Another Suicide Bombing, Fisk on America, Usher on Sharon

December 5, 2005

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Today's Contents:

At least five killed in suicide bombing at Netanya mall (Ha'aretz) Some 50 injured, Islamic Jihad apparently responsible

More Important ArticlesLinks to other important news articles for today

[JPN Commentary: What can one say about yet another attack in a long string of violence against civilians? We say the same things every time. We remind people who hear of suicide bombings that Palestinian civilians are injured or killed consistently in Israeli "operations", we express abhorrence and outrage at the deaths of civilians, we discuss how pointless violence is when it only deepens the quagmire both sides are in. In the wake of today's attack in Netanya, however, I saw an interesting "analysis" from a right-wing news source, which calls itself Independent Media Review and Analysis (IMRA). In that analysis, they state that the "fence [sic] hasn't stopped terror". They credit Israeli military operations in the West Bank for that, although one should immediately question why such operations failed to stop attacks in the past and do so now despite having been slightly scaled back in recent months. We at Jewish Voice for Peace, along with many colleague groups have been warning from the beginning of the construction of the separation wall that it would not stop attacks, and that only a just peace can do that. The considerable diminishment in attacks in Israel this past year would be attributed by us to the cease-fire commitment that Mahmoud Abbas brokered among most of the Palestinian armed groups, to general Palestinian exhaustion with the intifada and to an increased focus on building a representative Palestinian governing structure and other Palestinian institutions and infrastructure. JVP thus advocates a just peace as the best measure to prevent attacks on Israeli civilians (as well as against Palestinians), while IMRA believes that more repressive measures are the best way to prevent such attacks (they seem to believe that Israeli violence against Palestinians is either unavoidable or unimportant), but both agree that the wall is not going to do it. Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz is preparing the army to invade the Gaza Strip again, in response to the rocket attacks over the weekend and today's attack is likely to provide more momentum for going ahead with this. For Mofaz, it is a way to enhance his own standing in his race with Benjamin Netanyahu for the leadership of the Likud. In fact, there is already a good deal of commentary about how this attack affects Israeli politics. The weak point for the new leader of Labor, Amir Peretz, is that he is seen as completely inexperienced in dealing with "security matters" and international diplomacy. Thus, these attacks are seen as helping Sharon, as they shift the debate away from internal economic and social issues and to the ongoing conflict with the Palestinians. But this is also an opportunity for Peretz, albeit one that he is not likely to take, given the conservative track he is being advised to follow. Peretz should be taking these attacks as evidence for the failure of Sharon's policies and promoting the notion that only a just peace can end the violence. In fact, this is not far from what he was saying during his campaign within Labor, the sort of thinking that already has won him one election. One can only hope that he ceases to adhere to the poor advice being given him by more conservative Laborites. That was what cost Amram Mitzna the last election, and it simply holds little hope for defeating Sharon. Butg what is important here is not the impact on Israeli politics, but the cost, in blood, that is being paid today and is likely to be greatly escalated if Israel re-invades Gaza. That it would be futile for any hopes for peace or even for greater protection for Israelis is obvious--such measures have been consistently proven, time and time again, to increase the bloodshed for both sides. To some extent, this is just another example of lives sacrificed for internal politics; To a greater extent, it is simply another chapter in the ongoing madness of this conflict. -- MP]

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/653907.html 05/12/2005 At least five people were killed Monday and more than 50 others were wounded, including four seriously, when a suicide bomber blew himself up at around 11:30 A.M. at the entrance to Hasharon shopping mall in Netanya. The wounded were taken to Laniado Hospital in Netanya, Hillel Yaffeh Medical Center in Hadera and Meir Hospital in Kfar Sava. The names of four out of the five victims were released: Alexandra Zarnitzki, 65, from Netanya; Daniel Golani, 45, from Nahariya; Eliyah Rozen, 38, from Bat Hefer; and Haim Amram, 26, from Netanya. Islamic Jihad said that it had carried out the attack. An earlier claim in the name of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades was swiftly denied by the Fatah-linked group. Hezbollah's television station, Al-Manar, said the Islamic Jihad's military arm, the Jerusalem Brigades, made the claim in a telephone call to the station. The group later identified the attacker as 21-year-old Lutfi Amin Abu Salem, from the village of Kafr Rai, located between the West Bank towns of Jenin and Tul Karm. A video released by Islamic Jihad showed the bomber posing with a grenade launcher and an assault rifle. The group has carried out all four previous suicide bombings carried out since a joint cease-fire declaration last February. It has said it reserves the right to retaliate for any perceived Israeli violations. "A suicide bomber who tried to enter Hasharon mall in Netanya was spotted by passersby after he raised their suspicions," said Avi Sasson, deputy police chief in the area. "Two policemen at the scene pulled out their guns and ordered him to halt and to take his hands out of his pockets. At that stage, he blew himself up," he said. An eye-witness said that he spotted a man walking "like a robot" to the mall. He said that another woman who saw him shouted to the security guards at entrance to the shopping center: "Suicide bomber, suicide bomber!" The guards stopped the man and pushed him up against the wall, and nearby police officers rushed to help. At that point, the bomber detonated the explosives he had in his bag. One of the security guards was killed and the the policemen were wounded. "The fact that the security guard and policemen managed to identify the bomber meant that they prevented a major disaster," said Israel Police Commissioner Moshe Karadi. "The city of Netanya is located on the seam line... and this is the third time that bombers have succeeded in carrying out an attack there," he said. No warning Deputy Public Security Minister Yaakov Edri told Israel Radio that there had been no specific warnings ahead of the attack. Karadi also told reporters that there had been no specific warnings about the bombing. David Baker, an official in the Prime Minister's Office, said that the attack was the result of PA refusal to dismantle the terrorist organizations in the territories. In the wake of the bombing, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will convene a special meeting of the security cabinet Monday evening. In a statement released by his office, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas condemned the attack, and vowed to punish those responsible. The attack was the first suicide bombing in Israel since October 26, when a bomber killed six people in Hadera, just north of Netanya. The coastal city has been a frequent target of suicide bombings in the past five years of violence. In July 2005 five people were killed when an Islamic Jihad suicide bomber blew himself up near the shopping mall. The bomber, identified as 18-year-old Ahmed Abu Khalil from the West Bank village of Atil, blew up on a pedestrian crossing near the entrance to the shopping center.

[JPN Commentary:Robert Fisk is a renowned Middle East correspondent for The Independent (London). He has lived in the Middle East for almost three decades and holds more awards for journalism than any other foreign correspondent. In the article below, he compares the coverage of the war in Iraq in mainstream American media - which is fast changing for the better - with the coverage (or rather the lack of such) regarding the true nature of the Israeli occupation. - RG]

The Independent Online 3rd December 2005, http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/article330873.ece Watching the pathetic, old, lie-on-its-back frightened labrador of the American media changing overnight into a vicious rottweiler is one of the enduring pleasures of society in the United States. I have been experiencing this phenomenon over the past two weeks, as both victim and beneficiary. In New York and Los Angeles, my condemnation of the American presidency and Israel’s continued settlement-building in the West Bank was originally treated with the disdain all great papers reserve for those who dare to question proud and democratic projects of state. In The New York Times, that ancient luminary Ethan Bonner managed to chide me for attacking American journalists who - he furiously quoted my own words - "report in so craven a fashion from the Middle East - so fearful of Israeli criticism that they turn Israeli murder into ’targeted attacks’ and illegal settlements into ’Jewish neighbourhoods’." It was remarkable that Bonner should be so out of touch with his readers that he did not know that "craven" is the very word so many Americans apply to their grovelling newspapers (and quite probably one reason why newspaper circulations are falling so disastrously). But the moment that a respected Democratic congressman and Vietnam war veteran in Washington dared to suggest that the war in Iraq was lost, that US troops should be brought home now - and when the Republican response was so brutal it had to be disowned - the old media dog sniffed the air, realised that power was moving away from the White House, and began to drool. On live television in San Francisco, I could continue my critique of America’s folly in Iraq uninterrupted. Ex-Mayor Willie Brown - who allowed me to have my picture taken in his brand new pale blue Stetson - exuded warmth towards this pesky Brit (though he claimed on air that I was an American) who tore into his country’s policies in the Middle East. It was enough to make you feel the teeniest bit sorry - though only for a millisecond, mark you - for the guy in the White House. All this wasn’t caused by that familiar transition from Newark to Los Angeles International, where the terror of al-Qa’ida attacks is replaced by fear of the ozone layer. On the east coast, too, the editorials thundered away at the Bush administration. Seymour Hersh, that blessing to American journalism who broke the Abu Ghraib torture story, produced another black rabbit out of his Iraqi hat with revelations that US commanders in Iraq believe the insurgency is now out of control. When those same Iraqi gunmen this week again took control of the entire city of Ramadi (already "liberated" four times by US troops since 2003), the story shared equal billing on prime time television with Bush’s latest and infinitely wearying insistence that Iraqi forces - who in reality are so infiltrated by insurgents that they are a knife in America’s back - will soon be able to take over security duties from the occupation forces. Even in Hollywood - and here production schedules prove that the rot must have set in more than a year ago - hitherto taboo subjects are being dredged to the surface of the political mire. Jarhead, produced by Universal Pictures, depicts a brutal, traumatised Marine unit during the 1991 Gulf War. George Clooney’s production of Good Night, and Good Luck, a devastating black- and-white account of Second World War correspondent Ed Murrow’s heroic battle with Senator McCarthy in the 1950s - its theme is the management and crushing of all dissent - has already paid for its production costs twice over. Murrow is played by an actor but McCarthy appears only in real archive footage. Incredibly, a test audience in New York complained that the man "playing" McCarthy was "overacting". Will we say this about Messrs Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld in years to come? I suspect so. And then there’s Syriana, Clooney’s epic of the oil trade which combines suicide bombers, maverick CIA agents (one of them played by Clooney himself), feuding Middle East Arab potentates - one of whom wants real democracy and wealth for his people and control of his own country’s resources - along with a slew of disreputable businessmen and east coast lawyers. The CIA eventually assassinates the Arab prince who wants to take control of his own country’s oil (so much for democracy) - this is accomplished with a pilotless aerial bomb guided by men in a room in Virginia - while a Pakistani fired from his job in the oil fields because an American conglomerate has downsized for its shareholders’ profits destroys one of the company’s tankers in a suicide attack. "People seem less afraid now," Clooney told an interviewer in Entertainment magazine. "Lots of people are starting to ask questions. It’s becoming hard to avoid the questions." Of course, these questions are being asked because of America’s more than 2,000 fatalities in Iraq rather than out of compassion for Iraq’s tens of thousands of fatalities. They are being pondered because the whole illegal invasion of Iraq is ending in calamity rather than success. Yet still they avoid the "Israel" question. The Arab princes in Syriana - who in real life would be obsessed with the occupation of the West Bank - do not murmur a word about Israel. The Arab al-Qa’ida operative who persuades the young Pakistani to attack an oil tanker makes no reference to Israel - as every one of bin Laden’s acolytes assuredly would. It was instructive that Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 did not mention Israel once. So one key issue of the Middle East remains to be confronted. Amy Goodman, whom I used to enrage by claiming that her leftist Democracy Now programme - broadcast from a former Brooklyn fire station - had only three listeners (one of whom was Amy Goodman), is bravely raising this unmentionable subject. Partly as a result, her "alternative" radio and television station - how I hate that prissy word "alternative" - is slowly moving into the mainstream. Americans are ready to discuss the United States’ relationship with Israel. And America’s injustices towards the Arabs. As usual, ordinary Americans are way out in front of their largely tamed press and television reporters. Now we have to wait and see if the media boys and girls will catch up with their own people.

[JPN Commentary:Ariel Sharon has forged a new party and a new creed to pursue an old political ambition -- the exclusion of the Palestinians, writes Graham Usher. As one commentator said: "It is the first unilateral party in Israel". - RG]

Al-Ahram Weekly 1-7 December 2005 http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2005/771/re2.htm Ten days after he decided to dump Likud in favour of "a new, national liberal party" at the centre of Israeli politics, Ariel Sharon's gamble appears to be paying off. Polls not only show his Kadima ("onward" or "forward") Party defeating all comers as Israel's majority bloc in the general elections set for 28 March 2006; it is also attracting a steady haemorrhage of followers from Israel's established Likud and Labour parties. To cap it all, Sharon has received accolades from regional leaders like Egypt's President Mubarak. "Ariel Sharon is the only Israeli politician who can reach peace with the Palestinians," he told a Spanish newspaper on 27 November. "God willing he will succeed". Truly it is "springtime for Sharon," says Israeli analyst Robert Rosenberg. But the winter is not yet over, a fact that Sharon at least understands. For his party to be anything more than a political one-night stand Sharon needs to gravely and permanently weaken Likud and Labour. He is working assiduously to that end. So far Sharon has been able to woo 13 of Likud's 40 MPs to his new order: he seeks 20, say sources, as well as around 70 of Likud's mayors. He also needs to bleed Labour of its more moderate figures the better to paint its new chairman, Amir Peretz, as an "inexperienced" leader at the head of a far-left, "irresponsible" party. Haim Ramon was the first Labour politician to join Kadima, followed by Dalia Itzik, Labour minister in Sharon's outgoing government. Both are seen to be loyalists of former Labour leader, Shimon Peres, with analysts suggesting that their flight should be read as a harbinger of his. The perception has been reinforced by a scathing and racist attack on Peretz and his Moroccan origins by Peres' brother, Gigi. "Peretz and his people are a foreign body in the Labour Party, like General Franco and the Falangists who came from southern Spain ... and destroyed the magnificent Republic," Gigi told Israel's Army Radio on 28 November. Their "game is now entirely clear -- the One Nation (Peretz's former political party) people came from North Africa, took over (Labour) and shot them (Peres and his supporters) in the back". Shimon Peres has kept silent about his brother's tirade as well as his future choice of party. Sharon has reportedly offered him the post of "peace envoy" in any future government, an attractive deal since it allows Peres the allure of office without the hassle of joining a new party. Peretz's counter-offer is for Peres to become Labour Party "President", a meaningless title that few see Peres deigning to accept. Peres' departure from Labour is a "done deal", predicts one senior Labour Party member. His loss -- together with Ramon and Itzik -- will almost certainly hurt Peretz in the polls. But if Peretz is wounded, Likud is in freefall, with polls predicting it winning only 13 seats in the elections. Likud's problems are compounded by Sharon signalling that he would be willing to enter into a coalition with his erstwhile movement if it were headed by Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom and Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz. But he would draw the line against a Likud headed by the former Finance Minister and his ancient nemesis, Binyamin Netanyahu. Sharon's tactics here are as patent as those deployed against Peretz -- to paint Netanyahu as a far-right radical at the head of a rump Likud. It may work: Netanyahu is odds-on favourite to win the Likud primaries, scheduled now for 19 December. He is also hated by those his neo- liberal economic policies have most hurt -- Israel's poor and once Likud's vote-bank. With Likud and Labour shells of their former selves, the temptation for both will be to join Kadima in government -- precisely the grand coalition Sharon says he needs to execute his old/new platform for "peace". This was unveiled at Kadima's founding conference in West Jerusalem on 28 November. Its novel feature was Sharon's final, unequivocal abandonment of the old Likud dream of a Greater Israel stretching from the river to the sea. "We must be part of the Land of Israel in order to maintain a Jewish and democratic Israel," said Kadima leader and Justice Minister, Tzipi Livni. Its old feature was Sharon preferred replacement for the dream: a "disarmed, terror-free Palestinian state" in return for the preservation of the West Bank's main settlement blocs and Jerusalem "united" under Israel's control. The platform also called for a change in Israel's political system, with "regional elections, open primaries and direct elections for MPs and the prime minister". It is a clear move toward the "presidential", Gaullist system Sharon is now said to prefer. The Palestinian Authority's entrée into the new order is the 'roadmap' and a demand Sharon knows it cannot fulfil -- the complete disarmament of the Palestinian resistance. Instead, Sharon's future political negotiations will be with the US, first to persuade it of the merits of acceding to a Palestinian state "with provisional borders" as at least an interim solution, and then to accept the West Bank wall as Israel's irreversible eastern border. In this sense Kadima can claim another novelty, says Israeli analyst Nadav Eyal: "it is the first unilateral party in Israel".