Israel and Hamas continue their indirect negotiations for a cease-fire in Gaza. According to Yedioth Ahronoth the most likely agreement would for two stages. The first would commit Hamas to cease all firing of rockets and other attacks from Gaza and to stop all smuggling of arms, money and combatants from Sinai into Gaza. In return Israel would commit to cease all military activities in Gaza. In the second stage, Israel would lift its blockade of goods in and out of Gaza and negotiate with Hamas for the release of Israel captured soldier Gilead Shavit in return for Israel's release of Palestinian prisoners. Reaching agreement on this exchange will likely take a long time because Hamas's list of the prisoners it wants includes many whom Israel claims are murderers. Since Israel's declared policy is not to release such prisoners, a decision will be needed at the ministerial level, i.e., agreement among PM Olmert, Foreign Affairs Minister Livni and Defense Minister Barak. In view of Olmert's political fragility and impending competition between Livni and Barak to succeed him, these ministers will not rush to any decision.

A Dismal Science

The fighting in Gaza this morning produced another round of charges and counter charges between Hamas and Israel. Six unarmed Palestinians were killed this morning, including a mother and her four children. According to Hamas, they died when an Israeli tank shell crashed through the roof of their house as they were eating breakfast. According to an Israeli army spokesperson the tank shell hit two Palestinian gunmen who were carrying a large amount of ammunition. The ammunition exploded and killed the civilians. Almost any observer realizes that whatever the truth, both sides are liars or, to use Harry Frankfurt's useful distinction, bullshitters. Neither cares what the truth is, but will say whatever suits its purpose. The Israel army and government care no more about the deaths of Palestinians than Hamas cares about those of Israelis when its militants fire rockets at Israeli settlements.

Perhaps in this context, it is petty to be annoyed by the screeds of right wing Israelis who want Israelis to emulate Palestinian terrorists and suicide bomb Palestinian buses and restaurants. Don't these lunatics realize that Israeli has much more surgical and effective means, which result in a balance of deaths greatly in its favor.

Unfortunately, this lack of interest in the other's welfare -- the self regarding that is supposedly normative for groups on the realist view of international relations -- will continue to put a mutually acceptable accord beyond reach. Only a minimum of such interest can stop the perpetual whining of each side about the concessions it would have to make to get peace.

Too Short Views

Israel's quick rejection of Hamas's truce offer reflects too short a view. A spokesman from the Prime Minister's office dismissed it as an attempt to buy time for Hamas to regroup and rearm. Put another way, Israel believes it has Hamas at bay and sees no gain in callling off the chase now. That is consistent with zbang ve-gamarnu, the Israeli version of "shock and awe," those crushing displays of power which are supposed to reduce populations to acceptance, but never seem to work as planned. The problem for Israel is that treating Hamas and its supporters only as targets and objects, rather than as a political player and people will not make them disappear, just more obstinate and vengeful. Israel will never reach an effective, durable agreement with the Palestinians, without admitting Hamas at some point, in some capacity to the discussions for it. So if Israel wants an accord, it should respond more encouragingly to any signs of reasonableness from Hamas.

Hamas's alter ego PA President Mahmut Abbas (Abu Mazan) fared no better with George Bush. He came to Washington with the hope of getting Bush to tell Israel to stop building settlements on the West Bank, a requirement of the "road map" and, on the Palestinian view, a very major obstacle to peace. Instead his meeting was just another opportunity for Bush to display his lack of reality regarding the Middle East. He ignored the settlements issue, saying that he wanted to focus on the big picture "how to define a state that is acceptable to both sides," as if he were writing a term paper for a first year course in political science. If Abu Mazan was disappointed by Bush, he was angered by Secretary of State Rice, who is supposed to know something about the Middle East, the interests of the Palestinians and facts on the ground. In his discussion with her, she did not include the 1967 borders as part of the context for negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The Administration's was saying to him, in other words, "Take what we give you and shut up about the particulars."

So he returns home less confident about reaching an agreement with Israel whenever and probably less confident about his having a home.

Round Up

Today's big news in the Israel-Palestine perspective is Hamas's offer/ acceptance of a six-month truce over the Gaza Strip. Puts in the shade

1. UNWRA's stopping distribution of food in Gaza, because it lacks gasoline;
2. George Bush expressing his confidence that an agreement on a two state solution will happen before he leaves office (another "Mission Accomplished" statement? Or is he planning a coup that will declare him president for life?);
3. CIA officials identifying North Korea and Syria as part of a nuclear axis of evil;
4. Iranian president Ahmadinejad warning Syria against closer ties to the U.S. and Israel;
5. declarations by Israel settlers on the Golan Heights that they will not leave, regardless of any Syrian-Israel agreement that requires their removal.

Not your typical day, not even in the Middle East.

The Hamas offer comes after negotiations with Israel through Egyptian intermediaries and perhapas after a nudge from Syria. It does not extend immediately, as Hamas wanted, to the West Bank, so the Israel army will be free to hunt Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other militants there. The move is undoubtedly motivated by short term desperation -- Hamas's realization that it cannot provide welfare for Gaza, amid its low intensity conflict with Israel and the economic blockade. The announcement by UNRWA demonstrates as much and has forced Hamas to promise UNRWA some of its own stockpiled gasoline, a move that will reduce Hamas's very limited military capabilities . The offer is a grudging acknowledgment that the blockade itself is mainly a response to the rocket attacks it orders or sanctions upon the Israeli periphery of Gaza. It is a step on Hamas's part toward political realism.

Israel will likely agree to the offer with some minor modifications. Even if it does not include Hamas's commitment to stop smuggling arms and rocket makings into Gaza, a truce would provide quiet in the south for Israel's celebration next month of its 60th anniversary. Also Israel maintains an upper hand: The offer does not demand that it end the economic blockade. Instead it will consider the security conditions that are achieved under the truce and ease the blockade accordingly. Somewhere in Saul Bellow's late novels, a character, asked what he has learned, replies "Sydney Smith, an English clergyman's advice: short views." Not bad advice for Israel and the Palestinians now.

No Animals were Harmed in these Episodes

During the first intifada, Israel humorist and songwriter Dani Litani noted that the Palestinians must have a very large air force, because every time the Israel military spokesman reported that Israel soldiers were firing only into the air to break up demonstrations, five or six Palestinians fell down dead. Today it seems that many armed Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip have the magical power of turning into unarmed civilians once they are struck by Israeli bullets, shells or missiles.

After a brief lull two weeks ago, militant groups in Gaza and the IDF have resumed ratcheting up the violence. Today's series of incidents took the lives of three Israel soldiers, and, at least eighteen Palestinians, the majority of them unarmed civilians. The series began in the early morning when two armed militants, by approaching the border fence near Kibbutz Bari, drew an Israeli army unit into an ambush which killed the three soldiers. The Israelis replied with machine gun and tank fire, killing some Palestinian gunmen. Tanks and helicopters later fired shells and missiles at a nearby refugee camp, killing fifteen civilians. The Israel spokesman reported this shooting was directed at the source of the earlier fire. The Palestinians reported that the targets were actually two apartment buildings and a mosque and the dead included children and elders.

The sad truth is both sides long ago stopped caring how many Palestinian civilians get killed. Israel looks upon them as having gotten in the way of its soldiers killing as many Palestinian militants as possible, under current rules of engagement. Hamas and other organizations consider the civilian dead as both a recruiting tool and a reason for public opinion to sympathize with its cause.

Israel's overkill today might have also been meant as a "fuck you" to ex-President Carter for his hobnobbing with Hamas leaders. This is the Middle East, after all.