Today's Situation

Pride and prejudice Friday, June 30, 2006

Both are obviously far-fetched scenarios, held out by their proponents to cajole or threaten, but both are indicative of just how far the situation has gone. On the ground, the Egyptians have taken the lead role in trying to mediate something to defuse the crisis. The problem is that both Hamas and Israel have climbed very high trees, and pride, prestige and egos are now as involved as policy and politics. Hamas is asking for the release of thousands of prisoners. Israel is refusing to even consider any direct trade. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak does not want to see a victory for Hamas out of this, but he also cannot allow himself to be seen as collaborating with Israel over the toppling of Hamas.

One possible solution is that Shalit is returned to Israel, and prisoners are released to PA President Mahmoud Abbas, himself under pressure from inside his Fateh party to formally dissolve the government, a third of which is now in Israeli custody and the rest ‘underground,’ hiding from Israeli search parties. Abbas has the authority to do so, but he also cannot afford to be seen as an Israeli ‘collaborator’ -- even though he was the first to say on the Palestinian side, ‘give back the soldier.’

Meanwhile, despite politicians and media insisting the Israeli public is clamoring for action against the Hamas government and the Palestinians in general, a public opinion poll in Yedioth Aharonoth today shows clearly that the public favors negotiations and prisoner releases to get back kidnapped Gilad Shalit. Still, there is a genuine reason for Israeli reticence to do so. Give into the kidnappers’ demands and you invite many more kidnappings, goes the argument. The counterargument, of course, is not to give into the demands, but to drive a hard bargain. They ask for a thousand, give them 10, or at least start the haggling in a place where when it ends, you can say you got the best deal. That’s how it works in the shuks of the Middle East. And then make it illegal for settlers to hitchhike on the mostly empty roads of the West Bank, where they are sitting ducks for kidnappers, the way the late Eliyahu Asheri was, kidnapped on Sunday night and shot in the head at close range within hours of his capture even as his captors claimed to be holding him as a hostage for a trade. But instead of making it illegal for the settlers to hitchhike (the settlers say ‘it’s our land, why should we not be allowed to travel as we see fit -- keep the Palestinians off the roads’) the army won only a rabbinical decree saying that ‘at this time’ hitchhiking is forbidden. It’s hardly going to make an impression on the thousands of teenagers who grew up in the territories taught they are the true lords and masters of the land, and that the Palestinians are sojurners, at best.

So, the operation in southern Gaza continues, which mostly means observing from inside the Gazan border to make sure that nobody travels in and out of the Rafah area, which is where Israeli intelligence apparently is convinced the missing soldier is being hidden somewhere.

In northern Gaza, an operation meant to start firing artillery into residential areas where Qassams are launched has been put on hold. It is hard to say why precisely. According to Haaretz the prime minister didn’t like the plan, which basically relies on army leaflets telling the thousands of residents of the Beit Lahiye and Beit Hamoun areas to get out lest they be harmed, as the only way to avid civilian casualties. According to the TV commentators last night, the plan was put on hold at the request of the Egyptians, still working on a deal -- the latest proposal seems to be that Israel release all the prisoners due for release in the coming year, in exchange for the soldier.

Part of the problem this week is it is impossible to know what is happening behind closed doors. Officially, Israel is insisting that the dozens of Hamas lawmakers, elected officials and ministers it arrested this week will be prosecuted for their roles as official members of a terrorist organization -- Hamas. But it is also clear to all that they could end up as hostages to be traded back to the Palestinians in a deal for Gilad Shalit.

The trouble is that as much as Shalit is a hostage in the hands of what is most likely a fraction of a faction of an ever fragmented Hamas, itself without much support in the Arab world or even in the Palestinian street, the Israeli decision makers’ stridency seems to indicate that they are being held hostage by emotions, or at the very least by what they expect public opinion to say about them.

And according to the same poll that shows support for negotiations and prisoner releases, Olmert gets good marks from barely half the public, while Peretz gets good marks from barely a third.

In short, the war of nerves goes on. The latest deadline seems to be after this weekend, after Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman pays a visit to Gaza and presumably shuttles to Jerusalem to talk with Olmert and perhaps Peretz.

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