Comments:

@ Engage: About "The Promise", a play about the Israel/Palestinian conflict seen through the eyes of a British girl who comes to visit the place for a few weeks to see for herself. Many of the comments to this review of the play respond in the predictable far-Left clichoid manner that the creator of the drama and the network that screens it probably and possibly aimed at: example.

(Engage, the website, has a rigid and ideologically-based moderation policy where quite a few comments I left in the past did not make it through. Therefore I'm reproducing my comment here by way of recording it just in case it is deemed too pro- Israel to be allowed to appear on this self-described "non-Zionist" blog.

Update: Strange. When I checked about an hour ago, the comment appeared in the thread. When I checked again just now, it disappeared again. So what happened between then and now? I noticed this
on my sitemeter:

"London, United Kingdom, 0 returning visits

5th March 2011	09:38:10	Page View	No referring link contentious-centrist.blogspot.com/
5th March 2011	10:05:22	Exit Link	http://www.blogger.com/profile/07370528817706233156
5th March 2011	10:22:19	Page View	No referring link contentious-centrist.blogspot.com/

I'm guessing that when the comment was allowed, the moderator was unaware of my sarcastic remark about the website's eccentric moderation policies. Then someone checked it out and found it and got pissed off. And action followed quickly. Either that, or another moderator disagreed with the first moderator about allowing such brazenly pro-Israel apologetics ...

Either way, a mature and well-considered reaction. )

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From "Truth"'s link:

"According to Israeli authorities, the bombers entered Israel through the Egyptian border with Israel, after slipping out of Gaza when Hamas forces demolished a portion of the separation wall between Gaza and Egypt last month. "

If you wish to cast a doubt about the veracity of a statement of fact, better be attentive to the facts and what they tell us.

"Israeli statistics indicate that the barrier has substantially reduced the number of Palestinian infiltrations and suicide bombings and other attacks on civilians in Israel and in Israeli settlements, and Israeli officials assert that completion of the barrier will make it even more effective in stopping these attacks[33] since "An absolute halt in terrorist activities has been noticed in the West Bank areas where the fence has been constructed".[34] Israel's state comptroller, however, notes that most of the suicide bombers crossed into Israel through existing checkpoints.[35]

Israeli officers (including the head of the Shin Bet) quoted in the newspaper Maariv have said that in the areas where the barrier was complete, the number of hostile infiltrations has decreased to almost zero. Maariv also stated that Palestinian militants, including a senior member of Islamic Jihad, had confirmed that the barrier made it much harder to conduct attacks inside Israel. Since the completion of the fence in the area of Tulkarm and Qalqilyah in June 2003, there have been no successful attacks from those areas. All attacks were intercepted or the suicide bombers detonated prematurely.[17] In a March 23, 2008 interview, Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Ramadan Abdallah Shalah complained to the Qatari newspaper Al-Sharq that the separation barrier "limits the ability of the resistance to arrive deep within [Israeli territory] to carry out suicide bombing attacks, but the resistance has not surrendered or become helpless, and is looking for other ways to cope with the requirements of every stage" of the intifada.[36]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_West_Bank_barrier#Effects_on_Israeli_security

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About Rachel Corrie and her legacy:

Corrie aligned herself sentimentally and seamlessly with suffering Palestinians, reserving for them her absolute anger and attendant pity to the extent that suffering Israelis merited nothing but a sneering hatred from her. Corrie’s idealism did not proceed from love but from ideologically induced hatred. She was a de-facto apologist for Palestinian terrorism, and she died trying to prevent the work of an Israeli bulldozer, which was searching for munitions buried in the ground . Contrary to Palestinian reports and what is generally claimed, the bulldozer was not there to demolish a house, (though houses used as cover for weapon-smuggling tunnels were demolished by the IDF, but not on that particular day). Any which way you slice it, those munitions were there to be utilized in attacks against innocent civilians. Corrie died protecting terrorist weapons. She was completely indifferent to the deaths these weapons spelled at a time when suicide bombings were a matter of daily, sometimes hourly, occurrence in Israel.

Btw, when I look at this photo of Corrie what strikes me is less her complete self-abandon to mindless hatred. What I notice is the difference between her semi-crazed demeanor and the baffled and smiling faces of the Palestinian kids, who surround her. What can it mean?

http://www.scottishfriendsofisrael.org/Images/Activists/rachel-corrie-burns.jpg