Bush pullout demands make him target of Israeli ire

By Matt Spetalnick ELON MOREH, West Bank, April 9 (Reuters) - Members of an Israeli tank brigade waging an offensive in the West Bank found a unique way to show how they felt about the U.S. president -- they adopted a stray dog and named it "George W. Bush". "He's a cowboy," one soldier said as the brown pit-bull terrier prowled an Israeli hilltop encampment overlooking the city of Nablus. "He barks a lot," said a second. "But he's useless," another chimed in. Bush's ever more strident demands for an end to Israel's 12-day-old military campaign in Palestinian areas has struck a sour note among army commanders and their troops -- a reflection of growing resentment among the Israeli public as a whole. "If the U.S. had this problem of terrorism, they wouldn't ask for permission. They would finish the job like they did in Afghanistan," said Commander Oran Ben Goya, head of Israeli forces in the eastern part of Nablus, the scene of some of the heaviest fighting of the past few days. Opinion polls show an overwhelming majority of Israelis support the operation, which the army has depicted as an effort to crush a "terror infrastructure" behind a recent spate of suicide attacks in a Palestinian uprising against occupation. Many Israelis believe Bush has turned against the Israeli campaign because he wants to mollify Arab states to shore up his global anti-terror alliance ahead of possible military action against Iraq. Since the Jewish state can ill afford to alienate its chief ally and provider of $3 billion in annual aid, most commentators believe a pull-out will be well under way by the time U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell arrives at the end of the week. RUNNING OUT OF TIME Israeli commanders expressed deep frustration that they were running out of time to complete their mission. "I don't think we will be able to do all we wanted to do," Ben Goya said. "That means we may have to come back again." Israeli forces have fought fierce battles, house by house and alley by alley, in Nablus's ancient casbah market area and in a refugee camp in the nearby city of Jenin. Both have been subjected to heavy bombardment by tanks and helicopter gunships. Army officers say soldiers stationed at Elon Moreh, a Jewish settlement overlooking Nablus, peer down with high-powered telescopes on neighbouring refugee camps and see Palestinian gunmen roaming freely. But officers say they have yet to strike key militant strongholds in the camps and are increasingly doubtful they will be allowed to undertake such operations before they are ordered to end their offensive. The army's mood was further darkened on Tuesday by the killing of 13 Israeli soldiers in an ambush in a refugee camp in Jenin, the worst single blow to the Middle East's best-equiped armed forces in 18 months of conflict. Ben Goya said that while the Israelis hold the advantage of advanced weaponry, Palestinian fighters are more familiar with the terrain and have employed an array of deadly booby-traps and trip wires that have forced soldiers to tread carefully. CAUGHT OFF GUARD The Israeli offensive was launched after 27 people were killed by a Palestinian suicide bomber who blew himself up in an Israeli seaside hotel during a Passover holiday celebration. International protests against the military operations that ensued have shocked Israelis, who see the campaign as a legitimate drive to root out terror. The army says it has killed at least 200 Palestinians, many of them wanted militants, though Palestinian officials say civilians have borne the brunt of the onslaught. Israelis, including Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, seem to have been caught off guard by the Texas-raised president's uncompromising demands for a withdrawal from all Palestinian-ruled cities and towns. "The Texans, as any American knows, are a breed of their own," political commentator Hemi Shalev wrote in the Israeli daily Maariv. "Sharon apparently did not take into account President George Bush's short Texan fuse when he decided to ignore him for many days." ((Jerusalem newsroom, +972 2 537 0502, jerusalem.newsroom@reuters.com))

Cia Was with IDF upon its "Incursion" into the west bank... kattracks posted, John commented some.

Read the first ten posts... gets you the context. We could not negotiate if we were not there from the very beginning of the incursion. NOBODY talked about it... but the CIA.. and other Federal alphabet agencies, who were OUTSIDE the building and INSIDE the building "negotiating surrender" of known terrorists...

We were there, to make sure that during the incursion the right people would be... ahem.. removed and that our people, would be safe.

WASHINGTON, Apr 02, 2002 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- The CIA and other U.S. agencies played a key role Tuesday in negotiating the surrender of approximately 180 people from the West Bank compound of Palestinian security chief Jabril Rajoub, U.S. officials confirmed.

"We helped negotiate a resolution to the standoff," one U.S. official told United Press International. "We wanted to prevent an attack and evacuate the people the Israelis said were wanted terrorists."

More than 15 Israeli tanks and two Apache helicopters had Monday night surrounded the compound, in the West Bank town of Bitonia, saying they were looking for suspected Palestinian terrorists holed up there.

Why did bush NOT criticise the action? Because WE were part and parcel to the selection of targets, searching for SPECIFIC people on OUR list of names... and very likely, some "dirty nukes" rumored to be in and around Jerusalem, in the West Bank.

Turkey IS sending strong signals to NATO this morning that they are going into Iran...

For quick understanding Turkish strong support of Israel, and vice versa... do a search for A_Turk, and Turk2... they have lots of links on their home pages that are useful.

Furthermore, Israel and Turkey, just inked a 60 MILLION dollar contract with turkey, with whom their fighter pilots train over TURKISH air space and the black sea, to upgrade their armor and tanks with the latest Israeli "gadgets"...unspecified items.

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Anybody who doubts a regional war is about to break out... and that Bush is NOT behind Israel... needs to think about what Bush has NOT said. And the different meanings that can be applied to what he HAS said, when the statements are kept in context.

IE.. this morning I heard a snippet from POWELL, demanding immediate withdraw by Israel.. then I got hold of the WHOLE quote... It included the phrase(s), "finishing up their operations (Israel's) and then," just before the other snippet which we all heard broadcast all over the arab and european world... Israel needs to get out...

Therein lies the problem we are having. Freepers who refuse to listen to what is NOT said, NOT reported and NOT in common circulation for public consumption. Powell said he is cutting his trip short to expedite Israel getting OUT quickly, but only AFTER they finish their business... which I might add, the CIA and NSA are still cooperating with.

We need to consider that there is a LOT of things that BUSH has NOT said. Were he compromising to get arab terrorists support HE would be making blatant, indisputable statements of "moral equivalency"... He has not.

And despite the fact that his speech with powell, mentioned Israel's "need to please expedite getting out..." et al, the VAST majority of the speech was , "Arafat and his terrorist organizations MUST embrace Israel, or LOSE all hope for a palestinian homeland..." furthermore Powell and Bush have made lots of less than veiled threats to STOP dealing with arafat for good, after his refusal to in public and in arabic, condemn terror attacks, terrorism and acknowlege Israel's unqualified right to exist.

The soft selling, pitter-patter, deception by the press relates to two things... their love for terrorists, and on the administration's part, as an aspect of the war effort and "deception" that comes from NOT saying certain things... WE don't practice outright lying like Clinton did. We just use the different shades of meaning, or ignore the central truth while focussing on peripheral items.

Bush means for "Israel to get out..." but only as "Responsible Arab leadership around the world steps up to the plate," and does what he repeated in his speech last week regaring Israel's security, right to exist, and an end to the fallacies of "right of return."

He made it clear, If not, ALL bets are off.

Meanwhile, after getting the bombs and guns reduces as much as possible, Israel with the help of OUR intelligence, ahs done much to make sure that when we take out bagdad or tehran, Jerusalem will not go up in radioactive flames.

How could the CIA and NSA observers work out negotitiations directly with langley... if they were not there, complete with SatComs and data terminals to begin with?

They could not. You don't simply walk into a battle zone, with satcoms and intell terminals, without getting permission, and without making the appropriate plans ahead of time with the IDF and "special ops"..

Reading between the lines... we need to get better at it.

The script you described has been played out before: Give Arafat one more chance, he doesn't do anything, Isreal goes back in. Only thing changed this time is the depth of Isreals defense.

Looks that way on the surface, I will agree. However, Bush is different from other presidents in many ways. Perfect he ain't, what with CFR and caving to the Democrapic agenda in many cases, but he's different when it comes to diplomacy, foreign and military affairs. I do not believe that he tolerates totally immoral behavior that costs Americans their lives, as shown by our reaction in Afghanistan. Now, I would do things a bit differently domestically, like really tightening up immigration from suspect countries, investigating those here VERY closely, arming pilots, etc. But I think that Bush's attention is mainly offshore. He's scared to death of Hussein's capabilities, though he doesn't show it. I will, however, never forget the way the First Lady looked when Bush gave his 1st speech after 9/11. She looked like someone who had just been told she had inoperable cancer and had 2 weeks to live. Something is going on that we don't know about, and this is the reason for the rush to decapitate Hussein. I suspect that he's got radiological weapons (not nukes, but conventional explosives wrapped in a blanket of radioactive material). These make a big mess, poison an area for quite a while, and would wreck our economy if set off in more than 2 or 3 cities. He's probably also close to nuke capability and that, combined with his incredible paranoia, makes him the most dangerous man on Earth. As such, Bush will do nearly anything to get him.

I think that Bush already knows that we're in WW3. The Islamics and the Red Chinese are gunning for us. Fortunately for us, the Islamics think with their shrunken balls, not their heads like the Chinese. They jumped the gun - if they had waited 10 years, the Chinese would have been much closer to ready to take us on. As it is, we have a shot at breaking the power of the Islamics before China is ready. A bit of shooting and nastiness now will likely deter China and, if it doesn't, at least take away their likely ally.

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