This past Sunday was what Palestinians and much of the Muslim world call Naqba-"Catastrophe". May 15th is the day according to the Gregorian calendar when in 1948 Israel became an internationally recognized nation. That was also the day on which seven Arab armies mobilized for the purposes of snuffing out the infant nation. It has come to be a perennial day for demonstrations, often violent, against Israel's existence, and against its refusal to repatriate the thousands of Arabs who fled into surrounding nations and territories during the conflict which ensued. We wish first of all to thank God for all who prayed for Israel during the weeks leading up to and through this day. In the event, things were certainly not so severe as it was feared they might have been. Still, it was a day of demonstration, riot and violence on a number of fronts. In Tel Aviv an Israeli Arab truck driver rampaged through the streets crashing into cars and a bus, wounding a number of people and killing an Israeli pedestrian. There were riots along the border in Gaza, and in Israel in parts of Jerusalem, resulting in the death of a youth in Silwan. In the north, thousands massed on the borders of Syria outside the Golan Heights and many thousands more were bussed from refugee camps in Lebanon to demonstrate on the Israeli border. On the Syrian front, several hundred managed to illegally break through the border and briefly occupy part of a Druze village; at least three were reported killed there, while across the border in Lebanon as many as ten were killed. As the crowds were approaching the border of Lebanon the Israelis were given orders to fire at the legs of those who would not stop. At the same time the South Lebanese army was filmed firing in the air over the crowds; the officers of the Northern Command issued a statement later strongly suggesting the likelihood that it was shots from the Lebanese army which caused the fatalities. Israel has submitted a formal complaint to the UN Security Council against both Syria and Lebanon for breach of UNSC resolutions and breaking international law. It is strongly suspected that the incursions from Syria were stoked by that government to draw world attention away from the slaughter which has been going on in recent weeks as government forces there have attempted to squelch riots of Syrian citizens against that despotic regime. In the end, by the end of the day, the violence had been quelled, and the demonstrators withdrew. Nor were there signs of any beginning of a "3rd Intifada" as had been urged over Internet and Facebook.
On Monday Prime Minister Netanyahu delivered an address at the opening of the Knesset's summer session in which he pointed out that for all the calls both within the Palestinian Authority and in nations around the world for Israel to return to the 1967 borders, the present conflict was "not a conflict on 1967 but a conflict on 1948, and on the right of Israel to exist. You must have noticed that yesterday's events did not take place on June 5, the day the Six Day War erupted, they took place on May 15, the day the State of Israel was established." The Prime Minister went on to comment on the recent "reconciliation" between Fatah and Hamas, "A Palestinian government half of which is comprised of those who declare their willingness to destroy the State of Israel on a daily basis is not a partner for peace. Anyone who says 'one makes peace with one's enemies' must add 'one makes peace with an enemy who has decided to make peace.'" Although Netanyahu has given lip-service to establishment of a Palestinian state, his stipulations for such are such that as of yet the Palestinians have given no indication of accepting-* That they recognize Israel as a nation-state of Jews; * That a peace agreement with Palestinians will bring to an end future claims on the land; *That there be no "right of return" for Palestinian refugees; * That with any future state there must be an Israeli military security presence along the Jordan Valley; * That in any future scenario large pre-existing settlement blocks in Judea and Samaria will remain part of Israel; *That Jerusalem will remain the undivided capital of Israel.
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