BY AHMAD NIMER
RAMALLAH — Last week there was a massive escalation in Israel's military attacks against the Palestinian population of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. On a nightly basis, Israeli F-16 warplanes have dropped bombs over Palestinian cities as Apache helicopter gunships circled overhead.
Since February 14, 60 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli missile attacks against Palestinian towns and villages.
The recent escalation in Israeli attacks is ostensibly a reaction to a string of impressive military operations by Palestinian armed groups. On February 14, Hamas claimed responsibility for the destruction of an Israeli Merkava tank in the Gaza Strip during widespread incursions of Israeli forces into Palestinian areas. The Merkava tank is regarded as the most well-protected tank in the world, and its destruction — which led to the death of three Israeli soldiers — dealt a massive blow to the prestige of the Israeli army.
The Hamas operation marked a shift in Palestinian strategy towards high profile military operations against Israeli soldiers and settlers in the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In the days after the destruction of the tank, Israeli soldiers were killed at checkpoints in both the West Bank and Gaza Strip, including a successful operation near Ramallah in which six soldiers were killed at an illegal checkpoint on February 18.
This strategy aims to draw Israeli troops into a costly guerilla war reminiscent of southern Lebanon.
The rapidity and scale of Palestinian operations has shocked the Israeli government and military, both of which remain unsure of how to respond to this new strategy. Increasingly, voices within the Israeli ruling class are calling for an end to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's rule, citing the failure of his promise to bring "security" to Israeli citizens and his refusal to resume negotiations with the Palestinians.
Meanwhile, the Israeli economy has entered a tailspin, with newly released figures indicating the highest level of unemployment since the founding of the state in 1948. These figures follow last month's announcement that 2001 was the first year of negative growth in the Israeli economy since 1953.
Many Israelis are beginning to question a policy that promotes Israeli colonial settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip at the expense of those living inside the 1948 armistice line that divides the West Bank and Gaza Strip from Israel-proper. Hundreds of Israeli army reservists have signed a petition refusing to serve in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Last week a forum of high ranking Israeli army officers called for the immediate withdrawal from parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip and the resumption of negotiations.
The shift in Palestinian strategy indicates the weakening of a conciliationist trend within the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the largest Palestinian political faction, Fatah. For several months, a sharp debate has been occurring between those who wanted to halt the intifada and move into negotiations with Israel and those advocating the continuation of the intifada.
Prominent ministers in the PA advocating the former position had met with Sharon and Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres over the last month. The majority Palestinian grassroots opinion, however, strongly favoured the continuation of the intifada.
The debate over strategy had even publicly emerged within Fatah for the first time since the beginning of the intifada. A meeting of Fatah in Ramallah that was called three weeks ago with the intention of bringing various armed cells under the control of the PA ended without resolution. The armed operations over the last fortnight are noteworthy because they are marked by a high level of unity between different political factions, principally Hamas, Fatah and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
It is too early to say whether this assertion of grassroots unity at the level of armed struggle represents the possible beginning of an alternative political pole to the PA. Palestinian President Yasser Arafat has been careful not to commit himself to either position — on one hand riding the wave of popular support for the Palestinian resistance but on the other, continuing political arrests of militants and supporting secret negotiations with Israel.
From Green Left Weekly, February 27, 2002.
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