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The Bomb in Jerusalem on Wednesday

- Wednesday, June 11, 2003 |

Repeat after me: It wasn’t retaliation for Rantisi.

One more time: It wasn’t retaliation for Rantisi.

The bus bombing in Jerusalem today that killed upwards of 15 people was not Hamas retaliation for Israel’s attempt to eliminate Abdul Aziz Rantisi, the financial, political and religious instigator of terrorism against Jews. Whether or not the attack had happened yesterday and whether or not it had been successful, the bombing would have occurred today because today is one of the days Israel’s defenses against terrorism failed.

Repeat after me: It wasn’t retaliation for Rantisi.

One more time: It wasn’t retaliation for Rantisi.

According to Israeli experts, a homicide bombing takes nearly two weeks to plan and execute. Since the Aqaba summit, Israel has stopped more than 50 planned attacks, including yesterday a 15-year-old boy with explosives, planning to blow himself up. Every day, Israeli forces seek out and find those who would kill Jews. Every day, Israeli forces stop something from happening. Hundreds and hundreds of times since the Palestinian war against Israel entered its current phase in September 2000. But some days, they fail.

It wasn’t retaliation for Rantisi. It wasn’t part of a “cycle of violence.”

Those, including the President, who said yesterday that Israel’s operation against Rantisi would hurt the Road Map or “damage the peace process” miss the point of violence against Jews. The “map” and the “process” are not goals; a secure, legitimate, Jewish Israel living, if need be, alongside a peaceful, democratic Palestinian state is a goal. The others are only tools, and only for parties ascribing to their principles. Israel, certainly; Abu Mazen, maybe. But Hamas is an enemy engaged in war against the Jewish state. Parties interested in war should get war. And yes, the elimination of war parties and war processes IS the obligation of the PA under the terms of the Road Map. But since Abu Mazen publicly abdicated, preferring, he said, “negotiations” for a “truce,” it falls to Israel, as ever, to defend its people.

We believe the President knows this. In his 20 September speech he said:

“We will direct every resource at our command – every means of diplomacy, every tool of intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence, and every necessary weapon of war. We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place to place, until there is no refuge or no rest. And we will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”

Rantisi is a terrorist and deserved a terrorist’s fate. The bombing today was part of his ongoing war against Israel. They are related by philosophy, not by timing. Today and every day, Israel should have our full support in engaging and eliminating its enemies.