Helana Cobban har intressanta funderingar kring vad Gaza’s nu öppna gräns med Egypten kommer att innebära. Både för Israel-Palestina och Egypten i sig. Speciellt om Hamas nu länkar upp med sina kusiner inom MB och försöker säkra sin livlina ut mot omvärlden. De lokala beduinerna i Sinai har också sedan länge befunit sig i konflikt med central regeringen i Kairo. Helt klart är att Gaza inte längre är belägrat. Däremot i krig med och anfallet från Israel men det är en en annan sak
‘Just World News’ with Helena Cobban
The paradigm shift: now that the Egyptian border is open, Gaza can no longer be regarded as Israeli-occupied territory. Some scholars such as Dugard maintain that the occupation continued after the 2005 withdrawal because Israel continued to control the access points. I’ve argued in the past that international law precedents, such as the ICJ’s judgment in the DRC-Uganda case, don’t support this interpretation and that the occupation ended once Israel gave up effective control on the ground. At this point, however, the argument is moot: as long as the Egyptian border stays open, Gaza can’t seriously be regarded as occupied even under Dugard’s interpretation. This would mean that the law of belligerent occupation no longer applies to Gaza, although the humanitarian law of war, including the provisions relating to siege, still do. Israel is no longer legally responsible (note: legal and moral responsibilities aren’t necessarily the same) for the general welfare of Gaza, or for supplying its people with goods like electricity or fuel.
And now the wild speculation: On the hopeful side, this is a potential chance for Gaza to get its act together. The Palestinians have, to put it bluntly, choked on Gaza several times, and neither the PNA nor Hamas has been able to control the place sufficiently to govern it or to institute an effective cease-fire. Israel has been partly responsible for this state of affairs but so has Palestinian infighting and the prevalence of splinter militias. If Hamas can re-establish an economy in Gaza and use the popularity that it has surely gained from this move to consolidate its authority, then it might be able to work out a mutual cease-fire on the Israeli border, position itself as a responsible diplomatic player, and maybe even reduce the perceived risk of Gaza by enough to attract foreign investment. This would in turn increase the pressure on both Israel and Fatah to move toward ending the occupation in the West Bank, because otherwise Hamas would be able to point to its success in Gaza as the only viable alternative.
Working against this is the fact that Egypt will now take a major security interest in Gaza, given that a linkup between Hamas and the Egyptian ikhwan is Mubarak’s worst nightmare. As noted above, it’s politically impossible at the moment for him to close the border, but he isn’t going to just leave a Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated political organization alone. I think we can expect to see Egyptian security forces infiltrate Gaza in the near future, primarily in covert roles, and there’s a potential for major disruption if this turns into an undeclared Hamas-Egypt war.
Of course, the reverse might also happen – that Hamas would expand its security interests to include north Sinai. If the route to al-Arish becomes its lifeline, then it will want to protect its access to that route, and might find allies among the local Bedouins who are in effective revolt against the central government. I think Hamas wants to avoid this kind of entanglement, which is why it’s trying so hard now to come to an agreement with Egypt on border control, but I don’t think the possibility of Hamas strongholds or patrols in Sinai can be ruled out. This in turn would raise tensions along the Israel-Egypt border due to the increased possibility of infiltration.
Nedanstående är vad den Israeliska analyswebplatsen Debka hade att säga. Har svensk media helt missat betydelsen av den framgång Hamas haft? Fatah som västmakterna med USA och Israel i spetsen satt sitt hopp till är totalt irrelevant och med det hela den ‘fredsprocess’ som Annapolis skulle startat. Det är också intressant att Hamas nu verkar ha skaffat sig mer strategiskt djup.
Announcing that Egypt would not expel the hundreds of thousands of Gazan Palestinians who continue to crossed the broken border fence into N. Sinai, President Hosni Mubarakre deployed his special border force from the Gazan border to points south of El Arish, Bir Lahfan and Abu Aweigila. This step effectively handed over to the control of Hamas-led Palestinian terrorist organizations and al Qaedal a Sinaienclave of roughly 855 sq, km., twice the area of the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip.
Early Thursday, Jan. 24, American forces and equipment withdrew from the Multi-force Organization base at Al Gura northeast of al Arish. This force monitors Sinai’s demilitarization under a key clause of the Egypt-Israel peace treaty. Washington and Cairo are discussing evacuating the entire base and its 400 multinational personnel. The Egyptian high command was informed that Hamas had begun moving some of its elite units to its new stronghold. Egyptian forces are not capable of contending with this strength or the hundreds of thousands of Gazan Palestinians on the move between Gaza and Sinai since Hamas blew up the concrete border fence Tuesday.
Israeli officials continue to treat the crisis as a problem for Egypt to address, rather than emanating from Israel’s failure to pre-empt Hamas’ well-laid plan with timely and appropriate military action. Senior military sources told DEBKAfile that Hamas’ strategic feat is irreversible. By demolishing the 10-km concrete barrier dividing the Gaza Strip from Egyptian, Hamas has acquired a new stronghold outside Israel’s military reach while their missiles and guns retain access to Israeli targets from the Gaza Strip.
They wonder why defense minister Ehud Barak has not cut short his attendance at the Economic Forum in Switzerland when the blockade he ordered on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip – but for fuel and other necessities – had become futile.
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