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Gaza: The British are Coming

(Access/MiddleEast) Shmuel Bar - UK diplomats and officers of Britain's Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) have formulated a new security plan for Gaza after an Israeli withdrawal, based on "co-opting" the Fatah Tanzim and al-Aqsa Brigades, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad into a security regime while not attempting to disarm them or decommission their heavy weapons. The British plan includes building 12 "task forces" (integrated military units with representation of all PA factions) under British auspices, for taking control upon the Israeli withdrawal. Israel is to be asked to refrain from unilateral security actions and to remove a few hundred al-Aqsa Brigade members from its wanted lists and allow them to serve as security forces inside Gaza. If implemented, the plan will preserve the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza, which will be a constant threat to Israel. The British tendency to co-opt Hamas has already struck a sour chord in Washington, where the State Department clarified that "We consider Hamas a terrorist organization....Far from being welcomed into any partnership of cooperation, Hamas should be ostracized and disempowered as an organization." The writer is a senior research fellow at the Institute for Policy & Strategy, Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya.
2004-04-14 00:00:00
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