TEL AVIV — Israel has concluded Hamas will fully
control the Gaza Strip by 2006.
Israeli security officials said Hamas has already gained control over
large areas of the Gaza Strip. They said Hamas forces have taken over
several towns and could complete the process in 2006.
"Hamas no longer listens to the Palestinian Authority," Israel Security
Agency director Yuval Diskin said on Sept. 21. "It is a well-oiled
organization that is seen as effective and not corrupt."
Officials linked the Hamas rise to Fatah's decline in the Gaza Strip, Middle East Newsline reported.
They said Fatah has been splintered by corruption and power struggles, with
many operatives joining other Palestinian insurgency groups as well as
criminal gangs.
Diskin said the PA proved incapable of stopping Hamas and suggested that
such a task could be undertaken only by Egypt. He said Hamas was not gearing
for victory in Palestinian Legislative Council elections in January 2006,
rather would seek to achieve what he termed a respectable showing.
Officials said Hamas would assume much of the Palestinian administration
of the Gaza Strip in wake of Israel's withdrawal from the area. They said
Hamas would increase political and security control amid the failure by PA
Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to confront insurgency groups.
Israel Security Agency deputy director Ofer Dekel Dekel said Abbas has
more than 63,000 security officers under his command. But Abbas has refused
to use the officers to impose order in either the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
"His messages to the [security] apparatus are confusing," Dekel told the
Herzliya-based Institute for Counter-Terrorism on Sept. 14. "He is not
willing to confront [Hamas]."
In two rounds of elections in 2005, Hamas has gained control of
municipalities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and enforced regulations
meant to bolster Islam. The measures have included a ban on music festivals
and mixed theater. Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar has pledged to also outlaw
contacts with Israel.
"For Hamas, which is a conspiratorial, secret [organization] such a move
is dramatic," Dekel said. "It shows the direction it seeks to take —
increasing influence — and that is political."
"Nothing has been done until now by the Palestinian Authority against
those terrorists, against those generators of terror that deliberately build
their factories within neighborhoods and refugee camps," former ISA director
Avi Dichter told the Washington-based Brooking Institution on Sept. 22.
Amos Gilad, director of the Defense Ministry's political-military
division, agreed. He envisioned a Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip and West
Bank that would include the establishment of a massive Islamic militia.
"Their [Hamas] strategy is to take power by stages," Gilad said. "They
will also try to establish an alternative army."
