On Gaza, healthcare and peace

Here's Mona Ghussein from Palestine on the new series of the English Hour on Arab News Network satellite TV. I was fairly pleased with the broadcast when I did it, though you may think differently. Let me know:

Talking Paris, Charlie and the Salafists

There is much to be said about the horrifying events of the past few days. The Next Century Foundation of which I am Secretary General has already issued a strong statement. First I would like to say something of another cartoonists who has touched my world who has been assassinated, then of how the security services and others deal with extremism, and then of the evolution of Muslim fanaticism now that ISIS is centre stage.

Naji al Ali, Charlie Hebdo and the rest

My late father was a close friend of the Palestinian cartoonist Naji al Ali who was assassinated by Mossad in London back in 1987. The killing devastated my father. Ironically, I gave framed prints of his cartoons to each of my three children this Christmas. This is a typical Naji al Ali cartoon; it is one that suggests even Christ would be angered by the plight of the Palestinians:

And back then he was killed because he was hated by some. And now we have all these cartoonists amongst those who have just been killed in Paris:

Cabu (Jean Cabut), 76;
Charb (Stéphane Charbonnier), 47, the Editor and a strong campaigner against racism;
Philippe Honoré, 74;
Tignous (Bernard Verlhac), 57;
Georges Wolinski, 80, a distinguished French Jewish cartoonist and a recipient of the Legion of Honour.

For what? What did they do that was so offensive? This was what merited all that killing:

"100 lashes if you don't die of laughter"

This was a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed, as were others published at the time. Certainly it may be offensive to some and may arguably be satire in poor taste. But does it merit murder?

Dealing with extremism

What is extraordinary is the degree of networking between these killers. Here our prison system has much to answer for. As a former prison visitor myself I am much concerned by the way we segregate our prisons keeping minority groups together presumably for convenience. Extremists should not be allowed to mix with other prisoners. Our own Abu Hamza from Finsbury Park Mosque taught the terrorist Djamel Beghal who did time in prison with Cherif Kouachi who with his older brother Said did most of the killing. The same Djamel Beghal whom Hyat Boumeddiene went to visit in the south of France for crossbow training. The system failed us here. Hyat Boumeddiene was of course the wife and co-conspirator of Ahmedi Coulibaly, the third terrorist, the one who targeted the Jewish supermarket.
And there's another failing surely: Cherif Kouachi traveled to Yemen in 2011 to meet the Arab-American terrorist leader Anwar al Awlaki (subsequently himself assassinated in a drone strike).
Back in 2010 Awlaki wrote in the terrorist magazine, "Inspire" to say in regard to the Charlie Ebdo cartoons: "It is better to support the Prophet by attacking those that slander him than it is to travel to the land of Jihad."
This is the same Anwar al Awlaki who exchanged 18 e-mails with Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan back in 2009 before he killed 13 and injured 30. E-mails monitored by the security services; but the truth is that the security services are busy garnering so much information that they can never analyse the data they acquire. They need to focus instead of trawling everything.
Anwar Awlaki was dangerous indeed. He was the ideologue that inspired the impressionable underpants bomber Abdulmuttallab also in 2009.
We need to get better systems in place to deal with extremism.

The Evolution of Muslim Fanaticism

Cherif Boumeddiene may have been loyal to the late Anwar al Awlaki, an al-Qa'ida leader (Awlaki was after all his funder) but Ahmedi Coulibaly and his wife Hyat were loyal to Islamic State. Islamic State or ISIS (Daesh in Arabic) represents a new level of fanaticism. ISIS has the motto "Pure Mohammadan Islam". A curiosity in itself this motto because as a rule Muslims resent the word "Mohammadan". ISIS regard al-Qa'ida as ideologically muddled. They follow the extreme puritan teachings of Saudi ideologue, the late Youssef al-Ayyeri. He rejected democracy which he regarded as a decadent infidel ideology. He rejected "modernism" and materialism and the emergence of states based on ethnic identities. Similarly he rejected nationalism which he regarded as divisive, and he rejected both socialism and communism. He also rejected traditional Islamic tolerance for Christians and Jews, the "People of the Book". His view was that they were only tolerated by the Prophet as a matter of convenience and what is now needed is "cleansing" of other religions from the world. These are "heathen ideologies".
ISIS develops Youssef al-Ayyeri's ideas and takes them still further. They reject diluted forms of Islam that call Islam a "religion of peace". They regard the world as divided between Dar al Islam (the house of Islam) and Dar al Harb (the House of War). There can never be peace between Islam and that which is not Islam.
The only form of government acceptable in "pure Mohammedan Islam" is the "Caliphate" and the only law is sharia law.

Conclusions

We have seen two approaches to Western tolerance / intolerance of Islam. One is the Franco-American approach of "integrationalism" and the other is the Anglo-European approach of "multiculturalism". If success is measured in terms of mere numbers recruited to ISIS then integrationalism is more successful. France may be suffering the brunt of this but there are comparatively few French recruits to ISIS - comparatively few per capita when compared to nations like Britain.

But we miss the point. This has all happened before. We have a subculture that feels marginalised. So did those subject to the Tsars and the consequence was communism. So did the Germans post World War One and the consequence was Nazism. The modern Muslim in much of the Sunni Arab World feels marginalised and the consequence is ISIS.

We need to think hard about the policies we adopt in the Middle East. In Libya today we are now backing General Haftar against the alleged Islamists and he is a Gaddafi clone. In Iraq the Shiite led government still imposes the anti-Sunni deBaathification laws that we gave them. And our bombing campaign to contain ISIS all too often targets civilian areas. You think I am talking without personal knowledge? My good friend Ambassador Hambley and myself were attacked by ISIS an hour out of Kirkuk earlier in 2014 and wouldn't have escaped with our lives but for the courageous fight put up by the boys from the Iraq Army who were escorting us. I have two children living and working in Iraq at present. Here is my daughter, Loveday's, take on the liberation of  Jurf al-Sakhar if you would like the viewpoint of a Cornish girl. Read it and weep. We are to defeat ISIS this way? We need wiser heads in charge of Western policies than we have at present - or we may yet pay a terrible price.

But there is a deeper warning in all this. If you ever saw the Bond movie "Skyfall" this was part of M's speech: "Our enemies are no longer known to us. They do not exist on a map, they aren't nations. They are individuals. And look around you - who do you fear? Can you see a face, a uniform, a flag? No, our world is not more transparent now, it's more opaque!"

But the terrible truth is our enemies are visible - and I suspect we are the ones who create them. We ourselves must deal better with our subcultures. We live in a society in which the gulf between rich and poor is increasing and as a consequence, in an era of food banks and spiraling rents, people are being marginalised. And all too often, as in the Middle East so in the West, the marginalised are from the religious and ethnic minorities.

Remembering Gaza

This interview is with Dr Imad Karam of Initiatives for Change, the film maker from Gaza. It was recorded before the recent Gaza war but is still relevant:

To support the Next Century Foundation's appeal for those families that have lost their breadwinner click on this button:

Syria's Chemical Weapons

A number of stories have been coming out of Syria in the past 24 hours. Some are correct. Some have been misleading. With some reluctance we feel we should point this out. The latest press coverage states:

1. There has been a chemical weapons attack on the Damascus suburbs of Adra and Douma: This report is at best misleading.
2. An airbase in Northern Syria has been taken by rebel forces: The airbase has been taken. It has been besieged since December and was no longer functioning as an airbase (nor has it been for some time) but the base was still held by Assad's forces and has now fallen to the rebels though there are still pockets of resistance by government troops who may or may not regroup (surrender is of course not an option in this civil war since - under most circumstances - both sides kill all prisoners).
3. Rebel forces have pushed into the Alawite heartland near the Al Assad home village of Qardaha. This report appears to be true. It is a mountainous region and four villages appear to have been taken but it is unlikely they will be held. None the less the symbolism this push represents is powerful.
4. Bashar al-Assad has adopted a more hardline approach stating, “No solution can be reached with terror except by striking it with an iron fist,” and placing war before peace.

The chemical weapons story is of gravest concern because this is ground that has been covered before. The NCF issued a report on the use of chemical weapons in Syria on 16th June. For the record we append it to this e-mail. In that report we made a commitment to provide you with a record of all "Credible chemical weapons attacks". We have not fulfilled this promise because we were unable to provide sufficient evidence. We stopped work because we were only able to identify 29 possible deaths from chemical weapons (25 of which were deaths of civilians who were presumably government sympathiser in so much as they lived in a government held area) which simply did not gell with press reports. The table we compiled is below. Our researcher on this project stated "this (29) does not seem a very reliable figure as I have seen footage of many people suffering from vomiting/difficulties breathing but often no precise figure for the number of dead could be found":

Dec 23rd 2012	Homs	http://security.blogs.cnn.com/2013/01/16/u-s-syria-didnt-use-chemical-weapons-in-homs-incident/
March 19th 2013	Aleppo	http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/19/us-syria-crisis-chemical-idUSBRE92I0A220130319
Apr 13th 2013		http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/world/middleeast/article3738391.ece
	Sheikh Maqsud (Aleppo)	https://yallasouriya.wordpress.com/2013/04/13/syria-syria-pictures-of-children-casualties-of-chemical-shelling-in-sheikh-maqsud-amc/
	Damascus	http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/27/us-syria-chemicalweapons-idUSBRE94Q05720130527
April 29th 2013	Saraqeb, Idlib	http://brown-moses.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/links-between-alleged-chemical-attacks.html
May 14th 2013	Qasr Abu Samra	http://www.newstrackindia.com/information/locations/Syria/2244016-city-qasr-abou-samra.htm
May 23rd	Adra	http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-0xWF2Hou8
May 27th 2013	Jobar, Damascus	http://www.lemonde.fr/proche-orient/article/2013/05/27/syrie-le-monde-temoin-d-attaques-toxiques_3417225_3218.html
May 29th 2013	Unspecified	http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/may/29/syria-chemical-weapons-use-britain-allegations
	Saraqeb, Idlib	http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_05_16/In-Syria-has-been-found-evidence-apparently-corroborating-reports-of-a-chemical-attack-media/
	Saraqeb, Idlib	http://brown-moses.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/links-between-alleged-chemical-attacks.html

 

 

In the above table only one source per incident (where possible) has been listed but it should be stressed that we did look at all available sources.

 

What has proved interesting is that in a number of alleged chemical weapons attacks there is clear evidence of riot control gas canisters present as with the attack in Sheikh Maqsud, Aleppo, on April 13th. There have been a number of such instances of the abuse of riot control gas by government forces. Tear gas in a confined space often proves fatal, especially to children. Note the pictures / video of the remains of canisters on this link. Now compare this to the picture below of the standard tear gas canister used in Egypt today (please forgive the highlighting of the made in USA strapline - we are not trying to make a political point - it was simply the best image of this type of canister available on the internet):

 

 

Syria's President Assad has now agreed to UN chemical weapons inspections. We can but hope that the weapons inspectors prove more scrupulous than their predecessors in Iraq. The latest reports of chemical weapons use are probably the most questionable yet. We hesitate to say that the footage has been fabricated in an amateur fashion. We leave you to draw your own conclusions. Clearly had it been fabricated a great deal of cooperation would have been required - but are we viewing the aftermath of the use of riot control gas as so often seems to be the case in Syria - or is this indeed an instance of the use of chemical weapons?The following is our earlier chemical weapons report:

 

THE 16th JUNE REPORT ON CHEMICAL WEAPONS FOLLOWS:

 

The Syrian Government’s use of Chemical Weapons

From the NCF Secretary General:

Chemical weapons have been around a long time. The first to use chemical weapons in the Middle East were the British who employed them in the Second Battle of Gaza against the Turks in 1917. Since then they have been used repeatedly, most notably by Saddam Hussein against the Iranians from 1983 to 1988 and the Kurds from 1987 to 1988.

That the Syrian government has chemical weapons is without question. Their existence has been confirmed by the Syrians in oblique statements, most notably by onetime Syrian spokesman Jihad Makdissi who apparently lost his job over the remark.

Syria’s main chemical weapons base, though there are others nearby, was at the Safira base just to the East of Aleppo.

The Free Syrian Army destroyed the Safira base on 29^th November 2012. The artillery base was utterly demolished but the nearby air defence base was fought over for some time. Safira was a sprawling military complex. However, the Islamist group Al Nusra joined the fight and by mid February 2013 the entire town had fallen into rebel hands.

There were allegations that the Syrian Government had used chemical weapons in Homs on December 23^rd but the USA claims that investigation seemed to have proved fairly conclusively that this incident had in fact been misuse of riot control gas though the Syrian government has been curiously reluctant to allow further investigation by the UN in this instance (they have subsequently revised their position and the UN will now go in). Contrast this, however, with a leaked US cable that seems to imply that chemical weapons were indeed used in Homs (unless this earlier report is an example of bias by an over enthusiastic diplomat - you can make your own mind up from the limited information available - we can but hope that the forthcoming UN investigation will be credible). Subsequently allegations that chemical weapons were being used in Syria emerged from anonymous British secret service sources. Specifically the British claimed that there was a chemical attack in Darraya near Damascus in April. There is indeed clear evidence of fighting including government bombing but no substantiated evidence of chemical weapons use in this instance. However, there is clear evidenced of the use of a chemical attack in the same area as recorded on 24^th March by French reporters. There were at least two fatalities and though it had initially seemed possible this was a severe tear gas attack, samples brought back from the area by French reporters proved sarin nerve gas had been used. There was also a report of chemical weapons use in Damascus on April 13^th but this may indeed have been tear gas. In the same month there was an attack in Saraqib near Idlib on April 29th. Here at last there is credible video evidence, which appears to show at least four people severely injured by chemical attack (which later analysis proved to be sarin).

Subsequent to which the United States has determined that sarin was used in:

1.       A March 19 attack on the Aleppo suburb of Khan al-Assal. This attack hit a government controlled area (a point which the rebel commander acknowledged at the time). The Syrian government said the attack killed 25.

2.        And in an April 13 attack on a rebel held neighbourhood of Shaykh Maqsud in Aleppo. This was an isolated incident that appeared to affect a single house. Video evidence seems to show four dead including a baby and twice that number injured in what is clearly a chemical weapons attack of some kind.

3.       Susan Rice, US ambassador to the UN, also said unspecified chemicals, possibly including chemical warfare agents, were used May 14 in an attack on Qasr Abu Samrah. The NCF has been unable to find any evidence to substantiate this claim. The absence of evidence is interesting, because in Syria there are an abundance of citizen journalists who would normally substantiate such a claim.

4.        And in a May 23 attack on Adra. Here there is video evidence of four people in grave difficulty from what may be a chemical weapons attack. There is no video evidence of any deaths.

The next incident we have to report on the chemical weapons front is extraordinary. On 29 May seven members of Al Nusra were arrested by the Turkish authorities near Adana in possession of two kilos of sarin nerve gas. The Turkish authorities claimed that the Al Nusra members were planning an attack in Adana on 30 May, presumably to implicate the Syrian government and draw the Turks into the Syrian war. Subsequently the Turkish authorities switched their ground and denied that the chemical agent found was Sarin but refused to say what it in fact was.

What then, overall, is the probable truth? Clearly the Syrian government has regularly and repeatedly misused riot control gas. Clearly the rebel Al Nusra front group has supplies of Sarin gas. Clearly there was a significant attack against civilians in a government controlled area on March 19^th. Clearly there were some smaller chemical weapons attacks or incidents affecting civilians in rebel held areas. There appear to have been up to 40 chemical weapons related deaths in total in Syria to this point in time, culpability for which remains unproven.

The US government have proved unable to provide evidence to support the claim by US Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes that between 100 and 150 have died from chemical attacks at the hands of the Syrian government.

The NCF team will commit to preparing a record of all credible reports of chemical weapons attacks. This will be an ongoing investigation to be undertaken along with our existing reports into Syrian war casualties.

All of this does however highlight one issue. There is an acute need to promote the Chemical Weapons Convention in the Middle East today.  The are only eight countries in the whole world which have either not signed and / or not ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention. They are:

Angola

Egypt

Israel

Myanmar

North Korea

Somalia

South Sudan

Syria

They should all be brought onboard urgently.

And if we are to use alleged use of chemical weapons by the Syrian Government as an excuse for overt weapons supply, we should be careful.

A new Sunni-Shi’a war far more serious than the one we had in 1979 is looming. If we are to open the floodgates for weapons to be channelled to rebels inside Syria, it may accelerate the fall of the Assad government but at what cost? What will be the imminent danger of that move for the security of the region? Will Jihadists then wage a war against other regional states?  We should safeguard, monitor and control the use of these weapons. It is by no means easy to ensure that sophisticated weapons do not fall into the hands of Al Nusra.

It is worth reminding ourselves that the Al Nusra Front is allied to Al Qaida. That this group has sarin gas in its possession has to be a concern. It is no coincidence that there have been announcements that tests are to be carried out this month to see what the effects might be if sarin gas were released on the London Underground.  

The Death of the Two-State Solution?

The following notes are from my son, Samuel Morris, currently in Gaza on behalf of the NCF. Sam has been travelling in Israel and Palestine for much of the past month and these are his observations.

 

2013 has been touted by many as the year to solve the Israeli-Palestinian issue. The combination of a new American administration and the apparent surprise win by the centrist parties in the Israeli elections, meant that some thought the stars had aligned and a solution, or the beginning of one, might be on the cards. However three months into the year things do not look quite as positive.

The way that the elections were represented as a centre left success was flawed. Yes, Yesh Atid and Yair Lapid were big winners but whatever the outcome of the coalition talks, the new government will still be right of centre. The only difference will be the political make-up of the coalition, not policy. The shape of the the coalition ultimately doesn't matter. The issues that will be argued over are the draft for military service, the relationship between the secular and the orthodox and impending budget cuts - not the Palestinians.

The shift to the centre, politically, has only really involved a handful seats. The right-bloc may have got smaller but it has got harder, especially in relation to the settlements issue. An interesting footnote however is that this election may have signalled the end of the Russian voting bloc in Israel. Netanyahu made a mistake by joining with Yisrael Beitinu and creating a heavily right-wing list. However, Netanyahu was still the winner and is still in the driving seat. It was Likud as a party that took the hit.

This new voting shift reveals a new trend: The demise of the old elites within Israel. The big names from the secular Ashkenazi political establishment have been overtaken by the rise of a new elite. Bennett and Lapid are both examples of this trend. Young and modern, they represent these new elites of the Israeli right and centre.

 

Though the Israeli electorate is concerned with Israel's international image and with its isolation from the international community, Palestine itself was not the issue in this election. The Israeli electorate had other things on their mind. Ultimately, the unprecedented social movements that Israel has witnessed over the last couple of years were translated into votes at the ballot boxes.

Bringing Livni into the coalition is seen as a message from the prime minister to US President Barack Obama that Israel is serious about the peace process. Especially with Obama soon to make his first appearance in Israel. Livni is likely to play a role similar to that of outgoing Defence Minister Ehud Barak in smoothing relations between Netanyahu and Obama. Livni's presence in the coalition is a coup for Netanyahu; now he can go on to form a right wing coalition while appeasing the Americans with the hollow olive branch of Livni to deal with the Palestinians. If Netanyahu can overcome the bad blood between himself and Bennet, then he will be able to form a coalition. Bennet and Lapid have reservations about joining a coalition with the Haredi parties. Both want to pass laws changing the status of the ultra-orthodox in Israel, something that would be impossible in a coalition with the Haredim. The strength of the Lapid-Bennet alliance may force Netanyahu to exclude Shas and the Haredim. The negotiations have become a staring contest. Who will blink first? Whatever the outcome, this makes bad reading for anyone who hoped 2013 would be the year for a break though in finding an achievable Middle East peace process.

There may be a genuine desire to reinstate 'the peace process', but in reality this means nothing. The resumption of the peace process means the resumption of the status quo not a step forward  on the road to peace. Bilateral peace process negotiations are dead in the water whether Livni believes in them or not, and may be more harmful than no negotiations at all. Both Iran and the key regional issues in regard to Syria and Egypt rank higher on Israel's to-do-list than Palestine. However, if a reasonable deal was placed on the table, the majority of the Israeli public would accept it. The issue is that there is no one on the Israeli side to initiate such a deal and no Palestinian to accept it. Time is not on the side of the Palestinians. The policy of Israel toward Palestine is one of keep as much as you can for as long as you can. Ultimately, the concept of a two state solution is slowly slipping away. The only way that this can be changed is by the involvement of the international community. 

There is now more security in Israel, with fewer attacks and a high level security apparatus now in play. For the first time since 1973 there have been no Israeli deaths in the West Bank or Jerusalem. The limitation of Palestinian control to a handful of Palestinian Authority "islands" in the West Bank is seen as a better situation than handing over full authority.  There is a view that withdrawal from territory creates conflict. The examples of Gaza and South Lebanon are often cited as reasons not to withdraw from further areas. The political will to provide the Palestinians with a state is currently very weak. Security is the word that has dominated Israeli politics in recent years, not peace. However this ignores the fact that peace not only brings security, but stability. 

The only way for Israeli politicians to feel the need to step into meaningful negotiations is if they have something significant to gain. The Abdullah Plan was a missed opportunity. It showed that the Arab states were willing to engage meaningfully with Israel, and would have provided the infective Arab League with a purpose. If it had been built upon, instead of being flatly rejected, the current situation could have been more positive. With the Palestinians third on priority list for the Israeli political elite, after Iran and Syria, a comprehensive peace plan is the only way forward. It may be the only framework within which to resurrect the dying concept of a two state solution, as it would provide Israel with considerable trade and security benefits at a time when Israel has major concerns over the changing face of the Middle East. 

It is still uncertain how the escalation of Palestinian protests over the past few days will affect any ongoing negotiations to establish a governing coalition in Israel. There are worrying signs that the West Bank and Gaza are on the verge of a third intifada, and these signs have been there for a while. With the current state of Israeli-Palestinian relations, the lack of any political solution and Israel's policy of settlement expansion in the West Bank, a third intifada seems sadly inevitable, if things continue as they are. All this tinder box needs is a spark. Whether the recent death of Palestinian detainee Arafat Jaradat will provide that spark, has yet to be seen.

HAPPY CHRISTMAS

Christmas is far from over. The feast lasts right through Twelfth Night. That is up ‘till and including the Epiphany feast of the Three Wise Men on 6^th January by my reckoning.

One of the Churches in Homs, Syria

Moments of Sadness:

For me the worst side of the past year has been the war in Syria. So sad to see our British government just pouring petrol on that fire. To what purpose? We back the Salafist factions in a bloody civil war that will last, at an absolute minimum, a further two years and probably much longer. We undermine UN attempts at a negotiated settlement that would speedily see the back of Assad and by so doing we force the Christians (10% of Syria’s population) and Alawites (15% of Syria’s population) to fight to the death (by giving them no ownership of any part of the post Assad body politic in this sectarian conflict).

Meanwhile, casualty figures remain high; however on the plus side the winter in Syria will drastically lessen the level of conflict in the bitter cold as people concentrate on survival. None the less, there were 1,155 civilians killed in the past week, plus 343 rebel fighters killed, and plus 362 government forces (army and police) were killed. Most weeks the death toll is similar.

Moments of Gladness:

For me one of the best parts of the past year was standing in the election for Police and Crime Commissioner. Of course I lost but it became an informed campaign towards the end and proved very worthwhile. By the way, one strong argument AGAINST the widespread encouragement of postal voting was that press coverage only gathered pace after the closing date for postal voting. Another clear impression I was left with was the growing importance of social media. It took three of us (myself, my sister and my buddy Mark) to field the hundreds of e-mails each day on issues as disparate as drugs, wildlife crime and privatisation. What did strike me though, was that to get a real take on these complex issues, you still need to go out and meet people. Reading the press or e-mails is all well and good but you only get an in depth feeling for what people are thinking by listening to them. And the good old public meeting, even though in some of them only one or two actually turn up, was the best way of gauging how people felt.

And Finally:

I wanted some sort of maxim, a kind of New Year’s resolution for 2013. I was thinking of something I once wrote for my son and daughter-in-law which went, “Live without fear; Love without sorrow; Laugh at the past; Take hold of tomorrow.” But it didn’t seem quite right. What seemed right was the maxim, “Live for the moment”. It seems the best approach – just for now. But with the old motto, "Wisely if Sincerely" (sapienter si sincere) as a rider.

I wrote a Christmas poem this year. It goes:

Though there was someone who built the mountains tall,

And there is someone who paints the forests green,

An instigator who makes the oceans roll,

A known-unknown God, the only seen-unseen;

There is still Christmas to bring Him down to earth,

A great crescendo to roll the old year out,

And should the darkness allow the devil in,

There’s baby Jesus to turn things round about.

For there’s tomorrow to build a brighter dawn,

Another New Year around the corner yet,

And should the past seem battered, bruised and torn,

The next year’s sunrise is a far brighter bet.

For there’s an angel stood here for you and me,

To keep us laughing when days are dark and grey,

And keep us happy when nights grow cold and long,

And shape the sunshine straight out of broken clay.

Turning to Gaza

Now that the elections are over, I return to my day job. I will keep writing from time to time but some of the topics covered will relate to the Middle East and other issues unrelated to the South West. 

We spoke to friends in Tel Aviv and in Gaza today. The ceasefire continues to hold. Their perspectives are:

TEL AVIV: It's been challenging because of the rockets. Four times the alarm sounded when I was driving and we had to get out of our cars and lie flat on the highway. You can't live like that. Enough is enough is enough is enough. Let's hope the quiet will remain for a few years.

GAZA: In Khan Younis yesterday one man was killed and 19 injured. They were Palestinian farmers trying to return to the border area and Israel opened fire. Hamas said this was the first violation of the cease fire. But Hamas needs the cease fire. They will want to keep things calm - at least until after the Israeli election (22nd January 2013 to elect the 19th Knesset).

BACKGROUND:

The ceasefire was announced on 21^st November in Cairo by Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr and US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton. The ceasefire took effect at 19:00 GMT (9pm local time). The announcement finally came after 8 days of bloodshed which left over 140 Palestinians and 5 Israelis dead. Just prior to the ceasefire taking effect, there was a brief shower of rocket fire and air strikes from both sides. 

Details of the Egyptian brokered Ceasefire Deal

1. Israel must end all land, air and sea hostilities on Gaza. This includes incursions and targeting individuals.
2. All Palestinian factions in Gaza to end all hostilities against Israel, including rocket and border attacks.
3. Following a 24 hour cooling-off period after the start of the ceasefire, talks must begin on opening crossings into Gaza and allowing the free movement of goods and people.
4. Both sides are to assure Egypt that they will abide by the ceasefire deal and to follow up on any reports if there have been any breach of the deal. 

An interesting footnote or two:

1. It would seem that according to sources in Israel, Hamas and Israel have negotiated face to face on this deal (a first).
2. There is a report that Israel was persuaded to accept the ceasefire because of a US promise to station troops in Sinai (and thus intercept Hamas arms supplies by Bedouin smugglers). However the source is notoriously unreliable.
3. There are those that suggest this is a golden opportunity to bring rapprochement between Fatah and Hamas (see below) . . .

Ambassador Marc Ginsberg, a former US Ambassador to Morocco, writes in his weekly column in "The Huffington Post" that now is the time for the US to pressure Hamas to bury its hatchet with Fateh and to finally acknowledge Israel's right to exist, if a Middle East Peace Process is to be restarted.

He suggests that President Obama should use Bill Clinton as his special envoy -- both to ensure that the current Gaza/Israel ceasefire doesn't collapse and to forestall Iran from taking further advantage of the situation.

Ambassador Ginsburg overstates the role and influence of Iran in all of this, aside from the missiles it has sent to both Hamas in Gaza and to Hizballah in Lebanon. He probably also overestimates the potential role the US can play in resolving the broader crisis.

Unfortunately, to most Arabs -- and certainly to those governments and certainly the publics of the new Arab Spring -- the US has lost its ability to play "honest broker" in any issue involving Israel and the Arabs. Although the Israelis have had some face to face talks with Hamas, the US still refuses to do so.

Ambassador Ginsburg's talk with them several years ago should also convey some worry about Egypt's real intentions and attitudes towards Israel.  As he himself writes, it was the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (MB) which largely created Hamas in the first instance. Both Hamas and the MB read from the same "play book" about Israel -- and it is not a very optimistic text. End Introduction.--------------------------------

"A Field Guide to the Gaza Truce: Merely 'Lock and Reload?'"

THE HUFFINGTON POST

By Ambassador Marc Ginsberg

21 November 2012

When Secretary of State Clinton, accompanied by Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Amr, jointly announced a few minutes ago at a Cairo press conference the elusive agreement to end the current round of hostilities between Israel and Hamas, the accord represented the first example of cooperation between the U.S. and the new Muslim Brotherhood-led government in Egypt on a major Middle East regional security crisis.

Mrs. Clinton has nothing but praise for President Morsi and Egypt's role in helping to broker the understanding.
 
Whatever one calls the truce, ceasefire or "quiet for quiet" agreement that (temporarily) ends the latest round of conflict between Israel and Hamas, the accord comes not a moment too soon since it forestalls an inevitable Israeli incursion into Gaza, which Israel deemed essential to put an end to the missile attacks terrorizing its civilians.

As  reported by "The New York Times," Israel agreed to stop all land, sea and air hostilities in Gaza, including the "targeting of individuals" -- a reference to militants of Hamas and its affiliates who have been killed. The cease-fire also calls on the Palestinian factions in Gaza to stop all hostilities against Israel, including rocket attacks and attacks along the border.

Two hours in and all's apparently quiet on Israel's western front except the sound of celebratory Hamas gunfire, as if Palestinians have not heard enough in recent weeks.  Not unexpectedly, the agreement does nothing to address the far larger and consequential challenge that Hamas poses as an Iranian terrorist proxy, or for the aspirations of Gaza's Palestinian inhabitants for a long-term solution to their difficult and painful existence under Hamas rule.

Secretary Clinton's welcome and evidently successful mini-shuttle diplomacy between Jerusalem and Cairo, along with President Obama's round-the-clock consultations with Israeli PM Netanyahu and Egyptian President Morsi achieved the breakthrough, even though Obama and Clinton had made it clear during their swing through Asia that the U.S. had Israel's back and strongly supported Israel's right to defend itself in the face of the torrent of Hamas weapons fired against its civilians.

If Morsi and his Egyptian allies resented the strong American declarations of Israeli support, the Egyptian leader apparently did not let that get in the way of brokering an agreement with Washington.

As a consequence of the rapid-fire Egyptian-American led negotiations, the U.S.-Egyptian relationship may have taken important steps forward, perhaps ushering in a new bilateral phase focused on incubating the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, developing strategies for raising the credibility of the new Syrian government-in-exile, and enhancing Libyan domestic stability -- all challenges where both the U.S. and Egypt share common goals.

But consolidating the Gaza accord is clearly essential before achieving further regional cooperation and will be a rigorous test of this uneasy post-Arab Spring alliance.

Egypt emerges from the Gaza agreement as the principal "anchor tenant" -- assuming responsibility for policing Hamas's conduct in spite of the sympathy average Egyptians have expressed toward Hamas in recent weeks. After all, it was the Muslim Brotherhood that gave birth to Hamas in the first place, and it could not have been easy for Morsi to put the screws on his Hamas allies to stand down from their offensive.

Why Hamas decided it was in its interest to abide by Cairo's directives remains unanswered, but Hamas may have extracted from Morsi certain confidential side agreements... stay tuned.

So how do Israel and Hamas emerge from their latest confrontation and how will the agreements fine print and inferences be implemented?

As for Hamas, while it may have gained new stature and sympathy I heard nothing so far to indicate that it was able to extort from Israel a commitment to lift its economic blockade of Gaza -- Hamas' stated goal. Whether Israel will quietly relax parts of the economic blockade in the days ahead outside the prying eyes of the Israeli media will greatly depend on the sustainability of the ceasefire and whether Israel is convinced that Egypt is prepared to better police the Sinai weapons smuggling tunnels that is Hamas lifeline to Iran.

And what has Israel achieved for all of the terror inflicted on it by Hamas not only in recent weeks, but since Hamas expelled the Palestinian Authority from Gaza?

Regrettably, not much. The agreement represents merely a return to the status quo ante -- Hamas is still in power, and still going to do everything to resupply its missile stockpiles through the Sinai Peninsula smuggling tunnels. Reflecting the evident dilemma, Israeli PM Netanyahu's office issued a terse statement conveying Israel's willingness to accord Egypt's efforts a chance to achieve an end to Hamas attacks, while reserving Israel's right to act if the ceasefire fails to hold.

Israel's muted reaction reflects the somber reality that Hamas' capacity to fire missiles into Israel has not been substantially degraded despite the Israeli bombardment. In fact, up until the ceasefire, Hamas was still firing missiles and executed today's  Tel Aviv bus bombing. Moreover, Hamas has gained new allies, which beat a door to Gaza city during the conflict to publicly stand shoulder-to-shoulder with their new Hamas allies.

Delegations from Egypt, Tunisia, Turkey, Qatar and Arab League all came to remonstrate solidarity -- a far cry from the days when Hamas was viewed in most of the Arab world as a terrorist organization carrying out Iran's beck and call (which, by the way, it still is).

In the warped mind of Hamas' leaders, the conflict's toll of dead and wounded civilians and infrastructure destruction is an inexpensive price for becoming the new kid on the Islamist block, further isolating Israel in the region.

Yet, the ceasefire is a step in the right direction even though the text has not yet been released. The agreement forestalls a far bloodier battle between Hamas and Israel. After all, had the talks failed their failure would have triggered an almost-certain Israeli ground offensive into Gaza with all of the attendant consequences that would likely eclipse the 2008 Cast Lead offensive since this time around, Israel would not vacate Gaza without having completely rounded up every last Hamas leader and destroyed every last weapon and smuggling tunnel, which they failed to do in 2008.

Soon after Mrs. Clinton's pronouncement, the White House issued a statement  alluding to an American commitment to explore ways to more effectively police the perimeters of the Sinai Peninsula to prevent the weapons smuggling by Hamas and its allies from Iran that permitted such a "game-changing" missile offensive against Israel. 

The Israeli embargo on the Gaza Strip had obviously failed to prevent the very military empowerment of Hamas that the blockade was principally intended to prevent. So if the Israeli blockade did not accomplish its principal objective, what will be done by Israel and the U.S. about the Sinai sieve?

That is one of the tactical challenges embedded in this announcement and it will be very interesting what role, if any, the U.S. committed to play to better police the lawless, Egyptian-controlled Sinai.

Also, by signing onto its provisions Washington announced its commitment to promote the long-term durability of the agreement. Secretary Clinton stated at her Cairo news conference the necessity of effective, ongoing diplomacy to prevent the agreement from unraveling.

Now on her way home and just about out the door -- Secretary Clinton is scheduled to leave her post when her successor is nominated. Symbolically, she has enormous stature and respect in the region. Diving into the deep cesspool of this latest Hamas Middle East crisis is the last thing she had in mind during her Asian victory lap; her willingness to hold onto this hot potato until she can safely and securely hand it off to her successor may be vital to the agreement's durability, even though I don't wish the task on her at all given the challenges it creates.

Under the Rahm Emanuel adage to never fail to take advantage of a good crisis, President Obama has an unexpected window of opportunity to re-engage a sustained, high-level U.S. diplomacy to push direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations out of its cryogenic state. Nothing could energize this moment more than having the president enlist the best American Middle East deal-maker in the world -- former President Bill Clinton.

That is one lousy reward for President Clinton's 24/7 tireless campaigning for Obama's re-election, but no one other than Mrs. Clinton has the admiration and respect of all of the parties to force them out their dangerous diplomatic death spiral.

As I stated in my last  column, the Obama administration has no Middle East front bench to speak of. Its previous star players (George Mitchell and Dennis Ross) abandoned the playing field for their own respective reasons when neither could put any points on the board. They gave it their best try, but kept going back to their old, shopworn playbooks and the Gaza crisis provies how critical a time it is for the U.S. to come up with new ideas, new strategies and new blood to get the U.S. back in the game to rescue the absolute necessity for a two-state solution -- a strategic interest to us as well as to our allies. 

As for Iran -- Hamas' principal arms supplier and state terrorist benefactor that pressed Hamas to launch this latest offensive in the first place -- what did it get out of this confrontation so far? Quite a bit, I am afraid.

Although its Hamas missile transfer racket may face new obstacles, just imagine the Ayatollahs' satisfaction as Arab adversaries of Iran rushed to Hamas' defense. Moreover, it was Iran's missiles that were tested against Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile system.

Although Iron Dome was a godsend preventing Israeli civilian casualties, Iran's missile-meisters now have battlefield information how Iron Dome operates for what likely will be a more lethal next round.

So the plot stays more or less the same -- destined, I am afraid to play itself out again but with more lethality given Iran's machinations and Hamas' embolden leaders.

During the crisis there were a slew of Middle East pundits who urged Israel to begin talking with Hamas as if Hamas deserved to be rewarded with an Israeli negotiator for blackmailing it with missile attacks. The pundits talked of the need for Israel to face new realities and act more responsibly toward Hamas.

Now don't get me wrong. I am all in favor of talking if there is a basis for negotiation otherwise fools' errands only delay hard choices.

Several years ago, I entered Gaza blindfolded and in a trunk of a car in order to meet with a fairly senior Hamas official. I wanted to hear Hamas' positions from the horse's mouth, so to speak. For hours, I listened to Hamas' representatives harangue against Jews -- spewing the a particularly virulent anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism normally echoing from other salafist and Islamic extremists I have encountered during my many years traversing the region.

Just read Hamas' Arabic charter for amplification. Can Hamas reengineer itself and moderate its resolute rejection of Israel's right to exist in any form? Only Allah knows.

But nothing so far indicates that all of Hamas' Koran-stoked terrorism will be ejected from its warped sense of reality.

Before anyone gets too rambunctious about pressuring Israel to deal with Hamas, how about pressuring Hamas to first negotiate a viable accommodation with its Palestinian Authority and Fatah brethren first. A united Palestinian leadership is essential to any viable Israeli-Palestinian negotiation.

Yet, on the margins of this crisis, and after years of inter-Arab mediation by Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE, Hamas and the PA remain at loggerheads -- refusing to compromise on basic principles.

That says a great deal about whether Hamas can ever be expected to plausibly retreat from its refusal to accept Israel's right to exist. Palestinians will need to make that choice, and American full-fledged diplomacy is crucial to compel Palestinians to make that choice. ###