Senior Hamas official survives IAF airstrike in Gaza City

[Gimel]

Israeli warplanes on Wednesday bombed the home of a
senior Hamas leader, Mahmoud al-Zahar, wounding
him and killing three others, witnesses and
hospital officials said.

Zahar's wife was among about 20 people wounded, the medics
said. They said she was seriously hurt.

The airstrike was in apparent retaliation for twin suicide
bombings carried out by Hamas less than 24 hours before.

<snip>

Hospital officials identified one of the dead as
Zahar's 30-year-old bodyguard. Relatives identified the
other victim as Zahar's son, Khaled, 24.

<snip>
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=338449&contrassID=1&subContrassID=0&sbSubContrassID=0

The Hamas leader survived with light wounds, as he ws in the garden at the time. They should have struck with a 1 ton bomb.

[mike_c]

1. sure, that way they could have taken out some of the neighbors...

They should have struck with a 1 ton bomb.

...maybe an elementary school or two. How much blood will it take to satisfy your lust for killing innocents?

[Gimel]

2. The man

was standing at the door of his "garden home". The innocents died in Israel this week.

[rini]

3. Pity

they missed the target. I good marksman might have done better.

[Forkboy]

5. I agree

so why dont they try this? I doubt many would be upset at the death of a Hamas leader.I know I wouldn't shed any tears.It's the killing of civilians (something that those here on the Israel side use as justification) that bothers so many.Why is ok for one side to kill civilians but not the other?

And before someone says,"But Israel doesn't target civilians.I think you know the difference." save it.Israel knows full well that innocent people will be killed by their tactics yet they do it anyway.As someone who supports ALL human life I find that as unacceptable as the suicide bombings are.

THEY ARE BOTH WRONG AND AN INSULT TO HUMANITY!

[Violet_Crumble]

7. Wrong...

Innocents also died in the Occupied Territories this week. Don't ever forget that, Gimel...

Violet...

[Jackie97]

9. Read your own article, Gimel....

It says that three Palestinians were killed and twenty were wounded. Are they not innocents? Perhaps only Israelis are innocent?

[Gimel]

11. Doesn't appear to me

that they were totally innocent. But then, maybe a bodyguard and a son have different loyalties.

[Violet_Crumble]

12. The son was an innocent civilian...

There's never any justification for killing family members based on a view that they *might* share the views of the family member who was the primary target...

So, we won't be hearing any complaints from you over family members of IDF troops or Israeli politicians being killed?

Violet...

[Gimel]

17. Saddam's sons

were also "innocent".

[Jackie97]

18. Legally, I think that you're right...

The United States, like Israel does like to be the executioner for suspects that haven't been tried lately.

However, I would love you to be able to prove that all of the sons of a criminal are criminals themselves. How would you like it if people assumed that you were a dangerous criminal because your father or somebody else in your family was a dangerous criminal? It happens in a lot of families, and people should not be condemned for what their family members do. Otherwise, Solomon should have been put to death or at least have had to watch his child die because his father David murdered somebody.

[Gimel]

19. Agree

There is serious room for doubt. Yet the son was in his 20's in his father's house (a known terrorist leader) accompanied by a body guard. Although a trial would have certainly been better, knowing the loyalities that exrst in most mideastern families, I have little doubt of his complicity, personally. Like I said, I may be wrong. Maybe the security forces have other information.

[Jackie97]

24. Kids still bum off their parents in the U.S.A.

And unlike the Palestinians, grown children in the U.S. A. have a heck of a lot more opportunity to provide for themselves and move out on their own.

Palestinians, on the other hand, can barely survive even as families much less on their own. I don't think that trying to survive by living in the parent's house should make one considered to be guilty of a crime.

[Violet_Crumble]

22. No they weren't...

Saddam's sons had been accused of atrocities against the Iraqi people and that had zero to do with their being his sons. Yr now comparing a dead Palestinian who as far as I can tell was being accused of nothing of being in the same situation as the sons of Saddam Hussein, who were both being sought on the strength of what they'd done and not whose sons they were....

I find trying to say the dead Palestinian wasn't innocent because you THINK that MAYBE he MIGHT have been involved with Hamas to be really troubling. It's now okay to justify the killing of people based on maybes? And clutching at really weak straws and claiming that Israel MAY have had some intelligence on this guy is just as bad. If they'd had intelligence, they wouldn't have been shy in sharing it seeing as how they're very quick to point out when they think someone's a member of Hamas. As it is, the daughter and wife of the guy they missed were injured in the attack. Is there some intelligence the IDF doesn't want to share with the world on them as well?

Violet...

[Gimel]

26. Right to question

I agree. They should have been spared. I still doubt that the son was innocent. That is my right. My right to doubt.

No warfare is just, and attacks on innocent civilians are totally unjustified.

[Violet_Crumble]

28. Then we've got total agreement on this one...

It's definately yr right to doubt the son was innocent. My only problem is if someone were to say he wasn't innocent and not add those magic words 'in my opinion'....

I think it'd be a much fairer world if all civilians could be left where they are and the warring factions be taken off to a remote island and allowed to kill each other :)

Violet...

[Jackie97]

14. They are innocent....

because you can't prove that they share the views of the targeted person, especially the son. What if people started killing Jews that were related to other Jews who were part of IDF or the Jewish Defense League? Would that be okay? Of course not.

In any case, it was three people who died. Prove that all three were guilty of a crime. Also prove that the twenty injured were guilty of a crime. You don't appear to have a leg to stand on.

[Gimel]

Started you say?

It has happened repeatedly. For instance the family of a son of Meir Kahan that was attacked as the drove with five of their children. All were killed. All suicide attacks agains civilians have the same rational behind them.

I don't have to prove anything. It is a matter of military record. I do no have access to them. Injuries of innocents may have occured. But in my opinon, the son and bodyguard were not innocent victims.

[Jackie97]

23. Two wrongs make a right?

"All suicide attacks agains civilians have the same rational behind them."

So, if people on the other side are doing this, then how does that make it okay for people on your side to do it? After all, Israel is claiming that they are morally superior here. Shouldn't they at least act like it in their actions?

"But in my opinon, the son and bodyguard were not innocent victims."

I can almost see the bodyguard (even though he's still legally a civilian) because he chose to protect the guy. Why the son? What crime did he commit that can be proven? Answer the question.

[Gimel]

20. Started you say?

It has happened repeatedly. For instance the family of a son of Meir Kahan that was attacked as the drove with five of their children. All were killed. All suicide attacks agains civilians have the same rational behind them.

I don't have to prove anything. It is a matter of military record. I do no have access to them. Injuries of innocents may have occured. But in my opinon, the son and bodyguard were not innocent victims.

[Herschel]

8. When I endorsed

the brave Israeli fighters that hunt down the animals I was met with scorn. Now there is objection to bombing! Oh, my.

[Forkboy]

4. The bloodlust on this forum

is quite sickening.

[StandWatie]

6. especially since no one in Gaza has done jack shit

They are cheering on political assassinations done with US jets and helicopters.

[Gimel]

10. Gaza happaens to be

fenced in. However, terror attacks occur from Gaza, although not the suicide bombings. They cut through the fences and attack children. They bomb school buses. Wouldn't call that "jack shit".

[StandWatie]

13. nope, hasn't happened since 2k

prove me wrong...

on edit: There have been attacks on Israeli soldiers in the Gaza Strip and a spate of Katushka rocket attacks that didn't do much and only served to draw a real rocket attack back on Gaza but no suicide bombers leaving Gaza.

[Gimel]

21. Is 2K ancient history?

Not by a long shot. The same activists exist there. Kassam rockets are fired daily into Israel from Gaza.

The threat from Gaza:
Jerusalem Post. Jerusalem: Aug 31, 2003. pg. 06
Abstract (Article Summary)
The Hamas terrorism machine didn't remain idle during nearly six weeks of the hudna - the intra-Palestinian pseudo-cease-fire. Kassam rockets were improved and tried out almost daily, with impunity, on a Gaza beach. Israeli military observers spotted them being test-fired into the sea, in an effort to increase their range. Even before Hamas abrogated the hudna, it was estimated in Israel that the rockets reached ...

Anything in the year 2000 is still real. You are still jumping around about Beirut, which was bombed nearly 20 years ago. Why should it matter to you or anyone?

On edit: Many of the Hamas leaders reside in Gaza, but their operatives work from the West Bank. For instance Yassin.

[StandWatie]

25. it's not ancient history

it's when Gaza was closed, no one is attacking from there because they can't.

Therefore Israel is bombing the one of the most densely populated areas on the face of the planet to kill people who can't reach Israeli's anyway.

[Gimel]

27. That doesn't compute

You are ignoring the facts in the case. What else is to be expected? Does the Pentagon have military power? Do the US troops come from the Pentagon?

[StandWatie]

29. they aren't locked in a cage

The captive residents of Gaza are not the Pentagon, they aren't the IDF, they aren't anything but prisoners incapable of harming Israel.

[Gimel]

30. Your are trying

for sympathy. It's a ploy. All the villas in the Gaza, including Arafat's have electronic communication. A cell phone is enough. One would think you lived in the previous century.

[StandWatie]

31. right..

Well there is your weapon of mass destruction: a cell phone.

These guys can just call up and order a suicide bomber like a pizza. Hell, maybe they can but that brings up an even more interesting question: Why are they ever ordering them to stop?

[Resistance]

15. The killed son, Khaled was to be married next Friday

source: http://www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2003/2003-09/045.html

"Relatives of Alzahar said that Khaled was getting married next Friday, and he was preparing to leave the house with his father to the hospital for medical checks when the air strike happened."

[bemildred]

16. Another ill-chosen, botched job.