A Daily Analysis
By Marc Schulman

February 25, 2008 Border March Fizzles/ Children Hurt in Sderot

A number of Qassams hit Sderot today and one of them however will remain in most Israelis memories for a long time.  A Qassam hit near a makolet (small grocery store) this afternoon, in it were a 10 year old boy and his eight year old sister.  The shrapnel from the missile injured the boy.  What made this different is that television cameras arrived on the scene within seconds, showed the boy in pain, both worrying about his sister and both calling out for their mother.  The arrival of the medical personnel was filmed as well, as well as the kids getting into the ambulance.  It was clearly a very emotional clip.  The boy underwent a three hour operation on his injured hand and the medical prognosis is excellent.  The eight year old sister begged in an interview not to have to go back to Sderot, pleading for no more Qassams.
 
The expected demonstration by tens of thousands of Gazans to try to possibly breach the border fizzled today when only a few hundred or at most a thousand people showed up.  Interestingly, an Israeli Channel 10 correspondent who in the past had stated that he doubts anything that Israel is doing would affect Hamas' popularity, today admitted to changing his mind.  He stated that Hamas is now hated by most of the people of Gaza, who all complain about the situation that Hamas has brought them.  He claims that the huge demonstrations that we have seen on behalf of Hamas represent people who come to demonstrate out of fear.  The problem: Hamas is now effectively a fascist state and just because it is unpopular does not mean that anyone will dare try to overthrow it.