Now They Write About It?

Craig Smith of the NYTimes writes about gun-smuggling and tunnel digging in Gaza.

One comment:

Yuval Steinitz, chairman of the Israeli Parliament's foreign affairs and defense committee, said 12,000 guns, several hundred antitank-rocket launchers, thousands of antitank rockets, tons of explosives and possibly even some shoulder-fired antiaircraft missiles have entered the Gaza Strip over the last year, primarily through the tunnels.

"We're not talking about weapons for terrorism but about weapons for an army," he said by telephone from Jerusalem.

"Some of the tunnels were financed by the Palestinian Authority itself, and some of the weapons smuggled through them were bought by the P.A., although most of them went to Hamas, Islamic Jihad or other terrorist organizations," Mr. Steinitz added.

He complained that Egypt, too, bore responsibility. "The smuggling doesn't begin in the tunnels," he said. "Egypt is doing to Israel exactly what Syria is doing to the Americans in Iraq, putting troops on the border and then succeeding not to succeed."

He said that Israel asked both Egypt and Jordan to stop weapons smuggling into the Palestinian areas five years ago and that Jordan, with a longer border and larger domestic Palestinian population, had managed to do so. "But Egypt did almost nothing, and today 90 percent of the Palestinians' weapons and arms are coming from Egypt," Mr. Steinitz said.

And two other excerpts:-

His cousin said there were many telltale signs that tip people off, including the smell of clay, traces of sand indoors or dirt under fingernails.

Remember my point about "collective punishment"?

In May 2004, they finally opened the "eye" and brought four shipments into the Gaza Strip, totaling 900 Kalashnikovs, 400 handguns and 200,000 rounds of ammunition.

P.S. My good friend CK sent me this which has wisdom beyond his years and mine, too: "Yeah, 'cause before, the tunnels only threatened Jews. Now they threaten 'peace'."