The lightning flash
by Rabbi Arthur Waskow

The events of last week in Gaza, Israel, and Washington are
like a lightning storm that illumines very deep issues in
the current agony of the Israeli and Palestinian peoples.
Every day, some new lightning flash dispels the shadows
around an additional aspect of this event.

When the lightning keeps flashing, it is wise to notice
where it is landing.

From articles that have appeared in the Israeli press
(especially by a veteran reporter for Yediot Akhronot, a
right-of-center large-circulation paper) we have learned
that last Monday, July 22, intense negotiations among
various Palestinian militias - including some like Tanzim
that had resorted to terrorist mass murders - had resulted
in an agreement to halt all attacks against Israeli
civilians.

We know that Hamas' top leader had also publicly moved in
this direction. We have also learned (from the Saturday, July
27, Philadelphia Inquirer) that the U.S. had persuaded Saudi
Arabia to cut off all money to Hamas unless it agreed to
this.

We know that as of the afternoon/evening of the 22nd, the
Israeli government knew all these facts.

We know that for months, the Israeli government had
targeted Sheikh Shehada for assassination because of his
role in planning terrorist attacks (and because the
Palestinian Authority had refused to arrest him for trial
by Israel for these murders), but had held off (according
to Israeli government statements) because they could not
be certain of avoiding killing civilians.

And we know that at midnight that night, 90 minutes after
Tanzim had committed themselves to cease bombings, with
an agreement scheduled to be published in Israeli,
Palestinian, and U.S. papers within a few days, the Israeli
military dropped a bomb on Gaza, aimed at Shehada.

We know this bomb was dropped on an apartment complex at
midnight, and was almost certain to kill civilians. Indeed,
it killed 15 civilians (mostly sleeping children) and
shattered the agreement reached that very evening by the
Tanzim.

The question gets more and more stark, the possible answers
more and more horrifying:

Why, after what the Israeli government says were months of
shadowing Shehada and not killing him to avoid killing
civilians, did the Israeli government order him killed when
it was 99% certain to mean the killing of civilians nearby?

Was the reason that the Sharon government was desperate to
shatter the impending cease-fires lest they force Israel
into a peace negotiation moving toward a viable Palestine
alongside Israel?

Was it because the Sharon government is uninterested in a
peace agreement with a Palestinian state and wants total
control of all territory west of the Jordan and the
destruction of all efforts at Palestinian self-government
and possible statehood?

The Israeli government has said since the bombing it had no
expectation the cease-fire commitment would matter. But
now we know that with the Saudi cash in jeopardy, there was
very good reason to think that indeed it might matter.

So - did the Sharon government do this bombing because it
had no hope that the new agreement would matter (but then
why, after months of waiting, rush to attack?); or despite
the likelihood it would shatter a serious step toward
ending violence; or BECAUSE it was likely to shatter that
effort?

Does the Sharon government care about Israeli civilian
lives? Or does it see Israelis eating pizza at Sbarro's as
"troops" who must die if necessary to serve General
Sharon's vision that Israel can control the whole West
Bank/Gaza and shatter every vestige of Palestinian
nationalism?

What would such a total-control policy do to the future of
Israel, the Jewish people, the Palestinian and other Arab
peoples, the world as a whole?

What should Americans - Jews, Christians, Muslims -
do in the light of this lightning flash?

Precisely because in the Middle East religion has been so
often mobilized for war, is this not the moment for an
effort to gather an alliance of Jews, Christians, and Muslims
to bring deep changes in U.S. policy toward action for peace
between a viable Palestine and a secure Israel?

---
Rabbi Arthur Waskow is author of Godwrestling: Round 2
and director of The Shalom Center, a North American network
committed to drawing on Jewish wisdom, old and new, in order
to pursue peace, justice, and the healing of the earth.
See www.shalomctr.org.