أحــ الحلو ــمد
15-03-04, 02:44 PM
In the three-and-a-half years the Palestinian Intifada has seen suicide bombers attack Israeli buses, nightclubs and restaurants but yesterday saw the first attack on a seaport. The attackers killed at least 10 Israelis and wounded more than a dozen others, some of them seriously, in the southern Israeli port city of Ashdod.
The bombings, by two teenagers, were in response to the past week's killings by Israelis in Gaza and the West Bank, where troops have killed at least 25 people, including five or six children. It is natural for Palestinian armed groups such as Fatah, Izzadin al-Qassim and Hamas, who jointly claimed responsibility, to react after such a bloody week.
As well as being a new target, the attack marks a new development in the Palestinian struggle for liberation, with different liberation groups co-ordinating their operations.
Israeli Cabinet Minister Yosef Panitzky claimed that the bombers "found a weak point and exploited it", but anyone who protests that Ashdod is a civilian facility should remember that the Palestinian towns and refugee camps are also civilian sites. Israeli killings of Palestinians are far more numerous than those inflicted on the Jewish state, so if there is to be condemnation of the violence it should be aimed primarily at the Israeli occupation army and the government that controls it.
Many of the Palestinian victims - more than 2,400 have died - have been civilians going about their daily business or children playing harmlessly but the Israeli military invents excuses for killing them and is held blameless by the Western world.
In two months the Israelis bulldozed at least 1,200 Palestinian homes without attracting international criticism. In Rafah alone there are 15,000 homeless refugees as a result of Israeli demolitions.
To suggest that Israelis deserve sympathy and support whenever they suffer an attack while ignoring the slaughter of Palestinian women and children in cold blood is simply Western hypocrisy.
The international community has failed to uphold justice in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, leaving the Palestinians at the mercy of their enemies so they are entitled to defend themselves with whatever means they have.
The Israelis have raped an entire country under false historical pretences and their brutal Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has given his forces carte blanche to kill civilians as they please. The war of terror Sharon is waging against the entire Palestinian population was bound to attract a deadly response.
The bombings, by two teenagers, were in response to the past week's killings by Israelis in Gaza and the West Bank, where troops have killed at least 25 people, including five or six children. It is natural for Palestinian armed groups such as Fatah, Izzadin al-Qassim and Hamas, who jointly claimed responsibility, to react after such a bloody week.
As well as being a new target, the attack marks a new development in the Palestinian struggle for liberation, with different liberation groups co-ordinating their operations.
Israeli Cabinet Minister Yosef Panitzky claimed that the bombers "found a weak point and exploited it", but anyone who protests that Ashdod is a civilian facility should remember that the Palestinian towns and refugee camps are also civilian sites. Israeli killings of Palestinians are far more numerous than those inflicted on the Jewish state, so if there is to be condemnation of the violence it should be aimed primarily at the Israeli occupation army and the government that controls it.
Many of the Palestinian victims - more than 2,400 have died - have been civilians going about their daily business or children playing harmlessly but the Israeli military invents excuses for killing them and is held blameless by the Western world.
In two months the Israelis bulldozed at least 1,200 Palestinian homes without attracting international criticism. In Rafah alone there are 15,000 homeless refugees as a result of Israeli demolitions.
To suggest that Israelis deserve sympathy and support whenever they suffer an attack while ignoring the slaughter of Palestinian women and children in cold blood is simply Western hypocrisy.
The international community has failed to uphold justice in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, leaving the Palestinians at the mercy of their enemies so they are entitled to defend themselves with whatever means they have.
The Israelis have raped an entire country under false historical pretences and their brutal Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has given his forces carte blanche to kill civilians as they please. The war of terror Sharon is waging against the entire Palestinian population was bound to attract a deadly response.