Mideast Conflict Beckons Armageddon
Pastor Dale Morgan
Mideast Conflict Beckons Armageddon *
Israel faces the greatest crisis since the partition scheme was pushed
through the United Nations in November 1947 and the declaration of an
Israeli state in May 1948.
The Cold War was only a year away from freezing American-European
relations with the Soviet Union and the governments of eastern Europe.
The historian Paul Johnson has argued that, had the Cold War started
before November 1947, there may never have been an Israeli state. The
new state immediately had to face five Arab armies provided by Egypt,
Syria, Jordan, Iraq and Lebanon and defeated them. The hot war in the
Middle East had started.
Today, the situation is worse than ever. The "war" between the forces of
outgoing Hamas Prime Minister Ismael Haniyeh and the internal security
forces led by the al-Fatah movement of Palestinian President Mahmoud
Abbas has been going on for nearly a week. Yesterday, the Hamas forces
had more or less overwhelmed al-Fatah in Gaza. The dissolution of the
Hamas-Fatah government by Mr Abbas had a surreal ring about it; not so
his declaration of a state of emergency.
The buzzword is that an Islamic state Hamas-stan will come into being
and al-Fatah would reassemble in the West Bank, where its moderate writ
runs stronger. If this were to happen, there will be four "states" in
the region, Israel, an Islamic state in Hamas-stan and a moderate
Palestinian "government" on the West Bank. This is serious enough in the
context of a Hamas government backed by Iran. In the further context of
a Hizbollah "movement", backed by Syria and Iran, in Lebanon to Israel's
north, the spectre of a fourth "state" becomes daunting. Some see
Armageddon approaching.
The irony behind all this is that only a few weeks ago, Hamas and
al-Fatah agreed to form a government of national unity. The inclusion of
al-Fatah, it was hoped at the time, would soften the approach of Hamas -
the elimination of Israel, an objective shared by Iran and by the
Hizbollah. It soon became clear that this was not going to happen and
instead of decreasing, tensions between the two groups increased until a
state of civil war existed between the two sides.
Perilous is not the word for all this. Unless good counsel prevails, and
there has been no evidence that it will, the situation in the next few
days will border on the incandescent.
Mr Haniyeh will not be happy with the idea of a Palestine reduced to
Gaza. His next objective will be to wrest the West bank from al-Fatah
control. The question, a vital one for the future of the Palestinian
Authority, which lost its authority in Gaza, is whether it can restore
itself on the West Bank.
A wild hope is that it will do so and, impossibly many say, even declare
an independent Palestinian West Bank. That will indeed be one for the
books. Should such an unlikely eventuality emerge, the Israelis will
have to revisit the question of settlements more seriously than ever and
the Americans and the Europeans will need to pour in aid as they have
never done before.
That will still leave the Arab countries in the region waiting to be
convinced by Mr Abbas, if he is thinking along these lines and if he
survives this crisis at all, that this new entity is even desirable, and
Mr Haniyeh pondering his next move, which will include the removal of Mr
Abbas once and for all.
We are on a razor's edge.