January 27, 2005:
Beloved in Messiah:
The following is a monthly news update from Israel, written by columnist David Dolan who lives and writes in Jerusalem - a useful background and analysis commentcommentary helping to "make out the woods from the trees," in the complicated political and military developments now taking place in war-torn Israel. We commend Mr. Dolan’s excellent summary to the careful consideration of our readers.
Continue to pray for Israel during this period of heightened concern!
Regards, Charles E. Quigley +++++++++++++++++++++
NEWS FROM ISRAEL
January 27, 2005 by Charles E. Quigley
A PERSONAL MESSAGE FROM DAVID DOLAN -
Shalom from south Florida!
Below is the January Israel news and analysis report, written this month while on the road. I am currently in the middle of a speaking tour in cool southern Florida before heading to (presumably warmer) Jamaica and Barbados in early February, then on to the Pacific Northwest, and finally back to Israel in early March.
This month's news report focuses on the recent Palestinian election, the formation of a new coalition government in Israel, and a subsequent terror attack that sparked Israeli action toward a major military operation in the Gaza Strip. That in turn prompted the new Palestinian leader to take some important measures to halt the violence, although how far that will go remains to be seen. I also look briefly at reports that some of Israel's near neighbors are developing nuclear weapons.
David Dolan +++++++++++++++++++++
JERUSALEM UPDATE
for January 2005 by David Dolan
NEW GOVERNMENTS, OLD PROBLEMS
After many weeks of political wrangling, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon finally succeeded in stitching together a new coalition government in January. This came just as Palestinian voters went to the polls to elect PLO chairman Mahmoud Abbas to replace the late Yasser Arafat as Palestinian Authority leader.
Despite his crowning achievement in finally forming a new unity coalition government with the center-left Labor party and the small United Torah Judaism party, the high political hurdles that Sharon still needs to overcome were immediately apparent when a third of his own Likud party Knesset members refused to endorse the new coalition. The 13 so-called "Likud rebels" stated that they could not support an alliance with Labor that was primarily formed to uproot Jewish residents from their homes in the Gaza Strip and northern Samaria later this year.
The dramatic decision to abstain in the January 10th Knesset vote meant that the "national unity" government was only approved by a narrow 58 to 56 majority, signaling further political instability ahead. Most embarrassing for Sharon, the new left-right coalition only survived its maiden Knesset test because the ultra left-wing Yahad party - headed by one of the failed Oslo peace accord’s main architects, Yossi Beilen - supported it. In other words, Sharon now heads a government that is effectively in power only because two leftist parties who fiercely opposed him in the 2003 elections now basically back his altered policies. This unusual alliance added to calls in January by several right-wing parties for fresh national elections.
Given the shaky foundations that his new coalition is built upon, Sharon immediately stepped up efforts to woo the Orthodox Shas party into his patchwork government. However, Shas leaders wasted no time in repeating their earlier insistence that they will not join a government that intends to unilaterally evacuate Jewish settlements.
CHEERING WORLD LEADERS
With [emerging] governments finally installed in both Jerusalem and Ramallah, the stage was seemingly set to renew the long moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace process. U.S. President George Bush, British PM Tony Blair and even Ariel Sharon were among the many world leaders to send quick congratulations to Abbas on his substantial January 9th election victory.
According to Palestinian officials, Abbas captured 62% of the vote - far more than his nearest rival, reform advocate Mustafa Barghouti. However, reports of widespread voting fraud and other irregularities during the January 9th ballot prompted 46 Palestinian Authority election committee members to resign. The substantial group maintained that they had been intimidated by armed Palestinian security forces loyal to Abbas, who demanded they extend the voting time by two hours and allow non-registered Palestinians to participate. The resignations came despite claims by international monitors, headed by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, that the election was conducted in a "free and democratic" manner. Some of those who resigned said they wished to warn the public that such voting irregularities and intimidation might be repeated in the upcoming legislative elections, currently scheduled for July.
During a ten minute telephone conservation after the election results were announced, current U.S. President George Bush encouraged Abbas to pursue Palestinian security reforms which were spelled out in the U.S.-backed 2003 Road Map peace plan. In particular, he urged the new leader to crack down on terror groups operating virtually unhindered in Palestinian Authority-ruled zones. He then invited Abbas to meet with him at the White House in Washington. Abbas reportedly pledged to "turn a new page in relations" with Israel, a comment he later repeated during a telephone conversation with new Israeli vice-premier Shimon Peres. Sharon announced that he would meet with Abbas in the coming weeks to get the peace ball rolling again.
ILLUSIONS OF PEACE
The substantial difficulties that Mahmoud Abbas will face in actually implementing any true reforms were immediately apparent when the radical Iranian and Syrian-backed Hamas and Islamic Jihad groups offered only lukewarm support for him as Arafat’s official successor. "We have to respect the Palestinian choice," said Hamas spokesman Hassan Yusef, adding ominously that, "This doesn’t mean Abbas has the right to make internal Palestinian decisions related to our rights without our consent." He further stated that Hamas will "never surrender" its Kassam rockets and other illegal arms to Palestinian Authority security forces. "Does he want us to give up our weapons while the occupiers are still here, to face them with our bare hands?" he asked rhetorically.
Apparently trying to appease his many internal opponents, Abbas delivered a fiery victory speech in Ramallah on the evening of his electoral triumph. Like several previous speeches during the election campaign, it seemingly endorsed suicide attacks against Israeli civilians. "We offer this victory to the soul of our brother, the martyr Yasser Arafat (an indirect reference to the widespread Palestinian contention that the veteran PLO chief was poisoned by Israeli agents), "and to our other martyrs, and to the 11,000 prisoners in Israeli jails."
After meeting with visiting American Senator John Kerry in Jerusalem the next day, PM Sharon voiced "concern" over Abbas's hard-line statement. But he said his government would "reserve final judgment" until after the new PA head was given time to prove his concurrent declarations to world leaders that he was interested in reigning in Palestinian militant groups and unfreezing the peace process. "His statements during the election campaign were not encouraging, but he will be tested by his actions after the elections," read a statement issued by the Prime Minister’s office. It added that Abbas "will be tested by the manner in which he fights terrorism and works to dismantle its infrastructures."
THE FIRST TEST
It was only a matter of days before Abbas was put to a fiery test. In a daring attack launched just four days after his electoral victory, terrorists belonging to three Palestinian organizations launched a combined truck bomb and shooting attack at the Karni Gaza Strip crossing outpost. The assault left six Israelis dead, along with three Palestinian terrorists.
It quickly became apparent how serious the assault was in that some of the attackers had come from the PLO Fatah-linked Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. Other gunmen were reported to be members of the Islamic fundamentalist Hamas group and the so-called Popular Resistance Committee. Adding weight to the gravity of the incident, Israeli officials charged that PA security guards stationed inside the Karni terminal assisted the joint Fatah-Hamas terror cell.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was livid over the attack, and even more so when Abbas failed to strongly condemn it. He ordered an immediate suspension of all Israeli government contacts with the new PA administration until it "investigates this incident and brings to justice those who planned it, and takes other real steps to stop terrorism." At a subsequent cabinet meeting two days later, Sharon told his old and new ministers that, "Despite the change in Palestinian leadership, we see that its leaders have not even begun to take any action against terror." Ranaan Gissin, a top aid to the premier, then told reporters that an anticipated meeting between the Israeli and Palestinian leaders would "have to wait until PA security forces move against the violent groups."
Sharon revealed that he had ordered Israeli military forces "to step up operational activity against terrorism, and they will continue to do so, without restrictions - I emphasize, without restrictions - as long as the Palestinians are not lifting a finger." The PM’s office later clarified that Abbas would be granted about one hundred days to crack down on terror. But it added that the Israeli military commanders had also been given a green light to confront Palestinian terrorists in the meantime with all measures that they deem necessary.
ABBAS RESPONDS
As media reports circulated that a major Israeli military operation was imminent, Abbas urgently convened his cabinet on January 17th. After ordering an official investigation into the Karni crossing attack, he issued "clear instructions to the security chiefs to prevent all kinds of violence, including attacks against Israel," according to new PA Information Minister Kadoura Fares. He also reportedly directed that the PLO-linked Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades be "absorbed" into the PA security structure in the coming weeks. Another cabinet minister, Azzam al-Ahmed, affirmed that official moves were afoot to halt the violence. But in typical PA fashion, he added that, "Israeli military operations must also end" - as if the IDF was not responding to continuous and unprovoked terror assaults and rocket attacks by Palestinian groups against Israeli civilians.
After PA leaders announced that they would deploy some 8,000 uniformed security personnel in northern Gaza in an attempt to halt repeated rocket attacks on nearby Israeli civilian centers, Sharon ordered a renewal of security cooperation with Palestinian officials. He directed army commanders to at least temporarily shelve plans to launch a major ground operation into the tense area, an operation that was approved by his inner security cabinet on January 19th. Israeli military leaders resumed contacts with their PA counterparts later that same day, reportedly warning them that the IDF was prepared to "take full control of all rocket launching sites inside the Gaza Strip" if the PA failed to act right away.
Israeli military analysts said the main responsibility for halting frequent Hamas rocket launchings would fall on some 600 highly trained PA special forces, who are known to be completely loyal to Abbas, and therefore willing to take on militant terrorists who are attempting to thwart his careful steps toward the resumption of the peace process. Israeli troops have reportedly been ordered to cooperate fully with the special forces, at least for the time being.
ON THE MOVE
With the threat of an imminent major Israeli military campaign hanging over his head, Abbas kept his word in late January and started to deploy his armed PA security forces in most sections of the northern Gaza Strip. This came as Hamas and Islamic Jihad leaders announced that they had agreed to a temporary "ceasefire" in their jihad war against the detested Jewish state, set to last for one month. Abbas said he expected the truce to be extended beyond that time. While welcoming the announcement, Israeli officials stressed that a ceasefire is not what is called for in the Road Map peace plan. Instead, the PA is mandated to completely disarm the radical terrorist groups.
Most Israeli analysts expressed continuing skepticism that Abbas has the will or the ability to carry out the required disarmament. Still, most senior Israeli officials saw the fact that the new PA leader was even trying to negotiate a permanent ceasefire with Palestinian rejectionist groups as a hopeful sign.
Analysts noted that Yasser Arafat did nothing to halt terrorist violence in the four years after the Oslo accords collapsed in mid-2000. Instead, he encouraged the continuation of such assaults by frequently hailing the "martyrs" while stressing his determination to "liberate holy Al Quds" (Jerusalem) whether Israel liked it or not.
Many Israeli political commentators echoed Shimon Peres in cautioning that the keys to any real ceasefire are located in Damascus and Teheran. If the extremist Iranian regime and its Syrian ally see some real advantage in a cessation of Palestinian violence at this time, they can easily order their Lebanese Hezbollah proxy force to stop economic and military aid to Palestinian Islamic militants. However, there is little, if any, reason to think that this is indeed the case, added many pundits, given that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict continues to conveniently divert domestic attention in both countries from the repressive rule of their despotic regimes.
NEARBY NUKES?
While attention was focused as usual during January on the Israeli-Palestinian struggle, other important developments in the region garnered some notice as well. The most dramatic was the official Israeli security report that no less than three neighboring nations were well into the process of acquiring nuclear weapons.
While it has long been clear that Iran is working overtime to develop devastating nuclear warheads, Israeli Mossad intelligence chief Meir Dagan told a Knesset committee on January 24th there are "significant signs" that Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia are also traveling down the deadly atomic weapons path. He said that Pakistani scientists - who helped the south Asian country become the first Islamic nation to openly possess nuclear bombs in the 1990s - had passed on vital nuclear know-how to the three Arab states for a substantial price. He indicated that Egypt had the most advanced program, which is extremely disturbing to Israeli officials despite the 1979 Camp David peace treaty between the late Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin.
Dagan told Israeli legislators that Russia continues to help Iran build a nuclear reactor at Bushehar; blatantly ignoring attempts by the U.S. and others to halt such aid. This revelation came as media reports swirled that Russia was about to supply Syria with a new range of strategic weaponry, including threatening ground-to-ground missiles and shoulder-fired anti-aircraft weapons. This brought back memories of the recent time when the Soviet Union was the main supplier to Damascus of such strategic weapons before its collapse in late 1991. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been acting increasingly autocratic in recent months according to worried Western analysts, reportedly suspended the missile transfer in late January in response to urgent requests from Israeli and American leaders. Still, he made clear that the action was only temporary, indicating that the weapons transfer might still go ahead despite its chilling effect on recently warm Israeli-Russian diplomatic relations.
WHILE THE LOCAL conflict with the Palestinians seemed to be taking a long overdue hopeful turn in early 2005, the overall regional picture looked dimmer than ever before. Tiny Israel can never afford to allow even one of her hostile Muslim neighbors to possess the Ultimate Weapon of Mass Destruction, let alone several of them.
Still, other rays of light still managed to shine through the clouds during the month. For one thing, the Israeli public was greatly relieved when initial fears that hundreds of Israelis had perished in the south Asian tsunami mega disaster turned out to be vastly overblown.
Despite the regional and world shakings, the sovereign God of Israel remains firmly in control, even while the world quakes as the prophesied last days approach. May all who trust in His love and power, "Sing to the Lord, praise the Lord! For He has delivered the soul of the needy one from the hand of evildoers." (Jeremiah 20:13).
DAVID DOLAN, Jerusalem
(DAVID DOLAN is a Jerusalem-based author and journalist who has lived in Israel since 1980.)
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