Harsh Truths of the Disengagement

By P. David Hornik, FrontPageMagazine.com | May 7, 2007

Not long ago a bitter debate raged over Israel ’s disengagement from Gaza . The more tender-minded proponents argued that once the hated “Israeli occupation” had been removed, Gazans would desist from anti-Israeli violence and turn to peaceful tasks of state-building. The more tough-minded proponents argued that, while the terror against Israel would continue, Israel would now have legitimacy in the world’s eyes to deal with it.

Whoever said the attacks would continue was right. Last March 8 the head of IDF Southern Command, Maj.-Gen. Yoav Gallant, said that since the disengagement “2,053 Kassams have been launched at Israel, 296 explosive charges have been detonated, 143 attacks were carried out against tanks that were outside the security fence—not inside Gaza—and there were 260 incidents of gunfire at IDF forces outside the fence.”

It kept going this weekend. On Friday, three Qassams were fired at open fields in the Negev desert beside Gaza ; on Saturday, two Qassams were fired at the town of Sderot , one hitting a house and destroying its roof while its inhabitants were not at home; on Sunday, four more Qassams were fired at the Negev and a fifth at Sderot that injured two people at a gas station, one with shrapnel wounds all over his body. Many of the rockets that land in open spaces are not meant to hit solid targets and instead constitute practice firings, the Gaza terrorists knowing they can leisurely experiment and hone their craft since the Israeli army is not likely to respond.

Indeed, since Israel signed a ceasefire with the Palestinian Authority last November 26, a nightmare-situation has emerged that not even opponents of the disengagement anticipated. Opponents knew that the “legitimacy” argument was foolish because structural factors of Arab oil power combined with ideological Palestinianism, anti-Israelism, anti-Semitism, anti-Westernism, and antimilitarism ensured that the world, notwithstanding the supposed magnanimity of the disengagement, would continue reacting to violent flare-ups with sympathy for the Palestinians and condemnation of Israel whatever the actual facts and justice of the case.

Opponents of the withdrawal, though, while expecting that Israel would have great difficulty both operationally and diplomatically in acting against Gaza terror after the pullback, did not foresee a situation in which Israel would just give up and let Sderot and the surrounding area become a helpless shooting gallery. But that is what has happened since the November 26 “ceasefire,” since which time hundreds of Qassams and mortars have been fired with almost no military response by Israel . (For a sense of what this means in terms of the daily suffering of the residents of Sderot, see videos on this page.) CONTINUE