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Palestinians vs. Israelis – Gaza Incursion Late Monday, April 16, the Gaza Incursion took place where the Israelis tried to take out Palestinian mortar positions at Gaza. The Israelis entered Gaza only to stop the shelling, and made it clear that they had no intention of reoccupying territory that has been turned over to the Palestinian Authority. As a result of the incident, The "Commission on Human Rights", a United Nations group comprising 52 countries turning to the uprising of Palestinians, found Arabs blameless and called on Israel, which is not permitted to sit on the commission, "to desist from all forms of violation of human rights." Here is the anti-Israel lineup: 50 nations. Only two nations refused to blame Israel for Yasser Arafat's war: the United States and Guatemala. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the following Tuesday after the attack that Israel is failing to live up to its part of the 1993 Oslo peace accords and that her response to continued terrorist attacks and harassment, including the latest actions in Gaza, were "excessive and disproportionate." Anti-Semitism is alive and well in the Middle East. The Conservative Chronicle wrote, "The problem now, as it has always been, is that much of the world considers modern Israel illegitimate. It is not a part, not a piece, not a percentage, but all of the land the Palestinians want." What is acceptable? An eye for an eye? 10 Palestinians for 10 Jews? Would the U.S. agree to Israel defending itself if it were in the spirit of " an eye for an eye?" America's real interests in the Middle East do not revolve around Israel's borders or Arafat's promises. Washington has more pressing concerns: hostile dictatorships, Islamist extremism, terrorism, threat to pro-Western governments, and the danger of regional war. Of all the nations in the Middle East, only Israel stands with America on each of those issues, just as it is the only one that shares America's democratic values. As Americans painfully learned in Vietnam, when on side fights to win (in this case the Palestinians) and the other side fights to settle (in this case Israel), the side fighting to win wins. Last Friday, June 1; Israelis realized just how close the conflict is. With brutal suddenness, the suicide bomber who brought carnage to a popular dance club stripped the Seaside City of Tel Aviv of the notion that it occupies a different world from the blood- soaked realm of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Jerusalem. At Waterworld, the Palestinian bomber killed 19 people, himself and wounded over 100. Waterworld, a disco owned by Russian immigrants is a nightclub that mixed Russian tunes with trance music, it had become a popular haunt for young people as soon as it opened six months ago. The explosive the bomber used contained ball bearings, nails and screws that exacerbated victims' wounds. At Shevah Mofett High School, where five of the dead and six of the wounded had studied, Principal Avi Benvenisti decided early in the morning that he would open the campus, normally closed on the Jewish Sabbath, and staff it with counselors and social workers. Gurgen Zarifian, a student at the high school and Waterworld clubgoer was quoted saying, "It is not just that they (Palestinians) ruin our daily lives, now they ruin our escape. This was a place lots of students came to every Friday night to just forget about all the things they see on TV." For some Israelis, the only thing that makes sense is retaliation. Student Ilya Zilberstein said, "The only answer now is war. Sharon has to react severely to this. If the Palestinians know that every time they kill one of us, we will kill 10 of them, they will be afraid and they will not do these things." Ironically, the day after the bombing, fearing retaliation, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat offered his version of a cease-fire aimed at stilling eight months of bloody Mideast strife. Under pressure, with two senior European diplomats, including Germany's foreign minister, standing at his side, Arafat explicitly condemned Friday's bombing and said he would "do all that is possible to achieve an immediate and unconditional, real and effective, cease-fire." Perhaps Arafat should have offered this false piety before the bloodshed. Israeli officials greeted Arafat's statements with hefty skepticism. Concrete actions, not words, will be essential to demonstrate his seriousness, they said. In a seven- hour emergency Cabinet session held, unusually, on the Jewish Sabbath, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his government ministers argued bitterly about the scope and breadth of possible military reprisals. An aide to Sharon said that while "no one expects Arafat to deliver," the government was prepared to wait the "hours" that it would take for his orders to filter down through the troops. Israel wants Arafat to rearrest militants of the radical Islamic Jihad and Hamas groups who were released at the start of the intifada and who have claimed responsibility for most of the recent bombings. Israeli officials are also demanding that Arafat issue explicit hold-fire instructions to the many armed militias who profess loyalty to the Palestinian leadership and that they dismantle training camps that Israel claims are used to prepare attacks against Israeli citizens. For many Israelis, a retaliation is fitting for the suicide bombing. However, as witnessed by Sharon's decision to leave the Gaza Strip following the Gaza Incursion, Israel is highly influenced by U.S. reprimands and worldwide pleas for no more bloodshed. Meanwhile, Israeli Jews suffer the losses of modern day anti-Semitism. Gun Control Recent Californian Legislature requiring the registration of "assault weapons" and the later requirement of the turning in of certain of those "assault weapons" has the NRA speculating that your state could be next. Here are excerpts from an abbreviated version of an address given by NRA Second Vice President Sandra S. Froman. According to Froman: What happens in California could happen to any of us. Peaceable Californians who dutifully registered their lawfully owned SKS rifles during the deadline extension offered by the state attorney general know exactly what the government's so-called "sensible gun control" means: broken faith. These gun owners trusted the government, with their good name and the fact that they owned an item of personal property, and that trust was broken. Ultimately, they either had to move that personal property out of state, give it to the state, or have it forcibly taken by the state and face prosecution. That little rifle, the SKS, a clumsy Chinese hunting rifle, morphed into an "assault weapon." It was said to be the "gun of choice for drug lords," "the favorite of drive-by shooters." It never mattered that semi-automatic rifles are unheard of in drive- by shootings and they are not the gun of choice for drug lords. It never mattered that peaceable gun owners weren't drive-by shooters nor drug lords. The ultimate goal of so-called "sensible gun control", according to Froman is that a decent person's property could be relabeled, redefined and confiscated. Two events sparked anti-gun lobbyists to rally for gun control: The first event occurred last February, when a disgruntled former IRS employee discharged a gun into the grounds of the The White House; The second event was the August 1999 shooting spree and murder committed by Buford Furrow, a troubled individual. After his rampage at the L.A. Jewish Community Center, virtually all the media and White House emphasis was on Furrow's hardware. Lost in all of this according to Froman was that Furrow, a convicted felon with a history of violent psychopathic behavior, had been previously hauled before a Washington State judge for violating probation after having been caught in possession of firearms. His simple possession of any gun was a Federal felony carrying severe penalties. Froman continues to say that, "Had the U.S. Justice Department acted, as it is duty-bound to do, Furrow would have been serving a long Federal prison sentence in August 1999, instead of shooting children in Los Angeles." Based on personal experience Froman says that she was once almost a victim of violent crime. She knows from personal experience that the choice of self-protection brings real freedom. If the California anti-gun rights crowd had its way, that choice would be denied to all citizens. She says that, "We can stop this destruction of our rights only by changing those who control political power. We've done it nationally one vote at a time." Froman sums it up best by describing the political reasoning in California: Ending violent crime has everything to do with putting criminals away for a long time and nothing to do with banning hardware. That's why the media and politicians who press for gun control are intentionally silent about enforcing existing law against armed violent felons.
