If anyone had asked me last year whether I'd ever expected Arik Sharon and his supporters to actually follow through with the Disengagement, I would have answered confidently that they were destined to fail. How could they find justification for evicting people from their homes when they had every right to be there?, And even if they could, wouldn't it encourage terrorism anyway by suggesting that the Palestinians had succeded in getting what they wanted without having to give up anything for it except for a few people whose lives they obviously didn't value anyway?   No, humanity wouldn't tolerate injustice on that level. The rest of the world, Arik included, would eventually wake up and realize just how erroneous they were in believing that withdrawal from Gaza would actually solve Israel's problems.     
   I don't understand how the world is able to get away with being so blind. Objectivity sounds like a nice idea sometimes, but it just doesn't work here. Israel announced that they were closing Jewish settlements in Gaza, and the Palestinians shelled them because they didn't get the West Bank and Jerusalem. Never mind that Israel spent valuable time and resources doing something it didn't even have to in the first place.  The Israelis had more than enough valid reasons to hold onto Gaza.  Israel released Palestinian prisoners, but the Palestinian leadership wasn't satisfied, though they never matched any of Israel's sacrifices with any meaningful ones of their own. Israel withdrew its forces from "occupied cities," and the Palestinians used that new-found freedom to shelter terrorists and conceal their weapon-making facitlities. Israel began dialogue with Holocaust-denying Palestinian prime minister Mahmoud Abbas, and the Palestinians sent suicide bombers. Israel keeps showing good faith in the "peace process", so when are the Palestinians finally going to take the initiative and start acting like people who really want a state?

By Roni Singer, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service, and Agencies

A suicide bomber blew himself up at the Hasharon mall, at the entrance to the coastal town of Netanya, on Tuesday evening killing two women and wounding 24 others

Six people were seriously wounded in the attack, and 18 others sustained light injuries. The wounded were taken to Laniado Hospital in Netanya, Meir Hospital in Kfar Sava and Hillel Yaffe Medical Center in Hadera.

Miriam Feinberg, the mayor of Netanya, where much of the Maccabiah Games is taking place, told Israel Radio that she witnessed the attack. Click here to request or provide information on family and friends in Israel.

"I was at a junction... I saw the attack in front of my eyes," she told the radio, adding that she had been on her way to attend the games.

She said that the city intended to continue with its planned events, Israel Radio reported. A Maccabiah official said Tuesday evening that all Maccabiah participants had been accounted for.

Police and Palestinian security identified the bomber as Ahmed Abu Khalil, an 18-year-old member of Islamic Jihad from the West Bank village of Atil, about 13 kilometers (8 miles) east of Netanya.

"We reiterate our commitment to calm, but we have to retaliate for Israeli violations," suicide bomber Khalil said in a farewell video.

Reuters news agency reported that Islamic Jihad had released a statement claiming responsibility for the attack, in a telephone call to the agency's office in the West Bank city of Tul Karm.

Islamic Jihad said after Tuesday's attack that it remained committed to
the cease-fire. Islamic Jihad has said that despite the truce, it reserves the right to retaliate for what it perceives as Israeli violations, such arrests of Islamic Jihad members.

According to initial reports, at least three bodies were found at the scene of the bombing, at the main entrance to the mall, including that of the suicide bomber

Police said that the bomber had apparently been wearing an explosives belt. Local police said that there had been no warning of a potential attack.

Prelimary reports said that the bomber had tried to enter mall, but for reasons unknown had decided to blow himself up at the entrance.

"Israel has done all it could to ease up Palestinian needs but the PA has not fulfilled obligations undertaken at Sharem al Sheikh and shows no signs of doing so," David Baker, an official in the Prime Minister's Office, said in response to the attack.

The Palestinian Authority condemned the bombing Tuesday evening, saying that it had been intended to derail Israel's planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip next month.

Netanya is at Israel's narrowest point, 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the West Bank. The city has been a frequent target of Palestinian bombers, but the frequency has dropped sharply in the past year, with completion of a section of the separation fence along that part of the West Bank.

The Netanya mall has been a target for suicide bombers in the past. On May 18, 2001, a bomber blew himself up at the mall, killing five Israelis

The last suicide bombing in Netanya was on May 19, 2002, when three Israelis were killed on a street not far from the mall. The bombing in Netanya was the first suicide bombing in Israel since February 25, when a bomber blew himself up outside a nightclub at Tel Aviv beachfront, killing five people.

About 40 minutes before the Netanya bombing, West Bank police foiled an attempted car bomb attack in the Shavei Shomron settlement, close to Nablus.

According to military reports, a Palestinian managed to enter the settlement, driving through the gates as they opened to admit an Israeli vehicle. The man drove several meters into the settlement before an explosion occurred inside his car, most likely caused by a gas canister.

No Israelis were injured in the attack. The Palestinian driving the car was moderately wounded.

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...I really don't understand it: Israel is giving the Palestinian what they want. The people of Israel are putting themselves at greater risk by "disengaging" from the "occupied territories" in order to make peace with a group of people who still refer to Israel's creation as "al Nakba"- the catastrophe.  Israel is sacrificing land to people who neither deserve it nor have any legitimate claims to it, dsotie whatevr they say to the contrary. All in the name of "co-existence" with those who will never accept its existence, no matter what concessions it makes (short of collective suicide in the Mediterranean Sea). It's all so one-sided. And futile.

Someone please tell me again: what are the Palestinians giving in return?