Israel and the Middle East News Update Monday, September 8 Headlines: Israeli Official: Hamas Has Begun Repairing Gaza Tunnels Foreign Ministry Proposes International Force in Gaza, Favors EU Troops Israeli Politicians Praise Sisi Plan for a Palestinian State in Sinai Palestinian PM: Palestinians Face Boycott Threats Over Hamas Wages Abbas Threatens to Break Partnership with Hamas Hamas Accuses Abbas of Sabotaging Unity Government Riots in Jerusalem: One Man Lightly Injured; Gas Station Vandalized PM to West: Nip Islamic Extremism in the Bud Commentary: The National Interest: “The 2014 Israel-Hamas War: A Preliminary Net Assessment” By Shai Feldman Yedioth Ahronoth: “General Michael Hayden: Deal with ISIS Like We Dealt with al- Qaida” By Ronen Bergman S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace 633 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, 5th Floor, Washington, DC 20004 www.centerpeace.org ● Yoni Komorov, Editor ● Nathaniel Sobel, Associate Editor News Excerpts September 8, 2014 Ha’aretz Israeli Official: Hamas Has Begun Repairing Gaza Tunnels Israel has received intelligence indicating that Hamas has begun reconstructing the attack tunnels that were destroyed during Operation Protective Edge, a senior Israeli official said on Sunday. Two weeks have passed since the cease-fire went into effect, the official said, and Hamas has already begun preparing for the next confrontation and is focused on replenishing its arsenals. The senior official said that Hamas militants have returned to arms smuggling through several tunnels that remain intact under the Philadelphi Route in Rafah. He said that the smuggling continues despite the Egyptian security forces' more concentrated and effective efforts to stamp out the tunnels. FROM ISRAEL RADIO: “Security officials yesterday criticized the statements made by a political official, who said that Hamas has renewed the rocket production, the rebuilding of the tunnels and the smuggling from Sinai to the Gaza Strip” Ha’aretz Foreign Ministry Proposes International Force in Gaza, Favors EU Troops The Foreign Ministry submitted a classified document to the security cabinet two weeks ago with a proposal for stationing an international force in the Gaza Strip to monitor rehabilitation and prevent the rearming of Hamas and other terror groups. The Foreign Ministry believes that such a force could serve Israel’s interest if it carries out effective security work in Gaza. The two-page document, entitled “Principles and Parameters for Deployment of an International Force in Gaza,” was given to the ministers of the security cabinet on August 21, by the Foreign Minister director-general. Jerusalem Post Israeli Politicians Praise Sisi Plan for a Palestinian State in Sinai Israeli politicians responded enthusiastically Monday to reports that Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi was willing to give Palestinians land in Sinai adjacent to Gaza for a state. Science and Technology Minister Yaakov Peri, a former Shin Bet chief, said he's surprised by Sisi's generosity, calling the proposal "worth discussing seriously." On Monday, Army Radio reported that Sisi had offered Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas 1,600 square kilometers in Sinai to expand the Gaza Strip to five times its current size. According to the plan, the territory would serve as a Palestinian state under the complete control of the PA. The new territory, composed of Gaza together with the extra land in Sinai, would be a demilitarized state that would serve as a home to which Palestinian refugees could return. See also, “Sisi denies offering PA state in Sinai to Abbas” (i24 News) Agence France Presse Palestinian PM: Palestinians Face Boycott Threats Over Hamas Wages The international community has threatened to boycott the Palestinian leadership if it pays the salaries of former Hamas employees in Gaza, prime minister Rami Hamdallah told AFP on Sunday. In an exclusive interview, Hamdallah said he had been warned he would face problems if he visited the Gaza Strip without first sorting out the salaries issue. Hamdallah, who heads the Palestinian 2 government of national consensus, said the question of wages had become the main stumbling block to an intra-Palestinian reconciliation deal. "This unity government should control both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip but there are many things blocking its work," he said. Ynet News Abbas Threatens to Break Partnership with Hamas The rift between Fatah and Hamas, which developed over the course of Operation Protective Edge, continued to widen Saturday, when Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas spoke to Egyptian reporters, threatening to break their current partnership if the organization in Gaza doesn't begin to make some changes. "If Hamas won't accept a Palestinian State with one government, one law, and one weapon - then there won't be any partnership between us," said Abbas. "This is our condition, and we won't back away from it." Reuters Hamas Accuses Abbas of Sabotaging Unity Government Hamas on Monday accused Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas of trying to sabotage a fragile reconciliation agreement after he accused them of running “a shadow government” in Gaza. In a sharply worded attack on Hamas, Abbas on Saturday threatened to break off the unity agreement over the group’s de facto control of the Gaza Strip. But Abbas’s words sparked an angry response from Hamas, with spokesman Fawzi Barhoum accusing him in turn of trying “to destroy the reconciliation and play into the hands of the Americans and the Israelis.” Walla Riots in Jerusalem: One Man Lightly Injured; Gas Station Vandalized Violent demonstrations erupted last night in a number of locations across Jerusalem, following the death of Mohammed Sinokrot, who had been critically injured in rioting in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Joz the week before. One Israeli man sustained light injuries from a stone that was thrown at him in A-Tur in East Jerusalem. At the same time a group of young men threw stones at passers-by in Issawiya. Security forces who were called in dispersed the demonstrators with crowd dispersal means. Jerusalem Post PM to West: Nip Islamic Extremism in the Bud Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu warned Monday that the extremism represented by groups such as the Islamic State is a threat to the entire world, not just the Middle East. Speaking during a meeting with visiting Norwegian Foreign Minister Børge Brende, Netanyahu said that those who do not "nip it in the bud" immediately, will find the Islamic extremism seen today in the Middle East "at their doorsteps tomorrow." Netanyahu told Brende that there is "a growing awareness in the international community of the threat posed by Islamist terror and radicalism. Groups like ISIS, Hamas, al Nusra, al-Qaida, al Shabaab, Hezbollah supported by Iran, they form a clear and present danger to our civilization, to our way of life, our values." 3 The National Interest – September 8, 2014 The 2014 Israel-Hamas War: A Preliminary Net Assessment By Shai Feldman On August 26, after more than fifty days of fighting, the latest phase of the Israel-Hamas War ended with an Egyptian-mediated ceasefire. It will be months, if not years, before the ramifications of the 2014 war will become clear and fully apparent. At this early point, just over a week after the ceasefire was announced, any assessment of the violence must be considered tentative at best. The following are a number of early reflections on this recent explosion of Palestinian-Israeli violence: First, as reflected in the ceasefire agreement, neither Israel, nor Hamas has gained anything significant from the violence. Hamas may have gained a modest expansion of fishing rights for Gazans and may gain some improvement in the ease of movement and access of people and goods into and out of the Gaza Strip. Israel may eventually gain some tightening of the constraints on the smuggling of weapons and ammunition into the Strip. None of these constitute strategic gains. Hamas did not gain any significant change in Gaza’s isolation— neither its demands for building a seaport, nor for the rebuilding of the airport were accepted. Similarly, there is little hope that Israel’s wish to see the Gaza Strip demilitarized will ever materialize. Talk of a grand bargain in the framework of which Hamas will agree to disarm in exchange for massive reconstruction of the Gaza Strip will most likely remain just that—talk. A second prism leading to the conclusion that neither side has gained anything significant in the war is that the fighting ended not because one or both sides had achieved their objectives, but rather because at some point, Israeli and Hamas leaders concluded that there was no point to the war’s continuation. Namely, that more fighting with its associated costs were not likely to yield a different result. Given its limited resources and unlimited aims, Hamas could not coerce Israel into making significant concessions merely by increasing Israel’s pain and suffering incrementally through the further use of rocket fire. Its attempts to increase Israeli costs dramatically through a “game changer”—the imaginative use of “attack tunnels”—was defeated by a combination of Israeli technology and the agility of the IDF’s response teams. Similarly, Israel was unlikely to coerce Hamas into submission by conquering additional neighborhoods in the outskirts of Gaza City. Yet it was reluctant to attempt to do this through a “game changer” of its own: a deep penetration of the heart of Gaza by ground forces in an attempt to destroy the command and control structure of Hamas’ military arm. This reluctance was fueled by four concerns: First, the expectation that such a strike would be associated with very high casualties on both sides; Second, unwillingness for Israel to find itself once again holding a population of 1.6 million Gaza Palestinians against its will; Third, huge uncertainty about an “exit strategy”—what would allow Israel to end its reoccupation and leave? And finally (and perhaps most importantly), fear that with Hamas destroyed, the IDF’s eventual withdrawal would leave Gaza completely chaotic and Jihadi groups far worse than Hamas would enjoy an ideal breeding ground.