Friday, September 01, 2006
Settling accounts
The Israelis got a really bad guy yesterday:
IDF forces operating in Nablus early Thursday morning gunned down Fadi Kafisha, 29, commander of Fatah's Al Aksa Martyrs' Brigades in the northern West Bank city and a "terrorist mastermind" who military officials said was financed and directed by Hizbullah.
"He was a motor of terrorism," said commander of the the Shomron Brigade Col. Amir Braum of Kafisha. "He was the chief fugitive in Nablus, an explosives expert and responsible for many attacks, among them the attack at Jerusalem's French Hill in September 2004."...
IDF officials said Kafisha was the West Bank's chief bomb "engineer" who personally assembled dozens of explosive belts in the past year, many of which he signed with his name.
Kafisha actively recruited and dispatched suicide bombers and, according to military sources, in March 2006 soldiers manning the Beqoa checkpoint east of Nablus arrested a would-be suicide bomber wearing a belt with Kafisha's name all over it, literally.
According to IDF officials, in addition to "quality attacks" against Israeli civilians, Kafisha also stood behind several car bomb and shooting attacks against IDF forces operating in Nablus.
"Since the end of the war in the North, there has been an escalation in the activities of terror organizations in Nablus," Braum said. He speculated that the terror cells were emboldened by perceived successes of Hizbullah against an Israeli military machine that before may have seemed invincible.
Good. It is important to take out the bombmakers. Yes, there will be more, but killing a terrorist organization's bombmaker is like destroying an assembly line -- it will slow them down for a while.
Col. Braum's quote touches on the strategic question that has been argued inside Israel and 'round the world since Israel agreed to cease fire in Lebanon: Have the "perceived successes" of Hezbollah weakened Israel's deterrent? Whether or not it has, Mr. Kafisha does not sound like a man who could be deterred. Col. Baum may be offering his best speculation, or a political opinion.
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