My take on the Gaza-Israel crisis:
1. Abu al-Ata (the PIJ leader killed by Israel) earned his fate honestly. He was a rogue actor encouraged by Iran to launch rocket attacks on Israel to make it difficult for Hamas to consolidate its truce with Israel.
1. Abu al-Ata (the PIJ leader killed by Israel) earned his fate honestly. He was a rogue actor encouraged by Iran to launch rocket attacks on Israel to make it difficult for Hamas to consolidate its truce with Israel.
2. Israel is trying to keep Hamas out of the fight by restricting its retaliatory attacks to PIJ targets only and keeping casualties low. (That is the opposite of its usual strategy of attacking Hamas targets to press it to take responsibility for PIJ actions.)
3. So far Hamas has stayed out of the fray. But it is under pressure, especially from Iran. This strategy can only work if PIJ rockets continue to do little damage, Israeli retaliation causes limited casualties, and Hamas is able to resist the pressure to join in. Any one...
of these goes awry and all bets are off.
4. Politically this will make it more difficult for Gantz to form a minority govt with Arab support from the outside. Gantz, Lieberman and Odeh will be under pressure not to make this deal. And Bibi can be counted on to incite against it.
4. Politically this will make it more difficult for Gantz to form a minority govt with Arab support from the outside. Gantz, Lieberman and Odeh will be under pressure not to make this deal. And Bibi can be counted on to incite against it.
