Palestine

January 22, 2009December 12, 2020

Israel Continues to Break Unilateral Cease Fire

On entering Gaza ABC reporter, Ban Knight said “after three weeks of war the state of Gaza still came as a shock to me.” Ben has reported some grab bytes from Gaza locals:

“I didn’t want to come out until now,” one man said.

“They targeted everything. They shot everywhere. Nowhere was safe.”

I spoke with one man who claimed that since the ceasefire, Hamas officials have been rounding up members of Fatah accused of collaborating with Israel and shooting them in the legs. Hamas denies it.

But this man, a Fatah supporter, believes Hamas will hold onto power here by dividing the people even further.

“Hamas have more support than they did before the war,” he said.

“They’ve convinced the people that Israel invaded with Fatah’s permission.”

Talal Oukal, a Palestinian analyst stresses the need for reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas.

… everything is linked to a historic reconciliation between the two big rival groups, “and once they agree, I believe that other problems would be marginal and can be resolved through diplomatic ways between Israel and the Palestinians.”

However, he warned that if the two parties fail to achieve reconciliation soon, “I believe that the situation would remain as it is because the Western world led by the United States, including Israel, are not willing to hold direct talks with Hamas which basically rejects to condemn violence or recognize Israel.”

He added that the issues that can be resolved through diplomatic ways, if Fatah and Hamas reunite and agree on a reconciliation, are “the release of captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit and the reopening of Gaza Strip crossing points including Gaza-Egypt Rafah border crossing.”

Dr Azzam Tamimi explains the realities of Israel’s occupation of Palestine – Israel could have peace if they removed the occupation and blockade, released prisoners, remove settlers, withdraw to pre 67 borders. As the oppressor, Tamimi insists Israel needs to take the initiative and negotiate with Hamas.

In Haaretz, Gideon Levy admits the obvious – Israel’s ‘war’ was a complete failure.

This war ended in utter failure for Israel.

This goes beyond the profound moral failure, which is a grave matter in itself, but pertains to its inability to reach its stated goals. In other words, the grief is not complemented by failure. We have gained nothing in this war save hundreds of graves, some of them very small, thousands of maimed people, much destruction and the besmirching of Israel’s image.

What seemed like a predestined loss to only a handful of people at the onset of the war will gradually emerge as such to many others, once the victorious trumpeting subsides.

The initial objective of the war was to put an end to the firing of Qassam rockets. This did not cease until the war’s last day. It was only achieved after a cease-fire had already been arranged. Defense officials estimate that Hamas still has 1,000 rockets.

The war’s second objective, the prevention of smuggling, was not met either. The head of the Shin Bet security service has estimated that smuggling will be renewed within two months.

Most of the smuggling that is going on is meant to provide food for a population under siege, and not to obtain weapons. But even if we accept the scare campaign concerning the smuggling with its exaggerations, this war has served to prove that only poor quality, rudimentary weapons passed through the smuggling tunnels connecting the Gaza Strip to Egypt.

Israel’s ability to achieve its third objective is also dubious. Deterrence, my foot. The deterrence we supposedly achieved in the Second Lebanon War has not had the slightest effect on Hamas, and the one supposedly achieved now isn’t working any better: The sporadic firing of rockets from the Gaza Strip has continued over the past few days.

The fourth objective, which remained undeclared, was not met either. The IDF has not restored its capability. It couldn’t have, not in a quasi-war against a miserable and poorly-equipped organization relying on makeshift weapons, whose combatants barely put up a fight

Hamas has not been weakened, it will be strengthened. Fatah, collaborator with the Occupation on the other hand will be weakened.

Their war has intensified the ethos of resistance and determined endurance. A country which has nursed an entire generation on the ethos of a few versus should know to appreciate that by now. There was no doubt as to who was David and who was Goliath in this war.

Israel’s aggressive and lawless character has now been confirmed to the world.

Israel’s actions have dealt a serious blow to public support for the state. While this does not always translate itself into an immediate diplomatic situation, the shockwaves will arrive one day. The whole world saw the images. They shocked every human being who saw them, even if they left most Israelis cold.

The conclusion is that Israel is a violent and dangerous country, devoid of all restraints and blatantly ignoring the resolutions of the United Nations Security Council, while not giving a hoot about international law. The investigations are on their way.

Levy’s assessment of the weakening of the PLO sheds light on its move to negotiate with Israel on terms remarkably similar to those of Hamas – Israel’s withdrawal from land occupied in 1967 and the freezing of all settlement activity. With the advent of Obama’s presidency, now is a good time for Palestinians of whatever faction to drive for a realistic deal which can ensure a viable state. The current bantustans are not workable as a basis for a Palestinian state. If Israel is unwilling to make concessions, then a one state solution becomes the only possible outcome.

The PLO Executive Committee said it was demanding Israel commit to a comprehensive freezing of all settlement activity in and around Arab East Jerusalem and in the occupied West Bank and a commitment to give up its hold on all occupied land captured in the 1967 Middle East war.

“The Palestinian leadership are not ready to return to political negotiations with Israel unless there is a new basis for talks,” the PLO said, without elaborating.

It said it wanted to conduct talks on the basis of the Arab peace initiative of 2002 which offers Israel peace and normal relations with all Arab countries in return for withdrawal from all territory captured in the 1967 war.

Successive Israeli governments have either ignored or rejected the offer, which would require Israel to dismantle settlements which house hundreds of thousands of Jews.

The prospect of the PLO, Fatah and Hamas aligning demands and even worse uniting will send chills down Israeli politicians spines. Expect a renewal of attempts of divide and conquer.

There are signs of this already, with Israel preventing Abbas from bringing much needed cash to Gaza.

The restrictions threatened to undercut the ability of President Mahmoud Abbas’s West Bank-based government to reassert a presence in the Hamas-ruled territory after Israel’s 22-day offensive, said the officials, who asked not to be identified.

The cash restrictions also underscored the wider hurdles facing reconstruction, estimated to cost more than $2 billion, in the Gaza Strip, where 1.5 million Palestinians live.

Israel has told the United Nations and other aid groups planning for the rebuilding they must apply for project-by-project Israeli approval and provide guarantees none of the work will benefit Hamas.

Israel had no immediate comment on why the Palestinian Authority’s post-war cash shipments were being blocked. The restrictions were put in place long before fighting broke out on December 27, with Israel arguing that Gaza had enough cash in circulation and that some of the money could end up with Hamas.

Middle East envoy Tony Blair, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank countered that the restrictions were crippling Gaza’s economy and undermining the Palestinian Authority, which adopted anti-money laundering rules to prevent any of the money from going to Hamas and other groups.

Juan Cole agrees that Fatah and the PLO have been weakened by Israel’s failure in Gaza.

The fundamentalist group Hamas is reasserting itself in Gaza as Israeli troops withdraw, and now has a new pretext to target members of the Fatah group, secular nationalists loyal to Palestine Authority president Mahmoud Abbas. So the Israelis may have actually politically strengthened Hamas and further weakened Fatah, which is already notorious for corruption, political repression, inefficiency, and, increasingly collaboration with Israel.

As Obama rings around the ME leaders expressing his wish for an Arab Israeli peace, he has not yet stated any plans to talk with Hamas leaders, preferring instead

to help consolidate the current Hamas-Israeli cease-fire, and help the Palestinian Authority with a major reconstruction effort in Gaza after three weeks of conflict.

Israel is still only allowing in humanitarian aid, so the reconstruction of Gaza must wait for Israel’s hegemonical leisure. Tipsy Livni insists the blockade will remain as long as Hamas holds Gilad Shalit. No mention is made of the thousands of Palestinian prisoners including children being held, many for years, in Israeli dungeons.

Will Obama do the sensible thing and talk to political groups which have legitimate claims against the regimes who have delegitimised them using Bush’s phony ‘war on terror’ as cover?

In his piece, Obama Should Quit War on Terror, Talk to Hamas and Taliban, Nathan Gardels thinks so.

“Power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please, ” Obama declaimed on the Capitol steps. Instead, “our power grows through its prudent use, our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.”

Israel, take head – humility and restraint have been notably lacking in the case of Israeli aggressions.

Olivier Roy also points out the pragmatic necessity of negotiating with Hamas – the alternatives he points to are undesirable.

Where a political approach has been tried, it has worked. The relative success of the surge in Iraq is based on the implicit rejection of the official doctrine of the “war on terror”: Local armed insurgents were recognized as political actors with more or less a legitimate agenda, thus separating them from the foreign-based global militants who did not give a damn about Iraqi national interests.

Whatever the justification of the Gaza military operations (to punish the inhabitants for supporting Hamas or to free them from the control of Hamas), it will not work. Dismantling Hamas’ military capacity can only buy time, not solve the issue.

Under the logic of the current military scenario, either the PA must be reinstated in Gaza — only to face political and military guerrilla warfare with Hamas — or the Israeli Defense Forces must maintain control, perhaps with the involvement of foreign troops. In either case, the military “solution” will prevent the emergence of a Palestinian state.

Palestine is thus doomed, in the best case, to be either under a permanent Israeli occupation or under some sort of an international mandate. The suggestion that Gaza could be handed over to Egypt and what remains of the West Bank to Jordan will just contribute to extending the conflict. Such an eventuality would nullify the only positive result of the Oslo negotiations, which is to have transformed an Israeli-Arab conflict into an Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Thus, if the Obama administration truly seeks to change the equation in the Middle East and Afghanistan, it must recognize the real motives and aspirations, not imagined ones, that actually drive groups like Hamas and the Taliban. Such a recognition would lead the U.S. to talk to the Taliban in Afghanistan and look for a political instead of military solution that responds to legitimate Pashtu aspirations. It would lead the U.S. to refrain from endorsing the Israeli delusion that it can eliminate Hamas by force while frustrating Palestinian statehood.

Despite Israel’s supposed unilateral cease fire, Israeli gunboats are still firing at civilians in Gaza.

A Palestinian medical official says an Israeli gunboat off the shores of Gaza City has opened fire on Gazans, wounding a man and a girl.

Dr. Moaiya Hassanain said Thursday that a shell fired by the gunboat hit a house in a beachside refugee camp. He said the wounded were passersby in the street, AP reported.

Gunboats off Gaza have been firing for several days despite a cease-fire, which ended a three-week Israeli offensive, being in place.

More civilian killings from gunboats by Israel:

Israel’s navy shelled the Gaza Strip on Thursday morning, injuring seven Palestinians, including five fishermen.

Mu’awiyah Hassanain, the director of Ambulance and Emergency Services in the Palestinian Health Ministry told Ma’an that Israeli gunboats shelled the As-Sudaniya area northwest of Gaza City.

He said the wounded people were taken to Ash-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.

Hassanain added that rescue teams are still working to recover the corpses, many of them now decomposing, of those killed in Israel’s three-week war on Gaza.

Separately, two Palestinians died in Egyptian hospitals where they were treated for wounds from Israel’s three-week offensive.

Medical officials identified them as: Tamer Omar Al-Louh, 22, from Gaza city and Azzam Mu’awad Ash-Shafe’y, 24, from Rafah.

The death toll from the war is now 1,330, with more than 5,000 injured.

Israel Continues Bombing Gaza In Spite of Ceasefire, Sacramentans Report

Despite the ceasefire, Israel bombed Gaza again yesterday. Reports from Gaza are terrible. Tonight we spoke with a young Gaza man now living in Amman; he told us that seven of his cousins there were killed by the Israeli attacks. We are also getting reports of increased repression against Palestinians in the West Bank as well as Palestinian-Israelis; including killing and arresting demonstrators.

It is imperative that world pressure on Israel continue and increase. Not only to stop the atrocities against Gaza, but to end the occupation and apartheid policies and practices of Israel that have led to these atrocities. Israel must immediately stop the attacks on Gaza and open all borders; it must remove all of its military, apartheid wall, and settlements from the West Bank; it must stop its harassment and unequal treatment of Palestinian-Israelis; and it must adhere to UN resolutions regarding the Palestinian refugees.

January 22, 2009December 12, 2020

Ariel Sharon Flashback – 1982 Interview with Amos Oz

ABOUT THE SOFT AND THE DELICATE By Amos Oz

(supposed interview with Ariel Sharon published in the Israeli daily Davar Dec. 17, 1982)

printed in Counterpunch

“You can call me anything you like. Call me a monster or a murderer. Just note that I don’t hate Arabs. On the contrary. Personally, I am much more at ease with them, and especially with the Bedouin, than with Jews. Those Arabs we haven’t yet spoilt are proud people, they are irrational, cruel and generous. It’s the Yids that are all twisted. In order to straighten them out you have to first bend them sharply the other way. That, in brief, is my whole ideology.

“Call Israel by any name you like, call it a Judeo-Nazi state as does Leibowitz. Why not? Better a live Judeo-Nazi
than a dead saint. I don’t care whether I am like Ghadafi. I am not after the admiration of the gentiles. I don’t need their love. I don’t need to be loved by Jews like you either. I have to live, and I intend to ensure that my children will live as well. With or without the blessing of the Pope and the other religious leaders from the New Yor Times. I will destroy anyone who will raise a hand against my children, I will destroy him and his children, with or without our famous purity of arms. I don’t care if he is Christian, Muslim, Jewish or pagan. History teaches us that he who won’t kill will be killed by others. That is an iron law.

“Even if you’ll prove to me by mathematical means that the present war in Lebanon is a dirty immoral war, I don’t care. Moreover, even if you will prove to me that we have not achieved and will not achieve any of our aims in Lebanon, that we will neither create a friendly regime in Lebanon nor destroy the Syrians or even the PLO, even then I don’t care. It was still worth it. Even if Galilee is shelled again by Katyushas in a year’s time, I don’t really care. We shall start another war, kill and destroy more and more, until they will have had enough. And do you know why it is all worth it? Because it seems that this war has made us more unpopular among the so-called civilised world.

“We’ll hear no more of that nonsense about the unique Jewish morality, the moral lessons of the holocaust or about the Jews who were supposed to have emerged from the gas chambers pure and virtuous. No more of that. The destruction of Eyn Hilwe (and it’s a pity we did not wipe out that hornet’s nest completely!), the healthy bombardment of Beirut and that tiny massacre (can you call 500 Arabs a massacre?) in their camps which we should have committed with our own delicate hands rather than let the Phalangists do it, all these good deeds finally killed the bullshit talk about a unique people and of being a light upon the nations. No more uniqueness and no more sweetness and light. Good riddance.”

“I personally don’t want to be any better than Khomeini or Brezhnev or Ghadafi or Assad or Mrs. Thatcher, or even Harry Truman who killed half a million Japanese with two fine bombs. I only want to be smarter than they are, quicker and more efficient, not better or more beautiful than they are. Tell me, do the baddies of this world have a bad time? If anyone tries to touch them, the evil men cut his hands and legs off. They hunt and catch whatever they feel like eating. They don’t suffer from indigestion and are not punished by Heaven. I want Israel to join that club. Maybe the world will then at last begin to fear me instead of feeling sorry for me. Maybe they will start to tremble, to fear my madness instead of admiring my nobility. Thank god for that. Let them tremble, let them call us a mad state. Let them understand that we are a wild country, dangerous to our surroundings, not normal, that we might go crazy if one of our children is murdered – just one! That we might go wild and burn all the oil fields in the Middle East! If anything would happen to your child, god forbid, you would talk like I do. Let them be aware in Washington, Moscow, Damascus and China that if one of our ambassadors is shot, or even a consul or the most junior embassy official, we might start World War Three just like that !” ……

We are talking while sitting on the balcony of the pretty country house belonging to C. which is situated in a prosperous Moshav. To the west we see a burning sunset and there is a scent of fruit trees in the air. We are being served iced coffee in tall glasses. C. is about fifty years old. He is a man well known for his (military) actions. He is a strong, heavy figure wearing shorts but no shirt. His body is tanned a metallic bronze shade, the colour of a blond man living in the sun. He puts his hairy legs on the table and his hands on the chair. There is a scar on his neck. His eyes wander over his plantations. He spells out his ideology in a voice made hoarse by too much smoking:

“Let me tell me [sic] what is the most important thing, the sweetest fruit of the war in Lebanon: It is that now they don’t just hate Israel. Thanks to us, they now also hate all those Feinschmecker Jews in Paris, London, New York, Frankfurt and Montreal, in all their holes. At last they hate all these nice Yids, who say they are different from us, that they are not Israeli thugs, that they are different Jews, clean and decent. Just like the assimilated Jew in Vienna and Berlin begged the anti-Semite not to confuse him with the screaming, stinking Ostjude, who had smuggled himself into that cultural environment out of the dirty ghettos of Ukraine and Poland. It won’t help them, those
clean Yids, just as it did not help them in Vienna and Berlin. Let them shout that they condemn Israel, that they
are all right, that they did not want and don’t want to hurt a fly, that they always prefer being slaughtered to
fighting, that they have taken it upon themselves to teach the gentiles how to be good Christians by always turning the other cheek. It won’t do them any good. Now they are getting it there because of us, and I am telling you, it is a pleasure to watch.

“They are the same Yids who persuaded the gentiles to capitulate to the bastards in Vietnam, to give it in to Khomeini, to Brezhnev, to feel sorry for Sheikh Yamani because of his tough childhood, to make love not war. Or
rather, to do neither, and instead write a thesis on love and war. We are through with all that. The Yid has been
rejected, not only did he crucify Jesus, but he also crucified Arafat in Sabra and Shatila. They are being identified with us and that’s a good thing! Their cemeteries are being desecrated, their synagogues are set on fire, all their old nicknames are being revived, they are being expelled from the best clubs, people shoot into their ethnic
restaurants murdering small children, forcing them to remove any sign showing them to be Jews, forcing them to move and change their profession.

“Soon their palaces will be smeared with the slogan: Yids, go to Palestine! And you know what? They will go to
Palestine because they will have no other choice! All this is a bonus we received from the Lebanese war. Tell me,
wasn’t it worth it?

“Soon we will hit on good times. The Jews will start arriving, the Israelis will stop emigrating and those who
already emigrated will return. Those who had chosen assimilation will finally understand that it won’t help them to try and be the conscience of the world. The ‘conscience of the world’ will have to understand through its arse what it could not get into its head. The gentiles have always felt sick of the Yids and their conscience, and now the Yids will have only one option: to come home, all of them, fast, to install thick steel doors, to build a strong fence, to have submachine guns positioned at every corner of their fence here and to fight like devils against anyone who dares to make a sound in this region. And if anyone even raises his hand against us we’ll take away half his land and burn the other half, including the oil. We might use nuclear arms. We’ll go on until he no longer feels like it…

“…You probably want to know whether I am not afraid of the masses of Yids coming here to escape anti-semitism smearing us with their olive oil until we go all soft like them. Listen, history is funny in that way, there is a dialectic here, irony. Who was it who expanded the state of Israel almost up the boundaries of the kingdom of King David? Who expanded the state until it covered the area from Mount Hermon to Raz Muhammad? Levi Eshkol. Of all people, it was that follower of Gordon, that softie, that old woman. Who, on the other hand, is about to push us back into the walls of the ghetto? Who gave up all of Sinai in order to retain a civilised image? Beitar’s governor in Poland, that proud man Menahem Begin. So you can never tell. I only know one thing for sure: as long as you are fighting for your life all is permitted, even to drive out all the Arabs from the West Bank, everything.

“Leibowitz is right, we are Judeo-Nazis, and why not? Listen, a people that gave itself up to be slaughtered, a people that let soap to be made of its children and lamp shades from the skin of its women is a worse criminal than
its murderers. Worse than the Nazis…If your nice civilised parents had come here in time instead of writing books about the love for humanity and singing Hear O Israel on the way to the gas chambers, now don’t be shocked, if they instead had killed six million Arabs here or even one million, what would have happened? Sure, two or three nasty pages would have been written in the history books, we would have been called all sorts of names, but we could be here today as a people of 25 million!

“Even today I am willing to volunteer to do the dirty work for Israel, to kill as many Arabs as necessary, to deport
them, to expel and burn them, to have everyone hate us, to pull the rug from underneath the feet of the Diaspora Jews, so that they will be forced to run to us crying. Even if it means blowing up one or two synagogues here and there, I don’t care. And I don’t mind if after the job is done you put me in front of a Nuremberg Trial and then jail me for life. Hang me if you want, as a war criminal. Then you can spruce up your Jewish conscience and enter the respectable club of civilised nations, nations that are large and healthy. What you lot don’t understand is that the dirty work of Zionism is not finished yet, far from it. True, it could have been finished in 1948, but you interfered, you stopped it. And all this because of the Jewishness in your souls, because of your Diaspora mentality. For the Jews don’t grasp things quickly. If you open your eyes and look around the world you will see that darkness is falling again. And we know what happens to a Jew who stays out in the dark. So I am glad that this small war in Lebanon frightened the Yids. Let them be afraid, let them suffer. They should hurry home before it gets really dark. So I am an anti-Semite ? Fine. So don’t quote me, quote Lilienblum instead [an early Russian Zionist – ed.]. There is no need to quote an anti-Semite. Quote Lilienblum, and he is definitely not an anti-Semite, there is even a street in Tel Aviv named after him. (C. quotes from a small notebook that was lying on his table when I arrived:) ‘Is all that is happening not a clear sign that our forefathers and ourselves…wanted and still want to be disgraced? That we
enjoy living like gypsies.’ That’s Lilienblum. Not me. Believe me. I went through the Zionist literature, I can prove what I say.

“And you can write that I am disgrace to humanity, I don’t mind, on the contrary. Let’s make a deal: I will do all I
can to expel the Arabs from here, I will do all I can to increase anti-semitism, and you will write poems and essays about the misery of the Arabs and be prepared to absorb the Yids I will force to flee to this country and teach them to be a light unto the gentiles. How about it ?”

It was there that I stopped C.’s monologue for a moment and expressed the thought passing through my mind, perhaps more for myself than for my host. Was it possible that Hitler hadnot only hurt the Jews but also poisoned their minds? Had that poison sunk in and was still active? But not even that idea could cause C. to protest or raise his voice. After all, he said to have never shouted under stress, even during the famous operations his name is associated with…”

The above article was discussed at length in an article in The Spectator by Paul Gottfried in 2002.

However, Holger Jensen claims to have spoken with Amos Oz, who told him the interview was with a soldier.

When the interview first appeared after the invasion of Lebanon, “Z” was widely assumed to be Sharon because the interviewee was described as a military man “with a certain history,” about 50 years of age, heavyset and a prosperous farmer. All this fit the stocky Sharon, who had a farm, was the right age and certainly had “a history.”

Sharon had lost his job as defense minister after being held indirectly responsible for a massacre of Palestinian refugees by Israel’s Lebanese Phalange allies in Beirut. The military man interviewed by Oz justified the invasion of Lebanon, dismissed the massacre of Palestinians as one of the harsh realities of war — “how can you call 500 Arabs a massacre?” — and spoke contemptuously of Israeli pacifists as those with “soft and delicate hands.”

Oz never revealed who “Z” was, saying he had promised to protect his identity. He held to that promise when I telephoned him Monday, but confirmed that it was not Sharon. “I have never met or interviewed Sharon,” Oz said. The Middle East is full of mythology. History is rewritten to promote the viewpoints of Israelis or Palestinians and both sides in the conflict suffer from selective recall when it suits their purpose.

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From Recent Trends in Emigration from Israel: The Impact of Palestinian Violence by Ian S. Lustick, 2004

Yisrael Harel, a veteran Gush Emunim activist and former editor of Nekuda, published a long and stunning article in April 2003 which depicted the demographic spectre as Israel’s most daunting problem and even went so far as to propose a solution which would include not only Egyptian and Jordanian acceptance of masses of Palestinian refugees, but also Israeli abandonment of the Gaza Strip, the central heavily Arab areas of the West Bank. The article began as follows, in language formerly almost never heard on the right.

“The Jewish majority between the Jordan and the sea is disappearing day by day, and without an absolute Jewish majority the State of Israel will not be able to survive for long. Security for an absolute Jewish majority is a crucial foundation for any plan…”

Harel concluded by rejecting transfer as impossible and by emphasizing that “every solution [to the Palestinian problem], that does not guarantee a Jewish majority in the Land of Israel is no solution.”

Contemporary immigration figures to 2006 are here. There’s a definite drop off in recent years.

January 21, 2009December 12, 2020

Ban ki Moon admonishes, Israel skulks

UN bombed with white phosphorus Beit Lahia Gaza

Israel received stern words from UN leader Ban Ki Moon who was outraged at the firing on the UN at Beit Lahia.

“I have seen only a fraction of the destruction. This is shocking and alarming,” Ban said, condemning an “excessive use” of force by Israel as well as Hamas’s rocket fire into Israel.

“These are heartbreaking scenes I have seen and I am deeply grieved by what I have seen today,” he told a news conference held against a backdrop of still smoldering food aid in a U.N. warehouse set ablaze by Israeli gunfire last Thursday.

Ban particularly deplored the attack on the UN warehouse:

“It is particularly significant for a secretary-general of the UN to stand in front of this bomb site of the UN compound,” he said.

“I am just appalled and not able to describe how I am feeling having seen this … it’s an outrageous and totally unacceptable attack against the UN. I have protested many times, and I protest again in the strongest terms.”

Ban called for a “full investigation” into the incident to make those responsible for the attack “accountable”.

Despite UN demands, Israel is not allowing supplies with construction materials through, only food and medicine aid – is this a sign that their immoral collective punishment of Gaza’s civilian population is not yet over?

The Israeli exclusivist war machine has destroyed more than 4,000 buildings with over 20,000 severely damaged.
50,000 Gazans have been made homeless due to Israel’s aggression and 400,000 people are without running water.

@AJGaza The Israeli army says its troops have completed their pull-out from the #Gaza Strip.

Significant to Palestinian aspirations, in his inauguration speech Obama said:

“To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect.

“To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West – know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy.”

Let’s hope the Stalinist reprobates in the Israeli Knesset heed his advice.

While Ban calls for national unity between Palestinian groups, Hamas supporters are retaining the power of their democratic vote and are demanding UN recognition –

“The Hamas government was elected by popular vote,” one said. “We demand an end to double standards.”

The United Nations, with other key mediators in the Middle East, say they will only deal with Hamas if it recognizes Israel, renounces violence and accepts interim peace deals.

Photo Courtesy of Sameh Habeeb, Photojournalisht Gaza

Chances of recognition of the fascist Occupier entity are likely to be non-existent at this point, with 1350 dead and around 5000 people injured from Israel’s unprovoded attack on Gaza. With Israel’s timed withdrawal from Gaza, Hamas is claiming victory.

In blind stupidity and arrogance, the majority of Israelis believe the murder of innocent Palestinians and destruction of their dwellings and public buildings is a legitimate and necessary accompaniment to their government’s attempt to topple the democratically elected Hamas government and right wing Netanyahoo is leading in the electoral polls. Zionism however thrives on hatred and the illegitimate attack and murder by Israel is bound to increase animosity toward the oppressor.

The election of this expansionist hardline ethnic cleanser could prove disastrous for Palestinians – again. Akiva Eldar provides some interesting speculation on imminent change in US policy toward Israel:

Obama is surrounded by Jewish advisers who are very familiar with Israeli tricks and stalling tactics, especially when it comes to the settlements (have we mentioned “natural growth” yet?), but they would still want the new president to adopt the tradition of the “special relationship” with the Jewish state. Obama, however, has also been exposed to the school of thought, existing in both the administration and the American think tanks, that argues that the excessive closeness between the U.S. and Israel undermines America’s strategic interests in the Arab world.

Brent Scowcroft, one of the shapers of foreign policy under President George H.W. Bush, and according to Time magazine, a strong influence on Obama, has called for a fundamental restructuring of American policy in the Middle East. Scowcroft, who was the boss of the current (and incoming) defense secretary Robert Gates, and a friend of the new national security adviser, James Jones, is proposing that the “special relationship” be adjusted to a “natural relationship.” Perhaps such a change would be able to transform celebratory ceremonies into dry agreements.

How will AIPAC and the other gungho Jewish benefactors to US politicians react if Obama does alter US policy to Israel?

The Zionist enterprise’s military wing, the IDF, is investigating a reserve paratroop unit’s use of phosphorus shells in the incident.

According to senior army officers, the IDF used two phosphorus-based weapons in Gaza. One, the sources said, actually contains almost no phosphorus. These are simple smoke bombs – 155mm artillery shells – with a trace of phosphorus to ignite them.

Alkalai’s probe is thus focusing on the second type: phosphorus shells, either 81mm or 120mm, that are fired from mortar guns. About 200 such shells were fired during the recent fighting, and of these, according to the probe’s initial findings, almost 180 were fired at orchards in which gunmen and rocket-launching crews were taking cover.

The one problematic incident was the reserve paratroops brigade that fired about 20 such shells in a built-up area of Beit Lahiya. Many international organizations say phosphorus shells should not be used in heavily populated areas. The brigade’s officers, however, say the shells were fired only at places that had been positively identified as sources of enemy fire.

The 120mm shells, a recent acquisition, have a computerized targeting system attached to a GPS. Brigade commanders say they were very effective, but they were also responsible for two very serious mishaps: a strike on a UNRWA school that killed 42 Palestinians and a friendly fire incident that seriously wounded two officers.

Expect a duck and weave coverup – why were the shells authorised to be used in the first place at all?

Amnesty and Human Rights Watch have condemned the Israeli actions as war crimes:

Human rights group Amnesty International has accused Israel of war crimes, saying its use of white phosphorus munitions in densely populated areas of the Gaza Strip was indiscriminate and illegal.

The accusations from the London-based organisation came as the scale of the destruction caused by the Israeli assault on the Palestinian territory overwhelmed Gazans.

Amnesty is not the first group to accuse Israel of using white phosphorus.

Human Rights Watch made the accusation on January 10 and the UN has also said Israel used the munition during its offensive in Gaza.

Donatella Rovera, a researcher with Amnesty, said: “Such extensive use of this weapon in Gaza’s densely populated residential neighbourhoods is inherently indiscriminate.”

“Its repeated use in this manner, despite evidence of its indiscriminate effects and its toll on civilians, is a war crime,” she said.

Attorneys on behalf of Belgian and French nationals with relatives who were either wounded or killed in Gaza have petitioned a Belgian court to arrest Tipsy Livni for war crimes when she visits Brussels tomorrow.

In other war crimes news, there’s a new Israeli site listing the prospective war criminals and their misdeeds.

includes “arrest orders,” complete with pictures and personal details, for Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert,Livni, Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai, Public Security Minister Avi Dichter, National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi and his two predecessors, Dan Halutz and Moshe Ya’alon, former air force commander Eliezer Shkedy and others.

It also explains how to inform the International Criminal Court in The Hague of when the “suspects” are outside Israel, and hence vulnerable to arrest.

The first sign of hope and justice from Obama comes from the announcement that he has “ordered the U.S. government to suspend prosecutions of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay for 120 days.”

Israel must be judged at the International Criminal Court – Sign the Universal petition.

Francis A. Boyle called for an International War Crimes Tribunal three days after the commencement of Israel’s disgraceful slaughter.

The United Nations General Assembly must immediately establish an International Criminal Tribunal for Israel (ICTI) as a “subsidiary organ” under U.N. Charter Article 22. The ICTI would be organized along the lines of the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia (ICTY), which was established by the Security Council.

The purpose of the ICTI would be to investigate and prosecute Israeli war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide against the Peoples of Lebanon and Palestine–just as the ICTY did for the victims of international crimes committed by Serbia and the Milosevic Regime throughout the Balkans.

The establishment of ICTI would provide some small degree of justice to the victims of Israeli war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide against the Peoples of Lebanon and Palestine–just as the ICTY has done in the Balkans. Furthermore, the establishment of ICTI by the U.N. General Assembly would serve as a deterrent effect upon Israeli leaders such as Prime Minister Olmert, Foreign Minister Livni, Defense Minister Barak , Chief of Staff Ashkenazi and Israel’s other top generals that they will be prosecuted for their further infliction of international crimes upon the Lebanese and the Palestinians.

Without such a deterrent, Israel might be emboldened to attack Syria with the full support of the Likhudnik Bush Jr. Neoconservatives, who have always viewed Syria as “low-hanging fruit” ready to be taken out by means of their joint aggression. If Israel attacks Syria as it did when it invaded Lebanon in 1982, Iran has vowed to come to Syria’s defense.

And of course Israel and the Bush Jr administration very much want a pretext to attack Iran. This scenario could readily degenerate into World War III.

For the U.N. General Assembly to establish ICTI could stop the further development of this momentum towards a regional if not global catastrophe.

The US GIVES free fuel to the Israeli military worth $1.1b since 2004

Israel wanted a humanitarian crisis – Targeting civilians was a deliberate part of this bid to humiliate Hamas and the Palestinians, and pulverise Gaza into chaos

Audio: Abunimah, Finkelstein, Mearsheimer discuss Israel’s attacks on Gaza

In a desperate attempt to prevent their war criminals from being prosecuted, the IDF is censoring the names of battalion commanders involved in the attack on Gaza.

The IDF has also taken preliminary steps to defend military officers against legal charges abroad stemming from their involvement in Operation Cast Lead. The full names of battalion commanders involved in the fighting will be censored to prevent Israeli and international left-wing activists from attempting to try them for war crimes. The names of more senior officers cannot be redacted as their involvement and names have been reported by many media outlets.

Robert Fisk: So, I asked the UN secretary general, isn’t it time for a war crimes tribunal?

January 18, 2009December 12, 2020

Khuza’a Village & More Israeli War Crimes

From the Guardian, another Israeli war crime:

In testimony collected from residents of the village of Khuza’a by the Observer, it is claimed that Israeli soldiers entering the village:

• attempted to bulldoze houses with civilians inside;

• killed civilians trying to escape under the protection of white flags;

• opened fire on an ambulance attempting to reach the wounded;

• used indiscriminate force in a civilian area and fired white phosphorus shells.

If the allegations are upheld, all the incidents would constitute breaches of the Geneva conventions.

Previous war crimes are hotly denied by the hasbara machine:

The Israeli army announced yesterday that it was investigating “at the highest level” five other attacks against civilians in Gaza, involving two UN facilities and a hospital. It added that in all cases initial investigations suggested soldiers were responding to fire. “These claims of war crimes are not supported by the slightest piece of evidence,” said Yigal Palmor, an Israeli foreign ministry spokesman.

More evidence of white phosphorus illegally used on civilians:

Al Nasser ICU

January 16, 2009

Missiles believed to contain white phosphor were deployed by the Israeli military during this attack. International volunteers photographed a fist-sized lump of flaming material found on the ground next to a burnt-out home. It was still burning from the previous day.

The only way to extinguish it was to bury it, but it would instantly re-ignite if uncovered. It was giving off a thick grey smoke with a foul stench. Doctors at the Al Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, which received 50 casualties that day from Khoza’a, described serious chemical burns and victims being covered in a white powder which continued to burn them. Many people were also suffering from serious breathing difficulties after inhaling smoke emitted by this weapon.

Dr. Ahmed Almi, a member of the delegation of Egyptian doctors who finally gained entry to the strip to support Gazan hospitals during the crisis, outlined some of the most serious cases. Four of them died in the hospital after doctors battled to save them. He commented that some of the injuries were so horrific they must have been inflicted by abnormal munitions. He gave the example of a man who had been shot and sustained a small entry wound but massive exit wound, 40-50 cm wide. 13 people were killed overall during this incursion according to medical sources.

Before the Israeli war on Gaza began, volunteers here had been working with the farming community in Khoza’a, accompanying local farmers as they succeeded to access their land to plant winter wheat. The IOF had prevented them from reaching their fields, in some cases for over five years. Israeli soldiers shot at them, even during the ceasefire. The same ceasefire which Israel claims was broken by Palestinians. . – Photo & text courtesy of Rafahkid

Pictures taken by photographer Bruno Stevens in the aftermath show heavy damage – and still burning phosphorus. “What I can tell you is that many, many houses were shelled and that they used white phosphorus,” said Stevens yesterday, one of the first western journalists to get into Gaza. “It appears to have been indiscriminate.” Stevens added that homes near the village that had not been hit by shell fire had been set on fire.

The village of Khuza’a is around 500 metres from the border with Israel. According to B’Tselem, its field researcher in Gaza was contacted last Tuesday by resident Munir Shafik al-Najar, who said that Israeli bulldozers had begun destroying homes at 2.30am.

The stuff of nightmares – terror incarnate:

Marwan Abu Raeda, 40, a paramedic working for the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, said: “At 8am we received a phone call from Khuza’a. They told us about the injured woman. I went immediately. I was 60 or 70 metres away from the injured woman when the Israeli forces started to shoot at me.” As he drove into another street, he came under fire again. Twelve hours later, when Rawhiya was finally reached, she was dead.

Iman said she ended up in an area of rubble where a large group of people had sought cover in a deep hole among the debris of demolished houses. It is then, she says, that bulldozers began to push the rubble from each side. “They wanted to bury us alive,” she said.

There’s also evidence of other new weaponry being tested against Gazans including the GPS-guided mortar, GBU-39 [aka DIME] and the Spike, a weapons jointly developed by the U.S. Navy with Rafael, the Israel Armament Development Authority.

Khuza'a Village Massacre- White Phosphorus

“It was the hardest day of our lives”
7th January 2009

Update for Wednesday 14th January, 2009

In an escalation of the ground offensive in the south of the Gaza Strip, Israeli forces terrorised the population of Khoza’a, a small rural community east of Khan Younis. They entered the area at about 3.00am on the morning of Tuesday 13th January in an incursion lasting until Tuesday evening. This follows heavy missile strikes on Khoza’a in recent days, notably on Saturday 10th January.

According to a local municipality official, approximately 50 homes were bulldozed along with farmland, olive and citrus groves. The scent of lemons could faintly be determined whilst navigating the wreckage, emanating from so many mangled trees. A family explained how their home was demolished with them inside it. They sheltered in the basement as the upper storeys were destroyed. Later they realised the basement itself was being attacked and narrowly missed being crushed to death by escaping through a small hole in the debris.

Iman Al-Najar was with her family in their home when military D-9 bulldozers began to demolish it. They managed to escape and Iman then encouraged some of her neighbours to try to leave the vicinity. The group of women were instructed by Israeli soldiers to leave by a particular street. They had children with them and carried white flags, yet when they reached the street Israeli special forces concealed in a building opened fire on them and shot 50 year-old Rowhiya Al-Najar. The other women desperately tried to rescue her but the gunfire was too heavy and they had to flee for their lives. An ambulance was also prevented from reaching her and she bled to death in the street.

Meanwhile Iman and about 200 other residents whose homes had been destroyed had gathered near her uncle’s house which was protecting them to some degree from the shooting. However, this area in turn was also attacked. Iman described how the bulldozers began piling debris up around them, effectively creating a giant hole that they were standing in. They were literally about to be buried alive. By some miracle they managed to also escape from this situation by crawling on their hands and knees for about 150 metres. It was extremely difficult for them to move, especially with the injured and the elderly.

The terrified residents then sought sanctuary at a local UNRWA school. But when they got there missiles were being fired around it and they had to retreat. Finally they managed to leave the area entirely and walked several kilometres to where friends were able to pick them up. Iman’s 14 year-old brother Mohammed was missing for 12 hours and she feared he was dead. He had been detained by soldiers in a house along with a neighbour who had begged to be let out to find her children but was not allowed to do so. When the soldiers had shot Rowhiya Al-Najar, Mohammed said they had been singing and dancing and forced him to do the same. When he refused, they threatened to shoot him too.

“It was the hardest day of our lives,” repeated Iman over and over again. She had nothing left in the world but the clothes she was standing up in, but under the circumstances she was lucky to escape with her life. As in so many other parts of the Gaza Strip, the atrocities committed against civilians in Khoza’a amount to war crimes. – Photo & text courtesy of Rafahkid

While Israeli shill, Mark Regev bleats shallow, pernicious hasbara about Hamas being responsible for child deaths, ruling out any negotations with Hamas, Rabanovich attempts to pass off the carnage in Gaza as a defeat of Iran (Sunnis and Shias must be getting on better these days) and a flock of other hasbaraniks whine about Hamas using human shields, a vacuous canard given the population density in Gaza, Paul Canning points out:

It’s worth noting the following: the Israeli Supreme Court has ruled against the use of Human Shields by the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) in 2005. This ruling was appealed.

And it’s still happening: Israel Uses Gazans as Human Shields.

Hamas has decided to offer its own unilateral truce – for a week.

The group said the ceasefire would be temporary unless Israel also stopped military action, ended its blockade of the Gaza Strip and opened border crossings between Gaza and Israel.

Other armed Palestinian factions have concurred.

“During this period, the resistance is ready to respond to all efforts by the Egyptians, Turks, Syrians and Arabs that will allow for a total withdrawal of Israeli soldiers and the total opening of border crossings.”

Israel has indicated it will maintain a military presence until there are no rockets fired from Gaza, meaning troops could be a fixture at Israel’s leisure.

Doctors are concerned about injuries in the wounded which have not been seen before.

Dr Fosse said he had seen a number of patients with extensive injuries to their lower bodies. “It was as if they had stepped on a mine, but there was no shrapnel in the wounds,” he said. “Some had lost their legs. It looked as though they had been sliced off. I have been to war zones for 30 years, but I have never seen such injuries before.” However, the injuries matched photographs and descriptions in medical literature of the effects of Dime bombs.

….

While the loudest controversy has been over accusations that white phosphorus was illegally used, other foreign doctors working in Gaza have reported injuries they cannot explain. Professor Mohammed Sayed Khalifa, a cardiac consultant from Sudan, said that two of his patients had had uncontrollable bleeding. “One had a chest operation, and continued bleeding even after having been given large quantities of plasma,” he said. “The other had what seemed to be a minor leg injury, but collapsed with profuse bleeding. Something was interfering with the clotting process. I have never seen such a thing before.”

Dr Ahmed Almi, an Egyptian cardio-thoracic consultant at al-Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in southern Gaza, said he had seen a number of patients with inexplicable injuries. A boy of 14 had a small puncture wound in his head, but extensive damage to his brain, making it impossible to save his life. “I don’t know the nature or type of these weapons that make a very small [entry wound] and go on and make massive destruction in the tissues,” he said.

Israeli military representatives have refused to confirm or deny using specific weapons, but insist that all Israel’s weapons comply with international law. Neither white phosphorus nor Dime bombs are illegal, but campaigners say the way they have been used, especially in Gaza’s densely packed urban areas, could constitute a war crime.

Maxwell Gaylard, former Australian diplomat and UN representative issues a helpful description, rejected naturally by the Israelis, of the treachery of Israel under last year’s truce.

“The Israelis would not let us facilitate a regular and sufficient flow of supplies into the strip,” Mr Gaylard, the most senior representative of the UN office that deals with the peace process, told The Age.

…

When Israel launched its surprise attack on Gaza, Mr Gaylard said the UN’s massive warehouses there were nearly empty, with all food and equipment sitting in nearby port facilities.

“The food was in Israel, but we couldn’t get it in,” Mr Gaylard said. “This is before. The blockade was very tight.”

The Age appears to have a case of hasbara plague as it states:

According to Hamas, in return for stopping the rocket fire Israel had promised to ease its blockade of Gaza and allow the passage of more food and commercial supplies.

Had the journalist done his homework, he would have known the terms of the truce specifically stated Israel *would* remove its disgraceful blockade constituting collective punishment of 1.5 million Gazan residents, if the rockets stopped. During the final three months of the truce there were barely any rockets fired, so one can understand Hamas’ unwillingness to back down at this juncture.

Hamas of course was not to know of Israel’s determination to prosecute a carefully timed massacre regardless, in a fiendish plan formulated prior to the commencement of the truce.

According to Mearsheimer:

Israeli leaders disliked the ceasefire from the start, and Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the IDF to begin preparing for the present war while the ceasefire was being negotiated in June 2008. Furthermore, Dan Gillerman, Israel’s former ambassador to the UN, reports that Jerusalem began to prepare the propaganda campaign to sell the present war months before the conflict began. For its part, Hamas drastically reduced the number of missile attacks during the first five months of the ceasefire. A total of two rockets were fired into Israel during September and October, none by Hamas.

Gaylard expands on this:

“The expectation on the Gazan side … was that more supplies would be allowed in, and it didn’t happen,” Mr Gaylard said.

“In fact, we noticed, I think from June 19 for the next four or five months, or up to even December 19, less of our supplies and spare parts and items of equipment, less got in than before June 19.”

Mr Gaylard slammed Israel’s siege policy towards Gaza, saying it had strengthened Hamas.

“It’s difficult to understand the mentality of firing these rockets … it is equally hard to understand why the Israelis are strangling this place.

“It is to cause Hamas to fall, but my experience of the last year of going in and out of Gaza and staying there was that it had exactly the opposite effect.”

Gaylard also criticises the Israelis’ disingenuous accusation of Hamas using civilians as human shields:

“Everyone is packed in there. So if you attack militants or installations in that area, you are going to cause collateral damage.

“One of the fundamental points about the strip … is that it’s probably the only place in the world that I can think of where you cannot as a civilian flee the conflict.”

Significantly, Gaylard highlights realities on the ground – that a two state solution is becoming less popular as a ‘solution’ to conflict. We agree with his assessment – a pluralistic democracy with mixed ethnicity and equal rights for all would increase societal health and decrease regional animosity.

As for the long-term goal of resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Mr Gaylard said that while the international community remained in favour of a two-state solution to the conflict, a growing number of Palestinians now preferred the idea of one democratic state including the land’s Jews and Arabs.

He urged the international community to put more pressure on Israel to stop the growth of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, which he said Israel had pledged to do several times, most recently at the Annapolis Middle East peace conference in 2007.

“Palestinians are trying to meet their part of it … security has improved in these key West Bank towns. Meanwhile, (in) the settlements, I don’t see any change,” Mr Gaylard said.

The Israelis are unlikely to move on settlements or other issues before testing their considerable malign influence on the incoming US executive.

Mr Palmor said it was unhelpful to single out the problem of settlements.

“We are trying to conclude a global solution to the conflict, one that will resolve all the issues, including security, refugees, land and settlements.”

Global solution sounds ominous – what on earth is he talking about?

The Boycott Israeli Apartheid movement is kicking off, with Hertz insisting on withdrawal of offers of free car hire in conjunction with El Al flights. Additionally –

Several companies who do business with Israel are facing boycotts. “Emails are being circulated alerting people about which companies to boycott,” said Inayat Bunglawala, from the British Muslim organisation ENGAGE.

In South Africa, MPs cornered the Israeli ambassador with

a severe tongue-lashing, accusing his government of perpetrating “racist” abuses against the Palestinian people “that make apartheid look like a Sunday school picnic”.

And as the war in Gaza rages for its fourth week, Cosatu has called for the Israeli ambassador to be “kicked out” of South Africa, for the embassy to be “shut down,” for a “total boycott of Israeli goods” and for the “savage rule of Zionism over the Palestinian territories to come to and end”.

A red-faced and clearly agitated Segev-Steinberg dismissed apartheid comparisons as “rubbish,” but the National Assembly’s foreign affairs committee chairperson, Job Sithole, was unrelenting in his condemnation of the Israeli government and its armed forces.

“When Palestinians have to go through checkpoints like cattle through a dip, this is apartheid. When they cannot drive on the roads by virtue of the fact that they are Palestinian, this is apartheid,” the chairperson insisted.

He was supported by ANC MP Patrick Sibande, who, in an angry tirade against the ambassador, accused the Israeli government of an “ethnic cleansing” programme against Palestinians.

…

ANC MP Albertinah Luthuli, granddaughter of the late ANC leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Albert Luthuli, also slammed the ambassador for his government’s refusal to allow international journalists into the Gaza Strip.

January 18, 2009December 12, 2020

Why do They Hate the US? Duh!

Condi really has no idea at all. Gaza is trivialised, reduced to a kindergarten slave state, its democratically elected government defined as a coup. The clinical ignorance of this woman is appalling.

Surely she can’t be this thick – do the Israelis feed their US accomplices something that blinds them from reality?

Israel and the US have concluded a unilateral cease fire which is meaningless without agreement from Hamas, no matter how much they might like to think they have marginalised them.

Basically this ‘cease fire’ means that Israel can swoop down from its Mordor like country and bomb, assassinate and the rest of its tricks at its leisure. Same old scenario as before the carnage – low intensity terrorism.

There can be only ONE Pharaoh. And when were Pharaohs ever dragged up to answer for their misdeeds at a war crimes trial?