On July 31, a bomb planted at Hebrew University in Jerusalem killed seven students and wounded 60. That evening several thousand Palestinians marched through the streets of Gaza to celebrate the bombing, and to oppose the spreading occupation of the West Bank.

Five separate attacks against the Israeli occupiers were reported August 4. A suicide bomber targeted a bus used by Israeli troops, killing 10 and injuring an additional 40 people, half of them soldiers.

In the West Bank town of Nablus, where the Israeli government has launched a large military incursion, three Israeli soldiers were injured when a booby trap exploded nearby.

Three Israeli settlers were wounded when the bus in which they were traveling was fired upon on the outskirts of the Jewish settlement of Avnei Khefets, near the West Bank city of Tulkarm.

Armed Palestinians detonated a bomb alongside a road north of Ramallah as two cars passed, then opened fire on the vehicles, wounding three Israelis. In another incident, a security guard for an Israeli telephone company was killed by the Damascus Gate entrance to Jerusalem’s Old City.

The recent wave of actions comes as Tel Aviv expands its war against the Palestinian people, with the backing of Washington. Following the Hebrew University bombing, President George Bush reiterated his support for Israeli military action, saying, "I’m just as angry as Israel right now."

Hundreds of Israeli troops backed by as many as 150 armored vehicles stormed into Nablus August 2, tightening the noose around a city already under occupation and curfew. At least three Palestinians were killed and five were injured when tanks, armored personnel carriers, and bulldozers punched into the city in the dead of night. The incursion was the largest military operation mounted by Israeli forces since launching a campaign to reoccupy the West Bank 44 days earlier.

For four days leading up to the assault thousands of residents defied the occupiers’ curfew, attempting to resume their normal lives after weeks of confinement to their homes. New York Times reporter Joel Greenberg commented that this was "nothing less than the defiant reclaiming of the streets."

"This is a challenge to the occupation forces," said Zafer Badran, 23, a merchant who opened his stall in spite of the Israeli military presence. "We’re not afraid of them. We want to eat."

On August 5, Tel Aviv announced a travel ban through the northern West Bank. "Nobody enters, and nobody leaves," Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer exclaimed. In response, U.S. state department spokesman Philip Reeker issued the mildest of reprimands, saying that Israel "has to consider the consequences of any action it takes."

"We’ve always said that Israel has a right to defend itself," Reeker added.

Israeli forces have imposed curfews in seven of the eight major cities in the West Bank, combined with an expanding web of roadblocks and checkpoints, bringing trade to a halt, and choking off food supplies and access to medical care to Palestinians in the cities and in the hundreds of villages that have been cut off from the outside world.

Soaring malnutrition among Palestinian children under age five has reached emergency levels and ranks among the highest in the world, according to the U.S. Agency for International Development. Some 22.5 percent of Palestinian children suffer from acute or chronic malnutrition. More than half of all Palestinians living in the occupied territories have been forced to decrease food intake in recent weeks.  
 
A policy of assassinations
The security cabinet for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon moved July 31 to deport to the Gaza Strip family members of anyone the Israeli regime labels "terrorist." The cabinet also formalized a policy of destroying the homes of alleged suicide bombers and others the authorities claim have attacked Israel.

Since then, armed forces have blown up or bulldozed 11 homes, in some cases tearing down or damaging surrounding dwellings. On August 6 the Israeli Supreme Court threw out a petition by 43 families who had asked that they be given notice before their houses were destroyed so that they could appeal the decision. The Supreme Court president, Aharon Barak, ruled that Israel is at war and destroying homes is "part of the overall war activity."

Tel Aviv continues its policy of political assassination of Palestinian leaders. The July 22 attack in Gaza targeted Hamas leader Salah Shehada. The 2,000-pound "smart bomb" killed Shehada and 14 others in a crowded house, including nine children.

Helicopter gunships and soldiers killed two Palestinians in Jenin August 6. Israeli officials accused one of involvement in suicide bombings.

On the same night in Jaba’a, a village near Jenin, troops in helicopters and jeeps launched a volley of machine gun fire against Ali Ajouri, 23, a local leader of Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade in the Askar refugee camp near Nablus. After a three-hour gunfight, the Israeli forces shot him dead, leaving his corpse so mangled it was barely recognizable, according to witnesses who found his and other Palestinian’s dead bodies.

Ajouri’s sister has been detained--an action requiring no formal charges--and has been ordered exiled to the Gaza Strip. "Her only crime is that she has a brother," said Hava Keller of the Women’s Organization for Female Political Prisoners. "They jailed her without charging her with anything."

Tel Aviv’s incursions and killings take place in the context of preparations by Washington, its major backer, for a massive ground and air assault on Iraq.  
 
 
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