December 5, 2005: A suicide bomb went off outside the entrance of a central Israel shopping mall. Four died and dozens were wounded. Israel said it would get the group that carried out the attack. The Palestinian Authority said it would find and punish those responsible. However, in the usual drill, other Palestinian Authority officials also said that because of Israeli interference in Palestinian affairs, it would be impossible to hunt down and stop the suicide bombers. So, as a practical matter, the PA is leaving it to Israel to shut down the suicide bomber operations still active in the West Bank. This is what Israel is doing, and has prevented dozens of attacks.

December 4, 2005: Over the weekend, there were more rockets fired out of Gaza into southern Israel. A few Israeli farmers, living eight kilometers from Gaza, were shaken up when two rockets landed nearby.

December 3, 2005: Off the Gaza coast, Israeli patrol boats fired on a Palestinian fishing boat that entered a prohibited area. One man on the fishing boat was killed.

December 1, 2005: Israeli firms are providing security equipment and services to local governments in Kurdish controlled northern Iraq. The contracts are being kept quiet (but not secret), and the training is being performed by former and retired Israeli army commandoes and security specialists. The Kurds want the best, and are figure that the mostly Arab al Qaeda doesn't like Kurds much under any conditions.

November 30, 2005: Fatah, the dominant party in the Palestinian Authority (PA), had to suspend an internal election because of accusations of voting fraud. The PA has been losing support for years because of internal corruption, which has proved very difficult to clean up.