May 16 to 31, 2006 Chronicle of Attacks

2006-05-31	Children in a Sderot school during a missile attack drill: a daily reality in this small town within firing range of the thugs of Gaza. The first Qassam missile - a steel tube filled with explosives - crashed into Sderot in February 2002. They have become a daily occurrence, and regularly kill and maim civilians. Sderot has no military bases but several schools and kindergartens. 4 Missiles: Around 6 this morning (and so far unreported by a single media channel outside Israel, according to Google), 4 separate Qassam missile strikes hit the southern town of Sderot. One explodes in an apartment building, injuring 2 people who require hospitalization and causing serious damage. One strikes - and explodes - a cluster of cooking gas cannisters in the courtyard of a residential building. One lands near Kibbutz Or Ha-ner causing damage, and a fourth lands in an open space. Though the Gaza Strip is frequently described (wrongly) as the most crowded place on earth, the terrorists who fire missiles like these daily manage to do so free of interference from anyone (police, army, Force 17, security militia) on the Palestinian side of the border who all appear to have a speck of dust in their collective eyes. Israeli forces have the capacity to pulverize the vicinity of the launching areas (which is also where the terrorists most likely live) with artillery or aerial weaponry, but choose not to because of the risk of civilian losses among the Palestinians. If you or your children lived in Sderot (not occupied territory, never disputed), could you make sense of that? UPDATE Islamic Jihad takes responsibility and promises more rocket attacks on Israeli civilians.
2006-05-30	Missiles: Two more Qassam landings around noon; no reports of injuries or damage. The missiles strike near Kibbutz Karmiyah and Kibbutz Zikim, dispatched by Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip.
2006-05-30	Home-made: Qassam and other lethal projectiles are fired into Israel multiple times each day in this current hot phase of the ongoing war waged by the Palestinian Arabs. Associated Press photographer Hatem Moussa took this picture (at right; others here) which gives some useful insight. AP's caption says it's of Palestinians taking away the body of a militant killed while preparing to fire a missile (on the left) into Israel. AP calls the missile home-made. Why? Does this change anything? Or are they simply trying to fraudulently elicit some sympathy from the viewer? And with whom was this anonymous militant affiliated? Islamic Jihad? Maybe one of the Fatah 'action' brigades? The PA police perhaps? Was he a Hamas 'activist'? It matters not one bit. The distinctions between one terror group and another exist to advance a lazy and false narrative: weak Palestinians, strong Israelis, Hamas-honoring-a-truce. We've met many journalists passing through Jerusalem; hard to believe any of them can tell the difference between a terrorist from one Palestinian terror faction or another. They simply pass along whatever their local sources tell them. And a Hamas truce? A ceasefire? It's a journalistic fiction in the service of Hamas and some misplaced sense of defending an underdog cause. As you view today's news pictures of grieving Palestinian relatives wailing photogenically over the bodies of 'militants' permanently prevented by Israeli fire from shooting off their 'home-made' missiles, ask yourself what these missiles are designed to do; and what, other than luck and forceful Israeli action, is preventing them from doing even more damage. And finally why did reporters and their editors give virtually zero coverage to last week's 'home-made' missile that destroyed an Israeli school classroom? (Our report on that is here.) That Israeli school-children were not blown to pieces that day is a miracle... which was certainly not the intention of the barbarians and their home-made hatred.
2006-05-29	Mortars: Palestinian terrorists this evening lob mortar shells over the Gaza border. One lands near an army base in the western Negev, causing damage but thankfully no injuries. Another lands in an open area. (This was not their intention.)
2006-05-29	Crossing: Karni is the name of the main crossing point where Israeli goods pass into Gaza. It has been attacked by Arab terrorists multiple times with considerable loss of life. When Israel learns of an impending attack on it, as has happened routinely during the past year, and shuts it down temporarily, the howls of protest from the media and foreign politicians are deafening since closing Karni means suffering for the people of Gaza. Chris McGreal for instance routinely does this in the pages of the influential British daily, The Guardian. Last Thursday, under the headline "How can people live, I wonder?" he wrote: "The Israeli government has justified the persistent closure of Karni with what it said was intelligence about impending attacks. Others are sceptical." The trouble is, Israel's fears are seriously real and the McGreals of this world, about the intelligence of whose reporting we are skeptical, are never called to account for their agenda-driven mischief. Today provides an example. 3 Palestinians are spotted this morning attempting to scale the security barrier in the vicinity of Karni. Taking no unnecessary risks, IDF forces shoot to kill. One of the Palestinians dies; two others flee. On the body of the dead man there is a Kalashnikov rifle and a ladder nearby. He turns out to be an 'activist' 'militant' 'resistance fighter' of the Popular Resistance Committees. His death qualifies in Palestinian terms for 'martyrdom' since he was engaged in planting explosives at the security fence. Mothers of sick Gaza children unable to get adequate food or medicine because of Karni's closure might not entirely approve of his new sanctified status. ("Supply shortages spark health crisis in Gaza" NY Times 8-May-06, for instance.) But who listens to them? Certainly not Hamas or the PA.
2006-05-29	Terror: As of this morning, there are 80 general terror warnings in effect. 15 are classified as specific alerts. Most relate to the Islamic Jihad organization.
2006-05-29	Israeli infantry soldier on duty in the Nablus area this week Thwarted: Israelis are focused on the troubled northern border with Lebanon this morning. But to remind us that the threat is relentless and constant, the authorities hold multiple concrete warnings of terror attacks, leading the IDF to throw up sudden roadblocks in key locations. As a result, 2 Palestinians are stopped this morning at one such checkpoint near Nablus. They arouse the suspicion of the young soldiers manning the post and attempt to flee. They are subdued after flinging their bag away which turns out to be packed with explosives for an intended terror attack against civilians. Explosives safely disposed of; terrorists (bomber and driver) safely behind bars. No apology yet from Machsom Watch or other critics of Israel's security checkpoint policy.
2006-05-28	Israelis sitting out missile attacks in a bomb shelter on Kibbutz Menara, northern Israel today. Border Alight: The cold-blooded Hizbullah strategy which has caused so much misery in Israel's north in past years is being played out again - with predictable results. This morning, in addition to the Katyusha attack we reported earlier, Hezbullah launch large-scale attacks right along the Israel-Lebanon border including additional Katyusha firings on communities and military bases plus mortar shells and sniper and machine gun fire attacks. Heavy fire is currently being exchanged. There are casualties and property loss. Developing. UPDATE: Sunday evening, a wide swathe of towns in the north from Kiryat Shmona to the coastal resort of Nahariya are in danger of missile strikes. Thousands of residents are ordered into the bomb shelters this evening. Lebanon meanwhile pours scorn on a 'warlike' Israel while media headline writers reach for the familiar context-free cliches: "Israel bombs militant targets in Lebanon"; "Islamic Jihad denies claim it attacked Israel"; "Islamic Jihad claims rocket attack on north Israel"; and so on.
2006-05-28	Northern Exposure: A Sunday morning barrage of three (at least) Katyusha missiles lands in the Safed area, reminding us Israelis that we are surrounded by barbarians in every direction. Two people are lightly injured today; there is property damage. Palestinian terror groups have carried out many such attacks in the past, in particular Hezbollah whose terrorists periodically fire the rockets at Israeli targets, and are reported to have stockpiled many thousands of Katyushas. The last such attack from the north was on 3-Feb-06. Three background notes of importance: (1) Today's rockets land a few kilometers further south than in any previous attack from Lebanon is known to have landed in Israel. (2) Earlier this month, a Palestinian woman was intercepted by Israeli security smuggling electronics, instructions and specifications for assembling explosives (including reference to Katyushas) and for carrying out terror attacks. (3) Palestinian terrorists in the south have fired Katyusha missiles into Israel on 3 occasions since March 2006.
2006-05-27	Missile Attack: A Qassam missile crashes into the small agricultural community of Kfar Maimon this evening. Fortunately no injuries. (This was not the intention of those who fired it from the Gaza Strip.)
2006-05-27	Stabbing: A Jewish teenager, 14, is stabbed in the back by a Palestinian next to Damascus Gate in Jerusalem's Old City late on Sabbath afternoon. His injuries are light. (This was not the intention of the attacker.)
2006-05-27	Withdrawal Part 2: Yesterday we expressed our skepticism about widespread media reports of Hamas withdrawing its new 'special forces' from the streets of Gaza. Tonight, it's reported they're back on those streets.
2006-05-26	Withdrawal?: The media are afroth this afternoon about a reported Hamas decision to "withdraw its special police forces from tension areas where clashes with the official Palestinian security forces have been taking place in recent days". We reported their initial deployment two weeks ago. Have a look at the AFP picture at right, a snapshot of the very well-armed Hamas 'special forces' in action against their Fatah brethren this week. Recall that Hamas have vowed never to disarm any members of the "resistance". And then ask yourself: (a) if these gun-toting thugs are being withdrawn, where are they withdrawing to? And (b) what is being done with the weapons that were plainly issued to them? Then note for yourself that this question has not been asked or answered by any of today's media reports. Instead, the excitement of Hamas 'scaling down' the violence by a 'withdrawal' dominates the region's news. How quickly people forget what the terrorists actually want.
2006-05-26	It Continues: A Qassam is fired into Israel again this morning. It lands in an orchard causing property damage but no injuries. (This was not the intention of those who fired it.) Elsewhere this morning, a routine inspection at an IDF checkpoint near Bethlehem turns up a Palestinian carrying a 15 centimeter knife, en route to places where Israelis can be found.
2006-05-25	Missiles: Two Qassam rockets are fired into Israel early this morning. No injuries reported. (This was not the intention of those who fired them.)
2006-05-24	Checkpoints Work: Despite endless criticism of IDF security checkpoints (calling them a form of collective punishment for instance) by people whose lives are not threatened by government-sponsored Palestinian terror, you just can't escape the fact that they do what they're supposed to do. Tonight, IDF soldiers manning a checkpoint north of Nablus spot a Kalashnikov rifle (archive picture right) in a Palestinian car. Weapon seized; owner arrested; lives saved.
2006-05-23	Seven people were murdered, 30 injured, when Ibrahim Hamed's gang attacked Jerusalem's Cafe Hillel on Emek Refaim Street in 2003. To paraphrase the BBC's Caroline Hawley: Why would the murderer of the saintly Dr David Applebaum and his daughter Nava who was to be married the next day, have to be arrested - now? We feel the question tells more about the person asking than about the moral or strategic issue it raises. Klotz Kashe?: The BBC features prominently in this blog's Hall of Shame. Illustrating the harm caused by uncritical media parroting of the "Hamas is having a truce" nonsense, the BBC's Caroline Hawley writes "...it is not clear why the army have moved against Hamad now..." which is what they did so brilliantly yesterday against one of the most notorious terror practitioners alive. After all, says Ms Hawley, "Hamas has not carried out any suicide attacks for 15 months..." On the run for the past 8 years, Ibrahim Hamad has murdered dozens of Israelis; he is among the most hardened and brutal murderers in this brutal and cruel war. Hamed's gang and the suits (like Ismail Haniya, the Hamas leader) who provide its political facade don't deny that terrorism is one of the tools at their disposal, a tool they regard as legitimate. Yet the BBC's Ms Hawley still wonders why an army charged with protecting Israeli society after more than 1,100 murders-by-terrorists in five years might want to arrest Hamed... now. A better question is why the BBC would knowingly provide a platform for naive and dangerous views like Ms. Hawley's. Perhaps someone might explain to her how, ultimately, people's lives are placed at mortal risk by such moral and political befuddlement.
2006-05-23	Red Alert: A "hot" warning is issued this evening by the security forces throughout the center of the country. This includes the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem highway and Highway 443. Warnings of this kind are issued when intelligence information is obtained pointing to a specific terrorist en route to a specific location or region.
2006-05-23	AP today distributes this pic of the murderer's mother with his portrait at the family home in Silwad, near Ramallah. AP failed, for the moment at least, to offer any photos of the mothers of Hamed's victims. Freshly Retired: Ibrahim Hamed is not a household name. Perhaps he ought to be. He has been on Israel's most-wanted list for years. As head of Hamas's West Bank terror operation - called the Izzedine al Qassam gang - he claimed credit for the murders of dozens of Israelis. That career is now on hold: he is captured alive today near Ramallah by Israeli security forces, and emerges from his hideout dressed only in his underwear, according to the BBC. 'Suicide rather than capture' is evidently meant for other people's children.
2006-05-21	It Continues: At least one more Qassam rocket lands around 8pm tonight in the western Negev. Fortunately no injuries.
2006-05-21	Still More: Another Qassam rocket fired from Gaza lands at about 6pm near Zikim in Israel's western Negev. And for anyone wondering if the Palestinian leadership understands the moral depravity involved in lobbing lethal explosives over the fence into people's back yards and school grounds, the Palestinian president provides the answer in a little-reported quote today. Speaking on May 15, 2006, Mahmoud Abbas said: "The futile firing of missiles needs to be stopped, [as they] mostly just give Israel a pretext to escalate its aggression against our citizens in the Gaza Strip." Who says the "moderate" Palestinian Arab leadership entirely lacks a moral compass?
2006-05-21	Today's Qassam crashed through the wall of the school, and landed in an empty classroom without exploding (Ynet) More Rockets: Two more Qassams (for a total of 3) this morning in the Sderot neighborhood; one falls harmlessly, the other crashes into a yeshiva (school) classroom. It's Sunday here, a regular working day in Israel, and all the pupils are temporarily out of their classroom when the Qassam strikes, having their morning prayers in the school's chapel (beit midrash). So instead of this being a report about a massacre of children, it turns out to be just another in the hundreds of reports of missiles fired by attempted murderers on civilian targets in Israel while their government, the Hamas-controlled PA, looks on, probably smiling. The students are terrified by the near-catastrophe; the parents rush to school to take them home; the army's sappers arrive to deal with the explosives; and the rest of us are left wondering how long our luck can hold out. Outside of Israel, mainstream media gave it barely a passing mention because, after all, no blood flowed, so almost none of your friends even knows it happened. And when Israeli forces eventually do identify the people who did today's planning, financing and firing, and - hopefully - find the right way to permanently prevent them from executing cold-blooded acts of terror like this one again, news report consumers from Oslo to Osaka are going to wonder when those Israelis are going to finally stop their "aggression" against the "poor", "defenseless" Palestinians. Accurate and contextual reporting does matter.
2006-05-21	Rockets: A Qassam lands this morning at Tzomet Gevim, just outside Sderot. When the terrorists fire these deadly weapons, they pray for maximum damage to Israeli lives and property. Today's result: two civilian victims of shock. Thankfully, that's all.
2006-05-20	Current Warnings: As of tonight, Israel's security forces (police, army, border police) are aware of 83 concurrent terror-attack warnings, 16 of them classified as 'concrete' (red alerts). Most originate in the northern Samaria district, mainly in Nablus. We believe it is impossible to understand the security measures Israel puts in place without knowing about these constant threats. So why is this never reported in your newspapers or TV news?
2006-05-20	Pisgat Zeev's shopping mall in Jerusalem's northern suburbs Stabber: Our daughter was murdered in a Jerusalem pizza restaurant at a time - August 2001 - when few seriously believed there was a need for, or much that could be expected from, security guards posted outside stores, malls, theatres and restaurants. But almost every day since then, someone, somewhere in Israel has been stopped by alert security guards and prevented from carrying out the next headline-grabbing terror attack. Tonight it is the turn of the Pisgat Zeev shopping mall on Jerusalem's north side. A Palestinian man, 19, is stopped at the entrance to the mall after attracting the attention of the guards and prevented from entering. He pulls a 30 cm (12 inch) knife from his underwear and screams while waving the knife and trying to stab whomever he can. He is subdued, taken away by police and confesses to having come with Jew-stabbing on his mind. Fortunately tonight will not be his big night.
2006-05-19	Hawara checkpoint, near Nablus: Daily inconvenience to one side; daily threat of murder and maiming to the other Transitioning: The Hawara checkpoint, south of Nablus, is the largest security cross-over in the West Bank. This morning, a Palestinian passing through under the eye of Israeli security forces is stopped and found to have four pipe-bombs and a 20cm knife stashed into his pants (Hebrew bulletin here). An entire literature exists - mainly of the protest, outrage, defamation and vilification variety - to describe Israel's self-defense strategy at these crossings. For instance Machsom Watch (machsom is Hebrew for barrier): try to find even a single mention there of terrorists prevented from carrying out their evil plans. (But if you're looking for rudeness and superficiality, you'll find plenty of that there.) Though this happens routinely, daily in some places, the people who want you to know how really rude and insensitive it is of Israel to impose these military checkpoints on the Palestinians become deathly quiet whenever attempted murders are frustrated there. And they are, constantly. Nablus is now the nerve center of Palestinian terror; a Jerusalem Post report says "nightly raids carried out by IDF troops in Nablus and the nearby refugee camps [are what keep] suicide terrorists out of Israel's cities". Matters to some; utterly irrelevant to others.
2006-05-18	Shooting: An Israeli couple are shot this evening by Palestinian Arab gunmen near the town of Tapuah. The man is moderately wounded; his wife lightly injured. They continue driving to Tapuah Junction, where they receive medical treatment before being transferred to a hospital. The al-Aqsa Brigades, loyal to Mahmoud Abbas and Fatah, take responsibility.
2006-05-18	Missile Barrage: Six more Qassam rockets are fired this afternoon from the northern Gaza Strip (let's be clear: from areas abandoned by Israel in the name of peace last summer) into Israel. One lands near "a strategic facility"; one falls just outside an IDF base at Zikim. Fortunately no one injured - but that was not the intention. Meanwhile the Jerusalem area where we live has been the subject of two separate "concrete warnings" of a terror attack today - still in effect as we write this. UPDATE: The terror alert is removed this evening but only after large security contingents are first deployed throughout the city, with roadblocks on the main highway to Tel-Aviv, in northern Jerusalem and at French Hill Junction.
2006-05-17	Live television coverage of the Fatah/Hamas clashes Cops Again: Yesterday we noted the new terrorist "security" force formed by Hamas. Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah, the PA's president, today vetoes its establishment; Hamas responds by announcing the immediate deployment of the force, confirming that these are nothing more than terrorist thugs operating under a different public relations cover; no need to prepare uniforms, training or other clap-trap. Violence has been escalating in Gaza since Hamas won the March elections; there are daily casualties among both Hamas and Fatah. All of this is fuelled by a power struggle between Abbas and the Hamas Palestinian prime minister Ismail Haniyeh. Haaretz says "A key area of dispute is control over the security forces." So much control, so much dispute, so little security.
2006-05-16	Lawlessness in Gaza has been a fact of life for decades. Now civil war seems to be brewing Good Cop, Bad Cop: Leveraging its bogus status as “truce” observer, Hamas has announced a new paramilitary force made up of 3,000 re-purposed terrorist 'militants'. The initiative’s surreal blend of terror and law enforcement earns a compelling analysis by Matthew Gutman in USA Today, quoting one of the recycled 'cops': “For us it is the same, defending Palestine (by attacking Israel) and ending the chaos. We are serving the Palestinian people.” Fancifully titled the Security Forces Support System, the Hamas creation is headed by Jamal Abu Samhadana, a notorious terrorist long on the run from the Israelis. With an appalling list of barbaric outrages to his name and blood on his hands, he is at the top of Israel’s “most-wanted” list. He told the Telegraph (UK): "We have only one enemy and that is the Jews," but that's alright because his force "will also act against corruption and lawbreakers". The formation of this Hamas force, and the choice of its head, are seen as an exercise in muscle-flexing and perhaps a precursor to full-scale civil war with other power blocs, notably Fatah. USA Today quotes an Israeli analyst with an eye for the economic efficiency of the new Hamas business model: “It can provide law and order in the morning and terrorism in the evening.” Which conveniently leaves their nights free.
2006-05-16	Rockets: Nativ Ha'asara, a small farming community near Gaza, comes under rocket attack again at 5 this morning. A Katyusha missile (much more accurate and much longer range than the usual Qassam) narrowly misses a residence, damaging a chicken coop and greenhouses, and killing livestock. The goal of Islamic Jihad who took credit was, of course, to kill Israelis and not poultry. No one on their side of the fence stopped or bothered them; this is the normal condition of Israel's Gaza border with the Palestinian Authority. Katyushas are familiar to Israelis living on Israel's border with Lebanon where Hezbollah has made liberal use of them for terror purposes for years. Both Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad are sponsored by Iran.