London asplode

[Abcdxxxx]

Well, there's a split in Israel's phillosophy for handling terrorism, which can explain some of their mixed results. With world scrutiny on them to act divinely humane in their approach, they've had to back away from taking a strong arm stance. If you go through a timeline of terrorism the only success preventing this activity is through a firm hand. Terror activity in the region only increased after there were gestures that these people had legit beefs that should be discussed at a bargaining table. Israel has discovered you really can't take away their motivation for doing it. Poverty and class structure just can't be attributed as the sole motivation (the suicide bomber can always be traced to someone with money, with little regard for the working class, or the value of a human life).

So you can battle terrorism with compassion and try to "kill them with kindness", and understanding.... or you can be the Alpha dog, and keep yourself braced at all times so a mysterious backpack left absent on street corner becomes an immediate emergency. Israel's entire lifestyle revolves around these satety concerns. Having a bag searched when you go to the movies was standard back in the 70's for example. The Islamic fundamentalist world , and Arab League no longer fear people who want to be liked, and understood as compassionate people, now that they've learned how to manipulate the system.

Keep in mind this all happened only a couple months after Blair hosted a conference titled 'London supporting the Palestinian Authority", and Livingstone ranted about Israel's "war crimes". Rowan Williams anounced a church boycott of Israel only two days ago. There have also been low level gestures to recognize Hamas again. Oh, and interestingly enough, the IRA trained the PLO on how to do these types of bombings.