Super Moderator
Location: essex ma
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well, the next move has been taking shape:
Quote:
Plan to bolster Abbas leaves Gaza adrift
Simon Tisdall in Washington
Monday June 18, 2007
The Guardian
The US and Israel are expected to discuss a joint strategy to bolster the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, and further isolate Hamas when Ehud Olmert, Israel's prime minister, meets George Bush at the White House tomorrow.
Officials in the US admit that Washington was taken by surprise by last week's swift seizure of power in Gaza by the Islamist movement. Mr Bush had reportedly been preparing a major statement on Palestine to coincide with Mr Olmert's prearranged visit. The speech has now been scrapped as the two countries scramble to reformulate their policy.
The emerging strategy, to be fleshed out at the White House talks and at a meeting today between Mr Olmert and the UN secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, is likely to focus primarily on providing enhanced political and diplomatic support, and possible expanded security assistance, to Mr Abbas and the new, secular Fatah-led government that was sworn in yesterday.
"A government that is not a Hamas government is a partner," Mr Olmert said en route to New York. Israel and the US would try to "empower the moderates" while offering an olive branch to the Palestinian population at large. "It's time for Israel to deal seriously, openly and generously with the suffering of the Palestinians that has taken place over many years as part of the conflict between us and them," Mr Olmert told the New York Times. "We want to say to the Palestinians that we are not indifferent to what happened to them."
The revamped US-Israeli approach is expected to involve the release to Mr Abbas's new administration of some, or all, of the $560m in tax and customs revenues withheld by Israel since Hamas took power 18 months ago.
"I am willing to cooperate with Abu Mazen [Mr Abbas] if there will not be a Hamas government, and meet all my commitments, including all the financial commitments, no question about it," Mr Olmert said. "To give it to a Hamas government is reckless. To give it to a Fatah government is an opportunity."
Also under consideration is a relaxation of restrictions on bilateral US and international aid and economic assistance to the government of the newly-appointed prime minister, Salam Fayyed.
EU foreign ministers will consider the issue at a meeting today. The European commission has pledged to continue humanitarian aid to Gaza. But while a US official in Jerusalem said at the weekend that Washington would support an easing of the embargo if a moderate Palestinian government took office, he warned that the relaxation might not apply to Gaza.
Aides to Mr Olmert said the possible deployment of an international force along the Egypt-Gaza border, to further contain Hamas, may also be discussed when he meets Mr Ban at the UN.
The speed with which Mr Olmert has attempted to turn the Fatah-Hamas split to advantage may reflect political and public pressure on him at home. But how he proposes to deal with a potentially ever more impoverished, hostile, radicalised, Hamas-led Gaza on Israel's doorstep remains unclear.
Uncertain, too, is the extent to which Mr Abbas, under pressure from the Palestinian diaspora and Arab opinion, is ready or able to turn his back on the 1.5 million residents of Gaza, whoever wields real power there.
Saudi Arabia, author of the Mecca agreement earlier this year, is urging Hamas and Fatah to resume political cooperation. Egypt and other Arab League countries are also likely to push for reconciliation.
Mr Bush has yet to speak publicly on the latest developments, but despite state department protestations that US ostracism of the elected Hamas government was not to blame for the Palestinian schism, concerns have been raised in Washington that his policy has handed another regional strategic victory to Iran, Hamas's main backer, and to fundamentalist Islam.
"For the Bush administration the outcome in Gaza is an embarrassment," said Martin Indyk, a former US ambassador to Israel. "Secretary of state Condoleezza Rice has committed her last 18 months in office to resolving the Israel-Palestinian conflict. A failed terrorist state is hardly what she had in mind for a legacy." Mr Indyk urged the White House to pursue a "West Bank first" policy, leaving Hamas to reap what it has sown.
Other analysts said the US should back off before it made more mistakes. "Almost every decision the US has made to interfere with Palestinian politics has boomeranged," Robert Malley of the independent International Crisis Group told the Washington Post.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/internatio...105242,00.html
so over the weekend, abbas formed a new "provisional government"---of course among the first actions was to fire the prime minister...this "provisional government" appears to be a step toward cutting gaza loose and concentrating on the west bank---the americans israel and the eu have all suddenyl recognized that this financial embargo idea may not have been the best thing, not because of the suffering it was causing in gaza--o no--but because this past week has changed the landscape, narrowing the space within which the total incoherence of the israelo-american "vision" can play out.
of course, everyone is shocked suprised flabbergasted amazed scandalized that recent events have unfolded....in the tack that is being adopted reflects directly the fundamental value of facing saving for political weak regimes confronting a crisis of their own making.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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