Lawrence of Cyberia

A Uniter, Not A Divider

We are grateful to Sharon for two things -- he united all the Palestinian factions and he took away every option except to resist.

- Comment by a Palestinian human rights lawyer, cited by South African poet and anti-apartheid activist, Breyten Breytenbach, in An Open Letter To General Ariel Sharon

From yesterday's Washington Post:

JERUSALEM -- Three years ago, members of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah political movement created the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades to compete with Hamas -- in effect, to see which organization's armed wing could send the most suicide bombers against Israel and win the most support among Palestinians.

Today the former rivals have forged alliances, a shift that is complicating Israeli efforts to thwart major attacks and blurring the ideological lines between nationalist and religious factions, according to Palestinian militants, analysts and senior Israeli military officials...

Since the start of this year, militant groups have asserted joint responsibility for three of the eight major attacks conducted against Israelis. Though the number of attacks is lower in comparison to previous years, Israeli military officials said the greater proportion of combined operations is significant and ominous.

"It's on a deep level now," said a senior Israeli military intelligence official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "It's deep, and it's going to be deeper in the future."

Quote of the Week, 22.3.04

The Israelis are their own worst enemies when it comes to fighting terrorism. The Israelis are like a guy who sets fire to his hair and then tries to put it out by hitting it with a hammer. They do more to incite and sustain terrorism than curb it.

-- Larry Johnson, Deputy Director of the U.S. State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism, 1989 - 1993.

(Attribution: UPI, Hamas History Tied To Israel).

The funeral of Ahmad Yassin, Gaza City (Reuters: Mohammed Salem)

Protesting the killing of Ahmad Yassin in Hebron, West Bank (Reuters: Nayef Hashlamoun) and Nablus, West Bank (AFP: Jaafar Ashtiyeh);

Ramallah, West Bank (AP: Muhammed Muheisen) and Tulkarm, West Bank (Reuters: Mustafa Abu Dayha);

Amman, Jordan (Reuters: Ali Jarekji) and Basra, Iraq (AP: Nabil Al-Jurani);

Istanbul, Turkey (Reuters: Fatih Saribas) and Karachi, Pakistan (Reuters: Zahid Hussein);

Sidon, Lebanon (AP: Mohammed Zaatari) and Damascus, Syria (AP: Bassem Tellawi);

Karbala, Iraq (Reuters: Ali Jasim) and Manama, Bahrain (AP: Ali Fraidoon);

Sana'a, Yemen (AP: Bryant MacDougall) and Jakarta, Indonesia (AP: Dita Alangkara);

Ramadi, Iraq (AP: Ali Ahmed) and Jenin, West Bank (AP: Mohammed Ballas);

Tripoli, Libya (AP: Wu Wei) and Multan, Pakistan (AFP: Mohammed Malik).

Tehran, Iran (Reuters: Raheb Homavandi) and Berlin, Germany (AP: Markus Schreiber);

Sydney, Australia (AP: Mark Baker) and Los Angeles, USA (AP: Damian Dovarganes);

Brooklyn, USA (Reuters: Shannon Stapleton) and Hebrew University, Jerusalem (Reuters: David Furst);

Nazareth, Israel (AP: Lefteris Pitarakis) and Tel Aviv, Israel (AP: Ariel Schalit);

London, UK (Reuters: Kieran Doherty);

Baghdad, Iraq (Reuters: Ali Jasim) and Beirut, Lebanon (Reuters: Sharif Karim);

Cairo, Egypt (AP: Amr Nabil) and Mosul, Iraq (Reuters: Namir Nooreldin);

West Jerusalem, Israel (AP: Lefteris Pitarakis).