LETTER FROM JERUSALEM
Gazans' protest on Israel's border fizzles
By Ira Sharkansky
 JERUSALEM—It was a campaign that fizzled.
We began reading in the press last week about the IDF's preparation for a Palestinian effort to break through the border from Gaza and into Israel. This was against the background of their destroying the southern border crossing, and pouring by the tens of thousands over several days into Egypt.
Palestianian aspirations were for upwards of 40,000 school children and others to join hands in a human chain from the southern to the northern boundaries of Gaza. The purpose was to call international attention to the suffering of Gaza under the Israeli blockade. Organizers said that it would be a peaceful demonstration, but the Palestinians themselves said that some groups were planning to break through into Israel.
It did not happen.
Perhaps 2,000 children and others participated. The human chain was missing numerous sections, and did not stretch from the south to the north of Gaza.
It rained heavily on the day set for the event.
Hamas did not cooperate. Some weeks earlier, Hamas turned out hundreds of thousands for a celebration of its anniversary as a movement. Its incentive then was a food package provided to those who would appear, and a threat for those who expressed reservations. On this occasion, something kept Hamas from using its money or its muscle.
Commentators reported that the thin turnout reflected Gazans having tired of the Hamas regime, and the suffering associated with it.
Israeli officials warned the Palestinians that they would not tolerate a breakthrough at the border, and arrayed considerable force in the event of an effort. Government ministers said that the IDF and police would employ non-lethal means of crowd control, but that no one would be allowed through in any case. A day before the planned event, the IDF moved tanks and artillery into position, along with thousands of police and soldiers. Newspapers on the morning of the demonstration showed pictures of snipers positioned where they would have a shot at anyone planning to reach Israel. From all the signs visible to the Palestinians, non-lethal force would be only the first line of defense.
Demonstration organizers saw success in their failure. It was their first effort. They learned. There would be other efforts, more successful than this.
Israelis agreed that there would be other attempts. They also learned the advantages of clarifying their own intentions. Massing armour, artillery, soldiers and police is expensive, but worth the price if it persuades the Palestinians that a charge against the border would not be worth the risks.
Television crews and journalists from around the world had assembled at the border crossings to record the mayhem. There was nothing to broadcast, except for pictures of a demonstration that did not happen.
About 20,000 Gazans took part, less than half the number Hamas called for and less than participate in a good Gaza funeral. Media reports attributed the low turnout to the rain - and indeed, there is nothing quite as nasty as cold February rain in a Mediterranean city.
There is, as usual, a contrarian's view - a more hopeful one.
The Hamas principle was women and children first. Not into the lifeboats or out of the burning building, but first to face the beefed-up Israeli military forces on the other side of the Gaza border. Maybe Gaza's women and children didn't want to go first, and so they didn't go at all. Maybe, absent the ability to shop as they did when they burst through the Egypt/Gaza border, they stayed home. Maybe, one can hope, some of Gaza's men were uncomfortable or humiliated to be told to march behind the women and children and so they stayed home.
Hamas rules Gaza with an iron fist and everyone there has been set against everyone else. Israel faces daily shelling with ever more precise rockets, and Gilad Shalit remains a prisoner of Hamas in violation of international law. But beyond that, the manager of Gaza's only Christian bookstore was abducted and killed; the YMCA library, which had been a resource for Muslim as well as Christian high school students, was burned to the ground; Hamas TV encourages children to hate and kill (recently they were encouraged to "bite and eat" Danish people); gangs of Hamas teenagers are encouraged to fight gangs of Fatah teenagers. Gaza is an outpost of bloody misery and anarchy - last year's civil war ousted Fatah leadership, but a great many Fatah members remain stranded there.
One might hope Palestinians would ask themselves on occasion how they descended into this abyss. Part of the answer would be that they were given lousy leadership in the form of Yasser Arafat and his gang brought from Tunis under the Oslo Accords; they inherited lousy leadership in the form of Abu Mazen when Arafat died; and they elected lousy leadership when they chose Hamas. All of this - including allowing Hamas, a terrorist group, to run for election - was done with the active participation of the American and Israeli governments. The result has been the isolation, radicalization and impoverishment not only of this generation of Palestinians, but the ruination of the next as well. Children taught what these children are taught will not become healthy adults, if they live long enough to become adults at all.
Maybe the low turnout was due to some dawning recognition in Gaza, as there was in Anbar, that a radical, terrorist government will devour its own as well as its enemies. And maybe in Gaza, as there was in Anbar, people will look for a way to throw out that which they had previously accepted. The unfortunate difference may be that when the people of Anbar were ready, American forces were there to help affect the change. The Palestinians have little hope of rescue from their own folly and their own jailors.
On the other hand, let's not ascribe too much intellectual understanding to the Gaza civilians - maybe it was just the rain.
PETE'S PLACE
Daily news discourages potential olim
By Peter Garas
 CANBERRA, Australia —I was fascinated, but not surprised by the content of the article from Judy Lash Balint of 26th February entitled "Aliya fails to keep up with out-migration"
When you read the press these days (or if you are now less able to read for any reason and have to view your news) what do you find?
Do you find stories like:
"Israel, the place to come for fun sun and employment" or perhaps an advert for working on a Kibbutz picking fruit like "Israel, the place where you can enjoy the fruits of your labour" or something more arcane like. "Don't just read about the history of your family, faith and fellows - come and live in Israel and enjoy them - live and in person!"
Hardly.
You are more likely to see stories about Israeli troops in Gaza, suicide bombers, rockets being fired daily into the places where people come to live, arguments among the religious right, the socialist left and everyone else, world condemnation from the UN about Israel restricting food and other humanitarian supplies to the poor underprivileged refugees of Gaza, the interminable 'peace talks' with the other group of Palestinians and of course the rantings of certain people in Lebanon who aggressively shout at the cameras messages like, "You want war! That's what you will get!" or yet others, slightly farther away from the action, who continue to issue statements about wiping out all of the Jews and sending them into the Mediterranean!
I don't know about you - but if this is the picture that I get from the news - daily - then the chances are that making 'aliyah' or "going up" to Israel is less attractive than it may otherwise be - especially if my thinking contains thoughts along the lines of "I would like my children to have a good and peaceful life."
The pressures in Israel are unrelenting, the Zionist youth movements that used to imbue enthusiasm into the developing teens in other lands for making aliyah are now no longer as "fashionable" as they once were and YouTube and reality TV are (apparently) far more entertaining than learning to do Israeli folk dancing!
Judy Lash Balint is quite right - there is something wrong with this picture - the question is what do people want to DO about it!
The status quo is not going to change people's minds about migration in or out of the country.
SAN DIEGO JEWISH WORLD THE WEEK IN REVIEW
Judy Lash Balint in Jerusalem: Aliya fails to keep up with out-migration
J. Zel Lurie in Delray Beach, Florida: Hadassah celebrates Israel’s 60th birthday with new stem cell research and therapy
Dorothea Shefer-Vanson in Mevasseret Zion, Israel: Turning a rubbish dump into parkland
Peter Garas in Canberra, Australia: An Aussie's take on U.S. election
Donald H. Harrison in San Diego: A puzzling toast on a 40th anniversary
Sheila Orysiek in San Diego: Reaching and keeping nationhood
Plus, an invitation from the editor to join San Diego Jewish World
Shoshana Bryen in Washington, D.C.: Satellite shot proves Reagan's wisdom
Rabbi Baruch Lederman in San Diego: A scream in the dark, a knock on the door
Sheila Orysiek in San Diego: Cousin Barry—Another shimmering soul
Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal in San Diego: Why Moses was angered by Golden Calf
Gary Rotto in San Diego: Free at last, free at last ... to write a column
Ira Sharkansky in Jerusalem: Shas minister blames quakes on gays
Carol Davis in San Diego: S.D. Opera scores with Maria Stuarda
Donald H. Harrison in San Diego: We can make those souls shimmer longer
Dov Burt Levy in Salem, Massachusetts: In Israel, the egg roll wars heat up
Fred Reiss in Winchester, California: A Jewish path to self improvement
Peter Garas in Canberra, Australia: When bunnies and children urge murder
Charly Jaffe in San Diego: Anita Diamant takes women beyond usual feminist mantras ... to the the mikvah
Sheila Orysiek in San Diego: Sharing the Dessert: The Last Grand Jeté
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WASHINGTON, D.C.—
The big, much-ballyhooed "human chain" across Gaza was a big bust - an interesting bust, but a bust nonetheless.