"Relative calm"

Electronic Intifada picked up on the media's (in the case the Los Angeles Times) deliberate obscuring of Israeli atrocities against Palestinians by way of the expression "relative calm".

The headline proclaims: "Palestinian Suicide bomber Shatters Calm of late." The lead sentence then goes on to state that this bomber "shattered a months-long period of relative calm..."

The fact is, however, that the truce and this "calm" were shattered long before this. The last suicide bombing against Israeli civilians was Nov. 1, 2004. It took three Israeli lives. Since that time, while Israelis have basked in "relative calm," 170 Palestinian men, women, and children have been killed.

During this LA Times' "relative calm," another 379 Palestinian men, women, and children were injured and maimed. Anyone who has been to the West Bank or Gaza knows what this means: leg bones splintered, intestines torn open, teeth shattered.

Also, of course, during this "calm" over 8,000 Palestinians have been sitting in Israeli prison cells, routinely abused and grotesquely humiliated; over 300 of them children.