Israel is more worried about resistance attacks against its soldiers than its civilians, for the former are the guardians of Zionism and the prestige of self-appointed supremacy, writes Azmi Bishara
Israel opened its raid into Gaza by bombarding power stations, the main water pipeline and several major thoroughfares. If civilians in Gaza are the source of terrorism, this is certainly their infrastructure. But the real “infrastructure of terrorism” is not to be found in that poverty-stricken collection of slums they call Gaza. The real infrastructure of terrorism is the Israeli occupation and Israeli occupation policy.
The purpose of the current Israeli assault on Gaza in not to rescue one kidnapped Israeli soldier. He was just an excuse, applied retroactively. Israel has made no bones about the fact that it regarded harsh retaliation against Palestinian resistance operations a built-in feature of its unilateral withdrawal plan from Gaza. Moreover, at least two weeks ago Israeli military officials had already started to leak to the press information regarding plans for a massive response to the Qassam missiles that had been fired from Gaza into south Sedirot and elsewhere, harming no one. It was intensely distressing and nerve-racking to see the civil casualties from the Israeli raids on Gaza during those weeks and then listen to Arab political analysts predicting more extensive Israeli incursions after every raid. There was no suggestion of a Palestinian response. Then the tunnel attack and kidnapping caused even the most loquacious commentator to fall dumb.
Israel acts as though its current behaviour is internationally justifiable on the grounds of the unilateral disengagement. It points to its non-presence in Gaza, even as it attacks from inside the Strip. The subterfuge is possible because of the model solution Israel has invented for Gaza and intends to apply to the West Bank: Palestinians locked up behind walls, guarded by Palestinian security forces on the inside and by the Israeli army on the outside. But the latter will strike hard and fast into this concentration camp after every resistance operation intended to remind Israel that it can’t solve the Palestinian problem and the problems of the Palestinians by leaving those overcrowded slums and locking the doors behind it.
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