Egypt has chosen a radical step toward finding a solution to the Gaza conflict. Egypt has chosen to place the blame squarely on the shoulders of Hamas.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit has made a public statement of Egypt's assessment of where the blame for the current Gaza conflict resides and blame is being placed with Hamas and it's leadership.
Egypt's
foreign minister said on Thursday that Hamas must ensure rocket fire stops in any truce deal to halt Israel's assault on the Gaza Strip, criticizing the Palestinian group for giving Israel an excuse to launch the bombardment.
Ahmed Aboul Gheit was not able to offer a reason why he thought Israel was looking for an excuse to invade the Gaza region which it had returned to Palestinian control in 2006.
Aboul Gheit said any eventual truce agreement should include a mechanism to oversee "that everything proceeds without one side causing problems with the other." He told journalists that the mechanism could involve "international forces or Arab forces or just observers."
The problems Gheit appears to be referencing would be the daily Kassam rocket and mortar attacks which Hamas has allowed, encouraged and supported on the towns of Southern Israel.
He criticized Hamas, saying Egypt had seen "the signals that Israel was determined to strike Hamas in Gaza for the past three months. They practically wrote it in the sky."
"Unfortunately, they (Hamas) served Israel the opportunity on a golden platter to hit Gaza," he said.
Such an outspoken complaint from Egypt to Hamas signals a significant deterioration in the working relationship between the Militant Hamas and Moderate Egypt.
The absolute militancy of Hamas may be presumed to be the reason behind the closures of the crossings between Egypt and Gaza. Egypt may not have wanted to appear as if they were giving overt aid to a regime in Gaza which had such a single minded focus on obliterating Israel.
While the Hamas leadership was safely tucked away in bunkers, the Hamas leadership had left the rank and file security personnel, police and public to their own devices and to protect themselves.
"Where are the Hamas leaders now, when the residents of Gaza are getting killed? All of Hamas's leadership is in bunkers,"
stated Muhammad Bassiouny
One other very telling comment came from Bassiouny regarding the Palestinians living in Gaza, and the presumed support mentioned in an address made by Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh.
"the Arab people have proven the Palestinian issue is in their hearts."
(Haniyeh)
Bassiouny, a former ambassador to Israel, scoffed at Haniyeh's faith in the Arab world's support, saying, "No one cares if all of the Palestinians are destroyed; what kind of talk is this?"
The lack of Arab support for Palestinians perhaps points to why the Palestinian people don't have a homeland. It simply doesn't serve the needs of any other Arab nation.
