Word: militiaization
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...peaceniks don't buy it. To them, Sharon embodies the old expansionist Israel of settlements and the Lebanon war. For Palestinians, he's a symbol of the slaughter that befell them at the hands of Israel's Lebanese Christian militia allies in the Sabra and Shatila refugee area near Beirut. The official government report found that Sharon as Defense Minister had "indirect responsibility" for the massacres, and that event remains an essential part of the Arab vision of him.* "For us," says Ziad Abu Amr, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council from Gaza, "he could never be anything except...
...conflict now, it remains unclear to what extent they're able to control the situation. On the Palestinian side, Arafat's authority is increasingly challenged not only by the Islamist radicals of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, but also by the rank and file of his own Fatah organization, whose militia have led the street confrontations with Israeli forces for the past two months. Barak, too, has to deal with some very angry generals and even angrier Israeli settlers in the West Bank and Gaza, and there remains vast potential for violence to consume the situation despite the best intentions...
...settlers during the current violence, and although three different groups claimed responsibility, the blast follows a pattern of similar attacks in the area by the Islamic Jihad, an Islamist faction opposed to the peace process. But despite denials on the Palestinian side, Israel blamed the attack on the "Tanzim" militia of Yasser Arafat?s Fatah organization, and began blasting Fatah targets from helicopter gunships Monday night...
...back on a path to peace, the specter of Lebanon is beginning to loom over the West Bank and Gaza. Four Israelis and two Palestinians were killed in fierce clashes Monday, in a new escalation of violence that has followed Israel's decision last week to begin assassinating Fatah militia leaders it believes are orchestrating attacks against Israelis. Last Thursday's helicopter rocket attack on a local militia leader in Bethlehem reminded many Israeli commentators of their army?s tactics in Lebanon, and the association is an uncomfortable one for many Israelis. After all, they lost hundreds of young...
...While the Israelis have the sophisticated military and intelligence capacity to systematically pick off Palestinian militia leaders, that only tends to make the ground even more fertile for the gunmen. After all, last Thursday's strike may have eliminated a key Fatah militia leader, but it also killed two middle-aged women bystanders. Israel protests that the gunmen are hiding behind civilians, but that's an argument it can't win in the eyes of a Palestinian population that sees itself as resisting occupation, or in the eyes of an international community that questions Israel's continued presence...