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Breach in Gaza: Hamas Blockades the Peace Process

[Washington Post] Editorial - Hamas provided a dramatic illustration of its ability to disrupt any movement toward peace between Israelis and Palestinians, as tens of thousands of residents of the Gaza Strip surged across the border into Egypt. President Hosni Mubarak announced that Gazans would be allowed to shop in Egypt because they "are starving due to the Israeli siege." In fact, as Mr. Mubarak well knows, no one is starving in Gaza. Israel closed its border with Gaza and disrupted power supplies in response to a massive escalation of Palestinian rocket launches from Gaza at nearby Israeli towns - between Tuesday and Saturday last week, some 225 rockets were aimed at the town of Sderot, where more than 20,000 Israelis have been relentlessly terrorized. Those who say their priority is an Israeli-Palestinian settlement ought to be trying to stop Hamas' disruptions. Egypt's obligation as a law-abiding state is to restore order on the border and prevent the ongoing and massive smuggling of armaments into Gaza. That would go a long way toward stopping the rockets. The Bush administration and European governments should act to stop the ongoing farce at the UN Security Council and the UN Human Rights Council, which have ignored months of daily rocket attacks aimed at Israeli civilians but now rush to condemn a partial, three-day disruption of Gaza's power supplies. Hamas, and the people of Gaza, should get a consistent message that relief lies not in blowing up international borders but in ending attacks on Israel and allowing a peace process to go forward.
2008-01-25 01:00:00
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