palestine

What you don't see in media about Gaza

Netanyahu Agreed to Ceasefire after Obama Promised US troops in Sinai Next Week?By RT

November 23, 2012 "RT" -- Israel and Palestine are momentarily at a ceasefire, but the potential reasoning behind the recess could have some real international implications. Israel’s Debka reports that the pause in fighting comes after the US promised to send troops to Sinai. US troops will soon be en route to the Sinai peninsula, Egyptian territory in North Africa that’s framed by the Suez Canal on the West and Israel on the East. In its northeast most point, Sinai is but a stone’s throw from Palestinian-controlled Gaza, and according to Debka, Hamas fighters there have been relying on Iranian arms smugglers to supply them with weaponry by way of Egypt.
Once deployed, the Americans will intervene with the rumored arms trade orchestrated by Iranians, ideally cutting off supplies for Hamas while at the same time serving as a thorn in the side of Iran.
The decision to send US troops to Sinai in exchange for a ceasefire was reportedly arranged early Wednesday morning after Pres. Obama made a deal over the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. A ceasefire has since been called after a week of fighting, but more military action could soon occur, claims Israel, if the flow of weapons to Gaza is not stopped. Netanyahu has been adamant with his pleas for the United States to strike Iran in an effort to disrupt its nuclear enrichment facilities, a demand which up until now has been brushed aside by Pres. Obama. The White House has up until now insisted on diplomatic measures in order to make an impact on any Iranian output, but Debka’s sources suggest that US troops may now have to intervene in Sinai if any smugglers should attempt to move weapons into Gaza.
“By opening the Sinai door to an American troop deployment for Israel’s defense, recognizes that the US force also insures Israel against Cairo revoking or failing to honor the peace treaty Egypt signed with Israel in 1979,” adds Debka.
According to their sources, US troops are expected in Egypt early next week. Meanwhile, American forces have all but surrounded Iran and are stationed in countless bases across the Middle East.

CEASEFIRE DECLARED : Thanks be to Egypt's Morsi and Palestinian refusal to be cowed. Political opinion gives Palestine victory over Israel

OBAMA REPORTED AS SAYING:

During a state visit to Thailand this weekend, the president called on Israel to halt what he called a ‘gratuitous and murderous assault’ on the Gaza Strip.Obama dismissed Israel’s claims that it was acting in self-defence, and accused Israel of having deliberately provoked the latest confrontation,  and engaging in the ‘collective punishment’ of a ‘defenceless’ civilian population.He rejected claims  by the Israeli government that Palestinian civilian deaths were due to the use of ‘human shields’ by Hamas fighters.    Though Obama condemned Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups for firing missiles at Israeli civilian targets, he placed primary responsibility for the conflict on Israel itself.   ‘ Given Israel’s continued domination of the Gaza Strip even after its 2005 disengagement, the idea it is acting out of self-defence is meaningless,’ the president declared.

Obama was indeed in Thailand, this is what he actually said:

‘Let’s understand that the precipitating event here … was an ever-escalating number of missiles that were landing not just in Israeli territory but in areas that are populated, and there’s no country on Earth that would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders.’

In consequence Obama was ‘fully supportive of Israel’s right to defend itself’.   The Peace Laureate nevertheless insisted that he would ‘prefer’ not to see ‘a ramping up of military activity in Gaza.’

And who did the president blame for this ‘ramping up’?  Not Israel, but Turkey and Egypt, whose governments have both condemned the Israeli assault.   Wise and statesmanlike as always, Obama warned that

‘those who champion the cause of the Palestinians should recognise that if we see a further escalation of the situation in Gaza then the likelihood of us getting back on any kind of peace track that leads to a two-state solution is going to be pushed off way into the future.’

So there you have it; Israel must keep bombing Gaza in order to bring the Palestinians  back on a ‘peace track.’    Countries that criticise the bombing and call for it to stop are responsible for bringing about a ‘further escalation’ of the ‘situation’ in Gaza. BY: MattCarr, He is the author of three published books: My Father’s House (Penguin 1997), The Infernal Machine: a History of Terrorism (New Press 2007), recently republished in the UK as The Infernal Machine: an Alternative History of Terrorism (Hurst & Co 2011), and Blood and Faith: the Purging of Muslim Spain (New Press 2009, Hurst 2010).

JusticeMan ·Comment from Information Clearing House

My heart bleeds for the children of Gaza.
Israel, the ultimate cowardly and evil collection of occupiers that ever existed draws its strength not from within but from,
The French who supplied you with the nukes.
The Americans who supplied and continue to supply the money, weapons, bombs, intelligence and political and media cover,
The Germans who supplied the Nuclear submarines and most sophisticated surveillance equipment.
The British who supply the bombs, weapons and arrogance.
The Arab Gulf monarchies who supply the deadly silence.
The treasonous few Palestinians who sold their souls for a handfull of dollars.
The Polish, Russians and Brooklynites who supply the soulless evil zombies who roam the holy land of Palestine.
My heart bleeds for the children of Palestine.
Oh children of Palestine, the world became a darker place and love has retracted and departed our mother earth.
Darkness and gloom have engulfed us, Hope is dead and nothing can save humanity anymore.

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Palestinian activists Blocking settlers Cars near Ramallah

Preparing the ground for the big Iranian operation

The current operation in Gaza can be called 'the little southern Iranian operation,' since
it's designed to paralyze Iran's power in Gaza. Many people have been tempted to link the Gaza operation and the upcoming election. Even though war is sometimes a way to avoid dealing with domestic problems, the smoke that reached the Gaza sky this week wasn't connected to the Israeli election. Instead, one could view the attack on Gaza as part of a new plan, a master plan that turns its eyes east to Iran's nuclear program. Salman Masalha, Ha'aretz
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President Shimon Peres is winding up an important official visit to Russia. A few weeks ago, he started a ruckus by making his views on a military strike against Iran known. Peres also makes an effort to resuscitate the clinically dead peace process. Peres is not only Israel's president. In the eyes of leaders around the world, he represents the sane, wise, peace-loving Israel, an image that fell apart under successive arrogant and power-loving prime ministers. To many Israelis, he symbolizes what Israel should be. It is easy to see why, in an election season with such a disappointing field of candidates for prime minister, Peres' name is once again being raised as someone who can and should guide Israel to calmer shores. Politicians from the center and the left are already beating a path to his door to propose that he offer his services. Peres himself has protested, saying he has no interest in running and intends to see out his presidential term. But the very force of his denials actually makes one suspect that Peres is listening carefully to the offers. It is doubtful that Peres' return to party politics could guarantee a victory for him and his ideological followers. It certainly would deprive Israel of a vital guide in a storm.Ha'aretz Editorial

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  20/11/2012: Israeli army has continued it’s shelling of Gaza, increasing the casualties to 118 killed, 1000 wounded. Total air, naval and ground raids exceeded 1600 rockets. 40 per cent of Palestinian victims are children.
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In Israel the public debate on Operation Pillar of Defense has been slightly more restrained than during similar operations in the past, giving the impression that Israeli society has matured and moderated. Interior Minister Eli Yishai is the notorious exception. In the past few days he has missed no opportunity to rant, rave and rile people up.

Yishai has urged the Israel Defense Forces "to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages" and destroy the enclave's infrastructure. Yishai supports a sweeping ground offensive in the Strip.

Of all the ministers, the one whose party represents a dark, medieval culture is inciting us to send Gaza back to those very days. Many of his party's elected officials and voters don't serve in the IDF, yet their leader is exhorting the IDF to get entangled in Gaza, kill and be killed.

Yishai isn't the only one making radical proposals. Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz and other politicians have said unacceptable things. But Yishai is the most prominent - he's a deputy prime minister. Ha'aretz20/11/2012

Sharon the Truth Teller

http://www.gilad.co.uk/writings/sharon-the-truth-teller.html

By Gilad Atzmon

Gilad Sharon, son of Ariel Sharon, wrote in the Jerusalem Post that Israel should “Flatten all of Gaza.”

“There should be no electricity in Gaza, no gasoline or moving vehicles, nothing. Then they’d really call for a ceasefire,” he wrote. “We need to flatten entire neighbourhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza. The Americans didn’t stop with Hiroshima – the Japanese weren’t surrendering fast enough, so they hit Nagasaki, too.”

Many Israelis and even some Zionists are ‘outraged’  but the truth must be told – Sharon’s views are fully consistent with Zionism, Israeli thinking and some aspect of Jewish culture.

For example, Sharon’s call is fully consistent with some devastating Old Testament’s passages:

‘You will chase your enemies, and they shall fall by the sword before you. Five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight; your enemies shall fall by the sword before you.’ Leviticus, 26:7–8

COMMENT INTERNATIONAL from the internet

Stop Pretending the US is an Uninvolved, Helpless Party in the Israeli Assault on Gaza

The Obama administration's unstinting financial, military and diplomatic support for Israel is a key enabling force in the conflict . Literally each day since the latest attacks began, the Obama administration has expressed its unqualified support for Israel's behavior. Just two days before the latest Israeli air attacks began, Obama told Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmud Abbas "that his administration opposes a Palestinian bid for non-state membership of the UN".

Glenn Greenwald

African PioneerNov 17, 2012 7:18 PM

Gaza has become a show, act of political pundits hipocracy, these Arabs, Persian leaders have many weapons to supply Palestinians with, they chose fancy words, lip service, it took Arab nations, hipocracy inside UN few hours to condemn Libya, Iraq, Bosnia, Syria, Serbia into many death camps, yet Arab world has not acted on unprovoked attack on Palestine. Emir of Qatar did not ask for sending of troops to fight Israel in Gaza, NATO did not intervene to protect people of Gaza, not even Arab/African nations expelling Israeli ambassadors as they did with Libyan, Syrian ambassadors. Arab league ambassadors met for haft an hour to call for bombing of Iraq, are we really human beings?. Has world lost it's sense of conscience, humanity?. Where are youth of world to defend Palestine?. Where are our armies and defenders of truth?. Where are leaders of wise men, tribes, seekers of justice?. Where is Moammar?. Where is dignity of Mohamed (PBUH) and moslem people?. Where is our power?.

hasanNov 17, 2012 4:29 PM

Israel can do everything they wants. They have big support from arrogant regimes in Arab world and Europe.

JalalNov 17, 2012 2:10 PM

The blood of the palestinians is on the hands of the PG Arab states.The problem of occupation has lasted all these years because of the complicity of those states.When it comes to Syria a strong opponent to Israel the Saudis and Qataris are very quick to provide arms,money and act against any UN or human institution to bring down that country.When the problem is Israel they urge the UN to solve it.Great hypocrytes and zionists.

John ScullyNov 17, 2012 1:4 PM

You let these Israeli's get away with this Iran will be next, then each one of you that have ignored the deaths that are accuring in the Gaza Strip. Come on China & Russia step in along with Pakistan, Israel would not dare to continue if you all laide down the law and ment what you said.

trotNov 17, 2012 11:40 AM

My child is the same age as the boy in the photo. How do we all stay human in the face of this evil as activist Vittorio Arrigoni told us to from Gaza during the atrocities of Cast Lead before he, too, was killed? The world's most egregious injustice is this one. How long til they do it to us all? We are all Gazans.

Alexander J Ajay posted in Shamireaders on FB Alexander J Ajay 17 November 18:53 The hackers said their operation "OpIsrael" had either damaged or completely erased the sites of more than 650 private and public institutions that included the Bank of Jerusalem -- one of the country's main finance houses. "Bank of Jerusalem database has been deleted," the group said in a tweet next to a link to the lender's non-functioning website. It also claimed to have briefly downed the foreign ministry website in protest over an alleged Israeli threat to cut the Gaza Strip's Internet communications.   Hackers down hundreds of Israeli sites over Gaza www.dailystar.com.lb Online activist group Anonymous says it had downed the websites of dozens of Israeli state agencies ...

"Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai says "the goal of the operation is to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages. Only then will Israel be calm for 40 years," according to Israel's Haaretz website." (thanks Sultan) Posted by As'ad AbuKhalil




Listen to the BBC reports on Gaza yesterday, you get the impression that Gaza is launching a war on poor little defenseless Israel.  BBC News coverage is not qualitative different from that of Fox News.  Posted by As'ad AbuKhalil
"Oren spoke during a visit to Capitol Hill on Friday after both houses of Congress overwhelmingly voted for resolutions in support of Israel's "inherent right to act in self-defence".
"The United States has given us the full backing to take whatever measures are necessary to defend our citizens from Hamas terror," he said."  What does "to take whatever measures" mean in international law and foreign policy?  Does that mean that Israel can commit any number of massacres and that it can perpetrate any war crimes and that it can kill any number of children and that it can drop any kind of bomb on the Palestinians while counting on unconditional US support? Posted by As'ad AbuKhalil

List of victims of Israel's assault on Gaza: all what you have done to our people is registered in notebooks

"GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- Palestinians killed in the latest Israeli offensive as of Saturday, Nov. 17, 2012.

1. Ahmad al-Jaabari
2. Muhammad al-Hums
3. Ranan Arafat (female child)
4. Omar Mashharawi (child)
5. Isam Abu al-Miza
6. Muhammad al-Kaseih
7. Hiba Mashharawi Turk (pregnant woman)
8. Mahmoud Abu Sawawin (elderly man)
9. Habis Masmah
10. Wael al-Ghalban
11. Hisham al-Ghalban
12. Rani Hammad
13. Khalid Abu al-Nasr
14. Marwan Abu al-Qumsan (elderly man)
15. Walid Abadla (child)
16. Hanin Tafish (infant)
17. Uday Jamal Nasser
18. Faris Basyouni (child)
19. Muhammad Iyad Saadallah (child)
20. Ayman al-Abid Abu Warda
21. Tahrir Suleiman
22. Ismail Qandil
23. Younis Kamil Tafish
24. Muhammad Suleiman
25. Amjad Abu Jalal
26. Ziad Abu Jalal
27. Ahmad Abu Jalal
28. Hasan al-Heilma
29. Khalid al-Shayer
30. Ayman Salim
31. Ahmad Abu Masmah
32. Mukhlis Udwan
33. Abdul-Rahman al-Misri
34. Muhammad al-Loui
35. Awad al-Nahhal
36. Ali Abdul-Hakim Manama
37. Osama Abdul-Jawwad
38. Ashraf Darwish
39. Ahmad al-Atrash
40. Muhammad Yasin".  (thanks Laleh) Posted by As'ad AbuKhalil

Richard

Personally, WE should learn to be UNITED despite the fact, that religious and political ideologies fragment us on a daily living basis, hence this result which is so obvious, is the factual truthful reality, what waits for humanity us HELL on earthl. 

However, I do not know if this is possible, but WE have to put aside our primitive beliefs, and focus on what is happening to us, which we initially created. Sadly, what the Palestinians are facing in GENOCIDE committed right in front of our eyes. Please let this FACT sink into your psyche and allow whatever necessary action that follows to bring about to save these people/s, after all WE are human beings, not psychopaths On that logical note alone, we have to be united and to bring about a brave new world, but the first step is to stop this insane criminally instigated KILLING/S.

Dominic

Israel's criminal assault on Lebanon fits nicely with the paradigmatic slaughter of the Amalekites. "Slay both man and woman, child and suckling." This is precisely what Israel is doing, and the killing of children and women has been approved by the Yesha Rabbinical Council, which in a bold press release also took itself the liberty to deride the ethical norms of the Christians.Needless to say, the Israeli bloodlust is becoming an embarrassment to Jews both inside and outside Israel. Furthermore, the Jews have every reason to fear a global upsurge of antisemitism. Jews in Europe dare not reveal their Jewish identity in public, and if their Jewish identity is known, they are quick to denounce the state of Israel. Northern America is the only place in the world where one's Jewishness is not a liability. But this may quickly change.
The Jewish majority is still in the diaspora, and the state of Israel is making life very difficult for the diaspora Jew. Given these circumstances, it is hardly surprising that Jews themselves are beginning to question the viability of the Jewish state:
"There exists a heterogeneous agglomeration of Jewish people
around the world [...] for whom the state of Israel has come to
represent an 800-pound albatross that needs to be pried from
our necks before it drags us over a cliff." (David Himmelstein)

"I write as a Jew and as a synagogue member. [And] I write with
a growing sense of shame. The source of the feeling is simple:
Israel claims that it continues to act in my name. [The fact of the
matter is that] Israel, in its present manifestation, sustains
anti-Semitism." (Andrew Benjamin)
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"I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, 
I myself become the wounded person." 

-------Walt Whitman.

"Electronic Intifada"  - November 16, 2012 - These were some of the calls from a group of Israelis demonstrating in favor of Israel’s attack on Gaza in the streets of Tel Aviv last night.

Peaceful protests by Palestinian students at Israeli universities were met with similar incitement.

In Tel Aviv, across the road, another group of Israelis protested against the assault. “We came here to say that we must end this war immediately,” Knesset member Dov Khenin of the communist Hadash party told the anti-war crowd, “every additional drop of blood is needless.”

Israeli transport minister Israel Katz called for Israel to bomb Gaza so hard that the population would flee into Egypt, and for Israel to cut off water and electricity supplies.

Hans· Why on earth is the world still believing in this "Israeli Victim" story? Israel has defied international law for decades and committed ethnic cleansing, land theft and a myriad of other horrro tactics on the Palestinians. The world should wake up and finally hold Israel accountable. Israel and the US are the greatest threats to peace in the world.

Angie·Obama quote: U.S. "wants the same thing Israel wants." 
Some Nobel Peace Prize winner .....
.

Alec·In 1937, during earlier partition proposals, David Ben Gurion, a zionist, who was to become Israel’s first prime minister, wrote to his son, 

“A partial Jewish state is not the end, but only the beginning. The establishment of such a Jewish State will serve as a means in our historical efforts to redeem the country in its entirety….We shall organize a modern defense force…and then I am certain that we will not be prevented from settling in other parts of the country, either by mutual agreement with our Arab neighbors or by some other means….We will expel the Arabs and take their places…with the force at our disposal.” 
Quoted in Jerome Slater, “What Went Wrong? The Collapse of the Israeli-Palestinian Peace Process,” Political Science Quarterly, vol. 116, no. 2, 2001, pp. 173-74.

PRESS RELEASE from PressTV Iran:

An Israeli military vessel has been hit by a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip, Palestinian sources say.
Palestinian resistance fighters also managed to shoot down an Israeli unmanned aerial vehicle in the north of the Gaza Strip on Sunday. Meanwhile, Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas resistance movement, fired M-75 missiles toward Tel Aviv on the same day, the sources said. On November 16, an Israeli F-16 fighter jet flying over the Gaza Strip was also shot down by the Palestinian fighters. Israel has been targeted by more than 770 Palestinian rockets and missiles since November 14, Israeli media say. Rockets fired from Gaza on Sunday landed in Israel’s southern cities of Ashkelon, Ashdod, and Kiryat Malakhi, and Eshkol area, where three Israeli soldiers were injured. At least two Israelis were also wounded in Ashkelon.
In Tel Aviv, a rocket hit a commercial district and a second one landed 200 meters away from the US embassy. It is the first time that Tel Aviv has come under attack in decades. Over 50 Palestinians have been killed and about 500 others wounded since the beginning of Israeli attacks on Wednesday. Three Palestinian kids, including two toddlers, have also been killed over the past several hours. AO/HSN

Thousands in London occupy outside Israeli Embassy against war on Gaza

In the U-K, Londoners hold a fourth day of protests against Israel’s latest military offensive against the Gaza Strip. Thousands have gathered outside the Israeli embassy in support of Palestinians.Theres a Sense of de ja vu here.
These protesters have been outside the Israeli embassy in London before. They would say they've been here too many times.

NINE MEMBERS OF ONE FAMILY DEAD

Al Jazeera's Nadim Baba, reporting from Gaza, has said that the search continues for survivors of an Israeli air strike that killed nine members of the same family in Gaza.

Our correspondent said rescue workers worked frantically to pick up the debris from "the massive crater where the residential building stood".

Five children were among the nine members of the extended family that died in the attack.

With darkness quickly falling, Al Jazeera's Baba said "a frantic search ... at top speed" has been conducted to see if anyone else is still alive under the rubble.

UPDATE9:37 P.M.The death toll in the IDF attack on a house in the northern Gaza Strip rises to 12, including four children and five women, all of the same family.

Palestinian mourners carry the bodies of Tahrir Salman and Mohammed Salman in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahia, 16 November.

A policeman looks at an unexploded missile fired by an Israeli aircraft in Gaza City, 17 November.(Majdi Fathi / APA images)

Palestinian rockets (above and below)