Monday August 15, 2005

I've Been Thinking:

The international press sees blood in the Gaza Withdrawal.
The potential for violence playing out right before our very eyes is what makes it a good news story. A civil war could erupt right there on live TV.

Here are today's numbers for Morag, a Gaza settlement with a reputation as being religious extremist and ultra nationalist, one of the settlements everyone assumed would refuse relocation:
42 families are there
16 families have already agreed to leave
400 young kids have arrived to bolster the community
The 400 are labeled "infiltrators" by the Israeli Army and by extension, the press.

If there is Israeli violence during the withdrawal process, it will be instigated not by longtime residents, but stimulated by outside activists.
Israel's police and army are prepared, in the words of the commander their job is to "take it and not dish it out."

We need to wait and see, not speculate. Mass violence is possible but unlikely.

The Gaza withdrawal is reality TV in the very real sense.