PA blames Israel for Gaza bombing

[Herschel]

In a series of articles, interviews, and cartoons, the Palestinian Authority media on Thursday claimed that Israel was behind the attack on the American convoy in the northern Gaza Strip in which three US guards were killed.

The allegations came as the PA announced that its security forces arrested a number of Palestinians from the Jabalya refugee camp on suspicion of involvement.

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" Sharon and his generals are responsible," columnist Ali Sadek wrote in the daily Al-Hayat al-Jadeeda. "I don't rule out the possibility that they detonated the bomb with a remote control because their actions in the past, especially against the Americans, are known.

"They are the ones who killed 70 US Marines who were aboard the Liberty ship during the June 1967 war... The Israelis were also responsible for a series of bombings against US and British cultural centers in Cairo and Alexandria in order to create a crisis between Egypt and America."

Basem Abu Sumayah, director of Voice of Palestine, the official PA radio station, said: "This is a suspicious attack carried out by an anonymous group backed by a non-local party that has the experience, capability, and expertise in manufacturing and preparing land mines."

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http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1066287148291

Please!

[The Magistrate]

1. It Will Be Interesting, Sir

To see what the recently arrested suspects are made to say in custody. In the words of O'Brien: "All confessions made here are true. We make them true."

The charge is mere propagandist swill, and need not be taken seriously by anyone.

[Darranar]

2. I think I can agree...

with the writer that this was not a local group that carried out the attacks.

This was a group that had the means and the equipment to detonate such an explosive; my first guess would be Al Qaeda, or a related organization.

It doesn't make sense to me that Israel would have committed this act; there would have been much to lose and nothing to gain.

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Darranar]

5. That's not true...

There are two reasons that the US won't get involved:

A. Any corporate interests in that nation are already served by Sharon.

B. The political benefits to such a war would be minimal.

[mmm]

4. Israel would have everything to gain

[drdon326]

6. I'm fascinated.....

what would that be??

[Darranar]

7. Absolutely nothing...

I don't doubt that the GOI has the means and the amorality to carry out such a strike, but, as I said above, they woud have no motivation to do so.

[drdon326]

9. I wanted mmm's opinion.....

this should be interesting.

[Darranar]

10. I know who's opinion you wanted...

I was simply backing you, though not in the way you neccesarily wanted...

[rini]

13. now we are at odds again

amoral.......get a grip; as opposed to what?

[Darranar]

14. Let me try to explain this as best I can...

I view immorality and morality as two sides of the same coin. An immoral person is someone who is ideologically motivated, with his ideology being, according to conventional thought, wrong; a perfect example is a suicide bomber or Osama Bin Laden.

An amoral person is someone who is concerned with nothing but personal power and gain. Ideology is nothing but the means to reach that. Many of the members of the Bush Administration are amoral, as are greedy fools like Ken Lay.

I have yet to decide which one Ariel Sharon is, but that he is one of the two is certainly my sentiment. If those people got in the way of his aims, whatever they are, I would not doubt that he would try to carry out such an attack.

[The Magistrate]

8. You May Well Be Right, Mr. Darranar

A splinter of jihadis, in cooperation with the al Queda, seems to me the most likely explanaition. Local personnel, outside equipment and planning....

[Darranar]

12. That's another possibility...

The question is where the local personel would have come from. The Palestinian terrorist organizaitons have tried to distance themselves from it; if it was an ideologically based attack, they would have done nothing of the sort, and they have no pragmatic reason to launch this strike.

[The Magistrate]

15. Off The Top Of My Head, Sir

Two possible reasons.

First, simple considerations of Islamicist solidarity: with the jihad against the U.S. in progress in Afghanistan and Iraq, why should it not be opened in Palestine? What better credential for Palestinian nationhood, than to lend armed force to that world-wide cosmic struggle?

Second, to disrupt a C.I.A. operation: the scholarship program, whatever it actually is, is certain to appear to radical eyes as a means of recruiting agents, and those who participate in it suspect as collaboraters.

The "distancing" does not impress me much: "plausible deniability" is nothing new, nor is it patented in the West. If things might be dangerous, or go wrong in some way, compartmentalization is useful. As the old show used to intone: "If you are caught or killed, the Secretary will disavow any knowledge of your actions."

[Darranar]

16. Denial means nothing...

rhetoric means nothing, there we agree.

I think that in all three locations you mentioned, though less so in Palestine, there are two categories of fighters fighting against America and Israel. There are local groups who are completely established locally and do not have much deoendancy on the outside; both Hamas and Islamic Jihad fall into this category, for the most part, as do resistance movements in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

The second cateogry of people are the professional terrorists of such organizations as Al Qaeda. This group is also made up of foreign fighters joining in the Jihad.

There are, of course, different groups and organizations that fall into each category, and some that fall in somewhat into both. However, it seems to me that it is the professionals who are targeting forces aside from their main enemy. Foreign terrorists were likely behind the bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad, and foreing terrorists were likely behind this as well.

Cooperation between both categories vary; I am no expert on the ties of Hamas to Al Qaeda, so I really do not know the extent of Hamas's, or another Palestinian terrorist group's, involvement in this.

I'm aware that this post has failed to really address either point you made. To conclude, therefore, I must say that you could well be right and I have nothing to say to contest your arguments.

[rini]

11. well my dear

the world as we know it has ended; I agree with you.

[teryang]

17. A modest observation

...I usual don't post on the P/I board because I don't have the encyclopedic knowledge of minutia some of its advocates pro and con demonstate. I used to brief middle eastern affairs as part of my duties as a younger person. The macro patterns haven't changed in thirty years.

I humbly suggest that the bulldozing incident, the presence of American officials and their bombing/killing are all related. I notice that the articles covering this subject matter typically fail to report occurrences which happened the day before and the day before that in the McNesia format of editorialization by omission.

[Resistance]

18. Possibly another Lavon Affair?

The Lavon Affair

In July 1954 Egypt was plagued by a series of bomb outrages directed mainly against American and British property in Cairo and Alexandria. It was generally assumed that they were the work of the Moslem Brothers, then the most dangerous challenge to the still uncertain authority of Colonel (later President) Nasser and his two-year-old revolution. Nasser was negotiating with Britain over the evacuation of its giant military bases in the Suez Canal Zone, and, the Moslem Brothers, as zealous nationalists, were vigorously opposed to any Egyptian compromises.

It therefore came as a shock to world, and particularly Jewish opinion, when on 5 October the Egyptian Minister of the Interior, Zakaria Muhieddin, announced the break-up of a thirteen-man Israeli sabotage network.

The trial established that the bombings had indeed been carried out by an Israeli espionage and terrorist network. This was headed by Colonel Avraharn Dar --alias John Darling-- and a core of professionals who had set themselves up in Egypt under various guises. They had recruited a number of Egyptian Jews; one of them was a young woman, Marcelle Ninio, who worked in the offices of a British company.

This whole episode, which was to poison Israeli political life for a decade and more, came to be known as the 'Lavon Affair', for it had been established in the Cairo trial that Lavon, as Minister of Defence, had approved the campaign of sabotage. At least so the available evidence made it appear. But in Israel, Lavon had asked Moshe Sharett for a secret inquiry into a matter about which the cabinet knew nothing. Benyamin Givli, the intelligence chief, claimed that the so-called 'security operation' had been authorized by Lavon himself. Two other Bengurion proteges, Moshe Dayan and Shimon Peres, testified against Lavon. Lavon denounced Givli's papers as forgeries and demanded the resignation of all three men. Instead, Sharett ordered Lavon himself to resign and invited Bengurion to come out of retirement and take over the Defence Ministry. It was a triumphant comeback for the 'activist' philosophy whose excesses both Sharett and Lavon had tried to modify. It was con-summated, a week later, by an unprovoked raid on Gaza, which left thirty-nine Egyptians dead and led to the Suez War Of 1956.57

[Darranar]

19. I doubt it...

as I sadi above, because Israel has little to gain and much to lose.

[The Magistrate]

20. Another Small Point In That Connection, Sir

The Lavon affair was a trifle in destruction: this is common to most adventures in covert provocatuerism. The explosives involved were aimed at property, and were little more than fire-crackers. The thing was exposed when a bomb detonated in an operative's pocket in a theater, and it did little harm even to him: he was available for interrogaton, and eventual hanging, if recollection serves. There is simply no reasonable comparison possible between this half century old attempt at stirring a drastically different political pot, and these recent events in Gaza.

[cantwealljustgetalong]

22. yes but there is never a bad time to bring up the Lavon affair...

or the USS Liberty for that matter...

gets the juices flowing every time...

[teryang]

21. Gaza is an internal security matter

...that is the plausible motive. Other outside forces may have had even more persuasive motives but they can strike anywhere.