The NY Times examines developments in the last several days and wonders if Israeli-Palestinian relations and chaos within the PA can really be called “calm.”
Measuring by the sharp drop in deaths, there is cause for optimism. But factoring in the almost daily bombings and shootings that fail or are headed off, there is reason for skepticism.
Since Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, called for an end to it at a Feb. 8 summit meeting, the violence has approached the lowest levels since the current fighting resumed four and a half years ago.
There have been no deaths on either side in a week, an exceedingly rare occurrence. Yet it was hardly a week of calm, as Palestinian militants staged several attacks and Israeli security forces carried out a new round of arrests in the West Bank.
Reporter Greg Myre notes internal Palestinian fighting, a car bomb, the discovery of a weapons lab, another weapons seizure, the Tel Aviv bombing, and the attempted assassination of the PA’s own Interior Minister.
