Amira Hass inside Palestine

PA security forces break up demonstration

According to Palestinian sources, Hamas activists demonstrated in areas under Israel's security control because they were barred from holding the protest in areas under the control of the PA. Some 20 participants in the protest were hurt in clashes with Israeli troops. Last week an initiative to hold a joint protest by Hamas and Fatah against Israel was abandoned after the IDF arrested a senior Hamas member involved in its organization.

Real people's terror

My parents despised all their everyday activities - stirring sugar into coffee, washing the dishes, standing at a crosswalk - when in their mind's eye they saw, based on their personal experience, the terror in the eyes of children, the desperation of mothers who could not protect their young ones, the moment when a huge explosion dropped a house on top of its inhabitants and a smart bomb struck down entire families. Salmeh's mother says: "When I wake up [from a restless sleep] I am surprised. I know it's only by chance that I am alive."

They decide when History begins

The siege of Gaza did not begin when Hamas seized control of the Strip's security organs, or when Gilad Shalit was taken captive, or when Hamas was elected in democratic elections. The siege began in 1991 - before the suicide bombings. And since then, it has only become more sophisticated, reaching its peak in 2005.

Now that the dust has settled: Benazir Bhutto

Robert Fisk

So let's run through this logic in the way that Inspector Ian Blair might have done in his policeman's notebook before he became the top cop in London.

Question: Who forced Benazir Bhutto to stay in London and tried to prevent her return to Pakistan? Answer: General Musharraf.

Question: Who ordered the arrest of thousands of Benazir's supporters this month? Answer: General Musharraf.

Question: Who placed Benazir under temporary house arrest this month? Answer: General Musharraf.

Question: Who declared martial law this month? Answer General Musharraf.

Question: who killed Benazir Bhutto?

Er. Yes. Well quite.

You see the problem? Yesterday, our television warriors informed us the PPP members shouting that Musharraf was a "murderer" were complaining he had not provided sufficient security for Benazir. Wrong. They were shouting this because they believe he killed her.

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DemocracyNow!

BBC

But an old friend of Ms Bhutto, Salman Tassir, told the BBC World Service he did not think criticism should be directed at the government.
"There have been suicide attacks on Gen Musharraf also," he told Newshour.
"I mean it is extremism and the fanatics who are to blame."

Ha'aretz

What makes the security failure all the more startling is the fact that it comes just weeks after the first assassination attempt following Bhutto's return to Pakistan from a lengthy political exile.

This being 'breaking news', this is just my on-the-spot knee-jerk reaction. I have to wonder, if the extremists opposed to democracy are to blame, and, that their enemies are just as much Musharraf as Bhutto or Sharif, why is the ex-General, or 'our man in Islamabad', still among us?

On a sadder note, I wonder aloud : will this be a moment of history as was the Kennedy brothers' assasinations, or just a footnote? Sure, she was but another 'democratic leader', whom the West would no doubt have found a creative way to cuddle up to. However, like my ten-year-old future mother in 1963, today I feel like crying. Not only for Benazir but for the scores of 'innocents' who died along with her.