Wanna bet the cease fire occurs just as Obama is sworn into office?

Because the Bush administration understands how peace comes from the end of a gun and Obama's won't.

JERUSALEM and Tel Aviv - The Israeli military on Thursday shelled the main United Nations aid compound in Gaza, struck a building that houses foreign news organizations, and caused a fire at a hospital. The attacks sparked global condemnation even as efforts to reach a cease-fire continued.

Later in the day, Hamas struck the Israeli city of Beersheba with a salvo of Qassam rockets, injuring five people, two of them seriously.

The Israeli strikes on what political officials said were unintended targets in the Gaza campaign underscore what some analysts see as a furious drive by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to achieve as many last-minute blows to Hamas as possible before a cease-fire is reached. And at this stage of the war, fissures are emerging within the Israeli civilian and military leadership.

"It's the final push to make Hamas understand, either they make a decision for a cease-fire, or it will be difficult to survive," says Shmuel Rosner, a leading opinion maker and journalist. "They need to show seriousness so Hamas doesn't interpret Israel's waiting of the last few days as reluctance to continue the operation."

While Ehud Barak, Israel's defense minister, apologized to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon for Israel's strike on their Gaza headquarters, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert took a different approach. He said the building had been used by Palestinian militants to strike Israeli forces.

[snip]

In Gaza, flames from the bombings Thursday also engulfed the al-Quds Hospital in Gaza City, though it was unclear whether this was from a direct hit or from a fire resulting from a nearby attack.

A UN spokesman said that the headquarters was hit by what was believed to be three white phosphorous shells, which burn at higher-than-usual temperatures, and that UN workers were unable to douse the flames with standard fire extinguishers.

Thursday marked the second time since the war began that a UN facility took a direct hit from Israel.

Last week, Israeli forces bombed a UN-run school in Jabalya, in northern Gaza, killing 39 Palestinians sheltering there. The Israeli army says it hit the school because it was the source of mortar fire, but the UN says that no militants were found at the site.

And the use of white phosphorous bombs is a nice touch. We use them in the Iraq war even though at first our military denied it. Even the phosphorous dust is a dangerous hazard.

White phosphorus can cause injuries and death in three ways: by burning deep into tissue, by being inhaled as a smoke, and by being ingested. Extensive exposure by burning and ingestion is fatal.

Kind of like salting the earth of your enemies, isn't it?

Of course bombing someone's house flat

Will make them stop being angry at your mistreatment...

A Palestinian looks from a window at the rubble of a house destroyed in an Israeli airstrike in Rafah refugee camp, southern Gaza Strip, Saturday, Jan. 3, 2009. Israeli warplanes and gunboats blasted more than two dozen Hamas positions Saturday, targeting weapons storage facilities, training centers and homes of leaders as its offensive against Gaza's Islamic militant rulers entered a second week.
(AP Photo/Eyad Baba)

And of course, once peace has been achieved, all will be forgiven. Right?

A Palestinian girl cries during the funeral of her brother who was killed after an Israeli air strike in the northern Gaza Strip January 4, 2009.
(Ismail Zaydah/Reuters)

Are the Israelis thinking they can somehow kill everyone? The mass murder of a people? Why does this sound so familiar?

How to justify terrorism

Which comes in many forms:

Former McCain-Palin campaign spokesman and current Weekly Standard editor Michael Goldfarb notes that Israel, a couple of days ago, dropped a 2,000-pound bomb on a Gazan home which killed a top Hamas leader . . . in addition to 18 others, including his four wives and nine of his children.

[snip]

There are few concepts more elastic and subject to exploitation than "Terrorism," the all-purpose justifying and fear-mongering term. But if it means anything, it means exactly the mindset which Goldfarb is expressing: slaughtering innocent civilians in order to "send a message," to "deter" political actors by making them fear that continuing on the same course will result in the deaths of civilians and -- best of all, from the Terrorist's perspective -- even their own children and other family members.

To the Terrorist, by definition, that innocent civilians and even children are killed isn't a regrettable cost of taking military action. It's not a cost at all. It's a benefit. It has strategic value. Goldfarb explicitly says this: "to wipe out a man's entire family, it's hard to imagine that doesn't give his colleagues at least a moment's pause."

That, of course, is the very same logic that leads Hamas to send suicide bombers to slaughter Israeli teenagers in pizza parlors and on buses and to shoot rockets into their homes. It's the logic that leads Al Qaeda to fly civilian-filled airplanes into civilian-filled office buildings. And it's the logic that leads infinitely weak and deranged people like Goldfarb and Peretz to find value in the killing of innocent Palestinians, including -- one might say, at least in Goldfarb's case: especially -- children.

If you do it, it's terrorism. If I do it, it's heroic and patriotic defense of my country.

Maybe Israel thinks the Obama administration won't approve

But they know the Bush administration understands completely and approves:

John Ging, the head of the UN relief agency in Gaza, described the situation there as "inhuman".

"We have a catastrophe unfolding in Gaza for the civilian population," he said. "The people of Gaza City and the north now have no water. That comes on top of having no electricity. They're trapped, they're traumatised, they're terrorised by this situation.

"They're in their homes. They're not safe. They're being killed and injured in large numbers, and they have no end in sight. The inhumanity of this situation, the lack of action to bring this to an end, is bewildering to them."

The UN has been particularly angered at the contention of the Israeli foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, that there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Ging also accused Israel of a campaign of destroying public buildings vital to the administration and governance of Gaza.

"The whole infrastructure of the future state of Palestine is being destroyed," he said. "Blowing up the parliament building. That's the parliament of Palestine. That's not a Hamas building. The president's compound is for the president of Palestine. Schools, mosques."

And it's Hamas' fault for starting this war, even though the Palestinians have been suffering:

While firing rockets at civilians is a crime so, too, is the Israeli blockade of Gaza, which is an egregious violation of international law and the Geneva Conventions.

According to the UN, most of Gaza's 1.5 million Palestinian refugees subsist near the edge of hunger. Seventy per cent of Palestinian children in Gaza suffer from severe malnutrition and psychological trauma.

Medical facilities are critically short of doctors, personnel, equipment, and drugs. Gaza has quite literally become a human garbage dump for all the Arabs that Israel does not want.

Gaza is one of the world's most-densely populated places, a vast outdoor prison camp filled with desperate people. In the past, they threw stones at their Israeli occupiers; now they launch home-made rockets.

Call it a prison riot, writ large.

Exactly.

What would you do if your country was invaded?

You would not surrender even though the soldiers promised a wonderful new government and lots of perks. You would either fight or sabotage their efforts. The occupying military would always be invaders, never friends.

At the time of the invasion, you would not overthrow your own government but hold tightly to it no matter what. You would not be so stupid as to invite even more instability, thus even if you hated your own administration, you would rally behind it. The more the soldiers demanded you give up your support of your government, the more you would protect it.

Two stories come to mind. The police often say that answering a domestic disturbance is one of the most dangerous calls to make. Fighting couples immediately join together to attack the third intrusive party, even if they hate each other. Disagreements are temporarily forgotten.

The second is an old allegory of the sun and the wind having a competition: The sun and wind bet each other they could remove the coat of the man walking far below across the meadow. The wind inhaled deeply and blew and blew. The man gripped his coat tightly and wrapped his arms about himself. As the wind tugged at his coat, the man bent almost double but the wind could not rip the coat away. At last the wind gave up. Then the sun tried. The meadow grew warm and bright. The man straightened up and opened his coat. The sun shone more strongly still. The heat rose from the earth and the air shimmered. The man removed his coat.

What you want cannot be taken by force but must be given by choice. If you take peace by force, it will not be peace. Diplomacy not military might will be the thing that saves the day.

Israel cannot force the Palestinians in Gaza to forsake Hamas when they were the ones building schools and answering their needs. Demanding Palestinians submit to the will of Israel will make them cling more tightly to Hamas. The brutalization of Palestinian innocents by Israel exposes Israel for the thug it has become.

Pakistan and India will not be able to destroy enough of each other so that Kashmir can be claimed, they cannot undermine the other because the blowback comes straight into their cities. And both of them have nukes. Just how far are they willing to go before their political dangers become destabilizing for themselves?

And how about ourselves? How about if our military is turned on us?:

EL PASO -- A U.S. Army War College report warns an economic crisis in the United States could lead to massive civil unrest and the need to call on the military to restore order.

Retired Army Lt. Col. Nathan Freir wrote the report "Known Unknowns: Unconventional Strategic Shocks in Defense Strategy Development," which the Army think tank in Carlisle, Pa., recently released.

"Widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities ... to defend basic domestic order and human security," the report said, in case of "unforeseen economic collapse," "pervasive public health emergencies," and "catastrophic natural and human disasters," among other possible crises.

The report also suggests the new (Barack Obama) administration could face a "strategic shock" within the first eight months in office.

Fort Bliss spokeswoman Jean Offutt said the Army post is not involved in any recent talks about a potential military response to civil unrest.

The report become a hot Internet item after Phoenix police told the Phoenix Business Journal they're prepared to deal with such an event, and the International Monetary Fund's managing director, Dominique Strauss-Khan, said social unrest could spread to advanced countries if the global economic crisis worsens.

So many times in the last eight years the things we thought would never happen have happened. Preventive war, the destruction of Habeas Corpus, torture.... so who is to say the military will not be turned on American civilians?

What would you do if your country was invaded?

The incompetence of Condi

Condi Rice went to the Middle East to get the peace process back on track:

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has held talks with Egyptian officials, the first stage of a trip aimed at saving Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas broke off contacts with Israel in protest at its recent offensive in Gaza, which has left more than 110 Palestinians dead.

Ms Rice said the US was concerned about the toll of innocent life, but blamed Hamas for triggering the bloodshed.

She said talks must not be sabotaged by those rejecting a peace deal.

Ms Rice headed on to Israel and the West Bank for further negotiations with Israeli and Palestinian leaders.

Yet still the circle of violence and the helplessness of those caught in its vortex continues:

Israeli tanks and infantry moved out of Gaza before dawn today after a five day operation to kill militants that left more than 110 Palestinians dead, including 22 children.

Hopes that the incursion had ended the barrage of Palestinian rockets raining down from Gaza on Israeli border towns proved in vain, however, when three missiles hit the resort town of Ashkelon this morning, damaging an apartment building. No-one was hurt.

Israel said that its withdrawal did not mean it was scaling back its operation against the Islamists, but merely suspending it temporarily for a two day visit by Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State.

“This very limited (Gaza) operation was intended to show Hamas what could happen, what you may call a ’prequel’,” said an Israeli official.

So then:

The killing of eight people at a Jewish religious college by a Palestinian gunman will not derail peace talks, the Israeli government has said.

The gunman was shot dead after opening fire with an assault rifle inside a crowded library at the Mercaz Harav seminary in West Jerusalem.

Israeli police said the attacker was a Palestinian resident of East Jerusalem.

Some Israelis have called for peace talks with the Palestinians to end but Israel has said they will continue.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas condemned his Hamas rivals - who are in control of Gaza - for hailing the attack.

Hamas described the shooting as a "natural reaction" to Israeli military actions in the Gaza Strip last week that left more than 120 Palestinians dead.

And in Gaza:

Gaza's humanitarian situation is at its worst since Israel occupied the territory in 1967, say UK-based human rights and development groups.

They include Amnesty International, Save the Children, Cafod, Care International and Christian Aid.

They criticise Israel's blockade on Gaza as illegal collective punishment which fails to deliver security.

Israel says its military action and other measures are lawful and needed to stop rocket attacks from Gaza.

Israel pulled its troops and settlers out of the Gaza Strip in 2005, but retains control over Gaza's airspace and coastline, and over its own border with the territory.

And into this confusion and endless retaliations we send ....

Walls will not contain people

Borders will fall.

As tens of thousands of Palestinians clambered back and forth between the Gaza strip and Egypt today, details emerged of the audacious operation that brought down a hated border wall and handed the Islamist group Hamas what might be its greatest propaganda coup.

Hamas, which took control of the coastal territory last June after a stand-off with Fatah, has denied that its men set off the explosions that brought down as much as two-thirds of the 12-km wall in the early hours.

But a Hamas border guard interviewed by The Times at the border admitted that the Islamist group was responsible and had been involved for months in slicing through the heavy metal wall using oxy-acetylene cutting torches.

That meant that when the explosive charges were set off in 17 different locations between midnight and 1am the 40ft wall came tumbling down, leaving it lying like a broken concertina down the middle of no-man's land as an estimated 350,000 Gazans flooded into Egypt.

Whatever the reasons and whoever is behind it, it does not make that much difference. Inequality, injustice, and mistreatment will not be endured while on the other side of the wall there are things longed for. Look at what brought down the wall in East Germany, the reason why the border between Mexico and the United States is so porous.

Remember too, that those who build walls are just as contained as those behind the walls. We make ourselves prisoners of our own fear.

Speak to the injustice and borders and walls could stand.... but then, at that point, what would be the need?

Update 1/28: Karin of Pax Americana has an excellent post on the reasons for the wall and its fall.

It's not convenient

We'll just stand back here and watch you circle the drain, thank you. Guess Cheney's frantic visit to Saudi Arabia didn't patch things.

Via Eli at Multi Medium, Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post:

Now the White House ponders what Abdullah's sudden and sparsely explained cancellation of the dinner signifies. Nothing good -- especially for Condoleezza Rice's most important Middle East initiatives -- is the clearest available answer.

Abdullah's bowing out of the April 17 event is, in fact, one more warning sign that the Bush administration's downward spiral at home is undermining its ability to achieve its policy objectives abroad. Friends as well as foes see the need, or the chance, to distance themselves from the politically besieged Bush.

Official versions discount that possibility, of course. Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi national security adviser, flew to Washington last week to explain to Bush that April 17 posed a scheduling problem. " 'It is not convenient' was the way it was put," says one official.

But administration sources report that Bush and his senior advisers were not convinced by Bandar's vagueness -- especially since it followed Saudi decisions to seek common ground with Iran and the radicals of Hezbollah and Hamas instead of confronting them as part of Rice's proposed "realignment" of the Middle East into moderates and extremists.

Abdullah's reluctance to be seen socializing at the White House this spring reflects two related dynamics: a scampering back by the Saudis to their traditional caution in trying to balance regional forces, and their displeasure with negative U.S. reaction to their decision to return to co-opting or placating foes.

Abdullah gave a warm welcome to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Riyadh in early March, not long after the Saudis pressured Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas into accepting a political accord that entrenches Hamas in an unwieldy coalition government with Abbas's Fatah movement.

"The Saudis surprised us by going that far," explained one White House official in a comment that reached -- and irritated -- Saudi officials. So don't count on Abdullah to put new force behind his long-stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace initiative at the Arab summit scheduled this week in Riyadh.

So the romping in the flowers and the hand-holding means nothing?

Meltdown between Fatah and Hamas

could lead to civil war:
"One day after the attempted assassination of Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya, Fatah and Hamas are shooting at each other. In an exclusive interview with SPIEGEL ONLINE, veteran Palestinian politician Hanan Ashrawi warns of possible civil war and calls on all sides to lay down their arms."

[snip]

"SPIEGEL ONLINE: Could this be the start of a Palestinian civil war?

Ashrawi: It certainly has all the indications of internal confrontations and clashes among different militias and among different factions. So I'd hate to think of this as a civil war but clearly it has the elements of an internal confrontation which is extremely dangerous and very lethal. And of course Palestinian weapons are being used against other Palestinians and it threatens to spiral out of control.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Just a few weeks ago, the Palestinian factions were still negotiating to create a national unity government. Now they are shooting at each other, and there has been an attempt on the life of Prime Minister Ismail Haniya. Why are Palestinians shooting at each other instead of trying to foster unity?

Ashrawi: This has been some time in the making. First of all, the Palestinians are living in a very abnormal situation, in a pressure cooker, in a situation in Gaza where it's entirely besieged and cut off from the rest of the world and the economy is in shambles, totally destroyed. The situation is one of utter deprivation. There is tremendous anger, there is such resentment and vulnerability and for some time now there has been the external siege and the sanctions have created this situation in which people feel there is no way out. There is a sense of despair. Generally people cooped up like this with no way out tend to take out their anger against each other. And besides there has been a political rivalry, let's put it that way, between the two major factions Fatah and Hamas that has not resolved itself in ways that are peaceful. At the same time other people have not played a constructive role in trying to resolve these differences in a democratic way. And I'm afraid the situation is going to extend beyond the confines of Gaza and into different areas of the West Bank."

AlJazeera has more:
"At least 13 Palestinians have been wounded in the Gaza Strip after supporters of the ruling Hamas movement and the rival Fatah faction traded fire during protests after Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, called for early elections, medics and witnesses say.

Thousands of armed Hamas and Fatah supporters staged competing protests in central Gaza City late on Saturday. Demonstrations were also under way in the south and the north of the coastal strip. Several smaller protests were also staged in the West Bank.

Hamas has rejected Abbas's call for elections, warning that it amounted to a call for "civil war" and vowed to fight the measure by bringing its supporters into the streets."