Perspective on Monday

Massacre on Gaza beach
Blaming the victims


Last Friday, Israeli gunboats rained bombs, missiles, and death on Palestinian beach goers accompanied by artillery tank fire across from Gaza borders. killed were scores of innocent Palestinian civilians who were enjoying a summer day on Gaza beach.

Over 24 people lost their lives in this killing frenzy. Many of those killed were young children. One nine old girl survived after her entire family were wiped out.

On Gaza's beach, Palestinian families flocked to take a break from suffocating life in the strip, a very crowded narrow strip of land Israel had left after almost 40 years of occupation.

Though Israel had withdrawn its troops from the cities. It still, however controls every aspect of life in the strip.

Gazans cannot go to the west Bank, or Israel's proper for work, or do anything else without humiliating long hours of standing at the military check points. Gaza's borders with Egypt still has controlling, and invasive Israeli presence.

Even when Palestinians turned to the sea for some relief , Israel, once again, hit them from the sea, from the air and from the land.

The reality for every Palestinian is that they have nowhere to go; they are being caged-in in this miserable strip of land that will eventually implode.

For the massacre on Gaza beach, the Israeli government declared that it will " investigate" the killing of civilians; it also added that the killing of innocent civilians was "regrettable"

I am thinking, what would the Israeli government investigate?

Did the gunners on its warships know that they were firing on a crowded beach? Or maybe they did not see the people on the beach!

Or is there a remote possibility that the Israeli navy warships were perhaps trying to bomb Tehran but it hit Gaza instead, and by accident!

Undoubtedly, this was a deliberate act of cold-blooded murder; the Israeli government has no respect for human life particularly if that life was a Palestinian one.

The US, Europeans, and Arab governments have called on the Palestinians to exercise restraint.

Hamas and other Palestinian organizations should indeed refrain from firing their homemade rockets on Israel.

The balance, militarily and economically, between Israel and the Palestinians is vastly disproportionate and lopsided toward Israel.

While Israel feels that it has the right to bomb and kill civilians spending time on the beach and call that massacre" regrettable"The Palestinians, however, will end up being bombed out of their very existence for firing few useless home made pipes they call " rockets" which really caused no significant damage, let alone killing anyone.

Israel's strategy is simple: Israel kills Palestinian civilians, usually using its airpower causing so much carnage, which in turn enrages militants who feel emotionally compelled to retaliate.

Their retaliation gives Israel a pretext to deploy much more lethal power against them and declaring to the world that it was defending itself against those " evil" and "terrorist" Palestinians.


The world really works in a strange way, Palestinians, the weak, who have their persons occupied, their land occupied, Their air occupied, their water occupied, their airwaves occupied, their farms, orchards, and olive trees occupied,and are the ones who mostly killed . Yet, they are the ones to be blamed.

Many innocent Israeli civilians are getting killed too, it is worth noting, also, that many peace-loving Israelis understand the Palestinian plight and support them in their quest for freedom and independence.

Many of the world's governments have called on Hamas to recognize Israel's right to exist, almost none of those countries have called on Israel to recognize the Palestinians right to exist and to have a sovereign state of their own.

Even if Hamas recognizes Israel right to exist tomorrow, Israel simply does not care; they will not negotiate with any Palestinian unless he surrenders every Palestinian national right including Jerusalem.

Only then this Palestinian will be declared as a " Partner for peace" and perhaps gets to have lunch and his picture taken with president Bush and make it on the cover of Time's magazine, as the man of the year.

I would not be surprised that the world major powers including Arab governments would call on the Palestinian people and their government to limit their resistance of occupation to writing letters to the editor in Israeli newspapers.