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Palestinians Cash In on Costly Gaza War
by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700
Copyright
October 23, 2014
All Rights Reserved.
Demanding recognition from the U.N. on a Palestinian
State, Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority spokesman Saeb Erekat insisted it’s
time for the world to recognize an independent state. Palestinian Liberation Chairman Mahmoud Abbas urges U.N. member-states to recognize a
Palestinian State with borders before the 1967 War, including all of Egypt’s
Gaza Strip, Jordan’s West Bank and East Jerusalem and Syria’s Golan Heights. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu rejects Palestinian demands, hoping to capitalize on the last bloody
war that cost over 2,200 lives and $5 billion in damages. While claiming victory inside
Hamas-controlled Gaza, Abbas has become more belligerent demanding a Palestinian
State. Hamas’s received none of
their demands to end the six-week-long war [July 8 to Aug. 26], destroying 5,000
businesses and 40,000 private homes.
Insisting on an independent state, PLO’s
Abbas and Hamas’s leader in exile Khaled Meshall hoped that the six-week
old Palestinian suicide war against Israel built enough global sympathy to win
backing for an independent state.
Hosting a donors’ conference in Cairo Oct. 12, Abbas and Meshaal got what they
really wanted from the Gaza War: $5
billion. Broke and unable to pay
salaries in Gaza, Hamas couldn’t meet salaries to civil servants, forcing
Hamas’s Gaza leader Ismail Haniyeh lto aunch a six week war with Israel. Watching Gaza’s infrastructure laid
to waste, Haniyeh and Abbas kept the war going for as long as possible to rack
up more damages. When Hamas agreed
to ceasefire Aug. 26, they got none of their demands, especially ending the Gaza
blockade. Given that they got none
of their demands, the only logical reason to end rocket attacks was to cash in.
Speaking from the once besieged city of Ramallah, Erekat rejected
attempts by Netanyahu to return to direct negotiations between Tel Aviv and
Ramallah. “If he believes that he
can sustain the status quo and [that] we’ll do that for him, forget him. This will no last beyond November .
. . we will not take it anymore, business as usual no more,” said Erekat. Now 59, the U.S.-educated Erekat was
PLO founder Yasser Arafat’s right-hand-man until his suspicious death Nov. 11,
2004. Arafat went to his grave
never realizing his dream of a Palestinian State. Erekat knows that all attempts to
impose a two-state solution on Israel would be vetoed in the U.N. Security
Council. Expecting Israel to honor
1968 U.N. Security Council 242, returning to the pre-Six-Day-War borders is
unrealistic. Hamas’s latest war
accomplished the goal of getting more cash and giving Israel another PR black
eye.
When the PLO
and Hamas talk about Israel’s occupation, they’re referring not only to Israel’s
expanded borders after the 1967 War but to the original British Mandate of
Palestinian handed to Israel by Great Britain in 1948. Neither Hamas nor the PLO recognize
Israel’s right to exist, causing problems for over 40-years of U.S. peacemaking,
trying but failing to win Israel’s recognition in exchange for returning land. After the late Israeli Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon gave back the Gaza Strip to Palestinians Aug. 10, 2005, it
was promptly transformed into a Hamas terrorist base, spending precious cash on
rockets not infrastructure and schools.
When Israeli Defense Forces discovered in the latest war an elaborate
warren of 30 military tunnels, it became clear why the Hamas government ran out
of money. Now Erekat wants statehood bypassing Netanyahu and the Israeli government.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry had been back-and-forth to Israel and
the Palestinians territories 20 times in the last two years trying to broker
peace talks leading to an independent Palestinian state. “The state of Palestine has the full intention . . . [to] become a member of the ICC,”
threatening to sue Israel for war crimes in the International Criminal Court. Palestinians believe they have the
right to fire rockets, infiltrate Israel, abduct and kill Israeli citizens, all
in the name of “resistance” to protest Israeli occupation. While Gaza sustained 2,200
causalities in the six-week long war and billions in damage, Palestinians would
have killed far more Israelis had they had the capability. Israel could have wiped out the
entire Gaza population but tried to limit collateral damage wherever possible. Erekat never acknowledges Israel’s
right to defend itself against Palestinian abductions, murders and rocket
attacks.
Since Israel declared
statehood in 1948, Palestinians have been in a continuous state of war, despite
occasional peace deals like former President Jimmy Carter’s 1978 Camp David
Accords or former Preside Bill Clinton’s 1993 Oslo Protocol. All agreements were based on U.N.
Resolution 242, asking Israel to return land for peace. Every negotiated deal brought Israel no
peace, only more demands, leaving Meshaal to admit recently that Hamas has no
beef with Jews but with the Israeli state.
Meshaal suggested that he could live with Jews as long as they lived
under a Palestinian State. With
Palestinians acting so unrealistically, it’s no wonder that the last 40 years
hasn’t found peace. Erekat’s recent
threats to go to the ICC or U.N. Security Council won’t result in an independent
state. Judging by all the cash from a
Cairo donors’ conference, a state isn’t necessary or even desired
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