I dispute the piece in Hersh’s article re Israel’s ‘intercepts’ of a May meeting of Hamas leadership. Also, the Israeli claim to have ‘picked up signals intelligence involving Hamas, Syria & Hizbollah’. What is supposed to have been said is out of character, out of sync with events at the time, and lacks factual support. It is all too neat, too convenient and, isn’t it just too clever the way it drags in all those Israel wants to eliminate. It reeks of Israeli spin/lies/propaganda.

 

Israel is a master at this….has done it all many times before. According to Hersh’s informant the intercepted conversation indicated that Hamas felt it had got no benefit from its 18 months long self imposed cease fire and “were losing standing among the Palestinian population”. The conclusion was “Let’s go back into the terror business and then try and wrestle concessions from the Israeli government”. This is total nonsense. Anyone who knows Hamas and its policies knows this is nonsense.

 

No one knew better than Hamas what would result from this. AND, the language “the terror business”! That is not the way they would have expressed themselves. Even if this was an Israeli slant on a conversation it totally belies the way Hamas sees what it does when its people carry out a suicide bombing, which I assume was meant by ‘the terror business’. Having talked at length with Hamas members on this subject, I have some understanding of this. And, I have to say, I have a great deal of sympathy for their view.

 

From the beginning Hamas took a decision, well publicised, that it would NOT attack civilians. It would confine its attacks to the military and the settlers whom it saw as part of the occupation force. It was not until Israel began assassinating its leaders that it changed its policy. And, it announced the change of policy. Even then it did not carry out random attacks. Attacks by Hamas were always AFTER an assassination of one of their leaders or attacks on refugee camps as Jabalia, where Israel kills many people.

 

In two years Israel assassinated the whole top leadership including their spiritual leader Sheik Ahamed Yassin. Israel then began killing those lower down the ladder. Assassinations, cowardly, shameful acts, are carried out by rockets fired at vehicles and homes or 1,000 ton bombs dropped from a great height. And, assassinations always kill many others as well. Hersh’s informant, “with close ties to Israel” (Yes, doing Israel’s dirty work, planting the cover story) tells him that if Hamas did so (go back to terror) and Nasrallah backed them there would “be a full scale response”. But Hamas did NOT ‘go back to terror’.

 

In January 2005 Hamas announced it would pursue political struggle, not armed struggle. Even when Israel assassinated their head of security, Abu Samhadana, Hamas refused to be provoked. Nor did they when Israel made a second attempt on the life of foreign minister Mahmud al-Zahar. When Israel vastly increased its attacks, its shelling of civilians and its nightly use of sonic booms, Hamas did not react. After the Gaza Beach massacre of June 9, Hamas threatened to call off the cease fire, but did not do so. Following the beach massacre reports claimed that all factions fired hand made, inaccurate Qassam rockets over the wall separating Gaza and Israel. A small town,

 

Sderot is on the other side of the border/wall, this is where the rockets usually land. The rockets are likened to glorified sling shots. Though, recently, one rocket reached Askelon, aprox. 4kms from where it was fired, in over five years only 5 people have been killed. The effect is psychological rather than deadly….they cause fear. One Gaza Palestinian told the NY Times he did not want the rocket firing stopped, saying: ‘We live in fear all the time. Why shouldn’t they?’

 

On June 25, men from three groups, one of them Hamas’ military wing, Izz-idin al-Qassam Brigades, captured the Israeli corporal Gilad Shalit. The media persists in reporting this as ‘Hamas kidnapped..’ Not so! The groups put out a statement, June 26, in the name of all Palestinian factions, as well as those involved, calling for the release of all women and children held in Israeli jails in return for release of Shalit. As for the other two groups participating in the capture of Shalit, the leaders of both had recently been assassinated by Israel.

 

Far from ‘losing standing’ among the Palestinians, Palestinian support for Hamas remained high. Palestinian anger and frustration was directed at the US, the Europeans and Israel whom they rightly saw as those behind the campaign against them and their democratically elected government. They were angered by the double standards of the US and EU and the fact that Hamas was being called upon to ‘renounce violence’ but Israel’s violence against them, was ignored.

 

Palestinians saw the US and EU as trying to de-legitimise Hamas at Israel’s behest while they were arrested, killed, wounded, starved and their society bankrupted because they exercised their democratic right to choose their representatives. But the critical point in this is the fact that at the time these alleged ‘telephone’ calls and ‘intercepts’ were supposed to be taking place Hamas was immersed in a major struggle with Fatah. The circumstances of this were so grave that civil war was a likely result, if not handled carefully.

 

There were some who would have welcomed a civil war even though it would have brought Israel in on the pretext of separating the combatants. A disparate mix of plotters had long planned the demise of Hamas. After its election win of Jan.25 the gloves came off.

 

The Israeli siege of Gaza began soon after Hamas won the Jan.25 elections. Israel closed the crossing points and began shelling this small strip of land by day and by night. Israel also turned the nights into a sleepless hell by breaking the sound barrier with sonic booms at two hourly intervals. Each day at least 150 shells fell on Gaza. Journalists, reporting these heinous acts, almost without exception, accepted, and repeated, whatever the Israelis said without question. The refrain was always the same ‘the Israelis say they are firing into open land’ in response to ‘Palestinians firing rockets across the border’. Well, as all would know you would be hard pressed to find open space anywhere in Gaza. The Palestinians said shells were fired on all areas of Gaza whether rockets were fired or not. This is supported by Amira Hass, an Israeli journalist, who lives in Ramalla and spends part of her time in Gaza.

 

In an article, ‘Hungry and Shell-Shocked’, in Ha’aretz,, April 27, she gave details: ‘Where will the next blow land?….when, and on whom will it land?’ She says people set up watch groups to prevent rockets being fired, the police also prevented their firing but nothing stopped the shells, which came from the land and the sea. And, far from firing into open space the shells destroyed homes, farmland, crops and farm animals. At the same time drones fired rockets from above. While people, many of them children, were killed each day.

 

Throughout all this Hamas was trying to overcome the siege of the money supply. Financial disaster faced the Hamas led Palestinian Authority (PA) with the US and EU cutting off aid and Israel illegally withholding taxes that it collected on behalf of the PA. The situation was dire. The salaries of those who worked in all areas of the civil/public service, ministries, schools hospitals, police/security could not be paid. Approximately 160,000 families were having to fend for themselves. Even money donated by Arab states and Iran could not be transferred as Egypt’s Arab bank, holding the funds, had been threatened with penalties by America. The foreign minister al-Zahar was reduced to collecting money from Egypt in suitcases, so that people could be paid a small part of what they were owed.

 

Equally dire for Hamas was a nasty underhand campaign, with a full compliment of dirty tricks, which began at the same time. The campaign, to undermine Hamas, push it into a corner and make it impossible for it to govern, began well before the swearing in ceremony.

 

The PA’s Fatah government, before it left office, created conditions that placed an incoming Hamas led government under financial pressure. Fatah left Hamas not only a legacy of debt but facing a serious dilemma. Fatah’s outgoing Interior Minister, Nasser Yusef, between January and March, approved an increase of 18,000 men into the already over stocked security service. This came on top of an increase of 14,000, Fatah people, recruited in the previous 6 months, bringing the security forces to 90,000. The PA’s acting finance minister Jihad al-Wazir refused to pay the new recruits. The huge security service increase, and its effect on the payroll, had prompted the PA’s respected previous finance minister, Salaam Fayad, to resign.

 

The dilemma for the Hamas administration was that General Yusef’s approval meant it had to decide whether to confirm the 18,000 personnel recruited AFTER the election. They faced having to choose between the rapidly growing deficit and a confrontation with the new recruits who were members of armed groups linked to Fatah. Hamas opposed the recruitments, which were done without regard to proper procedures. Hamas had said changes would be made when they took power. After the swearing in, in March, Hamas interior minister Said Siyam, ordered an end to new recruitment. He also ordered an end to fuel and maintenance payments for cars of PA officials. Cars had been given to these people by former Palestinian president Yasser Arafat.

 

In some cases former ministers had more than one car. This was part of the corrupt system of cronyism, nepotism and patronage that operated during Arafat’s time, and continued until the January election. The proposed new additions to the payroll were made during and after the January election. Details from an Interior Ministry memo to General Yusef were leaked to a senior Gaza journalist, Wissam Afifa, of Al Risala, a pro-Hamas newspaper. Afifa said the increases in the security service payroll were to buy off demands by armed, Fatah linked groups for jobs and salaries. These groups had carried out a number of kidnappings and raids on PA premises in Gaza for the same reason. Afifa said the practice had then been extended as a deliberate attempt to embarrass the Hamas administration. He said, “It is a grenade thrown into the middle of Hamas”.

 

On taking office the Palestinian Prime Minister, Ismail Hanyeh, told the first meeting of his Hamas led cabinet that the new Ministry of Finance had “inherited an entirely empty treasury” as well as the debts of the previous ministry and government. The Prime Minister said cabinet members would not be paid until the financial crisis was resolved. He said the PA would do all in its power to pay the 160,000 civil servants despite the aid cut-off by the EU, and Israel’s withholding of $60m a month in taxes owed to the PA. He pointed out that the administration needed a minium $130m a month to remain viable.

 

FORCES RANGED AGAINST HAMAS

 

Long before the Hamas election victory well documented reports show that serious planning was underway to: eliminate Hamas and Hizbollah; to undermine Bashir Al-Assad in Syria and Mahmoud Armadinajhad in Iran. The objective in these two states was ‘regime change’. In early 2005 King Abdullah of Jordan was making his way around the Middle East, visiting Arab leaders to gain support for concerted action against what he referred to as ‘a Shi’ite crescent’ rising across the Middle East. Using highly emotive language he made dire predictions about a rise in Shi’isim, in the region, which he said would be a disaster, would change the region ‘as we know it’, ‘nothing would be the same’.

 

Israel loudly echoed Abdullah’s rhetoric as did George W Bush who used the words ‘axis of terror’, a term often used by Israel. Hamas and Hizbullah and the states of Iran and Syria were the subject of all the rhetoric. Abdullah received support from Egypt and Saudi Arabia, both allies of America, as is Jordan. Egypt and Jordan are the recipients of considerable aid from the US. Both have signed peace agreements with Israel. Both confer with the US on Middle East affairs. All three co-joined for reasons of self interest as all are having to contend with unrest in their home states.

 

The unrest, engendered by their peoples dissatisfaction with oppressive, corrupt, regimes is directed at the leadership. All three see themselves as under threat and fear for their power and position. In the campaign to create fear of rising Shi’ism it seems to have been forgotten that Hamas is not a Shi’ite organization and Syria is not a Shi’ite state.

 

However, Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, a military dictator has clamped down hard, with waves of arrests, since the Muslim Brotherhood, banned as a party, standing independent candidates, took more than one-third of the seats in recent elections. The Brotherhood renounced violence 30 years ago, deciding to achieve its aims by political means. It provides services as education, health and welfare services, that should be provided by the government, to the community. In Jordan, Abdullah is thoroughly disliked. The army is sent onto the streets to prevent demonstrations support-ing the Palestinians. Shows of support for Lebanon were banned as they were in Egypt.

 

In Jordan criticism of Israel is banned. In Saudi Arabia, where demonstrations are banned, there is a substantial Shi’ite community that is becoming restive. All three states strongly criticised Hamas and Hizbullah, after the capture of the soldiers. But all three were forced to retreat from their position when Israel attacked Lebanon. Each state had trouble containing its people’s protests and King Abdullah of Jordan, in a striking reverse, harshly criticised America.

 

 Throughout the region editorials predicted change, The Saudi ‘Arab News’ saying: ‘The Arab world has changed. It has a new breed of young people. They will not put up with the same status quo’. In Cairo, despite the bans people made their feelings known, chanting “Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Nasrallah has bested you all”. Nonetheless, neither Egypt, Jordan, or Saudi Arabia moved to help extricate Hamas from a predicament, not of its making. All slavishly aligned themselves with an unprincipled America, backing a renegade Israel in moves to topple Hamas.

 

In fact, long before the capture of Corp. Gilad Shalit Israel, supported by America, formed a plan to topple Hamas. As Israel pounded Gaza with its artillery, after Shalit’s capture, Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh accused Israel of a ‘premeditated plan’ to topple his government. The PM’s accusations are supported by a number of Israeli sources. Gideon Levy, in an article: The Black Flag, in the Israeli daily, Ha’aretz, asks why no one questions the kidnapping of two Palestinian brothers, one a doctor, recently returned from working in Sudan. The brothers were kidnapped by Israelis, from their home in Gaza, the day before Shalit was captured. He goes on to say: ‘What we are doing now in Gaza has nothing to do with freeing Gilad Shalit. It is a wide scale act of vengeance, that the IDF and Shin Bet have wanted to conduct for some time”. This refers to reports that after the second Intifada began, Israel’s IDF and Shin Bet planned the destruction of the Palestinian infrastructure and the elimination of Hamas.

 

Ilan Pappe of the University of Haifa in a July 14 article ‘What Does Israel Want?’ talks about the frustration of the military at being restricted to ‘low intensity conflict’ against stone throwers instead of all out war, ‘real war’. He writes ‘After the outbreak of the second intifada in October 2000, some of the frustration evaporated with the use of 1,000 kilo bombs dropped on a house in Gaza….. or during operation Defensive Shield in 2002 when the army bulldozed the refugee camp in Jenin’. He writes this is not about the captive soldiers “This is about destroying the Hizbollah and Hamas once and for all’.

 

NOTE: The 1,000 kilo bombs were used to assassinate Hamas leader Salah Shedadeh. Two were dropped on his Gaza home after midnight killing him, his wife and child. Sixteen people, nine of them children, were killed by the blast, in nearby homes.

 

Ori Nir, in The Forward, July7, wrote: ‘The Bush administration appears to have dropped any objections to Israeli efforts to topple the Palestinian Authority’s democratically elected Hamas government’. The Israeli press is very forthcoming on the subject of the military and its plans. Newspapers as Haaretz, Maariv and Yediot Aharonot are examples. Using quotes from Maariv a ZNet article, ‘It’s Time to End the “Last Taboo” July 16, records: “The IDF Assault on Gaza Was Planned Well in Advance”. The article quotes the Israeli daily as saying that what is taking place in Gaza and the West Bank “has been in the works for months”…. since the 2005 withdrawal of Israeli settlers from Gaza the IDF has been training for a “large-scale incursion and reoccupation of the territory’.

 

The ZNet article reports that Israel’s daily Maariv’, reported this early in 2006, in an interview with IDF General Yoav Galant. The article quotes the general as saying, the IDF “would employ more aggressive military activity ….including (re)occupying the Gaza Strip”. And, “We are in advanced states of preparing forces…” The general said this would be in response to Palestinian “attacks”. But he, of course, made no mention of Israel’s daily attacks, with heavy weapons, on the people of Gaza.

 

Professor Tanya Reinhart, writing in Yediot Aharonot, June21, went further. The article, What are they fighting for’, gives details and references for the military’s plan to crush the people of Gaza, destroy their infrastructure and eliminate Hamas. Professor Reinhart writes, “The Israeli army’s war in Gaza is not about him (Gilad Shalit). As senior security analyst Alex Fishman widely reported, the army was preparing for an attack months earlier and was constantly pushing for it”. She goes on to say that government authorisation had been given by June 12, but the attack was postponed due to the global outcry after the civilian killings (on Gaza’s beach). “The operation began on “28th June with the destruction of infrastructure in Gaza and the mass detention of the Hamas leadership in the West Bank, which was also planned weeks in advance”. She gives as references: Alex Fishman, “Who is for the elimination of Hamas”, Yediot Aharonot, June 30, and Aluf Benn, “An operation with two goals,” Haaretz, June 29. And that is not all. She writes: “The Israeli army is hungry for war…since 2002 the army has argued that an “operation” along the lines of “Defensive Shield” in Jenin was also necessary in Gaza.

 

Exactly a year ago, on July 15, before the ‘Disengagement’, the army concentrated forces on the border of the Strip for an offensive on this scale on Gaza. But then the US imposed a veto. Rice arrived for a visit that was described as acrimonious and stormy, and the army was forced to back down. Now, the time has finally come. With the Islamophobia of the American Administration at a high point, it appears that the USA is prepared to back such an operation, on condition that it not provoke a global outcry with excessively reported attacks on civilians”. Her reference: Ori Nir, ‘US Seen Backing Israeli Moves To Topple Hamas’, The Forward, July 7. And, “With the green light for the offensive given, the army’s only concern is public image. Fishman reported this Tuesday that the army is worried that “what threatens to bury this huge military and diplomatic effort” is reports of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

 

Hence, the army would take care to let some food into Gaza. From this perspective it is necessary to feed the Palestinians in Gaza so that it would be possible to continue to kill them undisturbed”. Reference: Alex Fishman, ‘Their food is gone’, Yediot Aharonot, July 11.

 

Here it should be noted that the army need not have worried. The fact that the Palestinians, in Gaza, really are starving and living in intolerable conditions, has barely received a mention. Even the callous, shameful remarks of government advisor Dov Weisglass “We need to make the Palestinians lose weight, but not starve to death, just put them on a diet”, passed without comment.

 

Finally, Haaretz, Israel’s well-known daily, on July 1 printed an article ‘Arrest of Palestinian Cabinet Ministers Planned Weeks Before Alleged Kidnapping’. It began: “The detention of Hamas parliamentarians in the early hours of Thursday morning had been planned several weeks ago and received approval from Mazuz (Attorney General Menachem Mazuz) on Wednesday. The same day Shin Bet Director Yuval Diskin presented Prime Minister Ehud Olmert with the list of Hamas officials slated for detention”. Haaretz reported that a Justice Ministry spokesman said the arrests were carried out with the approval of the judiciary and that Israel ‘will arrest more Hamas officials’.

 

Also, legal proceedings against the detainees ‘will be carried out in military courts’. The IDF, in its sweep through the West bank, arresting ministers and Legislative Council members, ‘arrested the Mayor of Qalqilyah and his deputy’, both members of Hamas. The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education, Nasser a-Shaer, was also arrested though he stood as an independent.

 

And, Israeli Minister, Benjamin Ben-Eliezer warned that Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh ‘is not exempt from arrest or harm’. After Haniyeh’s election as PM the Israelis threatened his life. Throughout all this Hamas was coping with attempts by Fatah to cause civil strife, take over the security forces, foment a factional power struggle and prevent Hamas extending its authority over the Gaza Strip and West Bank. Hamas was having to grapple with problems, from outside its domain, and within.

 

A defeated Fatah, having long controlled the Palestinian Authority, angry and bitter, was doing all in its power to make the way difficult. All, from Mahmoud Abbas down, were looking for ways to undermine Hamas. Internally, Mahmoud Abbas, refusing to face up to Fatah’s defeat, presented Hamas with a number of ultimatums. Abbas had been elected as Palestinian Authority President in 2005, replacing the deceased, Yassar Arafat.

 

After Fatah’s election defeat many members blamed Abbas, threats were made on his life by members of his Fatah party. Some said he should not have allowed the election to proceed. However, the election was due, had been twice postponed, and Abbas faced a storm of protest had the election not been held.

 

Afterwards, Hamas supported him, saying they would protect, and respect him. But this was not to be a two way process. Abbas, with support from America, Israel and some Arab states, was planning Fatah’s return to power. After the Jan.25 election Hamas approached Fatah to form a government of national unity, to include all parties Fatah refused.

 

Two small parties, whose leaders, Hanan Ashrawi and Musstafa Barghouti, the only members elected, were prepared to be part of a Hamas led government, but pulled out after pressure from the US. A Hamas cabinet of ministers was sworn in, in March. Hamas continued its overtures for a national unity government. However, Abbas, decided to ‘pull a fast one’ in an attempt to corner Hamas. He used the ‘Prisoners Plan’ as the subject of a referendum, which he proposed should be voted on in 40 days if Hamas did not endorse it by June 5. The plan/document was drafted by prominent Hamas and Fatah leaders in Israeli jails. It implied ‘acceptance of a potential agreement with Israel based on the 1967 borders’. The document calls on all the factions in the Palestinian parliament beginning with Hamas and Fatah to form a national unity government, based on the document.

 

It said a unity government was the only way to assure the success of the Palestinian government. It said the document was meant to ‘serve as a basis for dialogue between Hamas and Fatah’. And, it included passages meant to ensure ‘the cooperation of Hamas and Fatah’ and that there ‘will be NO civil war’. The document was drafted by Marwan Barghouti, a respected, popular ‘young guard’ Fatah leader and Sheik Abdel Halek Natshe, a senior Hamas official in the West Bank and a member of the Palestinian parliament. Representatives from Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine were involved in the drafting. There was also a call for the creation of a ‘new Palestinian Liberation Organization’ (PLO) in the plan.

 

The PLO, as an organization, had been replaced/negated by the PA during the Oslo process. The 18 point prisoner’s plan envisaged a Palestinian state based on 1967 borders: Jerusalem as the shared capital of Palestine and Israel: King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia reconfirm his 2002 proposal that Arab states are prepared to enter into normal relations with Israel after its withdrawal from lands occupied in 1967. The point at issue in this was the implied recognition of Israel as an existing Jewish state. Hamas had set out its own conditions in reply to those of Israel. Whereas, Israel the US and the EU prattled on about how Hamas must ‘recognise Israel: renounce violence: accept previous agreements with Israel’, no demands were made on Israel.

 

Why? Surely what’s good for one is good for the other. To begin with, Israel has never recognised Palestine. When one travels to Palestine, all documents given to be filled out, on entry, make no mention of Palestine. Palestine is designated as ‘Israel’. Israel has always seen Jordan as Palestine. Also, how does one recognise an entity that has not defined its own borders? Israel has never accepted the UN declared borders. It continues, against international laws and conventions, to add to the territory awarded it under the UN partition. It has said it will, eventually, unilaterally, declare its borders, but to date has set no time table. Presumably, it will do so when it has cleansed the West Bank of the indigenous Palestinians.

 

As for renouncing violence, Hamas had not carried out violent acts for 18 months. Hamas had made quite clear that it was prepared to stick by what it said. Also, Hamas had said that it was prepared to renounce violence for political means if Israel stopped killing its people. Yet never was it proposed, by those making the demands, that Israel end its violence from rockets, tanks, bombs and artillery shells; the whole paraphernalia of military might used against civilians.

 

As yet, nobody has explained the difference between being killed by a suicide bomber, the weapon of the powerless, and being killed by bombs dropped from a great height, the coward’s weapon.

 

As to the previous agreements with Israel, these have been ended or annulled by Israel. As soon as Sharon took power he made quite clear that he had no intention of abiding by any agreement made during the Oslo process. He said the ‘Road Map’ was ‘a dead issue’. He then got George W Bush’s support to annex huge areas of the West Bank __ reminiscent of Balfour giving away land not his to give __ he ignored “Quartet” proposals and under- took a unilateral removal of settlers from Gaza. All this is set aside by those making demands on Hamas. Ehud Olmert, Sharon’s successor, was Sharon’s anointed, and right hand man in the cabinet. He is well known for his repressive, hardline, anti-Palestine tactics while Mayor of Jerusalem. He is a clone of Sharon and will do his utmost to scuttle any ‘peace process’. In fact, he, and his party, have already managed to scuttle two attempts by Hamas and Fatah to form a government of national unity.

 

Hamas made it clear from the start that Israel must end its occupation and return to 1967 borders before any position was taken on recognition/acceptance of Israel. In articles in the London Guardian and the Washington Post, Ismail Haniyah, said it was ‘up to Israel’. He said ‘we offer our hand in peace, in return for a just peace’.

 

 In answer to questions from Newsweek-Washington Post’s Lally Weymouth, Haniyah expressed surprise at the conditions imposed on Hamas, saying “Why don’t they direct such conditions and questions to Israel? Has Israel respected agreements? Israel has by-passed practically all agreements. We say: Let Israel recognise the legitimate rights of the Palestinians first and then we will have a position regarding this. Which Israel should we recognise? The Israel of 1917, the Israel of 1936, the Israel of 1948, the Israel of 1956, or the Israel of 1967? Which borders and which Israel? Israel has to recognise first the Palestinian state and its borders and then we will know what we are talking about”.

 

In answer to “Will you recognise Israel”, Haniyah replied “If Israel declares that it will give the Palestinians their state and give them back all their rights, then we are ready to recognise them”. On ‘Israel’s right to exist’ he says, …let Israel say it will recognise a Palestinian state along the 1967 borders, release the prisoners, and recognise the rights of the refugees to return to Israel: Hamas will have a position if this occurs”.

 

Khalid Mish’al, Damascus based head of the political bureau of Hamas, wrote in the Guardian, Jan.31, 2006, “Palestinians voted for Hamas because of our refusal to give up their rights. But we are ready to make a just peace’. He also made some pertinent comments as: “The day Hamas won the Palestinian democratic elections the world’s leading democracies failed the test of democracy…We are being punished simply for resisting oppression and striving for justice….our message to the Palestinians is this: our people are not only those who live under siege in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip but also the millions languishing in refugee camps in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria and the millions spread around the world unable to return home. We promise you that nothing in the world will deter us from pursuing our goal of liberation and return”. He also refers to the 9,000 prisoners in Israeli jails who, he said, must be released. And, his message to the Israelis…..”We have no problem with Jews who have not attacked us—our problem is with those who came to our land, imposed themselves on us by force, destroyed our society and banished our people……But if you are willing to accept the principle of a long-term truce, we are prepared to negotiate the terms. Hamas is extending a hand of peace to those who are truly interested in a peace based on justice”.

 

Hamas leaders, including Sheik Yassin before he was assassinated, have proposed an extended or long-term ceasefire (hudna)–ten years was mentioned—to establish a situation of stability and calm that would bring safety to the Palestinian people. This is what Mish’al referred to in his article. Haniyah also refers to this when asked if the ceasefire would be extended. “If Israel gives us a quiet period and stops its incursions and the assassinations, then we will be able to convince our people to continue with a state of quiet”.

 

Abbas, well aware of the Hamas position, seised on the prisoner’s document as a way of forcing Hamas into a corner. He threatened to call a referendum to gain public endorsement for the document unless Hamas accepted it within ten days, without changes. Abbas relied on a public opinion poll showing 80% of Palestinians supported the document, which would entail implicit recognition of Israel in 1967 borders, to boost his position. Abbas promoted the document as a basis for negotiations with Israel, which he claimed, would hasten the creation of a Palestinian state. Should Hamas refuse to accept the document unchanged, or, stick to the position that: their willingness to accept/recognise Israel must be based on justice, equality and reciprocity, Abbas would then point to Hamas’ stubbornness as the bar to negotiations, and a two state solution.

 

Abbas made his announcements without first consulting PM Ismail Haniyah. He did this despite the fact that Palestinian law makes no provision for referendums, and the law can only be amended by the legislative council, in which Hamas has a majority. Hamas reacted, saying the referendum was illegal. Abbas then said he would call a referendum by “presidential decree”. There was a calculated plan behind the referendum threat. Abbas and his allies, inside and outside the country, were busy summoning up a catalogue of dirty tricks to undermine Hamas.

 

The ultimate goal was to, one way or another, force the Hamas government out, and reimpose a Fatah led government. Abbas gambled on knowing that Hamas would stay with its stated position. Abbas and his Fatah collaborators had plans in place to ensure that Fatah won the referendum vote. Abbas would then claim this as an endorsement of himself and Fatah, and a rejection of Hamas. This was confirmed to me during a telephone conversation with a Palestinian journalist. When Abbas made his move it caused a flurry of diverse reactions. On June 2 Ori Nir wrote in the Forward, “Bush administration officials believe that Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas…. Took a key first step towards becoming an effective interlocutor for negotiations with Israel by pressuring Hamas …to endorse a joint platform that implicitly recognises Israel in the 1967 borders”.

 

Bush officials were pleased with the move but worried that “if Abbas blinks in the stand-off with Hamas his credibility will be severely damaged”, Nir wrote. But, ‘Israeli officials worry that if Hamas accepts the proposal it will increase pressure on the Israelis to negotiate directly with the Palestinians..’ Nir then quotes Michael Herzog former Israeli military secretary, ‘Israel may find itself under pressure by regional or European governments, who would say, ‘There is progress—let’s go with it’. Nir also quotes Ami Ayalon, former head of Israel’s Shin Bet security service, ‘Israel’s government would no longer be able to argue that it has no one to talk to on the Palestinian side…If this document is accepted by the whole Palestinian society, in a referendum, you can no longer convince the world that you must pursue a unilateral approach for lack of a Palestinian partner”.

 

The above, and much more in similar vein, confirms what those who have observed the situation in Palestine and, Palestine under occupation, for decades, have always known. Israel has never wanted peace, or a two state solution.

 

Israel wants the land of Palestine, without the people of Palestine. But tactical ploys as the referendum and manipulating the security services were only part of what the plotters had in mind. The day the election results were known the war against Hamas began.

 

A New York Times report of February 14, said US and Israeli officials met “at the highest level” to plot the downfall of Hamas. Meeting at the State Department they planned to do so by “starving” the Palestinian Authority.

 

Khalil Shikaki, a Palestinian pollster close to Fatah was quoted, “Fatah now is obsessed with undoing this election as soon as possible. Israel and Washington want to do it over too. The Palestinian Authority could collapse in six months”.

 

The Arabist, Feb.13, “How to Engineer a Coup”, reported ‘the United States and Israel are discussing ways to destabilise the Palestinian government so that the newly elected Hamas officials will fail and elections will be called again’. ‘According to Israeli officials and Western diplomats the intention is to starve the Palestinian Auth-ority of money and international connections to the point where some months from now, its president Mahmoud Abass, is compelled to call a new election…..the officials and diplomats say Hamas will be given a choice: recog-nise Israel’s right to exist, forswear violence and accept previous Palestine/Israel agreements, or face isolation and collapse’.

 

The Arabist said: ‘those drafting the plan….do not expect Hamas to meet them (the conditions)’. “The point is to put this choice on Hamas’s shoulders”, a senior western diplomat said, “If they make the wrong choice, all the options lead in a bad direction”.

 

After Hamas took up office Fatah leaders, many from the reconstituted Preventive Security forces (PSF), such as Mohammed Dhalan, former PS forces head in Gaza, began an obstructionist campaign against Hamas. They refused to submit the security forces to the authority of the Hamas led interior ministry, they obstructed Hamas officials in the performance of ministerial duties and publicly blamed Hamas leaders for the US-EU-Israel siege. These people, and those from the newly appointed 32,000 security services, were the ones seen on nightly television, demonstrating and demanding they be paid. They trashed the interior ministry and government offices of Ismail Haniya and other Hamas ministers. The media repeatedly reported that they “destroyed the office of Ismail Haniya” ignoring the fact that they were government buildings that were destroyed, NOT the personal property of the PM. They were the property of the Palestinian people. All the buildings damaged or destroyed by these deliberate acts of sabotage against elected Hamas officials were built with aid grants from the Europeans.

 

These actions were a planned part of the process to destabilise Hamas. The demonstrators, most of them from the recently appointed security services were ex-preventive security men. The PS forces grew out of the unfair, one-sided conditions of the Oslo agreements. Large numbers of Palestinian men were recruited, and trained, to protect the Israelis.

 

Never mind their own people. They were not deemed worthy of protection. The heads of preventive security Jibril Rajub, the West Bank, and Mohammed Dhalan, Gaza, were trained by the Americans and Israelis, after their appointment by Yasser Arafat. On Arafat’s return to Palestine in 1994, after the Oslo signing, the PS forces in collaboration with the Israeli secret services policed the Palestinian Territories.

 

A signed ‘security agreement’ between the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Israel, overseen by the CIA’s Tel Aviv station chief, Stan Muskovitz, committed the PA to actively look after Israel’s security…to ‘fight the terrorists, the terrorist base, and the environmental conditions leading to support of terror’. This was to be in cooperation with Israel and included ‘mutual exchange of information, ideas and military cooperation’(Clause1). Clause 13 committed the PA to ‘take all necessary security steps to penetrate the terror organizations and act to destroy them from the inside’. Arafat, by his choice of Rajub and Dahlan, made sure the job would be done. Arafat, the ultimate collaborator, ensured his PSF rigorously carried out their assignment. Palestinians were subjected to years of harsh repression and daily surveillance equal to the worst of Israel’s occupation.

 

Unable to gather in groups of more than three, ‘with a spy in every house’, suspects and those held responsible for attacks on Israelis were arrested, tortured, imprisoned and even murdered. Hamas members were assassinated, with frequent arrests of their political leaders. These people are now the vanguard in the war against Hamas.

 

 In May Abbas requested Israeli permission to increase his “presidential guard” from 2000 to 10,000 men, giving him a personal militia under his direct control. This, on top of the 32,000 increase noted above, was a considerable increase in security forces under Fatah’s control. Ha’aretz reported the details on May 28. On May 29, Ha’aretz said that with the cooperation of the Israeli government the Abbas militia will be armed by a third country.

 

A senior defence official told Ha’aretz that Israel’s goal in the weapons transfer is “to enable Abu Mazen (Abbas) to deal with Hamas and other Islamic groups’ (May26). A Fatah security official told the Sunday Times of London (May28) “Time is running out for Hamas”. He accused Hamas of plotting to assassinate Abbas saying “We’ll choose the right time and place for the military showdown. But after that there will be no more Hamas’s militias”.

 

This ominous, talk indicated the direction in which Fatah was heading. Though Hamas leaders expressed their determination not to be drawn into civil war clashes between Fatah militias and Hamas members began to occur, with increasing casualties.

 

In the second week of June three truckloads of weapons were transferred from Jordan to Abbas’s security forces. The transfer was authorised by Israel in a move to give Abbas superiority in confrontations with Hamas. Israel’s PM Ehud Olmert announced this while on a visit to London the previous week, causing consternation in the ranks of Fatah officials.

 

These people, angry that Israel had gone public, protested, one saying, ‘the Palestinian street will think that Israel is arming us so that we could fight Hamas. This makes us look like collaborators’. Abbas and his top aides denied all knowledge of the deal even after the weapons had arrived. Abbas accused Israel of lying, insisting that no weapons had been sent to his security forces.

 

Hamas officials said the three truck-loads of weapons, which included 3,000 M-16 rifles and 3 million bullets, were delivered to the offices of Abbas in Ramallah and Gaza city. Hamas, in a June 17 statement, called on the Palestinian Legislative Council to immediately investigate the matter. Hamas leadership said, “We want to know the nature and type of the weapons, why they are needed and the party that paid for the rifles and bullets”. The statement also said that the decision to supply Abbas loyalists with arms came at a time when Palestinians were suffering “under the yoke of financial siege and starvation”.

 

Hamas, rightly it must be said, believed that the US and Israel were complicit in the move. They urged the PLC to look into “the size of American and Israeli intervention in the internal affairs of the Palestinians. We strongly condemn the exposed American-Zionist conspiracy to spark dissention among our people by arming and financing one side under the pretext of arming the presidential guard”. The Hamas statement was an indication of the rising tension between Hamas and Fatah.

 

Supporters of Hamas had for some time been telling Hamas leaders they must fight Fatah, the security forces and thuggish Fatah linked gangs co-oped to trash property and provoke civil war. But Hamas refused saying ‘We will not fight our brothers’. They insisted talking must be the way to solve problems. Hamas has been slow to see that ‘our brothers’, though Palestinians, are, in reality, the enemy.

 

At the same time Hamas accused unnamed Arab states of being part of a conspiracy to destroy Hamas and end its tenure in government. This would have been a reference to Egypt and Jordan, both of whom want the Hamas government toppled. This was confirmed to me by a Gaza journalist during phone conversations.

 

Some time later, September 30, Israel’s Y Net news and the London based al-Quds al-Arabi reported a secret meeting in Jordan between intelligence heads of Egypt, Jordan, unnamed Gulf states, and Shin Bet head, Yuval Diskin. Mahmoud Abbas, also present, held talks with Diskin. The delegates at the meeting demanded Hamas ‘recognise Israel’s right to exist’ as a precondition to forming a unity government with Fatah. They wanted Abbas to oppose a Hamas premiership, remove Ismail Haniyeh from the position and appoint a technocrat.

 

Egypt and Jordan wanted the Hamas government toppled. Jordan said it will advise Abbas on legal means to topple the Hamas government. Abbas, most probably helped along by his talks with Diskin, called for a boycott of Khalid Mashaal, Hamas political leader living in Syria. Presumably, this could be seen as encouragement to Israel, and others, to assassinate Mashaal. Israel, which failed in a previous attempt, has recently threatened to do so. When Hamas issued its June statement it called on the Palestinians to thwart any attempt to trigger civil war.

 

All this took place at the same time as Hamas and Fatah, according to reports, were close to agreement on ending their dispute. On June 17, PM Ismail Haniya said “The dialogue has achieved significant results. I expect an agreement within the next few days”. Haniya also said that the referendum would not proceed. In fact, by June 24 the two sides had united around joint Hamas/Fatah proposals based on the prisoner’s document, even though it implied acceptance of Israel as a permanently existing Jewish state. Khalad Mashaal, previously opposed, was ready to give his approval. On June 24, Israel abducted two Gaza civilians, a doctor and his brother.

 

On June 25 Palestinians from Gaza captured Gilat Shalit. And, as the saying goes, the rest is history.

 

THE AFTERMATH

 

Israel’s leaders now had the excuse they wanted to attack Gaza, in an all-out Jenin style war, and destroy any hope of peace. Then Danny Rubenstein, well known Israeli commentator, put the kybosh on any chance of Hamas in the short term, agreeing to recognition of Israel. Rubenstein explained his government’s view of things: “It is best that the Palestinians remain extremists because then no one will ask the government of Israel to negotiate with them. How do we ensure that the Palestinians remain radicle? We simply strike at them, over and over”.

 

Khalid Mashaal rejected the Hamas/Fatah unity plan adopted as a common political platform on June 27. Ismail Haniya changed his position and ended further talks on the prospect of peace negotiations. However, the two groups continued to talk on ways to end the economic crisis, which led to further talks on unity government. Israeli tanks and armoured bulldozers entered Gaza on June 27.

 

Israeli aircraft bombed 3 bridges and the only power station—its 7 generators were deliberately and systematically hit one after the other. Over one million people were without proper access to clean drinking water. The estimated cost of power grid damage is $1.8bn and is unlikely to be repaired before next year.

 

Israeli warplanes made more than 260 strikes on Gaza. In these strikes the foreign and information ministry buildings and the Islamic University have been destroyed or badly damaged. More than 150 structures including houses, workshops, shops, factories and greenhouses have been destroyed, with more than 160 damaged. Orchards, apple, plum and cherry, have been bombed as well as 1,000 year old olive groves.

 

More than 300 Palestinians have been killed, one-third are children, and by Sept. 8, 26 women had been killed. By this date 1,200 Palestinians had been injured with over 60 amputees. Hospitals have run out of drugs and materials needed to treat the casualties.

 

The Israeli human rights group B’Tselem said 76 Palestinians including 19 children were killed by Israeli forces in August alone.

 

On September 11 Mahmoud Abbas and PM Ismail Haniyeh announced that their two parties would form a co-alition government. Abbas invited Palestinian media to hear the announcement. Abbas did not give details of the agreement, but said: “The continuous efforts to form a national unity government have ended successfully. Efforts in the next few days will complete the formation of the national unity government”. Haniyeh said he would retain his post. Hamas officials said the agreement was not a direct recognition of Israel. But elements of the platform—including acceptance of the Arab plan for a comprehensive Middle East peace agreement—suggest recognition of the Jewish state.

 

All expressed hope that the move would ease the crippling sanctions. There was no comment from the US consulate in Jerusalem from where the US Consul Jacob (Jake) Walles had been indicating to the smaller parties the US view that their best interests lay in not joining a unity government with Hamas. Israel rejected the plan as it would require a complete withdrawal from territories occupied in the 1967 war.

 

Soon after the two parties made their announcement Mahmoud Abbas announced he would visit Washington. Presumably his master summoned him. Officials said he would meet president Bush and attend a UN meeting. One week later, September 18, Abbas was reported by Reuters as having ‘frozen’ talks with Hamas on a unity government. Hamas said it was “unaware of this”. An Abbas aid, Ahmad Abdel-Rahman said the matter was frozen until Abbas returned from America. He and other Abbas aids then blamed Hamas, saying, “At a time when President Abbas is trying to market the unity government program to international envoys Haniyeh and Hamas officials say they are not committed to past peace agreements”.

 

This resulted from an answer Haniyeh gave to a question put to him, after Abbas left for the US. In his reply Haniyeh said the Prisoner’s Document on which the unity government was based, “did not recognise the occupation nor accepts existing peace deals”. This is true. Also, Hamas has always said that these issues ‘will be dealt with in the way that serves the interests of the Palestinian people’. However, Abbas had been selling the unity deal in Washington, and at the UN, by saying the new government would “honour” past peace agreements.

 

So, after the whole thing fell apart, Abbas and Fatah latched onto the Hamas answer as the reason. When, in reality, the REAL reason was Israel’s refusal to accept the plan. And, Israel refused because it has no intention of returning to the 1967 borders.

 

Since then, and after Abbas’s return, things have gone from bad to worse. On October 1, the Jerusalem Post had a headline: ‘Abbas Planning Coup Against Hamas’. The Post reported that on September 30 Hamas officials had accused PA chairman, Mahmoud Abbas, of planning a coup against the Hamas led government by sending thousands of PA policeman to riot in the Gaza Strip.

 

Hamas had warned that Abbas’s plot could ignite a bloody civil war, which was what Fatah hoped to provoke. On September30 thousands of PA police, many from the reconstituted PS force, rioted on the streets, shooting in the air, trashing government buildings and public property. They burnt tyres and shouted “we want salaries”. The rioters were from branches of the PA security forces loyal to Abbas. They were joined by several hundred Fatah gunmen.

 

During their rampage in Gaza they tried to assassinate a Hamas lawmaker, kidnapped a Hamas finance ministry official, burnt his car and stoned a car in which the culture minister was travelling. The rioting began in Gaza, and spread to the West Bank where Fatah ‘protestors’ set government buildings on fire, destroyed documents, threw furniture into the street, trashed the offices of a Hamas newspaper, attacked a Hamas women’s center and shot dead a prominent Hamas member as he left a mosque.

 

Television pictures were reminiscent of the Israeli sacking of Jenin and Nablus in 2002. The Al Aqsa Martyrs brigade, an armed military wing of Fatah, twice threatened to assassinate Hamas leaders including chief political leader Khaled Mashaal. The Al Aqsa Martyrs and Islamic Jihad are responsible for all suicide bombings inside Israel in the past two years. They have carried out more suicide bombings than Hamas. Yet Hamas gets the ‘terrorist’ tag. Their group has fired most of the rockets fired into Israel.

 

Hamas sees the protests and accompanying riots as an attempt by Abbas and Fatah to stage a coup, with aid from Israel and the US. These so called protestors, Fatah loyalists, are trying to create chaos and anarchy so that Abbas, by ‘presidential decree’, can dissolve the government and call new elections, which would be rigged in favour of Fatah. Hamas issued a statement that said, in part, “The riots by the so called policemen are part of an organised criminal campaign to trigger civil war and destroy our national institutions and achievements”. It referred to “acts of sabotage” And, “This is part of a plot concocted by the friends of Israel and the US to bring down the Palestinian government at any cost. These saboteurs are serving the interests of foreign and hostile parties. They act against their own people”.

 

Senior Hamas leaders added their voices in support. Mousa Abu Marzouk, living in Syria, said Abbas had rejected offers of mediation by Qatar and other Arab states. Muhammad Nazzal said Abbas had “backtracked on the agreement over the formation of a unity government after he came under heavy pressure from the US”.

 

Abbas, he said, “told the Hamas leadership that the US would not accept a unity government on the basis of the prisoner’s plan because it does not explicitly recognise Israel”. Hamas, which had lost the struggle to control the security services to Fatah, sent its own security force onto the streets to stop the rioting.

 

The PA security forces were normally under the control of the interior ministry, which was now headed by a Hamas minister. The appointment of thousands of men loyal to Abbas to the security forces made it unlikely that he and his Fatah party would relinquish control. Such a huge force under Fatah control was Abbas’s not so secret weapon, if and when it came to confrontation with Hamas.

 

Over 3,000 Hamas security personnel were sent onto the streets to disperse the rioters. They ordered an end to demonstrations and the destruction of property. As was inevitable clashes erupted between those from Hamas and security forces loyal to Abbas. Three days of bloody fighting left 10 dead and 100 wounded. The battles continued despite calls from PM Haniyia and Abbaz for an end to fighting.

 

Hamas withdrew its people to their usual positions on the third day, in response to Haniyia and Abbas’s calls for an end to fighting. After Hamas lost the power struggle for control of security forces it set up its own security force, they answer to the interior minister. Though there have been sporadic clashes between the two there has not been anything like these three days. Hamas spokesman Ghazi Hamad, said the violence was “regrettable” but the Hamas force was acting with restraint when it was attacked. They had to protect themselves. He said: “The protest today (second day) was beyond acceptable legal norms and turned truly into lawlessness”. Abbas condemned the fighting saying: “These confrontations have crossed the red line which we have avoided crossing for four decades”.

 

Haniyeh said “I appeal to all citizens …to abandon their differences, especially in the time we are facing an escalation by the occupation forces…” Abbas in an interview on Al-Jazeera, said he was ready to resume talks on forming a unity government to avoid crossing the “red line” into civil war. He said “I as president have the right to form or dissolve the government at any time, but I say we should exert every effort to form a unity government”.

 

But, in fact, he was exerting every effort to dissolve/dismiss the government. Behind the scenes the two sides had continued their negotiations to form a unity government but there had been little progress. A senior Hamas official, Osama Hamdan, told a press conference that Fatah was declaring that talks had failed because it wants them to fail. On the first day of the riots Abbas flew to Kuwait, then on to visit Arab leaders to gain support for dismissal of the Hamas led government.

 

Abbas claimed that his position as president gave him that power. But this is not so. The Palestinian constitution was designed to limit the power of the president. Arafat’s dictatorial presidency resulted in pressure from the US and EU to curb presidential powers, when the constitution was drafted. A majority of legislative council votes is necessary before such action can be taken. It cannot be done unilaterally.

 

THE STRATEGY TO ELIMINATE HAMAS

 

What has been taking place is part of a planned strategy to end the Hamas government and replace it with a Fatah majority government. The claims made by Hamas that accuse Abbas, and others, of plotting the removal of its government are not unsupported. Articles in the Israeli press and elsewhere, give enough detail to leave no doubt as to what is going on.

 

Abbas and Fatah believe that by creating chaos and preventing proper governance, they, with backing from Israel, the US and Arab states, can create conditions for staging a coup. Or, by making it impossible for Hamas to govern there will be pressure on Abbas, from outside, and inside, to dismiss the government and call elections. Their activities are also directed at placing the blame for the present situation on Hamas.

 

Hamas’s refusal to comply with the three requirements has hamstrung the president, they say. Thus, there is no progress towards peace or a two state solution. They say, they can do what Hamas cannot do: that is change the dire situation by getting the banns lifted, Israel to hand over taxes, the money from the US and EU flowing again, salaries paid and people working. To do this they must convince Palestinians that Hamas is to blame for their problems.

 

The majority of Palestinians whether Hamas or Fatah supporters know this is not true. But when people living in poverty are unable to feed their children, quite apart from the daily killing by Israeli rockets and bombs, they will grasp at any hope offered.

 

The lawlessness that accompanied the so called ‘protests’ began on the eve of Condoleezza Rice’s visit. It is interesting that the front men were all security men loyal to Abbas and members of Abbas’ elite bodyguard. The ‘protesters’ calling for salaries to be paid such as those recently recruited security personnel, recruited outside the legal limits were, in fact, not entitled to be paid.

 

Rice was preceded by a report in Haaretz, Oct. 1, which said she would propose ‘creative means’ to strengthen Abbas and weaken Hamas. Among these creative means was shoring up the presidential regime, strengthening security forces loyal to Abbas and finding ways to improve the economic situation so that credit went to Abbas. In the midst of Rice’s visit the Fatah faction organised a strike that closed offices, shops and schools. This was meant to be a show of strength.

 

The Hamas led cabinet was forced to close its ministries after two were attacked. Rice and Israeli PM Ehud Olmert met on October 4. According to the Jerusalem Post (Oct. 5) Olmert told Rice that he was interested in strengthening PA President Mahmoud Abbas, against Hamas. Other strategies discussed included persuading Russia to step away from its support for Hamas. Originally Russia had supported Hamas. A Hamas delegation was invited to visit Russia. Russia told the Quartet that Hamas should be accepted, and given a chance to show what it could do. But it seems Rice’s visit to Russia, after leaving Israel, also carried a message persuasive enough to convince Russia not to break ranks.

 

On Oct.4, Rice met with Abbas who told her that there would be no more negotiations on a unity government, and that he would take steps to fire the Hamas led government unless it agreed to accept the three conditions. PA officials told the Jerusalem Post Rice had expressed Washington’s full support for the president and his Fatah party, in their confrontation with Hamas.

 

A top Abbas aid told the Post, “President Abbas made it clear to Rice that he will give Hamas one last chance to comply with the conditions of the Quartet….If Hamas does not accept…the president will fire the government and establish a new one”. Another senior PA official told the Post Abbas was “satisfied” with his talks with Rice, he said the US administration had promised its full backing for any move aimed at overthrowing the Hamas led government.

 

After the meeting Rice told reporters that Abbas had the support of not only the US but the entire international community and many Arab states. Standing beside Rice, Abbas said formation of a unity government depended on abiding by agreements signed with Israel. “If this does not happen then all options are open for forming a new Palestinian government”.

 

On the same day Abbas told the visiting Bahraini Foreign minister, who had offered to mediate between Hamas and Fatah, that he had frozen contacts with Hamas. “There is no dialogue now”, he said. He also said there would be “no more negotiations on a unity government”. Just prior to Rice’s visit Abbas had requested a further supply of arms from the US. On Oct.5, Arutz Sheva-IsraelNationalnews.com gave details of the US plan to improve Abbas’s security. It said the plan to intensify security around Mahmoud Abbas includes special training for his presidential guard, Force 17.

 

A later report in the Israeli press said that this force, and others close to Abbas, would be trained by Israel and the US. A week later Hamas accused Fatah of foiling efforts by Qatar’s foreign Minister to broker formation of a unity government. Hamas said it was committed to a unity government but Fatah, with outside help, was determined to overturn the result of the elections. Hamas said “We welcomed the Qatari mediation. We were surprised when Abu Mazen (Abbas), and his team, said that the agreement was linked to US backing for it” (Haaretz Oct 12). SO, WHERE TO NOW? Hamas spokesman Osama Hamdan said: “They don’t want a unity government, since (US Pres. George W.) Bush told them this. This team’s (Fatah) final objective is to overturn the choice of our people by any means and to implement a program that…serves America’s vision of the New Middle East”.

 

This, unfortunately, is all too true. The facts are there. The ‘creative means” Rice discussed with Olmert were not new. They were old style dirty tricks, arming one side against the other, coups, sanctions and covert backing for a long time asset to create unrest on the ground. Muhammad Dahlan, the man behind Abbas, the eminence grise, ex-head of PS forces in Gaza, a favourite of the Americans is behind the protests and unlawful acts intended to bring chaos to the Gaza Strip. This in turn, it is planned, will bring down Hamas.

 

Dahlan, a feudal overlord, sees Gaza as his fiefdom. He was once a most powerful man in the PA line-up, and he was the White House choice to replace Arafat. His links to the CIA are long standing. A relationship he formed during the days of CIA training for his role as head of PSF in Gaza is still maintained. And there are those who believe he still passes on information to the CIA. He also had links with Israeli security with whom he worked closely. Some Israeli press reports say Dahlan is a person the Israelis can work with. Dahlan built a small empire for himself in Gaza during his PSF days. He accumulated great personal wealth by doing deals with Israeli businessmen. He entered into partnerships with Israeli business interests in monopolies supplying essential products to the PA.

 

These monopolies, especially gasoline and cement were very lucrative and PSF men working for Dahlan did very well. Using the same tools of patronage and cronyism used by Arafat, he built himself a power base, with his men much like a private army, able to be called out on call. Muhammad Dahlan’s business interests are extensive, apart from a monopoly on gasoline entering Gaza he has interests in the construction business, the import of gravel and other products and a range of investments. There was much comment when he paid US$5 million for the largest of the old original family homes in Gaza. This was at a time when many Palestinians were jobless and poverty stricken. Dahlan is hated by many in Gaza.

 

Many see his close cooperation with the US and Israel as collusion with the enemy. While head of PS he was accused by international human rights organizations of serious abuses, including torture. Abbas is supported by Dahlan who transferred his allegiance after falling out with Arafat. In June 2002 he resigned from his position as PS chief. In 2003 after Abbas became Prime Minister he gave Dahlan the job of interior minister, a job he wanted. Their working together is for the mutual benefit of both.

 

There is infighting within Fatah where the factions are manoeuvreing for superiority. Abbas, unlike Arafat, cannot hold them together. He needs someone like Dahlan and Dahlan benefits from working through the cover of Abbas. On October 24, Dahlan emerged from behind the scenes to call on Abbas to use his constitutional powers to resolve the crisis with Hamas. He said, “Hamas actions are leading us to civil war. We call on President Abbas to assume his responsibilities and take decisive measures to end the crisis”.

 

On the same day, the Jerusalem Post reported Palestinian ‘sources’ as saying “Fatah was preparing for a major showdown with Hamas in the Gaza Strip..” And, “Chairman, Mahmoud Abbas had instructed his Fatah loyalists and the security forces to prepare for “a major security operation”. Sources said, “thousands of policeman and Fatah gunmen will be deployed in the streets”. The Post reported that Abbas, who was in Jordan to talk with King Abdullah, was under intense pressure from his Fatah party leaders some of whom were urging him to stage a coup against Hamas.

 

The Post reported that Egypt and Qatar were pressuring Hamas to agree to Abbas’s plan to form a government of technocrats. In the same report the Post said that Egypt, Qatar and Jordan had warned the Palestinians that Israel was preparing a massive military operation in the Gaza Strip. Two days ago Nov.1, Israel mounted a huge military operation around Beit Hanoun in the north of the Gaza Strip. T

 

he ‘massive military operation’ had begun. The Palestinians were expecting it. A major expansion of Israeli occupying forces (IOF) operations in Gaza had been reported in the Israeli press for some time. When it began it was announced as: “to stop the firing of rockets into Sderot” and “gain release of Shalit”. As these pretexts were given when the so called ‘Operation Summer Rain’ began on June 27, it seems it was felt necessary to add further claims to justify the huge escalation.

 

The added pretexts were vastly exaggerated claims of arms smuggling and tunnels from Gaza into Egypt. None of this had any bearing on the military operation. A Jenin style operation had been planned back in the Sharon days (see above). It had merely been postponed. Israeli’s military, as Tanya Reinhart and Ilan Pape said, were not interested in Shalit or the crude rockets.

 

Their mission is to level Gaza and eliminate Hamas. In fact, Sharon discussed the elimination of Hamas with Bush during a White house visit, after 9/11. Using the ‘we are both fighting the ‘war on terror’ strategy he pointed to Hamas as ‘our terrorists’. Bush added Hamas to the list of ‘terrorist’ organizations and the stride towards genocide in Gaza was underway.

 

THE ASSAULT ON GAZA: ‘OPERATION AUTUMN CLOUDS’: NOVEMBER 1

 

In four days 48 Palestinians had been killed and 160 wounded. People were killed in all areas of the Gaza Strip. Beit Hanoun, which was re-occupied and surrounded by Israeli tanks and bulldozers, bore the brunt of the attacks.

 

Israel claims rockets are launched from here. But Jabaliya, Raffah, Gaza City and Beach Camp have been attacked. Rockets have not been fired from any of these areas, the crude homemade rockets, would be incapable of reaching Israel from these. Yet, if questioned, Israeli spokespersons repeat the ‘firing rockets’ mantra. On the third day of increasing carnage two women were killed and three critically wounded. The women were deliberately targeted when they peacefully demonstrated in support of men who had taken shelter in a mosque. The women braved Israeli tanks, and snipers, in a daring rescue. One woman said “We risked our lives to free our sons”. A Palestinian journalist was shot and seriously wounded as he filmed the protest.

 

Mahmoud Abbas who condemned Israel’s operation as ‘a massacre’ called on the UN Sec. Council to convene to discuss the issue. He also called the head of the Arab League, Amr Musa, to ‘initiate a meeting’ of the league to discuss the Israeli aggression against the Palestinians in Gaza.

 

Ismail Haniyeh called the operation a ‘slaughter approved at the highest Israeli level’. He called on the interna- tional community to intervene and stop the Israeli operation. He expressed astonishment at the global silence over Israel’s military operations of the past three days. “I call on everyone to carry the responsibility for the killing of women, children and elderly. I call on anyone who calls on us to make concessions to take a good look at what is happening here, to witness how Israel is daily massacring the Palestinian people”, he said. They could have saved their breath.

 

The only response was deathly silence. As the carnage continued John Ging, the Gaza director of UNRWA, said “this has to stop”. He told reporters the situation was “desperate”. And, “Death, destruction and despair are the terms to describe the situation”.

 

On the fifth day of carnage two paramedics were killed while trying to attend a casualty. The ICRC issued a strong statement criticising Israel and saying the paramedics and their vehicle was clearly marked. Israel said its attacks are focused on militants who fire rockets. But on the same day Israeli snipers killed a four year old girl, a seven year old boy and a seventy year old man who went onto his balcony to bring in his wheelchair bound son.

 

Finally, on the fifth day, as the death toll rose, the Pope, the EU and the UN voiced concerns about the operation. The Pope called on Palestinians and Israelis to end the bloodshed. The bloodshed was all on one side but, at least, he found his voice.

 

The EU voiced a similar plea, but went a step further, accusing Israel of acting against international law. And, “The right of states to defend themselves does not justify disproportionate use of violence”. But, as usual, Israel’s backer, the US, said, ‘Israel had a right to defend itself’. Israel’s PM Ehud Olmert, as usual, ignored the calls to end the operation, saying “We will continue until our goals have been achieved”. But on the on the fifth day of the operation 6 rockets were fired into Israel from the heavily surrounded, locked down Beit Hanoun outskirts.

 

Overnight on day six Israel removed its cordon of tanks laying siege to Beit Hanoun. The toll by then was 68 dead and more than 200 wounded in Beit Hanoun alone. As well, the hospital, which had been under siege, was without medical supplies, the town was without water and food desperately short. A military spokesman said “We withdrew our forces after having completed our mission”.

 

On day seven residents surveyed the destruction. One Palestinian resident, a police officer, said “The Israeli army has brought destruction into every single street and nearly every single house. This is the tsunami of Beit Hanoun”. An AFP reporter said, “Roads were gouged out. Homes, two mosques and a school were destroyed. The historic old town was pockmarked with bullet holes and shell craters, electricity pylons ripped from the ground and sewage spewing into the streets.

 

Residents picking their way through the wreckage mourned their “martyrs”, eyes red with fatigue, filled with hate and tears”. AFP photos show Palestinians among the rubble of their destroyed homes. What happened in Beit Hanoun is a re-run of what happened in Jenin and Nablus in the West Bank. But the military have not pulled out of Gaza, they have redeployed to another area where the carnage and destruction continue.

 

There can be little doubt that the ‘Autumn Clouds’ that opened to drench Gaza in further death, destruction and misery was the planned, and foreseen, Jenin style assault the army had pushed for.

 

Palestinians always knew Israel’s redeployment, and removal of the settlers in 2005, just made it easier, and less costly, for Israel to imprison and control them. Israel’s infrastructure minister, Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, in early October told the Egyptians that Israel would soon escalate its operations against Gaza in a full-scale assault to eliminate Hamas. He also said that Israel would assassinate Hamas members.

 

Israeli politicians were quoted saying a pre-emptive strike on Hamas was necessary to stop it building a supply of weapons ‘like Hizbollah in Lebanon’. “What we are hearing from military officers is that they see the need for an operation,” a ‘senior Israeli source’ told The Washington Times (Oct 25).

 

On the ground the operation proceeded as the Israeli military planned. Systematic killing, a massive destruct- ion of homes and property as well as the razing of fruit and olive groves was only reported by the Arab press. Targeting Hamas members also went ahead as planned. Four Hamas members were killed in pre-dawn air strikes, another was shot by a sniper in Beit Hanoun. Hamas members have been targeted in their homes, in the street and in their cars, bringing a warning from the military wing. But no other concerns were expressed. Why would they be?

 

None have ever been expressed before. Until the sight of brave unarmed women facing Israel’s military might, flashed around the world, the so called international community remained mute. As Israel and its backer knew it would. It took the shooting of unarmed women and the shocking massacre of 19 people, mainly women and children, to galvanise outside power brokers to call a UN Sec. Council meeting. A draft resolution condemning Israel was, of course, vetoed by the US.

 

Twenty four hours after Israel pulled back its tanks and bulldozers, ringing Beit Hanoun, tank shells were fired into homes, before dawn, causing a massacre of residents in their beds. As well as the dead 60 were wounded. Israel, as usual, rushed to its own defense. Olmert ‘apologised’, as if that makes a vile act of slaughter alright.

 

Then of course the usual lies/spin to justify its actions. It was a “technical error”, “a mistake”, the shells overshot their mark, they were “aimed at persons firing rockets”. Like hell they were. Firing rockets in the pre-dawn hours? Where is the evidence? Where is the film/video footage to show this? Why did no reporter ask for evidence? As a result the various factions, including Hamas’ armed wing, threatened retribution. If they do retaliate who could blame them?

 

The carnage did not stop Israeli politicians as Ephraim Sneh pushing for “a broad offensive in Gaza”. It is worth noting that in September Ilan Pappe wrote an article ‘Genocide In Gaza’ in which he said “Ever since the abduction the massive killing increased and became systematic.

 

A daily business of slaying Palestinians, mainly children is now reported in the internal pages of the local press, quite often in microscopic fonts”.

 

The Arab League finally decided enough is enough. Provoked and angered by the US veto, a hastily convened meeting in Cairo condemned the US stance and said the US had given the ‘green light to Israel’ to continue its attacks on the Palestinians. The Arab states decided that money must be given to the Palestinian government so that it can govern and carry out reconstruction. They said the Arab banks must release the money and they would “break the blockade”. Kuwait said it would pay half the sum required for Beit Hanoun reconstruction, estimated at $US50 million. It is to be hoped that they stick to this, making words equal deeds.

 

In a Guardian article (Nov.9), We Overcame Our Fear, Jameela al-Shanti an elected Hamas member of the Palestinian Legislative Council writes: “The unarmed women of the Gaza Strip have taken the lead in resisting Israel’s latest bloody assault”. “Yesterday at dawn, the Israeli air force bombed and destroyed my home. I was the target, but instead the attack killed my sister-in-law, Nahia, a widow with eight children…” She goes on “In the same raid Israel’s artillery shelled a residential district in the town of Beit Hanoun…”

 

The article gives details of the “massacre” and of raids on homes by Israeli soldiers, handcuffing and taking away all males over 15, of families shut in their homes while “snipers positioned on roofs shot at everything that moved”. This poignant, telling article, a must read, can be found at: http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article6003.shtml One telling passage reads: “But as though the occupation and collective punishment were not enough, we Palestinians find ourselves the targets of a systematic siege imposed by the so called free world. We are being starved and suffocated as a punishment for daring to exercise our democratic right to choose who rules and represents us. Nothing undermines the west’s claims to defend freedom and democracy more than what is happening in Palestine”.

 

Meanwhile talks on a unity government had recommenced. Talks focused on forming a government that could end the crippling sanctions. The discussion centred on a government of technocrats not tied to either Hamas or Fatah. Hamas would appoint 8-12 government ministers, Fatah, a lesser number and the smaller parties one each. This is not what the Palestinians voted for but is a way of covertly easing Hamas out of government. If successful, Abbas, Dahlan and the other plotters see it as a way of avoiding a backlash that would inevitably follow a coup.

 

While the talks were in progress representatives of Israel and Hamas met in London to discuss a position for negotiations with Hamas. The Israelis noted the necessity to engage in dialogue with Hamas. Hamas representat- ives proposed “a truce (hudna) of 10, 20 or 30 years” (to be negotiated) in lieu of recognition of Israel. This would allow a period of calm in which there would be an end to occupation and settlement of all outstanding issues.

 

As noted above the hudna proposal is not new. Sheik Ahmed Yassin first offered Israel this option. Just days afterwards he was assassinated. As Israel has always responded negatively to all proposals for peace and stability there can be no expectation that this will be any different.

 

Israel does not want peace, it wants Palestine. As long as Israel can count on its powerful backer it will not face the fact that there must be dialogue with Hamas. Israel must learn that its tanks will not force recognition by Hamas so a truce, of some duration, is a good option.

 

On Nov.13 Hamas and Fatah announced that Dr Mohammed Shabir, a US educated university professor was their choice to head a Palestinian unity government. Israel’s reaction, expressed by Olmert and foreign minister Tzipi Livni was not positive. Carping comments as “The issue is not who is sitting in the government but what the government says”, from Livni. If that is the issue why did they begin bombing and rocketing Gaza immediately after the elections, before Hamas said anything?

 

However, the Palestinians made their wishes quite clear. Palestinian sources told the press that setting up a government of technocrats depended on the US lifting economic sanctions on the PA. As well, Israel must release the imprisoned Hamas cabinet ministers and MP’s as part of a deal for the release of Gilad Shalit, which Israel has stubbornly refused to do. On Nov.17, Spain announced it would support the Palestinian unity government and with Italy and France would present a peace plan, with a view to ending the economic embargo. Prior to this, Nov.15, Qatar’s emir criticised Western countries for their attitude toward the Hamas led Palestinian government. Sheik Hamad bin Kalifa Al-Thani told the European Parliament “instead of rewarding the Palestinian people for practicing democ- racy, something rarely witnessed in our region, they have been punished for it with an international embargo”.

 

The shocking events of last week, which at least for a time, put the spotlight on Gaza and the vile slaughter of people who had nothing to do with firing rockets, will not bring peace to Gaza. The world outrage has already subsided. This is what Israeli spin artists count on. They know that if they go on the offensive, ride it out, it will be over in a week. But for the Palestinians it is not over.

 

Despite the outcry and the flurry of support, the Bush administration is pursuing a course towards another war. George W Bush has pressed ahead with arming Fatah. Quantities of arms, principally thousands of rifles have been sent to Fatah from Egypt and Jordan at Bush’s request. Bush has used Olmert’s visit to the US to persuade him to allow the armed pro-Fatah Badr brigade, based in Jordan, to cross into the West Bank and Gaza.

 

The Badr brigade was formed in the 70’s from PLO Palestinians in Jordan. To-day they are trained and equipped by the Jordanian military, to a high military standard, as part of Abdullah’s forces. Yuval Diskin, head of Israel’s domestic spy service, Shin Bett, told an Israeli parliamentary committee Fatah must be built up to neutralise the power of Hamas. He said unless Fatah was able to do this Israel must prepare for “a massive military operation in the Gaza Strip”. This, he said, was the reason Olmert agreed to Bush’s request that 1,500 members of the Badr brigade be brought in. For some time the Bush administration has been training forces loyal to Mahmoud Abbas.

 

Gen. Keith Dayton, sent to the territories as US security coordinator, is in Jericho, preparing Abbas’ forces for a confrontation with Hamas. Bush wanted Olmert to agree to allow the Badr brigade to enter the occupied territories so that Dayton can turn it into Abbas’s rapid reaction force in Gaza. As well, the UK timesonline (Nov 19) reports: “Ehud Olmert has ordered his security chiefs to target the Islamic movement’s political leadership”.

 

If these plans come to fruition the Palestinians face engineered civil war, more bloodshed, misery and chaos. Palestine’s young men, women and children will have to face the diabolical consequences alone, if the same lack of reaction to the bloody, cowardly assault by the “worlds most moral army” over past months is any guide.

 

AUTHOR’S NOTE: The purpose of this article was to present a case in rebuttal of claims made to Seymour Hersh, that originated from an Israeli source. The claims related to alleged Israeli “intercepted conversations” between Hamas’ leaders. And, to “signals intelligence” between Hamas, Syria and Hizbollah.(1). The Israel sourced claims, I believe, were bogus, and this view has since been supported by persons I have spoken to in Gaza. The claims were used to prepare the ground for the assault on Gaza and the elimination of Hamas. Shalit’s capture provided the pretext. Despite extreme provocation Hamas has stuck to its position, announced in Jan. 2005, that it would replace armed struggle with political struggle. Hamas has proved that it will keep its word. Only after the horror of Beit Hanoun, did the military wing, for the first time, join forces with Islamic Jihad and launch rockets from Gaza. Those I speak to in Gaza tell me that Hamas has not lost its popular support, far from it. Palestinians know that for the first time they have leaders who will represent their interests, not their own and those of Israel. http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/060821fa_fact

 

JANE HOWARTH corunna@hotmail.com

(August 06/Nov. 06)

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