Fragile ceasefire

Israeli forces have withdrawn from Gaza and the militants have stopped firing rockets, but people on both sides are sceptical about peace.

Yet another ceasefire has been announced between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) after five months of relentless bombardment and blockade of the Gaza Strip. The announcement, in the last week of November, was the result of the initiative of the Palestinian side and came as a surprise. According to reports in the Arab media, the Hamas leadership was fully on board and the leaders in exile played an important role in the behind-the-scenes negotiations with Israel. The announcement also coincided with the visit of American President George W. Bush to the region.

The Israeli government was no doubt aware of the conclusions drawn by the Iraq Study Group appointed by the United States Congress. Its report, which has had a tremendous impact on the American political scene, identifies the Israel-Palestine conflict as a major factor contributing to the instability in West Asia and also calls for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. It emphasises the settlement of the Palestine issue as crucial to the peace process in the region.

The report, officially released in the first week of December, contains five points that it says should be included in a peace settlement between Israel and the Palestinians. A key point reads: "Sustainable negotiations leading to a final peace settlement along the lines of President Bush's two-state solution, which would address the key final status issues of borders, settlements, Jerusalem, the right of return and the end of conflict." Significantly, for the first time there is backing at such a high level in the U.S. for "the right of return" for millions of Palestinians forcibly exiled from their land.

Yasser Arafat was vilified in the West for insisting on this right. Hamas, too, is uncompromising on "the right of return". The top-level policy panel, co-chaired by the influential former Secretary of State and close confidant of the Bush family, James Baker, has concluded that the Iraq issue can be solved only if there are serious efforts to bring peace between Israel and Palestine.

The Group called for a "renewed and sustained commitment" on the part of the Bush administration to a "comprehensive peace plan" involving Israel, the Palestinians, Syria and Lebanon. For the past six years, the Bush administration has preferred to be on the sidelines and give Israel a free hand. Baker has said that the Bush administration cannot pick and choose the recommendations it likes and wants the report implemented in toto.

The days of Israel getting a blank cheque to continue with its policy of aggrandisement and targeted killings seem to be numbered. The report also says the Bush administration must pressure Israel to hand back the Golan Heights to Syria.

The Israeli military establishment is not too happy with the sudden announcement of a truce by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Senior Army officials have told the Israeli media that they were not kept in the loop about the decision. There are reports in the Israeli press that moves are already on to undermine the ceasefire.

The blockade of Gaza started after Palestinian militants kidnapped an Israeli soldier, Corporal Gilad Shalit, on June 25. The militant groups demanded the release of Palestinian prisoners who have been languishing in Israeli jails for years, many of then incarcerated on flimsy charges. One of the first things the Israeli government did in retaliation was to destroy the dilapidated infrastructure of the thickly populated slice of Palestinian territory. This resulted in the disruption of power supply and water distribution and hospitals had to go without essential medicines.

Before the siege of Gaza began, Palestinians were reeling under the effects of an Israel-imposed embargo, backed by the U.S. and the European Union, since the Hamas-led government came to power in January 2006. The last six months have witnessed the further impoverishment of the Palestinian masses. Civil servants have not received salaries for months, and by end-2006 as much as 66 per cent of the population was living below the poverty line, 80 per cent of it in the Gaza Strip. Since the Israeli military operations started on June 28, more than 400 Palestinians, many of them women and children, have been killed.

Despite the odds, the Palestinian militant groups refused to be cowed down. Locally fabricated Qassam rockets continued to target Israeli settlements. Ehud Olmert told an Israeli Parliamentary Committee that an important reason why he agreed to a truce was the military's inability to prevent the firing of Qassam rockets into Israel. He, however, warned that Israel would use all the force it has at its disposal any time it wishes to do so. The Israeli Army is still reeling from the setback in Lebanon and from its inability to cow down the people in the occupied territories.

Under the terms of the latest truce, Israeli forces withdrew from Gaza and the militants have stopped the firing of rockets. The Hamas spokesman said his party was fully committed to the ceasefire. At the same time, the Hamas leadership insisted that it was committed to fighting the economic blockade without making concessions on the issue of Palestinian statehood.

Negotiations are on for a prisoner-swap. There are reports that the Israeli authorities will soon release the charismatic Palestinian leader, Marwan Barghuti. In a public broadcast, Ehud Olmert pledged to release numerous Palestinian prisoners, including those like Barghuti who have been sentenced to lengthy prison terms, if Gilad Shalit is released.

Senior Israeli officials suggested that peace talks, which have been stalled for the past six years, could be revived once the soldier was released. Ehud Olmert, for the record, insists that serious talks could restart only when the Hamas-led government recognises the state of Israel. Since coming to power, senior Hamas officials have said that they are willing to recognise the Jewish state provided the Israeli Army and settlers withdraw to the pre-1967 borders.

People on both sides of the divide are sceptical about the prospects of a lasting ceasefire. Israel has wilfully trampled on previous agreements despite the fact that the various Palestinian militant groups are holding their fire. The 2001 Ceasefire Agreement broke down after the Israeli secret service assassinated a leading Palestinian activist, Raeed Karmi, in January 2002. In response, Al Fatah-affiliated militant groups started suicide bombings. Some months later, the Palestinian side announced that it was suspending all militant activities.

In July 2002, Israeli forces eliminated Hamas leader Salah Shehadeh by dropping a one-tonne bomb on his home in Gaza. Along with him 15 innocent civilians were killed. It did not take long for the Palestinians' second "hudna" (uprising). Since then, Israel has succeeded in killing many top leaders of the militant groupings with its "targeted assassinations".

With the Israeli Prime Minster's popularity rating at an all-time low after the disastrous war in Lebanon, more fanatical voices are raising their heads in Israel. The beleaguered Olmert has inducted into his coalition an extremist party, Yisrael Beitenu, and designated its leader, Avigdor Lieberman, as Vice-Premier.

Lieberman has not hidden his fascist views, on Palestinians in particular and on Arabs in general. He has called for the transfer of the Palestinian population from Israel. He also wants a future Palestinian state to be similar to the Bantustans that existed during the time of apartheid in South Africa. Leading Israeli academic Ze'ev Sternhell has described Lieberman "as perhaps the most dangerous politician in the history of the state of Israel". Today, Lieberman as Minister of Strategic Threats is a key member of Israel's "security Cabinet".

Former American President Jimmy Carter, in his latest book, aptly titled Palestine: Peace not Apartheid, writes that Israel has converted the West Bank into a virtual apartheid state with the construction of the separation wall and the introduction of discriminatory legislation. Carter, a good friend and ally of Israel when he was President, has said in many of his recent interviews that his purpose is not to paint the whole of Israeli society as racist but to highlight the intention of a minority in the country to colonise Palestinian land.

It is a fact that today there are separate roads for Jewish settlers and Palestinians. The West Bank has been divided into three areas, with Israel grabbing much of the productive land in between and turning the occupied territories into `Bantustans'. According to John Dugard, a South African professor of law and currently a Special Rapporteur for the United Nations Human Rights Council on Palestine, Israeli policies have surpassed the apartheid policies in South Africa. "Restrictions on freedom of movement imposed by a rigid permit system enforced by some 520 checkpoints and roadblocks resemble, but in severity go well beyond, apartheid's pass system," Dugard wrote in a recent article.

Meanwhile, efforts to form a national unity government in Palestine seem to have failed. The exercise was aimed at sidelining the Hamas. Both Washington and Tel Aviv have told P.A. President Mahmoud Abbas that if the peace talks have to be revived and sanctions lifted the Hamas government has to be sacked and a new government installed without the Hamas in key positions of power. Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh has said that his party will not give up the portfolios of Finance and Interior in a "unity" government proposed by Abbas.

Haniyeh was given a high-profile reception during his recent visit to Egypt, Syria, Iran and Qatar, his first foreign tour since taking office. It is unlikely that he would now give up his job, as suggested by Abbas for the sake of an illusive "unity" government. Haniyeh has, however, reiterated his commitment to form a government of national unity based on the Palestinian Accord Document written by Palestinian political prisoners belonging to different groups languishing in Israeli jails.

In the second week of December, the Fatah leadership spoke of sacking the Hamas-led government and calling for a referendum to hold new elections. The Hamas leadership said such a move would be undemocratic as their party was elected by a popular mandate in January 2006. Dismissal of the popularly elected government could also spark a civil war in the occupied territories and derail the fragile peace that is holding in Gaza.