For ceasefire to last and peace to dawn

Seven weeks of bloodshed and searing images gave testimony that Hamas did not win its war against Israel.

Hamas’ main condition to accept a ceasefire was the lifting of the eight-year-old blockade of Gaza. The blockade is still in force and Hamas had to accept whatever was offered during the Cairo talks.

Israel did not emerge victorious out of Operation Protective Edge either.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared several times that his attack on Gaza has as a goal the disarmament of Hamas. He also demanded that the pro-Iran Islamic Jihad militias in Gaza, as well as the other five Palestinian factions be disarmed.

But the Israeli delegation to the Cairo talks signed the Egyptian initiative declaring a ceasefire without any reference to disarmament.

It is clear that both Hamas and Israel, following seven weeks of war, were too hungry and had to snatch any bite of the loaf offered by the Egyptians.

The huge figures of casualties and losses on both sides during those seven weeks dictated an urgent cessation of fight.

Both sides realised, belatedly, that they lacked insight into the enemy’s mindset and guiding motives. No tactical intelligence or strategic analysis predicted that Gaza would withstand so many thousands of casualties and tens of thousands of displaced families without caving in to the Israelis and showing the white flag.

The Hamas fighters proved to be a new calibre of soldiers, highly motivated and driven by that mysterious religious dynamic of true believers, which made their performance different from that of other armies Israel encountered.

Neither could Hamas read the mindset of the Israeli prime minister eager to win the forthcoming elections and in need of any external battle and victory to rally around him the majority of his constituency. 

Hamas did not foresee that the kidnapping of the three Yeshiva students in Hebron last June, killed later, would trigger such a massive reaction, of air raids, shelling and heavy bombardment.

Former head of the Israeli Internal Security Service, Shabak, (2005-2011), General Yuval Diskin, wrote a few days ago in the daily paper Yediot Ahronot that there is a formula for such a ceasefire to last for years rather than crumble within months, and that is the Saudi initiative, according to which 47 Muslim states, including all Arab countries, will give diplomatic recognition to Israel, in exchange for a comprehensive peace with the Palestinians.

Diskin wrote: “The time has come to dust off the Arab Peace Initiative, update it and make it into a surprising massive regional process, which gradually resolves — while providing significant security guarantees for Israel — the conflict with the Palestinians.”