Hamas: The Israeli government's sanctions are a "declaration of war"

Ehud Olmert announced on Wednesday that his government has decided to cut off fuel and electricity to the Gaza Strip - only allowing the flow of water to continue. In response to this contravention of the Fourth Geneva Conventions that address collective punishment, a Hamas spokesman said they considered this move a "declaration of war".

The UN secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, wasted no time in coming out and insisting that this move by the Israeli government violates international law but, considering the scores of UN resolutions that Israel has defied for decades, it's doubtful that it will suffer any consequences as a result.

Barak also said that Israel is moving closer to a large-scale military operation in Gaza. "Every day that passes brings us closer to an operation in Gaza," Barak was quoted as saying. He said an array of options would be considered before a major invasion.

The PMO statement also said that there would be restrictions on "the passage of various goods to the Gaza Strip," but stressed that all steps "will be enacted following a legal examination, while taking into account both the humanitarian aspects relevant to the Gaza Strip and the intention to avoid a humanitarian crisis."

The thing is that there is already a humanitarian crisis in Gaza. To state that you intend to look at your legal standing in imposing such crushing sanctions in order to avoid one is absolutely ludicrous.

Meanhwile, Condi Rice is in Israel for a 24-hour drive-by visit - no doubt to bring the White House's support for Olmert's actions while pretending to be concerned about the fate of the Palestinian people as the US government keeps funneling money to Abbas in the West Bank.

Israeli officials are promoting a proposal that the West Bank and Gaza be viewed as separate entities, and that Israel act more forcefully in Gaza to crack down on Hamas militants.

Senior Bush administration officials said no decision had been made. Some State Department officials argue that the administration could only support such a separation if Israel agreed to make political concessions to Mr. Abbas in the West Bank, with the goal of undermining Hamas in the eyes of Palestinians by improving life in the West Bank.

But it would be diplomatically perilous for the United States to be seen as turning its back on Gaza. Almost half of the Palestinian population lives on the teeming strip of land. A more desperate Gaza could become a breeding ground for Al Qaeda.

“Nobody wants to abandon the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people in the Gaza Strip to the mercies of a terrorist organization,” said the State Department spokesman, Sean McCormack. “We’re certainly not going to participate in extinguishing the hopes of a whole swath of the Palestinian population to live in a Palestinian state.”

The administration has led international efforts to isolate the Hamas-dominated government, demanding that it renounce violence, recognize Israel’s right to exist and abide by existing agreements between the Palestinians and Israel.

So, while state department spokespuppets like Sean McCormack say one thing, the Bush administration is doing the opposite by backing Olmert in this latest move. They are already actively participating in extinguishing those hopes by giving financial and military aid to the Israeli government.

Hollow words.

Needless to say, this is not the way to promote any kind of peace process, especially in the broader volatilities going on in the region with respect to Israel's relationships with Syria and Iran. Egypt also joined Syria today in calling for an IAEA resolution to have Israel's nuclear facilities inspected - a proposal, as the article states, that is brought up regularly by Arab states which has often been put off but which, this time, seems to be receiving more of push from those 2 countries. And Syria has every reason to be concerned after Israeli air strikes occurred within its borders just 2 weeks ago - a move finally confirmed by Netanyahu on Wednesday (although no reason for the strike has yet been given).

It seems Condi's cherished November "peace conference" meeting is in jeopardy as Abbas is now under pressure from Fatah not to attend if other Arab states like Syria are shut out of the meeting. The Saudis are also threatening to boycott the conference is it isn't expected to offer anything of substance. By the time November rolls around, it may just be Rice and Olmert playing footsies at the table while everyone else stays home.

They're even fighting over what to call the damn thing:

White House: Int'l Mideast meeting is not a big peace conference

By Aluf Benn, Barak Ravid and Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondents and The Associated Press

The White House said Tuesday the international meeting on the Middle East proposed by U.S. President George W. Bush should not be viewed as a big peace conference and it is too early to say where or when it will be.

However, the U.S. State Department said Tuesday that the meeting would most likely be held in the United States but the participants are still to be worked out.

White House spokesman Tony Snow at first described the meeting as an international conference, but several hours later he backed away from that portrayal as being too ambitious.

And let's play spot the contradiction yet again:

"This is a meeting," Snow said. "I think a lot of people are inclined to try to treat this as a big peace conference. It's not."

Announcing the meeting in a major policy speech Monday, Bush said it would be chaired by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and attended by envoys from Israel, the Palestinians and Arab nations. He framed the meeting in the context that the world can do more to build the conditions for peace.

Is it any wonder the Bush administration has been completely AWOL on the ME peace process? Let's face it: Bush's agenda is just to coast until he's done his term while passing this situation, along with Iraq and Afghanistan, to whoever wins the WH in '08. Neocons only know how to start wars, not end them. "Peace" is just a word in the dictionary between "paranoia" and "profits".

And it's clear that the Israeli government wants nothing to do with this talk of "peace":

On Tuesday, Israeli officials welcomed Bush's initiative for an international summit, but Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's spokeswoman Miri Eisin said that "this is not the time to discuss the key issues."

Eisin said the meeting would provide an opportunity to bring together all those who are truly interested in peace in the Middle East. However, she said it is too early to talk about full-fledged peace talks as long as Palestinian violence against Israel continues. A peace settlement would require agreement on such contentious issues as borders, the fate of millions of Palestinian refugees and the status of Israel's disputed capital Jerusalem.

"Israel has been very clear. We don't think at this stage you can talk about final status issues, but such a meeting would certainly add to the capability of arriving at the core issues," she said.

Around and around it goes as tensions between the countries in the region grow as a result of the neglect of any viable path to peace.

And I haven't even mentioned Iran, which has reportedly announced retaliation against Israel should its government attack or the assassination of an anti-Syrian lawmaker in Lebanon today.
 

Quote du Jour: IDF Forces Kill a 12 Year Old Palestinian Boy

Via Reuters:

A 12-year-old lay in the street, his arms twisted at odd angles, near a house in a Gaza City neighborhood where residents and medical workers said a shell fired by an Israeli tank exploded.

He was pronounced dead in a hospital along with two men, their bodies shredded by shrapnel. Residents said the men were civilians.

A military spokesman in Tel Aviv said a tank shell fired in Gaza City's Shejaia neighborhood was aimed at a gunman, and he had no information about a house being hit. [Oh, they just never do, do they? -catnip] Residents said tanks in the area later withdrew towards the Israeli frontier.

Two Israeli soldiers were wounded by an anti-tank missile during operations that Israel's deputy defense minister, Ephraim Sneh, described as "preventive measures" [pre-emptive strike, anyone? -catnip] to foil rocket attacks from Gaza.

And Abbas, who is now being funded by not only the US and Egypt, but by the Israeli government as well, released this canned statement:

Commenting on the raid, Abbas told reporters: "We strongly condemn these criminal acts, either in Gaza or the West Bank. We are against violence in all its forms and also we are against launching rockets (at Israel)."

And what about the fact that the IDF just killed 12 of your people, Abbas, including a 12 year old boy? Or is that just too sensitive for you to comment about now?
 

This is Just So Wrong

Via The Guardian:

Tony Blair has landed a major diplomatic job as the international Middle East peace envoy, responsible for preparing the Palestinians for negotiations with Israel. His role, to be announced today, will be largely to work with the Palestinians over security, economy and governance.

Working from an office in Jerusalem, and possibly another in the West Bank, Mr Blair will become the special representative for the Middle East quartet of UN, EU, US and Russia. The announcement comes on the eve of his departure from Downing Street tomorrow and is privately welcomed by Gordon Brown.
[...]
The idea of Mr Blair doing this job is understood to have originated with the prime minister himself in conversation with George Bush, who then suggested it to the UN. The UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, is said to be a keen supporter and Washington was reported last night to have mounted "an enormous push" to ensure Mr Blair got the post.

A man who lied his country into war with Iraq is thought to have enough integrity and dignity for such a post?

It was being stressed last night that Mr Blair's role - in the short term at least - would not be to act as a mediator between the Palestinians and the Israelis, or to become a negotiator for the road map to peace. He might, however, be responsible for trying to persuade the Palestinians to accept the conditions for ending the international boycott of Hamas. The now defunct Hamas government has not received any international aid since its election in March 2006, although aid has been sent directly to the poorest Palestinians through a temporary international mechanism.

The quartet says aid can only be conditional on the Palestinians accepting the right of Israel to exist and giving a commitment to exclusively peaceful means and to abide by all previous agreements.

Well, that all sounds quite lofty and simple but Charley Reese offers a realistic perspective on what life is like for the Palestinians while politicians pontificate:

Alas, President Bush discovered that he didn't like democracy after all. In his mind, democracy is only good if the election produces the results he wants it to produce. He immediately cut off aid and contact to the Palestinians, boycotted them and began a campaign to get other countries to withhold aid. These actions only harmed innocent Palestinian people. Since Hamas officials, unlike Fatah, were not in the habit of squandering public money on personal luxuries, the only people deprived by Bush's actions were ordinary people.

Now the president is pretending that the Fatah gunmen, whom he has been arming, were just sitting peacefully in the shade recently, trying their hand at knitting or crocheting, when all of the sudden those bad Hamas guys came up and started shooting. Regardless of Bush's lies, the truth is that Hamas fought back in self-defense. Between Fatah's gunmen and Israeli assassins, the Hamas guys must have felt like targets in a shooting gallery.

The Gaza Strip is a hellhole. It's a small patch of land, 41 kilometers long and about 6 to 12 kilometers wide. Its 360 square kilometers are crammed with 1.4 million Palestinians, about 1 million of them refugees from Israel's earlier wars. Unemployment is over 50 percent, and the poverty level is 60 percent. Nearly 18 percent of all children there suffer from malnutrition.

Israel controls its water supply and its air and land routes, and subjects its people to frequent closures, not to mention military attacks. It's true that some members of Hamas have resorted to terrorist acts, but the ratio of Israelis killed by Palestinians is small in comparison with Palestinians killed by Israelis. In the year 2006, according to B'Tselem, a respected Israeli human-rights organization, 660 Palestinians, including 141 children, were killed by Israelis, while only 23 Israelis were killed.

Try to visualize, if you can, 141 children. That's about the population of four average classrooms. Now visualize a heap of dead children. Those shot in the head are probably not recognizable, but you can see the bullet holes in the young, tender bodies of the others. If you can visualize this, then maybe you will get an inkling of the suffering inflicted on Palestinians by the Israelis.

Blair will certainly not be rattling the Israeli government's cage, so how can anyone expect that he will advance anything - let alone peace? And the more western governments divide and punish the Palestinian people by backing Abbas, the worse the situation will become.

There are no easy solutions and Palestine is not Northern Ireland. Blair lacks international credibility to be considered an impartial diplomat in this situation. Once again, he'll get his marching orders from Washington and Israel - from people who deliberately put the road map on hold and who chose to fund Abbas in an attempted military solution (ie. coup) thinking somehow that more violence is the answer. As with Iraq however, they're just creating more resistance in the Palestinian territories. Blowback - the thing they never plan for.

Related: Olmert promises to release 250 Fatah prisoners

Shalit's father: If Hamas wants talks, Israel must make deal

With friends like these...:

It is difficult to think of an American president who has caused more damage to Israeli interests than the president who is considered one of the friendliest to Israel of all time. No leader has done more than Bush - by commission as well as omission - to destroy the Palestinian Authority under Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas.

More Than Just Numbers

50,000 - The number of Iraqi women and children who have fled their country and are now prostitutes in places like Syria.

Less than 800 - The number of Iraq refugees accepted by the United States since 2003.

36 - The number of Afghans killed by the latest US airstrike in that country, bringing the total of civilians killed this year from 177-230, depending on who you ask.

60 - The number of Canadian troops who've died since the Afghanistan war began.

2 - The number of congresspeople (Kucinich and Ron Paul) who voted against condemning President Ahmadinejad in the US house for his alleged statement that "Israel should be wiped off the map".

0 - The number of US congresspeople who condemned Shimon Peres when he did say (no mistranslation here) that "Iran can also be wiped off the map."

4 - The number of countries that blocked a UN Security Council bid to suppport Abbas' emergency government. "The South African ambassador argued that the international community, especially the U.S., Israel and the Quartet, are to blame for the situation in the Gaza Strip."

$2.5 million - The amount of US aid given to Saudi Arabia in 2005 and 2006 which US lawmakers voted to cut off on Friday. (As if Saudi Arabia needs "aid".)

$2 billion - The amount of money allegedly funneled to Saudi's Prince Bandar through a British arms contractor. "Last week British Prime Minister Tony Blair acknowledged that his government shut down an investigation into the payments, in part because it could have led to the "complete wreckage" of Britain's "vital strategic relationship" with Saudi Arabia." (No wonder Bush wants Blair to head the World Bank.)

0 - The amount of credibility Star columnist Rosie DiManno has in her article about the antiwar movement, on a scale of 1-10.

400,000 - The number of dead in Sudan "by direct violence [genocide], disease and starvation"... "for Fiscal Year 2008, there is a projected $186 million shortfall for Darfur peacekeeping, and a $6 billion shortfall for America's core humanitarian assistance."

28 - The number of US soldiers killed in Iraq during the past week.

558 - The number of Gitmo detainees who appeared before Combatant Status Review Tribunals that whistleblower Lt. Col. Stephen Abraham (who took part in the hearings) now says "relied on vague and incomplete intelligence".

575 - The number of days left until George W Bush is history.

0 - The amount of patience I have left for violent warmongering, diplomacy-hating hawks.
 

Gaza Update

Israel sends missiles, tanks into Gaza.

About 200 Gazans, petrified by the chaos in the Hamas-controlled coastal strip, have been camped out for six days in a tunnel reeking of trash, urine and sweat on the Palestinian side of the Erez crossing, pleading with Israeli authorities to grant them safe passage to the West Bank.

From a Haaretz editorial: "The pictures at the Erez crossing remind any person who still tries not to forget harsh scenes of locked, sealed gates from the previous century."

The fear that dangerous Hamas operatives might infiltrate into the West Bank is not baseless. But the Shin Bet security service presumably knows how to properly screen those seeking to pass - if that is what Jerusalem decides to do.

In the dark days before the Holocaust, it was similarly argued, not without justification, that the German and Austrian refugees fleeing for their lives could include moles seeking to assimilate into the countries through which they passed and sabotage them.

The lessons of history should never be forgotten.

The Christian Science Monitor has more about the Palestinian refugees.

And, as I predicted last week, Olmert begged for more money from Bush and got it, of course. "At the end of the 10 years, Israel will receive $2.9 billion annually in military assistance from the U.S."

While the dictator strikes again:

The prime minister asked U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates for his assistance in expediting the handling of a number of IDF procurement requests meant to complete the replenishment of equipment and stores used during the Second Lebanon War.

Gates pointed out that though there is no problem with the requests in principle, there is an orderly procedure. However, Bush intervened and directed the defense secretary to expedite approval of the IDF's requests.

The reason Bush did that, of course, is because Ehud Barak is reportedly planning a massive military attack on Gaza and he needs the supplies - hoping to avoid a disaster like the failed efforts of the IDF against Hezbollah in Lebanon last summer. So, screw this talk of "process", Gates.

There won't be any talk of "peace" while Barak is around. He was waiting for an aggressive move by Hamas and he reportedly got it.

So, here we have the same scenario: innocent civilians stuck in Gaza, which the Israeli government is reluctant to lift a finger for - even those with pressing medical problems - who will be subject to a sweeping military incursion. How many innocents will die this time? And, more importantly, for what?

Meanwhile, Bush was busy hosting a congressional picnic on Wednesday.

MR. RUFFINS: Well, thanks for having us.

THE PRESIDENT: Kermit Ruffins and the Barbeque Swingers, right out of New Orleans, Louisiana. (Applause.)

MR. RUFFINS: Thank you. Thanks for having us. We're glad to be here.

THE PRESIDENT: Proud you're here. Thanks for coming. You all enjoy yourself. Make sure you pick up all the trash after it's over. (Laughter.)

Who's going to end up picking up Bush's trash in the Middle East once he's gone and who will bury the bodies?

Related:

Tony Blair as the UN's Middle East envoy? They're joking, right?

A Leader of Hamas Warns of West Bank Peril for Fatah

And yet another big lie had to be rolled out again:

The Americans say that their effort to aid, train and equip the elite Fatah forces was to protect the crossings to Israel and to deter Hamas, not to start a civil war.

A Secular-Democratic State Solution; The Light at the End of the Gaza-Ramallah Tunnel
 

Quote du Jour: Uri Avnery

Crocodile Tears
by Uri Avnery

What happens when one and a half million human beings are imprisoned in a tiny, arid territory, cut off from their compatriots and from any contact with the outside world, starved by an economic blockade and unable to feed their families?

Some months ago, I described this situation as a sociological experiment set up by Israel, the United States, and the European Union. The population of the Gaza Strip as guinea pigs.

This week, the experiment showed results. They proved that human beings react exactly like other animals: when too many of them are crowded into a small area in miserable conditions, they become aggressive, and even murderous. The organizers of the experiment in Jerusalem, Washington, Berlin, Oslo, Ottawa, and other capitals could rub their hands in satisfaction. The subjects of the experiment reacted as foreseen. Many of them even died in the interests of science.

But the experiment is not yet over. The scientists want to know what happens if the blockade is tightened still further.

read on...

As Canadians, we owe it to the Palestinian people to come up with a workable foreign policy that places humanitarian interests first. Our Conservative and Liberal parties hardly differ from the pro-Israeli government stances that their counterparts in the US, the Republicans and Democrats, choose to pursue. On Sunday, Peter Mackay was boasting about supporting Abbas - as if any aid would be forthcoming to the people in the Gaza strip (where the real crisis is, with Israel's government now cutting off fuel and other supplies) via Mackay's so-called grand gesture. We can't be satisfied with propping up only those Palestinians who are either supporting Abbas or who are protected by his forces.

For the sake of everyone involved, this imbalance of power must be rectified and truly open minds (not beholden to Israeli government lobbyists) need to come to the table. Canada cannot officially contribute someone who's willing to be brutally honest about what's happening in the occupied territories as long as we have a foreign minister who chooses to willfully ignore the realities on the ground there.

It's long past time for this "experiment" to end.

Related: The people of Palestine must finally be allowed to determine their own fate
 
 

"Rambo" Barak Reportedly Plans to Attack Gaza

"Rambo", you ask?

Via the Jerusalem Post:

Peretz accuses Barak of playing 'Rambo'

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert wasted no time in replacing Defense Minister Amir Peretz with new Labor chairman Ehud Barak, passing Barak's appointment in a telephone vote of Labor ministers on Friday afternoon.
[...]
Peretz was outraged that Olmert and Barak were so quick to replace him. He told Olmert in a conversation on Friday that the telephone vote took him by surprise and that Barak violated a promise to him that the handover in the Defense Ministry would be coordinated in a respectful manner by the two of them.

"Why is Barak burning to join the government while the prime minister is away?" Peretz told Olmert, according to a source close to him. "It's not as if Barak is Rambo coming to save us. So why is [his appointment] being handled so hastily and disrespectfully?"

And here's a possible answer to that question:

ISRAEL’s new defence minister Ehud Barak is planning an attack on Gaza within weeks to crush the Hamas militants who have seized power there.

According to senior Israeli military sources, the plan calls for 20,000 troops to destroy much of Hamas’s military capability in days.

The raid would be triggered by Hamas rocket attacks against Israel or a resumption of suicide bombings.

Barak, who is expected to become defence minister tomorrow, has already demanded detailed plans to deploy two armoured divisions and an infantry division, accompanied by assault drones and F-16 jets, against Hamas.

You see, Peretz, Olmert actually does think that Barak is "Rambo coming to save us".

Meanwhile, Olmert and Bush are scheduled to meet on Tuesday - because they've both done such a bang up job (literally) of finding ways to advance the so-called "peace process", haven't they? The Palestinian people are still just pawns in their geopolitical war games and neither one of these hawkish leaders has any chance of configuring something resembling anything like "peace" as long as they're in each others' pockets.

It's ironic that they're now both talking about boosting Fatah - a corrupt, former enemy they refused to deal with when Arafat was in power. A party that was rejected by the Palestinian people in a democratically held election. You see, democracy only counts when Bush gets what he wants. The will of the actual people who vote means nothing if it does not conform to America's imperialistic interests.

Abbas swore in his emergency government on Sunday.

But in the Gaza Strip, where Hamas Islamists routed Abbas's secular Fatah forces last week, 1.5 million people faced the prospect of greater hardship and isolation, with Israel cutting back fuel supplies and local suppliers saying the coastal enclave may run out of fuel for cars and stoves within two days.

Read more about the humanitarian crisis here.

As I wrote here before, this whole coup was planned by the Bush administration. Don't just take my word for it though:

Hamas denounced the naming of the new cabinet as a "coup".

Analysts and officials said Hamas had some reason to argue that Abbas was implementing a long prepared, U.S.-backed plan to strip it of power, albeit that the loss of Gaza was a shock.

Abbas adviser and former U.S. consul Edward Abington said Washington had encouraged the president to "kick out" Hamas for a year, urging him to form an emergency government.

That's why neither Bush nor Condi did anything to promote their so-called road map. They were counting on a violent solution and made sure Abbas was well-funded in advance.

"He did not want to get into a confrontation," said Abington. But in the end, he said, "it was forced on him."

And this message is being buried in this mess:

Hamas has made conciliatory overtures, however. It still refers to Abbas as president, and says it does not want a Hamas mini-state in its 40 km (25 miles) strip of coast.

Conveniently for Olmert and the new Rambo now, they can now justify random attacks in Gaza in the coming weeks, while issuing their well-known, half-hearted apologies for the civilians they'll no doubt kill - as if more violence is the answer. When has it ever solved anything? For either side?

Meanwhile, I'm sure the Rapture Ready folks are quite excited at the news that the conflict may be expanding again - a sure sign of armageddon to them - with rockets reportedly being fired into northern Israel from Lebanon again. If Rambo has any sense whatsoever, he won't decide to produce Israel/Lebanon War: The Sequel.

There are no winners in this situation and all parties involved are corrupt and out to protect their own interests in any way they can - hardly a foundation for peace talks. This is what happens when the US keeps meddling in the ME, Israel's hawkish leaders refuse to budge, aid is cut off to people in need and violence becomes what seems to some to be the only viable solution.

The bottom line is that it's inhumane to manufacture wars. Period.

Related: Johann Hari: Israel must negotiate with Hamas
 

The Engineered Crisis in Gaza

Make no mistake. This was planned by the Bush administration. Via Chris Floyd's blog:

...from Conflicts Forum last January:

Deputy National Security Advisor, Elliott Abrams — who Newsweek recently described as “the last neocon standing” — has had it about for some months now that the U.S. is not only not interested in dealing with Hamas, it is working to ensure its failure. In the immediate aftermath of the Hamas elections, last January [2006], Abrams greeted a group of Palestinian businessmen in his White House office with talk of a “hard coup” against the newly-elected Hamas government — the violent overthrow of their leadership with arms supplied by the United States. While the businessmen were shocked, Abrams was adamant — the U.S. had to support Fatah with guns, ammunition and training, so that they could fight Hamas for control of the Palestinian government...

The Abrams program was initially conceived in February of 2006 by a group of White House officials who wanted to shape a coherent and tough response to the Hamas electoral victory of January...Since at least August [2006], Rice, Abrams and U.S. envoy David Welch have been its primary advocates and the program has been subsumed as a “part of the State Department’s Middle East initiative.”

The stalled Bush road map for ME peace was not just a matter of neglect. It was part of a grand scheme to cause more chaos in the Palestinian territories. Although financial support had been suspended to the Palestinian government following the last democratic election - the results of which the Bush administration refused to accept - the state department, following approval from the Democratically-controlled congress (full of Israel-supporting hawks), funneled $59 million to Abbas this past April and encouraged Israel to stop withholding aid and tax monies owed to the Palestinians as well. That US money (and along with money from Egypt), which was reportedly supposed to fund "non-lethal training and equipment for Abbas' security forces and $16 million for upgrades at the Karni crossing into northern Gaza" has obviously come in quite handy now that the territories have been plunged into civil war. Undoubtedly, Bushco, as it often does, did not anticipate that those they and Abbas wanted to strip power from - Hamas - would actually emerge victorious in Gaza as it did this week. Subsequently, Abbas dissolved the government, declared a state of emergency and chose a new prime minister to replace the former Hamas politician who held that post laying the groundwork for another proxy war against Iran:

Washington, Europe and Israel prepared to throw open the taps on financial aid to Abbas that was cut off a year ago when Iranian-backed Hamas used its popularity in impoverished Gaza to defeat Abbas's more secular Fatah in a parliamentary election.

Meanwhile on Friday, Hamas' political leader held a news conference in which he said that Hamas does not want to seize power from Abbas:

Addressing media in the Syrian capital, Meshal said that Hamas had not wanted to take over the Gaza Strip.

"Hamas does not want to seize power ... We are faithful to the Palestinian people," Meshal said, promising to help rebuild Palestinian homes damaged in the months of bloody infighting.

"What happened in Gaza was a necessary step. The people were suffering from chaos and lack of security and this treatment was needed," Meshal continued. "The lack of security drove the crisis toward explosion."

"Abbas has legitimacy," Meshal said, "There's no one who would question or doubt that, he is an elected president, and we will cooperate with him for the sake of national interest."

But he also warned Fatah followers not to move this conflict to the West Bank where the moderate movement is dominant.

Meshal called for the Arab League foreign ministers, who are holding an emergency meeting in Cairo to discuss the situation in Gaza, to help mediate talks between Hamas and Abbas.

"I hope [that] ... the Arab ministerial meeting in Cairo presents a strong responsible Arab stance, as an umbrella to hold the national Palestinian dialogue to approach a Palestinian accord," Meshal said.

Meshal said Abbas' dissolution of the unity government "will not remedy the situation ... and will not solve the problem. There will be no two governments and no division of the homeland."

Abbas rebuffed him casting the entire Hamas movement as terrorists:

Ahmed Abdel Rahman, an Abbas adviser, rejected Meshaal's gesture. "There will be no dialogue with coup seekers, masked men and murderers," he said.

The Israeli government has also dismissed the idea of an international peacekeeping force, stressing continued violent aggression while "mulling" over aid to the Palestinian people:

A proposed multinational force deployed along the Gaza Strip's border with Egypt must be willing to fight the Islamic militant group Hamas to stop weapons smuggling in the area, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Friday.

At a news conference during an official visit to Portugal, Livni said Israel was not interested in any proposal involving a monitoring force for the Philadelphi corridor where Hamas uses tunnels to bring in weapons. Hamas gained control of the Gaza Strip on Thursday after days of heavy fighting with Fatah forces.

"Those who are talking in terms of international forces have to understand that the meaning is not monitoring forces but forces that are willing to fight, to confront Hamas on the ground," Livni said.
[...]
"At this stage, there is not even the beginning of the conditions under which a possible peacekeeping force could operate," said Foreign Minister Karel De Gucht. "At this point, a proposal would stand no chance."

And here's how at least one Israeli official describes Gaza:

Israel has been careful not to become involved in the fighting, and Housing and Construction Minister Meir Sheetrit (Kadima) said Friday that despite calls from the right for Israel to reoccupy the Gaza Strip, from which it withdrew in 2005, Israel would not move in to confront Hamas, which is sworn to destroy it.

"There is no intention to re-enter that swamp, Gaza, in this situation," Sheetrit told Israel Radio. "At this point, Israel has no reason to intervene."

That term speaks volumes. Nothing like dehumanizing the Palestinians by declaring that they live in a swamp.

Olmert is set to meet with Bush next Tuesday. And, in case you missed it, one former UN official had harsh words for everyone involved in the so-called I/P peace process this week.

De Soto also accused Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other senior U.S. officials of having "hijacked" efforts by former Quartet envoy James D. Wolfensohn to negotiate an agreement to provide greater freedom of movement for civilians in Gaza and the West Bank.

It was obviously "hijacked" for a reason: the Bush administration has absolutely no use for diplomacy, preferring instead to try to solve problems using military might and continued violence. None of their violent "solutions" have worked. Not in Afghanistan, Iraq or the Palestinian territories. Yet, they continue on their failed path because it's the only way they seem to know how to operate - even when the results continually and literally blow up in their neocon faces - leaving hundreds of thousands of dead, wounded, terrorized and displaced civilians in their wake. Crimes they will never be held accountable for.

It's madness.
 

Spot the Obvious Contradiction

Via the NYT:

The Arab League endorsed the 2002 peace proposal once again at a Riyadh meeting that ended Thursday. The initiative calls for “achievement of a just solution to the Palestinian refugee problem to be agreed upon in accordance with U.N. General Assembly Resolution 194” passed in 1948.

The resolution, in its key paragraph, “resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbors should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return and for loss of or damage to property which, under principles of international law or in equity, should be made good by the governments or authorities responsible.”

Israel has always argued that the United Nations resolution gives no specific right of return to Palestinians.

There will be no peace in the region until Olmert is replaced. That much is obvious.

TEL AVIV, March 30 — Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in interviews published Friday that Israel would not allow a single Palestinian refugee to return to what is now Israel, and that the country bore no responsibility for the refugees because their plight resulted from an attack by Arab nations on Israel when it was a fledgling state.

When other countries continually violate UN resolutions, they are quickly called to account (See: Iraq and Iran). This issue has been going on for almost 60 years and has still not been resolved.

Related:
Resolution 194
Electronic Intifada. Daily news and opinions from a Palestinian perspective.
Olmert channels MLK:

"I have a dream. That within five years there will be a global peace accord in the Middle East," Olmert told Maariv.

What Olmert doesn't seem to understand is that if you want peace, you actually have to make it happen and, on that front, he has failed and will no doubt continue to do so.