"No Hamas offices were targeted in yesterday's
attacks. Instead,
Israel focused
its wrath on the personal symbols of Yasser
Arafat. The
strikes hit Gaza City and the southern Khan Yunis
refugee camp, as
well as the West Bank towns of Ramallah,
Tulkaram and
Qalqiliya, targeting offices of the Palestinian
leader's security
forces as well as his Force 17 security detail,
which Israel has
declared a terrorist organisation." (The Guardian)
Israels førere ønsker å styrke Hamas og ødelegge den
palestinske staten samt drepe uskyldige: en klart
fascistisk linje i samme gate som den tyske krigen på
østfronten under andre verdenskrigen. Dette støttes
uforbeholdent av de bibelske bombekåte fra Bush II
til Bombevik.
Karsten Johansen
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,
612312,00.html
They ran for their lives through a
field of death
Suzanne
Goldenberg in Gaza
Wednesday
December 5, 2001
The Guardian
Schoolboy
Mohammed Abu Marasa's brief life ended in a splash
of blood on a
gravestone. The 15-year-old was cut down by flying
metal as he ran
through a cemetery, desperate to escape the
Israeli F-16 war
plane pulverising a nearby Palestinian security
compound.
Two people were
killed here yesterday, and more than 80
wounded - most of
them children - as the Israeli fighters and
attack
helicopters pounded eight Palestinian security
installations:
four in Gaza and four in the West Bank.
The first F-16 to
scream across a winter sky towards the walled
compound of the
Palestinian preventative security force created
instant chaos. A
terrified population poured into the streets.
Teachers at the
four schools that surround the compound in the
Sheikh Radwan
neighbourhood of Gaza City sent their charges
home, and
children ran for cover, lugging their satchels across
the sprawling
cemetery that borders the installation.
"Mohammed was
running for his life. He did not know he was
taking himself to
his grave," said Samih al-Madhoun, another
boy, aged 14.
Instead, he was
cut down in this congregation of the dead.
"Everyone is
going to taste death and we shall make trials of
you with evil and
with good, and to us you will be returned," the
inscription reads
on the gravestone where he fell.
Ten minutes
later, as rescue workers were trying to cut through
the chaos, and
more children were scrambling through the
cemetery - either
to escape or to get a look at the destruction -
the F-16s
returned.
Doctors at Gaza's
Shifa hospital said many of the wounded were
hit in the second
attack, including an ambulance attendant who
had arrived to
evacuate the wounded in the first bombing, and a
woman in her
ninth month of pregnancy.
"I was walking
home past the preventative security building when
the bomb threw me
off the ground, and something fell on me. I
looked at my
hand, and it was full of blood," said Ahmed Awad
Ayub, a
15-year-old being wheeled into surgery. Doctors said
he
could lose the
use of his right hand.
Yesterday's
bombings - the heaviest onslaught on the West
Bank and Gaza
since the start of the Palestinian revolt 14
months ago - were
Israel's retaliation for a weekend of carnage
visited on Haifa
and Jerusalem by Hamas suicide bombers.
Twenty-five
people lost their lives in the attacks.
No Hamas offices
were targeted in yesterday's attacks. Instead,
Israel focused
its wrath on the personal symbols of Yasser
Arafat. The
strikes hit Gaza City and the southern Khan Yunis
refugee camp, as
well as the West Bank towns of Ramallah,
Tulkaram and
Qalqiliya, targeting offices of the Palestinian
leader's security
forces as well as his Force 17 security detail,
which Israel has
declared a terrorist organisation. In Ramallah,
the missiles
struck perilously close to Mr Arafat, punching into a
building 50
metres from his security compound. Aides said he
had been taken to
an underground shelter when the helicopters
loomed into view.
Israeli officials
described the air attacks as a message: Mr
Arafat had to
round up and jail the gunmen and suicide bombers
of Hamas and
Islamic Jihad - and members of his own Fatah
militia - or the
consequences would be dire.
"The purpose was
to send a clear military message... 'Friends,
we've had enough,
take the responsibility that you have and stop
the terrorism,'"
said the Israeli army spokesman,
Brigadier-General
Ron Kitrey.
For Gazans, who
turned out in their thousands to gawk at the
destruction
yesterday, it made little sense. The preventative
security forces
are Mr Arafat's main instrument for arresting
militants.
"How is this
going to help Mr Arafat jail people or put an end to
what Israel calls
terrorist attacks?" asked General Mahmoud
Abu Marzouk,
Gaza's civil defence chief, pulling up to a scene of
destruction.
The two bombs
that landed on the compound yesterday
smashed through
four storeys of concrete, and gouged a huge
crater in the
ground below. The circle of destruction spread for
several hundred
metres: ripping olive trees from their roots and
steel shutters
off shop fronts, and showering glass on to families
who took cover in
their homes.
"I was watching
television with my grandmother and al-Jazeera
was showing the
missiles hitting Mr Arafat's offices in Ramallah,
when the windows
fell in on me and we were covered with
glass," said
Mahmoud Misabeh, 18.
Another jet
roared overhead, and three bright constellations
appeared - more
bombs - hovering against a cloudy sky before
dropping on a
national security building in the north of Gaza.
Hundreds of
screaming people jumped over gravestones to make
their escape.
The wave of
attacks began in the morning with armoured
bulldozers laying
waste to the Gaza airstrip, a humiliating act
intended to
impress on Mr Arafat the gravity of his
predicament.The
Palestinian leader remained trapped in
Ramallah where he
accused Mr Sharon of plotting his
destruction.
Mr Arafat said
the Israeli prime minister was trying to sabotage
his efforts to
crack down on militants at a time when
Washington is
adamant that he bring Hamas and Islamic Jihad
to heel.
President George Bush notched the pressure up
yesterday by
freezing the assets of organisations he said were
funding Hamas.
"They don't want
me to succeed and for this he is escalating his
military
activities," Mr Arafat told CNN. "He does not want a
peace process to
start."
The bombing
campaign put an immediate halt to a drive by Mr
Arafat's security
forces to arrest militants. Gen Marzouk said
the prisoners
being held in Gaza - such as in the preventative
security compound
- were no longer behind bars. "Some were
released, some
escaped, and some were wounded," he said.
"Over 70 were
arrested, but I don't think they are there
anymore."
There were
similar reports from the West Bank, prompting Mr
Arafat to sack
his security commander in Tulkaram for freeing
his prisoners.
But Gen Marzouk
said the crackdown was doomed. "Look
around you. There
are thousands of people in the streets. How
can Mr Arafat
arrest people in this situation? Mr Sharon wants
Mr Arafat to keep
on arresting people and to cause a civil war.
But we will not
have a civil war."
______________________________________________________________________________
ifrance.com, l'email gratuit le plus complet de l'Internet !
vos emails depuis un navigateur, en POP3, sur Minitel, sur le WAP...
http://www.ifrance.com/_reloc/email.emailif
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : 11-07-02 MET DST