On
Wednesday afternoon I went into our neighborhood pizzeria and noticed that their
TV was no longer tuned to the nonstop 24hour war channel. Rather, there was a
nonIsraeli music channel featuring a Spanish guitar player. That evening came
the news that the army had presented to the Inner Cabinet a detailed plan for the
complete conquest of the Gaza Strip, forecasting months of fighting and hundreds
– possibly thousands – of dead Israeli soldiers. Even the outspoken cabinet war
hawks Lieberman and Bennet shied away from supporting that plan.
So,
it looked like the tide was turning and that the State of Israel has come up against
the limitations of its mighty power. The atmosphere seemed to be improving
a bit, with some fissures in the "war mania consensus", and such staunch
mainstream commentators as Nahum Barne’a and former Mossad Director Efraim
Halevy started to change their tune a bit.
The
maverick Ari Shavit tried to analyze seriously how the past month affected us. The
unexpected fighting abilities exhibited by Hamas, which had spent years preparing
for this war, have broken up the complacency in which Israel had lived in the
past decade. Feeling secure in overwhelming military superiority, Israeli
society had shrugged off Kerry’s feeble attempts of peacemaking, confident of
an ability to “manage the conflict” without solving it. Israel was to go on
indefinitely as “a villa in the jungle”, a prosperous hightech enclave
splendidly selfisolated from the stormy region all around. But it was a
waferthin false security, as evident by how easily it was shattered and
replaced by a deepseated anxiety.
The
success of Iron Dome in deflecting the missiles shot from Gaza, making it
possible
for life to outwardly continue as normal in the cities of central Israel, was far
from making Israelis feel truly secure. The panic around the Hamas
cross-border tunnels was understandable for
inhabitants of a kibbutz two kilometers from the Gaza border: “They
could at any moment burst out of the earth and kill us all!”. From Tel-Avivans the same outcry probably refers to issues far deeper and profounder than physical tunnels dug in the
sandy soil of the Gaza border zone.
Israel
might count itself lucky that the war with Iran, towards which Netanyahu was pushing
for years (and on preparing for which he spent a great deal of money) is (hopefully!)
not going to happen. It might have been an even more rude and painful wakeup
call.
Yesterday
night I went to bed hoping that the tide was truly turning, that a UN/US brokered
72hour ceasefire would be the beginning of longoverdue negotiations, with our
side woken up from the illusion of omnipower and ready to talk rather than dictate.
This morning had seen a new rude awakening, the Gaza avalanche not stopped but
gathering an even greater destructive momentum. The prime minister’s nightmare
has come true – once again an Israeli soldier is in the hands of Hamas.
Tens
of thousands of Israeli soldiers had been introduced into the Hamas’ home
ground of the Gaza Strip, and Hamas managed – as they announced in advance they
would – to use the opportunity and capture one of them (“kidnap” as official
Israeli statements put it). Until now, Israeli society had
been
extremely sensitive to soldiers held in captivity, and ready to pay very high prices
in order to get them back. Would that still hold with regard to Second Lieutenant
Hadar Goldin?
Who
has broken the ceasefire? During the night, Israeli forces had advanced into the
Rafah area so as to create a fait accompli before the 8.00 ceasefire deadline
and take possession of several square kilometers of ground they had not held
before. Strictly, that would not be considered a ceasefire violation, though it
would not exactly be an act in good faith. (Good faith is in extremely short
supply on either side to this conflict...) Israeli forces then proceeded to
uncover and prepare to destroy a Hamas tunnel discovered in this same area. And
then, apparently, the tunnel disgorged Hamas fighters who killed two soldiers
and captured one and carried him with them back deep into the earth.
Did
all this happen at 7.00 before the ceasefire was to enter into effect, or at
9.30 when it was supposed to be in force? Did the ceasefire terms entitle
Israeli forces to go on blowing up tunnels in the areas of Gaza presently under
their direct control? Did the ceasefire terms entitle Hamas fighters presently
inside these tunnels to do something about the possibility of the tunnels and
themselves being blown up? Did the ceasefire terms refer at all to these
complicated issues? Diplomats might long argue about all this, and a Professor
of International Law might eventually set it as an interesting thorny problem
to his students. To thirty-five Palestinian inhabitants of the Rafah area,
killed in the immediate massive Israeli retaliation, all this would no longer
make any difference.
The
madness goes on.
***
Demonstration:
Saturday,
2nd of August. 20:00, Habima Theater Square, Tel Aviv
We
continue to call for an immediate cease fire, putting an end to the war and
bloodshed, while simultaneously seeking a political solution
Stop
the attack on Gaza!
War
does not lead to security, it merely claims more and more causalities.
Say
yes to a political solution that will make possible a secure life for both
people.
***
There will be assigned stewards. Please follow their instructions as for the
location of the protest, the conduct during the protest and the dispersal***
We
ask that all participants will avoid any violent conduct.
Lighting candles at the Rabin Square in Tel Aviv,
in memory of all Palestinians and Israelis killed in the Gaza War.
