I don’t think, no, I am sure that the last Tel Aviv operation did not make any of Israel’s leaders lose any sleep over it. They had previous knowledge of the possibility of it happening. For months and the Israeli police have been talking daily about 80 warnings of operations, 15 of them hot; what happened the day before yesterday was that one of these warning took place, so why the surprise and the commotion? What can the occupation do to punish a whole nation that is denied money, food and children and after it has exhausted its supply of oppressive measures over the years: it has used up all its weapons from planes to tanks, artillery, assassinations, destruction, road blocking, arrests and closures. The occupation has tried all means except for calm.

For more than a year all the factions, except for Al-Quds brigades in the northern West Bank, committed themselves to tahdiya and the occupation did not commit to it, ignored it and considered it an internal Palestinian matter as if it didn’t want it, so why would it get upset if an operation takes place? And why hold every Palestinian individual responsible for it? This is the question that I pose to the leaders of Israel and its analysts and generals before I pose it to the leaders of Europe and others. If the occupation tried all means of oppression to put an end to the cycle of violence, why wouldn’t it try the short, straight and inexpensive path, which is the path of negotiations? Are the statements of Olmert about unilaterally drawing the borders of Israel logical and how does the international community accept such dictates that would lead to more bloodshed and extend the conflict for another century?

The occupation cannot add anything new to its stock of punishments. It has exhausted all forms of torture. There is a financial, military and political siege, starvation, bombing, arrests, and loss of jobs, loss of necks, confiscation of lands, settlement construction, and murder of children, invasions and raids. What means lower than what it has used remain up its sleeve?

The occupation evades negotiations and bombs the road map on daily basis in order to bury it forever to keep the annexation plan, which is a plan for war and not a settlement. We on both sides who cry for the innocents daily must join efforts to force the government of the occupation to negotiate on the basis of the resolutions of international legitimacy because it is the only path to end violence and bloodshed.

There was a Palestinian commotion caused by President Mahmoud Abbas’s description of the operation, when he said that it’s despicable even though the dictionary of the Arab language is rich with non provocative descriptions. I believe that the killings of innocent civilians, no matter who is behind it, is a shameful act and can be described as despicable, but the practices of the occupation that push in that direction and make some of us imitate the occupation in its practices are the lowest. The occupation does that daily and in cold blood and uses the weapons of a state such as planes, tanks and missiles; from here I understand the words of the president as part of the comparison with the lowliness of the practices of the occupations.

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