Mediation plans

Tony Blair, special envoy for the Middle East Quartet, is already mediating. The US, Egypt, Qatar, and the Arab League have offered their services. Now the German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier has left for the region to try and defuse the latest escalation in the interminable Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Talks in Israel and the Palestinian Territories have been set up for Tuesday (15.07.2014).

Will the mission succeed? "At the moment the chances of successful mediation are pretty bad, because we can't reach all the conflict parties directly, and on top of that, they are allowing the conflict to escalate on the backs of the civilian population," said Rolf Mützenich, deputy head of the German Social Democratic Party for foreign policy, defense, and human rights. "At the same time it is the duty of international diplomacy not to let any chance go."

Cautious Security Council

But the United Nations Security Council has already shown how difficult mediation efforts will be. Last Thursday, Israel's UN ambassador Ron Prosor called on the Council to condemn Hamas and its "terrorism."

But the Security Council members could not resolve to do so. The Rwandan UN ambassador Eugene Richard, the council's current chairman, read from a statement on Saturday in which the committee expressed its serious concern over the development of the conflict and the called on both sides to protect civilians. "The Security Council members called for the de-escalation of the situation, the restoration of calm, and the re-institution of the November 2012 ceasefire," the statement said.

Hamas and the Arab League

Whether that will ever happen is doubtful, because the violence is going to be hard to stop, for a variety of reasons. Both conflict parties can rely on international partners to their various positions.

Hamas has the support of the Arab League and its 19 member states, who have condemned the "dangerous Israeli escalation" and described the attacks on Palestinian civilians as "a blatant violation of international humanitarian law."

Nabil al-Arabi, general secretary of the Arab League, took to Twitter to call on the UN Security Council to protect the Palestinians in Gaza. The League is thus backing one of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' central concerns - he wrote to the UN Secretary-General asking for "the state of Palestine to be officially put under UN protection."

Israel relying on the USA

Israel, on the other hand, still has the US on its side. In a telephone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Barack Obama condemned the rocket attacks carried out by Hamas, classified as a terrorist organization by both the US and the European Union. Obama once again reiterated Israel's right to self-defense, the White House confirmed in a statement.

German Foreign Minister Steinmeier also says the current violence was provoked by the Palestinians. "Hamas rocket attacks on Israel have started a spiral of violence that seems impossible to stop," he said in a ministry statement released Sunday. He also wanted to see Israeli and Palestinian civilians protected: "People on both sides are living in constant fear of the next attack. The pictures of the many innocent victims are hard to bear."

Hamas' calculations

It remains unclear whether the suffering of the civilians will move the two warring parties. Israel has not suffered any deaths yet, but it's a different situation in the Gaza Strip, where more than 170 people have been killed by Israeli air strikes. This could move Hamas to stop the violence immediately, or else motivate the organization to attempt further confrontation.

The Palestinian newspaper Al Hayat al-Jadida believes that Hamas will take the second option, and the organization has concrete reasons to do that - not least self-preservation. For one section of Hamas, conflict with Israel is more important than the well-being of Palestinians, the paper wrote.

Meanwhile, Israeli columnist Akiva Eldar wrote in the online magazine Al Monitor that the rockets fired at Israel showed the Palestinians they could at least strike fear into the occupying power. They also know that an invasion would be a huge burden to Israel financially, and the images of dead and injured Palestinians wouldn't do much for the sympathy with Israel. Demonstrators outside the Israeli embassy in Cairo have already called for the ambassador to be expelled.

Israel's costs

The current conflict with Israel brings symbolic as well as economic costs with it - not only that, the images from Gaza could easily lead to attacks from other countries. Rockets have been fired at Israel from Lebanon, and the Egyptian government fears that extremists in Sinai could try to fire shells towards Tel Aviv.

So Israel has reasons to finish the war quickly. Hamas, meanwhile, would seem to have less grounds to stop the violence. If it did, it would probably make demands that would include the central points of previous peace negotiations, such as a two-state solution and the end of settlement building. Israel has not been amenable to these before. Frank-Walter Steinmeier and the other mediators still have much work ahead of them.