Sir, - At the time of writing 17 Palestinians are dead following the decision of Israel to drop a one-tonne bomb on a densely populated neighbourhod in Gaza. The initial reaction from Ariel Sharon, was that the mission was "a great success".
You report that "an initial Israeli military investigation showed that analysts had misread aerial photographs of the target zone and should have realised the likely civilian casualties" (The Irish Times, July 25th). This is a joke. Israeli military analysts get the best of everything. They have the finest equipment US tax dollars can buy. They didn't misread the map. Their master misread the situation.
A one-tonne bomb weighs one tonne for a reason. This particular bomb was chosen to leave no doubt whatsoever: Mr Shehada, the target, was not going to walk out of the rubble alive. To claim that civilian casualties couldn't be predicted is sheer hypocrisy. A large bomb dropped from a great height into a slum anywhere in the world will kill bystanders or those asleep in their homes nearby.
Not for the first time, Ariel Sharon judged the mood incorrectly. He has grown bolder as his ever more punitive measures against the Palestinians have gone unchallenged by his patron, the President of the United States. Wars on terror end in places like Gaza, with mangled shanties, mangled kids and well-dressed, well-polished media spokesmen mangling words for the benefit of Western TV audiences.
Responsibility for the massacre lies with Sharon alone. It is cowardly in the extreme that he should try to spin the blame on to his military personel who, after all, were only following orders. - Is mise,
CATHAL RABBITTE, Giza, Egypt.
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Sir, - I would like to add my voice to that of the Israeli President Moshe Katsav in condemning utterly the horrific Israeli air force attack in Gaza.
Israel's government must take responsibility for this atrocity and do everything it can to prevent its air force doing this kind of thing in the future.
I am sick at heart at this, as I am at each and every attack on Israeli citizens. But a missile attack on an apartment building, after midnight when children and adults are asleep in their beds, is no more justifiable than a suicide bombing.
I am appalled and ashamed of the current Israeli government for sanctioning this and other similar operations. I am also appalled and ashamed of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's cold-hearted response to it, stating that it was "one of our greatest successes". Has he any heart, any moral sense at all?
There is a huge divergence of opinion within both the political establishment and civil society in Israel about the policies of the current Israeli government. I want to put it on record that such divergence of opinion also extends to the "local staff" of Israeli Embassies. - Yours, etc.,
Dr NOREEN O'CARROLL, Press Officer, Embassy of Israel, Dublin.