Word: gaza
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...Palestinians, sorrow has become routine. While the international community has committed itself to enforcing the two-month-old cease-fire between Israel and Hizballah in Lebanon, the siege of Gaza and its 1.4 million inhabitants goes on, battering the territory's infrastructure, paralyzing its economy and leaving what's left of the Palestinian government in chaos. As Israeli warplanes attack from the air--all told, their bombs have destroyed 43 buildings and killed more than 220 people, most of them suspected militants--the two rival Palestinian political factions, the Fatah movement of President Mahmoud Abbas and the Islamic militants...
...often those warnings aren't enough to save the innocent. One day last month, the Israelis dropped two enormous charges on a house in the southern Gaza town of Rafah, where smugglers were trying to tunnel into Egypt under a 25-ft.-high concrete wall built by the Israelis. There had been the usual telephone heads-up, but the blasts were so fierce that flying debris injured 50 neighbors. A spear of shrapnel flew more than 500 yds. away and killed a 14-year-old girl, Damilaz Hamad. According to the Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights, Damilaz...
...Israel and the U.S., the squeeze on Gaza was intended to have corollary benefits: sowing discontent with the Hamas-led government and strengthening Abbas, whom Israel sees as its only viable negotiating partner. But neither has happened yet. Sources close to Abbas say Rice has promised that sanctions will be lifted and funds will flow back to the Palestinians once the Israeli corporal is freed and the President dissolves the Hamas government. But Abbas, despite being the Bush Administration's favorite, could end up the loser. Many Palestinians see him as weak and fickle. Hamas' gunmen are more numerous...
...under Hamas' influence begin denouncing Abbas in mosques as a stooge of the U.S. and Israel, undercutting his credibility. Hamas would then use its majority in the legislative body to try to oust Abbas as President. If that were to fail, Hamas' fighters would take to the streets in Gaza and the West Bank territories. Such an internecine conflict would devastate the Palestinians, since many families have fathers who support Abbas and sons who belong to Hamas. And the consequences for Israel could be just as dire. A senior Hamas commander says the rift with Abbas is unmendable. Although Hamas...
...danger for Israel--and the world--is that the longer the siege of Gaza lasts, the more likely it is to strengthen radicals who have little interest in a peaceful settlement of the dispute with Israel. Despite the blockade of Gaza, many Palestinians still have a few good memories of Israelis. Feheme, an 11-year-old Palestinian boy with blood cancer, was twice treated in Jerusalem and still gets follow-up calls from his doctor. A farmer whose orange groves were shelled 12 times by Israelis after militants set off a rocket in a nearby field still talks fondly...