 Several Palestinian armed groups in the Gaza Strip have denied Hamas claims that an agreement has been brokered among them to stop firing rockets across the border into Israel. The al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, was the latest group to disavow the claim. "We are categorically denying that we have released a statement on reaching agreement with Palestinian factions over suspending rocket firing at the Zionist enemy", Abu Obeida, a spokesman for al-Qassam Brigades, said. "We are amazed that such an issue be circulated in the name of Izzad Din al-Qassam Brigades without their knowledge." Earlier, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) both denied they were party to a ceasefire. Khalid al-Batch, a leading figure in the Islamic Jihad movement, said that no agreement had been reached and warned of an Israeli military escalation. A statement from the PFLP armed wing, the Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades, said: "We affirm that we were not part of any agreement on stopping the firing of rockets at Israel or to neutralise any form of legitimate resistance as granted by all international codes and conventions." The denials are a blow to Hamas, which had announced the ceasefire on Saturday, saying the move was aimed at preventing retaliatory attacks by Israel and to allow Gazans to rebuild their homes, destroyed during Israel's three-week war on Gaza launched at the end of last year. The Hamas statement had noted that Palestinian groups would respond to attacks by Israel. The statement came just hours after three Israeli air raids wounded eight Palestinians. The raids came after a rocket was fired into Israel from Gaza. The rocket landed without causing casualties. Israel's war on Gaza, which began in December last year and ended in January, left more 1,400 Palestinians dead. There has been a significant reduction in the number of Palestinian rocket attacks and Israeli air raids since both sides declared unilateral ceasefires following the conflict. Al Jazeera 
 No date for the proposed visit was announced in Jerusalem | Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been invited to visit Egypt, Israeli officials say. The offer was made during talks between Mr Netanyahu and Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman in Jerusalem. Mr Suleiman also met Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who last year angered Egyptians with comments about the Middle East peace process. Mr Suleiman also discussed efforts to release of an Israeli soldier seized by Palestinian militants in 2006. Gilad Shalit was captured by militants, including members of the Hamas group which runs Gaza, in a raid into Israel which also left two Israeli soldiers dead. Lieberman's 'respect' During the Jerusalem talks, Mr Netanyahu told Mr Suleiman that "Israel and Egypt have common interests, and the most important one is peace," Israel's Haaretz newspaper reported. In his turn, Mr Suleiman delivered an official invitation from Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to Mr Netanyahu to visit Cairo. No date was announced. It was their first meeting since a cabinet led by Mr Netanyahu, a right-wing politician, took office in Israel. Mr Suleiman also held separate talks with Mr Lieberman. The Israeli foreign ministry later said in a statement that Mr Lieberman "expressed his respect and appreciation for Egypt's leading role in the region and his personal respect for Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Minister Suleiman". Mr Lieberman, who heads the ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu party, last year caused outrage in Egypt by saying Mr Mubarak could "go to hell" for refusing to make an official visit to Israel. Mr Suleiman has led Egyptian efforts to mediate a lasting ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian faction Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip. Source: BBC
 Saad Khan | February 25
PESHAWAR, Pakistan - Pro-Taliban militants on Tuesday declared an indefinite ceasefire and vowed to release prisoners in Pakistan's Swat valley, where they have fought for nearly two years to enforce sharia law.
The announcement came eight days after the government signed a controversial deal to accept Islamic law as the only system of justice in Swat, a former tourist resort and barely a morning's drive from the capital Islamabad.
The deal provoked alarm in the United States, Europe, Afghanistan and India, where governments are worried it will embolden militants in the North West Frontier Province, which is rife with Taliban and al-Qaeda extremists.
Militant leader Maulana Fazlullah convened a consultative council on Tuesday and agreed to extend a 10-day ceasefire, which had been scheduled to expire on Wednesday, and release prisoners, his spokesman Muslim Khan told AFP.
"Today the shoora met under Maulana Fazlullah and decided to hold a ceasefire for an indefinite period," Khan said.
His supporters observed a temporary truce since last Monday, when the government signed a controversial deal with pro-Taliban cleric Soofi Mohammad to enforce sharia law in Swat in an effort to end Fazlullah's insurgency.
No date has been announced for when sharia law would take effect. It is also not clear how the system, which supporters say will be faster than the penal courts, will be implemented or who will be responsible for justice.
"We are releasing all prisoners unconditionally. Today we released four paramilitary soldiers and we will release all security personnel in our custody as a goodwill gesture," Khan vowed.
"The meeting expressed satisfaction over the efforts being made by Maulana Soofi Mohammad for the enforcement of sharia," he said.
Fazlullah will "announce important decisions" on his illegal FM radio station late Tuesday, his spokesman added.
The militant leader said over the weekend that the ceasefire would be made permanent provided his militants were convinced of government assurances.
Thousands of Fazlullah's supporters have spent nearly two years waging a terrifying campaign to enforce sharia law in Swat, beheading opponents, bombing girls' schools, outlawing entertainment and fighting government forces.
Past peace deals between the government and militants have collapsed.
The brief kidnapping on Sunday of an official and six bodyguards in Swat, which before Fazlullah began his bloody uprising was Pakistan's only ski resort frequented by Westerners, raised concerns about the radicals' intentions.
Muslim, who initially denied any kidnapping, later said district coordination officer (DCO) Khushhal Khan and six guards had been taken to send a message to the government that it should not violate the agreement.
All boys' and some girls' schools reopened in Swat on Monday, a week earlier than the usual end of the winter holidays, but attendance was extremely low - at least partly due to ongoing security fears.
Militants have destroyed 191 schools in the valley, including 122 girls' schools, according to local education official Sher Azfal. Source: Brisbane Times
 By Avi Issacharoff
Officials in Egypt are attempting to persuade Hamas to accept Israel's current offer of a truce in Gaza before a far less accommodating government under Likud Chairman Benjamin Netanyahu is elected, the pan-Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat reported Monday.
The newspaper quoted the officials as telling Hamas that surveys in Israel show the opposition leader is likely to come to power in February's general election, adding that he would form a coalition with "extremist parties."
They reportedly said that Hamas stands to "lose everything" under these circumstances.
Hamas' Gaza spokesman Ayman Taha, meanwhile, has said recently that Israel has offered his Palestinian Islamist group a 10-year cease-fire in the Gaza Strip.
Egypt is also demanding a truce of a number of years' duration. But Taha said the group would agree to a cease-fire of no more than between one year and 18 months. Another Hamas spokesman, Ismail Radwan, said a long-term cease-fire "kills" the right to resistance by the Palestinians.
Also Monday, the London-based newspaper Al-Hayat reported that Israel has offered Hamas a cease-fire for an unlimited amount of time and the opening of Gaza's borders in return for abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
According to the report, Hamas rejected the offer on the grounds that it linked the opening of the border crossings to Shalit's release.
Shalit was kidnapped by Gaza militants in a 2006 cross-border raid. He is believed to be still held in the Strip.
Hamas and Israeli officials have also indicated that much of the discussion has centered on control of the border crossings in and out of Gaza. Hamas wants the blockade on Gaza lifted. Israel wants assurances that weapons smuggling into the Gaza strip will stop.
"Hamas listened to the Israeli proposal presented by [Defense Ministry official] Amos Gilad, and with it a proposal for a ceasefire for a year and a half, but Hamas presented a counterproposal of one year only," Ayman Taha told reporters in Cairo after talks with Egyptian intelligence officials.
The Hamas delegation met with the heads of Egyptian intelligence on Sunday who transmitted to them Israel's positions. Jerusalem has not yet clarified what stance it had presented.
Meanwhile, Taha reiterated the group's calls for a lifting of the blockade imposed on the impoverished and devastated Gaza Strip by Israel and Egypt as a condition for the truce. "[Hamas] called for a complete lifting of the blockade and an opening of all the crossings," Taha said.
Hamas proposed to Egyptian mediators that European and Turkish monitors be present at the border crossings, but rejected the presence of Israeli monitors, saying Israeli monitoring was "a large part of the problem," according to Taha.
Asked if Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's forces would be present at the crossings, Taha said: "Hamas is the existing government in Gaza."
Hamas wrested control of the Gaza Strip from Abbas's Fatah faction in fighting in 2007. Egypt has ruled out opening the Rafah crossing in the absence of the Palestinian Authority and European Union observers.
Commenting on the talks, Hamas's representative in Lebanon, Osama Hamdan, told Al Jazeera satellite television on Sunday that Hamas was unwilling to alter its positions to Israel's benefit.
"The Israelis must understand that they will not achieve through politics what they failed to do militarily," Hamdan said.
Israel launched an offensive in the Gaza Strip in late December with the declared aim of ending Hamas rocket attacks on its southern communities. About 1,300 Palestinians, at least 700 of them civilians, were killed during the 22-day offensive, while Israel put its death toll at 10 soldiers and three civilians.
Hamas official Hamdan also said Sunday that Fatah movement must end peace negotiations with Israel before any reconciliation talks can take place.
The remarks were bound to complicate Arab efforts to reconcile Hamas, which controls Gaza, and the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
Speaking at a rally in Beirut Sunday, Hamdan - a close ally of Hamas political leader Khaled Meshal - said that the group welcomed Palestinian dialogue, but any reconciliation should be based on a resistance program to liberate territory and regain rights.
He also demanded that the PA end security coordination with Israel, and maintained that the Israeli-Palestinian peace process had ended.
"Those who committed mistakes must correct their mistakes through a clear and frank declaration to stop security coordination with the [Israeli] occupation, release [Hamas] prisoners and later end negotiations [with Israel] because the peace process is irreversibly over," said Hamdan.
"It's time for us to talk about a reconciliation based on a resistance program to liberate the [occupied] territory and regain rights," he added.
Asharq Al-Awsat also reported Saturday that Hamas had suggested representatives of the Palestinian Authority be stationed at the Rafah crossing, but that they be residents of Gaza, not the West Bank.
Israel has been allowing some supply convoys into Gaza, though its borders remain largely closed. The Israel Defense Forces says more than 125 trucks a day - on some days nearly 200 - have entered Gaza since fighting ended on January 17th, but aid workers say the numbers are not enough. Source: Haaretz
 Hardline: Azad Ali attacked Britain's
call for a ceasefire in GazaBy Simon Walters and Jason Lewis
A senior Muslim civil servant has launched an astonishing verbal onslaught against the Government over its response to Israel’s military strikes in Gaza – and has suggested that killing British troops in Iraq is justified.
Treasury official Azad Ali, president of the Civil Service Islamic Society, now faces the sack over the remarks.
Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O’Donnell – who is the patron of the society – acted immediately after being alerted to the comments by The Mail on Sunday.
Shortly after this newspaper contacted the Cabinet Office, a senior official disclosed that Mr Ali had been suspended for the remarks made on his personal internet blog.
In it he:
• Quotes an Islamic extremist who says it is his ‘obligation’ to kill British and American soldiers in Iraq;
• Accuses the Government of failing to condemn the ‘Zionist terrorist state of Israel’; and
• Attacks moderate British Muslims as ‘self-serving vultures, feeding on the dead flesh of the Palestinians’.
The Treasury lists Mr Ali’s title as ‘Business Partner’. He is understood to work as an IT administrator. Source: Mail OnlineH/T: Jihad WatchAzad Ali
Latest recipient of the Distinguished Islamofascist Award
 January 17, 2009
ISRAEL is poised to call a unilateral halt to its 22-day-old offensive on Gaza after winning pledges from the US and Egypt.
The US and Egypt have agreed to help prevent arms smuggling into the Hamas-run enclave.
A senior government official said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's security cabinet is expected to vote in favour of a proposal at a meeting Saturday night under which Israel would silence its guns even without a reciprocal agreement from the Palestinian group which has controlled Gaza since mid-2007.
Under the terms of the proposal, Israeli troops would remain inside the territory for an unspecified period, the official told AFP on condition of anonymity
The Jewish state expected Hamas to halt its attacks as well, the official said, but warned that "if it decides to open fire, we will not hesitate to respond and resume our offensive."
The security cabinet meeting comes amid intense international pressure on Israel to call a halt to the war which has killed more than 1,100 Palestinians, with the UN General Assembly on Friday demanding an immediate and durable ceasefire in the Gaza Strip leading to the full withdrawal of Israeli forces.
"The (Israeli) security cabinet is expected to vote in favour of a unilateral ceasefire at (Saturday's) meeting following the signing of the memorandum in Washington and significant progress made in Cairo," the government official said.
The breakthrough came after Israel's Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni signed an agreement in Washington with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice under which the United States would assist in preventing smuggling into Gaza, and a top envoy returned from talks with officials in Cairo.
"Olmert was satisfied with the results of the talks in Cairo, which answered Israel's basic requirements for a thorough answer to Israel's demands to halt rocket fire and an agreement on coordination between Israel and Egypt on the opening of the crossings" in Gaza, added the official.
However, although Olmert is in favour of the ceasefire, its approval is not certain as the security cabinet has shown previous divisions over the conduct of the war which was designed to put an end to rockets fired from Gaza.
Even as the stage was being set for a possible end to the Israeli offensive, in which at least 1,188 Palestinians have been killed, including 410 children, the military was staging a fresh wave of deadly strikes on the territory.
At least 55 Palestinians were killed on Friday, including at least 10 people who died when a tank shell slammed into their house in Gaza City during a funeral wake, according to Palestinian medics.
In the Jabaliya refugee camp in the north of the territory, three daughters and a niece of a Palestinian doctor working in Israel were killed in an Israeli air strike.
"They were girls, only girls. I want to know why they have they killed them. Who gave the order to fire?" the children's sobbing father Ezzedine Abu Eish said on Israeli television.
Palestinian militants meanwhile fired over 20 rockets and mortar rounds into southern Israel on Friday, wounding five people, the Israeli military said. Over 700 such projectiles have been fired since the start of the war.
Khaled Meshaal, the exiled head of Hamas's politburo, on Friday told Arab leaders meeting in Doha that the Islamist movement would not accept any ceasefire that did not provide for a full Israeli pullout and the opening of Gaza's borders, including into Egypt.
His deputy Mussa Abu Marzuk later told Al-Jazeera television that Hamas would not make any decisions regarding a unilateral Israel ceasefire until its delegation held a fresh round of talks with Cairo on Saturday.
Clamping down on the porous Gaza-Egypt border, where hundreds of underground tunnels form Hamas's main rear supply route, has been a key Israeli demand for ending the offensive that has also wounded around 5,285 people.
After signing the deal in Washington, Livni told Israeli television that smuggling weapons into Gaza was tantamount to firing at Israel.
"They continue doing this, Israel has the right to respond," she said.
Rice said she hoped the agreement, under which the United States and Israel will step up efforts to stamp out arms smuggling to Gaza, would advance efforts to secure a ceasefire.
She said she hoped for a "ceasefire very, very soon" but could not promise one would be sealed in time for January 20, when President George W. Bush hands the White House over to his successor, Barack Obama.
"We're working ... on as quick a timeline as we possibly can in support of the Egyptian mediation," she said.
The war in Gaza has drawn worldwide protests and raised fears of a humanitarian crisis in the impoverished territory of 1.5 million people, which has been under a crippling Israeli blockade for 18 months. Source: The Australian
 January 15, 2009
HOPES for a peace deal in Gaza have improved, with Hamas apparently "reacting favourably" to an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire plan.
Hamas has agreed to a temporary ceasefire plan in Gaza, although Israel is yet to agree to the truce.
International pleas mounted overnight for a halt to the Gaza war as the death toll in the Palestinian territory passed 1000 people.
Israeli jets carried out a fresh wave of air strikes across the Gaza Strip this morning, killing at least 13 Palestinians, including a 13-year-old boy, medics and witnesses said.
But while al-Qa'ida leader Osama bin Laden seized on the conflict to call for a holy war against Israel, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas could be edging closer.
“The outlines of a ceasefire have begun to appear, even if we still have to face serious obstacles,” Mr Kouchner told the French parliament. “I'm convinced that our efforts will bear fruit.”
His comments were echoed by French President Nicolas Sarkozy who said he had “a good feeling that things are moving in a positive way” as he held talks with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in Paris.
Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos said in Jerusalem that Gaza's Islamist movement Hamas had accepted an Egyptian initiative to halt the war and “is going to publicly express its support and acceptance”.
While an Egyptian official said earlier that Hamas had “reacted favourably” to Egyptian efforts to end the fighting, according to MENA news agency in Cairo where UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon began his Middle East peace tour.
After talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Mr Ban repeated his call for an “immediate and durable ceasefire,” and urged “both parties... to stop the fighting now. There is no time to lose”.
Middle Eastern countries also added their calls to an end to the violence.
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah called an emergency summit of Gulf countries in Riyadh later today due to escalating tensions “resulting from the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people,” the Saudi SPA news agency said.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad told the BBC that his country was doing everything to mediate a truce and warned that Israel's offensive on the Gaza Strip risks “sowing the seeds of extremism around the region”.
His views were echoed by Jordan's King Abdullah II who said Israel “should be forced to be committed to UN Security Council Resolution 1860,” which was adopted last week, demanding an “immediate, durable” ceasefire leading to the “full withdrawal” of Israeli forces from Gaza.
The UN General Assembly was to hold an emergency session tonight to press for a ceasefire call.
Meanwhile a number of European deputies insisted that the EU take sanctions against Israel amid wider calls to freeze deeper ties with the Jewish state.
Bin Laden, in his first audio broadcast for more than eight months, called on Muslims to declare a holy war on Israel because of the Gaza conflict.
In a recording entitled “A Call for Jihad to Stop Aggression Against Gaza,” the al-Qa'ida leader also criticised Arab countries' handling of the conflict.
Gaza medics say more than 1000 Palestinians have been killed, including 292 children, and more than 4500 people wounded in the conflict. Ten Israeli soldiers and three civilians have been killed in combat or by rocket attacks.
“There's an increasing number of women and children being wounded and going to hospitals,” Red Cross spokesman Jakob Kellenberger told reporters in Jerusalem.
Iran meanwhile accused Israel of preventing a Red Crescent ship carrying medicines and food from reaching the Gaza Strip on Wednesday.
An Israeli army spokesman confirmed to AFP that the navy had stopped an Iranian boat from approaching the Gaza coastline. Israel has enforced a naval blockade along the Gaza coast. Source: The Australian
 January 09, 2009
THE UN Security Council has voted to call for an "immediate, durable" ceasefire in the Gaza Strip leading to the "full withdrawal" of Israeli forces, but the US has abstained.
Fourteen of the council's 15 members voted in favour of the compromise resolution worked out in three days of intense bargaining involving several Arab foreign ministers, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner.
The US abstention vote cast by Dr Rice came as a surprise as diplomats indicated earlier that they expected the text to get unanimous support.
The text “stresses the urgency of and calls for an immediate, durable and fully respected ceasefire, leading to the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza”.
It “calls for the unimpeded provision and distribution throughout Gaza of humanitarian assistance, including of food, fuel and medical treatment” and welcomes initiatives aimed at “creating and opening humanitarian corridors and other mechanisms for the sustained delivery of humanitarian aid”.
Resolution 1860 also “condemns all violence and hostilities directed against civilians and all acts of terrorism” and urged member states to intensify efforts for arrangements and guarantees in Gaza “to sustain a durable ceasefire and calm, including to prevent illicit trafficking in arms and ammunition and to ensure the reopening of the crossing points (into Gaza)”.
It “welcomes the Egyptian initiative (the three-point truce proposal unveiled by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak Tuesday) and other regional and international efforts that are under way”.
Mr Mubarak invited Israel and the Palestinians to Cairo for talks on conditions for a truce, on securing Gaza borders, reopening of its crossings and lifting the Israeli blockade on the Palestinian enclave.
The vote capped a day of high drama in which Arab ministers had threatened to press for a vote on their own draft.
US Arab ministers welcomed the adoption as they were under strong pressure from their public opinion to secure an immediate end to Israel's 13-day military onslaught in Gaza that has killed more than 760 Palestinians. Source: The Australian
 Martin Peretz | January 07, 2009
THE only real way to end the Gaza war is not an unpoliced ceasefire. Or a ceasefire policed by Egypt and other Arab countries, as proposed by the former US ambassador to Israel, Martin Indyk, who clings to his old ideas as a little girl clings to her favourite doll. Or a version of the UN interim force in Lebanon, which has been interim and useless for more than three decades.
The bitter fact is that, while the Jews prepared for a homeland state from the early 1920s until 1948, when Israel was proclaimed in accordance with the 1947 UN partition plan, the Palestinians did almost nothing except resent and resist the future.
The British ran Palestine for more than a quarter of a century, and during that time the Zionists prepared their state institutions. And let's face the facts: the Palestinians still don't have state institutions, certainly not in Gaza and virtually not in the West Bank either, though there one can detect certain primitive beginnings.
For example, the Palestinian Authority has perhaps 1000 men being trained by US officers. These men are performing responsibly and that gives reason for measured hope among Israeli defence brass.
There is no such optimism from Gaza except that Israel is gradually crippling Hamas by killing its armed men, trisecting the strip's territory, demolishing its arms caches and tunnels, and neutralising its capacity to communicate from top to bottom and bottom to top.
Still, the job is not yet done and the Israeli Defence Forces can ill-afford to stop the fighting when a reprieve would permit Hamas to restart its missilery. One salient fact about the tunnels: roughly 50 can be destroyed from the air but they are already nothing. There are others - some say several hundred - more deeply laid in the earth that would need bunker-busters, which are not cost-effective, or on-site smashing, which seems to be the army's present preference.
Since Defence Minister Ehud Barak has not made a single mistake in the fighting, he is not likely to allow the sworn-to-the-death enemy of Israel the manoeuvrability it possessed 10 days ago.
During the battle with Hezbollah in August 2006, Israel was in disarray. It now has the momentum of armed triumph behind it, and it is scarcely motivated to soothe the habitual hand-wringing anguish of, say, the UN and the Archbishop of Canterbury for the Gaza Palestinians who, in any case, routinely shift in their own minds from armed killers to innocent victims.
As it happens, world opinion is also not as it was in 2006. Yes, respectable numbers of Muslims have gathered in the world of Islam to vent their rage. Elsewhere, elements in the immigrant population of the West also released their spleen. And, of course, the Republic of South Africa denounced Israel.
Europe has made its peace with Israel's war against Hamas. Nearly everybody of any real significance in Europe understands Israel's predicament. Indeed, the Czech Republic now holds the chair of the European Union and its Foreign Minister is virtually a Zionist.
Had not European history turned awry in the 19th century, that minister, Karl von Schwarzenberg, would now be king of Bohemia. Exiled by the Soviets to Vienna, he spent much of the time in Austria presiding over Helsinki Watch. Schwarzenberg is now in Israel and is not hectoring or harassing its Government.
Many of the Arab states have also turned their backs on Hamas: Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, especially. Not for Israel, particularly, but inferentially for sure.
The reason is mostly that Iran is the grand patron of the Gaza terrorists, and any group bankrolled and arms-supplied by Tehran is anathema to the mainstream Arab governments. Hezbollah has demonstrated against its neighbour to the south. But for all its rancid rhetoric and documented capacity, it has not fired a single missile against the Jewish state.
Viewing the wreckage that Israel has wrought on Hezbollah's Gaza ally, it may surmise that the Israeli air force now has intelligence on its missiles just as it had on those of Hamas. And then, yesterday, it was as if Umm Kulthum, the voice of Egypt, had exonerated Israel of guilt for the Gaza war. Alas, Umm Kulthum is dead already many years. But Adel Imam, a national institution of Egypt, its legendary comic star, laid the blame for Hamas's disaster directly on Hamas itself. This is big news, and he is a brave man.
I go back to my earlier point that the Palestinians are unprepared for statehood, as many of the countries in Africa have been unprepared for statehood. It is true that most Palestinians aspire to statehood, and Israel as a whole longs for the Palestinians' statehood, too.
But the fact is that, fragmented as the Palestinian will is, prone to violence as its political culture is, peace will not be an axiomatic consequence of independence.
Maybe it can be devolved on the West Bank in short order rather than long, given especially an exchange of territory between Israel and the new Palestine, and arrangements for security in the Jordan valley.
Some Israeli land with Palestinian inhabitants might be transferred to the freshly independent entity, with the accumulated social benefits of the population transferred with them as well. The basic requirement here is that Israel will be assured that no weapons will ever land on its turf from the West Bank.
But how does one get that more hazardous assurance in Gaza? The Arab states are, frankly, models for nothing. None of them covets a caretaker role in Gaza. Not to guarantee Israel's safety and not to assure a reasonably civilised government there, either.
However broken by the IDF, Hamas will still be around. Who will cage it if it cannot be tamed? Certainly not the UN. We have already had noble experiments with soldiers of Fiji and of Ghana wearing their nifty blue helmets.
It is Europe, hitherto feckless Europe, that needs to guarantee the peace between the Israelis and the Gaza Palestinians. Europe has been Palestine's rhetorical patron. Now let it be Palestine's actual guarantor. That means ensuring the governors of Gaza not rule by the armed doctrine of fanatic and bloodthirsty Islam.
This is not only for Israel's sake but also for the sake of the indigenous population. It requires a resolute confidence in the face of an unruly, almost insuppressible politics.
With the Palestinian Authority or not, and preferably with it, Europe (by which I mean Britain, France, Germany, The Netherlands, Denmark, the Czech Republic, Poland, Canada, Australia and a few others) holds the fate of Palestine in its hands.
Martin Peretz is the editor-in-chief of The New Republic. Source: The Australian
 By Barry Rubin Nothing is clearer than Hamas's strategy. It gives Israel the choice between rockets and media, and Hamas thinks it is a situation of, "We win or you lose." Option A: The Ceasefire Hamas ends a ceasefire giving it the peace and quiet needed to build up its army and consolidate its rule over the Gaza Strip. Israel would deliver supplies as long as there weren't attacks. From a Western-style pragmatic standpoint this is a great situation. But Hamas isn't a Western-style pragmatic organization. Peace and quiet is its enemy not only because of its ideology--the deity commands it to destroy Israel--or its self-image--as heroic martyrs--but also because battle is needed to recruit the masses for permanent war and unite the population around it. Hamas has no program of improving the well-being of the people or educating children to be doctors, teachers, and engineers. Its platform has but one plank: war, war, endless war, sacrifice, heroism, and martyrdom until total victory is achieved. Thus, it ends the ceasefire. Read more ...Source: Gloria Center
 Palestinian supporters of Hamas gather during a demonstration in Gaza City
on Friday as violence escalated between the Islamic group and IsraelBy Ethan Bronner and Taghreed El-Khodary Published: November 14, 2008
JERUSALEM: Tensions between Hamas, the radical Palestinian rulers of Gaza, and Israel increased markedly on Friday after Hamas fired a barrage of rockets into southern Israel, sending 18 Israelis to the hospital with shock and mild injuries.
Hamas officials said the attack was revenge for the deaths over the past 11 days of 11 militants and the recent increased Israeli closure of Gaza crossings. They said that while they wanted to continue the five-month-old truce with Israel, it seemed to them that Israel did not and if that was the case, Israel would pay the consequences.
Israeli officials, who say they have been keeping the crossings into Gaza shut in retaliation for the rockets, thereby greatly decreasing the supply of supplies and fuel, said it was Hamas that was breaking the truce. Senior Israeli officials met in Tel Aviv on Friday and vowed not to back down from any provocation.
The confrontations, following five months of relative calm, began to spike earlier this month when the Israeli military destroyed a tunnel being dug toward Israel. The army feared that the tunnel would be used to seize an Israeli soldier as a bargaining chip, like Corporal Gilad Shalit, held by Hamas for more than two years.
The Israelis said it was a one-off operation, not a violation of the ceasefire agreed to in June, and asked Egypt to pass that message to Hamas in advance. But six Hamas militants were killed during the tunnel's destruction, leading Hamas to retaliate with rockets, which led to more closures and operations and then more rockets.
There are several factors at work beyond the tit-for-tat of the past week and a half. Hamas, which took over Gaza in June 2007 by kicking out its Fatah rivals, is feeling under unusual pressure because hundreds of its men have been arrested by the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority in the West Bank in recent weeks.
The arrests have been part of increased Israeli-Palestinian cooperation in which American-trained Palestinian troops are moving into West Bank cities, leading to some pullback by Israeli troops.
A second factor is that Egyptian efforts to broker a reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah have foundered, with Hamas alleging that Fatah had not made good on a mutual prisoner release.
Finally, under American and Israeli pressure, Egypt has started to destroy or shut tunnels into southern Gaza that have been a key source of supplies and fuel — and weapons — that have offset the Israeli closures.
As a result, Hamas is now feeling besieged not only by Israel but by Fatah and Egypt as well.
A campaign against Fatah started on Hamas television in Gaza two days ago, with a countdown of the days until the legal term ends for Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority. Abbas has said he will stay in power an extra year but Hamas is trying to pressure him to step down.
A large demonstration was also held on Thursday in Gaza demanding the release of Hamas prisoners in the West Bank.
Israel has come under criticism for shutting off supplies to Gaza in the past 10 days. Oxfam International issued a statement on Friday calling on the world to force Israel to end the closure.
"As a matter of humanitarian imperative, Israeli leaders must resume supplies into Gaza without further delay," the statement, by Oxfam International Executive Director Jeremy Hobbs, said. "If Israelis and Palestinians alike don't exert every effort now to maintain the truce which has held since last June, the result could be catastrophic for civilians both in Gaza and in nearby Israeli towns."
Electricity production has plunged for lack of fuel, leaving much of the coastal strip darkened. Israeli officials suspect there is actually enough fuel, and say that Hamas officials are trying to embarrass them by closing electricity plants.
The ceasefire between Israel and Hamas was scheduled to last for six months, meaning it has another month to go. Both sides are saying they are examining their options as the date approaches.
"We knew when we took out the tunnel that there would be a response and then we would try to get things back to normal," said Mark Regev, spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. "We have no desire to see a humanitarian crisis there. Unless the rockets stop, though, how can we move the supplies in? December marks the end of the six-month truce. Are they upping the ante before a new agreement?"
In Gaza, Mahmoud Zahhar, a senior Hamas leader, said, "We are still very committed to the truce. If Israel decides not to be committed, let it declare clearly its position. We have only been responding to their actions. Now, with the renewal date approaching, we are going to evaluate it and the crossings and will decide if we are going on with the truce."
Ethan Bronner reported from Jerusalem, and Taghreed El-Khodary from Gaza. Source: Herald Tribune
By Aaron Klein TEL AVIV – A mysterious explosion at a Hamas training facility in the Gaza Strip today occurred while terrorists were attempting to produce rockets that can hit further inside Israel, Hamas sources told WND. The explosion underscores the Gaza-based terrorists' utilization of a cease-fire agreed to with Israel last month to rearm, train and produce advance weaponry for use against Israel. "It is not really a period of rest. We have been training, receiving religious courses ... we've been producing weapons, working on smuggling everything that can reinforce us," said a senior terrorist in Gaza, speaking on condition his name be withheld. "This period will make that our capacities will be much stronger than before the truce," the senior terrorist said. Read more ...Source: WND
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Several Palestinian armed groups in the Gaza Strip have denied Hamas claims that an agreement has been brokered among them to stop firing rockets across the border into Israel. 
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