Even in Israel they are considered troubling and unnecessary. Here are 2 commentaries published today in Yedioth Aharonot, Israel's most popular newspaper. Unfortunately it has no English version, so I had to translate myself. You'll survive.

What's happening to IDF / Nahum Barne'a

IDF is a polite army. Last night, after it has been cleared that during a focused prevention in Tubas a helicopter gunship of IDF killed 2 children, 2 teenagers and one minor activist, IDF published an apology statement.

This statement joins a growing list of fatal mistakes, apology-owing mistakes, and the latest is in Wednesday night, in Gaza, when a tank shell has mistakenly killed a woman, 3 people from her family and inflicted critical injuries to more civilians.

In the fighting IDF wages today against the Palestinians there are no zero faults. Mistakes are destined to happen, and some of them are destined to end in tragic results.

Nevertheless, it seems that something very disturbing happens here, something greatly exceeding the forgiving word "mistake".

Until recently the affirmative norm in IDF prohibited knowingly hitting of innocent civilians. It happened, of course, when people were hurt, women and children among them, but the hit was mistakenly.

The turning point at this sensitive field was bombing the house of the terrorist Saleh Shade, in the heart of Gaza. All this time he kept his wives and daughters close to him, as a living shield.

Eventually a decision was made. The chief of staff, Bugy Yaalon, summarized it in an interview he gave to "Haaretz": "Recently we relieved ourselves and said that even if his wife is with him, we will hit him. A debate started whether we should hit him even when his daughters are around. We decided not to. We won't hurt the daughters. "

(Eventually 16 people were killed in the attack, including 6 children)

Question A: The moral dilemma, Shade against his wife, Shade against his daughters is hard indeed, but with all due respect, it belongs to a higher rank than the chief of staff and his generals. The chief of staff is not god, not yet. He is also not Prime Minister or minister of defense. Who authorized him to decide who to live and who to die when it's about a woman and a girl?

Question B: Right after Shade's elimination, the Prime Minister, the Minister of Defense and the chief of staff were asked if the moral norm that prohibit knowingly hitting of innocents was changed. The 3 of them responded in an absolute denial: the norm hasn't changed. How do their denial settle with the current version of the chief of staff?

Question C: In the last weeks there was a drastic decrease in the terrorist activity. In might be true that the IDF elite is right, when it sees this change as a temporal pause, and after it another terror wave will come. IDF holds a little respect to the efforts of the Minister of Defense to reach agreements with the seniors of the PA. Good. Yet, what is the use of re-heating the ground with initiated military actions. The Palestinians will respond in a terror attacks wave, and in the bloodbath we will never know if they were about stopping the terror or not.

Question D: a Wave of arrogance, rudeness and loquacity passes over IDF elite now, from the kind we only saw on the eve of Yom Kippur War [October War]. The feeling of "there's nothing like me" which rises from the words of the chief of staff and the commander of the airforce radiates down to the soldier in the checkpoint and the tankist in the junction.

In fact, they cut down the branch which they sit on, stir up many Israelis against them and break the national agreement that kept the firmness of Israel during the 2 years of the Intifada.

The question is where is the Minister of Defense. Fuad, do you hear?

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Playing on the nerves of the Hammas / Roni Shaked

Since the 4th of Augost (the suicide attack in a bus in Miron junction) up to last night there were not suicide attack or terror attacks inside the green line.

The reason to the temporal relaxation is not only the intensive activity of the GSS, the police and IDF against the terror. The main reason is the decision of the Hamas and the Jihad to hold the fire as long as inter-Palestinian dialog about bounding the terrorism only to Judea, Samaria and Gaza exists.

Since the elimination of Saleh (actually before that) the Hamas had been under a pressure of the PA and the Fatah to accept a cease-fire. The PA is interested in getting out of the hard maze and the great distress the Palestinians got into. The leaders of the Hamas are also attentive to the spirit of the street, that calls to stop the suicide attacks. The despair in the street start giving out signs. The Palestinian public is fed up. It wants to get out of the war and return to a popular nonviolent Intifada.

The leaders of the Hamas in the territories surrendered to this pressue - and stopped the suicide bombers. They stood against the heavy pressure of the Hamas HQ abroad, that demands keeping on the suicide strategy, because the leaders of the Hamas in the territories understood that the support of the street is more important.

But the policy of restraint and the prevention of suicide attacks might reach it end soon. The reason is the Israeli stiff military action and what the Palestinians define ignoring the Palestinian voices that demand to get a cease-fire.

The Palestinian restraint is cracked because of the hard and painful blows they absorbed in the recent days: First, because the death of innocent civilians in Khan Unis and Sheikh Ajlin in Thursday and yesterday in Tubas. The continuation of the elimination, the houses and the headquarters demolitions cause heavy rage. The heavy curfew, that lasts over two months, despite Israeli announcements on relieves, doesn't help.

The Hamas has a lot of reasons to attack. The organization is willing to prove that the arrests of the Hamas commanders all over the Western Bank - Jenin, Nablus, Hebron, Beth Lehem and yesterday also Ramallah - didn't break its operational ability. The Popular Front and the Islamic Jihad also have a debt. Yesterday even the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade of the Fatah joined the calls to return to suicide attacks.

According to the Palestinians, IDF's militant actions were just an invitation to suicide attack.