FCNL's Response to Congressional Action on Gaza: Requirements for Israel-Palestine Peace

Feb 10, 2009

FCNL's Response to Congressional Actions on Gaza: Requirements for Israel-Palestine Peace

In January 2009, the House and Senate passed one-sided resolutions on the Gaza crisis that failed to call for both sides to stop the fighting and maintain a ceasefire. The resolution included many misrepresentations about the conflict.

However, FCNL welcomes the language in both resolutions supporting robust U.S. diplomacy toward a two-state solution and an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

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February 11, 2009

Dear Representative:

Thank you for the strong support the House expressed in H.Res. 34, passed by an overwhelming majority on January 9, 2009, for "a just and sustainable resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict achieved through negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority in order to ensure the welfare, security, and survival of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state with secure borders, and a viable, independent, and democratic Palestinian state living side by side in peace and security with the State of Israel."

Just such a resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict has long been sought by the Friends Committee on National Legislation and other Quaker groups that have had a special concern for and deep involvements with those caught up in this conflict since 1948.

We, believe, however, that H.Res. 34 and many of the floor statements made at the time of its passage reflect understandings so flawed and incomplete, and an orientation so one-sided, as to prevent the House from advancing the goal that it has endorsed. Promoting an Israeli-Palestinian peace requires a sound understanding of the political facts and circumstances that perpetuate the conflict and empathy for all of those caught up in it. We see little sign of that kind of understanding and empathy in the House action.

While concern was rightly expressed in the resolution and on the floor over the "6,000 rockets and mortars" launched against Israel since 2005, no concern was expressed for the deprivation imposed on the people of Gaza by Israel's blockade that had over many months reduced the majority of Gazans to poverty and dependence on international food aid.

Beyond its failure to express adequate concern for all those involved in the conflict, the House action failed to recognize that:

* The June 19, 2008 ceasefire had ended Hamas rocket fire into Israel.

It is true that Hamas launched "thousands of rockets and mortars" into Israel over the years, but it is also true that the June 19 ceasefire between Israel and Hamas mediated by Egypt had virtually ended the rocket fire according to the Israel Defense Forces' own records. Smaller Palestinian factions in Gaza launched several rockets in the early weeks of the ceasefire, but Hamas acted effectively to stop them.

* Hamas was not solely or even largely responsible for the breakdown of the ceasefire. Israel's November 4, 2008 bombing was the first lethal breech.

It is true that then Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice said after the start of Israel's assault on December 27, "we… hold Hamas responsible for breaking the ceasefire and for the renewal of violence there," but it is also true that the first serious and lethal breech of the ceasefire was the Israeli bombing of tunnels inside Gaza on November 4, election day in the United States, that killed six Palestinians. Hamas responded to this attack with rocket fire and a cycle of Israeli bombings and Hamas rocket launches followed.

* Hamas was prepared to extend the ceasefire on terms the United States should have accepted and encouraged Israel to accept. Had the United States done so, the Gaza fighting could have been prevented and Israel's goal of ending rocket fire achieved.

It is true that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on December 27, that "For approximately seven years, hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens in the south have been suffering from missiles being fired at them. . . . In such a situation we had no alternative but to respond." But the prime minister's assertion that Israel had no alternative means to put a definitive end to the rocket fire is mistaken. The head of Israel's Shin Bet intelligence service, Yuval Diskin, told the Israeli cabinet December 21 that Hamas wanted to extend its truce with Israel and sought "to improve its conditions - a removal of the blockade, receiving a commitment from Israel that it won't attack and extending the lull [tahadiya] to the Judea and Samaria area." Also, former President Jimmy Carter, whose contacts with Hamas leaders in Damascus in April 2008 helped to achieve the June ceasefire and who tried to extend the ceasefire in December, wrote in the Washington Post January 7 that Hamas was prepared to restore and extend the ceasefire in return for opening the Gaza border crossings to civilian supplies but Israel signaled a willingness to permit resumption of only 15% of normal traffic. Hamas rocket fire continued and Israel launched its assault on December 27.

Had the United States signaled via the Egyptian officials in contact with Hamas that the United States would press Israel to lift the blockade and followed through, the carnage and destruction of the Gaza fighting, with its attendant damage to prospects for regional stability and peace, could have been prevented.

Former President Carter has been criticized for his approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but what Israel's leading newspaper, Ha'aretz, wrote about him in an editorial last April is equally true today: "Carter's method, which says that it is necessary to talk with every one, has still not proven to be any less successful than the method that calls for boycotts and air strikes. In terms of results, at the end of the day, Carter beats out any of those who ostracize him."

Now that unilateral ceasefires declared by both Israel and Hamas have reduced the fighting to sporadic exchanges between the two sides, the House should support the following steps to realize its commitment to "a just and sustainable resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict:"

* Encourage administration diplomacy to conclude a durable ceasefire agreement that will bring a definitive end to rocket fire in southern Israel and a full restoration of the normal movement of people and goods through the Gaza border crossings. But urge the administration to make receipt of adequate relief aid for Gaza's civilians an urgent and unconditional objective.

President Obama has said that "as part of a lasting ceasefire, Gaza's border crossings should be open to allow the flow of aid and commerce." The opening of the crossings to commerce is an essential component of a durable and sustainable ceasefire and deserves Congressional support. But three weeks after the end of major fighting Israel continues to constrict the flow of relief aid and personnel into Gaza. Under the Geneva Conventions civilians in time of war have a right to adequate relief. The House should urge the administration to press for the recognition and implementation of this right.

* Encourage the administration to end Hamas violence by ending its isolation and engaging it in a political process leading to intra-Palestinian reconciliation and peace negotiations with Israel.

Former senior Israeli defense and security officials, including Mossad intelligence head Ephraim Halevi, Israel Defense Forces Chief-of-Staff Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, and IDF Gaza commander Shmuel Zakai, called in May 2008 for indirect negotiations with Hamas for a long-term ceasefire. The former officials said in a letter to the Israeli government, "Recognizing that ending the Hamas regime in Gaza is not a realistic goal and that reinstating Fatah in the Gaza Strip by means of Israeli bayonets is not desirable ... non-public negotiations should take place with Hamas through Egypt or anyone else acceptable to both sides."

The former chief of Israeli military intelligence, General Shlomo Gazit, said as long as two years ago that requiring Hamas to first recognize Israel's right to exist , renounce violence, and accept former agreements before including it in talks was "ridiculous, or an excuse not to negotiate." "We must," he said, negotiate on concrete problems, not on declarative issues."

Former Israeli Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben-Ami said nearly a year ago that rescuing the last chance to negotiate a two-state solution "requires not only a ceasefire with Hamas, but also a return to a Palestinian national unity government that alone can offer the peace process the vital legitimacy that it lacks today."

U.S. allies in the Arab world echo the views of these former Israeli officials. The House can make an important contribution to Israeli-Palestinian peace by echoing them as well. If Middle East peace envoy Senator George Mitchell is to repeat his success in Northern Ireland he will have to include Hamas in the peace process as he did the Irish Republican Army for peace in Northern Ireland.

* Support administration efforts to enhance respect for international humanitarian law, as reflected in Ambassador Susan Rice's January 29 statement to the U.N. Security Council and urge investigations of Hamas and Israeli violations of the law of war in the Gaza fighting.

U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice told the Security Council January 29, that Hamas had violated international law with its rocket attacks and use of civilian facilities in Gaza. She also said that "We expect Israel will meet its international obligations to investigate" the numerous allegations of Israeli violations. In addition to an internal Israeli investigation, the U.S. should call for an independent international investigation with U.S. participation to help insure impartiality. Ambassador Rice should voice support for the UN Secretary General's call for an investigation of Israel's shelling of the UN Headquarters in Gaza. The U.S. should pay special attention to allegations of the illegal Israeli use of U.S.-supplied white phosphorous explosives to determine whether there were violations and whether any constituted substantial violations of the U.S. Arms Control and Export Act.

* Urge the administration to press Israel and the Palestinians (the Fatah movement, Hamas, and smaller factions) to implement the recommendations of the May 2001 Mitchell report, which nearly eight years later remains a sound prescription of measures essential to achieve Israeli-Palestinian peace.

The report, issued by a high level group of U.S., Norwegian, Turkish, and EU officials chaired by Senator Mitchell, called on the parties to act against any threat or act of terrorism, violence, or incitement, but said, "A cessation of Palestinian-Israeli violence will be particularly hard to sustain unless the Government of Israel freezes all settlement construction activity… including the 'natural growth' of existing settlements. The kind of security cooperation desired by the Government of Israel cannot for long co-exist with settlement activity."

* Finally, to advance the House goal of a just and sustainable Israeli-Palestinian peace we urge you to cosponsor H.Res. 130.

In addition to congratulating Senator George Mitchell on his appointment as special envoy for Middle East peace and expressing appreciation to those involved in Middle East peacemaking this resolution endorses the vigorous U.S. pursuit of a diplomatic resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian and Israeli-Arab conflicts and makes clear that ending these conflicts is an essential national security interest of the United States. Cosponsoring H.Res. 130 can provide important political support for the difficult diplomatic road ahead.

We at FCNL appreciate the stated support of the House for serious and sustained U.S. efforts to achieve a just resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We urge you to promote the actions necessary to move from supportive rhetoric to implementing reality.

Sincerely,

Joe Volk
Executive Secretary