With Gaza cease-fire, Arab and European leaders look to secure peace

Olmert: Key achievements of the war
Olmert outlined what he said were the key achievements of the war, namely, that Hamas’ military arm has been driven to its knees.

“Hamas has been dealt a very serious blow, both in terms of its military infrastructure and the infrastructure of its government. Many of its people have been killed. Its leaders are in hiding. The tunnels that armed them have been destroyed.” The Israel Defense Forces, he said, had gained control of many of the launching sites for Qassam and Grad rockets, one of which fell on the city of Ashdod, Israel, even as Olmert’s cabinet met to discuss the cease-fire.

Olmert, who leaves office in less than a month when Israel holds new elections, all but boasted that Israel took Hamas by surprise, and warned that there would be more to come if militants dared to continue to fire rockets at Israel. He also expressed “great regret” at the loss of innocent lives in Gaza.

“Hamas did not believe that Israel would carry out such a large scale operation, especially before elections,” Olmert said in his speech in Tel Aviv. “If it continues to attack us, it will be surprised by our determination. If our foes will continue to fight against us, then we will feel justified in responding in full.”

Olmert noted that what made the cease-fire feasible was an Egyptian proposal, which included a promise from Cairo to take steps to prevent weapons from being brought into the Gaza Strip. Giving the package extra teeth was an official offer Saturday from Britain, France, and Germany to help prevent arms smuggling into the Gaza Strip, including a promise from Britain to provide naval support.

International support
On Friday, the US and Israel signed an agreement to stop the smuggling. The US agreed to work with NATO and regional governments to police the region, including stopping the flow of weapons between Iran and Gaza, stepped up intelligence cooperation, training, and patrols in the Mediterranean, Gulf of Aden, Red Sea, and eastern Africa.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in signing the deal with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, said that the agreement was “one of the elements of trying to bring into a being a durable cease-fire.”

Grumbling from Hamas
Though Hamas changed its tune on Sunday, on Saturday top Hamas officials in the region rejected Israel’s unilateral truce as irrelevant.

“Either we hear what we have demanded or the result will be the continuation of confrontation on the ground,” Osama Hamdan, Hamas’s representative in Lebanon, declared in Beirut Saturday. The political head of Hamas, Damascus-based Khaled Mashaal, said at a summit in Qatar on Friday that Hamas would not accept Israel’s conditions for a cease-fire.

Similar views were heard from Hamas fighters in Gaza.

Previous

1 | 2 | 3

Next