TIPPING POINT: Incredibly, Palestinian spokesmen and apologists are still taking to the airwaves -- as usual, NPR's foremost among them -- in a last, desperate attempt to dictate to Israel what it "must accept" and "must do" to end the threat of terrorism.

Did none of them bother to read the morning papers yet? Has it not yet become apparent that the combination of this past weekend's triple-suicide bombing and America's success in routing the Taliban has brought us beyond a new "tipping point," when world leaders are no longer willing to condemn Israel for exercising the right of self defense?

Did it not dawn on the Palestinian Authority that when even Colin Powell is no longer calling for restraint, they no longer have a friend in the world that matters?

By week's end, I wouldn't be surprised to see Arafat put into "protective custody." Betcha, too, that when they confiscate his Palm Pilot to look up the home addresses for Hamas' rank-and-file, they find out he used the word "password" as his password.

UPDATE: SmarterTimes nails the less-smart New York Times for its "glaringly error-ridden" obituary of Mohammed Kamel, Egypt's former Foreign Minister who resigned in 1978 "in protest against the Camp David peace accords with Israel, predicting accurately that they would isolate Egypt in the Arab world without resolving the Palestinian question." But the Times never notes that the severance was temporary, and that virtually all Arab nations have now resumed diplomatic relations with Egypt, making Mr. Kamel's prediction look far less eerily prescient.