Gaza did not fix everything. Our part of the world is still upside down.
Hamas fighters are strutting on the main streets with their weapons, while their leaders proclaim victory from underground shelters.
Like Hassan Nasrallah, their counterpart in Lebanon, they may stay underground for the indefinite future. Perhaps they fear Israel if they peek out to the sunlight, or dare hold a victory rally in the open. Or they may fear the people of Gaza, faced with the rubble of wild promises.
Ban Ki-Moon, the United Nations Secretary General, is visiting Gaza and Sderot. He laments violence against civilians in both places, but only in Gaza does he call it totally unacceptable, requiring international investigations and charges of war crimes against those responsible.
Israel survived Kofi Anan's tantrums. It will still be here when Ban Ki-Moon is collecting his pension.
One should not expect much better. With a third of the world Muslim, and much of that off the rails of rationality, one must expect persistent claims of victory from the likes of Hamas, Hizbollah, and Iran, as well as condemnation from United Nations personnel beholden to the votes they can muster.
The noise does not make for gaiety in the Promised Land, even though we are doing better than those claiming victory in Lebanon and Gaza.
The latest sign of Israeli caution, also against the grain of what is happening elsewhere, appears in the responses to a query on a popular web site:
21 percent of 6,000 respondents answered that "Obama's swearing-in fills me with hope for a better future"
43 percent answered that "Obama's swearing-in fills me with dread for the future of Israel and the world"
36 percent answered that "I don't have expectations and therefore will not be disappointed."
Saudi Arabia pledged $1 billion to rebuild Gaza, Kuwait a quarter of that, Dubai a bit less than Kuwait, and Bangladesh $20,000. If there is a repeat of past financial pledges to Palestine, substantially less than those amounts will leave the pockets of the donors, and an impressive portion of that which leaves their pockets will end up in the pockets of well placed Palestinians.
Oil is back into the $30s. Along with recent events, that might limit Iran's inclination to make another sizable investment.
European governments are talking about aid, not to Hamas but to the "official" government of Mahmoud Abbas. Should we remind them that his term has expired?
For some time to come, Gaza is likely to be an organizational as well as a physical mess.
Palestinian suffering does not make me happy, except that keeping busy with scrounging money, and rebuilding, may keep them away from rocket launchers.
I welcome comments sent to my e-mail address, below.
Ira Sharkansky (Emeritus)
Dept of Political Science
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
msira@mscc.huji.ac.il
Tel: +972-2-532-2725
Fax: +972-2-582-9144