March 31,2008: Not much chance that Fatah and Hamas will make peace, and both admit as much. But in the meantime, Egypt is replacing Israel as the nation responsible for Gaza. Egypt will now supply much more (than the current ten percent) electricity to Gaza, and is already controlling the most active land crossings in and out of Gaza. This puts Egypt at more risk, because of the growing number of Islamic terrorists setting up shop in Gaza. Egypt has been battling Islamic terrorists for two decades now, and is currently winning that battle. But if Gaza is allowed to continue on as a terrorist refuge, more of those terrorists will make attacks in Egypt. Hamas does not want to sacrifice reputation (as an Islamic extremist organization) by cracking down on anti-Egypt Islamic terrorists, and the Egyptians don't want more terrorists. This is all leading to an unspoken solution; Egypt taking over Gaza and making it part of Egypt. This is what should have happened sixty years ago. But the Arab world decided otherwise, and have been fighting, and losing, ever since. As part of that failed strategy, Jordan gave up its claims on the West Bank (which was part of Jordan, before being captured by Israel during the 1967 war), once some of the inhabitants invented the concept of being Palestinians. Getting Jordan to take back the West Bank would be difficult, what with all the political poison now flowing through the area.

Rockets are still being fired out of Gaza, into Israel. A dozen or more of the Kassam rockets are landing in Israel each week. In the meantime, Israel continues to hunt down and arrest terrorist leaders in the West Bank. There is a escalating game of cat-and-mouse along the Israel-Gaza border. Israeli patrols and UAVs seek out Hamas terrorists trying to plant bombs, launch rockets or get across the fence. Increasingly, the Israelis are finding targets, and killing them. But Hamas justifies its continued rule of Gaza by constantly trying to kill Israelis. So, to keep Hamas in power, the war must go on.

March 28, 2008: In the West Bank town of Qalqilyah, a feud between two Palestinian clans left three dead and thirteen wounded. Over a hundred Palestinian police were required to restore peace. Armed and aggressive Palestinian clans are becoming more of a problem. The inability of the Palestinians to govern themselves has left the traditional (as in thousands of years old) clan/tribe organization as the only way to run things. But the clans have no easy way to settle disputes between themselves, if only because Fatah, Israel and Hamas all refuse to recognize the power of the heavily armed clans.

March 24, 2008: Egypt released 34 Hamas members who had been arrested for tearing down the Egyptian border fence. This was a good-will gesture to encourage Hamas to make peace with Fatah and Israel.