Gaza violence brings change in balance of power between Hamas, Israel

Eight days of fighting between the Islamic Hamas movement and Israel in the Gaza Strip ended up Wednesday with a ceasefire, which for the first time has changed the balance of power between the two sides following Arab and international diplomatic efforts, analysts said. Israel began its air operation "Cloud Pillar" on Nov. 14, when it targeted Hamas' armed wing commander Ahmed al-Ja'bari in Gaza. Hamas and other militants fired more than 3,000 projectiles and rockets with some of them hitting Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. The Palestinian rockets killed six Israelis in eight days, while Israeli war jets carried out more than 1,500 airstrikes on various targets, including Hamas' infrastructure and properties of its militants. Israel's attacks killed nearly 170 Palestinians and wounded some 1,200 others, more than half of them were civilians. As the Egypt-brokered ceasefire agreement came into effect Wednesday night, both Israelis and Palestinians expressed satisfaction that the war was over. Hamas announced that it achieved victory in this battle, while Israel said it had made many achievements. Aluf Ben, an Israeli writer specialized in Palestinian affairs, told the Israeli Haaretz daily that it was hard to say that Hamas achieved a victory. "Israel had two strategic goals; first is to renew the fragile ceasefire with Hamas, and to revive the peace agreements signed with Egypt in 1979," he said. "Israel succeeded in both goals and wants Hamas to have a role, similar to the role of Hezbollah in Lebanon, to restore calm and ceasefire for a long term of time, and at the same time enforce the ceasefire on other minor militant groups," Ben said, adding that Hamas was the one which began the war. Just one day before al-Ja'bari's assassination, Hamas militants attacked an Israeli army jeep with an anti-tank missile and seriously wounded several soldiers, he said. Ben said Israel also aimed at checking out its ties with the new Egyptian leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood Movement. However, senior Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar held a different opinion, saying: "Israel hasn't achieved anything in this battle except killing women and children." Hamas' "choice of resistance has won and Israel was defeated and will be defeated," he said. "Every war Israel wages on us empowers us instead of weakening us. We gain more support and we earn more weapons and prepare for the next battle." Hamas used new tactics in this war for the first time, when rockets were automatically fired with scheduled timing. Mekhemer Abu Se'da, a political science professor at the Gaza-based al-Azhar University, said the battle could not be calculated on the basis of a winner or a looser, adding that "the Palestinians had for the first time a power that defeated Israel and caused severe damages." "What the armed resistance in the Gaza Strip had achieved has created a new position in the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians," he said. "Whatever Israel says, it will think twice before waging another war on the Gaza Strip in the future." FRAGILE CEASEFIRE The ceasefire agreement calls on both sides to refrain from any future attacks on each other. It also includes a permanent opening of crossings, easing the movements of goods and persons, and stopping targeting the population near borderline areas between Gaza and Israel. Abu Se'da expected the agreement to last for a certain period of time, saying both Israel and Hamas would avoid at least during this time to outrage Egypt or other regional countries by violating the deal. Some positive changes would happen if the agreement lasted, he added. But Ahmed Rafiq Awad, a political analyst from the West Bank, believed that a single strike carried out by one of the two sides would break the agreement and bring conflicts back to the region, saying there had been ceasefire deals reached before that were violated. Other political analysts said that despite the great losses to the Gaza Strip, Hamas recorded a series of achievements that carry big meanings. Hani Habib, a political analyst from Gaza, said the balance of power between Hamas and Israel "wasdisordered." "Hamas earned more international support and a semi-recognition of the world after it forced Israel to come to the table of indirect negotiations through Egypt's mediation," he said. "The status now has created a new situation and changes in the rules of the game." Bdel Qader Hammad, another Gaza-based analyst, said there are changes in the positions of many countries in the region, which now support Hamas. "This was clear when 18 Arab foreign ministers visited the Gaza Strip during the war," he said. "After Hamas won the parliamentary elections in 2006, and seized control of the Gaza Strip by force in 2007 and went into a big war in late 2008 with Israel, it saw itself the super Palestinian power that should represent all the Palestinians all over the world," Hammad added. INTERNAL RECONCILIATION Palestinian observers believed that the war on Gaza this time had also brought positive signs of achieving an internal reconciliation between Hamas and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party. Sources said contacts had been intensively held to renew efforts to end internal disputes. Abbas, who is busy now preparing for the Palestinian bid due on Nov. 29 to gain the United Nations' recognition of a non-member observer state, hopes to gain Hamas' support. Hamas hasn't officially declared that it will back his diplomatic battle in the world body. Talal Oukal, a Gaza-based political analyst, said he hoped that Egypt, which is more influential on Hamas this time, would start a serious move to pressure the Hamas and other parties to end the division between Gaza and the West Bank and achieve reconciliation. Eyad Barghothi, another West Bank political analyst, said it is clear that when a Palestinian party becomes the winner, other parties are becoming losers in terms of ability, representation and the relationship between the region and the entire world. "Having one power winning on the expense of another power would harm the Palestinian cause, therefore, the only solution is that the two big powers should immediately sit together and achieve a historic reconciliation that ends more than five years of division," Barghothi said.