Today's Situation

A CHILDREN'S JIHAD?, August 22, 2007

A Hamas gunman was killed in an IDF air strike early on Wednesday morning near Gaza City, taking the Palestinian death toll for the past 48 hours to at least 13.

The only paper to cover the deaths - most of which occurred when the Israeli military targeted Palestinians it says were involved in firing Qassam rockets or mortar shells at Israeli targets - is Haaretz, which carries an IDF claim that Palestinian terrorists are deliberately using children to retrieve rocket launchers after use.

The claim comes after two children - aged 9 and 12 - were killed by tank fire in the northern Gaza Strip. According to Haaretz, the two were seen moving in a field near Beit Hanun toward rocket launchers immediately after Qassam rockets had been fired on towns in Israel. Soon after the launch, an IDF force identified the source of the rocket fire, surveyed the area, and identified a number of suspicious images near the launchers. A tank in the area fired a round, which killed the two children. Another child was seriously injured in the incident.

'Children have no reason to be near Qassam rocket launchers,' IDF officers told Haaretz. They said it is possible that Islamic Jihad had hired the children to collect the launchers after the launch. This phenomenon had already been observed in other instances, the officers added.

'A 14-year-old child has already fired an RPG rocket against an IDF force, and a grandmother aged close to 70 fired a light weapon against a Givati Brigade force recently in the Strip. What were these children doing there anyway?' the sources added.

In the meantime, Israel Radio reports that the Qassam attacks against Israeli towns in the western Negev continued on Wednesday, with Palestinians firing at least two such missiles.

Also on the Palestinian front, The Jerusalem Post leads its coverage Wednesday with a report that Fateh's armed wing - the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade - has rescinded a previous decision to disarm and to foreswear violence. 'We call on all our members who handed over their weapons to the Palestinian security forces to report to their commanders so that they can be issued new weapons,' said a leaflet distributed in Ramallah.

The group said the decision was made after the IDF arrested two Fateh gunmen who had been given amnesty by Israel in line with understandings reached between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Israel agreed last month to stop pursuing some 270 Fateh fugitives on condition that they surrender their weapons and sign a pledge to refrain from terrorist activities.

Elsewhere in Gaza, Yedioth Ahronoth's website, ynet, reports that the European Union announced Wednesday it will resume funding fuel for the Gaza power plant. The decision came after the EU received assurances from Hamas that it would have greater oversight over the funds. The plant was forced to cut off power to large parts of the Gaza Strip on Friday when fuel shipments from Israel halted, after intelligence officers warned that terrorists were planning to attack. The EU has been paying for the fuel shipments since 2006. A Palestinian official said that full power would be resumed by Wednesday afternoon. Hamas accused the rival Fateh faction of plotting with the EU to punish Hamas for its military takeover of Gaza three months ago.

Ynet also reports that a decision is expected Wednesday on the parole request of Nahum Manbar, who was convicted of aiding the enemy by selling weapons components to Iran. Manbar was sentenced in 1998 to 16 years behind bars and - given the fact that State Prosecutor Eran Shendar announced Tuesday that he opposed reducing Manbar's sentence - it seems unlikely that he will walk free.

On the diplomatic front, the State Department denied Wednesday a statement by President Shimon Peres, who said that the planned international conference on the Middle East this fall will be in Washington D.C. 'I have not heard any information about the date or the location for that,' said State Department spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos. It was not clear whether President Peres meant the city of Washington or the area, but Bush administration officials previously have ruled out the nearby Camp David as a venue for the talks.

A large number of Israel's senior commentators and reporters are taking advantage of what many see as the calm before the storm for a late summer vacation, and the buzz in the newsrooms is that dramatic developments are not expected on any front until after the Jewish New Year, which falls this year in mid-September.

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