National Review Online ran my last blog entry on Sheikh Yassin. I had an additional thought. Hamas may attempt to carry out operations just to show that they are still active. But, if these operations are not sufficiently planned they could end up being failures and further exposing Hamas leaders.

That being said, there is an important caveat - there will still be terror attacks and a few are bound to be successful. This morning's amphibious attack on Gush Katif in Gaza was a narrowly averted tragedy. Two Hamas terrorists either boated or swam onto the beach and almost got into a residential area. They should have been picked up at sea - and it is very fortunate that after they landed the IDF responded so quickly. There have been numerous waterborne attacks on Israel, most notably by Fatah, PFLP-GC, and the PLF. This is Hamas' first naval operation. Between this attack and the Ashdod attack they are clearly trying to develop new tactics.

But, back to my original point - Hamas is always seeking new avenues of attack. The Yassin assassination makes no difference.

In the wake of Israel's assassination of Sheikh Yassin, several cliches have predictably been bandied about. The first is the reference to Yassin as the spiritual leader of Hamas. Yassin was really the CEO of a terrorism conglomerate. Hamas has weapons research programs, international propaganda wings, legal and illegal money-making ventures, and a social welfare network - in addition of course to their core competency, mass murder. Yassin was intimately involved in building Hamas. In 1989 Israel tried and imprisoned Yassin. The trial revealed his intimate involvement in planning operations. During his imprisonment by Israel, Hamas began to fall apart. Hamas' number two at the time, Mousa Abu Marzuq took over - he was based in the United States at the time - and reorganized Hamas so that attacks on the leadership would not be as debilitating. Yassin was also a fundraiser extraordinaire. On his release from prison in 1997 he traveled to Iran and the Gulf where he raised tens of millions.

Another cliche is that Hamas is more than terrorism, it also runs hospitals and schools. True enough. But they offer enormous synergies with Hamas' core function - murdering Israelis. Hamas facilities double as bases for military operations. Hamas social activities serve to recruit terrorists. This has all been extensively documented, but the best single article is Matthew Levitt's "Hamas from Cradle to Grave" in Middle East Quarterly.

But my favorite cliche is that somehow the killing of Yassin going to initiate a new wave of violence against Israel - exemplified by Hamas' statement that the assassination had "opened the gates of hell..."

So before, Hamas was holding back in its operations? Hamas, which is utterly and unequivocally devoted to the destruction of Israel - as is clearly stated in their founding covenant which cites the anti-Semitic Czarist forgery The protocols of the Elders of Zion - was not really applying itself to murdering Israelis?

It is possible that the Yassin assassination will add - marginally - to the vast well of Palestinian anger. But, considering that substantial segments of Palestinian society encourage children to martyr themselves, it is difficult to believe that the Palestinians can get much angrier.

More importantly, this facile analysis ignores the operational side of terrorism. Suicide bombings are not random expressions of individual rage. They, and all other terror attacks, are carefully organized endeavors. Bombs need to be built and this is not something that can be done hastily - "work accidents" have killed dozens of Palestinians and a good bombmaker is too valuable to lose. Targets also have to be scouted and then the attacker needs to be transported. The truth is that Hamas is always carrying as many operations which they judge to have a reasonable chance of success as possible.

These comments of Sheikh Yassin, from al-Sharq al-Awsat translated by MEMRI, on why Hamas was recruiting women suicide bombers illustrates this point:

"The Islamic Movement cannot take all the Palestinian males demanding to participate in Jihad and in martyrdom operations, because they are so numerous. Our means are limited, and we cannot absorb all those who desire to confront the Israeli enemy..."

In short, Hamas has all of the recruits it needs - its problems are training, equipping, and deploying these recruits. Consequently, taking out leaders in terrorist organizations does not perpetuate the violence by further angering the masses. The Palestinian masses are already hopelessly blinded with rage. But removing the leadership frustrates attempts to harness this anger to commit acts of mass murder. And, maybe, just maybe, by removing a charismatic radical figure like Yassin a window is opened - creating the possibility that different ideas will emerge and that the Palestinians will turn away from the self-destructive madness.

I had the mixed blessing of watching (with half an eye) much of the second day of the 9/11 commission's public hearings. The thing that struck me the most - out of the interminable debates over who authored what memo and what "actionable" means - is that the Democrats nominated the wrong Kerrey.

Bob Kerrey was impressive and clear-thinking. He understood the importance of Bin Laden's 1998 declaration of war against the United States as a strategic watershed and he took on Richard Clarke on Iraq. Clarke's fundamental point is that Iraq is a distraction from hunting down al-Qaeda terrorists. Kerrey made clear that building a real Arab democracy is the ultimate antidote to the madness that inspires al-Qaeda and other Middle Eastern terrorism. It is a loss to the Democratic party and to the United States that he is no longer in the Senate. Further, a creative, clear, and independent thinker - it would have been a pleasure watching Bob Kerrey run against Bush.

And, having lost part of a leg in Vietnam, Kerry could have out Kerryed Kerry on national security credentials. (Only hopefully candidate Kerrey wouldn't talk about it so much.)