Stardate 20020426.1512

(On Screen): Since 3 Palestinian boys were shot dead by IDF forces on Tuesday while attempting to attack an Israeli settlement with knives and pipe bombs, Palestinian security forces have intercepted about 20 more kids trying to do the same thing, and have sent them home.

This according to Amin al-Hindi, the chief of Palestinian General Intelligence. Among other things, he's been talking to the militant groups and they've agreed to work together to try to discourage these kinds of attacks in future.

Which sort of begs the question: if they can detect and stop these kinds of attacks, why can't they stop the big ones? Arafat has been claiming for months that the Palestinian Authority was doing everything it possibly could to stop the bombings against Israel. Yet when they really got motivated, they managed to shut this particular form of attack down cold.

And it also indicates that the Palestinian Authority has always known who were behind the real bombings and were always able to communicate to them, another thing Arafat has denied.

Finally, it puts a lie to the claims made by some that the Israelis have now demolished so much of the infrastructure of the Palestinian Authority that it can no longer suppress the bombings even if it wanted to. Somehow they managed to stop these just fine.

Arafat has been caught in another lie. (Latest in a long series, collect 'em all!)