国际英语新闻：Israel to entrench deeper into war with Hamas

JERUSALEM, Jan. 2 (Xinhua) -- As the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Cast Lead operation in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip entered the seventh day on Friday and IDF is getting prepared for a ground operation to put an end to rocket attacks on southern Israel, analysts said an all-out war between Israel and Hamas was increasingly inevitable.

    Despite earlier speculations of a month-long confrontation before Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and U.S. President George W. Bush leave office, analysts now believe the confrontation has reached a point of no return, which Israel will have to see through to the end.

An Israeli border police officer fires tear gas toward Palestinian stone-throwers during a protest against Israel's offensive in Gaza, at Qalandiya checkpoint near the West Bank city of Ramallah Jan. 2, 2009.

    "In order to compel Hamas to change its strategic behavior, Israel cannot operate with a stopwatch in its hand," Dore Gold, president of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, told Xinhua.

    He noted that the February parliamentary elections in Israel and the incoming U.S. administration of President-elect Barack Obama later this month would do little to thwart Israel from its objective of addressing ongoing rocket assaults from Gaza.

    "Hamas has to understand that Israel will apply these military pressures in two months, six months, or a year as long as Hamas continues rocket attacks on Israel," Gold said, adding that the goal is to change the strategic situation so that there will be a complete cessation of rocket attacks on Israel.

A destroyed building is seen at the Jebaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza Strip Jan. 2, 2009.

    "What we know is what the strategic goal is: to bring about the cessation of rocket attacks on Israel. What exactly will be the combination of military and strategic pressures remains to be seen," he said.

    He ruled out the current likelihood of a truce as Olmert has made clear that the current conditions are not right for any kind of armistice in light of the intensification of rocket attacks since Hamas announced in December the end of a six-month-old Egyptian-brokered ceasefire with Israel.

    Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, during a Thursday visit to Paris, reiterated Israel's rejection of a French-proposed ceasefire , telling her French counterpart Bernard Kouchner that the renewal of a truce would both gain Hamas legitimacy as well as allow it to restock its arsenal.

    Hamas stepped up rocket assaults on Israel following the end of the ceasefire, extending its range to as far as the southern Israeli city of Beersheva, some 40 km away from Gaza.

Palestinians inspect their destroyed houses at the Jebaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza Strip Jan. 2, 2009. The

    Now nearly a week since Israel started last Saturday retaliating against rocket attacks by Gaza militants, it is clear that Israel consciously forwent the opportunity to finish the operation as a mere act of vengeance, analysts said.

    Some analysts, however, believe a ground operation would not be in Israel's interest as it holds many more risks.

    The ground war in Gaza will have to be waged in densely populated urban areas, and unlike the case in the war against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon in the summer of 2006, when civilians fled into northern Lebanon during combat, Gazans' only choice is to flee towards the Egyptian border.

    "One of the common conclusions of Israeli security experts is that wars cannot be decided from the air as much as Western powers would prefer that to be the case," Gold said, noting that IDF strategy had so far been focused on the destruction of Hamas' armaments.

    "Ultimately some kind of ground operation is necessary to bring the other side to accept the most minimal terms for a stable peace agreement," he said.

A Palestinian boy sits with his family's belongings at the Jebaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza Strip Jan. 2, 2009.

    Though some believe that a ground war in Gaza would cause an increase in both Israeli and Palestinian casualties, Gold noted that Israel's past experiences with ground operations had shown its ability to curb casualties while reaching its goals successfully.

    He said that while many had predicted that Israel's counter-insurgency campaign in 2002 that brought a significant reduction of suicide attacks from the West Bank would lead to huge Israeli casualties, losses were limited despite its house-to-house combat strategy.

    Israel's Southern Command anticipates that a ground operation would probably cause Israeli casualties but sees it as the most effective way to cease the threat from Hamas.

    Reserve Deputy Commander of the Gaza Division Moti Yogev told Xinhua that "the primary objective of any military operation was to defend Israel's southern population and to do so in a manner that would require the least amount of ground operation in a densely populated area while providing the most possible security for civilians living in southern Israel."

    "The IDF's current strategy would be three-fold," he said. "To put an end to rocket attacks from Gaza, the IDF would have to continue the strategic eradication of all terrorist entities in Gaza, disconnect Hamas from terrorist units in Egypt and the Sinaiand ensure the availability of humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza."

    The Israeli government opened the Kerem Shalom crossing on Wednesday, allowing in 93 trucks of humanitarian aid, and another 90 trucks bringing food and medicine on Thursday.

    Yogev noted, however, that the failure of a ground operation as currently planned would require more intensive methods aimed at cutting off important militant centers in Gaza and dividing up the territory to disrupt further terrorist attacks.

    He said that possibly one of the most damaging consequences of the current operation was that it tarnished future prospects for peaceful coexistence alongside a Palestinian state.

    "Immediately following Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, the area became a terrorist hotbed setting a dangerous precedent for any future planned withdrawals," Yogev said.

    "Each place that Israel has left has turned to terrorism," he said. "It is therefore especially dangerous if Israel should leave strategic Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria as adjacent Palestinian territories include many other cities that house terrorist entities within closer proximity to Israel," he added.