THE BEST THING RICE COULD DO IS TO KEEP CLEAR OF ISRAEL AND LET ISRAEL HANDLE THE HAMAS AND ARAB - MUSLIMS WITH THEIR OWN ACTIONS INSTEAD OF PRESSURING ISRAEL TO STOP THE FIGHTING.
Rice heads to Mideast to try to save peace plan By Sue Pleming MAR 3,08
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice left for the Middle East on Monday to try to salvage U.S.-sponsored peace talks derailed by Hamas rocket attacks on Israeli towns and Israel's military response in Gaza. With U.S. credibility at stake, Rice faces an uphill battle to revive peace talks suspended over the weekend by pro-Western Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Washington wants those talks to result in a peace treaty by the end of the year but that hope seems increasingly unrealistic.While Israeli troops pulled out of the Gaza Strip on Monday in response to international appeals, a senior Israeli official described it as just a two-day interval during Rice's visit.More than 100 Palestinians were killed in the Gaza offensive, which followed rocket attacks by the Islamist group Hamas on Israeli towns. The U.S. reputation as an honest peace broker is under the spotlight again because of Washington's close ties to Israel.
U.S. officials said Rice would press Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to get back to talks despite the violence in Gaza, which Hamas seized in June, but conceded the timing of her long-arranged trip made it difficult.The most important thing is to keep moving the talks along, said a U.S. official who asked not to be identified.Certainly we do want to see negotiations resume, said State Department spokesman Tom Casey. All this points out the need for there to be progress in the negotiations and ultimately have a two-state solution. That's the answer to the violence that we've seen.We regret any loss of innocent life that has occurred, and certainly hope that the actions will end in the near future, he said. Asked if he was referring to the Israeli actions, Casey said, both sides.On Wednesday, an Israeli civilian was killed by a rocket, the first such death since May.In the run-up to the Annapolis conference in November that kicked off the talks, scores of former U.S. diplomats and Middle East experts warned Rice of the dangers of cutting off Gaza and isolating Hamas, which won 2006 elections there, saying this could ultimately derail any progress made in Abbas-Olmert talks.
MISTAKE TO GO
Some experts were skeptical whether Rice, whose first stop is Egypt on Tuesday, should go at all and predicted her presence could exacerbate rather than reduce tensions.Casey said he was not aware that any consideration was given to Rice calling off her trip.I think it is a mistake for Rice to travel to the region at this time. The public in the region sees the Bush administration as partly responsible for the devastation in Gaza and her appearance on the scene will only add to the anger, said Middle East expert Shibley Telhami, a professor at the University of Maryland.Telhami said any revival of the peace process would have little resonance in the region. It's hard to see what good the trip can accomplish, he said.Middle East expert Nathan Brown, said her presence would only be useful if she had something to offer, such as a cease-fire deal, and that did not appear to be the case.The reason she is going is part of a process that is not leading anywhere to begin with -- the Annapolis process, said Brown, director of the Institute for Middle East Studies at George Washington University.
Israel says it is acting in self-defense to curb an increasing number of rocket attacks by Hamas Islamists and has shrugged off a U.N. accusation that it used excessive force.Abbas, who spoke to Rice on Sunday, ordered the talks be suspended until the aggression stopped. In her talks with Egypt's president and foreign minister on Tuesday, Rice will be looking for answers over how Cairo can secure its border crossing with Gaza. The border was blown apart in January by Hamas, enabling hundreds of thousands of Gazans to cross over into Egypt to get goods not available because of an Israeli economic blockade. Israeli officials have said some appear to have brought back arms and components to build rockets. The border has since then been sealed, although Egypt opened it up over the weekend to let dozens of wounded Palestinians receive care in Egyptian hospitals. Rice is set to meet Abbas and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on Tuesday in the West Bank and will then go to Jerusalem for talks with Israeli leaders, before leaving for Brussels on Wednesday for a meeting of NATO foreign ministers.
(Editing by Alan Elsner)
A Gaza Quagmire for Israel? By TIM MCGIRK/JERUSALEM MAR 3,08
Tit-for-tat clashes in Gaza may escalate into the next quagmire in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Before the current fighting started, Israeli officials privately scoffed that they could live with an occasional Hamas or Islamic Jihad rocket fired into their territory by the Palestinian militants in Gaza. But that changed last week when Hamas, angered at the loss of five senior commanders in an Israeli air strike, began targeting Ashkelon again, sending a dozen powerful Grad missiles into the Israeli port roughly five miles from Gaza's northern frontier. In retaliation, the Israelis stormed into northern Gaza. On Saturday, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas suspended contact with Israel, as fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants raged on for a second day, leaving nearly 70 dead and hundreds more wounded. Abbas' walk-out may doom the visit this week by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice who was due to fly into the Middle East to provide impetus for peace talks between the Israelis and the Palestinians. In light of the Israeli aggression, such communication has no meaning, said Abbas' spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeina. Abbas had no choice, say Palestinians. Even though Gaza is ruled by Abbas' Hamas rivals, pro-Gaza demonstrations have spread throughout the West Bank towns and cities under Abbas' control, with Palestinians there clashing with Israeli riot police. Many of the slogans they shouted were against Abbas, who is seen by many Palestinians as too pro-Israeli.
The brunt of the fighting occurred on Saturday when Israelis, in an operation named Warm Winter, stormed into northern Gaza with over a thousand troops backed by 30 tanks and helicopter gunships. They advanced to the edge of Jabaliya, a crowded refugee camp, and there took fire from gunmen hiding inside the buildings. After two Israeli soldiers were shot, eyewitnesses say, the Israelis retaliated with withering fire in all directions as they struggled to evacuate the wounded soldiers, who eventually died. On the Palestinian side, medical sources say that 25 of those killed were militants, the rest civilians, including women and children. Despite the fierce Israeli assault, militants kept firing a barrage of mortars and longer-range Katyusha rockets into southern Israel.
The Israeli attack on Gaza came after an Israeli student was killed in a rocket blast, and the port city of Ashkelon, with 120,000 residents, came under attack, showing Israelis for the first time that the militants of Hamas and Islamic Jihad had acquired a large arsenal of accurate, longer-range rockets. One Hamas commander told TIME by telephone: It's true that we're losing lives but we'll prove to the Arab world that we have the power to stand up to Israel. The Israeli combat brigade withdrew from northern Gaza early Monday morning, even as another rocket struck Ashkelon. Nevertheless, Israeli military spokesmen said Operation Warm Winter had succeeded in clearing out most of the area used by militant rocket launchers. There could be bigger battles to come. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert waved off calls of restraint from United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon who equally condemned both Israel for excessive and disproportionate use of force in Gaza and the militants for their unending barrage of rockets into southern Israel. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said, We are not happy about civilians being hurt in Gaza. Hamas and those who fire rockets at Israel are responsible and they will pay the price.If anything, the Israeli assault has steeled Gazans' support for Hamas. As one housewife in Jabalya watched the injured victims of an Israeli air strike being carted into an ambulance, she shouted, Keep hitting them with rockets. Take revenge for our children. Military sources say that after the initial thrust, the cabinet is now deciding whether to pull back or go into Gaza much harder and deeper, with division-strength troop numbers, to crush Hamas' organization and leadership. This is likely to be postponed until after the U.S. Secretary of State returns home, probably empty-handed, from her talks with Olmert and Abbas. On Saturday night, Israeli warplanes bombed the office of Hamas Prime Minister Ismael Haniyeh. He and other political and military leaders have gone into hiding. They fear, with good reason, that they will be targeted by an Israeli missile strike. The two choices facing Israeli are equally unpalatable: either negotiate with Hamas, considered a terrorist organization, or try to reconquer Gaza, with its hostile 1.5 million population, and get mired in a long and bloody assault, a mini-Iraq. View this article on Time.com
Long-range rockets fired from Gaza are Iranian: Israel army
MAR 3,08
JERUSALEM (AFP) - The Israeli army on Monday said that all the long-range rockets fired by Gaza militants against southern Israel during the latest round of violence were manufactured in arch-foe Iran. Speaking to the parliament's powerful foreign affairs and defence committee, a senior military intelligence official said that over 20 Katyusha-type rockets, also known as Grad, were fired against Israel since last Thursday.We are talking about regular Iranian-made rockets, an official quoted the intelligence official as saying.The 122-millimetre rockets have a range of about 20 kilometres (12.5 miles) and carry a large payload which caused heavy damage to buildings in the southern coastal town of Ashkelon, which bore the brunt of the Grad rocket fire.Gaza militants have in recent years fired thousands of short-range makeshift rockets and mortars against southern Israel, but have only rarely fired the longer-range Grad-type rockets.Israel believes that over 100 such rockets were smuggled into the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip through its porous border with Egypt in recent months following the Hamas violent takeover of the territory, a security official has told AFP.
More than 116 Palestinians, including 22 children, were killed during the latest escalation of violence in Gaza which erupted last Wednesday and ended early Monday morning. Two Israeli soldiers and one Israeli civilian have also been killed.Israel accuses Iran of actively backing and supplying arms to Hamas.
WE WILL SEE HOW THESE ARAB MUSLIMS BRAG WHEN IN THE FUTURE GOD DESTROYS 5/6TH OF THE RUSSIA - ARAB - MUSLIMS THAT MARCH TO ISRAEL. THEN WE WILL SEE WHO WILL HAVE THE BRAGGING RIGHTS. GOD PROTECTS ISRAEL REMEMBER THIS ARAB - MUSLIMS.
Hamas claims Gaza victory as Israel pulls back By Nidal al-Mughrabi MAR 3,08
GAZA (Reuters) - Hamas declared victory after Israeli troops pulled out of the Gaza Strip on Monday following a U.S. appeal to end days of fighting that killed more than 100 Palestinians. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said despite the culmination of the five-day operation, in which two Israeli soldiers were killed, Israel would take further action in the Gaza Strip until cross-border rocket fire was cut significantly.The withdrawal came in time for a two-day visit, beginning on Tuesday, by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, a driving force behind peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority that have so far shown little progress.The blood of Gaza's children has achieved victory and occupation will be removed, Hamas's Gaza leader Ismail Haniyeh said in a statement.Hamas, which seized the Gaza Strip from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction in June, vowed to continue firing rockets into Israel. It launched one into the main southern city of Ashkelon shortly after the troops withdrew, wounding one person.We are not willing to show tolerance, period. We will respond, Olmert said in broadcast remarks.A senior Israeli official said, however, there would be a two-day interval for a Rice's visit.
Israel had been under pressure from its allies in Washington to halt the violence after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas suspended U.S.-backed peace talks in protest at the bloodshed.The Palestinian Health Ministry said 116 Palestinians were killed in the Gaza offensive. About half of them were civilians, medics say.
Many of the civilian casualties came when Israeli missiles fired by helicopters, jets and unmanned drones hit buildings and homes that the army said were being used by militants.
PEACE TALKS
Speaking after the pullout, senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said the talks, which Washington hopes can result in a statehood deal this year, would remain frozen for now.We are working hard to reach a full calm, a full cessation of hostilities. We want to make sure that what happened will not recur, Erekat said.
Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said talks with Rice would focus on events in Gaza and Palestinian leaders would urge her to press Israel to end military operations there.Israel and the Palestinian Authority are divided over the scope of an agreement. Abbas seeks a full peace accord that would enable him to declare a state, while Olmert says the goal is an understanding of basic principles.In remarks to reporters, Riad al-Malki, the Palestinian foreign minister, called for the deployment of an international peacekeeping force in the Gaza Strip and in the occupied West Bank.
Such a move did not appear likely soon. Hamas opposes an international force.Addressing his centrist Kadima party, Olmert said he hoped to continue talks with Abbas, but under no circumstances will we restrain ourselves in the face of terror from Gaza.On Wednesday, an Israeli civilian was killed by a rocket, the first such death since May. Israel's security cabinet plans to meet on Wednesday to consider the government's next move in the Gaza Strip. In Gaza City, several thousand Hamas supporters took to the streets in celebration of the withdrawal. Some snapped photographs with gunmen. The Gaza violence touched off anti-Israeli protests in the West Bank, where a Jewish settler shot and killed a 17-year-old Palestinian on Monday in Ramallah after coming under attack by a crowd of rock-throwers, an Israeli police spokesman said. After Israeli troops left Gaza, municipal workers began repairing roads and power lines damaged in the fighting. Some grey concrete houses were pockmarked by bullet and missile holes. In Ashkelon, residents of a penthouse apartment hit by a Katyusha rocket picked through the debris.
Hamas says it fires rockets in self-defence, and that it would stop if Israel halted all military activity in the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank and ended a Gaza blockade. Israel says security concerns dictate its actions and that raids have foiled militants' plans to attack Israelis. (Additional reporting by Alastair Macdonald, Dan Williams and Adam Entous in Jerusalem and Ari Rabinovitch in Ashkelon; Writing by Jeffrey Heller and Alastair Macdonald; Editing by Keith Weir)
