MER Editorial: 10/01/97:

The Israelis simply can't be trusted.  Here they go again, with the complicity of the Americans and the Hashemite regime in Jordan, "releasing" the head of Hamas, Sheik Ahmed Yassin.

First of all the Israelis have wanted to get rid of Sheik Yassin for a long time.  He is in failing health and they have feared he would die in their custody and become a major martyr.  They are glad to be freed of him, just as they refused to have Mousa Abu Marzook, the political head of Hamas, extradited from his New York jail cell earlier this year and instead had him sent to Jordan as well.  The Jordanians, by the way, are well paid for cooperating with Israeli and American designs in this and so many other matters.

Secondly, the Israelis took this opportunity to in reality deport Sheik Yassin, not to "release" him.  His home is Gaza and Palestine, not Jordan.  They essentially expelled him.  But even so they did in an important sense blink; for one of the central demands of Hamas has been the release of their leaders from Israeli prisons.  Of course there are many many others still to go.

Thirdly, the Israelis continue to prepare to either force Arafat's "Authority" to succumb to their designs and to repress and destroy all opposition, or else to pursue their second  alternative and do things themselves.  The "or else" is Israel's plan to destroy the Hamas social and political infrastructure themselves, even if that means sending Israeli troops into the "autonomous" areas.  The Israeli army has again been conducting such "war games" in recent months.

The next time there is a terrorist incident the Israelis may well implement this plan.  They will say to the world they went so far as to "release" the head of Hamas and yet there is still terrorism! All the other issues, provocations, and deceptions, will be fogged over once again.  The Americans will go for it, and so will much of the world's gullible and oftentimes controlled press.

And finally the "release" may also be part of a botched assassination attempt, one for which Hamas for the first time has threatened to begin striking outside of Israel.

A few days ago Israeli agents attempted to assassinate another important Hamas leader, this one in Amman.  There may or may not have been cooperation with the double-faced Hashemite regime -- probably there was, though of course King Hussein's authority will vociferously deny it.

Whatever, Israel always tries hard to get its agents back. And since they were close to "releasing" Sheik Yassin anyway, they also managed to give the Hashemites the needed excuse to send their agents back to them. Very clever -- on the part of the Israelis anyway!

We're entering another calm before the storm period of time.  But it is in fact only a matter of time.  Nothing has really been solved; in fact on all the major historical issues the Israeli forge ahead with their apartheid "peace" and settlement "expansion".  The American rhetorical American "time-out" is but one more hoax and deception in a string that now spans many decades.  (c) MER
                                                                                    MAB