Winter waiting game
By Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff Haaretz 7 March 2008
www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/961726.html

In the course of Operation Warm Winter, held in the Gaza Strip at the
beginning of the week, the commander of the 74th battalion of the Barak
Armored Brigade, Lieutenant Colonel Nir Ben-David, noticed three young
Palestinians in civilian clothing entering a house at the edge of the town
of Jabalya. Using two Kalashnikov rifles and an RPG missile, the three then
opened fire in the direction of the tanks. When an Israel Defense Forces
unit responded to the fire, the Palestinians abandoned their weapons and
fled the site. According to the General Staff, this act was one of cunning,
not cowardice.

The operation by the Givati Brigade and the Armored Corps, which the army
has described as a relative success, illustrated the difficulty of
countering a terror organization that occasionally uses guerrilla tactics
and quasi-military fighting methods. Hamas is adopting a strategy of
disappearance: If it wants to, it will clash with the army, in uniform and
with weapons. Yet, if it so desires, it can also shed its uniforms, enter
houses and pull out the weapons from the cache only once it discovers a
military force's weakness.

Colonel Ilan Malka, the Givati Brigade commander in charge of Warm Winter,
received clear instructions: to deploy, within a few hours, at a certain
longitude, northeast of Gaza City; to prevent the launching of Qassams; to
arrest wanted men; and to seize weapons. Although Hamas' defensive system is
separated into battalions and brigades, the two brigade commanders in whose
sector Malka operated did not demonstrate much determination in checking the
Givati advance. From the moment it became clear that the IDF was stronger,
they focused their efforts on attacking the force's tail end, inflicting
losses and gaining pictures that would help in the battle for public
opinion. Had Hamas succeeded in catching a burning Israeli tank on video for
15 seconds, it might have been satisfied. But it did not get the shot. It
only attained the desired image yesterday morning, when an explosive device
destroyed a military jeep next to Kibbutz Ein Hashlosha.

A dramatic event, caught by the cameras, can change the Israeli public's
view on the need for a major ground operation in the Strip. The destruction
of two APCs in Gaza in May 2004, resulting in 11 dead in 24 hours, increased
public support for then prime minister Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan.
The ratio of casualties in this week's fighting - three Israeli dead versus
about 120 Palestinians (many of them civilians) - did not eradicate the fear
of additional losses. According to estimates by political officials, a major
ground operation could result in 200 to 300 casualties, a number they use to
explain Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's reservations about the move. As for the
General Staff, it thinks the casualty estimates are exaggerated.

The IDF does not believe that the mission of a comprehensive operation -
meaning the capture of parts of the northern Strip and the capture or
encirclement of parts of southern Gaza - is impossible. It even believes
that remaining in the area afterward constitutes a reasonable challenge. The
great difficulty lies in arranging an exit strategy: How do they prevent a
future threat to Sderot and Ashkelon once the IDF withdraws? Won't Hamas
again declare victory once the IDF pulls out, as it did this week in
Jabalya?

In the battle for public opinion, the Palestinians have the upper hand.
Israel's explanation that civilian members of the Atallah family were killed
in an Israel Air Force bombing because they chose to build an assembly line
for Qassam rockets in their home did not penetrate the public mind. Israel
also failed to exploit the fact that Hamas shelled the Sufa crossing at a
time when 60 trucks with food were entering Gaza.

The 14th floor

A senior defense official estimates that a major military campaign in Gaza
will last at least six to seven months: a month to take over the areas to be
occupied and approximately half a year for investigations, the arrest of
wanted men and the destruction of weapons. In time, the aim is to reduce the
firing of rockets and slow down the pace of Hamas' empowerment, in part by
addressing the problem of arms smuggling to Rafah, too. For now, the
military top brass is still working on an exit strategy.

Israel hopes that a multinational force can be established, which will
control the border crossings from the Strip into both Israel and Egypt, and
might even assume greater responsibility for parts of Gaza. However, such a
force must be credible in the eyes of Gaza residents. With this in mind,
initial feelers have already been put out in Arab and Muslim countries.
Surprisingly, the responses were relatively positive.

It was a difficult week on the 14th floor, which connects the Defense
Ministry building with the General Staff building in the Kirya Defense
Ministry compound in Tel Aviv. Relations between the people on either side
of the corridor - Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Chief of Staff Gabi
Ashkenazi - are usually proper, until the moment Ashkenazi refuses to
participate in the political game. This happened most recently on Sunday,
when the chief of staff decided to pull out the Givati soldiers from
Jabalya, and made the pretenses disseminated by the office of the Defense
Minister look somewhat ridiculous.

As far as Barak is concerned, Ashkenazi is a tough customer. He enjoys a
solid and independent status in public opinion, he is sufficiently
experienced not to get involved in the political arena and fall into the
same traps that brought down his predecessor Dan Halutz in the Second
Lebanon War. After Roni Yihye was killed by a Qassam strike at Sapir College
last week, and in the wake of the firing of Grads on Ashkelon, the public
declarations of several ministers created the sense that Israel and Hamas
are on the brink of war. This impression was supported by a leak about
unprecedented preparations by the army to attack in Gaza.

In fact, the plans were limited to massive aerial attacks, the prospect of
which slowly faded on Monday, and to the Givati ground operation. Several
generals thought the momentum should be maintained: They called for
additional forces to be brought to the border of the Strip and for a
succession of rolling ground operations. The chief of staff preferred to
wait. In his opinion, as long as the government does not outline specific
targets and a clear timetable for the army, there is no reason to drive the
forces to the point of burnout.

From the moment Military Intelligence indicated Hamas was planning to rein
in the firing, and without receiving instructions from Olmert and Barak to
accelerate preparations for a larger operation, Ashkenazi decided to
slightly move up the withdrawal of the Givati force and stop the escalation.
On Monday there were hardly any IDF forces left in the Strip, except for the
battalions that carry out ongoing security missions along the border.

Within 48 hours Barak managed to generate the following ideas: focused
firing on Qassam launching sites (the legal authorities are hesitant), the
creation of Palestinian "ghost towns" near the border of the Strip (Sharon
thought of that; it was never implemented), an arrangement for the voluntary
evacuation of settlement outposts (let's wait and see), and even a war
against the ultra-Orthodox draft-evasion. Every initiative immediately
received positive media coverage. It is quite possible that the election
campaign has already begun without our knowing about it, but it is hard to
blame the chief of staff for not being willing to join it.

The army is certain that the next round is just around the corner. And for
this battle, too, the chief of staff will recommend trying all the existing
"gradations," including assassinations of the leaders of Hamas' political
arm before launching a large-scale invasion. The gap between declarations
and deeds that became evident this week left a somewhat bitter taste among
the army's top brass. "Every time we embark on such a campaign, at whose
conclusion the previous situation is restored, our deterrence is eroded a
little further," admits a senior officer.

Beyond Sderot

On the street parallel to Saladin Road, which crosses Gaza from north to
south, in the area where the Givati Brigade and the Armored Corps operated,
some houses were completely destroyed after being battered by IDF
bulldozers; others were damaged by shells and bullets. The areas east of
Jabalya have also incurred great infrastructural damage, including burst
water pipes, torn electricity lines and asphalt roads that have simply
disappeared.

A Palestinian journalist who visited there (for over a year now, the IDF has
forbidden Israeli journalists from entering the Strip) says the most
concrete evidence of what happened in the area is found in the large numbers
of mourners' tents. There are several such tents on every street. The sight
is almost always the same: a plastic sheet put up in the yard of a house,
plastic chairs, loudspeakers, pictures of the dead, most of them Hamas
members, and a microphone for those visitors who want to say some words of
consolation. The few places where no mourners' tents stood were frequented
by men in wheelchairs or on crutches.

The destruction, the dead and the wounded did not prevent senior Hamas
officials from declaring victory immediately after the IDF withdrawal. The
first of the celebrants was Mahmoud al-Zahar, who has recently been
consolidating his status as the leading figure in the Strip's political
echelon, in part because Israel killed two of his sons.

Nor did the large number of dead arouse doubts in Khalil al-Haya's mind, who
is Zahar's rival for seniority in Hamas and has also lost a son in one of
last week's battles. "Be careful, be careful, be careful," Haya told the
Israelis, promising that Hamas' real strength has yet to be demonstrated. A
third senior official, MP Fathi Hamad, convened a press conference in order
to wave about a blood-stained IDF shirt. Hamad, who claimed that it was the
shirt of one of the soldiers killed in the operation, did not manage to
explain what message he meant to convey. All of them were surpassed by
Mushir al Masri, a 30-year-old Palestinian MP. In a speech in the spirit of
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, Masri explained that Hamas is capable of
hitting "Ma baad Sderot," what lies beyond Sderot.

In spite of the massive barrage of rockets on Sderot and Ashkelon, Hamas
also understands that so far it has not chalked up an impressive success in
direct clashes with the IDF. The victory celebrations are meant mainly for
the ears of its political rival, Fatah. The IDF operation in Gaza increased
Hamas' popularity among the residents of the Strip. And more importantly: It
proved Hamas' ability to dictate an agenda in the West Bank as well. It is
doubtful whether Hamas was behind the popular demonstrations in the West
Bank this week. But the protest, which was accompanied by the throwing of
stones and Molotov cocktails, testifies to the organization's influence in
the West Bank, right under Fatah's nose.

At the beginning of the week, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas,
whom the Arab media accused of being a collaborator in light of the mass
killing in Gaza, announced a freeze in negotiations with Israel. But Abbas
changed his mind Tuesday, when U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
arrived in Ramallah, and agreed to renew the talks. The next morning the
president changed his mind again, announcing that there would be no
negotiations without an overall cease-fire. Rice, who heard the announcement
during meetings in Jerusalem, was shocked and hastened to reprimand him. The
reprimand was effective, and Abbas reversed his stance yet again. The
negotiations, he said, will be renewed in the coming days.

In spite of the belligerent tone adopted by both sides, the idea of a
comprehensive cease-fire has still not been completely removed from the
agenda. Just recently, Hamas outlined its conditions for a lull: It would
cease firing rockets in exchange for a cessation of the aerial
assassinations and the IDF ground raids in Gaza. With regard to the West
Bank, officials with indirect contact to Hamas claim the group has announced
that it will agree to adopt an attitude of "constructive fog" regarding the
continuation of the arrests of wanted men there. Yet there are disputes on
how this stance should be interpreted. As such, the General Staff maintains
that Hamas' demand is unequivocal: an end to the arrests. The IDF analysis
is simple: without arrests, the attacks will resume. The military echelon is
more determined than its political counterpart, which is likely to support
one more lull before things deteriorate into a more violent confrontation in
the Strip.

Behind the debate lies another question: Is bringing down the Hamas
government in the Strip really a desirable goal for Israel? The flip side of
the optimistic scenario of deploying a multinational force in the Strip is
widespread anarchy, which will allow splinter groups identified with
international jihad to flourish. The head of MI, Major General Amos Yadlin,
estimates that under cover of the downing of the border fence in Rafah,
dozens of terrorists connected to Al-Qaida infiltrated the Strip. And what
if Al-Qaida succeeds in taking over? The General Staff claims that this is a
theoretical discussion, which is like comparing what is preferable - an
encounter in a dark alley with the Boston Strangler or a nocturnal visit
from Jack the Ripper.