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Dr. Aaron Lerner is co-founder of , Independent Media Review and Analysis, an Israel-based news organization which provides an extensive digest of media, polls and significant interviews and events relating to the Israeli-Arab conflict.
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By Dr. Aaron Lerner
June 30, 2006
The kidnapping of Gilad Shalit, ongoing Qasaam fire, the acceptance by "man of peace" Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas of the "National Conciliation Document" (in a version even more radical than the original) and the murder of Eliahu Asheri provides Israel with a window of opportunity to launch an important -- and possibly critical -- operation to roll back the ever growing Palestinian capability to engage Israel in a debilitating war of attrition and bog down Israeli forces needed in the event of the threat of invasion.
And that Palestinian capability certainly has been growing.
It's not that the security situation was close to ideal in the Gaza Strip before the retreat.
The second half of the masterfully planned Defensive Shield operation to clear out much of the then existing terror infrastructure in both the West Bank and Gaza Strip was never carried out, leaving Israel with the situation that while extremely small teams could essentially go anywhere at anytime in the West Bank (as exhibited by the operation that was able to track down and capture part of the team that murdered Asheri within hours) considerably large parts of the Gaza Strip were off limits to all but air attacks and major ground force operations.
Prime Minister Olmert claims that there were periods before the retreat in which the incidents of Qassams were worse than since the retreat. But the reason that there was so much activity wasn't because the IDF couldn't stop the rockets at the time. It was because the politicians didn't let them.
Besides halting Defensive Shield, the politicians kept dropping ongoing security measures. Roadblocks with vehicle inspection at key points on the road traversing the Gaza Strip were supposed to play a critical role in controlling the flow of rockets and weapons in the Strip, for example, but the politicians consistently pulled the inspections within days of an attack -- only to "close the barn door" after another attack.
Since the retreat the entire Gaza Strip the situation is even worse as it has become essentially one big terror training camp.
And the situation is anything but static.
As each day passes, the terror groups add new recruits and stock their armories as they move up the learning curve - both in terms of training and weapons technology - as they grow in numbers and their armories fill with weapons.
And to make matters worse, all of these groups are slated to be put on the Palestinian Authority's payroll.
This window won't last long. Pressure will only increase on Israel to find a way to gracefully step back. And the National Conciliation Document could very well end up succeeding in facilitating internal Palestinian stability so that they can be an even more dangerous enemy to the Jewish State.
Would a Defensive Shield operation in Gaza bring permanent peace?
Of course not.
The war against terrorism, just as the war against crime, never ends.
But that's hardly an excuse for not fighting.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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