Vicious circles

Hamas's vowed, but long-delayed, retaliation for the assassination of Sheikh Yassin and Abdul-Aziz Al-Rantisi kills 16 Israelis and wounds scores, reports Khaled Amayreh from Jerusalem

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Two Hamas bombers blew themselves up aboard two Israeli buses in the heart of the southern Israeli city of Beersheba (Beer Sabaa) killing at least 16 people and injuring many others. The bombing attack, which took place Tuesday afternoon, was the first in five months as Israeli political and security officials became increasingly confident of having crushed armed Palestinian resistance.

The simultaneous double-bombings were carried out by two Hamas men from Hebron who where later identified as Ahmed Qawasmi and Nassim Jaabari, both in their early 20s. Hamas spokesmen in the West Bank said the bombings were "a natural response to continued Israeli atrocities". Hamas spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and his successor Abdul-Aziz Al-Rantisi were killed earlier this year in targeted assassinations carried out by Israel.

"Look, we have to choose between fighting back against this criminal and Nazi-like entity called Israel or let them quietly murder our children and women and political leaders. They [Israel] must understand that their children's blood is not more precious than our children's blood," said Abu Omar, a Hamas spokesman in Hebron, who preferred to give his nom de guerre for obvious security reasons. "We have been offering a ceasefire for many months ... but the Zionists continued the killings and we had to fight back."

The Palestinian Authority (PA) condemned the bombings. In Cairo, visiting PA premier Ahmed Qurei reiterated the long-standing Palestinian stance on attacks targeting non-combatants, saying the Palestinian leadership denounced "all attacks on civilians, Palestinian and Israeli alike". Qurei said the bombings would give Israel a pretext to step up its repression and persecution of the Palestinian people.

Other Palestinian officials refuted American and Israeli accusations that the PA was not doing enough to prevent resistance and retaliatory attacks against Israel. "We are totally occupied by the Israeli army which has destroyed our security apparatus and headquarters. Israel has only itself to blame for this situation," said PA official Saeb Erekat. He also blamed Israel's systematic use of terror against the Palestinians for such operations, saying that those to whom evil is done do evil in return.

The Israeli occupation army killed more than 330 Palestinians, most of them innocent civilians, in the past five months, all under the rubric of fighting terror.

For its part, Israel vowed to step up "the war on terror" and speed up the construction of the gigantic apartheid wall deep inside the West Bank. Israeli security officials argued that had "the security wall" been built in the southern West Bank, the two Hamas activists wouldn't have been able to reach Beersheba.

On the ground, the Israeli army sealed off completely the city of Hebron, with a population of 170,000, preventing residents from leaving the town and forcing tens of thousands of school children to stay home on the first day of the new school year. Further, the Israeli army blew up the family home of Ahmed Qawasmi, a routine and manifestly illegal form of collective punishment reserved for Palestinians taking part in resistance against the occupation.

Israeli officials have indicated that the army will not carry out a large-scale invasion of Palestinian population centres in retaliation for the bombings. Instead, the officials said, the reprisals would take the form of "pin-point assassinations" as well as targeting Islamic educational and charitable institutions, which Israel refers to as the "Hamas infrastructure".

Following the Beersheba bombings, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon indicated that he would still go ahead with his unilateral disengagement plan in the Gaza Strip, despite overwhelming opposition from his own Likud Party. However, many Israeli commentators contend that Sharon is unlikely to be able to carry out the plan, in light of the powerful influence on his government of pro-settler groups.

Some Israeli pundits believe that Sharon will eventually go for an early general election, in which case he would either resign as leader of the Likud or give up the disengagement plan altogether.