Obama's damp squib on Palestine

There is a great piece in this morning's Indy by one of,in my opinion anyway,the best authorities on the Middle East Robert Fisk.

His attack on Barack Obama's handling of the Palestinian request for nationhood is quite brilliant.

Here are a couple of passages

A Martian listening to this speech would think that the Palestinians were occupying Israel rather than the other way round. No mention of Israeli occupation, no mention of refugees, or the right of return or of the theft of Arab Palestinian land by the Israeli government against all international law. But plenty of laments for the besieged people of Israel, rockets fired at their houses, suicide bombs – Palestinian sins, of course, but no reference to the carnage of Gaza, the massive death toll of Palestinians – and even the historical persecution of the Jewish people and the Holocaust.

In fact he quotes another writer Yael Sternhell

"The limp, unimaginative speech that US President Barack Obama delivered at the United Nations... reflects how helpless the American President is in the face of Middle East realities,

As Palestine prepares to hand in its formal request for UN recognition in just a few hours when President Mahmoud Abbas will deliver his historic address to the UN,the past few days have shown just have divided the world is on this issue.

America,as is usual,is standing firmly behind Israel and will use the US veto to block the Palestinian move at the security council and has been working overtime to discourage the application.

Britain and Europe however seem slowly to be warming to the idea.Both David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy have made conciliatory comments and William Hague has been warned that Britain’s improved status in the Middle East could be compromised if Britain takes Israel’s side at the UN.

The Tunnel economy

A fascinating article on the economy of the Gaza Tunnel( thanks to Robin Lustig for the tip.)

Here's a taster

Driven by pent-up demand, the few dozen tunnels that had been in operation before Hamas’s takeover increased to many hundreds, employing 10,000 workers; some that already existed were discarded, others upgraded with air-conditioning and even a makeshift railway. Hamas says it has disbursed $50 million in compensation to families whose homes were damaged or destroyed in the war. UN agencies say they have disbursed $40 million, and plan to distribute $40 million more. Gazan shopkeepers began filling the space once occupied by Israel’s exports with goods in Arabic packaging. Cigarettes and chocolate reappeared in Gaza’s markets, then clothes, shoes and mobile phones. Laptops followed and then larger household appliances such as fridges, washing-machines and 42-inch plasma TVs.

What Obama must achieve in Egypt today

Barack Obama's trip to the Middle East is not going to get the airtime that this momentous occasion should get but it is worth focusing on some of the issues that need to be tackled.

Over at Open Democracy,Nader Hashemi writes that his speech in Egypt requires three things to bring on board the sceptical Muslim audience that he will address.

1.that it should be a townhall-style meeting with everyday Egyptian citizens.

The symbolic value of such an event cannot be overstated. The sight of an American president, in open and uncensored dialogue with ordinary Muslims, will go a long way towards demonstrating respect for the Islamic world.

2.that it must address the key topic in the Arab world which is Palestine and

3.

Obama must be prepared to offend - albeit indirectly - his Egyptian hosts. There is a pungency in the leader of the "free world" delivering a major speech to Muslims in one of the least free parts of the world. Hosni Mubarak is one of the most despised as well as one of the longest-standing dictators in the Arab world - a status owed to a mix of his close alliance with the United States, his security forces' internal repression and his collusion with Israel in maintaining the siege of Gaza.

A nightmare scenario for the Middle East

At least according to haaretz.com who see this year as being the tipping point of the Middle East and warn of the consequences if President Obama is not firm over Iran and nuclear weapons

By Thanksgiving 2011, the situation was clear. Jordan's King Abdullah left for exile in London. Hezbollah took control of Beirut and a bloody war of attrition erupted between Israel and the Palestinians. The unrest in western Asia had repercussions on the rest of the international arena: Afghanistan went up in flames, Pakistan collapsed and Russia raised its head. In view of Washington's helplessness, some European states began to lean increasingly toward China. When the price of oil rose above $200 a barrel, the American economy plunged into another deep recession.

Ht-Andrew Sullivan

Netanyahu's challenge for Obama

The Israeli Prime Minister,Benjamin Netanyahu lays down a challenge for Barcak Obama in an interview with Atlantic magazine.

“The Obama presidency has two great missions: fixing the economy, and preventing Iran from gaining nuclear weapons,”

On the second issue,he tells Jeffrey Goldberg that he Iranian nuclear challenge represents a “hinge of history” and added that “Western civilization” will have failed if Iran is allowed to develop nuclear weapons.

Interesting words and on the eve of taking office Netanyahu has clearly drawn a line in the sand over what he feels are the priorities for Israel

Is it now time to talk to Hamas

I blogged a few days ago about it being perhaps time for the United States to talk to the Taliban to create an impetus for change in Afghanistan.

Another pariah would be to talk to Hamas and begin a process of reconciliation in the Palestinian territories.

Roger Cohen believes that this may eb the way forward writing in the New York Times who says that

The Obama administration should also look carefully at how to reach moderate Hamas elements and engineer a Hamas-Fatah reconciliation.

Of course the critics will point to its charter and its non reconciliation of Israel but as Roger points out

it’s wrong to get hung up on the prior recognition of Israel issue. Perhaps Hamas is sincere in its calls for Israel’s disappearance — although it has offered a decades-long truce — but then it’s also possible that Israel in reality has no desire to see a Palestinian state.

It is also important to recognise that Hamas won a free and fair election in the territory.The fact that it was unwanted by the Americans does not make it any less legitimate

Who broke the ceasefire in Gaza?

It worth reading Robin Lustig's post on the events in the Gaza strip.

He reminds us that

On 4 November, when much of the world was watching Barack Obama win the US presidential election, Israeli forces crossed into the Gaza Strip and killed six Hamas fighters. Israel says Hamas was building a tunnel under the border fence at Deir al-Balah which it intended to use to kidnap Israeli soldiers. Hamas responded by launching rockets and mortar shells into Israel.

190 to be exact

Whereas during the ceasefire these were the figures on launches

19-30 June: 9
July: 20
August: 17
September: 2
October: 2

Newspaper comment on the groundforces in Gaza

There is much debate in the papers this morning over the weekend's events in the Gaza strip

The Times leader uses the crisis to point fingers at the lack of leadership from the EU coming at a time when the Presidential changeover only now swings into effect.

Here was an opportunity for the EU to take a diplomatic lead. The interregnum in the US, where the serving President is seeing out his time but his successor is still 15 days from inauguration, created a diplomatic vacuum. Hostilities in Gaza demanded a mature and united diplomatic response. But behind the perfunctory call for a ceasefire issued on Saturday, what it saw instead was an unseemly squabble.

The Indy echoes the call

With neither Israel nor Hamas in any mood to countenance a ceasefire, however, it is also worth noting that appeals from the outside would carry more conviction if they also came with some positive and practical suggestions for what might happen next. So far, in public at least, constructive proposals have been conspicuous by their absence. Indeed, circumstances have almost conspired to leave the field for such initiatives vacant.

The Guardian beleives that Israel's eventual victory will be hollow

even if the Israeli army succeeds in its aims and destroys Hamas both as an army and as an organisation, it will have also destroyed the last remnants of government in the strip. Israel would have fought its way back to where it was in 1994, before the advent of the Palestinian authority, and back in direct control of Gaza. That is plainly not what it wants, because it would mean re-assuming control of 1.5 million Gazans as well. Putting a proxy Palestinian government in place would be just as fraught. Destroying the infrastructure of Hamas's rule in Gaza would also wreck the effective government on which any future ceasefire would depend. To take one small but relevant example, half of Gaza's ambulances have already been destroyed.

The Telegraph recognises that

A determined enemy lies concealed in Gaza's tangled warren of alleys and, for the first time, the struggle will now be on relatively equal terms, creating a significant danger of heavy losses among Israeli forces. This makes it all the more imperative for the government to set out clear goals, achieve them with minimum loss of life on both sides and then leave Gaza as swiftly as possible.

However

Sadly, Mr Olmert has allowed a degree of confusion about his country's war aims to emerge. Fighting talk from his defence minister, Ehud Barak, of a "war to the bitter end" has given the impression that Israel seeks to destroy Hamas or, at the very least, overthrow its administration in Gaza. In reality, Israel's war aims are almost certainly confined to halting the rocket attacks which have sown such misery in its southern cities. Mr Olmert should make clear that this defensive measure is the only objective.

The Mail has

grave doubts, too, over the likely consequences of the invasion for the Israeli people themselves.

and asks

Isn’t there a strong risk that, far from making them safer, it will subject them to even greater danger in the long term, by heightening tensions in the region?

Some blogging perspective on the Gazan attacks

It is difficult to find any sympathy for Israel after the events of the last few days.

No matter what the provocation,the seemingly endless bombing of civilian targets in this day and age is fairly inexusable.

Israel will point to the breakdown in the ceasefire and the luanching of rockets on its own civilians by Hamas.

The best perspective on the violence is to look at the Global voices website which as on many past occassions gives a bloggers insight into both sides of the tale.

This from an Israeli blogger

My feelings about what happened in Gaza yesterday: I feel very sad that it had
to be that way. But it had to be that way. We can't let rockets rain down on our
citizens and do nothing. I look forward to the day -- may I live to see it --
when the Palestinian leadership figures out what "compromise" and "good
leadership" and "promises" and "tolerance" actually mean. I'd really like for
our army to have nothing to do. That would be fantastic

And this from a Gazan currently in the USA but talking about the experience of the in laws

I was out in the souk when the strikes began- I saw the missiles falling and
prayed; the earth shook; the smoke rose; the ambulances screamed" he said, the
sirens audible in the background. he was on talateeni street at the time of the
attacks, just a few streets down from one of the attack sites.My mother was in
the Red Crescent Society clinic near the universities at the time of the initial
wave of attacks, where she works part-time as a pediatrician. Behind the clinic
was one of the police centers that was leveled. She said she broke down at
first, the sheer proximity of the attacks having shaken her from the inside out.
After she got a hold of herself, they took to treating injured victims of the
attack, before they transferred them to Shifa hospital

A massive cock up in Riyadh

Peace has once again broken out between Syria and Lebanon after last month's fighting in Beirut between factions loyal to Syria and the Lebanese government.

Therefore when the Lebanese football team turned up at the King Fahd Stadium to play a world cup qualifier,tensions were raised when the Syrian national anthem by mistake.

Fans were left shocked and Lebanese players were visibly angry when the Syrian national anthem began blaring from the stadium’s speakers, the Arriyadiyah sports daily reported yesterday. Officials quickly realized their mistake, and eventually played the correct national anthem. However, the error, which was committed by the organizing officials of the tournament, prompted the President of the Saudi Football Federation, Prince Sultan ibn Fahd, to order an official investigation into the incident.

For the record Lebanon lost 2-1