Middle East: The Dialectic of Bombs

MIDDLE EAST

On a Friday morning, the busiest place in Jerusalem is the Mahaneh Yehuda (Camp of Judah) market. Last week, a crowd of 3,000 filled its narrow lanes and open stalls as housewives shopped for the Sabbath. No one noticed a small blue delivery van parked on Agrippas Street, nor could they know that it carried 450 lbs. of explosives and a timing device. At precisely 9:28 a.m., the van blew up.

The enormous explosion killed twelve shoppers and shopkeepers, seriously wounded 17, and sent another 36 to the hospital. In the panicked crowd, a nine-year-old boy screamed: “I saw a hand flying in the air. I saw a head rolling in the street.” So fierce was the blast that it set fire to half a dozen shops and a score of cars, and shattered windows half a mile away.

It was the worst Arab terrorist bombing since three truckloads of explosives demolished Ben Yehuda Street in 1948, and the latest in a series of thrusts by Arab fedayeen commandos. Last August, ten people were wounded in Jerusalem during an attack still referred to as the “night of the grenades.” In September, one Israeli was killed and ten injured by a bomb in Tel Aviv’s bus station. On those occasions, angered Israelis rioted in nearby Arab sections. This time, however, police threw up roadblocks and slapped a curfew on Jerusalem’s Arab section, once again dividing the Old City.

The fedayeen nonetheless succeeded in their purpose of inciting the Israelis and further lessening hopes of peace in the area. Prime Minister Levi Eshkol declared that “the full responsibility for this horrendous incident falls on the head of the Arab states.” In the Middle East’s familiar dialectic of attack and reprisal, that verdict seemed to leave in doubt only the time and place of Israel’s retaliation.