Last update - 00:00 26/04/2007
Worse than turning a blind eye
By Israel Harel
In one of his Independence Day speeches, which were clearly connected to the Labor Party primaries, Amir Peretz said (flinging a barb at Ehud Barak) that the time has come to stop turning a blind eye to terrorism. Barak, his rival for the Labor Party leadership and his predecessor as defense minister, indeed turned a blind eye to the plans and actions of Hezbollah and the Palestinians. This undoubtedly encouraged Yasser Arafat to launch his terror war in September 2000 and the provocations of Hassan Nasrallah, which lead to the Second Lebanon War.
And lo and behold, two days ago on Israel's national holiday, the western Negev was struck with dozens of rockets and mortar shells. And the defense minister, his deputy, the press and even right-wing opposition members insisted on shutting their eyes and calling it an act of Hamas. The fact that Hamas was elected to head the Palestinian government by an absolute majority of the Palestinians and the fact that the missiles were launched from an area controlled by the Palestinian government, which includes the "moderate" Fatah movement, is not enough of a reason to look reality in the face. Even more, this is reason not to react in light of this clear reality.
In principle, what has been happening on the Gaza front is worse than what happened in south Lebanon before the Second Lebanon War. After all, everyone promised to draw conclusions - i.e., to stop turning a blind eye - to this war.
However, after the fighting concluded in Lebanon, these were the main conclusions of the ministers and commanders: After Hezbollah's shelling drove more than a million Israeli citizens to leave their homes and communities, Israel will no longer allow the terrorist organizations to shell the civilian home front; Israel will also prevent these organizations from regrouping, accumulating weapons and dictating the confrontation date. And another grave lesson: attacks designed to abduct soldiers or civilians, as occurred on the Lebanon and Gaza borders, cannot be allowed. The enemy's success in such efforts is a strategic success.
Immediately after the cease-fire in Lebanon, the Palestinians reviewed Israel's declarations about drawing conclusions. They realized, perhaps even to their surprise, that Israel, the regional power, may know how to draw verbal conclusions, but it does not know how to draw operative ones.
Immediately after the harsh results of Hezbollah's shelling of Safed, Kiryat Shmona and Nahariya, Israel reacted to the shelling of Sderot in a weak, non-deterrent and ineffective way. Israel's restraint resolved the Palestinians' last doubts about what is permissible and what is forbidden. We all remember the lines for the buses that carried Sderot residents to Eilat, in an operation organized by Arcadi Gaydamak. And when Israel was nevertheless close to achieving a military victory, it agreed, due to the weakness of its ministers and advisers, to a cease-fire. The enemy, who declared victory, managed to rearm and, on the southern front, even to obtain weapons it did not previously possess.
Now that it has turned a blind eye, Israel, as Peretz says, may indeed see everything, but it also - as proven by its lack of response to the attack carried out on its national holiday - accepts everything. First and foremost, this includes the continued targeting of its civilian population. And again, as in last summer's war, the civilian population is the primary victim. The army, whose main objective is, and whose existence is justified by, the prevention of attacks on civilians, has again failed in its values, morals and identity, along with its continued operational failure.
It is no coincidence that the Palestinians chose to launch their most massive shelling since the "cease-fire" on a symbolic day, Independence Day. Israel may be the celebrant, but the Palestinians are reminding us that they have not forgotten their dream of returning by force to nearby Ashkelon, and also to Haifa, Jaffa and Halsa, also known as Kiryat Shmona.