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<h1 class="title" id="page-title">Mahmoud Abbas calls for Arab
military intervention against Hamas in Gaza</h1>
<div class="submitted">
<span property="dc:date dc:created"
content="2015-03-30T08:55:00+00:00" datatype="xsd:dateTime"
rel="sioc:has_creator">Submitted by <span class="username"
xml:lang="" about="/users/ali-abunimah"
typeof="sioc:UserAccount" property="foaf:name" datatype="">Ali
Abunimah</span> on Mon, 03/30/2015 - 08:55<br>
<b><small><small><small><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/mahmoud-abbas-calls-arab-military-intervention-against-hamas-gaza">http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/mahmoud-abbas-calls-arab-military-intervention-against-hamas-gaza</a></small></small></small></b><br>
</span> </div>
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media-element file-full" height="411" width="618" style="">
<div class="content"><br>
Palestinian Authority leader <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/tags/mahmoud-abbas">Mahmoud
Abbas</a> issued a thinly veiled call for an Arab military
intervention to overthrow <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/tags/hamas">Hamas</a> in
Gaza, along the lines of the Saudi-led bombing campaign in <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/tags/yemen">Yemen</a>.</div>
</div>
<p>But the kind of intervention Abbas may be setting the stage for
would likely consist of ground troops rather than airstrikes.</p>
<p>Abbas made the suggestion at the Arab League summit hosted by
the Egyptian military regime in the Red Sea resort of Sharm
al-Sheikh on Saturday.</p>
<p>Abbas’ speech indicates that a similar call by his religious
affairs advisor in a Friday sermon in Ramallah represented
official PA policy, and not the views of a maverick. Hamas has
condemned the PA leader’s statements.</p>
<h2>“Security means”</h2>
<p><a href="https://youtu.be/eJ_H1wgYmvY?t=23m31s">Toward the
middle of his hour-long address</a>, Abbas warned of the
“dangers of division which we must confront culturally,
religiously and in addition to treating it through security
means.”</p>
<p>He welcomed a suggestion by <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/tags/abdulfattah-al-sisi">Abdulfattah
al-Sisi</a>, the head of the military junta that overthrew
Egypt’s elected president in 2013, that Arab states form a
“joint Arab force to protect Arab national security.”</p>
<p>Abbas suggested that the Arab League “troika” – its current,
past and next chairs – put forward “an Arab vision to solve the
wars, crises, discords and divisions” in several Arab states.</p>
<p>“The need is urgent to find practical and constructive
solutions built on an Arab vision and based on legitimacy, that
guarantee the territorial unity of every Arab country without
any foreign intervention, and whose decisions are binding on
all,” Abbas said.</p>
<p>In this context, Abbas’ use of “foreign” means “non-Arab.”</p>
<p>“In Yemen right now, there is an Arab intervention that is
acceptable and advisable,” Abbas said.</p>
<p>“There are other cases, there are other countries suffering
from division and discord. We suffer from division. We were the
first to suffer from division,” Abbas said in reference to the
split between his Fatah movement, <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/mahmoud-abbas-collaboration-israeli-army-secret-police-sacred">which
rules with Israeli support</a> in the occupied West Bank, and
Hamas which has governed the interior of the besieged Gaza Strip
since 2007.</p>
<p>“We hope that there will be united Arab positions and an Arab
vision and we are bound by anything that is decided by this
summit,” Abbas said.</p>
<h2>Plausible scenario</h2>
<p>The kind of scenario Abbas may have in mind would not likely
include airstrikes. Israel would not permit foreign aircraft to
operate over Gaza and as Israel’s experience shows, airstrikes
cannot dislodge Hamas.</p>
<p>Arab states would also not want to be seen repeating the kinds
of massacres Israel carries out in Gaza.</p>
<p>However, Egypt and Gaza share a border, which the Egyptian
regime has kept tightly closed to Palestinian travelers. The
Egyptian army has <a
href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/news/africa/16250-egypt-begins-demolishing-1220-houses-in-rafah">demolished
the homes of thousands of Egyptian families</a> along the
border to further isolate Gaza.</p>
<p>This border could provide an entry point for the joint Arab
military force <a
href="http://news.yahoo.com/arab-leaders-agree-joint-military-force-egypts-sisi-102805435.html">agreed
in principle by the summit</a> to invade Gaza.</p>
<p>This would be done under the cover of the Arab League and with
the pretext of helping Palestinians and restoring “legitimacy.”</p>
<p>But its effect would be to restore Abbas’ <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/mahmoud-abbas-collaboration-israeli-army-secret-police-sacred">Israeli-backed
rule</a> to Gaza so that he could crack down on Palestinian
resistance as he has done in the occupied West Bank.</p>
<h2>Hamas condemnation</h2>
<p>Hamas spokesperson <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/tags/sami-abu-zuhri">Sami
Abu Zuhri</a> called Abbas’ comments “<a
href="http://www.alhadathnews.net/archives/153081">dangerous
and unpatriotic</a>” and urged Arab states to rebuke him for
“attitudes that are consistent with the [Israeli] occupation’s
desire to strike the Palestinian people.”</p>
<p>More than 100,000 people are still living without permanent
shelter in Gaza after Israel’s devastating summer assault that
left more than 2,200 people dead and thousands more injured.</p>
<p>Hamas recently <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/hamas-says-videos-reveal-pa-collaborators-who-helped-israel-kill-resistance">released
recordings</a> which it claims prove Abbas’ intelligence
apparatus was helping Israel to gather information it used to
plan the attack.</p>
<p>But in line with Hamas’ policy of working with Abbas despite
his constant incitement against the movement, Abu Zuhri stopped
short of calling for the removal of the PA leader whose legal
term of office expired five years ago.</p>
<p>Hamas “confirms that Mahmoud Abbas lost his legal legitimacy
and that his presence in the presidency is linked to the extent
of his commitment to the Palestinian national consensus,” Abu
Zuhri said. “He has no mandate to take any decisions or make any
declarations that depart from the national consensus or national
constants.”</p>
<p>In a twist of irony, Hamas has itself <a
href="http://www.raialyoum.com/?p=236735">given its blessing</a>
to the Saudi-led air raids on Yemen which, <a
href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/articles/news/2015/03/yemen-six-children-killed-in-saudi-arabian-airstrikes/">according</a>
to Amnesty International have killed dozens of civilians, among
them a number of children.</p>
<p><a href="http://electronicintifada.net/tags/saudi-arabia">Saudi
Arabia</a> says the attacks are intended to drive back the
Houthis, predominantly Shia rebels who advanced on Sanaa in
recent weeks effectively deposing Abed Rabbu Mansour Hadi, the
US- and Saudi-backed president.</p>
<h2>Whose coup?</h2>
<p>On Friday, Mahmoud al-Habbash the PA’s chief Islamic judge and
an advisor to Abbas, called on Arab states to <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/arab-states-should-strike-gaza-yemen-says-advisor-mahmoud-abbas">“strike”
Gaza</a>, following the example of the Saudi-led bombing raids
on Yemen.</p>
<p>“What happened in Gaza was a coup, not a division, and it must
be addressed with firmness,” added al-Habbash. “There can be no
dialogue with coup-makers; they must be hit with an iron fist.”</p>
<p>Abbas and other officials of his Ramallah-based,
Western-supported PA regularly accuse <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/tags/hamas">Hamas</a> of
carrying out a “coup” when it took over the interior of the Gaza
Strip in 2007.</p>
<p>This is a reversal of the <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/content/palestine-papers-and-gaza-coup/9200">well-documented
reality</a> that Hamas was acting against a coup attempt by
forces loyal to Abbas, after Hamas won legislative elections the
previous year.</p>
<p>The coup, <a
href="http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2008/04/gaza200804">which
was supported at the highest levels of the US government</a>,
succeeded in the West Bank, where Abbas consolidated his <a
href="http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/mahmoud-abbas-collaboration-israeli-army-secret-police-sacred">Israeli-backed</a>
regime.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the democratically elected Hamas-led government was
isolated and besieged in Gaza.</p>
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