How it is/How is it?

Whether it's nationalism, religious ideology, whatever, at a certain point it's all a bunch of BS:

An hour later, back in Gaza City, more than 3,000 armed young men aligned with Fatah were marching and shooting guns in the air. My driver and I assumed the war had resumed, for who would send thousands of armed men to fire wildly in the air in front of the Islamic University of Gaza, a hotbed of Hamas support that was recently burned and looted by Fatah gunmen.

But it seems they just want jobs. After what they claimed was eight months of training—although their ability to march and handle automatic weapons makes me suspect they need another eight months—they have no jobs, only uniforms and weapons.

As they shouted and fought over whose turn it was to shoot the machine gun in the air, a local journalist leaned over and whispered in my ear. "This is about money," he said. "Fuck Fatah, and fuck Palestine. If [Israeli Prime Minister Ehud] Olmert called right now and offered them each [$250] a month, they'd all become Jews and join the Israeli Defense Forces."

Pretty much.

Hat-tip to Anagrysis, who whines too much for his own good.

Edit: and then there's stuff like this, which makes you wonder if this crap will ever stop.

Two Palestinian teenagers confessed on Monday that they stabbed Erez Levanon, 42, to death while he prayed in a forest outside his home settlement of Bat Ayin late Sunday afternoon, security sources said.

The two suspects were arrested by the IDF and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) earlier in the day.

Levanon, a father of three, was a popular songwriter and singer known throughout his community for his willingness to pick up his guitar for a good cause.

He played music for patients in Jerusalem-area hospitals and would entertain for free at bar mitzvas and weddings of those who lacked money, his friend Levin Goldschmidt said.

...Huddled in a green overcoat, Goldschmidt stood in Levanon's study in his hilltop home. Levanon's seven-year-old son stuck his head into the study, and said, "This is my father's room." His twin sister played outside amid the mourners.

Levanon's now silent guitar hung on the wall in the study. Underneath it was a box of a CD, A Light in the Heart, which Levanon had released with 14 original songs about happiness, peace and God. A number of them were based on the teachings of the 18th century Hassidic master Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav, of whom Levanon was a follower.

In pursuit of the Bratslav tradition of personal prayer, Goldschmidt said that Levanon along with others in the community would often go into the forest where he was slain to pray. It is peaceful and serene there, said Goldschmidt. But that tranquility was broken on Sunday when suspects Mudar Abu Dia and Mussa Ah'lil, both 18, left their village of Safa near Beit Omar, carrying knives.

They were arrested hours after Levanon's body was found between Beit Omar and Bat Ayin. Levanon's burned car was also discovered on Monday in Beit Omar. During their interrogation, the two teens confessed to the murder and said it was a nationalistically-motivated act.

Yaki Morag, the head of security for the small town, said that the area where Levanon was killed was fraught with dangers.

"This is a grove where we usually go to meditate. It turns out that the Arabs followed him, saw him, and took advantage of the opportunity," he told Army Radio. "I would always remind him to go out armed, and I don't know if that would have helped."

Sigh. Hat-tip and condolences to Lazer, who was a friend of Erez Levanon.