Bloodshot eyes

Ho-hum. Another day, another bomb, more detached body parts lying about, another blood-soaked street. Yeah, so what?

Yes, of course that is sarcasm. Bitter, angry sarcasm. Bitter and angry at the insanity, the inanity, the monstrosity of murder, the cycle of "gotcha last!" that has played out between Israel and the Palestinians for decades without gaining security for the former or a home for the latter, a cycle that, as the song says, is "nothing but a heartbreaker / Friend only to the undertaker."

One person has been killed and 21 wounded - five critically - by a bomb in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv.

Police said the device, containing metal bolts, exploded near a bus stop,

the BBC for July 11 said.

There are two things I find both outrageous and destructive about this. One is the attack itself. If terrorism can be defined as pain inflicted on noncombatants for political ends, then this is terrorism, bloody terrorism, pure and simple. No excuses, no doubletalk about "liberation" or "oppressed peoples." In a way, it's even worse than a suicide bombing, for in that case you can at least credit the bomber with the willingness to sacrifice themselves for their cause. In this case, according to police chief Yossi Setbon, the device had been concealed in shrubbery: the act of a coward.

The other is the reaction of the Israeli government. Instead of even blaming the bombers, instead of even hinting at the possibility of taking some measure of responsibility, some vague suggestion that Israeli policy might in some way have something to do with it, Ariel Sharon blamed the World Court.

"This morning's act of murder is the first to have occurred under the auspices of the opinion,"

he said, according to the Miami Herald.

aus·pice n., pl. aus·pi·ces. 1. Also auspices. Protection or support; patronage.

The BBC said the word was "patronage" rather than auspices. A distinction without a difference.

pa·tron·age n. 1. Support, encouragement, or championship, as of a person, an institution, an event, or a cause, from a patron.

In short, Sharon was saying the attack was the World Court's fault, that the World Court protects, supports, champions, terrorism.

That is just beyond the pale, completely unreasonable and unjustified - but perhaps not surprising from a government that seems determined to avoid the possibility of discussions whose outcome it can't control, that has, as I said on February 2, discussing a report in Haaretz,

gone out of its way to make sure there is no person, group, or organization that can claim to speak for the Palestinians as a whole

and then used that supposed lack of a "partner" as an excuse for "unilateral" moves. A government that, by the definition of "terrorism" I offered at the top, has a number of terrorist acts to its own discredit. A government that practices collective guilt and makes racist judgments, just like other terrorists.

"It is not without reason that the Palestinians are fighting against construction of the (barrier). They are well aware that completion of (it) will make it very difficult for them to continue with their acts of murder,"

the Daily Star quotes Sharon as saying. Note the crucial word "the." Not "some" Palestinians, not "radical" or "terrorist" Palestinians, but "the" Palestinians.

Well,

Hassan Abu Libdeh, chief of staff for Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia, said the government condemned Sunday's attack as "a counterproductive terrorist act." At the same time, he said, "The fence will never be a source of security for the Israeli government or the people. The only guaranteed source of security is peace between the two sides."

Or, as Moshe Dayan put it,

[i]f you want to make peace, you don't talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies.

Or, finally, as I recall another Israeli ex-general saying (I can't source it now, but I will try to track it down), "secure borders do not bring peace. Peace brings secure borders."

Right now, fence or no fence, the border is not secure because there is no peace. And another round of the grown-up version of "tag! you're it!" - one that, like most adult versions of children's games, leaves death and devastation in its wake - will bring it no closer.