Ex-Mossad chief: Rantisi strike is blow to Hamas

[JohnLocke]

Ex-Mossad chief: Rantisi strike is blow to Hamas
Saturday, April 17, 2004
Jerusalem Post
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Former Mossad chief MK Danny Yatom (Labor) said Abdel Aziz Rantisi's killing was another blow to Hamas following the death of Shiekh Ahmed Yassin.
"Hamas' strength is its line of leaders, this is what Israel is targeting. We have no choice but to fight to the death with a group like Hamas, which wants the destruction of Israel," Yatom said.
(...)
"Even when we tried to kill him in Jordan, he was their top leader. I suspect that the Hamas leadership will continue to operate from Damascus. The heads of Hamas are hiding and spending more time trying to find out who are the Israeli agents in their ranks, than trying to carry out attacks," Yatom said, adding, "Mashaal is the number one man in Hamas. He was always on the top of our list. He remains on the list."
"What happened today was an intelligence coup of the highest order," Yatom told Israel Radio.
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Read the rest here.

[JohnLocke]

1. First Yassin, then Rantisi. The next terrorist to die is Mashaal!

[MikeG]

2. When are we gonna stop giving Israel the okie doke to kill?

All it does is get more innocent people killed.

[JohnLocke]

3. Yassin and Rantisi were not, "innocent (sic) prople."

They were terrorists.

[MikeG]

4. I'm talking about the ensuing revenge killings.

[JohnLocke]

5. Are you going to retract what you said? (Yassin & Rantisi as "innocent")

[MikeG]

6. They aren't innocent. I didn't say they were.

The solution to the problems in the Middle East is not more killings and violence. By either side.

[JohnLocke]

7. Killing terrorist leaders DOES help the peace process.

Israel is not, cannot, and should not, attempt to negotiate peace with the Palestinians before all terrorist groups are destroyed. If the best way to destroy them to to kill or arrest the terrorist leaders, and doing this constitutes violence, them the solution to the problems in the Middle East is, at least in one part, some killings and violence. Therefore, your uninformed platitude ("The solution to the problems in the Middle East is not more killings and violence. By either side") is garbage.

[MikeG]

8. Both sides should read Gandhi.

He found a way to expel the British nonviolently from India without resorting to terrorism. This new violence only started after that pig Sharon took power.

[JohnLocke]

9. Until Hamas manages to do so, I'll defend Israel killing terrorists.

[dfong63]

11. funny, we are no closer to peace than we were before Israel started this

... campaign of terror against the Palestinians.

[Darranar]

14. So, by the same token...

should the Palestinians refuse to negotiate with the Israelis until Israeli settlement-building and general repression ends?

For the record, I support every effort towards a peaceful settlement, regardless of the situation on the ground, and whether it's Rantisi or Sharon speaking out against it, I condemn them.

[JohnLocke]

16. I'm fine with that.

Palestinians should refuse to negotiate with the Israelis until Israeli settlement-building and general repression ends. BUT... they should not commit acts of terror aganist others. Peaceful resistance or no resistance at all.

[Darranar]

22. So what, then, is accomplished?

Both sides sit in their respective bastions, watching brutal waves of death and destruction pour in both directions, killing Israelis and Palestinians by the hundreds, neither one willing to lift a finger to stop it until the other does.

Likud screams about Palestinian atrocities, ignoring their own, and Hamas screams about the atrocities of the "Zionist regime", ignoring their own. A large portion of both peoples are too angry at the other for the atrocity of the week before to stop their leaders from repaying it with another atrocity, others too afraid to do so. Most want an end, but have no idea to bring it about, and many become convinced that only the other can do so, convienently shifting the blame from themselves.

That is the way it stands now, and such refusal to negotiate does nothing but perpetuate it.

[JohnLocke]

26. Then what should each side do?

[Darranar]

27. Likud won't stop, neither will Hamas...

so we'll be left waiting until one side decides to root out the idiots screaming revenge at the other, then perhaps real progress can be made.

But that wasn't your question.

If I were the Prime Minister of Israel, I would immediately recognize the right of the Palestinians to a viable and independent state with the border being the Green Line, with minor and mutually agreed upon border modifications.

Without waiting for the other side to act, I would immediately cease settlement growth and remove every settler in every settlement not near Jerusalem. This would accomplish much in the way of reducing support for Palestinians terrorism without impacting Israeli security very much. The wall would go as well, perhaps rebuilt on the Green Line or to the west of it.

I would immediately return to the negotiating table, insisting on keeping only the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem of the Occupied Territories, and perhaps a few settlement blocs nearby. For every piece of land taken from the Palestinians, an equivalent piece of land, both in value and area, would be given. I would call for international supervision of Palestinian elections, to prevent rigging, and for supervision to ensure that the Palestinian police were acting against terrorists.

I would finance, or perhaps partly finance, a humanitarian project in the Occupied Territories to strengthen the infrastructure of the future Palestinian government and improve the devestating humanitarian situation there. I would call for international supervision to reduce corruption in this process.

Reluctantly, but for the sake of not destroying myself politically and ending the peace process, I would insist on generous compensation for the Palestinian refugees instead of full right of return, but I would let in as many Palestinian refugees as politically possible.

From the beginning, I would reduce Israeli incursions into the Occupied Territories. As the process continued, I would bring them down to zero, hopefully in the context of a cease-fire.

[dfong63]

10. they were not convicted in a legitimate trial

they were no more guilty than Sharon, Bush, Begin, Netanyahu, etc.

[JohnLocke]

12. So? A state of war exists, Israel can kill any terrorist she wants.

[gayboy]

20. ummm

Rantisi is innoccent?
:puke:

[Noon_Blue_Apples]

18. glee from someone who condemns palestinians for the same

this priceless moment brought to you by...

[Daniela]

13. In truth

"Hamas' strength is its line of leaders, this is what Israel is targeting."

This is, of course, idiotic and ridiculous. Hamas' strength is in its concept of violent resistance to colonial exploitation, theft and ethnic cleansing, and that has absolutely nothing to do with Hamas' "leaders." It has everything to do with what Israel does on a daily basis to the Palestinian people.

[Darranar]

15. So if Yassin's killing accomplished something...

why did they need to kill Rantisi, too?

[JohnLocke]

17. Yassin was a means to an end, not an end in itself.

[Darranar]

19. So why wasn't that end realized when killing Yassin?

I'm not about to weep for either death, but all this is doing is continuing the cycle of violence, death, destruction, and carnage.

[Noon_Blue_Apples]

21. So. You're missing the point

the assinations satisfy and feed the sheep

[gayboy]

23. and....

make Israel a safer place too....Is that just a side effect to the `feeding the sheep` thing ?

[Darranar]

24. How, exactly?

Yassin's assasination obviously failed, otherwise there would be no reason to kill Rantisi. Why will it work now?

[gayboy]

25. well one less director...

maybe one less kid (16yr old) will be sent to bomb a disco tonight ,at least until they find a new director....if its only one less suicidal maniacal sexually frustrated kid(72 virgins) and 10 less children (jews) killed....it would of been worth it....

[Noon_Blue_Apples]

28. enjoy your stay

.

[gayboy]

29. huh?

:wtf: