Israel Will Move Into Gaza Very Soon, and Washington Knows It
By Andrew Cochran
A newswire story today sounds the alarm on a probable Israeli incursion into Gaza to address repeated Hamas terrorist attacks into Israel. "Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Friday raised the spectre of a full-scale military operation in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip despite Egyptian attempts to mediate a truce. 'According to the information as it is now, the pendulum is much closer to tough military action,' Olmert told journalists on arrival in Israel following a three-day trip to the United States.'" The article includes statistics on the continued cross-border warfare. "At least 491 people, nearly all Palestinians and mostly Gaza militants, have been killed since Israeli-Palestinian peace talks resumed in November, according to an AFP count. The Israeli military said on Friday that Palestinians fired more than 2,300 rockets and mortar bombs at Israel in the past six months." The article predicts the move will come "within days."
None of this is news to the Bush Administration or Congress. They've already been briefed that the incursion is inevitable and top leaders from both parties will support it. The Egyptian government, which fears a Hamas-led Gaza as much as Israel does, has tried to mediate. But Hamas showers Israel with rocket fire, continues arms smuggling through tunnels built between individual houses inside and outside of Gaza, and won't release Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, kidnapped in 2006.
The sooner the better.
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