The Calm Before The Hurricane

Israel has called a 3-hour time out for humanitarian aid to get into Gaza.

The temporary cease-fire will take place in the "whole of the Gaza Strip" from 1 p.m. until 4 p.m. (6 a.m. to 9 a.m. ET) today, Israeli Defense Ministry spokesman Peter Lerner told CNN.

The three-hour truce is scheduled to take place each day.

"This is in order to enable replenishing of supplies and allow aid activities," he said.

Lerner noted that Israeli forces would respond to any aggression toward them during the pause.

Gosh, that's downright considerate of them to take a breather before expanding the incursion into phase three.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert convened a security cabinet meeting Wednesday to weigh expanding the army's offensive in the Gaza Strip and discuss an Egyptian ceasefire initiative, officials said.
"The cabinet is now meeting to discuss the operation in Gaza and to discuss the latest ceasefire initiative," a government official said.
According to a senior defense official, the cabinet will consider whether to expand the ground offensive, launched Saturday night, deeper into Palestinian towns.
"(Defense Minister Ehud) Barak has instructed the army to prepare for the third stage of the operation," the official told AFP.
"We can't see the operation stopping in the coming days. We still have to study the details of the Egyptian proposal," the official said.

The third stage of course would be the invasion and capture of Gaza City and other towns in Gaza in an effort to root out Hamas once and for all. I don't see how this can result in anything other than the occupation and outright destruction of what little infrastructure Gaza has left. Israel's not tipping its hand on this meeting to have the plan shot down. It's doing so for the express purpose of announcing to the Palestinian world that Gaza is about to become an abattoir and that there's nothing anyone can do about it as the people in Gaza are unable to flee. It's collective punishment of the first order and Israel knows that as long as the US backs them unconditionally, they can get away with it.

We may be looking at the beginning of what could even be the medium-term US style occupation of Gaza by the IDF. Surely Fatah is waiting in the wings for the chance to take over, and they figure when Israel then gracefully offers the choice between Israeli occupation and Fatah rule, the people of Gaza (well, the remaining ones) will choose Fatah. Israel will pack up and go home, Fatah will vow to rebuild, and everything will be all peachy. That's the plan, anyway.

Plans rarely survive first contact with the enemy. In the next few days, the casualties in Gaza are going to get brutal, ugly, and very graphic. There's a reason why Israel is keeping all reporters out of the combat zone (even US reporters) since this went to a ground operation: that's the one lesson they did learn from Lebanon in 2007. They know their ability to stay in Gaza past January 20 depends on the public relations war more than the military one.