30-Jun-06: Ashkelon

Journalists who continue to knowingly perpetrate the lethal nonsense that "home-made" Qassam rockets are of little danger to Israelis can skip this item. Some time yesterday, a Qassam rocket fired from Gaza reached the southern part of Ashkelon, in the vicinity of the city's cemetery and right next to the Givat Zion residential neighbourhood. The rocket itself failed to explode, but this particular dud demonstrates persuasively the steadily increasing range of the missiles used by the terror groups. Ashkelon police say the Qassam had a 155 millimeter diameter, like those found previously. This is the furthest north that a Gaza-fired Qassam has reached until now. Ashkelon is a Mediterranean city of about 100,000 people.

30-Jun-06: Two Funerals

At the Asheri funeral

Along with several thousand other people, we went to the quiet and very painful funeral in Jerusalem yesterday of a boy of 18.

He was a spiritual young man who enjoyed being alone in the hills. He impressed all who knew him as a gentle soul, in touch with nature and in love with the land of Israel. His name is Eliyahu Pinchas Asheri, and like the prophet Elijah whose name he shares, he was borne heavenwards in a fiery whirlwind. The whirlwind that took this sweet young man was an act of murder in cold blood at the hands of Palestinian Arabs. No provocation; no reason beyond the simple fact of his being a Jew and the Arabs being filled with hatred and in a position to kill him. That's all it takes.

His parents spoke at the funeral - each of them a broken vessel, grieving and lost. The Asheris spoke in gentle tones, asking their son to intercede with the master of the universe, begging him to bring peace. They spoke about the future - a better future, a future of peace between Israel and its neighbours, between Israel and its Maker. In the picture above, his mother Miriam in a blue dress, ripped at the front to symbolize her loss, stands by the simple stretcher (no coffins in Israeli funerals) on which his lifeless body rests. Her dignity, and that of her husband, were simply inspiring.

Judy Lash Balint was there too:

There were no shouts for revenge; no machine guns fired into the air; no religious figures whipping up the crowd into a frenzy of hatred. Only the soft sounds of weeping from dozens of girls and women and the flipping of pages of Tehillim (Psalms) as speaker after speaker poured out their anguish at the loss of another young soul to the barbarity of Arab terror.

In another place, 90 minutes drive from here, there was another funeral yesterday: different people, different atmosphere, different everything. Reuters provided us with some pictures - see the picture below. Yes, there was a mother, might have been a father, certainly plenty of bereaved friends and probably family. But this one was a lot noisier - guns firing into the air, participants screaming for anger and revenge. The dead person in this funeral was called Mohammed Abdel Al, "a member [in fact a leader] of the ultra hardline militant group Islamic Jihad [who] was with a group of other activists near Gaza's disbanded airport when an Israeli helicopter gunship opened fire at a cell of militants which tried to fire an anti-tank missile at troops based around the airport" according to The Independent.

[Is this the person with a similar name mentioned in yesterday's report (29-Jun-06: The Face of the Enemy)? We can only hope.]

In simpler terms: a terrorist murderer, a leader of the notorious Islamic Jihad which has more innocent blood on its hands than almost any other terror group.

When the mainstream media give you a photo, you may think you understand what's being depicted. Often, however, you don't. Superficially, these two pictures depict similar moments in people's lives, the grief of a mother, tears and sadness. But the differences between the two are profound and extreme. The differences are far more important than the similarities.

29-Jun-06: The Face of the Enemy

Reporters from the mainstream media assembled yesterday in Gaza City for a press conference given by a self-admitted terrorist-kidnapper. The gathering's purpose was to advance the terrorists' war by asserting that an eighteen year-old Israeli student, Eliyahu Asheri, snatched by terrorists on Sunday, would be murdered by them if Israel did not immediately cease to do this or start doing that etc.

Mohammed Abdel Al, a spokesman for the Popular Resistance Committees, a violent group with ties to the Hamas-led Palestinian government, holds up a poster he said shows the Israeli identity card of abducted Jewish settler Eliahu Pinchas Asheri during a news conference in Gaza City, Wednesday, June 28, 2006. The PRC on Wednesday threatened to kill Asheri if Israel doesn't stop its raid on the Gaza Strip.(AP Photo/Hatem Moussa)

It's now evident (on Thursday morning) that Eliyahu Asheri, son of Miriam and Yitro (Yitro moved to Israel from Australia at about the same time we did) had been dead for several days by the time the man in the picture above made his cynical speech and contemptuously waved his photographs. We wonder whether this still qualifies him to be called 'militant' (as most media channels did yesterday) or whether 'terrorist', 'kidnapper', 'murderer' or 'savage' are ever pressed into service as descriptors. We'll know the next time his PRC terrorist group calls another press conference.

The moral agnosticism (some would call it blindness) of reporters and editors who persist in referring to lying, murdering thugs like the man in the picture as 'militants' is at the very heart of the rampant confusion and ignorance that surrounds this ongoing conflict.

28-Jun-06: A Sight We've Long Wanted to See

Israeli forces, responding to the incessant bombing of civilian settlements within firing range of Gaza, today - finally - destroy a warehouse in Gaza filled to the rafters with Qassam missiles. The AP picture at right is captioned thus:

Rockets stored by Palestinian militants in a warehouse in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, burn after an Israeli airstrike on the building Wednesday, June 28, 2006. Israeli aircraft launched air strikes on an empty militants' training camp and on an empty field in Rafah on Wednesday afternoon, Palestinian security officials said. No casualties were reported.(AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)

No victims, no real damage, just a burning mass of destroyed implements of terrorist death. Kol hakavod le-Zahal.

28-Jun-06: A Government of Kidnappers

As we've noted before, kidnapping is one of many terror tactics the Palestinians have never hesitated to use. But to judge from the way the mainstream media are covering the snatching of Corporal Gilad Shalit from the Kerem Shalom army post, and of the yeshiva student Eliyahu Asheri, the penny hasn't dropped yet. They're failing to see, or at least to report, how deeply Hamas - as the duly elected government of the Palestinian Arabs - is complicit in these acts of terror and in endless others. Here's an example to make the point, courtesy of Palestine Media Watch, of the published words of Saed Siam (see picture above), a member of the Palestinian parliament, the PA's Interior Minister and Minister of Civil Affairs, the Hamas government's designated person responsible for locating the kidnapped Israeli soldier, and a man evidently capable of smirking out of both sides of his mouth at the same time:

In the past Hamas succeeded in kidnapping many Zionist soldiers. There are thousands of prisoners of our forces, they have to think how to free these prisoners. And I believe that it is inevitable to kidnap soldiers to exchange for them. In the past Hamas kidnapped 10 soldiers. There is nothing the resistance cannot do. And when there is a goal and a good plan, the goal can be achieved, especially about the prisoner issue, [which] is top priority. During the PA administration, Hamas succeeded in kidnapping and hiding bodies, but unfortunately, two bodies were handed over for nothing. When there is a kidnapping, and it is secured, each case in its own time, has its own negotiations."

PMW have helpfully provided streaming video of Interior Minister Siam speaking these words.

The thugs of Hamas have gotten a free ride from too many people for too long. And the many foreign politicians who extend the customary diplomatic respectfulness to them are being played for fools.

27-Jun-06: Gazans and Explosives

For us Israelis, the cold-blooded way Palestinian terrorists do their disgusting work right in the midst of their home towns, streets and beaches is beyond comprehension. Here at home on our computer we have dozens of published photographs of Palestinian gunmen firing at Israelis from inside circles of gawking children - perhaps their own nieces, nephews, brothers, sisters or children.

It's sickening to an extent that's matched only by their crocodile tears (our apologies to all crocodiles) when Arab children are injured by Israeli fire directed at the gunmen who operate from residential areas and children's playgrounds.

The news media's fascination with the fairly-obviously-staged video of a Gaza girl shrieking at the sight of her dead family two weeks ago has caused a lot of people to stop and think again about what's real and what's fake. Fake is not a word to throw around easily when people are lying dead on the ground and little children are wailing inconsolably. But sometimes fake is the only word.

And in case that's hard to swallow, here's a picture taken today and put out on the news wire by Associated Press. The caption says

Palestinian militants set up an explosive device into a mount of sand in preparation for a possible Israeli army ground operation at the Jebaliy refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip Tuesday June 27, 2006. (AP Photo/Wesam Saleh, MaanImages)

Children all around. Beach sand loosely covering a lethal explosive device. Thugs performing for the cameras. All in the name of defeating a not-yet-present Israeli enemy. Just another day in a fifty-eight year-old "refugee camp". (Similar pictures here and here.)

What we want to know is who's going to prevent the highly-probable accidents from happening in this particular Gaza sandpit while Wesam Saleh and his performing terror stooges sit around waiting for the Zionist enemy to show up?

Update: Just to illustrate the point about how the cold-blooded manipulation-of-images game is played, the ever-hostile AFP photo agency has conveniently republished the heartrending snaps of the orphaned Gaza beach girl in the past hour. Go here to see.

26-Jun-06: "We Know What To Do..."

It's been a day of clenched-teeth speeches: the Israeli prime minister and a host of senior military figures, reacting to yesterday's tunnel-borne attack on an Israeli miitary post on sovereign Israeli territory say - literally in some cases, figuratively in others - we know what we have to do, we're doing it (or we're going to do it real soon); and the bad people had better watch out.
Meanwhile, irrespective of whether Israel really is about to unrestrain itself, here's some of what the bad people have been doing this afternoon and this evening:

• A Palestinian terror group says it kidnapped an Israeli tonight, this time somewhere in the vicinity of Nablus. If true (and no one on the Israeli side is confirming it at this stage) it would be the second kidnapping of an Israeli by a Palestinian terror group in as many days. For what it's worth, the gang claiming victory this time, according to Yediot Aharonot, is the Popular Resistance Committee.
• The PRC says it plans to keep on kidnapping. And why not? Activities of that kind enhance the appeal of their 'resistance' struggle in certain quarters. They establish beyond doubt the fitness of their compatriots to have a state and to manage it, and affirm the depths of their 'desperation' as well as their membership in the ranks of the world's liberation movements. Of course, there is a different way of looking at this: there's neither morality nor politics in their hideous hatred - they're little more than thugs for whom anything that hurts the other side must, by definition, be good.
  
• At around 10 tonight, there are reports of a terrorist infiltration in the area of Kibbutz Nahal Oz, an Israeli community close to the northern end of the Gaza border.
• Qassam missiles have been fired repeatedly this evening from Gaza into several Israeli communities.
• There's a report of a civilian injured by one such Qassam missile landing in battered Sderot tonight. The same missile causes a power blackout in Sderot's southern suburbs.
  
• And a separate report that 4 people are injured in Sderot by shattered glass after another Qassam rocket lands in the area. Magen David Adom paramedics evacuate the injured to Barzilai hospital in Ashkelon. Paramedics also treat two patients with heart conditions. 11 people suffer from shock and are treated at the scene (Ynet).
• There's a heightened state of terror alert in various parts of the country. The police have established an enlarged presence in and around Jerusalem; in the areas close to where undisputed Israel and the Judea and Samaria areas meet; and in crowded public areas; all of this according to Israel Radio tonight. Checkpoints are being set up on an unannounced basis in many locations.
• The Israel Prison Service has its personnel on elevated alert in response to the general state of agitation. The Palestinian 'street' is in a state of excitement now that the kidnappers of Corporal Gilad Shalit have stated their terms - which include the release of all female Palestinian terrorists from Israeli jails. Meanwhile family prison visits are suspended.
• Israeli vehicles are stoned and/or shot tonight at various locations in Judea and Samaria.
• Islamic Jihad says it's developed a new rocket with a longer-range for use against Israeli civilian targets, according to Israel's Channel 1 news tonight. They call it the "Quds 4" and claim a range of 20 kilometers, three times longer than conventional Qassams. Sderot is about an hour's drive from Tel-Aviv and Jerusalem, so longer missile range, if true, really means something in this part of the world.
  

What's especially irritating to us about all of this escalation and bad language is how certain corners of the foreign media seem unable to withhold their gloating. Their message seems to be: finally, those uppity Israelis are being cut down a notch. The Melbourne Age, which we watch closely for old times' sake, seems especially prone to this.

But we're not persuaded. We would really like someone smart and incisive to explain to us how resurgent, aggressive Palestinian terror actions make things better for anyone. It's always been clear to most Israelis that Israeli military restraint is a policy of choice, not necessity; at any moment, the restraint can be eased and some really serious damage can be done to the fabric of Palestinian Arab life, not to mention the physical health and well-being of individual high-profile Palestinian figures. The enormous ring of Israeli armour deployed tonight at all points around the Gaza border (see the picture above) gives palpable physicality to that aspect of the asymmetry between the two sides.

The irresistable conclusion - at least for us - is that the thugocracy of the Hamas-led PA actually wants more suffering for their people, and sees some kind of long-term benefit in this.

A more demented view of political leadership would be hard to conjure up. These are not uplifting times.

26-Jun-06: Prayers for Welfare of Kidnapped Israeli Soldier

Gilad Shalit is the wounded Israeli soldier grabbed and dragged into Gaza in yesterday's attack on the Kerem Shalom military post. At the Western Wall plaza in Jerusalem's Old City yesterday, a large crowd of worshippers gathered to say prayers on his behalf. His Hebrew name is Gilad ben Aviva.

Anshel Pfeffer, writing in today's Jerusalem Post, provides some interesting insights into how the Israeli military views the seizing of one of its soldiers. The moral and ethical difference between Israel's approach and that of our neighbours could hardly be more pronounced:

It's talked about in hushed voices during the dead hours before dawn of a particularly lonely guard shift: "Nohal Hannibal" - the Hannibal Directive - the rumored standard procedure in the eventuality of an IDF soldier being captured.

In such a case, soldiers are told (although never officially) that their comrades will be given the order to rain fire on the abduction team, without consideration for the poor soldier's life. The underlying rationale is that the nation can bear the deaths of soldiers, but not the uncertain fate of a captured serviceman.

Exactly 30 years after the heroic rescue of Air France hostages from Entebbe by an airborne IDF force, Israel still suffers from a hostage complex. Ongoing warfare at varying levels, which has been Israel's norm for its entire modern history - including hostage-taking, soldiers missing-in-action and others held as prisoners-of-war - are all a tragic part of the normal scheme of things. Israel regularly captures hundreds of terrorists and other prisoners, and so, the IDF's superiority notwithstanding, it can't be illogical for things to also happen the other way around.

But when it does happen, the system is totally unprepared for the shock. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced Sunday that he had given orders not to negotiate over Cpl. Gilad Shalit's life, while it's clear that, if offered a quick diplomatic way out of the tangle, Israel will take it. Or isn't that the reason that Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni is ringing up UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan?

Defense Minister Amir Peretz warned anyone who has any influence over Shalit's fate that "his blood will be on his and his leaders' heads," although Peretz is the last person who will sanction a series of summary revenge killings.

And it's not only the miscalculated bluster of politicians. The media is also treating the capture as the central event at Kerem Shalom, much worse than the deaths of Lt. Hanan Barak and St.-Sgt. Pavel Slotsker or the humiliation of the IDF by terrorists.

Once again it's the Entebbe syndrome. Israel still hasn't learned how to come to terms with a situation where a soldier, or even a citizen, is in enemy hands. The first instinct is to launch a hurriedly prepared operation, like the one that failed to rescue Golani Brigade soldier Nachshon Wachsman in October 1994 and resulted in the death of one of his would-be rescuers, Nir Poraz. When that proves to be impossible, due to a lack of intelligence or the fact that the prisoners have been spirited away to Beirut or some other inaccessible hole, the leadership suddenly loses its backbone and is prepared to pay almost any price. That's how Hizbullah got dozens of live members back in exchange for the bodies of three soldiers, and the return of Elhanan Tannenbaum, who in 2004 had allegedly been tricked into going to Beirut in the hope of carrying out a drug deal.

While dozens of Kassam rockets fell daily on Sderot and the neighboring kibbutzim for months and, miraculously, casualties haven't been serious, the missiles haven't warranted a major operation in the Gaza Strip. If Sunday's raid on the IDF outpost had failed, the IDF would probably not be poised to strike now. But because the Palestinians have captured a soldier, the situation has changed completely.

But should that warrant an operation that might drastically alter the balance between Israel and the Palestinians as well as among the Palestinians themselves and almost definitely exact a heavy price in Israeli and Palestinian lives?

25-Jun-06: The Difference Between Terrorists and Soldiers

This morning's assault on an Israeli position by three Gazan terror squads brought about the deaths of two IDF soldiers. A third soldier was snatched, alive and wounded, and dragged back to Gaza as a hostage via an 800-meter tunnel stretching into israel from Gaza. This tunnel represents weeks and possibly months of work, confounding headlines like that in Melbourne's Age newspaper that the sneak attack was somehow payback for civilian deaths in the past week.

For decades, Israel has had to deal with an enemy which kidnaps and holds to ransom any Israeli unlucky enough to fall into their clutches. No one seriously holds the terror gangs to any international standard like the Geneva Convention - though why this should be is not so clear to us. At any rate, the identity of the parties responsible is well-enough known to warrant a specific form of response.

This afternoon, the IDF Chief of Staff Dan Halutz reports to a deeply worried nation that, as far the army is aware, the kidnapped soldier is alive. Halutz tells a press conference:

Hamas is involved in this matter from head to foot, literally. The soldier is alive, and therefore they bear responsibility for his fate.

The so-called Popular Resistance Committees, one of the three terror gangs vying for credit for this morning's act of war, tell a Gaza radio station that the Israeli soldier, Gilad Shilat, has stomach wounds but is in stable condition.

May Hashem protect him from these barbarians, and bring his rescuers quickly and safely to his side.

25-Jun-06: A Real Shooting War

A report by Haaretz correspondent Avi Issacharoff this morning says that Fatah and Hamas agreed last night on a number of policy issues, including (in Haaretz's words) limiting "resistance" operations against Israel to territories occupied since 1967.

Without getting into an analysis of what self-serving "joint" declarations of this sort mean in reality, we can simply observe that there's a long history of mischief and media ignorance that surrounds the whole subject. A fairly typical indication can be gotten from what's happening this morning on Israel's border with Gaza.

Taking a temporary break from bombarding kindergartens, schools and shopping centers, gunmen of the Gaza "resistance" crossed into Israel early this morning, evidently via a tunnel. Haaretz says the Gazan terrorists split into three groups. One of them fired an anti-tank missile at an Israeli tank, injuring three soldiers. A second fired a missile into an IDF pillbox in the Kerem Shalom area; and a third blew up an armored personnel carrier which was empty at the time. (We have posted an agency picture of the area above). Kerem Shalom, also the name of a kibbutz in the area, is Hebrew for "vineyard of peace". At least three of the gunmen are now dead following an exhange of fire with Israeli forces.

Nothing happens faster in the Middle East than the claiming of credit when Israeli targets are attacked, so Izz a Din al Qassam, which is one of the acknowledged (as distinct from unacknowledged) affiliates of Hamas, and the so-called People's Resistance Committees (PRC) which are also part of Hamas, and something relatively unknown called the Islamic Army, are all out there with press releases and candies.

The IDF says it has now warned "Palestinian security units to evacuate the Philadelphi Route along Gaza's southern border with Egypt in the Rafah area, saying Israeli military units were to enter" according to Haaretz. Yediot points out:

Since the IDF pullout from Gaza, soldiers foiled attempts of dozens of terror cells to carry out a terror attack on the border fence in the Strip. The cells attempted to place an explosive device or fire at forces patrolling the area. In most cases, the cells were spotted in time by IDF soldiers, sometimes with the assistance of the Israel Air Force. IDF sources noted that in spite of the fact that attacks were foiled and the difficulty terrorists have encountered when trying to carry out attacks. So far, more than 50 terrorists were killed on the border fence.

Our predictions:

• No foreign media report will connect the Fatah/Hamas tale of confining "resistance" to occupied territory. If they did, they would need to acknowledge that all of Israel is occupied in the eyes of the terror groups, and that Kerem Shalom and the entire border between Israel and Gaza is neither occupied nor disputed.
• If and when Israeli forces cross into Gaza to neutralize those who carried out this morning's attack, the photo coverage will be of Gaza mothers and children and of destroyed buildings. A balanced context (the months of endless missile barrages fired into Israeli civilian communities; Israeli civilian casualties and property damage on a daily basis; a co-ordinated military-style attack this morning on territory that no one considers disputed; a history of Egyptian forces, who are permanently present in the immediate vicinity of Kerem Shalom, turning a blind eye to terrorist tunnels and deployment) will be entirely absent.

We'll be happy to be proven wrong.

24-Jun-06: The Acts of Terrorism Continue

At about 9.30 tonight, a Qassam missile is fired from northern Gaza and lands in an open field in the western Negev, north of Sderot. There are no reports of injuries or damage. A second Qassam is reported to have been fired at about 11.30pm - no indication of damage or injuries at this stage.

23-Jun-06: A Reminder of the Context

It's always timely to try to put events into perspective, particularly when the mainline media do such a fine job of ignoring it. So - here's some perspective:

• An unofficial list of Israeli victims of Arab terrorism from 1952 onwards. Terrorism only started because of Palestinian desperation over Israeli occupation? Check the facts and weep.
• The National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism has an extraordinary database of terrorist incidents all over the world. 20,000 of them, and counting.
• The Foreign Ministry of Israel maintains a database of Israeli victims of Arab terrorism since the start of the Second Arafat War, September 2000
• The Worldwide Terror Attacks database of the US National Counterterrorism Center
• Database of terror attacks committed worldwide by Jihadists (this list tracks only the past 6 months)

23-Jun-06: Business as Usual

Three more Qassam rockets are fired this morning into Israel's western Negev region. All of them land in open areas and cause no injuries or damage. Yesterday afternoon, a Qassam landed near Sderot, and crashed into some agricultural hothouses, causing property damage.

An indication of the cloud-cuckoo-land approach of some to these daily acts of lethal violence can be gotten from a report we saw yesterday on the JPost.com website. Under the heading 'Kassams aren't meant to kill', this is an interview with the mayor of one of the Gaza towns most involved in firing explosives into Israeli civilian areas. His response is a classic reality-reversal: the Gazans are the victims, and it's their children who suffer when "the resistance" fire those Qassams into Israeli schools and homes. Here's the full text:

Mohammad Kafarna is a sheikh, a Ph.D. professor of the Arabic language, and a member of Hamas's political wing. Since February 2005 he is also the mayor of Beit Hanun, a job that has become practically mission impossible.

Violence and poverty plague his city of some 30,000. Unemployment is at 70%, physical abuse within families is increasing, and political factions and extended families are fighting and killing each other. Making things worse, the town, which faces Sderot across the 1967 border, has been shelled continuously by Israel for the last few months in response to Palestinian rockets being fired from its neighborhoods at Sderot, causing fear, destruction and sometimes death.

Eli Moyal, the mayor of Sderot, has said Beit Hanun should be wiped out if necessary to stop the Kassam fire. "You think this will solve the problem?" Kafarna responded. "And is it just?"

While Israel blames the Palestinians for initiating and maintaining the cross-border fire, the 40-year-old mayor, in an interview with The Jerusalem Post in his municipality office Wednesday, echoed other Palestinians in blaming Israel. "The mayor of Sderot is upset about the rockets?" he asked rhetorically. "And we are not upset that he wants to destroy our town? Which is easier, stopping the shooting on Beit Hanun or demolishing the city? You think the weak is the one hurting the strong. We are the hand trying to stop the sword."

The consequences of the fire, said the mayor, were not only harmful to those directly and physically affected. "Our children are not children. They don't enjoy their childhood. They play with toy guns. The culture of violence exists in them." Increased domestic violence was also a direct consequence of the shelling, he said.
While Kafarna said he favored "quiet and stability," he also defended the Palestinians' right to attack Israel. "It is the right of the people who were hurt to fight for their rights," he said. "Doesn't the Israeli citizen kill others to get his rights and to preserve his security? So why does he deny this to others?"

Still, Kafarna said that if Israel would stop shooting on Beit Hanun, he might be able to convince the "resistance" to stop shooting at Sderot. "We hope that the mayor of Sderot will pressure his government to stop the shelling on Beit Hanun, to give me the opportunity to talk to the resistance to stop shooting on Sderot," he said, adding, "But how do you want me to talk to the resistance when there is bombing from Sderot on Beit Hanun? It's not patriotic."

A more sober and realistic view of things can be gotten from this statistic. The number of explosive missiles fired by Arab terrorists - like the Hamas colleagues of Dr Kafarna and others - into Israel from Gaza since the Israeli presence in Gaza ended last summer (the so-called "disengagement") now stands at more than 500.

22-Jun-06: Swimming to Glory

Media coverage of inadvertent injuries and deaths of Gazan Arabs stemming from Israeli anti-terror action tends to overshadow other news reportage from the area these days. And especially reporting about the ongoing terror warfare against Israeli society - but there's little new in that sad state of affairs.

This morning, far from the headlines, two Arabs - possibly Palestinian Arabs, but no one knows at this stage - are spotted swimming off a southern Gaza beach. This is an area where Gaza meets Egyptian territory; swimming is strictly prohibited here for very clear security reasons. Sailors on an Israeli naval vessel observe that the Arabs are dragging sacks with them. The security forces have no need to be told of the long history of weapons of terrorism - the kind principally directed at Israeli civilians - entering Gaza this way. Warning shots are fired at the Arabs as they swim from the Egyptian side of Rafah towards Gaza and there are signs that at least one of them is hurt. The other evidently disposes of the sacks and escapes. This is followed by more directed fire. There is a separate report from Palestinian sources in Gaza Strip that one of the two Palestinians described as having been shot while trying to smuggle weapons from Egypt to the Strip is in good condition in a Rafah hospital.

Still no report about the sacks or about the other Palestinian. Parties interested in learning his identity are advised to check the PA's official list of 'Al-Aqsa martyrs' in coming days. That's where the government-sponsored Palestinian Authority website lists the names of its deceased heros, including our daughter's murderer. Scroll down to martyr/murderer number 601 to see how Palestinian society relates to its terrorist murderers when it thinks no one is looking.

19-Jun-06: Snapshot from the Local Battlefront

This week's edition of Newsweek, in an article entitled "The Gangs of Gaza: Killers are on the loose in the Palestinian territories..." provides readers with a report on the way things are in the arms bazaar of this troubled neighbourhood:

"A Palestinian arms dealer in Ramallah, who wished to remain anonymous as he offered to sell NEWSWEEK an unsolicited MP5 submachine gun, says that the price of a U.S.-made M-16 on the black market has doubled, from $5,000 to $10,000, since Hamas took power. "Hamas is buying like crazy," the dealer says."

Let's try to clarify that for the benefit of those ostriches with their heads in the ground who continue to maintain that the thugs of Hamas are in the midst of some sort of truce and are busy getting on with trying to solve the daily needs of their people (we meet people who match this description all the time): Hamas is buying weapons - killing implements - like crazy.

Meanwhile, the Reuters agency picture at right of a Hamas "activist" in Nablus six days ago serves as a small reminder of what one of those crazy customers looks like after those $10,000 - from an organization that claims to have been bankrupted by Europe, the United States and the accursed Israelis - have changed hands. A pity we can't show you any agency snapshots of the mothers, sisters and daughters of said crazy activists... they are busy being interviewed by the reporters from the same newsagency, wailing about hunger and the absence of medicine for their babies. What (and we mean this seriously) is wrong with this picture?

19-Jun-06: Bus Ambushed

Palestinian gunmen ambush and open fire on an Israeli bus today near Ofra, a Jewish community some 30 kilometers north of where we live (in Jerusalem). Three young women, all passengers on the bus, are lightly wounded by gunfire; three additional young women are treated for shock. It's later discovered that six bullet holes puncture the sides of the bus. The army is currently carrying out a manhunt for the terrorists. This the second drive-by shooting attack on Israelis in the past week. The earlier attack resulted in the death of the driver of a car who, though he was an Israeli Arab, was evidently mistaken for an Israeli Jew. Lethal distinctions of this kind are of the greatest importance to a terror-minded enemy with religious hatred and racist intolerance on their minds.

19-Jun-06: Sunday Night Hit

A park near the center of the Israeli town of Sderot is the target of yet another Qassam missile strike last night. The park is located near the city's sports center which, had it been hit by the poorly-aimed rocket, might have been a scene of considerable injury and damage. As it is, the injuries from last night's attack are limited to one person being hospitalized for treatment for shock resulting from the explosion. The heroes of the Islamic Jihad terror gang claim responsibility for last nights' attack. The long-suffering residents of the town are preparing a general strike to attract some badly needed attention from the authorities in Jerusalem.

18-Jun-06: Another School Struck by Palestinian Missile

The breathtaking series of near-disasters continues. A Palestinian Qassam rocket fired into the Israeli town of Sderot from Gaza hits a school and brings down an electricity power pole. No one is injured, there is some minor damage to property and the area is blacked out.

16-Jun-06: The Threat in the Freezer

Some years ago, the Israeli journalist and writer Uri Orbach composed a short article which captures an aspect of the oddness of living in a place where some of us are in mortal danger while others, just around the corner literally, are basically living a quiet and undisturbed life. Orbach captured the mood of the times (2001) here in Jerusalem where some neighbourhoods - some streets - were under round-the-clock sniper attack by Palestinian Arabs while others were at peace. The comment we wrote below about headlines focusing on Sderot reminded us that it's time to give Orbach's words some additional airplay. Here it is:

Where It's Really Dangerous
Uri Orbach (published originally in 2001)
In America, everyone knows that it is terribly dangerous in Israel now, and it is not recommended to travel to Israel.
In Israel, everyone knows that it is dangerous only in the territories and in a little bit of Jerusalem.
In Jerusalem everyone knows there is shooting going on, but only in the neighborhood of Gilo.
In Gilo everyone knows that it is dangerous, but only on Ha'anafa Street.
On Ha'anafa street everyone knows that it is dangerous, but not all along the street, just in the houses that face Beit Jalla.
In the houses facing Beit Jalla, everyone knows it is dangerous, but mostly in a few apartments on specific floors that get shot at occasionally.
In the apartments that get shot at, they know it's dangerous, but not in all the rooms. Just in the kitchen. In the bedrooms and bathrooms, on the other hand, it's totally safe.
In the kitchen that gets shot into they know it's really dangerous. But not in the entire kitchen. Just near the fridge and the toaster.
Those near the fridge know that where it's really dangerous is in the freezer, which is directly in the rifle sights of the sharp-shooters from Beit Jalla.
You can take milk and cheese out of the fridge part without getting hit - usually. Word-of-honor.
And in the freezer over the fridge part of the refrigerator on one part of Ha'anafa street at the edge of Giloh in Jerusalem in Israel? Oh boy, it's totally dangerous there. If you stand there and pull some frozen schnitzels out of the freezer, that's when you really take your life in your hands.
So for a few months, just until things calm down, we're not going to use the freezer.
Nu, so this you call dangerous?

Thankfully, Jerusalem's Gilo neighborhood is having far quieter days now, compared with 2001. And we hope the same will soon be true of Sderot and the communities of the western Negev. But there's no basis for thinking that the dangers out there, all around us, are really going away anytime soon.

16-Jun-06: Striking Sderot? Or Striking Israel?

Here's a rare note of appreciation to the editors of Haaretz. For some time now, as Qassam missiles have been raining down on whichever parts of Israel the Palestinian Arab terrorists can reach with their deadly missiles, headlines have habitually referred (accurately but problematically as we shall explain) to Sderot. Sderot Under Fire. Sderot Hit Again. Qassams Rain Down on Sderot. And so on. (That's a snapshot of a Sderot bomb shelter, with aesthetic mural, at right.) This way of looking at events is factually correct, but quite misleading. We wrote a note to the editors yesterday pointing out that these missile attacks are directed at Israel, and that it's Israel that is under constant attack. We also expressed concern at the constant references to Sderot which is a town very few Israelis visit or even know, other than through its being mentioned in the headlines... and as the home of the current defence minister. Sderot is physically and in other ways peripheral to Israel and to the lives of most Israelis. Our real concern is that it is this very peripheral-ness that is being exploited by the headline writers. In other words, so long as the Arabs are firing on our margins, hitting open fields, occasionally destroying someone's solar roof-panels, it isn't really that big of a concern. If we're right on this, then it's simply appalling - but also characteristic of much of the in-denial reporting and thinking that goes on in this country.
This morning, whether because of our note or (more likely) without connection to it, we see this headline: Six Qassams Hit Israel. The point is not a small one. Our country is under daily belligerent attack by armed forces with murder and mayhem on their minds. Failing to understand this - and from experience we can say that many of the reporters and photographers providing stories for the major media outlets do fail to understand this and so, therefore, do their readers - means that you can never understand the things that Israel does on the battlefield. Failing to understand this leads to viewpoints like those of many Israelis - not to mention foreigners - who say: "We're strong, we're powerful, we're safe. Let's not over-react to small irritations." That attitude - in simple terms: if it's not hurting us here in Herzliya or Ramat Hasharon, it's not worth reacting to - is undermining more aspects of Israeli life than we can describe here. It's a major concern, at least to us. It's an issue which goes to the very heart of how a society ought to react when parts of it are under life-threatening attack, and other parts feel safe. The traditional view in Jewish thinking is expressed as: Kol Yisrael Areivim Zeh B'Zeh - All Jews are responsible for looking after one another. It's the sort of high-sounding aspiration that many people will feel goes without saying. But it doesn't go without saying, particularly in these challenging times. Israel is under attack - real, physical, daily attack - and we're all threatened by it even if the shopping center in our town remains undisturbed. We need to get used to the notion that Sderot under attack is precisely the same as Israel under attack. And to respond accordingly.

15-Jun-06: The "Resistance" Turns to Snatching Teenage Girls

Three Palestinian Arab men from Jenin, all of them armed with pistols, try to forcibly grab and kidnap two Israeli teenage girls waiting for a ride at a hitch-hike post near Nablus this afternoon. The men's heroic attempt to achieve a glorious military victory for the liberation of their oppressed sisters and brothers is foiled when one of the girls (pictured at right, in a Jerusalem hospital accompanied by her mother) fights them off despite suffering head injuries at their hands, and the other runs faster than they can, eventually using her cellular phone to alert security forces. The girls are both 14, which may explain why the Palestinians found themselves outnumbered, outsmarted and out of business. It's not yet clear whether the Nablus three, currently being interrogated by the Israeli military, will be officially registered with the Palestinian authorities as martyrs.

15-Jun-06: Still more missile attacks on Israel

Yediot reports that 4 more Qassam rockets have been shot into Israeli towns from northern Gaza this morning. One lands in the beleagured community of Sderot, meters from the home of the Israeli defense minister. Another rocket explodes in Sderot's Naveh Eshkol neighborhood. Two more crash into open fields on the edge of the town. Haaretz says one of the missiles injured 3 people as it crashed into Sderot's industrial zone. All parts of the Israeli media are reporting this morning that the head of the Hamas regime, Ismail Haniya, having been warned by the Israeli authorities that they will turn their attention to him personally if the missile attacks are not curbed, has directed his thugs to cease their terrorism-by-rocket activity. Evidently his is not necessarily the last word. Another version says that Haniya said no such thing, and we're inclined to believe it. Neither Haniya nor anyone else in the top ranks of the Palestinian Arab terror organizations has ever called for an end to ongoing terrorism against Jews or Israelis, notwithstanding the wishful thinking of non-Arabic-speaking reporters and their editors.

14-Jun-06: On Living in a Bad Neighborhood

Late this evening, Islamic Jihad claims credit for yet another Qassam missile fired into Israel, the first in some 36 hours. This missile reaches Ashkelon, landing in the grounds of what is described as "a sensitive strategic facility", though it causes neither damage nor injuries. (This expression probably means the huge electricity power station located in Ashkelon, responsible for providing power to the entire country.)

It's largely pot luck when the Gazan thugs fire off their bombs; their hearts' desire is to cause civilian injuries and mayhem, the more the better - and frequently they succeed. But just about as frequently (like this morning, when several Qassams were detected being fired off from Gaza, but never reached Israeli territory), they manage to hit only their own Gazan territory and damage the property and bodies of their own fellow Gazans.

This does not cause any noticeable consternation to the foreign media, from which it follows that there is no reason why the thugs themselves ought to be concerned by it. After several generations of living in a country-sized garbage pile of their own making, the value of life to the citizens and the kleptocrats of Gaza is very, very low. It's unreasonable and unrealistic to expect painful compromises for peace from people who have so very little to protect and defend. And whose "leadership" is so utterly unconcerned with their welfare.

POSTSCRIPT: Just to illustrate the point we made about damaging their own people, it's reported that two additional Qassams are detected this evening by Israeli intelligence exploding before the Gazan thugs manage to actually fire them off. Under different circumstances, it might be possible to laugh at the Qeystone Qops antics of these jackasses, if only these Qassams were not so deadly.

14-Jun-06: What Happened on the Beach?

The notion that Israeli aggression caused the deaths of a Gazan family recreating on the beach this past Friday is so powerful, so compelling, so iconic, so irresistable to people who hate Israel and all it stands for, that evidence refuting the blame-Israel-always-at-all-costs version must be hard to take. How else to explain the strikingly skimpy coverage in the media of Israel's own enquiry into the deaths? In the interests of allowing the sober voices of Israel's self-examination to be heard, here is the English translation of yesterday's statement to the media.

Maj Gen. Meir Kalifi: In order to determine whether the claim that the IDF was responsible for the incident in the Gaza Shore on Friday was true or false we needed to determine the exact time and place of the incident. The investigation was based on intelligence analysis, Palestinian claims, media coverage of the incident and IDF filmed footage that documented all IDF activity during that day. We can say that the incident took place 150 meters from a place we call the "Casino". The time of the incident was between 16:57-17:10. We came to this conclusion by analyzing three films. The first shows nothing irregular or unusual that might indicate that a large explosion took place in a range of 50 meters from the place of the incident on the beach between 16:54-16:57. A second film, from around 18:30, depicts people's behavior after the explosion, proving that the incident must have occurred before then. The third film shows the arrival of the ambulances at 17:15 which brings us to the conclusion that the incident occurred not before 16:57 and not after 17:10. Taking this timeline in account we have checked all reports of IDF fire on that day. I can without doubt say that no means used by the IDF during this time period caused the incident. The closest IAF attack took place 2.5 kilometers north of the site and occurred after 17:15. Concerning naval fire, 17 shells were fired at areas 700 meters from the site of the incident. The naval shells fired in proximity to the location of the explosion landed between 11:00 AM and 12:00 noon. We have documentation of where all the shells landed. It proves that all shells were launched approximately four hours before the incident. We can also dismiss the cause being an IDF artillery shell, launched from the land. During those hours we fired six shells at a target called Reshef 31. In order to make sure we do not hit areas with citizens we fired range-adjustment fire approximately 580-600 meters north of the target. Using a special system we can precisely account for the places where five of the six shells landed. The first shell which was fired was not identified by the system, btt the possibility of the first shell fired from the battery causing the incident is close to zero, as it was launched at around 16:30. In addition a piece of shrapnel was found in the wound of one of the Palestinians who was injured and received medical treatment in Israel. The shrapnel was taken for examination in a laboratory. The examination showed that, without a doubt, the shrapnel was not a part of an IDF artillery shell. So, all possibilities that the cause of the explosion was an artillery shell fired on that Friday have been disproved.
The Chief of Staff: We need to remember the context of this incident. In the past few weeks Israeli civilians who live in the western Negev, especially in the city of Sderot, have been under a constant shower of Qassam rockets. We are working to reduce this. Concerning the incident on Gaza beach: on Saturday evening I expressed our regret for the members of the Palestinian family who were killed, and I emphasized that expressing regret does not mean taking responsibility. Today I state clearly we still regret the incident, but we are not responsible for it.

13-Jun-06: Drive-by Shooting

Two Israeli security guards attached to the construction of the security barrier come under fire by Palestinians in Bir Naballah, north of Jerusalem in the vicinity of Atarot. The shots came from a moving vehicle, and the gunment are believed to have fled in the direction of nearby Ramallah. One of the guards is wounded, though conscious, and is taken to Hadassah Ein Kerem hospital for treatment.

13-Jun-06: The Madness Goes On

The beleaguered parents of school-children in Sderot have had more than they can take. And look at what they're taking, day after day. On Monday, no fewer than 15 Qassam missiles - the kind the media love to call home-made, but which can rip a human being to pieces - landed in the town. 10 more fell short and landed in various parts of Gaza. What's quite extraordinary about this story (what isn't?) is that Israel's military is now restrained by the government from taking counter-measures against these acts of war. Why? Politics, essentially. The press is reporting that the IDF will remain handcuffed at least until the results of an inquiry into Friday's Gaza beach deaths are submitted to Amir Peretz, the minister of defence and himself a Sderot resident, and to the military's Chief of Staff, Halutz. That's likely to be later today. Meanwhile, this politically-inspired self-paralysis - suspending Israeli artillery fire and pinpoint assassinations of terrorists - allows those terrorists freedom to maneuver. It also takes the pressure off Hamas, who are behind the missile attacks, to desist. At the Sha'ar Hanegev school that was hit by a Qassam on Sunday and its janitor injured (picture at right), parents are now boycotting the school. (The school has reinforced classrooms... but their construction has not yet been completed. Haaretz reports today on the widespread incidence of post-traumatic stress disorder among the town's children.) When people speak of this war being asymmetrical, think of the asymmetry between the utter freedom of action of the government sponsored terrorists on the Palestinian Arab side, and the political/moral highwire walked by the Israeli military in defending its people, its territory and its communities. Think also of the asymmetry of the mainstream news reporting which almost totally ignores the constant bombardment of Israeli towns by the terrorists, but provides intense, photographically-rich coverage of the funerals of dead terrorists, and of street processions by wailing widows and children of murderous thugs. Mainstream news reporting is where most politicians get most of their opinions - so the implications of this assymetry are deeply disturbing... and self-perpetuating.

13-Jun-06: Foreshadowing Terror

The authorities are evidently preparing themselves today (according to a report we have seen) for what Israeli intelligence sources say is a concrete threat of terrorism, specifically planned for today, in what is helpfully defined as "the centre" of Israel which can mean Tel-Aviv, Jerusalem and everything in-between.

12-Jun-06: Military attacks on Israel continue

The onslaught continues, even as the Fatah and Hamas armies engage in a shooting war with each other. Late tonight, two more Qassam rockets are fired from northern Gaza into Israel. One lands on top of a car in the town of Sderot and injures a person walking by; two women suffer shock and receive medical treatment. A second Qassam lands in an open field. How the towns-folk of Sderot manage to keep their lives going on some sort of even keel is an ongoing astonishment. No less astonishing is how the daily acts of war - the hostile bombardment of Israeli civilian areas from across the border, with the active or passive connivance of the authorities in that area (i.e. the Hamas-led maybe-democratically-elected government of the Palestinian Arabs) - continue to get virtually no news coverage.

12-Jun-06: Sderot Under Fire

Sderot suffers two more Qassam rocket attacks at 7 this morning; then two more half-an-hour later. Ten such rockets have hit Sderot and the western Negev since last night. UPDATE: And they're continuing this evening: two more in the past hour (it's now 9.00pm Monday).

12-Jun-06: Drive-by Shooting

On a busy road just north of where we live in Jerusalem, an Israeli is shot dead and several passengers wounded. The shooting, Sunday night, is another blood-chilling illustration of what it's like to live next-door to a society completely infected with terrorism, managed by terrorists. The survivors, all of them Israeli Arabs, report seeing a Palestinian taxi (they're all yellow; see picture at right) and easily recognized) drive up to a spot between the village of Shadra and Kalandiyah where a major Israeli security checkpoint is located. A Palestinian passenger disembarks and opens fire on their vehicle as it drives by. Unfortunately for them, their vehicle has standard yellow license plates like all Israeli vehicles - the killer evidently thought he had achieved his ticket to paradise. Still unaware he has murdered the unfortunate Marwan Shuweiki from Jerusalem's Abu Tor neighborhood, the shooter returns to his cab and instructs the driver to return to Ramallah. There is, of course, zero expectation he will be found or apprehended by the Palestinian authorities. One of our children works as a volunteer ambulance paramedic and came home from her Sunday night shift with the initial report; we checked on the web and saw that Israeli sources were calling this either a family feud ("defending" family "honor" causes enormous numbers of casualties and misery in Arab society) or a criminal attack. This morning, maybe because no group has taken 'credit' for the attack (most unusual), the authorities and the media say this was a terror killing, with an element of identity confusion stemming from that Israeli license plate. Now what steps would you take if you knew there were shooters with murder on their minds living just down the road? And the authorities in their neighborhood think that's just fine. The Hamas government of the Palestinian Arabs has stated repeatedly it will neither disarm nor stop 'resistance' activities. Ditto, the 'moderate' Fatah leadership. On this there is wall-to-wall agreement among the Palestinian terror thugocracy. (A bomb was found yesterday, before the shooting, by Israeli soldiers not far from the scene of last night's murder.) Prediction: the media are having so much fun with Friday's Gaza beach deaths story that the murder of Mr Shuweiki will sink without a trace.

11-Jun-06: Some proportion please - and announcing a small change

It's extraordinary how the accidental (at the very worst) deaths of Gazans on the beach during a bombardment by Israeli forces on Friday can consign the background theme to oblivion. Background theme? Yes - the relentless terror war emanating from Gaza, directed at any Jew or Israeli they can possibly reach. 

While we report, day after day, on missiles landing in children's bedrooms, in school-grounds, in class-rooms, reporters and their editors deliberately ignore these events. It's as if Israelis have lost the right to be viewed as victims. 

We have had enough personal exposure to the mainstream media (reporters, photographers, editors, stringers, producers) to know that decisions about this are being made all the time by people who, in many cases, have a personal or political agenda - something quite illegitimate in terms of every journalistic norm. 

So we will keep publishing our alternative reports and hope that enough people, suspecting that the picture they're getting via the brand-name channels, is not the whole story. 

We began producing This Ongoing War on the website of the Malki Foundation. But we have quickly outgrown that facility, so from today onwards, we're publishing here on Blogspot. Please tell your friends.

11-Jun-06: It's Raining Missiles

It's Raining Missiles: Sunday morning, 10am, and the missiles keep crashing down on Israel with barely a word of reportage from the mainstream media. A man is critically injured when shrapnel from a Qassam rocket fired from the Gaza Strip lands near the Sapir Academic College of the Negev, Sderot. More than 30 such missiles have landed this weekend, 9 this morning so far. The injured man is a maintenance worker at the school. He is in surgery now - the hospital says his life is in danger. Hamas takes open responsibility for the rocket attacks, declaring it will continue "until residents of Sderot evacuated the town in fear". UPDATE: Missiles fired into Israel this morning: 14.

11-Jun-06: Gaza Beach

Gaza Beach: The beach deaths of several Gazans on Friday is now under investigation by Israeli authorities. The IDF's announcement this morning includes some words worth repeating here: "If terror organizations continue to fire at our civilian population, we will have to respond severely. We are under attack, and will use any means necessary while taking the utmost precautions. Sadly, accidents do happen. We are investigating the grave incident on the Gaza beach, and if it was in fact caused by a mishap, we will take appropriate action. We expect to know more in the coming 24 hours."

11-Jun-06: Still More Qassams

Terrorists in Gaza showing off their Qassams
in a Feb '06 file picture

Media attention in this region is focused on the deaths of Palestinian children on a Gaza beach yesterday. No one actually knows yet whether this was due to Israeli fire or Palestinian. And if it was Israeli, no sane observer thinks the killings were desired by Israel or deliberate. 

Still, the bile, the political hypocrisy and the media doublespeak are in full evidence as the Gaza beach deaths remain the focus. Meanwhile far from the spotlight - as usual - the terrorists continue with their 100% deliberate, 100%-civilian-directed bombardment of Israeli villages and towns. 19 Qassam missiles land in Israel in the past 24 hours. The last two rockets strike at around 9:45 pm Saturday night near Kibbutz Alumim and Kibbutz Be'eri, both of them in the western Negev. The missiles came from the northern part of the Gaza Strip. Miraculously (again) no damage or injuries. A third Qassam struck inside Palestinian territory.

10-Jun-06: Warnings

As of this evening, there are 11 'specific' terror warnings and some 80 general terror alerts - somewhat up on the average daily status of the past few months. 

The police have increased their alertness across the country, according to Yediot Aharonot. From tomorrow morning, police will be concentrating their efforts on securing crowded places and will deploy in greater than usual numbers in and around Jerusalem and at entrances to cities, as will Border Guard units and civilian volunteers. 

The dominant Palestinian Arab faction Hamas vowed yesterday to attack Israeli civilians - the only interesting dimension of this warning being that it was delivered by press release this time and not, as is customary, by Qassam, Katyusha, rifle and dagger.

10-Jun-06: Hamas Takes 'Credit'

Palestinian child being exposed to the best that his parents' society can provide for him, at a rally in Gaza today described by Reuters as part of an internal struggle for power.

Israeli towns in the vicinity of Gaza have suffered for months from endless bombardments, almost daily, of Qassams, Katyushas and mortars. A little game has been played all this time, in which various Arabic-named groups have claimed responsibility while Hamas, the largest of the terrorist organizations by far, has pretended to be holding back, observing a bogus truce.

This morning, the silly game ends. Hamas puts out an announcement taking "credit" for an attack on Sderot, announcing this was "only the beginning", that the range of its Qassam attacks will grow and that Hamas will no longer honor its "self-declared" "truce" with Israel. 

"The earthquake in the Zionist towns will start again," according to a leaflet distributed at a Hamas rally Friday night. Hamas "will choose the proper place and time for the tough, strong and unique response." 

We have only one question: why do otherwise skeptical reporters and editors repeatedly - obsessively - buy such self-serving nonsense from the Hamas thugocracy, ignoring Hamas' deep involvement in daily acts of civilian-directed terror? 

The incredibly short attention span of the global media when it comes to anything related to Palestinian terror, and the resulting shallow published reportage that passes for analysis, are costing lives on both sides of this awful war.

9-Jun-06: Stopped

For the second day running, Israeli forces have caught terrorists in the act, and stopped them permanently by means of decisive action. Today, an IAF aircraft strikes against a group of Palestinians fleeing from a Qassam launch site in northern Gaza. They are said to be members of the same terrorist gang headed by Jamal Abu Samhadana (about whom see this morning's report).

9-Jun-06: Qassams

At about 5 this morning, several hours after the IDF eliminated the terrorist explosives expert Jamal Abu Samhadana, 2 Qassams are fired from the northern Gaza Strip into the town of Sderot - where, by small coincidence, Israel's defence minister Amir Peretz has his home. One lands right next to an apartment building, shattering windows but nothing more serious; the other falls in an open area. There are no reports of injuries.

8-Jun-06: Missiles

Early this evening, two more Qassam rockets crash into Israel, close to Kibbutz Yad Mordechai. No injuries, no damage. It pains to say it, but at some point soon, Israel's amazing run of recent good fortune is going to end and one of these lethal flying bombs will exact a price in blood (as they have done many times in the past).

8-Jun-06: Qassams

Kibbutz Gevim and the industrial zone of Sderot suffer damage to vehicles and buildings this morning with the firing of 3 Qassam missiles into Israel from Gaza. Structures belonging to the new high-tech center established by global software giant Amdocs on Hanegev Street in Sderot are reported damaged. Damage is also caused to the infirmary of Kibbutz Nahal Oz.

8-Jun-06: Still Militating

Agence France Press, on the other hand, possibly working from
a different reality, captions yesterday's picture of these
gunmen in Gaza thus: "Hamas paramilitaries prepare to be repositioned
and posted away from the view of the
Palestinian people". Repositioned? Who's having a lend of whom?

Fatah and Hamas, the two armed-to-the-teeth armies that dominate and depress every aspect of life in the Palestine towns and cities, are in an escalating face-off. To us, this seems at the root of their impoverishment; beyond that, it's clear that their long-complaining society is heading inexorably into civil war and even more bloodshed. In the past few weeks, observers have noted the establishment, and then the standing down, and then the re-establishment, of various 'special' forces representing each of the sides. We reported below on newsagency articles about armed bands being withdrawn from the streets... but we also expressed extreme skepticism as to whether this was anything more than the customary wishful thinking that often passes for news reportage in this region. Seems some media people now share our doubts. AP, (see "Hamas militia still on Gaza streets") makes plain that despite all the talk of redeployment, there are thousands of freshly-armed, newly-attired 'militia' men (i.e. the same gangs of terrorists) loose, armed and ready to fire on the streets of Gaza and elsewhere, today.

7-Jun-06: Alert

A heightened security situation is in effect this evening in the Sharon area, north of Tel-Aviv. Intelligence information suggests a terror cell is planning a specific attack.

7-Jun-06: Positions?

"Not too major" terrorist, probably 7 years old, holds a "not too
major" weapon during whatAFP calls "a demonstration in support of
Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas in the West Bank city of
Ramallah" on 6th June. Click for larger version.

An Israeli newspaper says today that

"Israel is having a hard time figuring out the exact position that Hamas political leaders in Gaza have adopted regarding terror attacks. It appears that Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh wants to refrain from terror at this stage, but he and his associates are allowing members of the military wing some room to maneuver, as long as the attacks are not too major and there is no official claim of responsibility." 

An opportune moment to reflect that when decisions about the well-being of an entire population are taken - as they are in Israel - by politicians with 24 hour a day armed personal guards; by politicians who enjoy Knesset transport privileges that shelter them from sending their children on buses - they can indulge in such linguistic gymnastics.

The rest of us can only sit back and be appalled by the notion that a terror operation can ever be "not too major". Seems it's only "not too major" when it happens to other people.

And what, by the way, is an example of a terror attack that's "not too major"? Would it be a stabbing? a shooting? an explosives-filled rocket fired into town?

7-Jun-06: Stabbings

An Israeli girl of 18, and a young male soldier are the latest victims of a Palestinian stabbing attack. (Knives are a significant part of the current terrorist arsenal.) This one occurs near one of the Gush Etzion communities, south of Jerusalem. The woman is injured first: the attackers fling a rock at her, striking her head. They then get closer and one manages to stick a knife into the 19 year-old male's back. Both Israelis are now being treated after being rushed to hospital. A chase is underway in the vicinity of the village of Nahlin which is where the Palestinian 'heros' fled.

6-Jun-06: Another Qassamiracle

The Qassam crashed through the ceiling of the Sderot apartment

A woman is lightly injured by shrapnel; several others are treated for shock; and the just-vacated bed of a teenage boy, inside his family's apartment, is destroyed along with much of the apartment. 

Those are the thankfully minor results of a another Qassam missile attack in the Israeli town (un-'occupied'; never disputed) of Sderot. The damaged apartment happens to be right next to a school. The Gaza thugs who fired it would have been happier - we can be 100% certain - if the rocket had devastated the school. 4 additional Qassams land in open spaces this morning and do no damage. 

UPDATE: One more, for a total of six for the day. For people living in the fire zone, numbers are not the issue. If one hits your home or a family member, that's the one that changes your life even if people far away feel relaxed about the 'small number' and 'light damage' that generally prevails.