They came like thieves in the night, roaring in from the sea while the city was sleeping. The F-16s dropped two bombs on Mr Yasser Arafat's main police headquarters for the Gaza Strip at 3:20 a.m. yesterday. More than 20 people were wounded by broken glass and shrapnel. With the explosions, Israel served deafening notice that a two-day "grace period" - during which Mr Arafat's security forces were supposed to have arrested 36 "terrorists" was over.
Israeli Foreign Minister Mr Shimon Peres - who shared a Nobel Peace Prize with Mr Arafat in 1994 - dismissed more than 100 arrests carried out by the Palestinian Authority this week as "almost irrelevant". "We look at the quality of people put in jail," he told the BBC.
The police complex was built in the mid-1990s, shortly after Mr Arafat's triumphant return to Gaza, and was headquarters for nearly half of the 8,000 Palestinian policemen in the Strip. "This is proof that the Israelis don't want law and order in Gaza," police Gen Ahmad Hijou said as he inspected the bomb site. "The purpose of this centre was to provide traffic control, protect banks and businesses. We are civil police; we have no heavy weapons."
The headquarters includes administrative buildings, a police academy, dormitories, forensic laboratories, a parade ground and sports facilities. Like Mr Arafat's heliport at the nearby Mountada presidential compound, the Gaza airport and Palestinian Authority buildings attacked in Ramallah, Jenin and Bethlehem earlier this week, the Gaza police centre was a symbol of Palestinian aspirations for statehood. "I came back from Algeria two and a half years ago," said Mr Shabaan Shaat, a young policeman. "I had great hopes for Palestine - no more."
The assertion by the Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv in July that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon would expel Mr Arafat from the occupied territories and dismantle the Palestinian Authority appears to be coming true. Ma'ariv quoted a report by the Israeli intelligence agency Shin Beth saying that Mr Arafat's "disappearance from the scene" would be advantageous. The newspaper said Mr Sharon was planning a wide-scale military operation "against the Palestinian Authority in general and against Arafat in particular".
Yesterday's bombing turned the compound's kitchens and food warehouse into a crater. Half of a three-storey building that housed the women's police force was pancaked, with filing cabinets perched on the edge of the collapsed part.
The EU contributes $40 million to the PA each month. A forensic laboratory and police clinic across the street - built with EU money - was severely damaged yesterday. It stored finger-prints and photographs of suspected extremists - the very people whom Mr Sharon demands Mr Arafat have arrested.
The buildings destroyed yesterday have been unused for most of the past year, in anticipation they would be bombed by the Israelis. Policemen have pitched tents on the open-air ground floor of a high-rise nearby.
Palestinian authorities face the anger of Islamic fundamentalists as well as Israelis. Some 2,000 Hamas supporters marched in the funeral cortege of Mohamed Salmi, the 20-year-old who was killed in a clash with Palestinian security forces on Thursday. "Arafat traitor; Arafat you're tired - you're time is up" and "Arafat, drop your gun; give us your weapons," were slogans chanted during the march in Gaza City.
The Hamas supporters said they knew who killed Salmi, and would avenge his death. Did it bother them that Palestinians were killing Palestinians? "It's as if the Palestinian who shot Salmi was a Jew," one answered.
Israeli helicopter gunships attacked a Palestinian military compound in the southern Gaza Strip early today, witnesses said. They said at least eight missiles were fired at a compound in Rafah containing offices of the Palestinian military and general intelligence services, as well as of Force 17, Mr Arafat's bodyguard unit. There was no immediate report of casualties.
