14-Jul-06: This Ongoing, Ongoing War

In the past several hours (it's now mid-afernoon, Friday), Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon have fired off barrage after barrage of Katyusha missiles into any Israeli target they can reach - civilian, military, agricultural; it's all the same to them. Rockets have hit

• Tsfat (some know it as Safed) - reports in the last few minutes of another direct hit on a residence. The Old City was extensively damaged there yesterday and there are several people critically injured.
• Nahariya - center of town is hit. Local leaders and government politicians happen to have been meeting very nearby to discuss the crisis situation. Among politicians present was Vice Premier Shimon Peres.
• Hatzor Haglilit near Rosh Pina - several people suffered from shock after a missile landed near a bomb shelter. A vehicle parked nearby exploded.
• Beit Jan
• Kiryat Shmona - two separate barrages. One near a factory in the city's northern industrial zone; a second near the village of Beit Hillel.
• Biranit
• Matat
• Sasa right on the northern border.
• Karmiel - where we have friends who spent last night very uncomfortably accommodated in a bomb shelter. All the residents of the city have now been told to enter bomb shelters and protected structures this afternoon after today's Katyusha missile landings in the vicinity. So far no reports of injuries or serious damage, but we're told (and we believe) it's terrifying.
• Maalot - initial reports of a direct hit on an apartment building with injuries and damage.
• And Haifa's residents are being told right now (4.40pm) to find shelter and stay there.

If you're not familiar with Galilee and northern Israel, the places listed above are not military bases or desert reserves. These are towns and cities filled with people; places that have not been under direct Arab attack in decades, and which ought to be in the midst of their tourist season. The area suffered 120 long-range missile attacks yesterday. And today's no quieter.

For those of us mindful of what a terror organization is, it's self-evident that the only thing that will stop their active enmity (translation: shooting) will be when their physical ability to do this is neutralized.

Of course, it would be awfully nice if that could be done in a proportionate way. And we're happy to discuss with anyone interested (perhaps the political leaders of the European Union, Norway, Russia, France, Italy, the United Kingdom) how a proportionate response to deliberate, willful and enthusiastic mass murder ought to be conducted.

One last word: we named our blog "This Ongoing War" when we started it because we're appalled at the way observers and reporters keep presenting events out of context. Our daughter was murdered almost five years ago in a terrorist massacre. That attack on a restaurant filled with women and children, conducted by agents of the people who now sit in the Palestinian parliament and funded and supported by them, was one in a long series of acts of war. We can wish it weren't so. We can hope that there are people on the other side who really, truly want peaceful relations. But we can't make it happen by wishing and hoping. And we can't ignore the straight line that connects today's missile attacks on Israel, yesterday's Qassams and Katyushot, last week's stabbings, last month's drive-by shootings, and the restaurant bombings, grenade throwings and all the other acts of intended and actual murder carried out day after day for the past 6 years since the Arafat War began.

That straight line is described in our chronicle below, and wishing and hoping won't change its reality.