From Al-Jazeera.net:
The Palestinian territories have come to a halt during a general strike called in protest against an Israeli siege of a West Bank jail.The Palestinian Authority is already in a heightened state of alert after the raid on the Jericho jail provoked a wave of abductions and threats of revenge against the Jewish state.
The strike was ordered late on Tuesday after emergency talks in the Gaza Strip, and on Wednesday most businesses were shuttered and schools were closed.
The siege by Israel succeeded in its aim of capturing Ahmad Saadat, the leader of the resistance movement, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), but has sparked an angry reaction.
Three foreign captives - two French and a Korean - were being held by Palestinian fighters in the Gaza Strip after the raid, and much of the backlash has been directed at British and US interests.
Saadat surrendered to Israeli troops late on Tuesday along with 5 other jailed Palestinian political activists.
Israel holds the five PFLP members responsible for the killing of an Israeli minister in October 2001.
Two Palestinian security guards were killed and 26 others wounded, five of them critically in the assault.
A US State Department spokesman urged both sides to exercise "calm and restraint" amid mounting questions over why the international monitors at the prison were removed just minutes before the raid. The UN Security Council also called for calm.
The president of the European Parliament roundly condemned Israel's massive raid on the prison and the wave of kidnappings of foreigners that followed it...
The BBC did itself proud in covering this story. It never explained anything about the "killing of an Israeli Cabinet Minister." It did not explain to readers that that particular Cabinet Minister had been famous for his bravery ever since he had been forced to start fighting as a very young man, that because of his slender build he had the nickname "String Bean," that he rose in the ranks to become a general, that he was far more clear-sighted about the scope and permanence of the threat to Israel than his friend Ariel Sharon, and that he who had been so brave so repeatedly was gunned down, a man now in his seventies, by Arab killers in a hotel who gunned him down when he was alone and unarmed. Listeners to the BBC would have learned none of this; they were too busy being given the views of Saeb Erekat and, of course, that promoter of a reach-out-and-touch-Hamas policy, Alistair Crooke (without letting readers know all about Alistair Crooke nor his clients).
The Israelis have learnt that the only way to treat Muslims is to treat them they way that they would like to treat you, but to do it first.
I still laugh about the terrorist leader who copped a missile through his toilet window while he was sitting on it. Urban myth or not it seems terribly funny.
Most government sponsored or "public" media networkds seem to be ovverrun by left wing liberals with an inbuilt desire to lick the multicultural backside and the ABC in Autralia is just as bad, but not as bad as the SBS multicultural network where I fully expect the headline "Israeli Soldier assaults arab with knife by impaling self on knife".
Saadat was elected to the Hamas Parliment and was to be released.
Israel did what it needed to do. Israel takes real actions to protect its citizens including building a wall to keep the nut cases out.
Our Federal government could take lessons and let Israel do what Israel needs to do to protect Israel.
Iran is next.
THe Texican.
Freedom, the only choice at any cost.
The inmates had been running the jail for some time. As muslims expect there to be no adverse consequences for killing a Jew, especially one who had correctly foreseen the imperative of expelling Israeli muslims, and who could never possibly be loyal citizens of Isreal, saadat was looking forward to taking his place in the cabinet, where I was hoping he would be assassinated. Instead, the Isrealis chose to keep him and is buddies locked up as if they were murderers. Now the arabs are angry at Israel. arabs in the womb are angry at Israel. arabs in their graves are angry at Israel. Who gives a sh*t?
Whats with the General Strike? Who are they striking against?? Hamas runs the government!
Not working seems to be their response to ANY situation. The so-called Palestinians are the whiniest, laziest, stupidest, most degenerate and corrupt people on earth. They have perfected a masochistic death cult of such breathtaking perversity it makes a normal human's skin crawl.
They are allowed to do some kinds of work during a strike - throwing stones, looting the greenhouses that a Jewish philanthropist bought for them in Gaza or kidnapping the Westerners who are treating their sick and teaching their children.
Israel does what Israel has to do. Anyone who does not like it, better get out of the way.
Don't mess with Israel. Everyone that does gets consigned to the rubbish dump of history. Every culture which has come up against them is now gone, except one.
Learn from the past, Abd'allah.
Don't mess with Israel. Everyone that does gets consigned to the rubbish dump of history. Every culture which has come up against them is now gone, except one.
Learn from the past, Abd'allah.
excuse my hiccups
What does that even mean? What bustling commercial trade is going on there on a normal day? It just means that the "Palestinians" are stopping production lines for Qassam missiles, which are built to kill the infidels, so that they can go protest and chant about how they are going to kill the infidels. Here's hoping they stay on strike for decades.
Did this happen, or not? If not, it should!
"I still laugh about the terrorist leader who copped a missile through his toilet window while he was sitting on it. Urban myth or not it seems terribly funny".
Whats with the General Strike? they need to have employemnt first, like working at a job.. right now all they do is run around with your checkered tee towel on the face,and blow up your stupid muslim kid.
Israel has to serve its people and never depend on the rest of the world, especially the EU!
One of the Aussie-hostages who was released was on TV this morning. She said she never felt threatened and the pali's actions were merely "a cry for help..."
"One of the Aussie-hostages who was released was on TV this morning. She said she never felt threatened"
Funny, she can't have been watching the news lately, or does she think that Iraqi islamists are somehow different from Palestinian ones?
Funny, when hit head on, the inmates agree to take off their pants on order of the Israelis. I guess it takes guts to kill a bus of civilians, but mano to mano, I'll whuss out. The Palis remind me of that old joke, "are we men or are we Palis? . . . Pass the cheese."
Hugh:
Far more importantly, the MSM and George Al-Galloway are not mentioning that the UK had warned the PA three weeks earlier that they were going to withdraw their monitors if the PA couldn't do a better job of security. (Jack Straw made such a statement the other day, but that gets rather conveniently left out of the reports I've heard over the Al-CBC.)
I think Dry Bones had it right with the cartoon he posted on his blogsite yesterday. Once again the world falls for a Palestinian orchestrated crisis designed to ensure that Israelis look like the bad guys.