Missile Attacks Rock Red Sea Resorts
The city of Eilat on the Red Sea is Israel’s answer to Miami Beach; it’s the place where families come for a week of sun, sand, surf, and relaxation. Despite its close proximity to both Jordan and Egypt, Eilat is normally a peaceful and sunny resort town. But early Monday morning, the August vacationers who packed the city’s numerous hotels received a rude awakening — literally.
At 7:45 am, loud booming noises rocked the city. When the dust cleared, the tourists in Eilat learned that the harsh realities of Israel’s security threats had followed them to the country’s southernmost tip. A series of Grad rockets, which appeared to have been launched from the Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, had landed on the outskirts of the city and in the sea, none of them hitting populated buildings or causing casualties.
One rocket, however, missed its target — presuming, of course, the target was the Israeli city — and made its way over the border into Jordanian territory, with deadly results. Ynet reported:
Jordanian authorities said a Grad rocket landed near vehicles parked at the entrance to the InterContinental Hotel in Aqaba. Local media outlets reported that five people were injured in the attack. One of them, 40-year-old Subhi al-Alauna, died of his wounds several hours later.
In what can only be diagnosed as a severe case of denial and avoidance, the government of Egypt insisted that there was no way the rocket fire could have come from the Sinai, despite all evidence to the contrary, reported the Jerusalem Post:
“No rockets were launched from the Sinai,” said Egyptian sources. “To launch rockets from Egypt, it takes equipment and complicated logistical preparations. It is impossible, since the Sinai Peninsula has heavy security.”
The Egyptians didn’t state precisely where they believed the rockets had been fired from. They just declared defiantly that they weren’t fired from their country. Neither Jordan nor Israel was in a hurry to embarrass Egypt. Jordan, the country that had been hurt worst from the attack — and that seemed to be silently implicated in Egypt’s denials — bent over backwards to help the Egyptians escape both embarrassment and blame. Their government information minister and their media would only report that the rockets were fired “from outside Jordanian territory,” countering the Egyptians.
Before the precise culprit for the rockets was determined, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu immediately hit the telephones, reaching out to Egyptian President Mubarak and Jordanian King Abdullah to express his concern over the situation. He stated that “all of the countries in the region who want peace need to fight against these forces in order to expel terror and bring peace closer..”
The source of the attacks is an urgent and troubling issue for Israel. If indeed, as Israeli military sources theorize, they were launched by “global jihad groups” in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, it means that another front has opened up in addition to the volatile northern border with Lebanon and the volatile relationship with Hamas-ruled Gaza. It also calls into question the extent of control that the Egyptian military actually has over the Sinai. The rocket launches confirm Israel’s fears that Hamas in Gaza has been cultivating its relationship with the Bedouin that populate the Sinai, developing the area not only as as a pipeline for smuggling weapons into Gaza, but as an additional base for violence against Israel, in defiance of the peace between Egypt and the Jewish state.
First off, no one in their right mind believes that direct talks between Abbas & Netanyahu mean anything – except as a media event for Pres. Obama. In the real world, Abbas & his Fatah crooks are no longer relevent. There’s a fairly good article by Caroline Glick, ”Lights, Camera, Peace Process.” which accurately describes this fraud. http://www.carolineglick.com/e/
Second, talking about peace with the Palestinans is naive to say the least. There will be no peace, with direct talks or without direct talks. Even if a Palestinian state is somehow imposed on Israel, there will be no peace. There will only be a more intense conflict.
Hamas is not going away. Hezbollah is not going away. Syria is not going away. And, Iran is not going away. Any Palestinian state will immediately be taken over by Hamas.
Fatah is as much a terrorist organization as Hamas.
Oh, & by the way, there is no real pressure on Abbas from the US. Let’s be serious here, what concrete measures have been made? All Obama has done is say he will not pressure Netanyahu as much, otherwise, he has only repeated his support for Palestinian positions. Obama’s ”pressure” is to say that if Abbas engages in direct talks, the US will back every demand.
Let us be absolutely clear about one thing, it doesn’t matter to anyone but Israel if missiles are fired at Israeli citizens by Arabs, the International Community will simply blame the Israeli oppressor for making the Arabs so angry and upset that all they can do is try to kill Israelis.
However, if Israel should dare to respond militarily to these unprovocked and potentially lethal attacks, then the International Community will pounce, on Israel of course, for it’s unjustified, wanton, disproportionate, and murderous use of military force on innocent Arab civilians.
Whatever the reason for the rocket attacks from Sinai is anyone’s guess, as is the identity of the terrorist group responsible, it could even be the PLO, Abu Abbas’s very own terrorist group.
As for Egyptian denials, these are to be expected and are entirely predictable.
This is because in Arab eyes, Arabs can do nothing wrong, and furthermore, no one will ever dare question any Arab denial of responsibility for any terror act. This is because in the eyes of the International Community and much of the international media, there is only one terrorist state and one terrorist people, that is Israel and Israeli Jews.
Ken, American protestant evangelical Christians care. We support Israel against Islamic terror.
Yes the Evangelical Christians do in fact support Israel and we are deeply thankful for that blessed support.
But the mainstream Christian churches, particularly the Catholic Church, is remarkable for it’s outright hostility to Israel. The Vatican routinely appoints Bishops to the Holy Land who can give you chapter and verse about Israeli perfidy and oppression, but never say a word about the Moslem persecution, and I mean real persecution including murder, beatings, rape of Christian women, theft, and psychological oppression of Arab Christians.
In fact the Methodist, Lutheran, Presebyterian, and other mainstream Christian Churches routinely call for divestment from Israel, boycotts of Israeli products and institutions, and even participate in raising funds for Israel’s enemies.
Has the Vatican done anything to these bitches?
http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/07/22/our-lady-of-blockade-busting/
On the one hand, symbolically you do. On the other, this emotional identification based on appreciation of ‘Judah’ (I am not sure of the theological Christian expression, so I am using just one of those I have seen), doesn’t mean a great deal in practice. Or, it is significant in that you and other Evangelicals are an important part of US public opinion support of Israel. However, that support – while important in that it sets the Congress as a counterweight to the Administration – has severe limits in reality.
I would add that the Evangelical support is ‘self-limited’; that is, it is trumped by the focus on American partisan politics, which is natural. So, because supporting Bush was a priority for conservative American Christians, few challenged the plank added to the Republican Convention and Party position supporting a two-state solution. This was official Republican endorsement of Bush’s Road Map. That Bush, Rove, etc., knew that Evangelicals would support them even if that Administration continued to push for a PLO state gave them important maneuvering room on Israel. Had Evangelicals stood up against that policy in a unified way, then Sharon, Olmert (ugh) and now Bibi would have felt freer to discuss real solutions to the conflict, none of which include a ‘Palestinian’ state west of the Jordan River. As Terry wrote earlier, such a state is merely a guarantee of ever-increased violence and threats to Israel’s very existence.
This is not to diminish the sincere emotional support of folks like you for the Jewish state, it is only to state the realities. What counts most to most Evangelicals and other conservatives are issues of abortion, taxation, etc. Evangelicals were not willing to change those priorities in order to force Mr. Bush to take two, three, four steps away from the Saudis and the American business interests that align with them and other Muslim entities. It is also the case that the Republicans have failed to shift the policies on energy, which of course play into all this.
The reality is that Israel is essentially on her own in fashioning a strategic vision that truly protects her sovereignty and borders. That is not your fault. But America has played both sides in the Arab-Israel conflict, and will continue to do so.
Larry, don’t be so hard on the Evangelicals, they support us more than a lot of Jews do.
Western Media and politicians are backward these days, I’m sorry to say. The UN is a joke. It’s full of mostly anti-American and Anti-Israel states and we have China and Russia with veto powers and they hate the US and Israel.
I wish we and Israel would GTFO of that organization and form our own military and economic alliance.
And this was only one small rocket attack. Could you imagine the number of rockets and missiles that will be fired at Israel by Hamas and Hezbollah if nuclear facilities are bombed in Iran? This is the time to push massive, large-scale, covert operations to further destabilize the already shaky regime in Iran. That is the only way to overthrow the government in Iran, through a popular uprising like the one that brought the mullahs into power in the first place. Obama botched his best opportunity last year to overthrow the mullahs after the Iranian “elections.” Hopefully, he has learned something from that tragic mistake and will now use every covert option possible to end the rule of the mullahs. But this is Obama we’re talking about, so I doubt he’ll do it.
Wait until the Cartels figure out how to make Qassam rockets. We’ll have the Sinaloa Strip right on our southern border.
It has been so obvious for such a long time that Israel, no matter how it trys to interact peacefully with the land it gave the palestinians and those who inhabit it.Hamas just doesn’t care. Try bombing the United States daily and see what issues you have. We’b blow your country out of existance. With pride too!! And this is the answer Israel must use, it has showed constraint more so then any country ever attacked for so long. If you put huge nuclear heat to rock and sand, it turns to glass…Is this the answer Gaza is looking for? As with thier allies? Do they not think Israel will do this? Pull the Trigger Israel..enough is enough..If our Administration had any teeth they would support Israel, two hundred million americans do. We always have..it is written to do so..
Well of course Hamas is trying to derail the peace talks. So is Hizbulla/Iran. This is no coincidence and it doesnt matter who pushed the launch button. They need the conflict to continue. Same thing happened last time and they succeeded.
“The Eilat attacks were the only latest in an escalation of rocket fire in recent days that has been worrying Israelis yet has seemed to be of little interest to the international media — far less so than the follow-up to the flotilla incident.”
Arab terrorists trying to kill Israeli civilians are dog bites man stories, so common as to generate little interest. Israelis defending themselves are man bites dog stories and capture the attention of anti-Semites everywhere and of which there is no short supply.