最新时事英文版(三十八).docVIP

Who Wins，Who Loses if Israel Ends Its Gaza Siege？ Israels announcement that it will end its prohibition on a wide variety of civilian goods entering Gaza marks the collapse of the Israeli strategy to topple the territorys Hamas rulers through economic warfare. The Islamists who rule the tiny coastal strip will count the announcement as a victory simply because they survived the siege. So will Turkey, which backed the activist flotilla whose challenge to the siege ended in bloodshed — and set off the diplomatic firestorm that precipitated Israels about-face. The move marks Israel conceding that its Gaza strategy has failed to achieve its goal, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu disowned the blockade on Monday, stressing in his remarks to parliament that it was a policy hed inherited from his predecessors. That the blockade collapsed under pressure is also an embarrassment for the Obama Administration because Turkeys more muscular challenge will be seen throughout the region to have forced a change in Israeli behavior — something that Obamas polite entreaties have failed to achieve. (The President had urged the Israelis more than a year ago to ease the siege, to little effect.) Others with egg on their faces include Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Egypts President Hosni Mubarak, both of whom had tacitly but firmly backed the blockade in the hope of toppling Hamas and whose diminished relevance to events in the region has been highlighted by the blockade debacle. The U.S. as well as the Europeans welcomed the Israeli announcement as a first step toward normalizing economic life in Gaza, but they also noted that the shift would be judged by Israels deeds rather than words. If in fact Israel changes its current blockade policy — from prohibiting everything from entering Gaza, except for a limited range of items on a secret list, to allowing all traffic except for proscribed military items — it would also mean giving up on the political strategy of s