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Friday, 29 November, 2002, 12:46 GMT
Analysis: Al-Qaeda takes on Israel?
![]() More than 200 Israelis were evacuated
Al-Qaeda may be trying to reshape the battle into the west versus the rest.
The entry of Israel into the war has important implications, both practical and political. On the practical side, Israel will bring its own special tactics to bear. The Defence Minister, Shaul Mofaz (until recently the chief of staff), said of the Mombasa perpetrators that "our hand will reach them". This sounds like Golda Meir, the Israeli prime minister in 1972. She ordered secret assassination squads into action against the leaders of the Palestinian Black September Organisation whose assault on the Munich Olympic games led to the deaths of 11 Israelis. Western targets Politically, Israel has lost no time in aligning its own war against Palestinian extremism with the wider war against Osama Bin Laden. "The road from 9/11 through Chechnya to Bali and now Mombasa is a clear one", said an Israeli foreign ministry spokesman flown to Kenya to help in the bomb aftermath. Israeli Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went even further, suggesting that the attacks showed the dangers of setting up a Palestinian state.
Yet setting up such a state is seen precisely as the solution to the Middle East conflict by many western and other governments. Israel has always been an enemy for Osama Bin Laden. He compares it to the kingdoms of the Crusaders who were eventually pushed out of the Holy Land by the Muslim warrior Saladin (to whom, incidentally, Saddam Hussein also compares himself). But until now, Israel has not been a primary target for the al-Qaeda network, which has concentrated on American and other western citizens and interests. 'Wrath of God' The attacks appear to provide an answer to what Abdul Bari Atwan, editor of the newspaper Al-Quds al-Arabi in London, described as the "anger" in the Arab world that Israel had not been touched. Now that it has been, al-Qaeda can expect to feel the long arm of the Israelis which the Palestinians have experienced.
The 1972 example might be instructive. After the Munich massacre, Golda Meir set up a secret cabinet group called Committee X. It ordered Mossad to assassinate the leaders of Black September and this Mossad proceeded to do. The operation was called "Wrath of God" by later writers - though probably not by Mossad itself, whose style is rather more discreet. Independent actions Over the following few years, a dozen Palestinians were killed all across Europe. Mossad agents often used their favoured weapon, a Beretta .22 pistol. One victim was blown up by a booby-trapped telephone.
An important aspect of the operation was the way in which the assassination squads were set up. They acted independently, being given only the names of targets and access to money. In this way, they had much more freedom to act and could distance the Israeli Government from their actions. But Israel also uses its armed forces to strike abroad as well. In 1985 it bombed the PLO headquarters in Tunisia. In 1988, a commando team surrounded the villa used by the second in command of the PLO, Abu Jihad, and shot him. In Palestinian legend, he fell with his gun in his hand. |
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28 Nov 02 | Politics
23 Nov 02 | Country profiles
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