Gaza escalation is Hamas’ way of signaling Qatar via Israel: Send cash now
This has been the first summer in years when there has not been talk of military confrontation with the terrorist organizations in Gaza.
By HERB KEINONPalestinians prepare balloons attached with flammable materials to be released into Israel from Gaza, in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, on August 8, 2020.(photo credit: ABED RAHIM KHATIB/FLASH90)
With the coronavirus raging, the political battles between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Alternate Prime Minister Benny Gantz continuing, the thrice weekly anti-government protests ongoing, and a tense security situation in the North threatening, scarce attention has been paid this summer to Gaza.In fact, this has been the first summer in the last number of years when there has not been talk of a possible wide-scale military confrontation with the terrorist organizations in Gaza.Since the onset of the novel coronavirus in March, the situation in the South has been relatively calm. Hamas even called off a major planned provocation at the border fence in the spring, proof that there was some benefit in certain things that the pandemic has upended. This event was to be part of Hamas’s “Great March of Return,” which it began a year earlier – and included weekly riots at the fence.It was canceled because of Hamas’s concern that the pandemic could overwhelm the Strip.The corona-generated quiet, however, slowly seems to be fading. In July, three rockets were fired from Gaza, one of which was intercepted by the Iron Dome, and two others which fell in open spaces. The IDF hit back at Hamas targets in response, causing no casualties.A week ago on Sunday, rocket sires again wailed in the South, and the Iron Dome was again deployed, intercepting a rocket. The IAF retaliated by striking targets inside Gaza, again without inflicting casualties.On Sunday, shots were fired from the southern Gaza Strip toward civilians working along the Israel-Gaza border fence, and later in the day a number of fires were set in the fields by inflammable balloons launched from Gaza. The IDF responded by striking a Hamas observation post.And on Monday, the situation escalated even further, with incendiary balloons landing in dry fields, causing some 15 fires in the area near the fence, and Hamas then launching a number of rockets toward the Mediterranean Sea in what it said was a message to Israel.Taken all together, this amounts to a gradual stepping up of the violence; perhaps expected, but nevertheless jarring as it comes against the background of the relative quiet that the residents of the communities around Gaza have experienced for a number of months.While Hamas said rockets fired into the sea were a message to Israel that it will not be quiet in the face of Israeli “aggression,” those rockets were actually a message to Qatar: Show us the money.Qatar has been making payments to Gaza since 2012 and stepped up these payments in 2019 after the Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority refused to transfer funds to the Hamas-led coastal strip.In March, the Qataris pledged to continue their aid for another six months, and that aid is set to expire in September. As has been the case in the past, just prior to one tranche of aid ending, and before another begins, incendiary balloons and rockets start to fly.The dynamic is as simple as it is predictable: The Palestinians fire into Israel, then Israel retaliates and presses the UN and Egyptians to take steps to tamp down the tension, which they do by turning to the Qataris. Quiet then reigns until that tranche runs out and a commitment is secured to send more money.A number of journalists tracking planes tweeted on Monday about a business jet from Israel that flew to Qatar, via Amman, and then headed back to Israel. If over the next couple days the situation along the Gaza border calms down, it will be clear what the plane was doing in Doha: picking up cash.Although this system has bought a modicum of quiet, critics argue that it is tantamount to paying “protection money’ to the Mafia: Pay Hamas, and they are quiet for a while; don’t pay, and they set parts of Israel aflame.Beyond that criticism, this situation also reveals a lack of any long-term policy toward Gaza, with Israel relying on a Band-Aid strategy, and the other side able to rip off that Band-Aid and let the wound bleed whenever it suits their needs.
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