Apartheid in Palestine, the South African Perspective

When writing about the Israel-Palestine conflict, one must sometimes use words, indeed sometimes a whole language, specific to one side or the other. There are certain entities, ideas, and events that each side has a different word for. The UK Guardian's Seth Freedman wrote about this last month in his piece about al-Aqsa TV.

As the news began rolling once more, all I could concentrate on was the language employed, rather than the stories that were being reported. The abandoning of western media parlance – "Israel", "IDF", "settlers", and so on – in favour of an entirely different lexicon was a rude awakening for me, having been fed on a vastly different diet over the years.

Israelis call their military the IDF- Israel Defense Forces- their country Israel, and the wall separating it from the West Bank the security barrier. Palestinians call these same things, respectively, the Zionist Occupying Forces, Occupied Palestine, and the apartheid wall.

It is this last word that is most inflammatory, especially to Israelis. Most people worldwide recognize apartheid to have been an appalling period of South African history and its abolition a righting of decades worth of wrong. Which is why hearing this word used to describe Israel's policies toward Palestinians is a bitter pill to swallow.

Back in July, I made a visit to Hebron after which I quoted a humanitarian worker I interviewed as saying, "They cannot travel on this road. It’s an apartheid road." Out of all the writing I had done on the subject of the occupation, this one sentence drew the most fire from my Israeli friends. They argued that this word could not be used to describe their situation because it was born in South Africa and, therefore, could only be applied there. They said it was a cheap shot, an attempt to manipulate my readers by using a highly-charged word.

Yesterday I went to a talk called "Apartheid in Palestine: Black Perspective on the Israeli Occupation" hosted by the Black Alliance for Just Immigration. The most striking portions of the talk, for me, were the parallel's drawn by South African pastor Reverend Kelvin Sauls between the Israeli occupation and apartheid.

Reverend Sauls had just returned from a visit to Israel and Palestine and said that what he found was that life for Palestinians is even worse than it was for him under apartheid. Sauls, who grew up in Soweto, near Johannesburg, said, "There was never a wall built around Soweto" and cited the sewage running downhill from Israeli settlements into Palestinian vegetable gardens.

In 1948, the same policy took root both in South Africa and in Israel, Sauls says. It began by establishing bantustans, small areas of minority control. Former Deputy Mayor of Jerusalem, Meron Benvenisti, wrote in the UK Guardian back in 2004:

Similarly, when in South Africa a failed attempt was made to solve demographic problems by creating "homelands for the blacks", liberals originally supported the idea, and even a portion of the international community viewed the measure as a step toward "decolonisation". But, after a short time, it became clear that the ploy was designed to confer legitimacy on the expulsion of black people, and their uprooting. The bantustans collapsed, demands for civil equality intensified, and the world mobilised for the defeat of apartheid.

The bantustan model for Gaza, as depicted in the disengagement plan, is a model that Sharon plans to copy on the West Bank.

The US decided that separate was not in fact equal in 1954 with Brown vs Board of Education and segregation here collapsed as well. In relation to American race laws, Reverend Sauls said, "Jim Crow is alive and thriving in the Holy Land" and said that a two state solution would allow Palestine to become a bantustan, which he considers a non-viable entity.

Other similarities Sauls cited were the constant dispossession of land, the passbook system wherein anyone not carrying his or her papers at all times risks imprisonment, identifying people based on race and religion, the constant military presence, and the suggested appropriation of land by Israel.

In the currently discussed two-state solution, the map proposes that 85% of the land of historic Palestine goes to Israel and 15% goes to Palestine. This is the same way land was appropriated in South Africa.

Israelis often have a sense of pride in being what they consider the only democracy in the Middle East. Sauls reminds us that South Africa also thought similarly of itself, even though in both cases this democracy was racially based, a concept Sauls calls "ethnocracy."

Reverend Sauls, a pastor from the United Methodist Church, said about his trip, "My time in Palestine was very, very difficult. I never thought I would see such a manifestation. It was probably the most dehumanizing experience of my life."

However, he was also careful to point out that he supports Israel and believes that Israelis have a right to exist, but not by extinguishing another people. He says, "To do to Israelis what they have done to Palestinians will not make it ok," and says about Palestinians, "Their liberation will facilitate the liberation of all Israelis. You see, whites in South Africa were bamboozled, too."

Reverend Sauls and colleagues Gerald Lenoir and Phil Hutchins emphasized the difficulty in changing what they found in Palestine. Hutchins said, "This is the most difficult issue to talk about in US politics. Anyone criticizing Israel is called anti-Semitic," and added later, "We're going against the tide here." One of the reasons the Israeli occupation has survived much longer than apartheid is that terrorism and persecution have continually served to paint Israel as the victim, beginning with the holocaust and continuing on through Islamic fundamentalism and terrorism. Hutchins says, "Unlike South Africa, Israel has had the moral high ground since 1948."

For more information on the Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) please go here.

Iran Shipping Uranium to Somalia

An Iranian merchant ship was hijacked by pirates near Somalia and some interesting events have ensued.

The Times reveal that the pirates who took over this mysterious vessel, "suffered skin burns, lost hair and fell gravely ill “within days” of boarding the MV Iran Deyanat. Some of them died."

Weird, because that sounds just like radiation poisoning. Which is caused when people come into contact with radioactive material. Like uranium. Which is used to make nuclear weapons.

The ship's manifest says it's carrying "minerals." What's more interesting is that the shipping company is Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines, a state-owned company run by Iran's military.

Out of about 100 pirates who boarded the ship, a number of them fell ill and died during the six days of negotiating with Somalian officials. This was confirmed first-hand by Hassan Allore Osman, minister of minerals and oil in Puntland, who was sent to investigate the reports of toxic cargo.

The Long War Journal adds, "Somali and regional officials directly involved in the negotiations over the ship and who spoke to The Long War Journal are convinced that it was heading to Eritrea to deliver small arms and chemical weapons to Somalia's Islamist insurgents."

This, of course, is not terribly far fetched.

Iran's involvement in the conflict in Somalia on behalf of Islamist insurgents is well documented. In 2006, Iran flouted arms embargos and provided sophisticated anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons to the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), intelligence sources told The Long War Journal, including SA-7 Strella and SA-18 Igla MANPADS - shoulder fired surface-to-air missiles - as well as AT-3 Sagger antitank missiles.

A report issued by the United Nations in 2006 states that weapons were transferred to Somalia through Lebanon-based Hezbollah, which also absorbed a contingent of 700 Islamist fighters from Somalia during Hezbollah's war with Israel. The report also states that Iran provided support for Islamist training camps inside Somalia and had sent two emissaries to negotiate with the ICU for access to Somalia's uranium mines.

See? Uranium.

Second Voyage for Siege Breakers

In a new development of the breaking of the Gaza siege the Free Gaza Movement announces another trip to Gaza that departed from Lanarca, Cyprus on Thursday at 10am local time.

A list of the passengers and crew has been released and it includes one Palestinian lawmaker and one Israeli lawmaker, an Italian opera singer, a writer from Al Jazeera, and several medical doctors, among others.

When the last boat full of humanitarians arrived in Gaza, they were criticized for not bringing in more material goods, but reminded the world that the first trip was largely symbolic and immediately announced that more trips would bring more goods. It looks like they are keeping their promise- this trip has brought six cubic meters of medical supplies and doctors to administer much needed treatment.

The arrival of humanitarian volunteers in Gaza has provided means of assistance other than material, the most important of which has been the aid workers' accompaniment of Gazan fishing boats. The Israeli military does not normally allow the boats far enough from shore to catch adequate numbers of fish, but with an international presence on the boats, the IDF is reluctant to fire. However, even with international volunteers present, force has been used to keep the boats closer to shore.

Economics as it Applies to Human Life

This AP article says five more people have been killed in "tunnel collapses" while smuggling "contraband" into Gaza.

First, those "tunnel collapses" were caused by explosions. Second, the "contraband" was, in this case, fuel.

AP writer Ibrahim Barzak writes:

The five were bringing contraband goods from Egypt into Gaza when an explosion collapsed the tunnel, the officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the information had not been cleared for publication.

Two bodies were located shortly after the explosion Tuesday and the rest were removed early Wednesday. Three smugglers survived and emerged on the Egyptian side, where police arrested them, an Egyptian security official said. The three told police they were smuggling fuel.

Gazans blame the Egyptians for blowing up the tunnels but the Egyptians deny it. Everybody is under a lot of pressure here. The Egyptians are being pressured by Israel to stop the flow of weapons to Hamas through these tunnels and by the Arab world to stop doing what Israel says. The Israeli people are pressuring their government to prevent the resumption of daily missile attacks by Hamas. And Gazans are being pressured by their pesky children for a daily supply of food.

Daily I tell you.

Since the start of the year, 45 people have died in tunnel collapses and, in one of life's cruel ironies, a similar number of people have died as a result of the shortage of goods the tunnel operators were trying to solve. This loss of human life in the prevention of the loss of human life is a bit like our consumption of oil or mass produced food. The energy output exceeds the gain.

Palestinian Infighting Now Infamous

Al Jazeera writer Ramzy Baroud questions whether the idea of "Palestinian Unity" has any meaning anymore in his article Palestinian Unity: Goal or Mantra?

Palestinian disunity, and political -- if not, geopolitical -- fragmentation is eroding the Palestinian cause more than all Israeli efforts, walls and military incursions combined. The painful-to-watch televised bickering between representatives of various Palestinian factions has led to confusion among traditionally pro-Palestinian groups worldwide. The political objectives -- once agreed upon as "constants" -- and symbols that once united Palestinians everywhere are now wide open for extreme interpretation.

In fact, "respecting the sanctity of Palestinian blood", which for long served as the lowest possible denominator agreed on by every Palestinian grouping, has been violated many times in recent months and years; too many times to count. Repeating the slogan is, at this point, an empty mantra, joining the numerous other mantras that have for long served as a sedative for the hapless masses, whether Arabs, Palestinians or both.

I read Al Jazeera and Israel's Haaretz news everyday, and it's not often that they both say the same thing, but when they do, I find it bears repeating. Further underscoring my commentation of Abbas' temper tantrum the PA again uses the media to issue veiled threats to Hamas.

Haaretz writes:

RAMALLAH - The Palestinian Authority must be ready to use force against Hamas in Gaza "to reunify the homeland," said the head of PA forces in the West Bank, Gen. Dhiab al-Ali (Abu al-Fatah), considered the Palestinian chief of staff.

"If Gaza remains mutinous, the Palestinian Authority will have no choice but to use force against it," Ali said in a recent interview with Haaretz at his Ramallah offices.

Ali said the PA has not ruled out using force if the territory remains in Hamas' hands.

"There haven't yet been consultations with the Israelis on the issue," Ali said. "We hope we won't need that option - for us it's the last choice for unifying the homeland - but we must be prepared to implement it."

No senior PA official close to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has ever expressed such views to the media, and especially not shortly before a Fatah delegation is set to attend talks in Cairo on a possible detente with Hamas.

The mention of Israel backing up Fatah forces in a Gaza takeover is both heartbreakingly optimistic and a confirmation of a recent quip by Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.

Firstly, Fatah doesn't have forces, per se. As I wrote back on August 9th, the U.S. is funding the creation of Palestinian security forces, but the first battalion of 500 soldiers has just finished training. This is hardly a force one goes off conquering non-contiguous pieces of land with.

Secondly, Hamas released a statement July 29, saying:

"Now the Zionists are protecting you," Hamas said in a statement addressed to security forces in the West Bank. "You know that once the protection of the Zionists is over, people will enter your headquarters and kick you out," it said.

"You must know we are not acting against you now in the West Bank because ... we know the Zionists will immediately back you."

Abbas and his cabinet do not seem concerned with countering this statement. In fact, it seems they rather enjoy the world knowing they are under Israel's protection, as the faction most cooperative with Israel's agenda. The problem is, they have secured Israel's cooperation at the expense of their peoples' needs and wants, which is perhaps what causes the infighting Baroud mentioned above.

Your Dog's Poop Under Investigation

Once or twice a month I feel the need to start a blog post with the word "Wow." I have barely restrained myself in this post, but you get the point.

Anyway.

Reuters reports today:

Under a six-month trial programme launched this week, the city of Petah Tikva, a suburb of Tel Aviv, is asking dog owners to take their animal to a municipal veterinarian, who then swabs its mouth and collects DNA.

The city will use the DNA database it is building to match faeces to a registered dog and identify its owner.

Big brother alive and well in Israel.

2am proves IDF's Rush Hour

I normally do not report on the type of story I am about to report on. The potential for sensationalism and exaggeration is much too great. But I have seen so many similar reports over the last few months that to continue to ignore the trend would be to purposefully hide it. And so I must try to create something midway between sensationalism and deception.

At the customary hour for such dealings, 2:30 in the morning, On September 11, 12-year-old Mohammad Saleh Khawaje was awakened at home and arrested by Israeli soldiers for the charge of "stone-throwing and disturbance of public order." He is still in jail awaiting bail with his codefendant, 13-year-old Abdul Ahman.

In the Israeli justice system, Palestinian youth can be tried as adults at the age of 12. In contrast, Israeli youth are considered children until they turn 18.

This situation is further complicated by Mohammad's father's belief that his son was arrested in an act of revenge. Abed Saleh, Mohammed's father, says he had complained to Israeli police and military about a daylong beating he suffered at the behest of the now-infamous Lt. Col. Omri Bruberg.

Saleh tells ISM:

Abed Saleh wasn’t home when Israeli soldiers invaded the village of Ni’lin on Thursday night and raided his house. “The soldiers came to the house to take me again,” he explained. “They asked where I was. When they found out I wasn’t there they took my son instead.”

Saleh is not the first to accuse Bruberg of violence or of revenge for the complaints about such violence.

This is the second time in recent history that such allegations have been laid against Israeli soldiers under Lt. Col. Omri’s command. One month ago Jamal Amira, father of Salam Amira, the teenager who shot the infamous video in which Omri ordered the aforementioned shooting of Ashraf Abu Rama, was arrested as “Salam’s father” by self-proclaimed “friends of Omri”, and subjected to abuse strikingly similar to that Abd Saleh describes in his testimony.

A similar case was noted by the UK Guardian's Seth Freedman back in July. In that case, another Muhammad, this time 14 years old, described his ordeal in prison for the same charge as I previously mentioned: throwing stones. Freeman notes that, "Since September 2000 Israel has arrested and detained almost 6000 children, with 700 under-18s arrested in 2007 alone."

These are the facts on the ground, not rumor. What is debated is whether or not the children were actually throwing stones, and if they were, if this is a crime a 12-year-old should be arrested for.

Palin Answers Questions, Sort of

Sarah Palin is interviewed by Charles Gibson:



Oh, oops. Wait. Sorry. I had the wrong one. They were just so similar! Here's the right one:

From Another Angle

In covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict I've heard a lot of complaints from both sides. Why can't they just... is a common prefix for such complaints, framed as questions. And they're logical questions, ones I've had myself.

Well, there's an article on Haaretz today that might answer one of those questions. And this article is by no means out of the ordinary.

The jist is this:

Some 90 right-wing activists on Thursday besieged an Israel Defense Forces post north of Ramallah, in protest against the civil administration's decision to remove construction supplies from an illegal outpost in the West Bank.

The settlers rallied around the civil administration officials, pierced the tires of a supervisor's car, and sicked a dog on one of the soldiers.

Israeli settlers were about to start building a house, or houses, in an unapproved area, so the IDF showed up and carted their construction materials away. This may partly answer the question, Why can't they just stop letting in more settlers?

Illegal settlements have been dealt with in a multitude of ways. Sometimes the government ignores them. Sometimes the government gives passive support. Sometimes the government gives active support, like providing IDF guards to protect the settlers. Sometimes the government evicts them. No doubt the Israeli government's reaction to each settler has more to do with the strategic placement of that particular settlement, and whether it supports the land grab, but illegal settlers are not always supported wholeheartedly.

However, when the IDF does take any action against Israeli settlers, the backlash is fierce, both immediately and long term. In the short term, you have attacks like in the Haaretz article above. You have settlers spitting, yelling curses, and the like, at their IDF brethren. Calling them traitors. In the long term, well.

In 1947, David Ben-Gurion struck a deal with the orthodox Agudath party. In exchange for implementing Jewish law as national law in the new state of Israel, Agudath supported Ben-Gurion politically and he became the well-loved first Prime Minister of Israel.

Ever since then, the orthodox Jews in Israel have had extraordinary power over the government. One cannot win office without their support. And once in office, one would be swimming against the tide to try to accomplish anything without their support.

And they support Jewish settlement of the West Bank.

So any Israeli politician who dares to remove settlers from Palestinian areas will first have the soldiers they send spit on, cursed, and possibly beaten, and then they will be booed out of office.

This is the state of affairs.

Palin Seems Likable Behind Her Curtain

So like, I don't know anyone who has ever voted Republican. At least not that I know of. I've never thought about voting Republican. I'm still not thinking of voting republican.

But.

Ever since I realized Obama is behind 20 points I've found it useful to at least look at the bright side:

Yes, both McCain and Palin identify as anti-abortion, but neither has led a political life with that belief, or their other religious principles, as their signature issue. Politicians act on their passions - the passion of McCain and Palin is reform. In her time in office, Palin’s focus has not been to kick the gays and make abortion illegal; it has been to kick the corrupt and make wasteful spending illegal.

It wouldn't be the end of the world, right?

Yesterday I read a NYT's piece, which I subsequently cannot find again, which basically spent a thousand words talking about how Palin brings her kids to work and how she nurses Trig during conference calls and says things like, "Mommy has to go do this press conference."

So I find that she's just too likable. I can't seem...to stop myself...from liking her.

ALTHOUGH! It has been ten days since she was announced and she still has not spoken to the press. So I am still waiting for the other shoe.

Andrew Sullivan has opinions on this:

Notice that most campaigns actually believe that it is good for them to get press interest in their vice-presidential pick. Normally, they can't wait to get him or her in front of the cameras. It's important to realize that, whatever the intimidation from the GOP, what is happening with Palin is without historical precedent.

The question we have every right to ask is: why?

UPDATE:
Found the Time's piece, and I give you quotes:

She assured them she would not take much time off: she had returned to work the day after giving birth to Piper. “To any critics who say a woman can’t think and work and carry a baby at the same time,” she said, “I’d just like to escort that Neanderthal back to the cave.”

Ms. Palin installed a travel crib in her Anchorage office and a baby swing in her Juneau one. For much of the summer, she carried Trig in a sling as she signed bills and sat through hearings, even nursing him unseen during conference calls.

Olmert's Last Gasp

Haaretz announced today that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is finally being indicted for corruption charges. Olmert has been under investigation for suspicion of bribery since early May of this year.

Last month, when the bribery investigation reached critical mass, Olmert agreed to step down as soon as an election for leadership of the Kadima party was held. The two front runners for the party are Tzipi Livni, a politician on par with Obama in that she has great potential but has not been tested, and Shaul Mofaz, a man Palestinian leaders said would "derail the peace process."

Two weeks ago, Livni agreed to release 200 Palestinian prisoners in a show of good faith to faciliate peace negotiations.

And today, in one of his last gasp efforts to leave a meaningful legacy, Olmert proposed to prepare for the eventual evacuation of Israeli settlers from the West Bank.

He wasn't saying they should actually evacuate. He's just saying they should be prepared. An ounce of prevention or what have you.

But Mofaz made his opposition to the proposal known right away:

"The bill weakens the position of Israel in all future negotiations and I will not lend my hand to it," said Mofaz, a frontrunner in this month's Kadima leadership battle.

Note that Olmert suggested that the government should prepare for the evacuation of settlers living east of the security fence, not settlers living east of the green line, otherwise known as the pre-1967 border.

Nevertheless, suggesting that Israelis be evacuated from anywhere in the West Bank is not an advisable action for any Israeli politician whose retirement isn't already imminent. The last Israeli politician who made formal land concessions to the Palestinians was assasinated.

Israel Wags the Dog

LobeLog has yet another interesting take on Sarah Palin's candidacy, this time prompted by her meeting with AIPAC.

Jim Lobe, the Washington Bureau Chief of IPS, writes:

MSNBC and the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) are reporting that Gov. Palin met this afternoon with the board of directors of the America Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and Sen. Joe Lieberman to, in the words of one McCain campaign official cited by MSNBC, put “the American Jewish community at ease over her understanding of US-Middle East relations.” It’s worth noting that Palin, who has obviously been completely off-limits to reporters since she was rolled out as McCain’s running-mate in Dayton Friday, stiffed a reception in her honor sponsored by none other than Phyllis Schlafly a couple hours later. (One wonders what other lobbies have tried to arrange a meeting with Palin in the last 96 hours and with what success.)

Obviously the first lobby Palin meets with after the announcement of her candidacy would be AIPAC, which is usually referred to more casually as "The Jewish Lobby."

One of Lobe's commenters summed up my own reaction quite succinctly:

The Israeli-U.S. relationship has evolved into a classic case of the tail wagging the dog.

Palestinian President Throws Temper Tantrum

I've decided it's time for an update of my continuing coverage of Gilad Shalit. This update was inspired by a July 29 message sent by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and subsequently leaked to the press. The message was sent through Hussein al-Sheikh, head of PA civil affairs, to Israeli General Gadi Shamni.

It was a warning to Israel that if they released certain prisoners in their custody loyal to Hamas, that Abbas would dismantle the Palestinian Authority. Not simply resign, but dismantle the actual government.

Let's put aside the audacity and childishness of that warning for a minute and move on to the particulars involved here.

Hamas has held IDF soldier Gilad Shalit in Gaza for over two years now. After he was captured, Israel captured 64 members of the democratically elected Hamas-majority government, including eight cabinet members, twenty legislative council members, and the mayor of Qalqilyah and his deputy.

Just try for a minute to imagine what that would look like in any other country. What the international response would be. How fast it would get resolved. Just visualize.

40 of those elected officials are still in Israeli prisons.

Israel continues to hold them as a bargaining chip to exchange for Shalit. Hamas has since demanded their release, along with about a thousand other Israeli prisoners, some of which have been accused or convicted of murder.

Meanwhile, in June of 2007, Hamas took over Gaza, which was basically a declaration of war against the Fatah-majority government that remained in the West Bank. Since then Abbas and Israel have teamed up to destroy Hamas' infrastructure and avenues of funding. However, as I have mentioned, neither the PA nor Israel has managed to replace the community services they destroyed in the process. Numerous charities, medical centers, summer camps for kids, after school programs, and the like have been shut down in this process.

But back to that whole Shalit issue. Haaretz says:

According to an Israeli source well-versed in what is happening in the PA, publication of Abbas' threat to dismantle the PA if Israel releases the Hamas parliamentarians is liable to discredit him massively in the eyes of many Palestinians.

In addition, the source noted, this threat creates another obstacle to Israel's efforts to reach an agreement for Shalit's release.

This suggests first that this "statement" could be a Hamas-engineered ploy and second, that the journalist who wrote those very words has no qualms with causing Abbas to lose face.

But most interesting about this passage is the last sentence. This seems the most logical direction to take this development, but I don't think it's true. While the public is led this way and that and Shalit's family is dragged along, I don't think Hamas has ever had any intention of releasing Shalit. You may ask why they abducted him if not to trade for their own people, but instead of looking at what has happened since his abduction, look at what hasn't happened.

Hamas has fired missiles into Israel's cities and towns almost every day in the last two years. Gilad Shalit may be the only factor compelling enough to prevent a sweeping IDF operation in Gaza.

He's not a bargaining chip, he's an insurance policy.

And his worldwide fame at this point makes him more valuable than any nameless Israeli who dies as a result of those missiles, and certainly more valuable than any Palestinian politician.

Including Mahmoud Abbas. Israel and Uncle Sam are perfectly capable of installing a more agreeable PA president just as they installed this one.

And in response to the possibility that Abbas' temper tantrum could have been engineered by Hamas, the Haaretz writer adds:

Since his election as PA president in January 2005, Abbas has repeatedly threatened to resign - sometimes due to lack of progress in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, or due to internal power struggles within his Fatah movement. However, he has never yet carried out his threat.

In related news, Hamas and Fatah continue to antagonize each other like children, leading Hamas to retort most recently to Fatah that they are only safe and still in power in the West Bank because they enjoy Israel's protection.

Haaretz says, in a separate article:

Abbas' security forces have detained at least 150 Hamas supporters in the West Bank in response to a sweep in the Gaza Strip, where Hamas seized nearly 200 Fatah sympathizers after a bomb blast killed five Hamas militants and a girl on Friday. Hamas blamed the bombing on Fatah, which denies involvement.

These sorts of mysterious bombings are common here. Both sides accuse the other. It reminds me again and again of an ancient and well-proven warfare tactic: when you have two enemies, you don't fight them both, you get them to fight each other.

The US did it in Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan twenty years ago. When we wanted to destabilize Iraq, we gave weapons to the Kurds. When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, we gave weapons to the Afghanis. When Iran and Iraq went to war, we sold weapons to both of them and then sent the profits to the Contras in Nicaragua.

Let's look at the big picture, folks.

All Palin, All the Time

Wow.

Andrew Sullivan posted this chart showing the instances of the above search terms in google in August. Notice that "sarah palin" peaks at August 29th.

All the lefties (me included) have been yucking it up about how there's no way she's going to get elected. Not with all that bad press.

But we forgot the cardinal rule of media: no press is bad press.