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Yahoo: Israel vows no let-up, Hamas defiant, as Gaza toll tops 120


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http://news.yahoo.com/israel-vows-no-let-hamas-defiant-gaza-toll-082400269.html;_ylt=A0LEV04ABMFT_DEAh91XNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTEzZWpvaDloBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMQRjb2xvA2JmMQR2dGlkA1ZJUDMxOV8x

Israel vows no let-up, Hamas defiant, as Gaza toll tops 120

 

Israel pounded Gaza for a fifth day Saturday as it vowed no let-up in its air campaign to halt rocket attacks by militants which has killed more than 120 Palestinians.

 

A defiant Hamas fired five more rockets into Israel as the Islamist movement rejected growing international calls for a halt to hostilities, insisting Israel must act first.

 

Diplomatic efforts to stop the violence saw US President Barack Obama telephoning Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Washington offering to use its relationships in the Middle East to bring about a return to calm.

 

But speaking at a news conference in Tel Aviv on Friday, Netanyahu said he would not end the military campaign until he achieved his goal of stopping the Hamas fire and preparations gathered pace for a possible ground assault.

 

"No international pressure will prevent us from striking, with all force, against the terrorist organisation which calls for our destruction," he said.

 

"No terrorist target in Gaza is immune."

 

Despite international concern, truce efforts have been unsuccessful, according to Egypt, which has been key in mediating previous ceasefires between Hamas and Israel.

 

"Egypt has communicated with all sides to halt violence against civilians and called on them to continue with the truce agreement signed in November 2012," the foreign ministry said.

 

"Unfortunately, these efforts... have met with stubbornness."

 

https://now.mmedia.me/lb/en/mena/555431-britain-extremely-concerned-by-gaza-deaths

Britain "extremely concerned" by Gaza deaths

 

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said on Saturday he was "extremely concerned" about the loss of life in Gaza, where five days of Israeli air strikes have killed more than 120 Palestinians.

 

"Extremely concerned about humanitarian situation and loss of life in Gaza. Speaking to President Abbas today," Hague said on Twitter.

 

The Foreign Office confirmed the tweet and said that a fuller statement would be issued later.

 

Hague's statement represents a departure from the British government stance so far which has unequivocally backed Israel's right to launch air strikes in response to rocket attacks by Hamas militants based in Gaza.

 

British Prime Minister David Cameron on Wednesday spoke to Israeli president Benjamin Netanyahu to show "staunch support" and "underlined Israel’s right to defend itself from them," his Downing Street office said.

 

Israel has vowed no let-up in its air campaign to halt the rocket attacks, while a defiant Hamas has rejected international calls to halt hostilities, insisting Israel must act first.

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Read this from Andrew Sullivan Thursday (I normally don't post oped/blogger stuff but I dig Sullivan, ever since his coverage of Iran's Green Revolution five years ago. Just outstanding. And iirc got turned on there by SHF posting links here.) But yeah:

http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2014/07/11/the-revenge-doctrine-ctd-2/

The Revenge Doctrine, Ctd

JUL 11 2014 @ 12:20PM

J.J. Goldberg reveals that the official story of what happened after those three Israeli yeshiva students were kidnapped is more hasbara than fact:

Once the boys’ disappearance was known, troops began a massive, 18-day search-and-rescue operation, entering thousands of homes, arresting and interrogating hundreds of individuals, racing against the clock. Only on July 1, after the boys’ bodies were found, did the truth come out: The government had known almost from the beginning that the boys were dead. It maintained the fiction that it hoped to find them alive as a pretext to dismantle Hamas’ West Bank operations.

What more do you need to know about the bigotry, callousness and hubris of Netanyahu? Well, this, maybe:

It was clear from the beginning that the kidnappers weren’t acting on orders from Hamas leadership in Gaza or Damascus. Hamas’ Hebron branch — more a crime family than a clandestine organization — had a history of acting without the leaders’ knowledge, sometimes against their interests. Yet Netanyahu repeatedly insisted Hamas was responsible for the crime and would pay for it.

So Netanyahu knew that the kidnapping wasn’t by Hamas proper, insisted that it was anyway, withheld the truth about the boys’ deaths in order to sustain a massive process of collective punishment of Palestinians in the West Bank, and then unleashed yet another brutal, lop-sided pulverization of Gaza. This is not a rational regime; and it is not a civilized government. J.J. Goldberg notes the Israeli military’s profound ambivalence about where Netanyahu is taking the country, along with the religious fanatics and racist haters who propel him forward.

And yes, yes, and yes again to the notion that Hamas should not be firing rockets into Israel at all, let alone at civilians directly, even though they have incurred no casualties and have bounced off the Iron Dome when they encroached too far into Israel proper. But in this instance, there is no equivalence. One side deliberately and deceptively instigated absolutely unjustified collective punishment of an entire population, and pre-meditatedly whipped up nationalistic and racist elements to back them up. They then went on to bombard Gaza – and many civilians – into another submission – after a period of relative calm and peace. The result is another disproportionate slaughter: around 100 Palestinians dead so far, and no Israelis. If you see nothing wrong with this, your moral compass is out of whack.

Meanwhile, Obama and other world leaders have offered to broker a ceasefire, but Netanyahu has made it clear he’s not interested. An unnamed Israeli official tells Raphael Ahren that the goal of the bombardment this time is to permanently dismantle Hamas’s ability to strike Israel (didn’t they say the same thing last time?):

“It is quite possible that Hamas would agree to an immediate ceasefire — we’re hitting them hard, they want the situation to cool down,” the senior official told The Times of Israel, speaking on condition of anonymity. Brokering a ceasefire with Hamas would have been possible a week or a two ago, but an agreement that would leave in place the group’s offensive capacities not what Israel wants, the official said.

“Today, we’re not interested in a Band-Aid. We don’t want to give Hamas just a timeout to rest, regroup and recharge batteries, and then next week or in two weeks they start again to shoot rockets at Israel. Such a quick-fix solution is not something we’re interested in.” While refusing to discuss concrete steps the Israel Defense Forces plan to take in the coming hours and days, the official said that the government is discussing a ground invasion of Gaza “very seriously.”

Robert Naiman wants more US pressure on Israel to end the escalation:

The United States government has many levers on Netanyahu. Of course the U.S. gives Netanyahu billions of U.S. taxpayers’ dollars a year, but while it would be politically difficult (to put it mildly) to cut off U.S. military aid – the Obama Administration could not bring itself to cut off military aid to the Egyptian military coup, even when clearly required to do so by U.S. law – the Administration has many other, more subtle levers on Netanyahu that it could deploy without giving AIPAC, the ADL and their allies a convenient target for counterattack. The Administration could raise the volume of its public criticism of Netanyahu. The Administration could let it be known that it might refrain from vetoing a U.N. resolution that condemned Netanyahu. The Administration could “leak” that it is deepening efforts to engage Hamas politically, then issue a non-denial denial when these efforts are criticized. The Administration knows full well that it has all these levers and more. All it lacks is sufficient public political pressure to use them to force an end to the killing.

Au contraire. Most of the political pressure will come from those defending this latest slaughter built on a knowingly false pretext. Know despair.

Update from a reader:

I’m an American currently spending the month in West Jerusalem with my family. Look: I’m no fan of Netanyahu or the current right-wing coalition here. I’m still trying to understand the implications of the government’s withholding of the information that the three teenagers were likely killed immediately after abduction. But when you say that the rocket fire from Gaza has caused “no casualties” in Israel, this is untrue. For example:

Following a barrage of rocket fire targeting southern Israeli cities, a rocket launched from Gaza hit a fuel tank near a gas station in Ashdod, causing severe damage and a fire. One person was critically injured by the strike, while seven other Israelis were lightly injured, according to Magen David Adom.

Granted the level of casualties is far lower than what we’re seeing on the Palestinian side, but it’s not “no casualties” on the Israeli side.

And when you say that rockets “bounced off the Iron Dome”, you are wrong both figuratively and literally. Iron Dome only intercepts rockets bound for populated areas; all the rest it lets go. It has an astonishing 90% success rate at interceptions, but even so that means 10% are getting through to cause damage.

Even when the rockets fall harmlessly, they trigger sirens and send thousands of civilians running for cover. We see relatively few rockets launched toward Jerusalem, but I’ve had to drop everything and run with my family to shelter several times in the past week. It’s nerve-wracking. I can’t imagine how bad life is for civilians in Gaza right now.

Links for the various quotes at the link...

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WasAs always, it's a mixed story. I spoke to someone on Jaffa this week who claimed that the government knew and put out a gag order on the teens. I also spoke to a guy who served at the UN and repped Israel as a diplomat in the US and Japan who denied it. He said it was likely Officials strongly suspected they were dead, but didn't have absolute truth.

He also said that calls for a ceasefire by Israel were completely dismissed and the 200 rockets launched into Israel was the bigger catalyst.

One thing I noted yesterday. Russia filed a formal complaint and warned of retaliation after a single shell fell into her territory from Ukraine. One she'll is intolerable but 100's of missile is fine, right?

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WasAs always, it's a mixed story. I spoke to someone on Jaffa this week who claimed that the government knew and put out a gag order on the teens. I also spoke to a guy who served at the UN and repped Israel as a diplomat in the US and Japan who denied it. He said it was likely Officials strongly suspected they were dead, but didn't have absolute truth.

He also said that calls for a ceasefire by Israel were completely dismissed and the 200 rockets launched into Israel was the bigger catalyst.

One thing I noted yesterday. Russia filed a formal complaint and warned of retaliation after a single shell fell into her territory from Ukraine. One she'll is intolerable but 100's of missile is fine, right?

I'm not quite sure of the timeline on this whole thing, but from what I recall the youths disappeared, Israel started arrested tons of people, then at least one Palestinian youth was killed in a revenge killing by settlers, the bodies of the Israeli youths turned up, and Israel started bombing Palestine. Then Hamas and others started firing of 50 million rockets hoping to do some damage in return,

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If you don't care about it which is understandable then why post in the thread? People with families there aren't yawning i can assure you that.

Because it's the same story every 10-14 months. And nothing ever gets accomplished. This will quiet down it a month or two and then a year from now, it will start up again.

Neither side wants peace because it's too profitable to maintain constant war

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NBC had two reporters live from the scene. One in Israel with a sport coat and the other on the Palestinian side wearing riot gear and a helmet

120 plus dead on one side, none on the other

Israel must protect herself indeed

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NBC had two reporters live from the scene. One in Israel with a sport coat and the other on the Palestinian side wearing riot gear and a helmet

120 plus dead on one side, none on the other

Israel must protect herself indeed

I'm not going to blame Israel for being more effective.

I'm also not going to ignore the multitude of Palestinian attacks just because they suck at it.

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NBC had two reporters live from the scene. One in Israel with a sport coat and the other on the Palestinian side wearing riot gear and a helmet

120 plus dead on one side, none on the other

Israel must protect herself indeed

I hear ya, but I've never bought the proportionality argument. If someone shoots at me with the intent to kill me that counts. Hamas over the last three days fired more than 450 rockets. Many missed some were iron domed.

I don't know that I agree with this kind of bombardment even if they are trying to minimize casualties by announcing which buildings they're about to bomb in advance. I particularly don't support any ground operation, but the idea that Israel shouldn't respond to literally hundreds of rocket attacks is baffling.

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NBC had two reporters live from the scene. One in Israel with a sport coat and the other on the Palestinian side wearing riot gear and a helmet

120 plus dead on one side, none on the other

Israel must protect herself indeed

 

I seem to recall three bodies 

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I hear ya, but I've never bought the proportionality argument. If someone shoots at me with the intent to kill me that counts. Hamas over the last three days fired more than 450 rockets. Many missed some were iron domed.

I don't know that I agree with this kind of bombardment even if they are trying to minimize casualties by announcing which buildings they're about to bomb in advance. I particularly don't support any ground operation, but the idea that Israel shouldn't respond to literally hundreds of rocket attacks is baffling.

Those rockets are response to Israeli bombing which has so far killed over 150 people. All in response to 3 settlers being killed by unknown people. So Israel created this situation where those rockets are being shot. What should Palestinians do? Roll over and die?

If Israel stopped colonizing and oppressing the Palestinian people the situation would be entirely different, its like blaming the ANC and black South Africans for resisting apartheid. You are ignoring the larger power dynamics and the situation that spurred those rockets.

Indiscriminate rocket fire is terrible but do Palestinians have other options? They tried negotiation and ceasefire and they were "rewarded" with an invasion and 850 civilian deaths through Operation Cast Lead. Non-violent resistance hasn't worked and neither has violent resistance but I can understand the choice. There was violence from the ANC, from the groups supporting Ghandi in the Indian independence movement, there was violence during the civil rights movement (or the threat of violence, the fact is often times the only thing to change a more powerful party or groups stance or to gain freedom is through a violent response. 

 

Also if you look at the Palestine Papers where the Israelis were given basically everything they wanted and still rejected it. The fact of the matter is that one side is a colonizing power that is in total control of the violence and oppression. The fact is one side has not acted in good faith and continues to oppress the other, until that ends there won't be an end to violence, unfortunately.

Killing 150+ over unproven allegations of Hamas involvement in the kidnapping and murder of 3 Israeli settlers isn't proportionality or a response its simply an excuse to continue oppression and destruction of the Palestinian people. 

 

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Why the kidnapping of 3 teenagers made international news is beyond me.

 

Oh, no it isn't. It was the first piece of the propaganda machine to get started to justify an invasion and further colonization of Gaza by Netenyahu (who has no interest in peace at all, and who I put 100% blame for this on. Most Israel's and Jews I have spoken with are opposed to this operation) 

 

The thugs who killed those teens should have been found (the Mossad would have no problem with this considering how many sources they have in Gaza), tried and jailed.

 

Instead we now have another step in the process of annihilation. 

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Probably because I'm naive and I don't know nearly as much about the conflict, and the people fighting it, but I just can't understand why a Palestinian State and a Jewish State can't co-exist. Does the hatred run so deep that both sides won't stop until the other is completely annihilated? 

 

Also, from what I understand, your every day Israeli doesn't hold that much ill will toward Arabs and vice versa. Is this just a loud, powerful minority that's causing all this bloodshed? 

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The debate always boils down to "who started it, and why should xxxx stop instead of retaliate".

Always

 

I often wonder if this is what my parents went through, when my brothers and I were fighting. 

 

"Well, he started it"

"Yeah, but he . . . "

"But that was because he . . . " 

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I seem to recall three bodies

And one murdered Palestinian in retaliation, burned alive I believe, plus his American cousin was beaten and jailed by Israeli police. Does that mean Palestine and the US are justified to start bombing campaigns or is three a magic number?

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According to the Israeli I interviewed this week, prior to the Israeli attack there were more than 200 missile attacks. It was Hamas' refusal for a ceasefire more than the three teenagers.

The monstrous killing of the three as well as the equally monstrous killing of the Palestinian teen as some kind of misplaced Hamirabi logic was tragic, but not the key catalyst.

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And one murdered Palestinian in retaliation, burned alive I believe, plus his American cousin was beaten and jailed by Israeli police. Does that mean Palestine and the US are justified to start bombing campaigns or is three a magic number?

 

some people consider it one, but I'm not into that  :) ...none seemed in error

 

everything is justifiable

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