PALI CIVIL WAR UPDATE

Palestinians in Gaza Renew Internal Clashes, Abductions - Avi Issacharoff
Internal tensions between rival Palestinian factions Hamas and Fatah flared Monday in Gaza as assailants abducted twelve Hamas members and four from Fatah, security sources said. All the kidnapped militants were later freed after both sides agreed to swap captives. The kidnappings sparked gunbattles which wounded three Palestinians caught in the crossfire. In a separate incident, Palestinians kidnapped Agence France-Presse photographer Jaime Razuri. (Ha'aretz)

A Sovereign Palestine? - Paul Sheehan
The level of conflict between the Palestinian parties simmers just below the level of civil war, even as the spoils keep shrinking. Stripped of all emotion and prejudice, right and wrong, one reality becomes clear: there is no chance of a sovereign, autonomous Palestinian state. Not within our lifetimes.

Compare the fenced-off community of today with 20 years ago, before the intifadas. The Palestinian workforce was integrated into the Israeli economy, with relatively free movement into Israel. Education and health systems were built, universities opened, local governments were functioning, corruption was minimal, and life expectancy had soared from 47 under Arab rule to 68. Then came Yasser Arafat and Fatah. (Sydney Morning Herald-Australia)

The Palestinian Death Cult - David Horowitz
There are more than a million Arabs living in Israel. They don't go around killing each other. The reason is that in Israel - unlike any other Arab state - they are free. They are even part of the Israeli government. And unlike the Arabs in Gaza they are not followers of a state-sponsored death cult which teaches them to kill for Allah and especially to kill Jews.

This death cult is the problem in the Middle East, the source of the conflict, and the reason why Palestinian factions are killing each other. The sickness that has consumed the Palestinians of Gaza and the West Bank is self-generated, an emanation of the death cult they have been nurturing for decades. (FrontPageMagazine)