pigs and cows and horses and sheep and goats, etc), and independent of the intent of the dominant classes of the Iberio-Catholic, or the Franco-Catholic, or the Anglo-Puritan and subsequent Anglo-Protestant colonial enterprises, benign or malign, we lost 9/10ths of our population to germs.

Third, these colonial enterprises had the greatest depopulative effect, via disease and via human agency, in the temperate regions of the Americas, where European food culture, cereals in particular, could be transplanted.

So, looking at the colonial and post-colonial colonies south of New France and north of the valley of Mexico for guidance on a conflict between colonizers and colonized assumes a mortality and morbidity process without an actual parallel outside of isolate populations during the contact period.

Finally, US policy in your lifetime and mine, has been to terminate the Federal-Tribal relationship, and with that, any legal status of indians to land, water, minerals, etc., until Nixon restored the peer-to-peer relationship. If you want to portray Federal Indian Policy as benign, go ahead, just bear in mind that no one who works in Federal Indian Policy holds that view.

The right to vote was imposed on us, and states didn’t allow Indian voting until after you were born. My wife’s grandfather was only allowed to vote in Maine in the sixties.

I suppose it was only a moment’s thought that lead you to write the sentences I’ve quoted, and your intent was to solve for conditions in Palestine.

Wow! A click-to-edit time-window feature for comments. That is ultra-kwel!!!

Who won the war?

What a stupid question.

Nobody wins. All sides lose.

I’m listening to Mubarak at the Kuwait summit … wow!!!

Bad actor trying to read a difficult script … he is pretending he is a genuinely nationalistic Arab leader who really cares about the Palestinian cause

Farouk Sharaa is staring at him waiting for the closed session to tell him what he thought of his acting.

But style aside, Mubarak passed a number of indirect threats and warnings to Syria and Hamas. He is reminding them that Egypt is the largest Arab country.

Bashar suggested calling the Zionist entity the “Terrorist entity”. He said “we do not hesitate to call any terrorist a terrorist, why should we shy from calling Israel what it is?”

Alex,

What difference does it make what we call Israel? You referred earlier to the “maturity” of Assad. Does maturity include attempts at conflict resolution between the Arab and Muslim (Turkey&Iran) countries?
There must be a way they can come back to a common goal, which is presenting a common front to Israel, being one partner in a potential peace initiative that Obama is hinting to; that is where maturity shows itself. Why those hard lines ( I am aware of the politics)? Can someone act to bring them closer? Those are our eastern ways…why are we acting like barbarians? Then I will believe in “maturity”.

Israel has won the battle but not the war. The tide has turned but people who do not want to see that will not see it until it is too late.

For one, those pictures of murdered children have made it much much easier to speak against Israel. I intend to take full advantage of the matter, I am having them printed and making a poster, I have already one scheduled appearance at a church gathering in a couple of weeks to speak on the matter. My children will be using them in their schools…we will see Inshallah.

Wow… I think Josh, and everyone else, will dramatically revise their assessment of the Gaza War score after this Kuwait summit (beyond Mubarak’s pathetic bravado bit)…!! The “Moderates” are very conciliatory and groveling at Hamas/Syria’s feet, I could exaggerate.

Another Wow for EBW @ #16 above… amazing blog ( http://wampum.wabanaki.net/ )… very learned, informed, astute, eloquent, and elegant. I guess I am recommending it to all…!

One day, your descendents will curse you and your ideology for it will cost them and ours very very dearly.

My “ideology” (aka “self-preservation”) will enable me and my people to to have descendents.

Then they can curse or bless me as they see fit.;)

Majid you asked:

And what did Assad and Nejjad do all this time to help the Palestinians when they were massacred?

Then you added:

Assad’s reply was very pragmatic and realistic as a matter of fact: “We will not risk destroying 180,000 Sq. Km. (area of Syria) for the sake of 1000 Sq. Km. (the area of the Golan).” I think the guy knows what he is talking about.

Majid,

You seem to have answered your own question, moreover, you seem satisfied from Assad’s reply.

I would say
Hamas: 30 Zionists: short term 0 long term -300

Sim,

So you think Hamas “won” the war? Do you think Hamas should continue fighting, stop where they are, or just wait and attack Israel at a later date?

For one, those pictures of murdered children have made it much much easier to speak against Israel. I intend to take full advantage of the matter, I am having them printed and making a poster, I have already one scheduled appearance at a church gathering in a couple of weeks to speak on the matter. My children will be using them in their schools…we will see Inshallah.

Alia,

Will you be constructing a poster of the 8000 or so missiles flying out of Hamastan into Israel, the damage they incurred and the disruption of life in Israel?

I know, it doesn’t matter. It’s just the Zionist Entity.

Mubarak is not Stupid. Asad says that he will not destroy Syria for having the Golan. But Asad is willing to destroy Egypt.
Mubarak understand the risk of the MB. He knows that impoverished Egypt will not get any support from the west, when the MB takes Egypt.
He knows that Egyptian economy will suffer big time. No foreign tourist would go to MB-Egypt for vacation.
Mubarak knows that the MB wants to destroy Egypt ( to replace it with the Islamic Umma ).
Mubarak understands that the first to be slaughtered in the newly established MB-Umma ( ex-Egypt ) would be the present Egyptians who struggle bravely to bring some bread to Egyptians. With them gone, Egypt will starve to slow death.

Before disrespecting Mubarak, Salute him. For reading the grim Egyptian future, correctly.
.

Huh… the Saudi, Egyptian, and Jordanian kings have just kissed and made up with our Bibo… how about that…!? This summit is turning out to be quite a turning point…!

What, exactly, are all of the anti-Egypt/KSA/Jordan protests really calling for? What do the Doha Summit attendees have in mind, in the way of an actual plan?

I know that we all derive endless pleasure from playing the which-is-the-top-Middle-Eastern-country game, but apart from stupid regional politics, is there really some kind of substantive alternative being offered by Syria/Iran/etc.?

Assad, Nasrallah, Ahmadinejad, etc. want the ‘modarabs’ to abrogate their treaties with Israel, withdraw the peace initiative, and devote themselves fully to resistance.

Ok, I’m listening… And then what?

Haven’t got that far? I thought not.

We like to pat ourselves on the back and feel incredibly self-righteous about the fact that the modarabs would never actually follow through on our noble suggestion because they are stooges, puppets, etc. Just for the sake of argument, let’s consider another alternative: the modarabs are not following Assad’s “hardline” approach because it represents a complete strategic dead end, both for the regimes themselves as well as for the Palestinians.

It is wonderfully therapeutic to imagine a day where Egypt and Jordan cut their diplomatic ties, and the OPEC states issue a warning to the world that they intend to use the oil weapon unless an immediate solution is found. But has anyone tried to imagine what would happen on the following day? What would the solution consist of? What would we be demanding? A two-state result? A one-state result? How would we decide this? Who would represent the Palestinians? What about the refugees and all of the thorny issues of the right of return versus compensation, etc? A million questions bubble to the surface, questions that will not be answered by the bravado of a thrown gauntlet.

The resistance option is not much of an option until it can address these questions. Otherwise, it is just as improvisatory, reckless, and short-sighted as the ‘containment’ option pursued by the other side.

My two cents.

Cheeky use of the phrase “final solution” in the blog post…

QN,
Perhaps the idea of the “resistance camp” is to make these “million questions” the other side’s problem… they can be creative enough when they have to… if they are denied the “easy” unjust, vicious, and hopelessly barbaric solution they are pursuing… and which the world had once sworn “never again”…!

http://wampum.wabanaki.net/
Is great blog, neat, documentary and bold. I wished for Syrian Bloggers to get to this level, but every time they reach higher level in number and quality, the authority push them back years by blocking.
This blog: http://www.almarfaa.net/
Has contributed greatly to the recent war in Gaza, have a look at it. He is productive, smart, has initiative and great organizer. But, he has independent views from authorities in Syria.
That’s no good, what they did, they blocked his blog: http://www.almarfaa.net/?p=428
The real war of Gaza was through the domination of Media and blog sphere. There was over 250 post each day from http://www.israelforum.com/blog_archives.php , while Syrian bloggers did not reach 30 a day.
Which bring back the words used above, Maturity and Barbarians.
I wonder who think that despotic mind and behavior can anyone win anything?

A.P.,

You are equating the “disruption of life of civilians” with the murder of children and are clueless enough to utter such horrible comparisons in front of others. Shame on you and on the people you represent!

Dear EBW – Many thanks for you critique and explanation of US-Indian policy. You are correct that I use the Native American experience as a gloss for Palestine. Sorry it was so ham fisted.

Of course, you are right that the comparison between Palestinians and Native Americans does not work because of the great difference in the balance of power and disproportionate number of European settlers.

All the same, the fact that Native Americans have the vote – even though imposed and in an effort to turn Indians into Americans and relieve them of “their legal status to land, water, minerals, etc.,” Indians can find success and material advancement for their children within a US context. This is something that Palestinians in the occupied territories cannot do. It means that Palestinian suffering will continue from one generation to the next without foreseeable end. I am sorry if it seemed that I wanted to “portray Federal Indian Policy as benign.” It has been anything but benign.

Tom S.. Yes, the use of final solution at the end of my post was cheeky.

Alia states:

You are equating the “disruption of life of civilians” with the murder of children and are clueless enough to utter such horrible comparisons in front of others. Shame on you and on the people you represent!

Alia,

There is no equating, and there is no comparing. The Palestinians suffered a great deal more than the Israelis.

That being said, I hope Hamas will not provoke the Israelis into further fighting. Israelis will NOT tolerate another 8000 missiles being fired into Israel from Gaza.

Will the Israelis tolerate 10, 100, 1000? I really don’t know. We can ask this question to the other 170 countries that make up the UN and get an average if that helps you.

You know Akbar, despite all your bias, it’s a courageous move on your part to admit that the palestinians are suffering more than the israelis. I’ve always known that deep down you’re not a bad person.

and no, that wasn’t sarcasm.

Offended,

If it matters to you, the Palestinians have ALWAYS suffered more than the Israelis. I am sorry they suffer.

That being said (TBS), I fault the Palestinians and their Arab cheerleaders for “the politics of martyrdom”.

Actually, I have visions where Arab and Jew can work together to make the ME an economic powerhouse that could surpass China and everyone else.

However, where this is a dream, the road to get there is really impossible with the terror-supporting regimes and their supporters.

For example, a few weeks ago a question was asked if Syria was a help or a hindrance with respect to ME peace. (I believe this question was asked when Chris started posting here.) As I recall, both Chris and I termed Syria to be an “instigator” of terror, not a supporter of peace. This was evident at Doha.

Offended,

Thank you for the kind words despite our differences of opinion on the conflict. I have an emotional stake too, and so I don’t promise to be the perfect gentleman.

Bleak assessment of the Gaza war by Israeli officials:
half the tunnels were destroyed… they can rebuild them easily..
Hamas under shock but well alive ..
” If this is victory so damned the victorious”, writes Ofer Shelah dans Maariv…

Opération “Plomb durci” : quelle “victoire” pour Israël ?
LE MONDE | 19.01.09 | 09h37 • Mis à jour le 19.01.09 | 09h37

‘opération Plomb durci a atteint ses objectifs et même au-delà”, a assuré le premier ministre israélien, Ehoud Olmert après l’annonce d’un cessez-le-feu israélien unilatéral. Le quotidien populaire Maariv a titré en “une”, sur la “Victoire”. Les tankistes de Tsahal, juchés sur leurs Merkava ont fait le “V” de la victoire en quittant leurs positions avancées. Mais le cessez-le-feu israélien était à peine entré en vigueur que des roquettes tombaient sur Israël, avant la trêve du Hamas.

Youval Diskin, chef du Shin Bet (sécurité intérieure), a indiqué que “le Hamas pourra reconstruire les tunnels en quelques mois et recommencer à faire de la contrebande d’armes”. Et l’armée estime que seulement la moitié d’entre eux (environ cinq cents) a été détruite. “Nous n’avons rien obtenu des objectifs annoncés lors du déclenchement de l’opération lancée le 27 décembre”, a aussitôt proclamé le numéro deux du Likoud, Silvan Shalom, un parti qui a annoncé son hostilité à la décision unilatérale de mettre fin aux combats.

Nombreux sont ceux qui ont déjà reproché au gouvernement de n’avoir pas pu libérer le caporal Gilad Shalit, séquestré depuis le 25 juin 2006 dans la bande de Gaza. Comme l’a fait remarquer Nahum Barnea, éditorialiste d’Yediot Ahronoth : “Le consensus national qui a prévalu en Israël pendant vingt-deux jours est mort le soir du cessez-le-feu.”

A quoi donc a servi l’opération “Plomb durci” si, au bout du compte, aucun des objectifs recherchés n’a été accompli et si, en plus, le prix payé par l’Etat juif sera beaucoup plus élevé qu’il ne l’imagine en terme d’image ? Outre le Vénézuela et la Bolivie, la Mauritanie a décidé de suspendre leurs relations diplomatiques. Le Qatar va fermer le bureau commercial israélien à Doha. Bachar Al-Assad, le président syrien, a affirmé qu’un plan de paix saoudien adopté par les vingt-deux Etats arabes, en mars 2002, à Beyrouth était désormais caduc. La Turquie, dont le premier ministre Racep Tayyip Erdogan, a tenu des propos très durs vis-à-vis d’Israël, a décidé de ne plus jouer les bons offices dans les pourparlers avec la Syrie.

LE HAMAS ÉBRANLÉ, MAIS TOUJOURS BIEN VIVANT

Mahmoud Abbas, président de l’Autorité palestinienne et partenaire de négociations d’Israël, a été considérablement affaibli par cette guerre meurtrière et destructrice qui, si elle a amoindri les capacités militaires des islamistes, n’a pas permis d’en éliminer les cadres, à part deux d’entre eux. Si les chiffres de 15 000 à 20 000 combattants sont exacts, 500 à 600 d’entre eux auraient péri dans les combats, le reste étant constitué par des victimes civiles. La plupart étaient retranchés au cœur des villes, là où Tsahal ne s’est pas vraiment aventuré.

Si le Hamas a été ébranlé par cette offensive, le mouvement de la résistance islamique est toujours bien vivant. Sa capacité de résistance en fait, plus que jamais, une organisation incontournable, même si les Israéliens et le monde occidental refusent toujours de parler avec ses dirigeants. En saluant le cessez-le-feu israélien par une salve de roquettes avant d’appeler par la suite à une trêve d’une semaine pour faciliter l’acheminement de l’aide humanitaire et la poursuite de négociations pour aboutir à une solution concertée pour la réouverture des points de passage, le Hamas a d’ailleurs voulu signifier qu’il ne pouvait y avoir de solution durable à Gaza sans lui et que la fin du blocus du territoire restait pour lui une priorité.

N’en déplaise à Ehoud Olmert, qui a affirmé que “la force du Hamas allait décroître”, ces trois semaines de guerre risquent d’accroître son audience au sein de la population palestinienne, même si beaucoup de commentateurs estiment qu’il a commis une grossière erreur en ne reconduisant pas la trêve qui prévalait depuis juin, le 19 décembre 2008.

M. Olmert se dit fier d’avoir restauré la capacité de dissuasion de Tsahal après les manquements révélés par la deuxième guerre du Liban de l’été 2006. Mais Ahmad Aboul Gheit, ministre égyptien des affaires étrangères, critiquant le 17 janvier “l’intransigeance israélienne”, a dénoncé pour sa part “un pays ivre de puissance et de violence”.

M. Olmert a eu beau s’ingénier à dire “qu’Israël avait démontré une grande sensibilité en exerçant sa force de manière à éviter, autant que possible, de toucher les victimes civiles non impliquées dans la terreur”. L’usage de canon de char et de l’artillerie lourde sur des zones surpeuplées, a contredit cette affirmation. “Israël, qui voulait être une lumière pour les nations, est aujourd’hui fière d’avoir adopté l’échelle de valeurs de Vladimir Poutine. Si c’est cela la victoire, malheur aux vainqueurs”, écrit Ofer Shelah dans Maariv.