WarSclerotic

Hamas: This will be last truce; Israel: No progress in talks
Mati Tuchfeld, Yoav Limor, Israel Hayom Staff and Reuters August 12, 2014

(If this is the last, then what?-LS)

Israeli official says gaps between Israel’s and Hamas’ positions are big • Palestinian delegation consents to Palestinian unity government of technocrats overseeing reconstruction in Gaza, official says • Israeli cabinet meeting on truce talks canceled.

Talks to end a month-long war between Israel and Palestinian terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip have made no progress so far, an Israeli official said on Tuesday, as a 72-hour cease-fire in the Palestinian coastal enclave held for a second day.

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators were expected to reconvene later Tuesday in Cairo where Hamas and its allies are seeking an end to an Israeli and Egyptian blockade of Gaza.

“The gaps between the sides are big and there is no progress in the negotiations,” said an Israeli official who declined to be named.

Meanwhile, Hamas deputy political bureau chief Moussa Abu Marzouk told the Palestinian news agency Maan that “we are facing difficult negotiations, the first truce passed without any notable achievement, and this is the second and last truce. Its gravity now is clear. The delegation must achieve the people’s wishes.”

Hamas also seeks a seaport for Gaza, a project Israel says should be dealt with only under the framework of future talks on a permanent peace agreement with the Palestinians.

Israel has resisted lifting its blockade on Gaza out of fear that Hamas would restock with weapons from abroad if access to Gaza was eased. Neighboring Egypt also sees Hamas as a security threat.

Israel pulled ground forces out of Gaza last week after it said the IDF had completed its main mission of destroying more than 30 tunnels dug by terrorists for cross-border attacks. Israel now wants guarantees Hamas will not use any reconstruction supplies sent into Gaza to rebuild those tunnels.

A Palestinian official said Tuesday that the Palestinian delegation had consented that reconstruction in Gaza should be carried out by the unity government of technocrats set up in June by Hamas and the more secular Fatah party of Western-backed Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who is based in the West Bank.

Israeli representatives are not meeting face-to-face with the Palestinian delegation because it includes Hamas, which Israel regards as a terrorist organization. Hamas for its part is sworn to Israel’s destruction.

Israel’s cabinet was scheduled to convene on Tuesday to discuss the details of the potential cease-fire agreement, but the meeting was canceled in the morning.

ISIL Could Become the Voice of Sunnis If We Don’t Find a Way to Stop It Soon
By Andrew Tabler Date August 11, 2014 via The New Republic

(Based upon Obama’s upbringing, I’d bet he is a Sunni at heart. This could explain a lot.-LS)

The Islamic State in Iraq and Levant’s deep-rooted sense of purpose and its political, financial, and military ability have helped it carve out a safe haven between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. This week’s American airstrikes could help roll ISIL back—but if the American people really do not want to be sucked into another war in the Middle East, then Washington will need to cement these gains by working with Arab allies to bolster the moderate Sunnis who would fill the vacuum in Syria and Iraq following an ISIL defeat.

ISIL’s power comes from its effectiveness in rallying Sunni Muslims to fight against what they perceive to be Iranian-backed Shia regimes in Baghdad and Damascus. Bashar al Assad and Nuri Kamal al Maliki’s attempts to shoot and cajole their Sunni populations into submission have attracted jihadists from all over the world to Syria and Iraq. Unlike other terrorist groups, which rely on financial networks and wealthy benefactors, ISIL emphasizes self-sufficiency, using extortion, sale of oil products, and the charging of taxes and fees to generate revenue. These funds allow it to carry out operations that net even more resources, including millions of dollars from Mosul’s banks and American military equipment. It uses these ill-gotten gains to buy the allegiance and support of local groups and tribes.

In return, ISIL institutes order, doling out harsh punishments for violations of Islamic law, while protecting local populations from the Assad and Maliki regimes. It is restoring Sunni pride as well, carrying out successful raids against the Iraqi army and Syrian forces that have seized oil refineries and gas fields. All of this led ISIL leader Abu Bakr al Baghdadi on June 30 not only to declare the “Islamic State”, but the restoration of the Islamic Caliphate, an institution formally dissolved 90 years ago.

The Iraqi army has thus far proven incapable of pushing ISIL back, due in no small part to ISIL’s military ability and newly captured equipment. But the Iraqi army’s losses are largely due to the Maliki government’s unwillingness to include Sunnis, which is the result of the support it receives from Iran. Kurdish forces, which Washington decided to arm this week, are in a position to push back on ISIL near its northern enclave but will be unable, and most likely unwilling, to deploy in Sunni areas of Iraq.

The same military and political limits hold true in Syria. Despite Assad’s recent battlefield gains in the west, his willingness and ability to operate in Eastern and central Syria, where his forces have sustained heavy losses, remains limited. Assad’s hardline position during the Geneva Peace talks and surrounding his “reelection” last June make it unlikely that the regime will peeling off moderate Sunnis to its side.

Some have advocated inviting Iran to take care of the ISIL problem for the United States as some part of a “grand bargain” over its nuclear program. But those talks are not going so well, and even if they lead to agreement, both Iranian and American officials say the issue of Iran’s nuclear and regional aspirations will remain “stove-piped” for technical and political reasons. Furthermore, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vigorously rejects working with the United States, and he has not given President Rouhani any authority over the Iraq or Syria files, unlike his reluctant assent to nuclear negotiations in pursuit of sanctions relief. Iranian-backed forces also bring little positive to the table: Militant groups backed or trained by the IRGC-Quds Force (the body that orchestrates training of Iranian-backed proxy groups), such as Hezbollah or the National Defense Companies, have had no or very limited ability operating far away from their strategic depth in Iran and Lebanon. Worse, Iran encourages sectarian excesses which drive Sunnis to reluctantly work with ISIL, seeing it as better than Iranian-sponsored death squads.

The much talked about “moderate Sunnis” come from the same demographic as ISIL and Al Qaeda. But Sunni Arab states lack a “Quds Force-like” organization to train moderate Sunnis. Meanwhile, Sunni Arab society has to some extent supported jihadists in terms of money and men, replicating the low cost tools of the Quds Force in backing extremist Shia factions sans the discipline. These state’s lack of unity of purpose have so far only exacerbated the divisions among the Syrian and Iraq Sunnis.

Syria’s neighbors are also not in a position to root out ISIL, preferring to contain—with varying degrees of success—the crisis inside Syria. The most successful thus far has been Jordan, which has policed its border with Syria from the beginning of the conflict while working with the U.S. to covertly support the Syrian rebels. Nevertheless, Jordan has around one million Syrians in the country living outside refugee camps. The threat of terrorist attacks, run by the Assad regime or Sunni extremists, has caused Jordan to thus far shy away from the Obama Administration’s proposed program to more openly train and equip the Syrian opposition.

Turkey, which has the longest and most open border with Syria, has only recently begun efforts to clamp down on jihadist groups operating from its territory into Syria—especially following ISIL’s taking of hostages in Turkey’s Mosul consulate. Like Jordan, Ankara does not want to intervene in Syria due to fears of terrorist attacks on its territory and now ironically sees Kurds, its historic adversary, as its best asset against containing ISIL.

Both Lebanon and Iraq, due to internal divisions and incapacity, are unable to intervene in Syria other than through sub-state actors such as Hezbollah, which has simultaneously coordinated with the working Lebanese government to contain spillover from Syria. Israel, other than covert assistance to some groups in the south and treatment of wounded, has also preferred to stay out of Syria in favor of containment.

ISIL’s recent successes, if sustained, risks not only a redrawing of the Sykes-Picot boundaries, but making ISIL and jihadists in general the authentic and authoritative voice for Sunnis in the Middle East. The continued victories of jihadist forces threaten the Arab Gulf Monarchies, particularly Saudi Arabia, which, as guardians of the holy places, have assumed the primary political role in Islam since the abolition of the Ottoman Caliphate in 1924. A defeat of jihadist forces at the hands of the Assad and Maliki regimes also risks domestic blowback against Gulf monarchies—indeed some rulers have used the excuse of the power of Salafists and general sympathies for Syria’s Sunni opposition for not cracking down earlier on jihadist financial networks.

Given ISIL’s recent successes, it would be optimistic to think their aspirations are limited to a caliphate between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. ISIL has moved its forces toward the borders with Jordan and Saudi Arabia, and ISIL elements successfully attacked Lebanese Army positions along the frontier with Syria this week, taking prisoners. Meanwhile, analysts and European and American officials say hundreds, if not thousands, of ISIL and Al Qaeda operatives in Syria and the Islamic State are likely planning attacks either back home or elsewhere. These include Muhsin al-Fadhili, former head of Al Qaeda’s Iranian facilitation network; Sanafi al-Nasr, head of Al Qaeda’s Syria “Victory Committee”; Wafa al-Saudi, Al Qaeda’s former head of security for counter intelligence; as well as Al Qaeda founding member Firas al-Suri. Members of Al Qaeda Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) are also reportedly in Syria, indicating a growing opportunity for connectivity, coordination, planning, and synchronization with Jebhat al-Nusra and other jihadists. Taken together with national-based Jihadist units from China, the Caucasus, Libya, Egypt, Sweden, and beyond, the “Islamic State” is already the next Afghanistan or Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas in terms of a durable safe haven and training ground for global Islamic terrorism.1

Given the consolidation of the Islamic State’s gains, and the lack of interest and capacity of its neighbors to uproot the organization in Iraq and Syria, the Islamic State is likely to endure absent a more assertive and concerted U.S. policy involving military and political operations. Working with Iran and its clients in the Maliki and Assad governments will not solve the problem, due to both states’ limited military capacities and encouragement of sectarian brutality against Sunnis in both countries. While Iran and its allies may be a natural front on ISIL expansion further afield, empowering Iran and its allies now would be like throwing gasoline on sectarian fire.

If Washington seeks to find the “formula that speaks to the aspirations” of Sunnis outlined in President Obama’s recent New York Times interview, or the “geopolitical equilibrium” between Iran and the Arabs he outlined last autumn, Washington will need to work with allies in Iraq and the Arab Gulf countries to calm tensions and lead Sunnis in Syria and Iraq in a more moderate direction. It will be an uphill struggle: The jihadist narrative that America is waging war on Sunnis post September 11 continues. Many see Obama employing a double-standard in his decision to arm the Kurds and act to prevent a Yezidi “genocide” while refusing for three years to arm Syria’s Sunni-dominated opposition—who he continues to dismiss as mere “doctors, farmers, (and) pharmacists”—and enforce his red line against the Assad regime for its use of chemical weapons against civilians.

These could involve pressure on the Maliki government to be more “inclusive,” supporting a change in that government, and special military operations. The success of that program would be heavily dependent on the degree of cooperation and coordination with Sunni regional allies. The Saudi government, which has been wary of American involvement in Iraq, will have to be convinced that Washington will commit to supporting non-jihadi Sunnis in Iraq and Syria militarily (via training) and politically (vis à vis Iraq and Syria’s Iran-backed governments). Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis, who are worried in a very existential way about working against ISIL, will have to be convinced that such a program carries enough potential to work thus risking their and their families’ lives. Fortunately Arab Gulf countries have long-term relations with tribes in the areas ISIL controls and very deep pockets. Instead of relying on them to create a Quds Force-equivalent to train and support Sunni moderates in Syria and Iraq, the U.S. should play that role, working in concert with Arab intelligence agencies to coordinate and streamline their efforts to foster a viable moderate Sunni alternative that will fill the vacuum following any ISIL defeat.

For Washington, such efforts could help stabilize two weak and effectively disintegrated states. For Arab allies, it would provide an opportunity to help moderate forces check both Sunni extremism and Iranian-dominated governments in Baghdad and Damascus. And for the American people, it would make it much less likely its servicemen would have to invade another Middle Eastern country in the wake of another massive terrorist attack.

Saudi Arabian Newspaper: There Is No Longer an Arab-Israeli Conflict
Aug 12, 2014, 05:35 PM | Rachel Avraham via Jerusalem Online

(A wolf in sheep’s clothing, perhaps? – LS)

A fascinating article was uncovered that improved the image of the Saudi royal family. It claims that the Arab-Israeli conflict has ended and now there is a conflict between Israel and Turkey and Iran, who support terrorist organizations fighting against Israel. The weakness of the Arab states and the isolation of Qatar make the present time better to achieve a comprehensive peace agreement with the Arab world.

An international Saudi newspaper, which is the mouthpiece of the royal family based in Riyadh, declared that there is no longer an Israeli-Arab conflict, but an Israeli-Turkish-Iranian conflict. The paper declares that if Israel wants to do a big deal with the Arabs, now is the time.

Under the headline “there is no more Israeli-Arab conflict,” the article indicates that the attacks on Israel come from Gaza, who carries out the mission of Iran with the assistance of the Muslim Brotherhood and their patrons, Turkey and Qatar.

“Even the nature of the conflict changed,” the author of the article explained. “Conventional warfare, where armies of countries face enemies in the combat zone, has been replaced by asymmetrical warfare, where the army fights against guerilla movements in the cities. The conflicts between Israel and the Arab states, led by the 1948, 1967 and 1973 wars, are no longer the reality. Israel is now fighting political movements such as Hamas and Hezbollah, not the Arab countries, and the patronage of these movements come from Iran and Turkey. Of course, they are not Arab countries.”

“The disconnection of the Arab states and the rhetoric against Hamas in the Arab world, especially in Egypt, indicates a profound change in the perception of the conflict across the Arab world,” the article stressed. “The rhetoric of the current round turned Israel against Hamas, Turkey, Iran and Qatar. The support in the Arab world for Hamas is voiced only on twitter and other social media forums.”

The article stressed that Qatar, the only Arab country that supports Hamas, is isolated from the rest of the Gulf countries, after Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Bahrain withdrew their ambassadors from Doha: “So, what was once the Arab-Israeli conflict no longer exists.”

“The good news is that if Israel wants to achieve a great deal with the Arabs, now is the time to do it,” the Saudi newspaper declared. “Arab countries are now in the worst political situation they have been in for some time. Given the current political upheavals, they are now ready to sign a comprehensive deal with Israel.”

Hamas said to have executed dozens of tunnel diggers
By Marissa Newman August 11, 2014, 11:31 am Via The Times of Israel

(Imagine what they would do to us if they had the chance.-LS)

Any excavator who was suspected of collaborating with Israel was killed, Israeli website report

Hamas executed dozens of diggers responsible for its extensive tunnel system in past weeks, fearing the workers would reveal the site locations to Israel, a report on the Mako website’s army blog said.

The tunnelers, many of whom constructed the tunnels over the course of months, would dig for 8-12 hours a day, and received a monthly wage of $150-$300, according to the blog.

Sources in Gaza told the website that Hamas took a series of precautions to prevent information from reaching Israel. The terror organization would reportedly blindfold the excavators en route to the sites and back, to prevent them from recognizing the locations. The tunnels were strictly supervised by Hamas members, and civilians were kept far from the sites.

M., a former tunnel digger and Israeli collaborator, told the website that Hamas would strip search the workers to ensure they had no recording devices or cameras hidden on them.

“The people we met had their faces covered; no one knew them by their real names, it was all codes and first names. They didn’t want to take the risk that some of the diggers were collaborating with Israel,” he said.

A tunnel, within a civilian home, found by Golani soldiers in the northern Gaza Strip (photo credit: IDF Spokesperson’s Unit/ Flash 90)
A tunnel entrance, within a civilian home, found by Golani soldiers in the northern Gaza Strip (photo credit: IDF Spokesperson’s Unit/ Flash 90)

After the tunnels were completed, dozens were reportedly executed to prevent intelligence leaks to Israel.

“Anyone they suspected might transfer information to Israel on the tunnels was killed by the military wing,” a different source said. “They were very cruel.”

In 2012, a Journal of Palestine Studies article claimed 160 Palestinian children were killed while working on Hamas’s tunnel system.

The digging of tunnels began four years ago and has demanded 40 percent of Hamas’s budget, The Times of Israel has learned.

Tunnel diggers have been using electric or pneumatic jackhammers, advancing 4-5 meters a day. The tunnels found were reportedly mostly dug 18-25 meters (60-82 feet) underground, though one was discovered at a depth of 35 meters (115 feet). “That’s like a 10-story building underground,” one expert said.

Digging requires engineering and geological expertise, with tunnels usually dug through sandy soil, their roof supported by a more durable level of clay. As they are dug, the tunnels are reinforced by concrete panels, manufactured locally in workshops adjacent to each tunnel. These workshops have also been targeted by the IDF throughout its military operation.

Elhanan Miller contributed to this report.

Isis suicide bombing instructor blows up his own class by accident
By Christopher Hooton – 11 August 2014 via The Belfast Telegraph

Isis fighters take part in a military parade along the streets of Syria’s northern Raqqa province

(Apparently not all locals like ISIS.-LS)

An Isis commander at a terrorist training camp north of Baghdad accidentally detonated a belt packed with explosives during a demonstration in front of a group militants on Monday, killing himself and 21 nearby trainees.

The accident was a source of dark humour for locals, with suicide attacks in public spaces having become an almost daily occurrence in Iraq.

A bomber struck a falafel shop near the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Baghdad last week, and when told of the bungled training demonstration by the New York Times, Raad Hashim, who works at a liquor store near the site of the bombing, burst out laughing.

“This is so funny,” he said. “It shows how stupid they are, those dogs and sons of dogs.”

On a more serious note, he added: “It also gives me pain, as I remember all the innocent people that were killed here.”

“This is God showing justice. This is God sending a message to the bad people and the criminals in the world, to tell them to stop the injustice and to bring peace. Evil will not win in the end. It’s always life that wins over death.

Another local told the newspaper: “I heard this today when my friend rang me in the afternoon to tell me about it. He was so happy as if he was getting married, which made me happy as well.

“I hope that their graves burn and all the rest of them burn as well. I was not happy with the number killed, though: I wanted more of them to die, as I remember my friend who was killed by a suicide bomber in 2007.”

A further 15 people were wounded in the explosion, according to police and army officials, which took place at a compound situated in the northeastern Salahuddin Province.

The instructor was not named, but was described to the NYT by an Iraqi Army officer as a prolific recruiter who was “able to kill the bad guys for once.”

Attacks on civilians have worsened since the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (Isis), with US senior State Department official Brett McGurk noting that 50 suicide attacks took place in Iraq in November, compared with three in November 2012.

“The suicide bomber phenomenon, it is complete insanity,” he said at a congressional hearing last week.

Abbas’s Fatah Claims Murdering 11,000 Israelis
By Ari Yashar First Publish: 8/11/2014, 9:02 AM Via Israel National News

(Abbas the Moderate.-LS)

Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah faction, which has been presented by many as “moderate,” sought to leave no doubts on Sunday about its terrorist nature as it declared having murdered “11,000 Israelis.”

Palestinian Media Watch translated the statement from Fatah’s official Facebook page, in which the fictitious claim of having killed 11,000 Israeli citizens was made. Fatah also claimed having “sacrificed 170,000 martyrs,” similarly inflating the number of killed Fatah terrorists.

Fatah likewise asserted that it was the “first Palestinian faction to reach the nuclear reactor in Dimona.” The curious claim refers to a terror attack in 1988, in which three working mothers were killed by three Fatah terrorists on a bus on their way to the Dimona plant.

Abbas’s faction claimed being the first terror group to attack Israel in the first (1988-1993) and second intifadas (2000-2005), in the second instance bragging of a 2000 attack in Gaza.

In that attack, Baha Al-Sa’id of the PA security forces infiltrated Kfar Darom and murdered two IDF soldiers. He was shot by one of them in the exchange and died of his wounds.

At the end of its list of terror “achievements,” Abbas’s party wrote that it “led the Palestinian attack on Israel in the UN,” referencing the diplomatic war it continues to wage against the Jewish state.

The very last “achievement” listed, after all the terror attacks and cases of murder, reads: “Fatah leads the peaceful popular resistance against Israel.”

While Abbas has often been touted as a “peace partner,” his Fatah party’s Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades military wing claimed a shooting attack on “a group of Zionists” near Bethlehem just this Sunday. It also claimed responsibility for a failed shooting attack last Sunday in Neve Tzuf, Samaria.

Abbas’s Fatah faction has called for the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Israel, and declared “open war” on Israel late last month.

The statements are in line with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) charter of 1968, which calls for “armed struggle” or “armed revolution,” declaring “armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine,” and calling on local Arabs to “be prepared for the armed struggle.”

Following the charter, the PLO and Fatah were defined internationally as terror organizations, a status which was removed during the 1993 Oslo Accords process.

Exclusive: New Details Surface in Hamas Murder of IDF Soldier Hadar Goldin
by Breitbart News9 Aug 2014

(“…grabbed parts of his body and ran back into the tunnel from which the terrorists emerged.” Chilling story about who we’re dealing with. A must read .-LS)

On Friday, August 1st, media reported that Hamas had kidnapped IDF Officer LT Hadar Goldin, 23; the next day, he was announced killed in action by a Hamas suicide bomber who had emerged from a tunnel. Lt. Goldin was an officer in the Givati Brigade, an elite Israeli infantry unit. He had become engaged weeks before going to Gaza.

Major Benaya Sarel, 26, and 1st Sgt. Liel Gidoni, 20, were also killed in the explosion detonated by a Hamas suicide bomber.

An unnamed Israeli military source spoke to Breitbart News about the story of how Hamas used an UNRWA ambulance, a mosque, and the Islamic University to carry out the attack that killed the three IDF soldiers.

The officer explained how, after the suicide bombing that killed Lt. Goldin, a second kidnapping team of Hamas terrorists grabbed parts of his body and ran back into the tunnel from which the terrorists emerged. The tunnel led back into a mosque. From the mosque, they escaped in a clearly marked UNRWA ambulance. The terrorists then made contact with high-ranking Hamas officials hiding in the Islamic University.

As a result Abu Marzook, a senior member of Hamas, announced in Cairo that Hamas had kidnapped an Israeli soldier. Israeli intelligence intercepted a conversation between the kidnappers and the Hamas officials at the Islamic University and thus got all the particulars regarding the hiding place of the kidnappers. Within minutes, the IAF attacked both the kidnappers’ location and the Islamic University.

In the midst of this attack, a second force of IDF soldiers–which had gone into a mosque looking for weapons, explosives, and rockets– encountered a female suicide bomber who was about to detonate the belt she wore, which would have resulted in the deaths of the soldiers. One of the soldiers instinctively recited the opening words of the holiest Jewish prayer “Shema Yisrael”. The female suicide bomber hesitated and began trembling, giving the soldiers a chance to grab her and disable the device.

The soldiers then took her prisoner and turned her over to a counter-intelligence unit. Their investigation uncovered that the female suicide bomber’s mother was a Jew who had married a Palestinian in Israel and, after the wedding, was smuggled against her will into Gaza. There she lived a life filled with abuse and humiliation, and was basically a captive. In addition to the female suicide bomber, there were two smaller children as well. An armored force went in and rescued the two small children.

Hamas uses places of worship, hospitals, schools and civilian areas to launch attacks against Israel. Before the IDF carries out an attack against Hamas, they drop hundreds of leaflets, warning people to leave the area. They call every resident and send a warning shot before they actually launch the attack on a building. As one former IDF soldier told Breitbart News, “Israel defends their people; these are people that use their people to defend themselves.”

Israeli officials: We won’t return to Cairo talks until rocket fire ends
By HERB KEINON, KHALED ABU TOAMEH
08/09/2014 23:40 via The Jerusalem Post

(ISIS or whatever the hell the press calls them now is watching and taking notes. You can bet on it.-LS)

Israel will not send a team back to Cairo to discuss a cease-fire until Hamas rocket fire ceases, and will respond forcefully to all Hamas attacks, senior diplomatic officials said Saturday night.

The officials said if there was a continuation of the rocket fire that began at 4 a.m on Friday, and intensified four hours later with the end of the 72-hour cease-fire, then Israel would consider “all options on the table” and was not limiting itself to striking back from the air.

The officials said the Israeli team that was in Cairo negotiating with the Egyptians over a longer-term deal returned to Israel at 7 a.m. on Friday when it became apparent that Hamas was not going to extend the cease-fire.

Once the cease-fire formally ended, and Hamas fired rockets into Israel, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon instructed the IDF to respond “forcefully.”

It was also made clear that Israel would not conduct any type of negotiations under fire.

The full cabinet is scheduled to meet Sunday in Tel Aviv to discuss the developments.

Communications Minister Gilad Erdan, a member of the eight-person security cabinet, said in a Channel 2 interview Saturday night that while no one has a formula for ensuring that one day “it all ends,” the government is determined and has made commitments to the Israeli public that “what was, is not what will be, and we will stand by that promise.”

It is possible, Erdan said, that Israel might send its ground forces back in to Gaza.

“A wide ground incursion and the toppling of Hamas is being discussed,” he said.

Economy Minister Naftali Bennett said on Friday after the firing restarted that this was a test for Israel’s deterrence that would have ramifications for years. As such, he said, the response needed to be “hard and painful.”

He said Israel needed to decisively win this battle, whether UN Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon “likes it or not. Operation Protective Edge is not over, Hamas has not yet been defeated, and Israel’s citizens need to be strong and prepared for what comes next.”

Another security cabinet member, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, said Hamas should not get anything it is asking from Israel that applies to a possible final agreement with the Palestinians, such as a safe passage – which they are demanding – from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank, an airport or a seaport.

“I support continuing firing toward Hamas,” she said. “We should not pay Hamas for quiet. Hamas’s fire will not bring it to better achievements.”

Hamas, meanwhile, warned over the weekend that it would continue to attack Israel as long as its demands are not fulfilled.

The warning came as a Palestinian delegation representing various groups, including Fatah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, continued discussions with Egyptian security officials about achieving a long-term cease-fire with Israel.

The Hezbollah-affiliated newspaper Al-Akhbar quoted Hamas sources as saying that the movement would attack Tel Aviv on Sunday if its demands were not met by then.

The sources said the Palestinian delegation has informed the Egyptians that its members would leave Cairo on Sunday if no progress is made in the cease-fire talks.

However, the head of the Palestinian delegation, Azzam al-Ahmed of Fatah, said on Friday that the team would not leave Cairo until an agreement is reached that complies with all Palestinian demands, including giving the Gaza Strip its own airport and seaport.

“We haven’t asked for anything new and that’s why Israel has no right to say this is permitted or that it not permitted,” the Fatah official said. “We have told the Egyptians that we will stay in Cairo until we reach an agreement to end the bloodshed and lift the siege on the Gaza Strip.”

Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said, “There is no going back and the resistance will continue with full force. There will be no concessions on the demands presented by the Palestinian delegation in Cairo. Israel’s intransigence and foot-dragging won’t benefit it.”

Izzat al-Risheq, a Hamas member of the delegation, claimed that Israel used Saturday as an excuse to stay away from indirect talks [with Hamas] in Cairo.

“Its army is continuing its aggression and shelling of the Gaza Strip on Saturday,” Risheq said. “This excuse is silly.”

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said his movement would not make any concessions regarding its demand to have a seaport in the Gaza Strip.

“Such a port would be the Palestinian gate to the outside world,” he said.

Senior Hamas official Ahmed Bahr reiterated his movement’s refusal to disarm.

“The weapons of the Palestinian resistance will stay as long as Israeli occupation exists on our occupied land,” Bahr said. “The painful strikes of the resistance on Israel will drive the Israeli negotiator to accept all the demands of the resistance. This is the only language of negotiations they understand.”

Meanwhile, a Palestinian official told AFP that Egyptian and Palestinian delegates have reportedly reached a new agreement on a draft cease-fire proposal that will be submitted to Israel.

According to the official, the deal would see the Palestinian Authority and the government in Cairo render control of the Rafah border between Gaza and Egypt.

Israeli officials told The Jerusalem Post that Israel already accepted the idea of Palestinian Authority security officials manning the Rafah proposal, when it was presented in Egypt’s initial cease-fire proposal some three weeks ago.

In addition, under the reported terms of the new proposal to be presented to Israel, Hamas would in effect enact a unity deal signed in April with the PA, entrusting the group’s demands for a port in Gaza to the Ramallah-based government for negotiations at a later point with Israel.

In a related development, Netanyahu gave interviews over the weekend to three leading US, French and German television stations.

In the interview with both Fox News and France’s ITV, the prime minister responded to criticism of civilian casualties by underlining an incident that happened during World War II.

Netanyahu told ITV that in 1944, “the British Royal Air Force sets out to bomb the Gestapo headquarters in Copenhagen. A legitimate target.

Okay? But the British pilots miss. And instead of the Gestapo headquarters, they hit a children’s hospital nearby, right next to it, and some 83 children, I think, are horribly burned to death.

That’s not a war crime. And that’s not a massacre. What that is, is a terrible tragedy of war that accompanies every legitimate action.”

The difference between Israel and Hamas, he stressed, was that while Israel deliberately targets military and terrorist targets, and accidentally hurt civilians, “they deliberately hurt civilians, target civilians.”

In a related development, US President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron on Saturday called for an immediate cessation of hostilities in Gaza and pressed for action that would lead to a permanent cease-fire.

“On Gaza, they condemned the resumption of rocket fire and called for an immediate cessation of hostilities leading to a sustainable ceasefire,” the White House said in a statement about the call between the two leaders. “President Obama and Prime Minister Cameron reiterated support for Israel’s right to self-defense while emphasizing the need for all sides to minimize civilian casualties.”

Jerusalem Post staff and Reuters contributed to this report.

The Obama Doctrine: Pretend to Give a Damn–Until You Don’t Have To
by Ben Shapiro8 Aug 2014 via Breitbart dot Com

(“Barack Obama is an emotional pro and a foreign policy dilettante. And that is an extraordinarily dangerous combination.: – LS)

For years, commentators have attempted to peg down just what the Obama Doctrine is. His allies have labeled the Obama Doctrine a form of realism about the limits of American power. His critics have labeled the Obama Doctrine “leading from behind.”

In 2009, President Obama came up with his own definition of an Obama Doctrine: “we’re only one nation… the problems that we confront, whether it’s drug cartels, climate change, terrorism, you name it, can’t be solved just by one country.” But Obama has also, at certain points, claimed to champion unilateralism in the service of human rights and internationalism in the service of diplomacy.

The Obama Doctrine has been difficult to pin down because there does not seem to be a common thread uniting his disparate policies – muscular interventionism in Libya, pushy paternalism with regard to Israel, eager abdication with regard to Syria and Ukraine.

But with Obama’s latest decision to launch airstrikes against the Islamic State in the Levant (ISIL or ISIS), the Obama Doctrine has now come into focus: pretend to give a damn about suffering of innocents when it hits the headlines, ignore it the rest of the time.

Because Obama doesn’t truly care. At all. He is a master emotional manipulator, capable of achieving effective posturing when it comes to the suffering of innocents. That’s why the media constantly swoon at his “tone” and his “attitude” during his press conferences. They repeatedly praise his “anger” or his “determination.” But they rarely ask just what he’s doing to fight evil.

Any deployment of power will be short-term and ineffective. Obama will do all he can for innocents up until the moment when he doesn’t have to do so. Then he’ll leave them to die.

That was certainly the case in Egypt, where Obama expressed extraordinary optimism about the ouster of Hosni Mubarak, then promptly allowed the Muslim Brotherhood to take over. He has since spent efforts attempting to undercut the Egyptian military, which launched a popularly-supported coup against Mohamed Morsi.

It has been the case in Iran, where Obama belatedly denounced the treatment of democracy protesters, then did nothing as they were shot in the streets.

It has been the case in Ukraine, where Vladimir Putin has annexed Crimea and invaded eastern Ukraine. Obama has expressed outrage; Putin has scoffed, and his rebel forces have shot down a passenger airliner, to approximately zero effective action from the West.

It has been the case in Nigeria, where after expressing upset over Boko Haram’s kidnapping of innocent girls and ensuring that the State Department endorse the “power of hashtag,” the Obama administration has done precisely nothing.

It has been the case in Syria, where Obama assured the world that should dictator Bashar Assad cross a red line with use of weapons of mass destruction, there would be consequences. There were none. Assad, who Obama said should go, just signed onto another seven-year term. In sum total, the number of dead in Syria now approaches 200,000.

Now, Obama has done the same in Iraq. He will drop a few bombs. He will bluster. Then the world’s attention will turn to some other crisis, and Obama will blithely move on, leaving erstwhile allies to die.

This is no groundbreaking revelation. President Obama has always cared far more about appearances than realities. He bobs like a cork on the waves of crisis, skipping to and fro, always carefully attuning his public emotions to achieve the most sympathetic effect. If brief shows of force are necessary, Obama is unafraid to engage in them. But he is unwilling to make any commitment to taking the lasting action that actually effects change. To do that, he would have to lead rather than follow.

He would have to care.

Barack Obama is an emotional pro and a foreign policy dilettante. And that is an extraordinarily dangerous combination. Popularity is the Obama Doctrine. Ironically, the end result is massive unpopularity – it turns out that world events require prolonged and sustained action rather than posturing. More importantly, the end result is massive casualties.

‘Top advisors predict a long, very long campaign’ in Iraq
POSTED AT 8:41 AM ON AUGUST 8, 2014 BY NOAH ROTHMAN via Hot Air

(Ironic. Let’s see who starts demanding a ceasefire now.-LS)

“We don’t understand real evil, organized evil very well,” said America’s former ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan, Ryan Crocker, in an interview with The New York Times. “This is evil incarnate.”

“People like [Islamic State commander] Abu Bakar al-Baghdadi have been in a fight for a decade,” he added. “They are messianic in their vision, and they are not going to stop.”

President Barack Obama authorized military strikes on select targets in Iraq on Thursday aimed only to halt the Islamic State’s advance on the cities of Erbil, the Kurdish capital in the north, and Baghdad. At the same time, however, the president continues to assure the American public that this is not the start of a third Iraq War. For the time being, the introduction of American ground forces has been ruled out.

American military commanders seem to think that the president’s strategy of using airpower alone to reduce the threat posed by the Islamic State fighters is insufficient.

“We must neutralize this enemy,” Army Lt. Gen. Mick Bednarek, U.S. chief of the Office of Security and Cooperation-Iraq told a Military Times reporter. “This is not just an Iraqi issue. This is not just a regional issue.”

He added that, as even those only familiar with the threat posed by the Islamic State through media accounts know, this organization “is not just a violent extremist organization.”

“This is an army,” Bednarek added, “and it takes an army to defeat an army.”

Regardless of the assurances the president has made to a war-weary public, a report in CBS This Morning on Friday indicates that American military officials are aware of just how comprehensive a military campaign aimed at neutralizing this fundamentalist threat will have to be.

“Senior officials describe ISIL forces as swift, effective, and capable of carrying out military mission with quote ‘tremendous military proficiency,’” CBS news reporter Major Garrett reported. “The Iraqi army and Kurdish fighters have been no match for them. Now, from the air, the U.S. will join the fight. Top advisers predict a long, very long military campaign.”

CBS reporter David Martin noted that the humanitarian airlift operation “could foreshadow a much larger military campaign.” He noted that at least 150 American military advisors and an “unknown number of diplomats” remain in Erbil, a city under siege by Islamic State forces.

“Until this week, the Kurdish region had been considered so secure that the United States had chosen it as one of two Iraqi locations safe enough to transfer staffers from the U.S. Embassy in Iraq. But a sense of dread fell over the Kurdish capital on Thursday as the magnitude of the Islamic State threat became clear,” read a McClatchy news report revealing the fear that has overtaken that Iraqi city.

Military officials are already indicating that strikes in Iraq could be far broader than what the president described. “One senior administration official suggested that could include strikes on militants that have captured Iraq’s largest dam near Mosul,” a Wall Street Journal report read.

“We’re laying down a marker here,” an unnamed administration official said. “Just their presence…and the potential threat they pose could lead us to take action if targets present themselves.”

UPDATE: The first strikes on ISIS targets are already underway, according to the Pentagon.