I am very hurt by the death of innocent people caused by today's suicide bombing in Haifa.
Of course one of the people who died is the suicide bomber. And I am very hurt by her death

too.

I do not want either to demonise or to glorify the girl who sacrificed her life for her convictions.
Though I think she has hurt the Palestinian cause, I have to admit that she possibly thought that,

in so doing, she was helping the Palestinian cause. And that is the key to the whole situation. Possibly, it was also an act of revenge for friends or relatives killed by the Israelis.

You are free to think she was motivated by her hatred for the Jews and not by what the Jews
have done against her people or her friends and relatives. But you are also free to think she was motivated by her love for the Palestinian people. I think that the latter is closer to the truth. A parent would give his/her life for the children he/she adores. A true friend for his friend.

Sometimes one risks one's life donating an organ to a stranger. It is also an act of love.

It is so much more common in human nature to witness sacrifices motivated by love than 

by hatred. I do not deny that there was hatred in the heart of the suicide bomber. But I

affirm that love of her people, the belief she was helping her people, was the determining

factor. A resolve to avenge relatives or friends may have been an additional factor. But even

if we think that hatred was her motivation, it begs the question as to the reason for so much

hatred, to the point of sacrificing one's life for it.

I would like to put myself in the shoes of the suicide bomber. Since I am a Jewish Palestinian
I have to ask myself the question: as a Palestinian, which I am, could I become a suicide
bomber? Being a Jew, would it immunise me against commiting an act of terrorism hurting
innocent people? Of course not. Sharon himself is a terrorist causing the death of innocent
people. Jews have blown up a hotel in Jerusalem, killing many innocent people. Jews have
been arrested in Egypt for causing explosions, even a fire in a cinema, to have the US think it
was Egyptians who were doing it. The scandal was called "essek bish"  or the "shameful deal",
and was better known outside Israel as "the Lavon affair". So, being a Jew  would not
immunise me. The list would be too long of the acts of terrorism committed by Jews, sometimes
targeting Jews.

 

It was enough for the Jewish terrorist to be convinced that it was for the good of his people.
Still there is a difference. The Jewish terrorist that blew the hotel in Jerusalem did not commit
suicide. He did not, because he did not need to. I have no doubt that, had he felt that the only
way to blow up the Jerusalem hotel was by becoming a suicide bomber, and had he been
convinced of  how much that attack would help the Jewish people, that Jewish terrorist might
well have become a suicide bomber, had there been no other way to blow up the hotel.

Some Israelis may think that, had the "wall" been completed, there could have been no suicide
bombings. What an illusion. "Where there is a will, there is a way" is an old wise saying. Stop
the suicide bombings by a wall, and you will get biological warfare, poison warfare and other
ways to harm the "enemy".  Besides, explosives can create openings in the wall at a place where the Israelis, wrongly feeling safe behind the wall, would have put no patrol. It is impossible to maintain patrols along the wall, everywhere and all the time. There is the possibility of tunneling starting from far away from the wall, and ending far away too.

 

There is the possibility of mercenaries, or sympathising groups outside the wall and
believing in the usefulness of suicide bombing.

 

Involved resistance groups would have more imagination then I do, and will find still more
ways to overcome the challenge of the wall.

There is no way to stop suicide bombings or other attacks harming innocents, except by
suppressing the real cause, which is the conviction that it helps the Palestinian cause. Inflicting
more casualties on the Palestinians, destroying more of their houses only increases the
inducement for more suicide bombings.

 

One can demonize suicide bombers by saying they are motivated by Islamic fanaticism. The

US demonized the Vietnamese by saying that Asians do not care as much about children as Americans do. We know it is not true. But were it true, it would not have changed the fact that

the US troops had to get out of there.

To speak of the fanaticism of Islam does not modify the realities. Be it because of Islamic

fanaticism or because of other reasons, the Israeli authorities, and the Israeli people, have to

find a solution.  The solution is certainly not an antidote to the so-called Islamic fanaticism.

The solution lies in realizing that the conviction that suicide bombings help the Palestinian

cause comes out of despair.  The Palestinian people despair of seeing justice done, despair

of the humiliating and oppressive occupation. Give hope to the Palestinian people and

they will withdraw their support for the suicide bombings. Go on destroying the houses of Palestinians, go on increasing the number of Jewish settlements, and you increase the despair

of Palestinian people and, for many, you seem to close the door to any other option.

There can be no doubt that had the Israeli authorities, after the Oslo accord, abstained from increasing the number of settlements, started to dismantle what had already been built, and demonstrated a will to evacuate the territories conquered in 1967, there would have

been no suicide bombers.

 

I unambiguously condemn the suicide bombings. But I hold the expansionist Israeli establishment
to be ultimately responsible. As to the suicide bombers, they are victims I mourn, as much as I mourn the innocent Israeli victims. The primary terrorism is that of the Israeli state oppressing the Palestinian people, while the secondary terrorism is that of the Palestinian resistance, whether wise or not, whether helping or harming the Palestinian cause, but definitely caused by the primary terrorism of the Israeli state.

 

The Israeli people would become safe from terrorism when they will be convinced that their real enemy is the Israeli expansionist establishment. An appropriate Palestinian strategy would be to

help the Israeli people understand that security, peace and prosperity are common aims of the two peoples, the Israeli and the Palestinian. Those two peoples must form an alliance against the expansionist Israeli establishment, their common enemy.