A Daily Analysis
By Marc Schulman

February 7, 2008 Gaza War



A war continues along the Gaza border. Rockets rained down on Sderot and Israel responded with additional attacks on Gaza. Minister of Defense Barak announced that Israelís response will become stronger if attacks continue. Now that the Israeli Supreme Court has given the green light, Israel is a cut back in electricity to Gaza. As of tonight, there will be a 5% cut back.

Neither the right nor the left really has any answers. Netanyahu went to Sderot and said that Israel has to get away from a war of Attrition and take action; what does that mean? On the other hand Shlomo Ben Ami was interviewed on the London and Kirschenbaum tonight he said the current policy would never succeed and that Israel needs a political solution. He then continued to say that there is no chance for any final status talks to succeed at the moment. He went even further to say that even if the Israelis and Palestinians ever reached an agreement, there would be some Palestinians who would continue to fight. This opinion does not leave too many better options.

Hamas vowed additional suicide bombings today. It has renewed a debate amongst the Palestinians about suicide bombings. Those in the West Bank seem to have been surprised about the return of suicide bombings, feeling that did not accomplish anything. Hamas television showed a clip of the recent suicide bomber with his mother, before the attack. The mother praised her son for what he was going to do, saying that there was no greater honor. She wished him well with the 72 virgins and spoke to whole Arab world, asking that they too teach their children to be suicide bombers.

Actions on the Gaza-Egyptian border, combined with the suicide bombing in Dimona, seem to have upset an emerging agreement between Hamas and Egypt on the border. On Tuesday, fighting erupted between Egyptian troops and Palestinians. This, and the fact that Hamas took credit for the suicide attack in Dimona, has made the Egyptians questions whether they can enter into an agreement with Hamas.