Released Palestinian Terrorists Attack Israeli High School; Are Killed. Fatah Gunmen Kill Border Guard.

Two Palestinian terrorists killed in an attack on an Israeli yeshiva high school on Thursday turned out to be recently released prisoners, YNet reports. Although releases of Palestinian prisoners by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's government are supposedly limited to those with "no blood on their hands" (despite urging by the U.S. State Department and the Palestinian Authority to release prisoners convicted of murderous attacks), these two released terrorists apparently decided to get blooded quickly.

The 20-year old terrorists were both Hamas members from the town of Beit Omer, near Hebron. Dressed in uniform, and armed with a gun and a knife, according to a report from JTA, the terrorists disabled a security system in the perimeter fence of Kibbutz Kfar Etzion, broke into Mekor Hayim yeshiva high school, and threatened teachers and students. However, they apparently were unprepared for the reaction from two armed counselors, who overpowered and killed the terrorists, suffering minor stab wounds in the process.

As Knesset Member Zevulun Orlev of the National Religious Party aptly stated, “(Prime Minister Ehud) Olmert now has proof written in blood that a terrorist remains a terrorist. The attempted murder in Gush Etzion is another warning to the government that if it releases Palestinian terrorists, the result will be Jewish blood.”

Mekov Hayim high school is run by famed Talmudic scholar Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz. Rabbi Steinsaltz should be commended for the training and character of his guidance couselors, in addition to his innumerable other merits.

Ominously, another attack occurred almost simultaneously in north Jerusalem. A shooting attack on two Israeli Border guards near the entrance of the Shoafat refugee camp took the life of one victim, Rami Zuhari of Beersheva, and seriously wounded another, Shoshana Shomadayev, who is recovering from her wounds in a hospital. The attackers apparently stole the weapons of the killed and wounded Israelis--Fatah terrorist groups claimed credit for the attacks and stated that they held the weapons.

The Shoafat refugee camp exists almost 60 years after the Israeli War of Independence because the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), whose sole mission is the care and feeding of Palestinian refugees; the Arab nations; and the Palestinians themselves have refused to resettle the refugees and three or more generations of their descendents into new lives outside the camps. That is not the result of mere neglect and incompetence, but rather a deliberate policy designed to preserve the Palestinian refugees as a weapon to use to destroy Israel.

Fatah, of course, is the supposedly moderate organization headed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, with which the Olmert government is engaged in "peace negotiations." This is the second fatal attack by Fatah-aligned terrorists in a matter of weeks. Last month, two Fatah militia members attacked and killed two off-duty soldier out on a hike near Hebron, and wounded their female companion. Their weapons were stolen as well. As YNet reports here, this past Tuesday a Palestinian Authority military court sentenced the murderers of David Rubin and Ahikam Amitai to 15 years in prison. Based on past experience, it is unlikely that they will serve more than a fraction of even that light sentence for a double murder. Last year, prior to the Annapolis conference, members of Abbas' own security force attempted to assasinate Olmert himself. Yet the farce of conducting peace negotiations with terrorists actively engaged in murderous attacks continues.