According to Sarkozy. It looks like the Israeli’s have accepted the French sponsored peace plan that has been signed off on by Egypt, the US and most significantly the Palestinian Authority.
However one very important party doesn’t accept it; Hamas, per Israellycool and Ynet:
Osama Hamdan, a Hamas representative in Lebanon, said that the Egyptian-French Gaza Strip ceasefire initiative is unacceptable and that new ideas should be discussed
This looks like another crazy like a fox move:
Next, the French and Egyptians appear to have gotten the message about Hamas. The communique appears to go out of its way to exclude Hamas, and the truce principles agreement comes from Hamas’ political opponents/enemies in Fatah. They may want to smooth the path to restore the authority of the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in Gaza after three years of Hamas rule, at a time when Gazans may finally welcome the change.
Unless the Israelis want to reoccupy Gaza, they need some sort of political resolution to the conflict. Their biggest worry is the Iranian proxy Hamas. If they can get Hamas out of Gaza and the West Bank, that will be a huge victory for Israel and for the Palestinians in the long run. It will be an even bigger defeat for Iran, which is why the French and Egyptians want to make these arrangements.
Knocking Iran out of Gaza however wouldn’t solve everything as yourish.com and soccerdad reminds us:
Fatah is moderate relative to Hamas. It wasn’t Hamas that rejected the peace deal at Camp David in 2000. Abbas didn’t object to Arafat’s rejection either. A few months of dong what they should have been doing for 15 years, doesn’t mean that they’ve changed.
One might say that Fatah’s primary goal is theft and secondary goal is the destruction of Israel, Hamas has it the other way around. People forget that one of the reasons why Hamas managed to win that election was the massive corruption of the PA under Fatah. There is no reason to believe that would change if they took over in Gaza but it would be at least a relative improvement and depending on if Fatah has learned anything a significant improvement.
For the US the focus off of Gaza and back on Iran would be very good. The president elect wouldn’t mind having this stop before the 20th either.
Accepting this gives Israel a huge propaganda advantage. As long as Hamas doesn’t accept the plan they can smash them up Phil Sheridan style (well maybe not Sheridan style) citing Hamas’ failure to go along. If Hamas does eventually agree it can’t be seen as anything but a defeat that will discredit them with other Arabs.
Why this isn’t touted on the IDF Spokesperson’s blog is beyond me.
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