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An election, an anniversary and an investigation, Friday, September 30, 2005Fateh appeared to be the big winner in the third and final round of Palestinian local council elections, winning more than 50 percent of the votes in towns and villages across the West Bank, while Hamas appeared to bring in about 25 percent of the vote. The voting of course came against the background of an ongoing Israeli campaign of arrests – and occasional killings if there suspect resists arrest – of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and others that Israel suspects of helping terrorism. About half the people arrested since the campaign began last week in the wake of Qassam rocket fire from Gaza into the Negev, are Hamas activists and according to Palestinian sources, many of the arrested men were candidates either in the local elections held yesterday or for the national legislative elections slated for January 2006.Israel of course officially denies that it is conducting political arrests and even denies that the army's campaign is aimed at harming Hamas' electoral chances. And the truth is that many Hamas candidates had IDF-issued VIP passes so they could continue campaigning up to the last minute in the potentially bellweather voting that took place. Some analysis of the vote argues that since many of the voters were villagers, presumed less literate or politically sophisticated then city dwellers, the vote was along clan lines more than political lines. But those analysts, who are definding their thesis that Hamas is the next power in the Palestinian territories, are the same analysts who say that it was Israeli air raids and assassinations in Gaza that seems to have temporarily at least ended the Qassam rocket attacks, and not the political pressure from the Palestinian street that forced all the armed factions in Palestinian politics to reiterate their commitment to the Cairo agreement for a tahadiye, a 'lull' in the fighting. And meanwhile, Palestinian police are patrolling the streets of Gaza, enforcing – so far successfully – the PA order that bans any weapons from being displayed publicly, except weapons issued to PA forces. True, such a ban has been announced in the past, but this time, in the wake of the deaths of at least 21 Palestinians from a Hamas cache of explosives going off two weekends ago in the middle of a Jabalya refugee camp 'victory celebration,' the Hamas has lost a lot of appeal to the man in the Palestinian street, which does not believe the Hamas claims that it was an Israeli bomb that killed the innocent bystanders. Not that quiet is upon Israel and the Palestinians as the New Year's begin next week. For one thing, the killings of wanted men sought for questioning in the West Bank seems to have become too routine in the last few days. Another two were killed last night in Nablus, and now both the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades cell in Jenin, where three suspects were killed earlier this week, and the same organization's cell in the Balata refugee camp on Nablus's outskirts, are threatening that they will avenge the deaths of their members. That threats are real, but so far isolated – Hamas and Islamic Jihad leaders in Gaza and the West Bank have been reiterating their claim that they have put away their weapons at least until the elections (or until Israel grossly violates the unsigned ceasefire). Indeed, U.S. administration sources – so far anonymous -- are beginning to praise the PA for both the enforcement of the weapons ban and for the political persuasion applied by PA President Mahmoud Abbas that at least as of this morning has cleared the streets of Gaza from weaponry. Meanwhile, in Israel, police were hoping that a surprise – and embarrassing – decision by Attorney General Menachem Mazuz to reverse an earlier decision not to further investigate the killings of 13 Arab Israelis exactly five years ago this weekend, will reduce tensions in the Arab Israeli community ahead of planed marches and demonstrations set for tomorrow to mark the anniversary. The Justice Ministry is now trying to figure out whom to assign the case of probing the Police Investigations Department probe that ruled no prosecution is possible in the 13 cases – even though a judicial commission of inquiry, headed by Supreme Court Justice Theodor Or ruled almost two years ago that in at least two cases, that specific policemen were responsible for the unjustified shooting deaths of protestors who were objecting to then opposition leader Ariel Sharon's provocative visit to the Temple Mount as his way of protesting against then premier Ehud Barak's readiness to discuss dividing Jerusalem at the failed Camp David summit. Presumably, Mazuz was motivated by the near certain knowledge that an appeal to the High Court of Justice against the PID ruling is bound to succeed, forcing him to prosecute at least those policemen named by the Or Commission. But a new inquiry is not so simple, largely because Israeli law does not require autopsies for the sake of seeking evidence, only for the sake of determining cause of death. Thus, objections to autopsies by the families of nine of the victims has paralyzed all the investigations meant to determine who fired the bullets that killed their sons. Furthermore, if the deadly projectiles were either the rubber-coated steel bullets used in riot control, or M-16 bullets, the manner in which those bullets break up on striking a body makes it impossible to determine which weapon was used to fire. In short, the case is far from over, but as every experienced investigator knows cold cases are the hardest to solve. In any case, the Arab mayors and MKs who were on a hunger strike outside the Prime Minister's Office, demanding a new inquiry, folded up their tent and returned home yesterday, planning to take part in tomorrow's demonstrations. But they're still talking ahbout coverup. The police for their part are promising to stay away from the protest marches and rallies, to avoid friction. Both sides admit that there has been a slow but steady improvement in relations between the local communities and police since the riots of October 2000 and that the PID findings issued earlier this week did much to damage that improvement. All also agree that Mazuz's zigzag on the issue – he had stoutly defended the original PID findings – has shockingly undermined his own stature, perhaps because he seems to be practically ideological in his view that his responsibilities are limited to the strict letter of the law and that public norms of behavior are beyond his ken, up to the public to judge and decide on their own. And on the eve of the new Jewish year, which begins on Monday evening, Israeli officials, particularly at the mbassy in Washington are bracing for the reading of the plea bargain deal cut with Larry Franklin, the Pentagon analyst indicted for handing secrets (reportedly about Iranian spies in Kurdish Iraq looking for Israeli agents there) to two top officials from AIPAC, the organized 'Jewish lobby' in Washington. The two AIPAC officials, Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman have also been indicted in the case – and at least three Israeli officials from the embassy, who are all back in Israel, are named in the indictments, though not as defendants. The case, say Israeli officials somewhat blithely, will be bad for AIPAC, but not so bad for Israel. But already this year, for the first time in AIPAC history, the Israeli anthem was not played after the American anthem at the opening session of its annual general assembly of activists from all over the country. Not that Ariel Sharon needs AIPAC to win U.S. administration support, not after he actually went ahead and did the historic deed of withdrawing all Israelis from Gaza. He's still the golden boy of Middle East politics – but if the Palestinian ceasefire holds, at least out of Gaza, Mahmoud Abbas is gong to catch up. Abbas will meet with President Bush on October 20. The following week, the Knesset in Jerusalem convenes for its post-holidays winter session. Sharon is expected to deliver a 'state of the state' address at which he will reiterate that there are no more unilateral disengagements or withdrawals in store for the West Bank, and that Israel is only committed to the roadmap. Presumably, he'll say the roadmap cannot start until the Palestinians 'eradicate the terrorist infrastructure.' But if the guns stay off the streets of Gaza, and construction projects begin to pop up in that sorry land, Sharon's arguments about Abbas not delivering on his promises to end terror will begin to ring hollow. And Sharon knows it better than everyone else. After all, the reason for the disengagement was as simple as he said, 'from the Prime Minister's Office, things look different.'
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