Déjà Vu Along Gaza-Israel Border Portends New Breakout of Warfare

Leaders of the Hamas terrorist organization appear to be replicating their game plan that led to an 11-day war against Israel last May. Primitive yet effective incendiary devices are being directed toward the Israeli side of the border and violent rallies alongside the border separating Israel from the Gaza Strip that have left death and destruction in their path for the past two nights are promised by Hamas officials to again become nightly fare. Hamas charges that Israel has not lived up to the promises it made in order to end the May fighting while Israel insists on repatriating two Israeli civilians Hamas is holding captive in the Strip and the bodies of two of its servicemen killed during previous fighting. Egypt, for its part, has done its share in sealing the border with Gaza, cutting off any possible alternative to Israeli control. The demonstrations have already seen the deaths of a 13-year-old Palestinian boy, a Hamas operative, and an Israeli border police officer. The May confrontation left 256 Palestinians in Gaza and 13 Israelis and foreign workers in Israel dead.