How Israel Helped Spawn Hamas

We're privileged to re-post Andrew Higgins' outstanding piece of journalism in today's Wall Street Journal, which combines an impressive historical summary with contemporary analysis. He establishes how Israel assisted with the creation and growth of Hamas from the late 1970s. (I've known this for years from academic works; however, many people --- including a number I've encountered on the Net in recent weeks --- refuse to accept the evidence.)

More importantly, however, Higgins offers lessons which Israel's leaders conveniently forgot for the sake of this conflict:

When it became clear in the early 1990s that Gaza's Islamists had mutated from a religious group into a fighting force aimed at Israel -- particularly after they turned to suicide bombings in 1994 -- Israel cracked down with ferocious force. But each military assault only increased Hamas's appeal to ordinary Palestinians.

HOW ISRAEL HELPED TO SPAWN HAMAS
Andrew Higgins

Surveying the wreckage of a neighbor's bungalow hit by a Palestinian rocket, retired Israeli official Avner Cohen traces the missile's trajectory back to an "enormous, stupid mistake" made 30 years ago.

"Hamas, to my great regret, is Israel's creation," says Mr. Cohen, a Tunisian-born Jew who worked in Gaza for more than two decades. Responsible for religious affairs in the region until 1994, Mr. Cohen watched the Islamist movement take shape, muscle aside secular Palestinian rivals and then morph into what is today Hamas, a militant group that is sworn to Israel's destruction.

Instead of trying to curb Gaza's Islamists from the outset, says Mr. Cohen, Israel for years tolerated and, in some cases, encouraged them as a counterweight to the secular nationalists of the Palestine Liberation Organization and its dominant faction, Yasser Arafat's Fatah. Israel cooperated with a crippled, half-blind cleric named Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, even as he was laying the foundations for what would become Hamas. Sheikh Yassin continues to inspire militants today; during the recent war in Gaza, Hamas fighters confronted Israeli troops with "Yassins," primitive rocket-propelled grenades named in honor of the cleric.

Last Saturday, after 22 days of war, Israel announced a halt to the offensive. The assault was aimed at stopping Hamas rockets from falling on Israel. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert hailed a "determined and successful military operation." More than 1,200 Palestinians had died. Thirteen Israelis were also killed.

Hamas responded the next day by lobbing five rockets towards the Israeli town of Sderot, a few miles down the road from Moshav Tekuma, the farming village where Mr. Cohen lives. Hamas then announced its own cease-fire.

Since then, Hamas leaders have emerged from hiding and reasserted their control over Gaza. Egyptian-mediated talks aimed at a more durable truce are expected to start this weekend. President Barack Obama said this week that lasting calm "requires more than a long cease-fire" and depends on Israel and a future Palestinian state "living side by side in peace and security."

A look at Israel's decades-long dealings with Palestinian radicals -- including some little-known attempts to cooperate with the Islamists -- reveals a catalog of unintended and often perilous consequences. Time and again, Israel's efforts to find a pliant Palestinian partner that is both credible with Palestinians and willing to eschew violence, have backfired. Would-be partners have turned into foes or lost the support of their people.

Israel's experience echoes that of the U.S., which, during the Cold War, looked to Islamists as a useful ally against communism. Anti-Soviet forces backed by America after Moscow's 1979 invasion of Afghanistan later mutated into al Qaeda.

At stake is the future of what used to be the British Mandate of Palestine, the biblical lands now comprising Israel and the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza. Since 1948, when the state of Israel was established, Israelis and Palestinians have each asserted claims over the same territory.

The Palestinian cause was for decades led by the PLO, which Israel regarded as a terrorist outfit and sought to crush until the 1990s, when the PLO dropped its vow to destroy the Jewish state. The PLO's Palestinian rival, Hamas, led by Islamist militants, refused to recognize Israel and vowed to continue "resistance." Hamas now controls Gaza, a crowded, impoverished sliver of land on the Mediterranean from which Israel pulled out troops and settlers in 2005.

When Israel first encountered Islamists in Gaza in the 1970s and '80s, they seemed focused on studying the Quran, not on confrontation with Israel. The Israeli government officially recognized a precursor to Hamas called Mujama Al-Islamiya, registering the group as a charity. It allowed Mujama members to set up an Islamic university and build mosques, clubs and schools. Crucially, Israel often stood aside when the Islamists and their secular left-wing Palestinian rivals battled, sometimes violently, for influence in both Gaza and the West Bank.

"When I look back at the chain of events I think we made a mistake," says David Hacham, who worked in Gaza in the late 1980s and early '90s as an Arab-affairs expert in the Israeli military. "But at the time nobody thought about the possible results."

Israeli officials who served in Gaza disagree on how much their own actions may have contributed to the rise of Hamas. They blame the group's recent ascent on outsiders, primarily Iran. This view is shared by the Israeli government. "Hamas in Gaza was built by Iran as a foundation for power, and is backed through funding, through training and through the provision of advanced weapons," Mr. Olmert said last Saturday. Hamas has denied receiving military assistance from Iran.

Arieh Spitzen, the former head of the Israeli military's Department of Palestinian Affairs, says that even if Israel had tried to stop the Islamists sooner, he doubts it could have done much to curb political Islam, a movement that was spreading across the Muslim world. He says attempts to stop it are akin to trying to change the internal rhythms of nature: "It is like saying: 'I will kill all the mosquitoes.' But then you get even worse insects that will kill you...You break the balance. You kill Hamas you might get al Qaeda."

When it became clear in the early 1990s that Gaza's Islamists had mutated from a religious group into a fighting force aimed at Israel -- particularly after they turned to suicide bombings in 1994 -- Israel cracked down with ferocious force. But each military assault only increased Hamas's appeal to ordinary Palestinians. The group ultimately trounced secular rivals, notably Fatah, in a 2006 election supported by Israel's main ally, the U.S.

Now, one big fear in Israel and elsewhere is that while Hamas has been hammered hard, the war might have boosted the group's popular appeal. Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas administration in Gaza, came out of hiding last Sunday to declare that "God has granted us a great victory."

Most damaged from the war, say many Palestinians, is Fatah, now Israel's principal negotiating partner. "Everyone is praising the resistance and thinks that Fatah is not part of it," says Baker Abu-Baker, a longtime Fatah supporter and author of a book on Hamas.

A Lack of Devotion

Hamas traces its roots back to the Muslim Brotherhood, a group set up in Egypt in 1928. The Brotherhood believed that the woes of the Arab world spring from a lack of Islamic devotion. Its slogan: "Islam is the solution. The Quran is our constitution." Its philosophy today underpins modern, and often militantly intolerant, political Islam from Algeria to Indonesia.

After the 1948 establishment of Israel, the Brotherhood recruited a few followers in Palestinian refugee camps in Gaza and elsewhere, but secular activists came to dominate the Palestinian nationalist movement.

At the time, Gaza was ruled by Egypt. The country's then-president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, was a secular nationalist who brutally repressed the Brotherhood. In 1967, Nasser suffered a crushing defeat when Israel triumphed in the six-day war. Israel took control of Gaza and also the West Bank.

"We were all stunned," says Palestinian writer and Hamas supporter Azzam Tamimi. He was at school at the time in Kuwait and says he became close to a classmate named Khaled Mashaal, now Hamas's Damascus-based political chief. "The Arab defeat provided the Brotherhood with a big opportunity," says Mr. Tamimi.

In Gaza, Israel hunted down members of Fatah and other secular PLO factions, but it dropped harsh restrictions imposed on Islamic activists by the territory's previous Egyptian rulers. Fatah, set up in 1964, was the backbone of the PLO, which was responsible for hijackings, bombings and other violence against Israel. Arab states in 1974 declared the PLO the "sole legitimate representative" of the Palestinian people world-wide.

The Muslim Brotherhood, led in Gaza by Sheikh Yassin, was free to spread its message openly. In addition to launching various charity projects, Sheikh Yassin collected money to reprint the writings of Sayyid Qutb, an Egyptian member of the Brotherhood who, before his execution by President Nasser, advocated global jihad. He is now seen as one of the founding ideologues of militant political Islam.

Mr. Cohen, who worked at the time for the Israeli government's religious affairs department in Gaza, says he began to hear disturbing reports in the mid-1970s about Sheikh Yassin from traditional Islamic clerics. He says they warned that the sheikh had no formal Islamic training and was ultimately more interested in politics than faith. "They said, 'Keep away from Yassin. He is a big danger,'" recalls Mr. Cohen.

Instead, Israel's military-led administration in Gaza looked favorably on the paraplegic cleric, who set up a wide network of schools, clinics, a library and kindergartens. Sheikh Yassin formed the Islamist group Mujama al-Islamiya, which was officially recognized by Israel as a charity and then, in 1979, as an association. Israel also endorsed the establishment of the Islamic University of Gaza, which it now regards as a hotbed of militancy. The university was one of the first targets hit by Israeli warplanes in the recent war.

Brig. General Yosef Kastel, Gaza's Israeli governor at the time, is too ill to comment, says his wife. But Brig. Gen. Yitzhak Segev, who took over as governor in Gaza in late 1979, says he had no illusions about Sheikh Yassin's long-term intentions or the perils of political Islam. As Israel's former military attache in Iran, he'd watched Islamic fervor topple the Shah. However, in Gaza, says Mr. Segev, "our main enemy was Fatah," and the cleric "was still 100% peaceful" towards Israel. Former officials say Israel was also at the time wary of being viewed as an enemy of Islam.

Mr. Segev says he had regular contact with Sheikh Yassin, in part to keep an eye on him. He visited his mosque and met the cleric around a dozen times. It was illegal at the time for Israelis to meet anyone from the PLO. Mr. Segev later arranged for the cleric to be taken to Israel for hospital treatment. "We had no problems with him," he says.

In fact, the cleric and Israel had a shared enemy: secular Palestinian activists. After a failed attempt in Gaza to oust secularists from leadership of the Palestinian Red Crescent, the Muslim version of the Red Cross, Mujama staged a violent demonstration, storming the Red Crescent building. Islamists also attacked shops selling liquor and cinemas. The Israeli military mostly stood on the sidelines.

Mr. Segev says the army didn't want to get involved in Palestinian quarrels but did send soldiers to prevent Islamists from burning down the house of the Red Crescent's secular chief, a socialist who supported the PLO.

'An Alternative to the PLO'

Clashes between Islamists and secular nationalists spread to the West Bank and escalated during the early 1980s, convulsing college campuses, particularly Birzeit University, a center of political activism.

As the fighting between rival student factions at Birzeit grew more violent, Brig. Gen. Shalom Harari, then a military intelligence officer in Gaza, says he received a call from Israeli soldiers manning a checkpoint on the road out of Gaza. They had stopped a bus carrying Islamic activists who wanted to join the battle against Fatah at Birzeit. "I said: 'If they want to burn each other let them go,'" recalls Mr. Harari.

A leader of Birzeit's Islamist faction at the time was Mahmoud Musleh, now a pro-Hamas member of a Palestinian legislature elected in 2006. He recalls how usually aggressive Israeli security forces stood back and let conflagration develop. He denies any collusion between his own camp and the Israelis, but says "they hoped we would become an alternative to the PLO."

A year later, in 1984, the Israeli military received a tip-off from Fatah supporters that Sheikh Yassin's Gaza Islamists were collecting arms, according to Israeli officials in Gaza at the time. Israeli troops raided a mosque and found a cache of weapons. Sheikh Yassin was jailed. He told Israeli interrogators the weapons were for use against rival Palestinians, not Israel, according to Mr. Hacham, the military affairs expert who says he spoke frequently with jailed Islamists. The cleric was released after a year and continued to expand Mujama's reach across Gaza.

Around the time of Sheikh Yassin's arrest, Mr. Cohen, the religious affairs official, sent a report to senior Israeli military and civilian officials in Gaza. Describing the cleric as a "diabolical" figure, he warned that Israel's policy towards the Islamists was allowing Mujama to develop into a dangerous force.

"I believe that by continuing to turn away our eyes, our lenient approach to Mujama will in the future harm us. I therefore suggest focusing our efforts on finding ways to break up this monster before this reality jumps in our face," Mr. Cohen wrote.

Mr. Harari, the military intelligence officer, says this and other warnings were ignored. But, he says, the reason for this was neglect, not a desire to fortify the Islamists: "Israel never financed Hamas. Israel never armed Hamas."

Roni Shaked, a former officer of Shin Bet, Israel's internal security service, and author of a book on Hamas, says Sheikh Yassin and his followers had a long-term perspective whose dangers were not understood at the time. "They worked slowly, slowly, step by step according to the Muslim Brotherhood plan."

Declaring Jihad

In 1987, several Palestinians were killed in a traffic accident involving an Israeli driver, triggering a wave of protests that became known as the first Intifada, Mr. Yassin and six other Mujama Islamists launched Hamas, or the Islamic Resistance Movement. Hamas's charter, released a year later, is studded with anti-Semitism and declares "jihad its path and death for the cause of Allah its most sublime belief."

Israeli officials, still focused on Fatah and initially unaware of the Hamas charter, continued to maintain contacts with the Gaza Islamists. Mr. Hacham, the military Arab affairs expert, remembers taking one of Hamas's founders, Mahmoud Zahar, to meet Israel's then defense minister, Yitzhak Rabin, as part of regular consultations between Israeli officials and Palestinians not linked to the PLO. Mr. Zahar, the only Hamas founder known to be alive today, is now the group's senior political leader in Gaza.

In 1989, Hamas carried out its first attack on Israel, abducting and killing two soldiers. Israel arrested Sheikh Yassin and sentenced him to life. It later rounded up more than 400 suspected Hamas activists, including Mr. Zahar, and deported them to southern Lebanon. There, they hooked up with Hezbollah, the Iran-backed A-Team of anti-Israeli militancy.

Many of the deportees later returned to Gaza. Hamas built up its arsenal and escalated its attacks, while all along maintaining the social network that underpinned its support in Gaza.

Meanwhile, its enemy, the PLO, dropped its commitment to Israel's destruction and started negotiating a two-state settlement. Hamas accused it of treachery. This accusation found increasing resonance as Israel kept developing settlements on occupied Palestinian land, particularly the West Bank. Though the West Bank had passed to the nominal control of a new Palestinian Authority, it was still dotted with Israeli military checkpoints and a growing number of Israeli settlers.

Unable to uproot a now entrenched Islamist network that had suddenly replaced the PLO as its main foe, Israel tried to decapitate it. It started targeting Hamas leaders. This, too, made no dent in Hamas's support, and sometimes even helped the group. In 1997, for example, Israel's Mossad spy agency tried to poison Hamas's exiled political leader Mr. Mashaal, who was then living in Jordan.

The agents got caught and, to get them out of a Jordanian jail, Israel agreed to release Sheikh Yassin. The cleric set off on a tour of the Islamic world to raise support and money. He returned to Gaza to a hero's welcome.

Efraim Halevy, a veteran Mossad officer who negotiated the deal that released Sheikh Yassin, says the cleric's freedom was hard to swallow, but Israel had no choice. After the fiasco in Jordan, Mr. Halevy was named director of Mossad, a position he held until 2002. Two years later, Sheikh Yassin was killed by an Israeli air strike.

Mr. Halevy has in recent years urged Israel to negotiate with Hamas. He says that "Hamas can be crushed," but he believes that "the price of crushing Hamas is a price that Israel would prefer not to pay." When Israel's authoritarian secular neighbor, Syria, launched a campaign to wipe out Muslim Brotherhood militants in the early 1980s it killed more than 20,000 people, many of them civilians.

In its recent war in Gaza, Israel didn't set the destruction of Hamas as its goal. It limited its stated objectives to halting the Islamists' rocket fire and battering their overall military capacity. At the start of the Israeli operation in December, Defense Minister Ehud Barak told parliament that the goal was "to deal Hamas a severe blow, a blow that will cause it to stop its hostile actions from Gaza at Israeli citizens and soldiers."

Walking back to his house from the rubble of his neighbor's home, Mr. Cohen, the former religious affairs official in Gaza, curses Hamas and also what he sees as missteps that allowed Islamists to put down deep roots in Gaza.

He recalls a 1970s meeting with a traditional Islamic cleric who wanted Israel to stop cooperating with the Muslim Brotherhood followers of Sheikh Yassin: "He told me: 'You are going to have big regrets in 20 or 30 years.' He was right."

Rolling Updates on the Israeli Invasion of Gaza (7 January)

Later Story: Follow-Up: That State Department Twitter-Diplomacy….Gives the Game Away?
Later Story: Inconvenient (Rocket) Facts: Israel Still Can't Get It Right
Later Story: Rice to UN: US Seeks Regime Change in Gaza
Later Story: Inconvenient (Rocket) Facts: Israel Gets Caught Out by the BBC


12:45 p.m. Relatively quiet on both military and diplomatic fronts --- not expecting much out of any United Nations discussions --- so we're off for some downtime.

Tomorrow should offer some clues on the political direction of the conflict. With Hamas as well as the Palestinian Authority and Israel going to Cairo for negotiations, there may be some indication as to whether Tel Aviv and Washington will accept a settlement that leaves Hamas in control of Gaza or whether they try to isolate the organisation.

Meanwhile, on the military front, we may get some indication --- given the reports of Israeli moblisation around Rafah and warnings to residents --- of whether Tel Aviv is going to take the ground offensive into the cities.

11:30 p.m. Gazan medical sources say 700 Gazans killed in conflict, 219 are children and 89 are women. More than 3000 wounded: 46 percent are women and children.

11:25 p.m. Jabaliya Doubled: The Daily Telegraph of London is reporting the discovery in Zeitoun by a paramedic of between 60 and 70 bodies of the al Samouni clan (initial reports had put the death toll at 13), killed by Israeli shelling.



About 15 members of the clan were injured. Eight were left behind when Israeli troops began firing on ambulances.

So far, Israel has made no claim that there was Hamas members firing mortars from the shelled house.

10:50 p.m. A summary of Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah's speech on the Gaza situation --- "The Scheme is to Give West Bank to Jordan, Gaza to Egypt" --- is now posted in English on the Internet.

10:45 p.m. Took a break to post on today's How Not to Spin Information story: the Israeli consulate in New York, trying to prove Hamas was responsible for breaking the cease-fire, actually makes the case that the Gazan organisation was observing it.

8:45 p.m. Apologies --- missed this earlier. Israeli Cabinet postpones votes on expansion of ground offensive

8:40 p.m. Arab fightback? Representatives of Arab League at United Nations reject US-backed initiative for non-binding statement by President of Security Council and urge binding Security Council resolution for immediate cease-fire. Al Jazeera speculates this is because of growing "embarrassment" over Arab passivity in face of Mubarak-Sarkozy process.

8:30 p.m. Israeli military preparing for entry into Rafah in southern Gaza? Reports of leaflets being dropped on residents warning them to evacuate by 8 a.m. Gaza time

8 p.m. On CNN, French Foreign Ministry spokesman tries to reconcile different stories: Israel has welcomed "process" and "approach" of Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal. Tel Aviv is sending senior advisor to Minister of Defense Ehud Barak to Cairo tomorrow.

Spokesman adds that discussions are taking place with Hamas via Egypt and Syria. On the Palestinian Authority-Hamas issue, he talks of "Palestinian reconciliation".

6:15 p.m. Retractions: French President Sarkozy's office acknowledges that Israel has not accepted the Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal while Israeli military says three-hour "respite" --- to take place every other day ---does apply to all of Gaza, not just Gaza City

5:25 p.m. Important development: Ahmed Youssef, political advisor to Hamas leader Ismail Haniya, tells Al Jazeera there are "good elements" in Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal and hopes for clarification of provisions in next 48 hours. Youssef adds that he hopes negotiation of Mubarak-Sarkozy will be in conjunction with movement in United Nations towards a resolution.

Youssef says the "by-product" of rockets will end when the Israeli occupation is terminated, indicating Hamas will not accept a cease-fire which does not mention Tel Aviv's aggression: "As long as the occupation is there, we have to defend ourselves....When we have full control of our destiny....there will be no firing of rockets."

5:20 p.m. Thomas Friedman carries the media flag for Israel. His latest column in The New York Times, "The Mideast's Ground Zero", is being distributed via Twitter by the Israeli Consulate in New York. And no wonder, six years after Friedman marched into war with Iraq, he's still got an Axis of Evil to grind:

No doubt, Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran are hoping that they can use the Gaza conflict to turn Obama into Bush. They know Barack Hussein Obama must be (am)Bushed — to keep America and its Arab allies on the defensive. Obama has to keep his eye on the prize. His goal — America’s goal — has to be a settlement in Gaza that eliminates the threat of Hamas rockets and opens Gaza economically to the world, under credible international supervision.

5:15 p.m. Confusion over the Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal and possible embarrassment for the French President. France had announced Israel's acceptance of the limited cease-fire, but Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says that proposal is still being studied.

5 p.m. Two hours into the three-hour respite but Al Jazeera says there are reports of fresh fighting in Gaza City. Seven Israeli airstrikes, mainly in northeast Gaza.

The respite has allowed paramedics to get to some areas of Gaza for first time.

4:20 p.m. Israel "clarifies" the three-hour respite: says it applies only to Gaza City

3:45 p.m. A break from Gaza coverage to more important issues: CNN International is running an in-depth investigation of Oprah Winfrey's weight

3:20 p.m. Osama Hamdan of Hamas says organisation is considering Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal along with "other initiatives",  maintains cautious line --- "If we criticise Egypt, it does not mean we cannot discuss with Egypt"

3:12 p.m. Hamas officials say they are considering the Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal.

3:10 p.m. French officials say both Israel and Palestinian Authority have accepted the Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal for a limited cease-fire and talks in Cairo.

3:05 p.m. Respite, after firing from both sides in opening minutes, reported to be "generally holding". At least 683 Gazans killed since start of conflict.

2:20 p.m. Report of "tens of thousands" of mourners at funerals of the victims of Jabaliya school/shelter bombing.

UN officials "99.9 percent certain" that there were no militants in the shelter.

2:00 p.m. An  hour after the "respite" began, shelling resumes north of Gaza City, although more civilians are on the streets in the centre of the city. Machine gun fire near Beit Lahoun.

1:35 p.m. Israeli Defense Forces say they have suspended operations for three hours. Hamas says it will match this by suspending firing of rockets.

1:10 p.m. Israeli airstrikes kill four people outside a  mosque in Gaza City and two people in the Zeitoun district. Explosions reported in Jabaliya and Beit Lahiya.



12:55 p.m. London-based Arabic-language newspaper al-Quds al-Arabi reports that officers of US Army Engineering Corps have been stationed at Rafah to unearth smugglers' tunnels --- unclear whether they are now on Egyptian or Gazan side or border

12:45 p.m. Israel seizes the media initiative, at least with CNN: its headline story is of Tel Aviv's offer of a "short respite" with the three-hour pause in bombing each day, while the Jabiliya deaths are at the foot of the story (and noted with "The Israeli military said Hamas militants were firing mortars from the school").

11:55 a.m. No humanitarian bombing pause yet: Al Jazeera reports heavy Israeli bombing around city of Rafah on Egypt-Gaza border.

11:34 a.m. Dan Gillerman, the former Israeli Ambassador to the UN and the coordinator of Israel's information operations, tells Al Jazeera that the deaths in the Jabaliya bombing are "horrible tragedy" but whereas each death is "a cause for sadness" for Israel, each is "a cause for celebration" for Hamas.

Gillerman refuses to address the question of whether Israel violated international law with the shelling of the school/shelter. John Ging, United Nations Relief and Works Agency official, repeats that the GPS coordinates of the school/shelter were given to Israeli forces, and calls for a "full investigation".

11:10 a.m. Israeli Cabinet currently discussing military operations, including possible expansion of ground offensive with mobilisation of tens of thousands of reservists. Israeli forces reported to be in "holding pattern" around Gazan cities.

11 a.m. Israel announces, for the "humanitarian corridor", that it will halt military attacks for three hours each day. Al Jazeera reports Gazan reaction: "What about the other 21 hours a day?"

10:20 a.m. I have known and learned for 20 years from Professor Avi Shlaim, one of Britain's foremost historians on the Middle East. In today's Guardian of London, he has an opinion piece, "How Israel Brought Gaza to the Brink of Humanitarian Catastrophe", offering the historical context to the current crisis:

This brief review of Israel's record over the past four decades makes it difficult to resist the conclusion that it has become a rogue state with "an utterly unscrupulous set of leaders". A rogue state habitually violates international law, possesses weapons of mass destruction and practises terrorism - the use of violence against civilians for political purposes. Israel fulfils all of these three criteria; the cap fits and it must wear it. Israel's real aim is not peaceful coexistence with its Palestinian neighbours but military domination.

9:40 a.m. The United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator has released a situation report, current to 6 p.m. on 6 January, detailing casualties and damages from Israeli bombing and shelling. It also sets out the status of medical services and shelter and the provision of food, fuel, water, and electricity.

9:15 a.m. Ayman al-Zawahiri, the deputy chief of Al Qa'eda, issued a statement calling the Gaza conflict a "gift" from President-elect Barack Obama with "that traitor" Hosni Mubarak as the main partner.

Frankly, I consider this a sign of the relative weakness and peripheral place of Al Qa'eda, except to a small group of core activists, not only in Gaza but in international affairs. Far more important, as Juan Cole has noted, is the impact upon local "insurgents" in places such as Afghanistan, as they use the wider policies of countries like the US to mobilise their supporters.

9:05 a.m. Other success of Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal is pushing the specific incident of the shelling of Jabaliya school/shelter, which killed at least 43 and wounded at least 100 Gazans, and the general humanitarian issue to the background. Al Jazeera is leading with the Jabiliya killings but other news services have put it in the background.

The Israeli proposal for a "humanitarian corridor" appears to be a public-relations success, at least for the moment. And, contrary to my opinion yesterday, it seems that Jabaliya will not be the successor to Qana (Lebanon) 2006, when dozens of civilian deaths in a single incident helped force an end to military operations.

Jabaliya was one of three schools/shelters struck yesterday. More than 660 Gazans have now died.

9 a.m. Lead development is the Mubarak-Sarkozy proposal for immediate cease-fire and meetings in Cairo between Israel and Palestinian "factions"

There is still lack of clarity on proposals such as arrangements for border security and when and to what extent blockade would be lifted. Perhaps most important, no confirmation on whether Hamas would be invited to negotiations. In fact, there is not even agreement on the cease-fire. United States is still holding out against any cessation of military operations.

However, immediate "success" of the proposal is to block any UN resolution on the crisis. Initiative is now clearly with France, Egypt as the Arab "leader", and --- behind them --- the US and European countries. If Israel and the Palestinian Authority play their parts,, then this could be an ambitious move for a "grand design" on Gaza. This would include isolating and possibly overthrowing Hamas.