MID-EAST REALITIES - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 4/28/01: They -- the same personalities representing the same countries that created this "Apartheid Peace" and its resultant intensified uprising against it -- are at it again. The Americans, primarily using the CIA and covert means at the moment, are desperately trying to keep their "peace process" at least minimally alive and credible. The Europeans are pretending to be seriously involved, but of course they continue to defer to the Americans on matters Middle Eastern, their occasional protests not very serious or credible. Now fronting for the Sharon-led Israeli government Shimon Peres is off for another visit to the heads of the main Arab "client regimes" willing to have him -- that's Cairo and Amman -- then likely comes to Washington to coordinate the next steps and to keep the political dike from crumbling. Meanwhile the Arafat "Authority" and its cronies are kept in power just in case they can be used further; while at the same time they are weakened and threatened still trying desperately to twist them into submission.

JERUSALEM, April 28 (Reuters) - Several Jewish settlers were wounded, some seriously, in a Palestinian mortar attack on a Jewish settlement in the southern Gaza Strip on Saturday, the Israeli army said. An army spokeswoman said the Netzer Hazani settlement in the Gush Katif Jewish settlement bloc was hit by mortar rounds on Saturday afternoon and that around six people had been evacuated for medical treatment.

"There are six wounded, some of them are seriously hurt," the spokeswoman said. She later said at least five were wounded, but added "the number is changing all the time." She had no further details.

Palestinian security officials said they were checking the report.

The attack occurred a day before Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres was due to travel to Cairo and Amman for talks with Arab leaders on a proposal to end almost seven months of Israeli-Palestinian violence and revive peacemaking. It followed two mortar attacks overnight against the Jewish settlements of Kfar Darom and Nisanit in the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction said it had fired mortars overnight to avenge the "terrible massacre" of four of its fighters. They were killed on Thursday by an explosion Palestinians blamed on an Israeli remote-controlled bomb. Israel has denied it was behind the blast.

BRUSSELS, April 28 (Reuters) - EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana begins a three-day visit to the Middle East on Saturday to discuss the regional situation with the Palestinian, Israeli, Egyptian and Jordanian authorities.

"During his visit, Solana will discuss...how the European Union can contribute to overcoming the present crisis and help the resumption of the negotiations," Solana's spokeswoman said in a statement. Solana will meet Palestinian President Yasser Arafat on Saturday and other Palestinian officials on Sunday. On Monday, he will hold talks with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and travel to Cairo to meet Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak and Foreign Minister Amr Moussa.

He will then fly to Amman to be received by Jordanian King Abdullah and Foreign Minister Abdulilah al-Khatib.

GAZA, April 28 (Reuters) - Children fill their paintings with blood, ambulances, soldiers, guns and flags, reflecting the daily reality of life for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

They are quick to fight, swiftly resorting to stones or knives to settle street squabbles. They find it hard to concentrate in class and teachers find it hard to control them.

Bedwetting among youngsters aged up to 15 is common.

For Palestinian psychiatrist Iyad al-Sarraj, these are obvious symptoms of the stress imposed by Israeli occupation in the Gaza Strip, the most densely populated spot on the planet.

Sarraj, head of the Gaza Mental Health Programme, detects many other signs of severe trauma, affecting adults as well as children, which he fears could wrench society for years to come.

Israel ceded 60 percent of the Gaza Strip to Palestinian rule in 1994. Now 1.2 million Palestinians are crammed into 243 square km (94 square miles), while 7,000 Jews in heavily fortified settlements occupy the remaining 40 percent.

"Without exaggeration, I can say that every single person in Gaza is traumatised, adult or child, man or woman, to different degrees with different coping mechanisms," Sarraj told Reuters.

"I fear the future of Palestine, even in peace, because the traumatised people and children will show delinquent behaviour and psychological problems, drug addiction and violence. We could enter a state of in-fighting, or even civil war," he said.

Sarraj said thousands of Gazans had sought treatment at his centre since the start of a Palestinian Intifada, or uprising, in which at least 393 Palestinians, 74 Israelis, and 13 Israeli Arabs have been killed in the past seven months.

In April alone, about 1,000 people have made their way to his seafront offices, traumatised by direct injury, the loss of a relative or the after-effects of Israeli bombardment.

Sarraj said Gazans, whose freedom of movement has been curtailed since Israel captured the Strip from Egypt in 1967, feel completely caged by curbs imposed when the revolt began.

"They are in a severe state of depression and despair and express themselves in violent and aggressive ways," he said.

Conditions in the West Bank, where there is less crowding and relatively more freedom of movement, are somewhat easier.

The events of the past seven months have evoked a rage among Gazans far more intense than the feelings created during an earlier Intifada that lasted from 1987 to 1994, Sarraj argued.

The first Intifada led to peace talks with Israel that many Palestinians hoped would win them independence and prosperity.

Instead, seven years of peacemaking led nowhere. Along with hatred of Israel for blocking their aspirations, grew bitterness at their own leadership's alleged corruption and incompetence.

Sarraj said youngsters who grew up during the first Intifada experienced traumatic confrontations with Israeli troops.

Some saw their fathers beaten and helpless, destroying their sense of security rooted in the home and family. Others suffered direct injury or the indirect consequences of the conflict.

"In many cases children perceived the trauma through the eyes of the parents, through their behaviour. A father tortured in Israeli jails would come home and project all his anger and aggressiveness against his wife and children," Sarraj said, adding that domestic abuse was again on the rise.

Other sources of trauma were the high casualties inflicted by Israeli troops, often on protesters armed only with stones, during the present Intifada, as well as heavy Israeli retaliation for attacks by Palestinian gunmen.

"Suddenly, while trapped in their cage by Israeli closures, people were exposed to air, land and sea raids. When you're in a cage, this puts you in a state of frenzy," Sarraj said.

"People become very restless, very anxious and very tense because they have no escape, and so build up such violent energy that they need to express," he said. "That makes everyone suffer from trauma, especially children."

Sarraj said the presence of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, respected by most Palestinians as a symbol of their struggle, was helping to keep the lid on tensions in Gaza.

"The minute Arafat is out of the picture, the whole thing will erupt and it will be total chaos," he predicted.