All Because of a Small Olive
by Uri Avnery

Why has the Sharon-Ben-Eliezer-Peres government collapsed? Because of a small olive.

It started like a children's tale: Once upon a time there was a small olive in a Palestinian village. It grew and ripened on a branch of an old tree in a grove on the top of a hill. "Pick me! I want to give my oil!" the little olive pleaded.

But it went on ripening, and the pickers did not come. They could not reach it, because the settlers had set up two mobile homes on the hill, and the whole area became a "security region" of this outpost. When the owners of the grove approached, the settlers cursed them, beat them up and started shooting. This happened at dozens of locations all over the West Bank.
[more]

PM Sharon dissolves Knesset, election slated for Feb. 2003

"Elections are the last thing this country needs right now," said the prime minister, "the political blackmail of the far right has left me no option."
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''The history of Hizbullah''

The war between Israel and Hizbullah was not simply born. It was conceived in a seething cauldron of all the things that make the Middle East a snake pit of unending bloodshed, unrivaled bitterness, and unfathomable duplicity.

To understand how this violent relationship might evolve in the future, and how the international community can most effectively seek to keep it under control, it is best to start at the beginning - the real one, rather than the red herrings bred by a mainstream media that is alternately guilty of gross ignorance and shameless fabrication.
[more]

thanks to Cursor