Guest Editorial

The devastating Israeli bombardment of Gaza in the past few days did not come as a surprise to anybody. Its scale and magnitude, however, were unexpected by almost everybody except its perpetrators.

The attack, which Israel called "Operation Cast Lead", began around 11:30 A.M last Saturday when 64 aircraft delivered over 100 tons of explosives on 50 to 100 targets in the Gaza Strip. It was described by officials as the largest Israeli operation in Gaza since 1967. In that first attack, over 130 were killed and about 800 injured. The number of casualties on that day and the following few days has continued to rise and those slain come from a seemingly random sample of society: they include Hamas security forces and civilian men, women and children, among them seven UNRWA students and their instructor.

Israel's disproportionate and indiscriminate bombing of Gaza should invite experts of humanitarian and international law to seriously investigate the Palestinian claim that the attack is a war crime.

On the second day of the Israeli attack, the objectives of both Israel and Hamas were clear. Israel wanted to teach Hamas the same lesson that it meant to give Hizbollah in the summer of 2006: that there is a heavy price all Gazans will pay when Hamas launches any attack against Israelis. In addition, Israel wanted to destroy the smuggling tunnels from Egypt to Gaza without any promise of easing its siege on Gaza. In other words, Israel wanted to renew the truce while maintaining, and consolidating, the closure.

Hamas is even clearer in what it is striving to achieve from this confrontation. In the first official statement on the first day of the attack it declared that the "practical response to the Israeli attack is the opening of the Rafah crossing and the cutting of diplomatic relations between Israel and Arab states."

It is notable that following that declaration, which was echoed by all Hamas spokespeople, the call to open the Rafah crossing and criticism of Egypt for failing to do so became the main rallying call in almost all solidarity demonstrations across the Arab world. That is a strong indicator that there are well-organized groups taking advantage of Arab sympathy with the Palestinians of Gaza to make political gains on a regional level.

The harmony between Hamas and Islamic political parties in the region is significant. In spite of the heavy material and human losses, the Israeli attack on Gaza is strengthening Hamas politically and increasing public support and sympathy for the movement. Hamas is using this momentum to achieve an end to the closure of Gaza, not by Israel opening the crossings it controls but by Egypt opening Rafah. The irony here is that if Rafah is opened on Hamas' terms, it will also secure a significant Israeli strategic objective, namely handing over effective responsibility for Gaza to Egypt.

In the meantime, the war in Gaza is also affecting the balance of power between the two main rival factions in Palestine, Fatah and Hamas. The Israeli attack has increased public sympathy and support for Hamas, because it is the target of these attacks and because it is trying to fight back. The Palestinian Authority in Ramallah, meanwhile, finds itself in an awkward and difficult position.

For one thing, it has been marginalized and has been the target of criticism while being compared unfavorably with the role and position of Hamas in Gaza. This has led Fatah spokespeople and leaders to change their tone from trying to hint at Hamas responsibility for the suffering of Gazans to a more reasonable and rational tone, exemplified by President Mahmoud Abbas, who, during a meeting of the PLO's Executive Committee, suggested that the time is right for coordination between the different factions and invited all factions, including Hamas, to address this issue.

This change in tone could result in some positive momentum in the dialogue among the Palestinian factions that are under growing pressure from the public to reconcile. Ghassan Khatib is vice-president for community outreach at Birzeit University and a former Palestinian Authority minister of planning. He holds a PhD in Middle East politics from the University of Durham.