by Hani M. Abueshiba
A series of coordinated attack took place Thursday from across the Egyptian side of the Egypt-Israel border. While it is important to realize that each attack was relatively small,
as a whole, the attacks indicate some degree of coordination among the attackers. Although details of the attack are still sketchy at best, Israel has reported 7 fatalities and some 29 injuries and is pinpointing the source as Gaza. While the Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak attributed the attacks to elements originating from the Gaza Strip, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) tactical reports stated that the attack had been launched from across Israel’s border with Egypt along the Sinai Peninsula.
The question to this claim is that how did Israel come up with this conclusion? From BBC and CNN to other news feeds, it is clear that the identities of the attackers were not completely confirmed by anyone, nor had any group including Hamas had gone forward to claim responsibility of such an attack.
The Israeli claim that the source of all this violence stems from Gaza is perhaps a vague accusation, intentionally ambiguous so as to make people instantly assume Hamas government in power in the Gaza Strip. Or the source could very well be Gaza; yet it is extremely unlikely to be Hamas or a faction from within, but it might be a group external to the enclave who are fed up and have lost tolerance by the ongoing illegal blockade of Gaza and decided to mount attacks although this is also unlikely be the case.
As for those who have an interest in evidence, rather than resorting to the comfort of deeply ingrained prejudice, the evidence suggests that the men who were involved in the attack in Eilat are unknown and their identities have not been confirmed yet. More than likely, this has much less to do with Gaza or the Palestinian national cause than it has with the aspirations of a made up group affiliated with some external power in the region.
Following the attack, those are set to be responsible for maintaining Israel’s exceptional security; quickly claimed that they knew exactly who was behind the attack in Eilat, and accordingly have set the air force to storm down Gaza by deadly missiles. As Paul Woodward put it in the War in Context, “… no one explained if Israeli intelligence was so good, they had not prevented the attack. Even so, the domestically perceived legitimacy of a security state depends less on its ability to thwart terrorism than its willingness to make a timely show of force.”
The advantage taken by the Israeli government serves to remind Israelis that the state created as a safe haven for Jews can only remain safe so long as everyone remains afraid.
As of the last week, Binyamin Netanyahu was desperately looking for a way out of an escalating internal crisis. The domestic unrest and the social protest movement was gathering thrust and posing a growing danger to his government. The real threat to Netanyahu was the dramatic shift of the public’s attention from being overly worried about its exceptional security needs into a demand of more social justice.
Playing the Jesus card and presenting himself once again as the man, Netanyahu exactly simulated what George W. Bush did after the attack of 9/11 when he pledged to hunt down those criminal, murderous people who dared to attack the United States of America. Faced with a mounting crisis in the form of the J14 movement, Palestinian diplomatic efforts to seek a UN membership in September, and unreliable Egyptian ally in the region, the Eilat attack is exactly the kind of gift Israeli right wing party loves the most.
The Real Beneficiary:
The incident has been called as a new threat to Israel and its security. Israel is looking at Egypt as the no longer reliable ally in the region. Prior to the attack, the Israeli government responded to increasing attacks in the Sinai by allowing the Egyptian military council to deploy an additional 1,000 troops in Sinai. Bearing in mind the current political and security circumstances, Israel is very skeptical of the Egyptian military ability to effectively deal with this problem. The Israeli impression is that Egypt is at the early stages of managing its political and militant opposition unable to maintain internal security as effectively as it used to do in the past.
To leverage more support, Israel will likely see the Eilat’s attack as a new kind of threat. Taking advantage of the current state of instability, the Israeli government is arguing that the security problem is no longer strictly confined to Gaza but has now spread to Egypt. In order to consolidate its security ambitions, Israeli officials have already pointing fingers at the deteriorating security situation in Egypt, a response which likely going to cause tension between Egypt and Israel- exactly what the Israeli government wants in order to divert attention from its failure to accomplish peace with Palestinians.
For one, Egypt is no longer a reliable ally as it used to be in the days of Mubarak. With the Egyptian military council showing no signs of real hostility towards Israel and unlikely to do so, the real fear for the Israeli government is a real democracy emerging in Egypt as they will not benefit strategically from it given the strong Egyptian opposition to the Israeli measures against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. With the attack happening from across the Egyptian Sinai borders, Israel will use that as an excuse to bolster military units in the Sinai area under the pretext of national security. In fact, Israeli officials have already put this request forward.
By blaming the source of this attack on Gaza, Israel can gain some diplomatic leverage to counter the Palestinian attempt to statehood in September. As a result, Israel will able to use this as a proof that the UN bid and the Eilat attack were just Palestinian effort to disrupt the peace process. Additionally, Israel will also benefit from blaming the source of the violence on Palestinians by increasing the military attacks on Gaza. Indeed, they have already escalated their military campaign on Gaza killing about 15 people in less than 48 hours.
From the above analysis, we can deduce the following: the Israeli government can now justify increasing protection from an Egypt it is uncertain about.
The attack is giving Israel the opportunity once again to re-affirm its security concerns as a result of the sweeping revolutions of change of what Yigal Walt referred to as “the New Middle East”. Through planting fear, the Israeli government is making sure that the need for security and possibly building more fences are a necessity. However, I must say that the problem of this strategy in the long run is that it does deconstruct cognitive need for understanding of the situations. This fear has worked perfectly in re-constructing the public rage in Israel back onto the Arab enemy.
In attempting to understand the recent developments that took place on the edge of the Sinai, the likelihood is that the explanation about who launched the attacks and why, and for what strategic purpose would be found not elsewhere but within the corridors of the Israeli cabinet.
Written by Hani M.A. PhD student in the field of Politics -University of Exeter, UK. Policy Advisor at the House of Wisdom – Gaza.
