generalspeaking

Conflicts and Ceasefires

"[Israel wants] to come out with arrangements that assure us that this ceasefire will be different from previous ones, that it lasts a long time and Hamas won't rearm itself."
"Fortunately, now we have an Egypt that seems willing to contribute to this outcome [with President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi, opposing Hamas]."
Yossi Kuperwasser, director general, Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs

As Israelis breathe a sigh of relief and hope upon hope that at least for the next 72 hours they will not have to rush to bomb shelters, Gazans emerged from whence they had fled to view their shattered landscape. Hamas remains in power. And Israel debates the politics, the costs and accomplishments of what the month-long conflict achieved. And while Israel has now agreed to an extension of that ceasefire, Hamas makes no comment, committing to nothing.

On the achievement side, the destruction of the 32 tunnels that were discovered leading into Israel, and the demolishing of about 3000 of the ten thousand rockets that Hamas is believed to be in possession of. And the deaths of an estimated 900 Hamas terrorists, diminishing the strength of the Islamist organization, but of course there will always be new recruits, and opportunities will present themselves for newer, more advanced missiles to be added to a new cache.

The ceasefire is for a limited period, although both sides are more than prepared to have welcomed it.
Israel, because it gets sick and tired of all the accusations tossed at it for having the effrontery to defend itself from incessant rocket attacks. Hamas, because they may feel for the present, that their sacrificial lambs, as Gazans tend to be in their overseers' strategic thinking, have experienced enough carnage leaving their outrage over Israel's incursion at a sufficiently high level to restore Hamas in their esteem.

The polarized goals of Israel and of Hamas in negotiating a lengthier cease-fire than a mere 72 hours presents a Gordian knot to Egypt, which has recognized what it has in common with Israel, in defeating the strength and purpose of the terrorists that plague Egypt as well. With Egypt's official declaration of the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization and Hamas's sibling-offshoot position leading it to aid the Brotherhood in Sinai attacks, Egypt has no love for Hamas.

What will result from this latest edition of the ongoing conflict between Hamas and Israel looms as yet another standoff; a limited period of quiet, that represents an uneasy peace which Palestinian Islamic Jihad wants no part of, and continues to lob its own rockets at Israel even while Hamas restrains itself until it no longer can, providing no long-term solution to the fact that Hamas's goal is to destroy Israel, and Israel's goal is to destroy Hamas.

Labels: Conflict, Defence, Egypt, Gaza, Hamas, Israel Security

posted by Pieface @ Thursday, August 07, 2014