Once again, Palestinians are the cause of the crossings into Gaza closing. Once again, the UN is telling Israel that even though Palestinians are trying to kill soldiers and civilians via terror attacks from the crossings, Israel should not close them. Unbelievable.
A potentially disastrous terror attack at the Erez Crossing into the Gaza Strip was averted on Thursday when a Palestinian suicide bomber driving a truck loaded with four tons of explosives tried ramming his way into Israel, killing himself but causing no other casualties.
Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attack on Erez, which is the main crossing point for international aid workers and Palestinians traveling to Israel for medical treatment.
The explosion created a huge ditch in the ground and caused serious damage to the surrounding buildings, forcing the IDF to shut down the crossing. As a result, 31 Palestinians who had permits to enter Israel for medical treatment had to return home.
The attack also caused power outages throughout northern Gaza, in Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanoun and Jabalya. Officials said that Erez would remain closed for several days until the damage was repaired.
So, let’s recap: Palestinians seeking medical treatment could not get it because of the terror attack. Power was cut because of the terror attack. And the crossing was closed because four tons of explosives damaged it heavily enough that it will take days to fix. And what does the UN representative have to say?
John Ging, the Gaza director of the UN organization in charge of Palestinian refugees, urged Israel not to let attacks like the one on Erez halt the flow of goods into Gaza. “If you hand the agenda over to the extremists, then they are very happy about it. If it only takes one rocket to derail everything, then that’s massive power,” Ging said.
Really? I would say that four tons of explosives, followed by heavily-armed terrorists in jeeps ready to kill and kidnap more Israeli soldiers, is pretty massive power. But hey, I have a brain in my head that’s untainted by whatever you need to have in order to work for the UN.
And here’s the best part of it all: The terrorists say they attacked Israel in order to force Israel to agree to the truce. You know, from the “Take the truce terms or we’ll kill you” school of negotiations.
Abu Ahmad, the Islamic Jihad spokesman, linked the attack to the failed ceasefire talks and said the bombing was meant to “send a message” to Israel that if it did not accept a truce “Gaza is not going to be a place where you will enjoy stability.”
Yeah. That’s the way to get a truce accepted.
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the – Web Reconnaissance for 05/23/2008 A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day…so check back often.
And each and every time that some well-meaning westerner, not to say those who aren’t so well-meaning, talk about the hardships Israel places on the Palestinians at the checkpoints, no one–absolutely no one–will bring up the fact that if they didn’t maintain these checkpoints murderers and tons of explosives would get into Israel.
Ye gods! Four tons! You can destroy a large building with that.