Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: i fallimenti della flottiglia

http://www.jidaily.com/Z86wF/e
Hamas at Sea: Blockade-Busting Backfires
By David Pollock
June 30, 2010
One month after the Turkish flotilla incident, the Israeli-Palestinian 
peace camp has so far managed to thwart the opposing agenda of Hamas and 
its supporters. This article surveys the incident's political and 
practical consequences, revealing the grounds for such an unexpected and 
-- for the parties in the Middle East peace process -- fortunate finding.
No New International Recognition of Hamas
The initial aftermath of the May 31 flotilla interception witnessed a 
few abortive signals that Hamas might gain greater global acceptance. 
One Russian statement suggested negotiations with Hamas, disregarding 
the longstanding Quartet conditions to which Moscow is a party. A few 
former U.S. diplomats made similar appeals, and some Hamas spokesmen 
responded by seeming to welcome such dialogue. These tentative overtures 
proved fruitless, however.
According to one U.S. official, various Hamas leaders appeared willing 
to play the political game, but not enough to make a difference. As 
Hamas representative Ahmed Bahr told Egyptian daily al-Masry al-Youm on 
June 20, the group wants a deal "that gives Palestinians their dignity 
back, which rules out the Quartet conditions and those stipulated by the 
U.S." Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan put it (perhaps 
unintentionally) well in a June 28 interview, claiming that he had 
personally convinced Hamas to adjust its rejectionist posture "to a 
certain extent" -- in other words, not far enough.
As a result, Hamas has no more international legitimacy today than it 
did before the flotilla episode. Symptomatic of this is the statement 
issued by the G-8 countries, including Russia, in closing their Canadian 
summit this past weekend. The section on the peace process makes no 
mention of Hamas at all. Instead, it reaffirms the goal of Israel and a 
Palestinian state "living side by side in peace and security," welcomes 
Israel's decision to investigate the flotilla incident and adopt "a new 
policy" toward Gaza, balances "the needs of Gaza's population" with "the 
legitimate security concerns of Israel," and urges "the strengthening of 
Palestinian Authority institutions" -- all at the expense, at least 
implicitly, of Hamas. And on Monday, speaking in Jerusalem, Russian 
foreign minister Sergei Lavrov noted that Moscow would continue to 
"engage" with Hamas but did not call for the group's inclusion in any 
other diplomatic discussions.
Egypt Maintains Political and Practical Containment
Cairo remains very uncomfortable with Hamas on its border, yet 
ineffective so far in supporting any alternative arrangement. Its 
desultory attempt to dilute Hamas power in Gaza by mediating a new unity 
agreement with Fatah has failed. For a brief moment after the flotilla 
incident, Turkey seemed poised to assume the mediator's role, this time 
with a pro-Hamas tilt. Within a couple weeks, however, Egypt and the 
Palestinian Authority (PA) were able to deflect this impulse, partly by 
mobilizing an informal Arab consensus against it.
Ironically, the capstone of this containment effort was Arab League 
secretary-general Amr Mousa's unprecedented June 13 visit to Hamas-ruled 
Gaza. While there, he repeatedly called on Hamas to sign the Egyptian 
reconciliation plan it had rejected last October. Yet, as Egypt's 
Foreign Ministry spokesman explained on June 26, Hamas leaders "insist 
on rejecting the Egyptian paper, because they do not want the legitimate 
Palestinian Authority to return to Gaza."
Over the past few days, the exchange of public insults between Cairo and 
Hamas has grown ever more shrill and categorical. On June 28, the 
semi-official Egyptian daily al-Akhbar called Hamas a "suspicious 
secessionist movement," sarcastically thanking it for enabling Cairo to 
escape the "quagmire" of Palestinian unity negotiations.
On the ground, security and political factors make Egypt loath to open 
its border with Gaza more than a crack. Remarkably, on the very same day 
of the flotilla incident, Palestinians killed an Egyptian soldier in a 
shootout over the new underground steel wall Cairo is constructing to 
block smuggling tunnels. Work on the barrier continues intermittently 
today. Moreover, Egyptian officials have surely noted recent 
developments in Israel, where three cabinet ministers have called for 
even greater disengagement from the process of supplying Gaza with 
water, fuel, electricity, and other imports. Any further Egyptian 
opening risks playing into that gambit, forcing Cairo to assume more 
responsibility for Gaza while potentially strengthening Hamas and 
exposing Egypt to its influence.
Consequently, the renewed opening of Rafah, Gaza's lone border crossing 
with Egypt, is more rhetorical than real. On June 29, for example, Egypt 
prevented a Jordanian aid convoy from entering the territory -- the 
latest in a years-long line of such measures. And the Egyptian 
establishment publicly blames Hamas intransigence for this predicament. 
As leading commentator Abdel Moneim Said Aly wrote in al-Ahram last 
week, "Contrary to common accusations leveled at Egypt, Hamas is second 
after Israel in upholding the siege on Gaza."
Effects of Easing the Embargo
Publicly and privately, Israeli and U.S. officials have offered mixed 
assessments of how adjustments to the embargo would affect Hamas. One 
U.S. observer noted that if reconstruction proceeds, around 40,000 more 
Gazan children would attend schools run by the UN Relief and Works 
Agency (UNWRA) rather than Hamas. New UNRWA commissioner Filippo Grandi 
hinted at the difference this might make -- without mentioning Hamas, he 
called UNRWA "a vehicle" for promoting "the fundamental values...of 
tolerance for diversity, peaceful coexistence, non-violence, respect for 
human rights and human dignity of everyone without distinction."
Another Western diplomat asserted privately that the blockade had 
unwittingly "helped Hamas but not Gazans"; in his view, easing the 
embargo would probably help reverse that situation. Even so, he 
cautioned, Hamas was already trying to bring new nongovernmental 
projects under its supervision. On June 28, the UNRWA director for Gaza 
condemned a "cowardly and despicable" attack by Islamist extremists on 
one of his organization's summer camps. Looking ahead, then, the key is 
not so much the quantity of additional resources provided to Gaza, but 
control over their local distribution.
Fatah-Hamas Rivalry Intensifies
Two things are clear regarding the post-flotilla twist in the internal 
Palestinian dispute: it is not just a media war, and neither side is 
about to give up. Both Hamas and Fatah continue to lob heated charges of 
betrayal. On June 24, senior Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar declared 
that there is "no need to launch rockets from Gaza as these must be 
launched from the West Bank -- but [PA president Mahmoud Abbas] won't 
let this happen." The same day, Fatah's Nabil Shaath bluntly claimed 
that "Hamas was responsible for the current deadlock."
As for public approval ratings, Hamas registered no gains in the one 
published Palestinian poll taken since the flotilla incident (June 
10-13), while Fatah still led 45 percent to 25 percent, the same spread 
as in March. This leaves a large remainder of "undecided" Palestinians, 
however, and Fatah showed little confidence in its popular appeal when 
it canceled local elections scheduled for this summer.
On the ground, the PA continues to arrest and harass Hamas operatives in 
the West Bank. Hamas has done the same to Fatah operatives, in addition 
to raiding a Gaza bank branch to confiscate funds from an account frozen 
by the PA. The two sides are also embroiled in a payment dispute that 
has shut down Gaza's only power plant. "It's a Palestinian problem," 
said the UNRWA's Gaza director, "made by Palestinians, and causing 
Palestinian suffering."
In this climate, any talk of Palestinian reconciliation takes a back 
seat to recriminations. The front page of al-Hayat al-Jadidah, the 
semi-official PA daily, reinforces this fact. Over the past two days, 
stories about unity discussions have been strictly at an unofficial 
level; the one official comment was from a Fatah Central Committee 
member blaming Hamas for spoiling Egypt's mediation efforts.
Conclusion
For once, a Hamas website has it exactly right: on June 24, the 
Palestinian Information Center predicted that "there will be no radical 
political changes after the attack on the Freedom Flotilla." Indeed, 
continued patience and steadfastness on the part of the United States, 
Egypt, PA, Israel, and others can help the people of Gaza without 
enriching, entrenching, or emboldening their Hamas rulers. This is 
hardly a sufficient condition for real progress toward 
Israeli-Palestinian peace, but it is a necessary condition.
David Pollock is a senior fellow at The Washington Institute, focusing 
on the political dynamics of Middle Eastern countries.

 Conclusion
l'unica testa che è saltata è quella di Dagan...
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