Crisis flared amid political vacuum

WASHINGTON — The Gaza Strip wasn't supposed to be like this.

In August 2005, when Israel unilaterally withdrew from the narrow coastal territory, then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon promised it would make Israel safer. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice hailed the move as "historic."

Israel left behind a political vacuum, however. That, along with decisions by Israel, the U.S. and Palestinian rivals, inadvertently boosted the militant Islamic group Hamas into power. Hamas is stronger than ever, and Israel's attacks risk bolstering it further, according to current and former U.S. officials, diplomats and analysts.

Israeli leaders say the aim of their military offensive in Gaza is to crush Hamas's ability to fire rockets into southern Israeli cities. U.S. analysts warn of collateral damage, however, that would further weaken Mahmoud Abbas, the secular Palestinian president who's committed to an eventual peace deal with Israel.

Sharon, who suffered a stroke in January 2006 that left him in a coma, had argued that disengagement from Gaza would improve Israel's strategic position and bolster "moderate forces" among the Palestinians "who want to make the right choice."

Even without its troops or the 9,000 Jewish settlers in place, Israel retained a chokehold over the strip, controlling major land crossings into Israel, Gaza's airspace and the waters off its Mediterranean seacoast.

Then, in January 2006, the Palestinians, with strong backing from the Bush administration, held legislative elections. Over Israeli misgivings, Hamas was allowed to participate.

Abbas' Fatah faction and Hamas have a basic disagreement over how to engage with Israel: Fatah supports negotiations leading to two states that exist side by side; Hamas has never recognized Israel and advocates armed resistance.

Hamas won a majority of seats, benefiting from the perceived corruption and incompetence of the Fatah.

"The United States should have anticipated a result it didn't like, and it should have played it better," said Jon Alterman, of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"Hamas has much more power now than it did three years ago," he said.

After the elections, the Bush administration began an effort to reverse the results, but it failed to weaken the group or persuade it to modify its hard-line views. As the months went on, the U.S. opposed Arab efforts to form a Palestinian unity government and pressed Abbas to confront Hamas.

In June 2007, after months of factional fighting, Hamas forces overran Gaza, ousting Fatah's foreign-armed and trained security forces. The U.S. rounded up diplomatic and financial support for Abbas, and Israel responded by clamping down harder on Gaza.

The fortunes of the Gaza and the West Bank — which together with east Jerusalem would theoretically make up a future Palestinian state — have diverged sharply since the Hamas takeover of Gaza.

While economic conditions for the 2.5 million Palestinians in the West Bank have improved as international development money poured in, Gaza's 1.5 million people have suffered under a strict Israeli embargo.

In Ramallah, seat of power for the Fatah-run administration and one of the wealthiest cities in the West Bank, businessmen sip lattes in European-style cafes and car dealerships showcase gleaming new Mercedes-Benzes. In Gaza City, the home base of Hamas, donkeys sometimes outnumber cars because of fuel shortages and residents fight over their daily allocation of bread.

Palestinians say that driving a wedge between the two territories is exactly what the Israelis have in mind.

Khalil Shikaki, director of the Ramallah-based Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, said he thinks Israel is trying to use the pressure of a military campaign to reorient Gaza toward Egypt and away from the rest of historic Palestine.

"Ultimately, Gaza would become Egypt's problem, not Israel's," he said. "The goal of a single Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank would be fully undermined."

An uneasy, Egyptian-mediated truce expired in December and Hamas began intensifying its rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel.

Rice argued recently that the Bush administration has improved the situation after inheriting a violent Palestinian uprising in 2001. "We have left this in a much better place," she said in an interview with Agence France-Presse on Dec. 22. Five days later, Israel launched its offensive.

In the West Bank, sympathy for Hamas appears to be rising in the streets even as the territory's leaders suppress pro-Hamas demonstrations and blame the Islamist movement for the breakdown of the truce.

In turn, Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum released a statement on Wednesday accusing Abbas of having formed a secret cell of Fatah supporters in Gaza to collect information on the whereabouts of Hamas leaders, who have gone into hiding for fear of assassination. Barhoum said Abbas planned to turn the information over to the Israeli military.

The accusation played on Palestinian fears that Abbas is too close to the Israelis and secretly supports the bombing campaign, even though he has condemned it.

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The Washington Post