The two Palestinian terrorists who murdered Cpl. Ahikam Amihai and Sgt. David Rubin on 28 December 2007, in Wadi Telem, turned themselves in to Palestinian General Intelligence in Hebron the same day in order to avoid being apprehended by Israeli security forces. The Palestinians confirmed that the two were in custody only after an inquiry from the Israel Security Agency. Similarly, the Palestinians returned the two soldiers’ weapons, as well as the terrorists’ weapons, only after a demand to this effect had been communicated by the ISA.

The two terrorists are:

Ali Hamid Dandanes (24), resident of Hebron, clerk at the Hebron Sharia court and a Fatah operative who was in contact with Palestinian General Intelligence; and

Amar Badad Khalim Taha (26), resident of Hebron, Fatah operative and a Palestinian National Security soldier.

A third terrorist, Bassel Nabil Naim Natashe (23), a resident of Hebron, was killed in the exchange of fire with Cpl. Ahikam and Sgt. Rubin.

From the Palestinians’ interrogation of the two terrorists, it arises that the attack was perpetrated after one of the terrorists identified the hikers in Wadi Telem and summoned his cohorts. The objective of this planned attack was to murder the hikers and steal their weapons.

Murdering all the settlers is certainly one way to end the occupation, but Americans and Europeans should consider if this is the most efficient use of their tax money. You are not getting an efficient ratio of settlers killed for your expenditure. It would be much more economical to buy them out and less messy too. Even better, you could demand a piece-work regime. For example, you can offer $10,000 for each settler killed. For less than a billion dollars, you could solve the whole problem of Israeli settlement in Jerusalem and the West Bank. That would make many people in the State Department very happy. As it is, you will be spending $7.4 billion over three years, and probably won't kill more than a few dozen Israelis. True, you could use the money for other purposes, such as helping the poor of the Muslim quarters in France, bailing out failing mortgage lenders etc. But what better use can there be for your money than supporting "peace?"

Those who have qualms about this peace process, and aren't interested in solving the dispute in this particular way, can point out that such things can happen. We can't blame the moderate Abbas for sheep that stray from the fold, can we? We must wait and see if the moderate government of the moderate Abbas brings the criminals resistance heroes to justice, turns them over to Israel, holds them for a while and quietly releases them, incarcerates them and allows them to escape, or simply releases them.

Meanwhile, Israel was busy on its own, overnight, killing Islamic Jihad and Hamas terrorists in Gaza, ostensibly enemies of democracy, peace and the moderate Palestinian authority. The reaction of the moderate government of the moderate Mahmud Abbas however, was to most immoderately condemn the Israeli actions. According to WAFA, the official moderate news agency of the moderate PLO, paid for by the tax dollars of the peace loving Europeans and Americans:

Presidency Spokesperson condemned on Wednesday the massacre perpetrated by Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) on the Gaza Strip which resulted in the killing of seven citizens.

The Spokesperson considered the massacre as an aggressive act aims at escalating situation before the US President George. W. Bush expected visit to the region.

"Israel tries to escape the political merits, the priority of which is implementing the Road Map plan and halting settlements activities in all Palestinian territories, including Jerusalem," according to the
Spokesperson.

The Spokesperson called on the Quartet, specially the US to intervene and put an end to bloodshed and Israeli crimes which destroy the peace process.(source: wafa.ps/english/body.asp?id=10881)

The peace process apparently consists of lobbing Qassam rockets at Sderot, and anyone who interferes with this moderate and peace loving activity is destroying the peace process. Americans and Europeans take note. The Evil Zionists are destroying the peace process that your dollars and Euros are financing by killing massacring Islamic Jihad terrorists "citizens."

Ami Isseroff