Israel is averaging two to three invasions of Palestinian population centres a day. The shattering of Palestinian lives, reports Khaled Amayreh from Hebron, is now routine Click to view caption The latest major Israeli incursion into the West Bank took place in Ramallah on 10 June when dozens of Israeli tanks and armoured vehicles, backed by several helicopter gunships, stormed the city for the 11th time in less than two months, placing its 120,000 inhabitants under a strict curfew. Crack Israeli soldiers began house-to-house searches for "weapons and wanted persons" while other soldiers took up positions on the roof-tops of strategic buildings, training their machine-guns toward the empty streets. They overran several buildings, including one used by local, Arab, and foreign news agencies, ostensibly to block news coverage of renewed appropriation or destruction of Palestinian property. Israeli tanks once again surrounded Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's headquarters, as army bulldozers began demolishing buildings in the vicinity of the battered compound. At least one Palestinian was killed in the nearby Am'ari refugee camp, early this week, when a few Palestinian youths tried to stop the advance of the invading tanks. Last week, Israeli tanks shelled Arafat's bombed-out premises, killing two of Arafat's personal guards and inflicting further extensive damage. Arafat's own bedroom sustained a direct hit, prompting the beleaguered Palestinian leader to call on the international community to stop the attacks. He warned that the whole of the Middle East would catch fire if Israel's aggression did not stop. Palestinian sources reported that Israel had recently detained more than 35 Palestinians, ordinary citizens and activists, in Ramallah and the Israeli army re-invaded Tulkarm in the northern West Bank, placing its population of 70,000 under curfew. Israeli troops conducted searches for resistance activists and firearms. The Israeli army described its latest incursions as "routine operations" aimed at arresting "terrorists" and "conveying a message" to the Palestinian Authority. However, most Palestinians see the recurrent Israeli tank invasions of their towns and villages differently. "These invasions seem to be a present from Sharon on the first day of the restructuring of the Palestinian cabinet. By ordering a renewed invasion of Ramallah while he is in Washington DC, Sharon is reinforcing facts on the ground, proving that the West Bank is under occupation and that the Palestinian Authority is completely without authority," said Mustafa Barghouthi, the second man in the Palestine People's Party (PPP). Since 29 March, the Israeli army's "entry" (the term Israel's official media use) into the de facto capital of the Palestinian Authority is averaged at two or three invasions of population centres every day. The incursions, often accompanied by a total blockade, are having a suffocating effect on the Palestinian economy, already crippled by more than 21 months of unemployment and closures. However, despite Israel's repressive measures, Palestinian resistance groups have been recovering from the hard blows they sustained in the past four months. During the past two weeks, Palestinian guerrillas carried out almost daily attacks on Israeli occupation targets. The latest episode occurred on 5 June, when an Islamic Jihad suicide bomber detonated a car laden with explosives next to an Israeli passenger bus, travelling near Haifa and carrying soldiers and some civilians. The ensuing inferno killed at least 13 Israeli soldiers and three civilians in addition to the Palestinian bomber. The operation, which coincided with the 35th anniversary of the June 1967 War, was condemned by the Palestinian Authority, although its main target was soldiers rather than civilians. Two days later, on 7 June, Hamas guerrillas attacked a paramilitary Jewish settlement north of Hebron, killing two soldiers and a woman (the wife of one of the soldiers). One of Hamas' fighters was killed in a subsequent exchange of fire with Israeli soldiers, while other guerrillas escaped the fortified settlement. On 8 June, guerrillas from the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) attacked an Israeli army base at Yitzhar, a settlement near Nablus, injuring four Israeli soldiers, two seriously. One of the attackers was killed. Three Israeli settlers were badly injured on 11 June, when a road-side charge was detonated by remote control near Hebron. In the course of the past few months, Israel has detained 8,000 Palestinians. Most of them are being held in harsh conditions, in eight detention camps scattered throughout Israel.
