Escalating Tensions in Israel-Palestine relations | Spero News.

By George Friedman

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly delayed his March 23 trip to Moscow following a bombing at bus stop in central Jerusalem that injured as many as 34 people. The bombing follows a series of recent mortar and rocket attacks emanating from the Gaza Strip reaching as far as the outskirts of Ashdod and Beersheba, as well as the March 11 massacre of an Israeli family in the West Bank settlement of Itamar.

Netanyahu, already facing a political crisis at home in trying to hold his fragile coalition government together, now faces a serious dilemma. There were strong hints that Netanyahu may hold a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Moscow to restart the peace process and avoid becoming entrapped in another military campaign in the Palestinian territories, but that plan is now effectively derailed. Though the precise perpetrators and their backers remain unclear, a Palestinian faction or factions appear to be deliberately escalating the crisis and thus raising the potential for Israel to mount another military operation in the Palestinian territories.

Attacks in Jerusalem, while rare, raise concerns in Israel that a more capable militant presence is building in Fatah-controlled West Bank in addition to Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. Even before the Jerusalem bombing, Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Silvan Shalom told Israeli citizens in a March 23 Israel Radio broadcast that “we may have to consider a return” to a second Operation Cast Lead in Gaza. He added, “I say this despite the fact that I know such a thing would, of course, bring the region to a far more combustible situation.” The past few years of Palestinian violence against Israel has been mostly characterized by Gaza-based rocket attacks as well as a spate of attacks in 2008 in which militants used bulldozers to plow into both civilian and security targets in Jerusalem. Though various claims and denials were issued for many of the incidents, the perpetrators of these attacks — likely deliberately — remained unclear.

The names of shadowy groups such as the “al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade-Imad Mughniyah” also began circulating, raising suspicions of a stronger Hezbollah — and by extension, Iranian — link to Palestinian militancy. (Imad Mughniyah, one of Hezbollah’s most notorious commanders, was killed in February 2008 in Damascus.) The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades-Imad Mughniyah group claimed the March 11 West Bank attack, which Hamas denied. Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s (PIJ) armed wing, the al-Quds Brigades, has meanwhile claimed responsibility for the recent rocket attacks launched from Gaza that targeted Ashkelon and Sderot. PIJ spokesman Abu Hamad said March 23 prior to the Jerusalem bus bombing that his group intends to begin targeting cities deep within Israeli territory as it enters a “new phase of the resistance.” This is notable, as PIJ, out of all the Palestinian militant groups, has the closest ties to Iran.

The wider regional context is pertinent to the building crisis in Israel and the Palestinian territories. Iran has been pursuing a covert destabilization campaign in the Persian Gulf region to undermine its Sunni Arab rivals, particularly in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis reacted swiftly to the threat with the deployment of troops to Bahrain and are now engaging in a variety of measures to try to suppress Shiite unrest within the kingdom itself. The fear remains, however, that Iran has retained a number of covert assets in the region that it can choose to activate at an opportune time. Iran opening another front in the Levant, using its already well-established links to Hezbollah in Lebanon and its developing links to Hamas and other players in the Gaza Strip and West Bank, remains a distinct possibility and is likely being discussed in the crisis meetings under way in Israel at this time.

George Friedman is editor of  STRATFOR, from where this article was adapted.

Obama condemns bombing in Jerusalem – The Oval: Tracking the Obama presidency.

President Obama prepares to speak Saturday in Brazil on the Libya operation.

CAPTION

By JIM WATSON, AFP/Getty Images

If Libya, Bahrain, and Yemen weren’t enough, President Obama is now dealing with new violence in Jerusalem.

Obama has issued a statement condemning today’s attack at a Jerusalem bus stop that killed one woman and wounded more than 20 others.

“The United States calls on the groups responsible to end these attacks at once and we underscore that Israel, like all nations, has a right to self-defense,” Obama said.

The Associated Press reports that “the bombing brought back memories of the second Palestinian uprising last decade, a period in which hundreds of Israelis were killed by suicide bombings in Jerusalem and other major cities.”

“There was no immediate claim of responsibility,” the AP said. “The attack comes as tensions have been escalating between the two sides. In recent days, Hamas and other armed groups in the neighboring Gaza Strip have been firing rockets and mortars into Israel, prompting Israeli reprisals.”

Obama’s statement:

I condemn in the strongest possible terms the bombing in Jerusalem today, as well as the rockets and mortars fired from Gaza in recent days. Together with the American people, I offer my deepest condolences for those injured or killed.

There is never any possible justification for terrorism. The United States calls on the groups responsible to end these attacks at once and we underscore that Israel, like all nations, has a right to self-defense.

We also express our deepest condolences for the deaths of Palestinian civilians in Gaza yesterday. We stress the importance of calm and urge all parties to do everything in their power to prevent further violence and civilian casualties.

‘Iran tried to buy banned items from N.Korea’.

UNITED NATIONS – Iran is under investigation for new attempts to import items from North Korea and China that are banned under UN sanctions against Tehran’s nuclear and missile programs, UN diplomats said on Tuesday.

The information emerged on the sidelines of a UN Security Council meeting to discuss a quarterly report on Iran’s compliance with four rounds of UN Security Council sanctions imposed on Tehran for refusing to halt a nuclear enrichment program that Western powers fear is aimed at producing bombs.

Iran says its nuclear program is intended solely for generating electricity.

Colombian UN Ambassador Nestor Osorio, who chairs the Security Council’s Iran sanctions committee, did not publicly provide details of the two incidents. He did, however, tell the council that both cases were being investigated by the Iran sanctions committee and a UN panel of experts.

Osorio said “the increase in the number of reported sanctions violations is a matter of serious concern.”

A Security Council diplomat provided Reuters with details of the investigations of the suspected violations. They involved attempts by Iran to import aluminum powder and phosphor bronze, both banned items.

“The aluminum powder was from DPRK (North Korea) and interdicted by Singapore,” the diplomat said on condition of anonymity. “The phosphor bronze was seized in South Korea from a Chinese company.”

Another UN envoy confirmed the diplomat’s remarks.

The first diplomat said the Chinese authorities cooperated in the seizure of the phosphor bronze. There was no indication that the government was involved or had approved of the attempted shipment, the diplomat said.

The applications of the aluminum powder and phosphor bronze were not immediately clear but the diplomats said Iran was banned from importing both substances due to possible uses in its nuclear and missile programs. North Korea also is under sanctions and forbidden from exporting such items.

‘Clear Violations’

British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant told the council that the two incidents were clear violations of the sanctions. He also complained about a shipment of Iranian weapons allegedly bound for Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan.

Another suspected violation by Iran was a shipment of weapons that Israel said was bound for the Gaza Strip.

On March 15, Israeli naval commandos seized a cargo ship in the Mediterranean carrying what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said were Iranian-supplied weapons intended for Palestinian militants in Gaza.

Israel’s UN ambassador, Meron Reuben, sent a letter to the Security Council last week complaining about the shipment and urging the council to “take firm action to prevent arms smuggling to terrorist organizations and to prevent the ongoing illicit transfers of arms from Iran.”

In addition to a ban on importing nuclear and missile technology, the council has banned all arms exports by Tehran.

PM: Iran will ruin ‘Arab spring’ hopes for democracy.

The world community should put pressure on Iran at least equal to the pressure that it is currently applying to Libya, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told MKs during an address to the Knesset on Tuesday evening.

After being forced to address the plenum by a petition signed by 40 opposition MKs, Netanyahu delivered a lengthy address that focused on Israel’s position in the international arena, with particular emphasis on unrest in the Arab world and on Israel’s relations with the Palestinian Authority.

“Israel is the only state in this area that is immune to these shocks, because, in spite of all of the criticism, Israel is the only democratic state in which Arab MKs can take the podium, to criticize, to slam, and to condemn,” Netanyahu said.

“There is not a single Arab state in which Arabs have the rights, the equality of rights, and the freedom to express themselves democratically as they do in Israel. It is this very freedom that people in Arab countries are seeking today.”

Netanyahu warned that if Iran is allowed to complete its nuclear program, “the hopes that the world holds for an ‘Arab spring’ will be destroyed,” because Iran has already proven its willingness to intervene in political unrest in Egypt and, in the past, in Lebanon.

“I would expect that the world put similar pressure on Iran. Iran is at least equal to Libya, and I believe that its importance is even greater,” said Netanyahu, adding that Iran hopes to “return the region to the ninth century.”

Iran’s leaders, he complained “have made great efforts to stop peace and progress in our area.”

The prime minister also clarified his position on building in the West Bank, after he announced last week that he planned to approve 400 new units following this month’s deadly terror attack in the Samarian settlement of Itamar.

“I didn’t mean that building is part of the punishment. We will find the people who did this, and we will hold them accountable.

But building is one of the ways that Zionism has found over the years to answer these terrible acts of murder,” he said. “It is an appropriate response, a response that has continued since the dawn of Zionism.”

Netanyahu echoed complaints made following the terror attack that the Palestinian Authority on one hand condemned the attack when talking to Israel, but at the same time continued with incitement against Israel.

“The Palestinian Authority’s response was at first stammering, then reserved, and then [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas] called and said that the act was a terrible act, and I told him that you don’t need to say it to me, but rather to the media – not our media – but to your media, which is controlled by the government,” Netanyahu recounted, and then added that the Palestinian Authority continued to name squares and events after terrorists who killed Israelis.

“How can you talk to us about peace when the State of Israel doesn’t exist in your textbooks? How can you talk about peace to us while you speak about making peace with Hamas? You can make peace with Hamas or make peace with Israel, but you can’t do both. I say to our Palestinian counterparts, choose peace. If you want to choose peace,” he added.

“Why don’t you come to do the most basic thing? Abbas is in Ramallah 10 minutes away from here, and flies across the world, but he won’t come here,” Netanyahu complained.

He concluded his speech attacking Opposition Leader Tzipi Livni and Kadima, who routinely cite their near-success at achieving a peace agreement during the last government. Netanyahu said that he knew that the Olmert government was “not near” an agreement, because the Palestinians had refused to recognized Israel as the Jewish state or to accept settlement blocs.

“You are blurring reality, and the time has come that you tell the truth – if not to the nation, then at least to yourselves,” he concluded.

Livni launched an impassioned response, during which she accused Netanyahu of “failing to prepare Israel for peace.”

“If the prime minister has a vision beyond a supertanker that you find at the last minute on Google, why don’t you present it here in the Knesset in Hebrew,” she asked, responding to rumors that Netanyahu is likely to deliver a second key speech on foreign policy in the coming months.

“It will probably not be in Hebrew, but in English. It will be about performance, about a continuation of words in which you try to find common ground among [Foreign Minister Avigdor] Lieberman and [Minister-without- Portfolio Bennie] Begin and [Interior Minister] Eli Yishai and [US President Barack] Obama and [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel and [former British prime minister Gordon] Brown.”

“The community that will watch knows that it is a play, that it is spoken by a prime minister who said before the elections that words are reversible,” she warned, while coalition MKs chided her for not correctly naming the current British prime minister, David Cameron.

MESS Report-Israel News – Haaretz Israeli News source..

What began as a local escalation is steadily transforming into a broader conflict that the sides will apparently have difficulty stopping.

By Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff

While the headlines are focusing on the Katsav trial, the protests in Syria and the implications of the earthquake in Japan, a small war has been going on for a week now along the Gaza border.

Israeli communities near the border are receiving a daily dose of mortars and rockets, and the Israel Air Force has been attacking Gaza. What began as a local escalation is steadily transforming into a broader conflict that the sides will apparently have difficulty stopping, though it’s doubtful either side has an interest in reaching that point.

The current tensions began exactly a week ago when Israel launched an air attack on a Hamas base in the ruins of the settlement of Netzarim, killing two Hamas men. That attack came in response to a Qassam fired from Gaza that landed in an open area. Hamas then responded with a barrage of 50 mortars on communities south of the Gaza Strip. Israel delayed its response so as not to disrupt the Purim festivities in the Sderot area.

But on Monday evening Israel launched a series of air attacks in which a number of Hamas militants were wounded. Things worsened yesterday afternoon. After a round of mortar fire on kibbutzim east of Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces fired its own mortars right back at the source of the firing – at the Sajaiyeh neighborhood east of Gaza City, killing four members of a family, including two children.

Southern Command’s initial investigation indicates that the mortars’ launching point, an olive grove on the edge of a residential quarter, had been clearly identified. It seems that a number of the IDF’s mortars went off course and hit a house in Sajaiyeh, a few dozen meters from the grove.

The IDF says armed Hamas men who had fired mortars at Israel were also hit in the strike, and has expressed regret about innocent casualties. The IDF says it fired to stop the firing in the Sha’ar Hanegev Regional Council. The commander of the sector used mortars of a type known as keshet for lack of more precise weapons, which were not available quickly enough due to the urgency of stopping the Palestinian mortar fire at the kibbutzim.

Military officials said yesterday that Israel has no interest in an escalation, which echoed precisely Hamas’ statements from the day before. Until the Sajaiyeh incident, it seemed that Hamas was again trying to enforce calm.

Now the picture is once again more complicated. Hamas TV repeatedly showed close-ups last night of the body of an 11-year-old boy, Mohammed Jihad al-Halu, who was killed by IDF fire. Hamas’ military wing released a relatively cautious statement, but the other factions have vowed revenge.

The more time that passes and the larger the number of casualties, the harder it will be to stop the escalation.

Gaza militants fire Grad rocket at Be’er Sheva following IDF strike – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Initial reports say one moderately wounded in attack, which came hours after a similar Katyush-type projectile exploded south of the coastal city of Ashdod.

By Haaretz Service

Tensions continued to rise along Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip earlier Wednesday, as Gaza militants fired a Grad-type Katyusha rocket at the southern city of Be’er Sheva early Wednesday, mere hours after another Grad exploded south of the coastal city of Ashdod.

According to initial reports, the Grad rocket struck a street in the middle of one of the city’s residential areas. Upon impact, a piece of shrapnel penetrated a nearby third-floor apartment, moderately wounding one man.

	Security forces gather around the place the Grad rocket fell in Be’er Sheva on February 23, 2011.
	Photo by: Eli Hershkovitz

The attack came after a Grad rocket fired from Gaza exploded south of Ashdod on Tuesday, following after a day of escalation along the border. The IDF later issued a statement claiming that an Israel Air Force craft fired at figures suspected in launching the Katyusha-type rocket, killing one.

At least seven Palestinians, including four civilians, were killed earlier Tuesday during heavy exchanges of fire between the Israel Defense Forces and Palestinian terror groups in the Gaza Strip, in one of the most serious rounds of fighting near the Strip since the end of Operation Cast Lead in January 2009.

At around 4 P.M., four mortars were fired at kibbutzim Alumim and Sa’ad, landing in open areas and causing no injuries. The IDF fired mortars at the launching point, apparently hitting the Palestinians behind the launches but also hitting 12 Palestinian civilians, killing at least four.

Later in the evening, a few more mortars and a Grad rocket were fired at Ashkelon. There were no injuries.

An investigation by the IDF’s Gaza Division showed an IDF radar identified that mortars had been launched. Based on the events of the weekend, when Israel was hit by over 50 rockets, it was believed that another barrage was on the way that could hit Israeli homes.

The order was given to fire at the source of the Palestinian mortar fire. One of the four mortars the IDF fired at the launch point in an olive grove strayed and hit a house about 80 meters away.

Speaking in the incident’s wake, Hamas Gaza officials threatened to retaliate on for the civilian deaths, with Hamas spokesman Ismail Radwan saying that “the brutal crime of today will not pass without a response by the resistance.”

“Israel is escalating against our people and the whole world should show their responsibility to stop this escalation,” Radwan added.

Last month, two Grad rockets were fired at Be’er Sheva, with one of them hitting a home in a residential area. The rockets marked the first time that Be’er Sheva was hit since the Gaza war in 2009.

1921 – 2011

My mother passed away on Thursday, March 17 and was laid to rest Yesterday, March 21.  I ask my readers’ understanding if the blog is somewhat sparse this week as I sit shiva ( Jewish week of mourning.)  – Joseph Wouk