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A Second Look: Just Foreign Policy News, January 9, 2008

Jan 10th, 2009
by Tom.
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Just Foreign Policy wrote:

Just Foreign Policy News, January 9, 2008


From: Just Foreign Policy [info@justforeignpolicy.org]
Sent: Friday, January 09, 2009 4:09 PM
To: Tom Chambless
Subject: Just Foreign Policy News, January 9, 2008
Israel and Hamas rebuffed a UN call for a cease-fire in the Gaza war, the New York Times reports. Gaza health officials said that the overall death toll passed 784 on Friday, according to Reuters, with women and children making up about 40 percent of the dead. The Israeli death toll reached 13, including ten soldiers and three civilians.

Hamas militants preparing rockets

Can anyone besides myself see anything wrong with this situation? All those rockets from Hamas that are reportedly causing such havoc and they have only managed to kill 3? And then here comes the mighty Israeli Army killing civilians by the score. Is there anyone else out there who sees anything wrong here ?

Sources close to the Obama transition team say the incoming administration is prepared to abandon Bush’s doctrine of isolating Hamas by establishing a channel to the Islamist organization, the Guardian reports. There is no talk of Obama approving direct diplomatic negotiations with Hamas early on, but he is being urged by advisers to initiate low-level or clandestine approaches, and there is growing recognition in Washington that the policy of ostracising Hamas is counter-productive, the Guardian says. Richard Haass, who was named by news organisations as Obama’s choice for Middle East envoy, supports low-level contacts with Hamas provided there is a ceasefire in place and a Hamas-Fatah reconciliation emerges.

Okay. What about this instead: “the incoming administration is prepared to abandon all of Bush’s doctrines”. Better? I thought so.

It is about high time that we begin talks with Hamas. The meme about “we don’t negotiate with terrorists” is just a right-wing talking point and absolutely untrue. During a bank robbery/hostage situation, who’s the first guy the cops call? The negotiator.

In this case, Israel might be better suited if our negotiator settles the issues with Fatah v. Hamas first. Israel should withdraw back to its borders to enable the negotiations to happen, then plans should be made for a new election.

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A Second Look: No Military Solution In Gaza

Jan 9th, 2009
by Tom.
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The Progress Report wrote:

No Military Solution In Gaza


From: The Progress Report [progress@americanprogressaction.org]
Sent: Friday, January 09, 2009 9:03 AM
To: tomc2322
Subject: No Military Solution In Gaza

A HUMANITARIAN IMPLOSION: Even before the current round of fighting, the situation in Gaza was dire. In Nov. 2007, Oxfam International reported “an increasing risk to public health in Gaza as water and sanitation services begin to buckle under the strain of Israel’s restrictions on fuel, vital maintenance goods and spare parts into Gaza.” The situation for 1.5 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip is worse now than it has ever been since the start of the Israeli military occupation in 1967. In March 2008, a coalition of humanitarian organizations released a report entitled The Gaza Strip: A Humanitarian Implosion. The report stated that “the current situation in Gaza is man-made, completely avoidable and, with the necessary political will, can also be reversed.” In a January 2008 interview with Middle East Progress, Nidal al-Mughrabi, Reuters senior correspondent in the Gaza Strip, said “the sanctions have led to more radicalism in the Strip. Hamas and other religious movements have used this environment and the pressure to their advantage. Instead of lobbying the people against Hamas, Israel, and the United States are moving the people behind Hamas.”

THE NEED FOR A LASTING RESOLUTION: There is a desperate need for a sustainable cease-fire agreement that provides both for Israeli security and takes significant steps toward ameliorating the condition of Palestinian civilians, possibly by re-opening Gaza crossings under international monitoring. As Center for American Progress Senior Fellows Mara Rudman and Brian Katulis presciently wrote in 2007, the strategy of “isolating Gaza puts Israel, Egypt, and the region at greater risk and ignores an international obligation to the 1.4 million people living in a small enclosed area of 360 square kilometers (25 miles long, six miles wide), who did not choose this fate, regardless of how they may have voted in the 2006 elections.” The Middle East has changed in significant ways since 2000, but the events of last several weeks once again show the need for greater U.S. engagement, along with international community and regional partners, to support and empower Israelis and Palestinians to finally reach something more than just a temporary truce.

George BushThe Center for American Progress is perhaps the foremost liberal think tank, but I disagree with the philosophy that the fighting cannot stop until a “lasting resolution” is reached. The biggest problem I have with this premise is that it is centrist and supports George W. Bush’s justification for the invasion.

The humanitarian crises should override the need for a long standing political solution. The humanitarian needs far outweigh ideology. Sanctions have never worked. Ever. The only thing sanctions test is how fast a population can starve.

,,,,,

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A Second Look at Gaza Talks In Cairo Thursday UPDATES, VIDEO

Jan 7th, 2009
by Tom.
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via Gaza Talks In Cairo Thursday UPDATES, VIDEO.

Scroll down for video, photos

CHEERS!!!!

UPDATE: 1/7 5:30 pm

Israel, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority will meet Thursday to negotiate a cease-fire plan, reports the AP.

UNITED NATIONS — Egypt’s U.N. ambassador says representatives of Israel, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas have agreed to meet Thursday for talks in Cairo on the Gaza crisis.

Ambassador Maged Abdelaziz says all the parties agreed to send technical delegations to discuss an Egyptian-French initiative to end the fighting in Gaza.

Details of the plan aren’t clear, but the initiative calls for a limited cease-fire in the Israeli-Hamas fighting to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza.

UPDATE: 1/7 3 pm

Israel increased its anti-tunnel operation on Wednesday night and captured 120 suspected Hamas fighters, the Jerusalem Post reports.

Tunnel openings are frequently hidden inside houses and Palestinians reported that by 9 p.m., 30 homes had been destroyed. According to Channel 10, the army said that anti-tunnel operations would continue through the night.

Finally some adult supervision. But France and Egypt? It figures that the US, still under Bush, would want war to continue. It makes me want to puke. I don’t care who’s leading the talks, just so they are happening.

Watch this video. Warning, there’s some blood.


Watch CBS Videos Online

The AP reports that last year’s US-funded plan to disrupt the tunnels between Gaza and Egypt had little effect.

Yes. It goes on to speak of the huge efforts to stop the illegal smuggling of rockets from Egypt through the border tunnels. The article says that the tunnels they found in Gaza City are different tunnels than the border ones, that these are dug for the purpose of kidnapping Israeli soldiers.

They are dug by Hamas militants for military purpose.

This makes sensational news, but it doesn’t tell the whole story. I will not waiver from my position that the tunnels may have been originally designed for covert military missions, but were later put to practical use for humanitarian purposes. Our own Interstate Highway System was originally passed in Congress as part of a homeland defense act enabling our military to move from one coast/border to another with minimum delays, then used extensively for civilian needs. When you imprison people, then allow them to have shovels, well…..you’re going to have tunnels for whatever purpose.

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