– Reflections on Sderot as EU pays visit to grieving town (Jerusalem Post):
Once they were ensconced in their plastic chairs, Asiris Abebeh handed Hensch (an EU representative), who led the delegation, a parcel wrapped in tissue paper. The little black nuggets inside looked like dates. But as Hensch examined them, the grieving mother explained that they were shrapnel from the rocket that killed her baby …
“We are working people; we don’t need to be buried in ice cream and chocolate and visits by VIPs,” said Gila Vazana ,who owns Star Felafel near city hall. “Our major problem is not poverty, or a loss of dignity, but Kassams. That’s all.”
– “Get down from the roof, you crazies”/ What’s wrong with the Palestinians? (Ha’aretz):
Why, every time the door opens a crack for some Israeli compromise or concession, do the Palestinians suddenly have this urge to maim and kill? Why, after the Oslo Accords, which Israel went through hell and high water to approve, did they unleash a campaign of bloody terror? Why did they launch another wave of terror at the split second that another opportunity arose for a settlement brokered by President Clinton at Camp David? Why is every senior American peacemaker sent here always greeted by a terror attack that sabotages the mission even before it begins?
Why, when the patriarch of the settlements decides to disengage from Gaza, have the Palestinians gone on a rampage? Why are they attacking, ambushing, and wildly shooting Kassam rockets at Sderot? I say Palestinians, and not Hamas, because the PA has more power and say-so than we think. If the PA didn’t want Sderot bombarded, it wouldn’t be.
– A way out of Fallujah and Gaza (Editorial, Wall Street Journal Europe, 5 Oct 04) :
Another important battle against terrorism is unfolding as Israeli troops fight Palestinians in Gaza to stop them from firing rockets into Israel. The offensive began after an attack killed two Israeli toddlers on Wednesday. In five days of fighting, more than 60 Palestinians, most of them believed to be terrorists, died as the Israelis carved out a security zone.
One of the things that sets this incursion apart from similar Israeli military campaigns in the past is Europe’s rather muted reaction. While normally jumping on every opportunity to criticize the Jewish state for trying to protect its citizens, most European capitals have so far remained unusually silent. “The international response did not rise to the anticipated minimum level of expectations,” Arafat adviser Saeb Erekat complained.
Many Europeans though still make an artificial distinction between Hamas and the global threat of Islamic terrorism. “It’s the occupation, stupid,” is the catch phrase of a worldview that pretends Hamas’s quarrel is with Israel’s size rather than its existence – even though Hamas has never concealed that its ultimate goal is to destroy Israel.
The decision by Prime Minister Sharon to withdraw all settlements from Gaza – unilaterally and without waiting for a Palestinian partner to emerge to sign a deal – was a further blow to the charade that Hamas’s terror was in any way a legitimate resistance to end the occupation. If that were the case, Hamas would stop its attacks now, at least from Gaza.
Hamas’s murderous ideology means the oft-repeated mantra that there is no “military solution” to this conflict is plain wrong. The opposite is true – just as al-Qaeda and its global networks must be defeated, only a military solution can end the Palestinian terror. And thanks to improved intelligence, targeted assassinations, and the security barrier, the Israelis are saying that it can be done.
Just as the Iraqi and American troops in Samarra and Fallujah must be allowed to fight until victory, so must Israel be allowed to finish off Hamas. Without these “military solutions” there is no hope for peace, neither in Iraq nor between Israelis and Palestinians.
