Behind the news with Gershon Baskin
March 18, 2006
Jericho
The biggest story of the week was without a doubt the Israeli invasion
of Jericho and the prisoner snatch on live TV. A week before the
Israeli invasion, the US and UK Consul General’s in Jerusalem warned
President Mahmoud Abbas that the British and American prison guards
stationed at the Jericho prison would leave unless the PA took steps to
protect them and to guarantee that the prisoners inside would not be
released. Since 2002, the British and American prison guards have been
stationed in Jericho. The agreement was reached between Israel and the
PA after the murder of former Israeli Minister Rehavam Ze’evi in 2002.
The suspected murderers at that time were under the protection of
Yasser Arafat in the Mukata’a in Ramallah. Israel placed a siege on
the Mukata’a and threatened that it would attack unless the suspected
killers of Ze’evi were turned over the Israeli forces. The
international community feared that Arafat would be killed in the raid
and worked out the deal whereby Ahmed Saadat, the PFLP`s secretary
general; Ihad Alma, the head of its military wing; Majdi Rimawi, who
recruited the cell that killed Ze`evi; Hamdi Kura`an, who pulled the
trigger; and Basel Al-Asmar, who assisted Kura`an would be imprisoned
in the Jericho prison under the watchful eye of British and American
prison guards. Once the suspects were imprisoned in Jericho, Israel
withdrew its troops from the Mukataa and the siege on Arafat ended.
The prison in Jericho was supposed to function like a real prison, but
from the beginning of the deal, the five suspects (who were not
formally tried for murder by the PA) and Fuad Shubeiki, former
Palestinian Authority chairman Yasser Arafat`s chief financier, who was
wanted for his role in smuggling arms into the territories, and
particularly his role in financing the Karine A arms ship were
subjected to the kind of treatment they would have in a real prison.
They had free reign of the prison, not confined to their cells. They
had unlimited visitors, free use of telephones, frequent interviews
with the local and international press and Ahmed Saadat even ran the
campaign headquarters of the PLFP in the Palestinian elections from the
prison. Although the Brits and the Americans complained formally
throughout the past years on this ridiculous situation, the thing that
really brought about the US and UK threat to leave was the fear that
the Hamas government, once sworn in would release the prisoners and
that it was more than likely that Israel would immediately move in to
either capture them or to kill them.
While Mahmoud Abass is clearly at fault for not taking the US-UK letter
seriously, it did not seem apparent to him that a new situation had
really developed that would lead to the Israeli raid. The Hamas
government hadn’t yet been presented and the prisoners were not being
released at any time in the coming days. Abbas even left for a
European tour thinking that there was no pressing reason not to.
When the British guards left Jericho on Tuesday morning, Israel
immediately moved in and placed a siege on the prison and implemented
its operation which was appropriately called “pressure cooker”. Three
prison guards were killed in the operation. All of the prisoners inside
surrendered and those wanted by Israel will now face the rest of their
terms in Israeli prisons. The Israelis forced the prisoners to strip
to their underwear in front of all of the media. Those humiliating
pictures were broadcasted around the world. This was really
unnecessary and simply added oil to the fire of hatred of Palestinians
towards Israel. It was an embarrassing scene to see those grown men in
the briefs and there was no reason why the commander of the operation
had to humiliate the Palestinians in that way.
More importantly, the whole unfolding of the events was a great blow to
hopes for future international involvement in assisting Israel and
Palestine find ways of both managing and resolving the conflict. Not
only did the foreign prison guards desert their posts at the first sign
of real trouble, the EU observers in Rafah also fled their posts when
they heard about the Jericho raid. Israelis who usually say that we
can’t trust foreigners to do these kinds of sensitive security related
jobs were proven right in this case. When the jobs in question are so
limited in their scope it makes it even more difficult to imagine
foreign troops stationed in Palestine to take on more serious
peacekeeping missions.
Rafah
Both Israel and Palestine would like to make revisions in the agreement
on the Rafah crossing. The agreements are supposed to stand for review
in mid November, but it is already clear that both sides are not
satisfied. The Karni crossing is continually closed by Israel because
of security warnings. Defense Minister Mofaz has full authority to
close the crossing at any time. The agreement stipulated that Israel
would make other crossing available if Karni had to be closed. Israel
has continually offered Kerem Shalom and the Palestinians have
consistently rejected the offer. The reason for the Israeli offer and
the Palestinian rejection has to do with the fact that Kerem Shalom is
a crossing at the Israeli-Palestinian-Egyptian triangle and as such,
with an Israeli-Egyptian agreement could lead to the closing of the
Rafah crossing, which is the Palestinians only international crossing
not under full Israeli authority.
The Rafah crossing was supposed to have a closed-circuit video system
that would enable Israel to act in real-time to prevent any persona non
grata from entering Gaza, but the system has never worked. Israel
would be very happy to have the Egyptians close Rafah and then the
Palestinians would have to come through their watchful eyes once again
in Kerem Shalom. So far, the Palestinian Authority has rejected the
use of Kerem Shalom even when Israel has said that it would not be used
to replace Rafah – there are no real good reasons why the Palestinians
should trust Israel, just as there are no real good reasons why Israel
should trust the Palestinians. With the Hamas government probably
taking power next week, the situation on the ground will most like
worsen. The full closure on the Palestinian territories imposed before
Purim is now extended at least until after the Israeli elections on
March 28. It is very likely that some form of total closure will now
become the norm and the impact on average Palestinians will really turn
the West Bank and Gaza into a pressure cooker. My advice is: watch
out for the next explosion.
Lieberman – Why?
The big surprise in the coming Israeli elections is likely to be
Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Betanu party. I don’t think many people
know the name of the number two person on the list, yet despite this,
it seems that Lieberman will get about 14 seats, making him the fourth
largest party in the Knesset. Lieberman is gaining most of his seats
from the Russian speaking Israelis because of his tough talk and his
platform of ethnic cleansing proposed by a series of unilateral border
adjustments. Lieberman, who once supported the greater land of Israel
policies, has come to realize that in his view Israel’s main problem is
demographic and that Jews and Arabs should not live together in the
same state. Lieberman does not go as far as the late Rabbi Meir Kahane
who would have forced the Arabs out of Israel. Instead, Lieberman
proposes a series of major border adjustments that would put whole
communities, such as more than 100,000 Palestinian-Israelis from Wadi
Ara within the Palestinian state. Lieberman would make such adjustments
even in Jerusalem. This platform has great appeal amongst many
Israelis who have become frustrated with the failure of peace processes
and have concluded that total separation is preferable to attempts of
coexistence.
Polls
I believe that there will be other surprises in the final count of the
votes. The final results seem to me to be more in question than what
the polls have continued to predict for months now. There are still
some 20 seats of undecided voters. I can testify that this has been
the first time in my life when I have been an undecided voter. We have
never had an election with so many undecided voters. As we move closer
to Election Day the polls don’t yet show real changes – this is where
we stand right now:
Kadima – 39 setas, Labour – 19-20, Likud – 15 seats. Shas 9-11, Yisrael
Beitanu – 9 seats, Meretz – 4-6, Yahadut Hatorah – 5-6, United right –
8-9, the Arab parties – 8-9. It also seems that the pot smokers of
Aleh Yarok will get in with 2 seats. Some polls put Kadima at 42 seats
after the Jericho raid. Some polls also show a decline in support for
the Likud. Labour seems frozen and hasn’t moved in weeks. I believe
that the polls will begin to indicate some shifts in the coming days as
the undecided voters begin to make their decisions. I believe that
Likud will continue to decline and Labour will rise slightly. I will
make my own predictions a couple of days before March 28.
Read Dave Phillips, Foreign Expert with PLO’s Negotiations Unit, Comments on Baskins`s Piece on Jericho Incident
See more on Jericho raid
