30-Nov-08: The terrorism grinds on

Far from Mumbai, where the tragic impact of a megacity neutralized and terrified by barbarians is just beginning to be analyzed, terrorism continues to exact its routine, regular, daily price among the civilians of southern Israel.
The Gazan thugs fired yet another Qassam rocket in the general direction of Israel. Today's landing happened in a square in the center of long-suffering Sderot, the Israeli community closest to the Hamas regime's Gazan vipers' nest. No injuries or damage were reported in this attack, but as we have pointed out many times that was not the intention of the terrorists.
Haaretz says "Four additional Qassam rockets hit southern Israel over the weekend. One struck an open field in the Ashkelon Beach regional council, causing no damage or injuries. Another rocket hit mere meters from a home in the Eshkol regional council, causing some property damage to the structure."

29-Nov-08: In the aftermath of the Mumbai carnage

This tragedy will be with us for a long time to come. So too its lessons.

Mumbai Terrorist Siege Over, India Says
MUMBAI, India — The full scope of the horror and desperation of the terrorist attack on Mumbai began to come into focus on Saturday after Indian commandos finally took control of the last nest of resistance. Government officials said Saturday afternoon that the death toll had risen to 162 and was likely to rise again. They also said 283 people had been wounded. Most of the dead were apparently Indian citizens, but at least 18 foreigners were killed and 22 had been injured, said Vilasrao Deshmukh, the chief minister of Maharashtra State. At least five Americans were believed to have died in the attacks.

Nine Israelis killed in Mumbai attacks: ministry
JERUSALEM (AFP) — Nine Israelis were killed in the attacks by Islamist militants that caused carnage in the Indian commercial capital Mumbai, a foreign ministry spokesman said on Saturday. "Eight bodies have been identified as being those of Israelis, some of them with dual Israeli and US nationality," the spokesman said. "All eight were killed in Chabad House," said Yigal Palmor, referring to a Jewish cultural centre that was stormed by Indian commandos on Friday. "A ninth victim has been identified by a relative, but initial information suggests that this person was not in Chabad House, and was not on the list of missing persons," he added. Palmor said another four Israelis remain unaccounted for.

The Mumbai tragedy has many dimensions. Those who concern themselves with this kind of matter will be analyzing what happened for a long time to come.

Right now, we think it's notable that the BBC, the world's most important and influential source of news, manages to report on the national origins of all the Mumbai victims without mentioning Israelis - the largest group by number - at all.

In its main report - which may change by the time you click to view it - the BBC counts the foreign victims this way:

"Most of the dead and the 295 injured are Indian citizens. At least 22 foreigners are known to have died, including victims from Germany, Japan, Canada, Australia, Italy, Singapore, Thailand and France. One Briton, Andreas Liveras, has been killed."

There's bound to be a rational, objective, fair-minded explanation.

28-Nov-08: Far from Mumbai, ordinary terrorism goes on

With the world's anti-terrorism ire directed at activities in Mumbai today, the terrorism action and counter-action in our part of the globe continues, as it has for the past eight years.

The security forces on Israel's border with Gaza just east of Khan Younis spotted Palestinian Arabs placing an explosive device near the border fence this morning.

Realizing they had been seen, the Gazans opened fire at the IDF unit, and received a volley of gunshots in response. This left one of the would-be bombers dead. Hamas sources are saying that four others were injured in the gunfight.

Two mortar shells were fired into Israeli civilian targets during the morning.

27-Nov-08: Hypocrisy on a global scale

The states of the United Nations, instead of dealing with the growing horror of terrorism which today has engulfed India and which, day after day, embitters our lives here, continue to busy themselves with the deadly, daily dishonesties of a manifestly bogus agenda: the manipulation of international forums by those pretending to want the creation of a state for the Palestinian Arabs.

Under the apt heading "Hypocrita", a word the new president of the UN general assembly may understand (see the picture of him in the grip of one of his favourite people at right), today's Jerusalem Post editorial delivers an analysis that we wish would get the broadest possible audience. We republish it below as our contribution to the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, observed annually on November 29.

That's the date on which, in 1947, the UN resolved to establish a Jewish and an Arab state in Palestine. To remind those who have forgotten, that 1947 UN decision was unanimously rejected with maximum violence by the Arabs. They promptly invaded the new and tiny state of Israel and have been trying to reverse the unsuccessful outcome ever since.

Hypocrita!

In the topsy-turvy world of the United Nations, no issue gets more consideration, monopolizes more resources or engenders more sloganeering than the "Question of Palestine."

The UN maintains a Division for Palestinian Rights, a Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, and a United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. If only the world body devoted similar energies to fighting AIDS or saving Zimbabwe.

Some say that the UN is a noble experiment gone terribly wrong. But the organization isn't all bad. A range of autonomous bodies - such as the Universal Postal Union and the World Intellectual Property Organization - do their work in a professional and non-partisan manner (though even among these there are ignoble exceptions).

Moreover, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has strived to be a fair administrator and an honest broker. He has expressed concern about human rights abuses committed by Hamas and repeatedly condemned Palestinian Arab attacks against Israeli civilian targets.

Unfortunately, Ban has remarkably little sway over what is said or done in the name of the organization he heads.

THE TRUE character of the UN is exemplified by its 192 member states. And nowhere does the melding of their "values" manifest itself more than in the General Assembly. Here the tyranny of the majority, often enabled by the acquiescence of nations from whom one would have expected better, has made a bitter mockery of the 1945 UN Charter that was intended to make the institution a beacon of tolerance and enlightenment.

By habitually championing the "right of return" - not to a Palestinian state to be created alongside the Jewish one, but to Israel proper - the General Assembly has obliquely committed itself to the demographic destruction of Israel.

Given its long history of having one set of rules for the Jewish state and another for everyone else, it is all too tempting for decent men and women to block out the UN's Annual Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People which has consecrated November 29 as a day of hate against, and delegitimization of, the Jewish state.

But at this newspaper we are haunted by the words of Edmund Burke: "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

A malevolent man who knew a thing or two about Jew-hatred once taught that a Big Lie can be made credible. He argued that people would have a hard time imagining that their representatives might fabricate colossal untruths.

Neither the evil man, nor his minister of propaganda, ever said: "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it...." but that was their intent.

THIS BRINGS us to Nicaraguan diplomat, Catholic priest, and General Assembly President Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, a self-proclaimed "lover" of the Jewish people. He declared Tuesday that nothing excuses "the failure to establish a Palestinian state."

Yet rather than blame the Arab and Muslim world which, between 1947 and 2002, explicitly rejected the two-state solution, or blame the Palestinian Arabs whose polity to this day is divided over the possibility of coexistence, d'Escoto Brockmann blames... the Jews.

Then comes the Big Lie: "Israeli policies in the Palestinian territories appear so similar to the apartheid of an earlier era, a continent away, and I believe it is very important we in the United Nations use this term," d'Escoto Brockmann said. "We must not be afraid to call something for what it is."

To state the obvious: The conflict between the Jewish people and the Palestinian Arabs has nothing to do with apartheid.

There is no system of racial segregation in the West Bank. There is a state of de-facto belligerency between West Bank Palestinians and Israeli Jews. Hamas-controlled Gaza seeks Israel's annihilation, not civil rights. Jews are not colonizers in Judea and Samaria. Nevertheless, Israel's government is ready to abandon much of the Jews' ancient heartland for peace with security.

As the padre speaks from the den of iniquity that is the General Assembly, we ask: "Why do you see the speck in your neighbor's eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye?" (Matthew 7:3)

Two Qassam rockets were fired by the Gazans into civilian areas of Israel this morning. Happy solidarity day.

21-Nov-08: Further escalation

Yet another mostly-unreported Qassam rocket attack on Israel this morning.

This time, the terrorists succeeded in causing an explosion in the industrial area of Ashkelon. Yesterday a Qassam rocket landed in Israel's western Negev region. There were two mortars this morning as well. These were fired into the Kissufim area in southern Israel. No injuries or damage in these incidents though it ought to be perfectly clear that this is not, and never has been, the intention of the barbarians.

In today's Gazan equivalent of a national league football competition, the so-called Popular Resistance Committee claimed responsibility for the mortars. YNet reminds us that "dozens of rockets have been launched at the western Negev in the past two weeks, one of which was a longer-range Grad rocket that wounded 15 in an Ashkelon shopping mall last Wednesday." Was this reported in the news channels of your community? Thought not. Ynet quotes an angry resident of Ashkelon called Moshe Nisimfor: "We're sick of the behavior of the military and other sources. People are shooting rockets, missiles at us and no one is responding". He has a point, but it's not being heard.

According to Haaretz, "Hamas has said it stopped firing rockets and is working to rein in the smaller groups." Our observation is that this is highly unlikely, given the very public declarations by Hamas figures in recent days of the vengeance they plan to wreak on Israel.

Note that despite the daily barrages of the past two weeks, Israel has nevertheless allowed key supplies to continue to pass from here into Gaza.

17-Nov-08: Escalating

The productivity of the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip rose yet again today, as eight Qassam rockets (so far) struck civilian areas in southern Israel. YNet says most landed in open areas and no injuries were reported, though several houses sustained damage. Palestinian Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attacks. Israel's response was that the transfer of 30 trucks of humanitarian equipment into Gaza scheduled for today were put on hold. The authorities are ordering residents of Israeli communities in the vicinity to stay inside their fortified rooms, in buildings which have them. Most do not.

14-Nov-08: "Profoundly worried"... sort of

Continuing a tradition that began more than a century ago, frustrated Palestinian Arabs from Gaza vented their anger and hatred at civilian Jewish settlements this morning, aiming to hurt and destroy anything within range.

This morning's barrage included fourteen missiles. One Gazan Qassam rocket hit an electricity pole next to a home in Sderot. An 80-year-old woman suffered shrapnel injuries. Seven other people suffered from shock and required treatment.

Four additional rockets hit Ashkelon today. One landed inside the city. Another fell just outside. Two more landed in open fields near the city limits. Two of those rockets were identified as Grad missiles. Three people suffered from shock, requiring medical treatment at Barzilai hospital in Ashkelon.

Demonstrating manifest prejudice and the absence of an ability to understand the moral and factual dimensions of what is being done to Israelis by the Gazan Hamas regime, the European Union Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighborhood Policy Benita Ferrero-Waldner is quoted today saying the Gaza crossings, closed by Israel once the barrages started this week, have to be opened and the delivery of fuel and good to be resumed.

"I am profoundly concerned about the consequences for the Gazan population of the complete closure of all Gaza crossings for deliveries of fuel and basic humanitarian assistance," Ferrero-Waldner said in a statement.

The EU politician, in a depressingly familiar-sounding response, spoke of the imperative of Israel re-opening the crossings: "Recent infringements of the calm agreed in June must not lead to a renewed cycle of violence. I call on all parties to exercise restraint."

Wow.

The Israeli response to this morning's bombing barrage, oddly, did not include calls for restraint, since past experience suggests this has only a modest effect. Instead, the IDF bombed a cell of Qassam rocket launchers in the Gaza Strip. Three of the 'activists' who 'activated' the rockets have now ceased their 'activities'.

Ynet says this morning's bombardments came from Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a terrorist organization whose rockets have been striking Israeli settlements (deliberately) and their own Gazan neighbours (somewhat less deliberately) for the past several days, as well as for the past several years. Several of their ideologues are depicted in the AFP photograph below.

The Hamas regime authorities, according to sources quoted by YNet, are doing nothing to prevent the rocket firings, though Hamas personnel are said to be 'not involved' whatever that means when you claim to be the government.

IDF intelligence says attacks on the crossings are planned in conjunction with the ongoing rocket attacks. Israel's government therefore prefers to have the crossings closed in the interests of safe-guarding the lives of the personnel who man them. That concern is evidently beyond the comprehension of well-protected EU bureaucrats and their political masters in Brussels.



UPDATE Sunday morning: Friday's total of Gazan rocket firings into Israeli civilian targets was sixteen. Can you imagine the impact on your community if you were the target of terrorism like this?

12-Nov-08: When it's 'quiet' here, it looks like this

IDF forces detected a Palestinian terror cell on its way to infiltrate into Israel via the Gaza border fence this afternoon.

The cell's four or five armed members, equipped with Kalashnikov rifles and grenades, approached from a spot just east of Khan Younis and were spotted planting explosives. Israeli paratroopers identified them and opened fire. Four Gazans are dead; several more are injured. AFP reports that the dead heroes were sent by the peace-loving Hamas regime that rules the Gaza region. As we wrote here a couple of days ago, Hamas successfully peddled a story to credulous journalists on Saturday of this week that "they would begin cracking down on the fire emerging from the Gaza Strip". This is perfectly accurate if 'cracking down' means funding, encouraging, planning and executing the fire.

Possibly as a means of masking their attack, the Gazans launched a mortar shell assault on the Kissufim crossing at about the same time as the gunman action a few hours ago. And as of now (early evening, Wednesday) there's a search underway for additional Gazan terrorists in the same vicinity.

Today's four dead Gazan Hamas operatives already feature in news reports as additional 'victims' of Israeli nastiness. But the reality is that in this ongoing war, they are armed-to-the-teeth, religiously-inspired barbarians on a mission to strike at any civilian targets within reach. Their goal is not capture territory or engage the enemy in battle - and certainly not to establish a state for their wives, children and society - but to sow terror and fear among Israelis and others unfortunate enough to be living within firing range of their fortresses and underground arsenals.

What sort of terror and fear? Eight days ago, the IDF found and blew-up a tunnel created by Hamas 'activists' running from inside Gaza to the Israeli side of the fence, intended to facilitate the kidnapping of Israelis - like the raid that resulted in a teen-age Israeli serviceman, Gilad Shalit, being taken hostage by Hamas terrorists two years ago and held ever since.

This past weekend's tunnel was immediately taken out of service with the help of Israeli explosives. It was certainly not the only such tunnel in service, and it's to be expected that similar shut-downs will happen in the future.

The Hamas Gazan regime, whose stocks of missiles are now enormously replenished after five months of cease-fire with the Israelis, delivered 60 rocket attacks in the past week as its response to the recent tunnel liquidation. Its rocket barrages were intended to emphasize just how much these people want a better education for their children, affordable health-care for their parents, and a brighter future for their community.

It's so hard not to be cynical about their self-destructive hell-hole.

10-Nov-08: Seventy and counting

Monday noon, another glorious autumn day here in Jerusalem. And the terror gangs of Gaza are firing their rockets again. One crashed into their own space late this morning, in the vicinity (but on the Gazan side) of Kibbutz Kfar Aza. And a morter shell fell short today as well, landing on top of Gazan land, people, houses, whatever - near the Kissufim cross-over. In the past six days, 70 Gazan rockets have been fired into Israel.

9-Nov-08: Rockets and reactions

There's a report this morning that last night, Saturday night, Israeli forces struck a Qassam-launch device in northern Gaza Saturday evening. This is evidently connected to the fifty or sixty Qassams that have been fired into civilian parts of Israel during the past five days. Shortly after the IDF action, another Palestinian-Arab rocket fired from Gaza hit Israel, this time near Zikim, south of Ashkelon.

Without quoting sources, YNet says the IDF forces in the area "are now authorized to open fire at Palestinian rocket launching cells prior to, during or shortly after their attempt to fire Qassams" into Israel.

Leaving us to wonder why an army of national defence would ever hesitate to do these things in the first place. To be instructed to hold fire when their equipment and people catch terrorists caught in the act of preparing - that's beyond our understanding.

Meanwhile the goods crossings that allow food and other vitals to pass from Israel into Gaza were closed on Israeli order as soon as the Gazan barrages began this past Wednesday. It would be nice to think that critics of this aspect of Israel's policy will mention the rocket attacks on Israeli towns but past experience (see below) suggests they won't.

8-Nov-08: The vipers remind us again that they're just over the fence

Making it the fifth day in a row of rocket barrages into Israel, the Palestinian terror organizations in Gaza fired four Qassam rockets at Israeli civilian targets last night (Friday). One fell within the territory of the Hof Ashkelon Regional Council and two just outside Sderot's city limits.

As they did earlier this week, the al-Quds Brigades terrorist group, a unit of the Palestine Islamic Jihad, claimed responsibility.

For what it's worth, there's a report from YNet that the Hamas regime is going to "begin cracking down on the fire emerging from the Gaza Strip... [Its] internal security agents began to mobilize Friday evening towards Sejaiya district in an attempt to halt the rocket fire. According to Hamas the agents even succeeded in blocking an Islamic Jihad vehicle driving a Qassam-launching cell."

We're skeptical that the Hamas-brand of terrorists are going to suppress the PIJ-brand of terrorists. But in the vipers' nest that is Gaza, events tend to be driven by a multitude of complex factors.

7-Nov-08: On having really bad neighbors

It's a beautiful November Friday here - sunny, warm, blue skies, balmy breezes. And the fourth consecutive day of terrorist rocket fire at Israeli civilian targets from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.

Five rockets crashed into Israel since dawn this morning. Two landed in Sderot; three in the Negev desert. Al-Quds Brigades, part of the Islamic Jihad terrorist entity, issued the usual muscle-flexing, hormone-oozing press release claiming responsibility. Meanwhile parents of Israeli school children have been asked by the authorities to remain alert - whatever that means.

Yesterday, Thursday, four additional Qassam rockets were fired into Israel. And since this past Tuesday, the Palestinian Arab terrorists have fired no fewer than 50 rockets into Israel. One of those landed close to the Neot Ashkelon elementary school where 700 children were preparing for an air raid drill that quickly took on a more real character, and not for the first time. Children who were frightened by the siren were collected shortly afterward by their parents.

Did we say frightened? Ours is not a society that quakes without reason. Have a look at the following graphs that summarize what it is like to live in a neighbourhood where the barbarians operate with absolute no restraint, and largely without any media or government attention from anyone but the Israelis. (Data courtesy of this source.)

Rockets that have been fired into Israel by the Gazan terrorists during the past year.

Mortars fired into Israel since October 2007 (above)

Israeli casualties - victims of the Hamas rockets and mortars (above) in the past twelve months only, and only in the cities and towns lying close to the Hamas-controlled Gaza region.

The charts above were prepared before the wild firing of this week.

So now a question for our visitors: Which self-respecting country - other than Israel - would ever absorb this sort of relentless attack on its civilian population without carpet-bombing the terrorist perpetrators in their vipers' nest strongholds?