There was much guesswork over how long the Gaza ceasefire will last, reads Doaa El-Bey Many writers questioned whether the truce in the Gaza Strip would last for long. Others asked why it was not preceded by a similar halt in hostilities in the West Bank. Hafez Al-Barghouti regarded the truce as incomplete, because a ceasefire between Fatah and Hamas should precede a united truce with Israel. As a result of that incomplete picture, Hamas, who is forced to play the role of the Palestinian Authority, would find itself forced to take strict measures against those who break the deal. Such an odd situation was the outcome of the state of division and conflict of interest between the two parties. "However hard we try, we cannot create a truce with others without first creating an internal truce among ourselves," Al-Barghouti emphasised. "And we cannot preserve the national interests of the Palestinians without outlining that interest and how to achieve it," he wrote in the political Palestinian daily Al-Hayat Al-Jedida. Mahmoud Abul-Haygaa wrote in the same newspaper that, "we want a truce but we want national dialogue first". Ever since the accord was sealed, the talk about it has been on the rise whereas talk about Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's initiative for national dialogue has subsided. The first priority and the top Palestinian interest now is to maintain the truce even if it results in Hamas curbing its resistance. Abul-Haygaa questioned the timing of the truce which Hamas regards as an effective way of establishing its authority in Gaza. If it is for securing the essentials for its people or for security reasons, why shouldn't the same reasons force Hamas to push the national dialogue forward? "We need a truce that includes the West Bank. People in the West Bank should enjoy peace as well. They should not wake up every morning to find more houses dilapidated and spend their days with the threat of tanks and airplanes overhead," Abul-Haygaa wrote. Abdel-Halim Qandil predicted that the truce would not last for long and could be broken at any time. A few days after it was concluded, the Israelis violated it in the West Bank, then it was broken in Gaza. In the London-based political independent daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi Qandil shed light on the position of the parties to prove his point. Although Israel possesses stronger fighting abilities, it is incapable of deterring the locally manufactured missiles that Hamas use. In addition, the decision-making process in Israel is suffering from havoc these days as Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert manoeuvres to waste time while his opponents and aides try to force him to resign over a financial scandal and fight to succeed him. What he wants now is to conclude a deal to release the detained Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. He even managed to get a promise from President Hosni Mubarak to keep the Rafah Crossing closed until Hamas agrees to free Shalit, which according to Qandil means that Israel is detaining all Gazans in response to Shalit's detention. Meanwhile, Hamas wants to separate the issue of Shalit and that of the Gaza blockade. They want Israel to lift the blockade and open Rafah because the boycott is weakening the movement's popularity in Gaza. As for Egyptian mediation, it possesses the means to press Hamas by keeping the Rafah Crossing closed, but cannot pressure Israel. As a result, Egypt is not in a hurry to open the border and is moving slowly and cautiously, fearing the wrath of Israel and the US. Abbas is not happy with the truce as it weakens his stand in the West Bank and makes him look like a lame duck. He can only work on slowing down any reconciliation agreement with Hamas until the situation explodes again in Gaza. Israel could do the job of weakening Hamas for him. Thus Qandil concludes that, "the truce will have a short life and could pave the way for a bloody war that Hamas could win." Ahmed Jamil Azem regarded the failure to reach a truce in the West Bank similar to that in Gaza as an indication of the failure of Fatah and joint Arab efforts. He did not deny that Abbas and his government exerted efforts to conclude the truce in order to spare the Gazans the horrors of the economic blockade and military confrontation. However, he questioned why Fatah was not included in the Gaza truce or a similar peace. "If the truce lasts and a similar one is not reached in the West Bank, Hamas would appear like a reliable partner that can respect a ceasefire and provide security for its members, whereas Fatah failed to uphold a similar truce after Oslo and its members were pursued by the Israelis in the West Bank," Azem wrote in the Jordanian political daily Al-Ghad. He called for garnering all Arab and international efforts to reach a similar truce in the West Bank as it is in the interest of all the Palestinians. Elias Harfoush argued whether the truce was a form of resistance or treason. He wrote in the independent daily Al-Hayat that the ceasefire could be transformed into internal strife between Hamas and the other Palestinian parties in Gaza. He regarded the recent break of the truce by Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade and the Jihad movement -- which is likely to be repeated -- as an indication that these parties cast doubt on the intention of Hamas's acceptance of the truce. Some of these movements question the price that Hamas took in return for its lenient stand. Others call for breaking the truce because they look at it as a form of treason. The contradiction in Hamas's stand, as Harfoush described it, lies in the fact that it accepted the truce although it had always blamed the PA and Abbas for adopting a lenient stand on Israel at the expense of the resistance. And that was one of the reasons that created the split between Hamas and Fatah. Harfoush wrote: "How can one justify that firing missiles against Israel is an act of resistance if carried out by Hamas, but an act of treason if Fatah leaders call for it?"
