The most dangerous thing that could happen during times of crises is for the people to lose the compass pointing to the right direction and start, under the pressure, to self destruct and end up defeated and losers by their own hands in the first place. There will therefore be no meaning for negotiating any political solutions because there is no one to control the situation in the street or capable of enforcing the law.

This applies to the Gaza situation these days, which has become almost out of bounds for the foreign reporters who used to be based in it while chaos is spreading gradually with the attacks - and no one knows who are behind them - on internet cafes and some restaurants and societies that carry out public activities which help the people in their daily lives or try to put a smile on their lips at a difficult time.

It is a strange action that raises many questions. Alan Johnston, the "BBC" reporter, was kidnapped almost 40 days ago, and yet there are no confirmed reports or even clear demands, thus making it the longest act of abduction there.

Reports that a family of outlaws is holding him for a financial ransom and threatening to sell him to an extremist organization indicate to what extent the humanitarian situation in Gaza has deteriorated and confirm the absurdist theory of self-destruction which ultimately sweeps everything with it, like a deluge.

The act of kidnapping the British reporter cannot be understood except within the context of the self-destruction theory. The strange thing is that he was the last foreign reporter with knowledge of the Gaza situations who had decided to remain after the others had left in the wake of a previous abduction that led to the departure of the armies of foreign reporters.

More strange still is that, on their part, the Gazans badly the foreign press so as to carry the voice of their suffering to the outside world. Therefore, the big losers in what is happening are the people of Gaza because such a kidnapping makes foreign reporters afraid to stay in the city, and this is what indeed happened, and if they do visit it, it would be under tight protection that does not allow them to learn about the real pulse of the street and the people there.

The case of the kidnapped reporter is not the only aspect of self-destruction since there are many signs of collapse and lawlessness that are damaging the Palestinian people's cause but which do not have their share of the spotlights because they involve daily small incidents in a larger series of violence that is hitting the region but which in the end affects the people's lives there and add one more suffering to their sufferings, but this one originating from within.

The Palestinian society, which is described as having the largest percentage of educated people, never heard of such incidents in the past and they include solving families' feuds with weapons, harassing the people and imposing certain behaviours on them on religious pretexts, or bombing centres, schools, and places where there are books or services associated with foreign relief agencies, as if the aim is to isolate Gaza's Palestinians or somalizing the Strip as a former Palestinian minister warned some months ago so that the ideologues of anarchy or extremist groups can impose themselves on the people.

The problem is that the strength of the somalization scenario's explosion, that is, the warlords' control of the Gaza Strip, will hit the areas in a destructive way due to the limited geographical space and population density in it, unlike Somalia's situation which is broader in terms of geography and the sea.

Whatever is said abroad or efforts made abroad, organizing the house is an internal affair and needs courage in the face of those tampering with the Palestinians' fate. The courage is there as demonstrated by the strike and protests of the Palestinian journalists to protest the kidnapping of their British colleague. But the courage that is required is that of the parties responsible for maintaining law and order.

Source: Al-Sharq al-Awsat website, London, in Arabic 24 Apr 07

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