Islamic Jihad Targets Israeli Children

Those poor Palestinians!

JERUSALEM -- A Palestinian rocket exploded Monday next to a day care center crowded with toddlers in southern Israel, sparking anger and panic in the frequently targeted town of Sderot and bringing warnings of retribution from Israeli leaders.

No one was hurt, but the blast and the panic underlined Israel's ineffectiveness in the face of the primitive rockets, which fall daily despite frequent Israeli airstrikes and occasional ground offensives.

Terrified mothers rushed to comfort their screaming babies, schoolchildren ran for cover, and angry parents said they wouldn't send their children back to school until they get classrooms outside town.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert pledged to provide "better security for the residents," indicating he would step up the Israeli offensive against Palestinian militants.

"We will not limit ourselves in regards to targeting the rocket launchers and those who dispatch them," Olmert said at a news conference in Jerusalem. "The instruction given to the army is to destroy every 'Qassam' rocket launcher and anyone who is involved in their launching against the residents of Israel."

Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for launching seven rockets at Sderot. Hamas, the larger Islamic group that rules Gaza, was bracing for retaliation.

"We are taking this new threat by Olmert seriously," Hamas spokesman Taher Nunu said. "We are warning of coming massacres against the people in Gaza."

Let me see if I understand.

A Palestinian rocket explodes near an Israeli day care center but Hamas is proactively painting the Palestinians as the victims.

"We are warning of coming massacres against the people in Gaza."

Hamas is expecting "massacres."

If some rebels along the U.S. border were lobbing rockets into Mexico and terrorizing innocent Mexicans, I think American authorities would root out the lawbreakers.

What's Hamas doing to stop the terror?

Crying on Jimmy Carter's pro-Palestinian, anti-Israeli shoulder?

According to the AP:

Sderot, a working-class town of 22,000, has been battered by thousands of the crude projectiles launched in recent years from the Gaza Strip, just a mile away. The unguided rockets rarely cause serious injuries or damage, but they sow panic.

22,000 rockets!

That's a war zone!

...On Monday, rockets exploded near several schools in town, just a day after the school year began. Images of students ducking into shelters, young schoolchildren wailing uncontrollably, and teachers shielding terrified toddlers with their own bodies outraged parents.

Batya Katar, head of the Sderot Parents Association, said parents were pulling all 2,500 of the town's students out of school.

"Buses are already on the way to pick up students who haven't been taken home," she told The Associated Press by telephone, the voices of panicked parents clearly audible in the background.

"Of course I'll take them out. Should I leave them in the hands of Hamas?" Nahum Bitton said as he arrived to fetch his children.

The Education Ministry announced that studies would continue, but Katar said parents would not allow their children to return to school until the government moved them to classrooms out of rocket range.

"The school year is over. We can't hold on any more," Katar said.

Imagine sending your children to school and having to worry about them becoming victims of terrorist attacks.

I couldn't put them in harm's way like that. I wouldn't do it.

Schools shouldn't have to be moved, but Israel is dealing with terrorists bent on murdering its citizens, including children.

Obviously, Israel's withdrawal from Gaza two years ago didn't stop the terror.

What did that compromise get them?

It didn't bring peace.

Jimmy Carter and other apologists for Palestinian terrorism make me sick.