Justifying the assault he was about to unleash, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said in a televised address, "Just as the United States is conducting its war against interna tional terror, using all its might against terror, so will we, too." He vilified Palestinian Authority chairman Yasir Arafat, calling him "the greatest obstacle to peace and stability in the Middle East." Sharon made his remarks December 3, a day after returning from a meeting with U.S. president George Bush in Washington.

The following day Israeli air strikes targeted five locations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, all facilities of the Palestinian Authority (PA). CNN correspondent Matthew Chance said warplanes and helicopter gunships launched a "ferocious" assault in Gaza City, and tanks and bulldozers destroyed the Gaza City International Airport, the only air link from Palestinian territory. Israeli forces bombed or targeted with missiles buildings housing the Palestinian interior affairs and Offices of Preventive Security, facilities of police and security forces, as well as Arafat's offices. Three of the PA's helicopters were destroyed by missiles and machine-gun fire.

One attack was in a neighborhood with a school. Doctors said more than 100 people were injured, many of them children. Israel sent tanks into Ramallah and Nablus, in the West Bank, and closed off several other cities. An Israeli military official called the attacks "symbolic" because the bombings were not specifically trying to kill Arafat.

Israeli and U.S. officials worked overtime to justify the aggression by turning reality on its head, painting Israel as the victim of the Palestinians.

The Israeli regime claimed their most recent assault was in response to three suicide bombings by Palestinian militants over the weekend in which 25 people were killed. The cabinet resolution calling the PA a terrorist entity said the government would take "action on a broader scale than opted for until today," and demanded the PA "prevent terrorism, punish terrorists, and dismantle the terrorist network." Arafat rounded up 130 members of the Islamic Jihad and Hamas who are wanted by Israeli authorities, a number deemed insufficient by Washington and Tel Aviv.

In Washington, administration officials and leading Democrats supported the war moves. "There is no way that Israel can negotiate a peace process so long as its country is being terrorized," U.S. president George Bush said. He demanded Arafat "respond forcefully to rout out those who killed." Secretary of State Colin Powell said Sharon "is responding in the way he believes is appropriate to defend his people and to defend his country."

U.S. senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, referring to Bush's threats against the Taliban in Afghanistan, said the "same message must be sent to the Palestinian Authority and to Chairman Arafat: Anyone who harbors or turns a blind eye to terror in their midst will be held accountable."

Standing by her side, Malcolm Hoenlein, executive director of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, added, "What the president declared for Osama bin Laden in going thousands of miles away to fight, Israel will have to do just a few miles away."

Bush combined his backing of Israel with a new attack on workers' rights in the United States by freezing the assets of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, the largest American Muslim charity in the United States. Federal agents raided four offices of the organization, seizing file cabinets, office furniture, and computers. The government also froze assets of Al Aqsa Bank and the Beit al Mal Holdings Company. Bush claimed they funded Hamas.

"This action is really creating outrage in the Muslim community," said Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American Islamic Relations, one of eight organizations that urged Bush to reverse the freeze on funds. "The holy foundation has a long history of being a respected Muslim charity that does good work, not only in Palestine, but other parts of the world."

The foundation's chief executive denied the charge of funding Hamas, saying the organization is a humanitarian one. A large part of the yearly donations to the foundation come during Ramadan.  
 
Arab governments protest
Several voices from Arab governments in the region spoke out against the Israeli rationale for the attacks. "The weekend was not the beginning of the cycle of violence; the cycle of violence had started long before that," Egypt's foreign minister told the press. He called the military attacks "totally unacceptable."

Samir Ragab, editor of Al Gomhuria, the state-owned Egyptian newspaper, said the "reality is that the policy of Sharon and his associates is the reason for what is happening. There will be no solution unless there is a fundamental change in policy."

The secretary-general of the Arab League said that "as long as the Israeli government continues its policy of assassinations, building settlements, destroying homes, and blockading towns, the violence will continue." Articles appeared in the major English-language newspapers in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Over the past six months Palestinians have faced a widening war by the Israeli regime, which has used greater firepower and military occupation of Palestinian-controlled areas in its attempts to crush Palestinian resistance. Nearly 800 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict, including by targeted assassination by Israeli forces, a practice that is an official policy of the government of Israel.

In late November Israeli forces killed Mahmoud Abu Hanoud, a leader of Hamas, and another 14 Palestinians. Five children were blown to pieces November 22 when they kicked what turned out to be a remote-controlled bomb planted by the Israeli military. Large marches, including one of 3,000 Palestinians December 3, have condemned the assassinations and killings.  
 
 
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