Like White on Rice...

Get me started on a subject (in this case subjects) and I'll be stuck on it like...well, you know.

By now you guys are like: Iraq and Palestine? Again?

Then I'll say: Uhm...shut up! ( So I'm not very quick on my feet)

It just so happens that the big news coming out has to do with Iraq and Palestine.

Well, yesterday Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas swore in his new emergency cabinet (effectively the government) made up completely of Fatah officials.

Under the circumstances, the swearing-in ceremony in Ramallah was a somber affair. Salam Fayyad, an internationally respected economist, will serve as prime minister as well as finance and foreign minister in the 12-member cabinet.

Most of the ministers, like Mr. Fayyad, are political independents and technocrats, with the exception of the interior minister, Abd al-Razzaq al-Yihya, a veteran Fatah figure and retired general with a reputation for toughness, who will be responsible for security forces. He held the same post under Yasir Arafat.

Mr. Abbas issued decrees outlawing the armed militias of Hamas and suspending clauses in the Palestinian Basic Law, which effectively serves as a constitution, that call for parliamentary approval of the new government. Hamas has a firm majority in the 132-seat Palestinian parliament, though 40 of its legislators are currently in Israeli jails.

The article mentions that Hamas is unhappy about the new government and still claims that the previous unity government in which it had the majority is the legitimate government. First, its claims to democratic legitimacy read like a mugger complaining to the person robbed. Second, it is within the power of the President to dissolve the previous government and install a new one...and justified in this case.

A 24 year old Palestinian lawyer sums up well how the it will be in the future for the 2 different Palestinian regions:

“Things will be very good in the West Bank and very bad in Gaza.”

Although good may be something more relative than anything else...


The New York Times has a good piece that serves as a backgrounder into why the 2 different Palestinian territories differ in the ways they do. Answers why they developed the way they did and why the cultures of the two regions differ. Read if interested to know a little more background on the Territories.

A teaser:

But Palestinian society is not so simple. There are many historical, economic and tribal loyalties that bind it together, and many of those cross, rather than coincide with, the frontiers of the two territories.

In addition, there are compelling reasons why the two communities need unity.

A look at the history of these territories, how they developed differently over time, and what their populations still share, shows why they are at odds now but also why it might be too early to write off the possibility that this breach can be
bridged.

Go ahead...

And this is a doozy:

Israel plans attack on Gaza

ISRAEL’s new defence minister Ehud Barak is planning an attack on Gaza within weeks to crush the Hamas militants who have seized power there.

According to senior Israeli military sources, the plan calls for 20,000 troops to destroy much of Hamas’s military capability in days.

The raid would be triggered by Hamas rocket attacks against Israel or a resumption of suicide bombings.

Barak, who is expected to become defence minister tomorrow, has already demanded detailed plans to deploy two armoured divisions and an infantry division, accompanied by assault drones and F-16 jets, against Hamas...(snip)

A source close to Barak said that Israel could not tolerate an aggressive “Hamastan” on its border and an attack seemed unavoidable.

“The question is not if but how and when,” he said.

An attack would likely succeed in weakening Hamas in Gaza, but I honestly cannot tell you what the repercussions and long-term impact of such an incursion would be...I'm racking my brain for some answers, but my first instinct is always to caution on the side against force being used hastily. I'll give it some more thought, and in the meantime I'll try and see what the true expert voices on the region are saying about any potential Israeli incursion.



Iraq

There seems to be alot of warnings and misgivings being sounded about US policy in Iraq

Foreign policy and national security experts are sounding off warnings against the dangers of a the new US policy of arming their former enemies in the Sunni insurgency.

A U.S. program to combat al-Qaida in Iraq by arming Sunni Muslims undercuts the Iraqi government and years of U.S. policy, and is a tacit acknowledgment that the country's violence is really a civil war, some U.S. military officials in Washington and foreign policy experts say.

The program, which Bush administration officials have hailed as a sign of progress
in Iraq, has sparked heated debate among military and foreign policy analysts.

It is opposed by the Iraqi government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki...(snip)

But others contend the program has long-term repercussions that can only be guessed at now. By giving weapons and training to Sunnis in Anbar and Baghdad who've been previously associated with Sunni insurgent groups, the program endorses unofficial armed groups over official Iraqi forces as guarantors of Iraqi security, military officers who oppose the program say.

Those officers also say it abandons the long-stated U.S. goal of disarming militias and reinforces the idea that U.S.-trained Iraqi forces cannot control their country.

At the Pentagon, at least six officers who served in Iraq shook their heads when asked about the idea of arming the Sunnis. They said they had little faith in a Sunni community that was aggressively killing their comrades just months ago.

"Why did we spend all that capital disarming them last year?" asked one military officer who served in Iraq last year under former Iraq commander Gen. George Casey. "As a military man, I cannot fathom the logic of putting more weapons out there."

The officer declined to be identified because he was not authorized to speak about the matter.

The article also notes that it is next to impossible to now expect the Iraqi government (that is Shia dominated) to try and and persuade the Shia militias to disarm if on the other hand the US is seen as actively arming the Sunni factions.

Yet, the strategy is also being questioned by the other groups in Iraq

The Shia and Kurds (including many Shia in the Iraqi government) are concerned about the US arming groups who take up those arms against their own people.

Shiite and Kurdish officials expressed deep reservations on Sunday about the new U.S. military strategy to partner with Sunni Arab groups to help defeat the militant organization al-Qaeda in Iraq.

"They are trusting terrorists," said Ali al-Adeeb, a prominent Shiite lawmaker who was among many to question the loyalty of the Sunni groups.

"They are trusting people who have previously attacked American forces and innocent people. They are trusting people who are loyal to the regime of Saddam Hussein."

And this

In an interview Friday, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told Newsweek magazine that some American field commanders "make mistakes since they do not know the facts about the people they deal with."

Maliki went on to say that arming the tribes is appropriate in certain circumstances "but on the condition that we should be well aware of the tribe's
background and sure that it is not connected with terror."

Other Shiite politicians are openly opposing the strategy.

"We cannot take weapons from certain insurgents and militias and then create other militias," said Abbas Bayati, a Turkmen Shiite lawmaker who is part of the majority bloc in parliament. "You need to open recruiting centers and provide training; now what is going on is giving weapons and money to the tribes and individuals."

Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish legislator, acknowledged the potential benefits of reducing the strength of al-Qaeda in Iraq but said of Sunni Arab groups: "They take arms, they take money, and in the future they will be a problem. Politically, they are still against the Americans and the Iraqi government."

Even the top commander in Iraq - General Petraeus - is sounding his concerns about the US arming Sunni insurgents

Although he is still for it, he just seems to admit that there is some risk involved. He seeks to dismiss concerns about the strategy by assuring us that they are taking "precautions."

Somehow that doesn't exactly inspire too much confidence in me...


In other Iraq news:

The PKK commander warns Turkey of 'military disaster' if troops cross into Iraq

A senior commander of the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) warned the Turkish government against sending its military forces into northern Iraq, in an interview published Monday.

Speaking to The Guardian daily from a hideout in the Qandil mountains on the Iraq-Iran border, Cemil Bayik said that while his units were not seeking a fight, the Turkish army faced "a political and military disaster" if it crosses into Iraq as part of an offensive against the PKK.

A Turkish incursion into Iraq could become "a quagmire for them (the Turkish army) and create space for Iran to interfere in Iraq also," Bayik told the newspaper.

And in Iraq News as it relates to the investigation into the abuses at Abu Ghraib:

How the General in charge of investigating the scandal was punished by the former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld for doing a genuine investigation into Abu Ghraib.

Nice article by excellent investigative reporter Seymour Hersh (New Yorker).

I'll admit I haven't tackled the whole article myself yet (Hersh's articles are usually pretty thick).

See that wasn't so bad was it? See ya in a couple days - unless something big pops up tomorrow.