It was the kind of radio call Colonel Shlomo Dagan, commander of Israel's Southern Gaza Brigade, has been getting all too often lately--a report of another Israeli settler shot by Palestinians. When the call came last Tuesday, he gathered his flak jacket, his helmet and his men and rushed to the dangerous road linking the Gaza Strip's Jewish settlements to Israel. An 18-year-old Jewish settler lay dead in the passenger seat of a car, hit by sniper fire. Dagan, with his camouflage helmet perched on top of spiky blond hair, arrived in minutes and began shouting orders.
Within a 50-yd....