* From JPost: ‘IDF Evacuates Palestinian Families After Gaza Floods’
IDF forces assisted in evacuating three Palestinian families after their homes were flooded near the Kissufim crossing in Gaza after heavy rains on Tuesday.
Lt.-Col. Ya’acov Shalomov, head of the district coordinating office in the south Gaza district, said the area where the homes were flooded is known for its constant terrorist activity, where bombs and shooting attacks are daily occurrences.
“Tuesday’s assistance was purely humanitarian, despite the dangers involved,” he said.
* Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom says the world must oust Syria from Lebanon:
The Syrian army has occupied Lebanon since 1976. “A million Syrians work in Lebanon and the thriving Lebanese narcotics industry is intended solely for the purposes of the Syrian Ba’ath people,” Shalom said.
* Bradley Burston of Haaretz on ‘The Damage Suicide Bombings Do to Palestinians’:
Nothing has done more to tarnish the image of the Palestinian national movement than suicide bombings. Nothing has done more to align Palestinians in the foreign – especially the American – mind with the likes of al-Qaeda. Nothing has done more to alienate Israelis from the Palestinian cause. Nothing has done more to fortify the argument that with suicide bombings, Palestinians make no distinction between Tel Aviv and Tel Romeida [in Hebron] – nor between Israeli soldiers, settlers, or leftist bleeding-hearts – and that their true goal is the eradication of the entirety of the Jewish state and the annihilation or exile of its non-Arab inhabitants.
* Haaretz has an interview with Prof. Jeremy Rabkin of Cornell on the judgement of the security fence at The Hague. Says Rabkin:
“It is important to view this as a political challenge and not as a legal challenge. The only reason Israel has to fear such a procedure is that it would cause it negative headlines in the international press.”
