Israel

The Tragedy of Gaza
By Diana Mukkaled | Asharq Al Awsat.com

I, like many others, watched helplessly as the bodies of "Jawaher" and "Dina" and "Samar" and "Ikram" and "Tahrir" were carried out of their destroyed house in "Block 5" of the Jabalya Refugee Camp in the Gaza Strip. The five sisters were killed in their sleep after an Israeli missile struck a mosque adjacent to their house. Their small bodies covered in dust and stone, the cries of their bereaved parents, the shock of their surviving siblings; all of this continues to reverberate painfully in the imagination. But does pain still have the same meaning or significance during this time of great despair and useless anger?

WARNING: GRAPHIC PIC INSIDE

Obama and Gaza: Exiting the Vortex of Violence
By Bernard Weiner | The Crisis Papers

One definition of mental disease is when someone repeats the same
counter-productive behavior again and again and again and expects different results.
Which brings us to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

This time it's centered in Gaza, but the ramifications threaten to engulf
much of the Arab Middle East, and Iran, and possibly beyond the region.

Each side believes that with just a bit more violent pressure, one more
attack, one more mass bombing, one more unleashing of the dogs of war, the other
side will bend to its will.

In effect, each side is acting out of a belief that it can make The Other
simply disappear. The Palestinians, many Israelis want to believe, will migrate

Phyllis Bennis' Letter to the Editor of the NYTimes:

To the Editor:

I believe the Israeli airstrikes are clear violations of international humanitarian law. While the Palestinian rocket fire against civilian targets in Israel may be illegal, that does not give Israel the right to violate the Geneva Conventions. The airstrikes represent:

If you're a Member of Congress, and your name doesn't happen to be Dennis J. Kucinich, can you still speak out in opposition to the carnage that President Bush and Secretary of State Rice are actively promoting in Gaza?

Yes, you can!

There are two key issues. Should the U.S. support an immediate ceasefire (international opinion) or should the U.S. insist that the violence continue (Bush Administration position.) Should the blockade on Gaza end (international opinion) or should it continue (Bush Administration position.) Of course, the blockade is also an act of war.

J Street reports (emphasis mine):

Congresswoman Donna F. Edwards (Jan. 2): "the United States must work actively for an immediate ceasefire that ends the violence, stops the rockets, and removes the blockade of Gaza."

Congressman Joe Sestak (Jan. 2):

Global Human Rights Groups Protest Slaughter in Gaza
by Stephen Lendman

On June 16, 2008, noted Israeli historian Ilan Pappe explained "The Israeli Recipe for 2008: Genocide in Gaza, Ethnic Cleaning in the West Bank." He wrote:

"Not long ago, I claimed that Israel is employing genocidal policies in the Gaza Strip." After re-thinking this highly-charged term, he "concluded with even stronger conviction: it is the only appropriate way to describe what the Israeli army is doing in Gaza" because of its repeated atrocities now greater than ever.

"It's Hell in Here" "They are Bombing 1.5 million People in a Cage" by Juan Cole | Informed Consent.com | Submitted by Michael Munk | www.MichaelMunk.com

CBS News broadcasts an interview with a Norwegian physician on the scene in Gaza. More

Understanding the Gaza Catastrophe
by Richard Falk, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Palestinian Territories | HuffingtonPost.com | Submitted by Michael Munk | www.MichaelMunk.com

Understanding the Gaza Catastrophe
For eighteen months the entire 1.5 million people of Gaza experienced a punishing blockade imposed by Israel, and a variety of traumatizing challenges to the normalcy of daily life. A flicker of hope emerged some six months ago when an Egyptian arranged truce produced an effective ceasefire that cut Israeli casualties to zero despite the cross-border periodic firing of homemade rockets that fell harmlessly on nearby Israeli territory, and undoubtedly caused anxiety in the border town of Sderot. During the ceasefire the Hamas leadership in Gaza repeatedly offered to extend the truce, even proposing a ten-year period and claimed a receptivity to a political solution based on acceptance of Israel's 1967 borders. Israel ignored these diplomatic initiatives, and failed to carry out its side of the ceasefire agreement that involved some easing of the blockade that had been restricting the entry to Gaza of food, medicine, and fuel to a trickle.

By Gareth Porter, IPS

WASHINGTON, Jan 5 (IPS) - Until mid-2007, there was a serious political obstacle to a massive conventional war by Israel against Hamas in Gaza: the fact that Hamas had won free and fair elections for the Palestinian parliament and was still the leading faction in a fully legitimate government.

But the George W. Bush administration helped Israel eliminate that obstacle by deliberately provoking Hamas to seize power in Gaza. That plan was aimed at getting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to dissolve the democratically elected Hamas government -- something Bush had tried unsuccessfully to do for many months.

Blaming the Victims - The Dominant Media Vilify Hamas
by Stephen Lendman

The blame game - no one plays it better than the dominant media, and they're at it again over Gaza. Expect no comments below in their spaces, yet honest journalism would headline them.

After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, Franklin Roosevelt addressed Congress - with an appropriating updating for Gaza:

December 27 "will live in infamy." The people of Gaza were "suddenly and deliberately attacked by....air forces of the" State of Israel. The "attack was deliberately planned many (months) ago. During the intervening time (Israel) deliberately sought to deceive (Palestinians) by false statements and expressions of hope for" the peace process.

"The (weekend and continued) attack(s) caused severe damage to" property throughout Gaza. In addition, "many (Palestinian) lives have been lost. The facts (on the ground) speak for themselves....this "unprovoked and dastardly attack" must not go unanswered.

GENEVA (AFP) — Israel deliberately targeted Hamas-run media installations in its bombing campaign on Gaza and is practising media censorship, a journalist rights group said Monday.

The installations in question include Al-Aqsa television, Al-Resalah newspaper and Sawt Al-Aqsa radio, which the Israeli army bombed on December 28 and over the weekend respectively, the Geneva-based Press Emblem Campaign said in a statement, citing a Palestinian media non-governmental group.

The press group, which fights for better protection of journalists in conflict zones, also condemned the recent deaths of two journalists as a result of Israeli attacks.

"Two Palestinian journalists were killed one in previous attacks by Israel, photographer Hamza Shahin,who died on 26 December 2008, and another during the current military round on 3 January, Omar Silawi.

Iranian TV newsman arrested for reporting on IDF's entry into Gaza
By Jonathan Lis and Gili Izikovich | Haaretz

An Iranian television reporter was arrested by Israeli authorities on Monday for a dispatch which broadcast news of the Israel Defense Forces' entry into the Gaza Strip.

The journalist is alleged to have violated military censorship laws which forbade the news media from releasing information during the initial stages of the ground incursion.

By Times of London

Photos here.

Israel is believed to be using controversial white phosphorus shells to screen its assault on the heavily populated Gaza Strip yesterday. The weapon, used by British and US forces in Iraq, can cause horrific burns but is not illegal if used as a smokescreen.

Molten Lead in Gaza
By URI AVNERY, CounterPunch

JUST AFTER MIDNIGHT, Aljazeera’s Arabic channel was reporting on events in Gaza. Suddenly the camera was pointing upwards towards the dark sky. The screen was pitch black. Nothing could be seen, but there was a sound to be heard: the noise of airplanes, a frightening, a terrifying droning.

It was impossible not to think about the tens of thousands of Gazan children who were hearing that sound at that moment, cringing with fright, paralyzed by fear, waiting for the bombs to fall.

* * *

“ISRAEL MUST defend itself against the rockets that are terrorizing our Southern towns,” the Israeli spokesmen explained. “Palestinians must respond to the killing of their fighters inside the Gaza Strip,” the Hamas spokesmen declared.

By Press TV

Medics tell Press TV they have found traces of depleted uranium in some Gaza residents wounded in Israel's ground offensive on the strip.

Norwegian medics told Press TV correspondent Akram al-Sattari that some of the victims who have been wounded since Israel began its attacks on the Gaza Strip on December 27 have traces of depleted uranium in their bodies.

The report comes after Israeli tanks and troops swept across the border into Gaza on Saturday night, opening a ground operation after eight days of intensive attacks by Israeli air and naval forces on the impoverished region.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak warned on Sunday that the wide-ranging ground offensive in the Gaza Strip would be "full of surprises."

A ground offensive in the densely-populated Gaza is expected to drastically increase the death toll of the civilian population.

By Richard Falk, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Palestinian Territories, Huffington Post

Envoy Insists 'No Point' in Security Council Calling for End to Gaza Violence
By AntiWar.com

For the second time in four days, the United States has quashed an attempted United Nations Security Council resolution calling for an immediate end to the war in the Gaza Strip. After the latest rejection, US envoy Alejandro Wolff declared that there was “no point” in the statement, because Hamas (who has previously suggested openness to a ceasefire) would never abide by it. Wolff added that it was unacceptable for the council to equate the killing of civilians by the Israeli government with the killing of civilians by Hamas, and that “Israel’s self-defense is not negotiable.”

1. Summary

With the Gaza death toll exceeding 400, the Islamic Human Rights
Commission calls on campaigners to send letters to the President of the United Nations General Assembly, to urge the U.N. General Assembly to establish an International Criminal Tribunal for Israel (ICTI).

2. Background

After five days of consecutive bombardment of Gaza, and an
ever-increasing death toll, demonstrators all over the world are calling for an end to the massacre. Campaigners are urged to continue attending demonstrations and boycotting Israel, and are now asked to send letters to the President of the U.N. General Assembly, urging for the long-overdue establishment of an International Criminal Tribunal for Israel (ICTI), under U.N. Charter Article 22.

On the topic of Israel's current attack on Gaza, Archibishop Desmond
Tutu said on Sunday:

"In the context of total aerial supremacy, in which one side in a
conflict deploys lethal aircraft against opponents with no means of

by Linda Milazzo

I don't believe in god. I never have. I don't believe in religions. I study them, but I don't practice them. I try to understand them to be sensitive to the beliefs and traditions of others, and to attempt to appreciate the motivations behind religious thought and deed. But they are irrelevant to living my life.

Long ago as a freshman at CUNY's Queens College I was introduced to Taoism. Taoism began in ancient China as a religion, then morphed into a dogma free/deity free philosophy. Since my late teens I've tried hard to apply MY understanding of my Tao to my life. I have the freedom to choose my own path and not judge the paths of others. But since I have freedom of opinion, I fall prey to judge. I try not to. But I do.

Through the Tao, I'm both a peacemaker and a warrior since Taoism couples with the art of self-defense. I understand my right to protect myself when needed, and to protect the defenseless when they need me. Since I'm by nature protective, it suits my sensibilities to aid the weak, where I fancy myself absurdly as inordinately strong.

sent in by willyloman

By Associated Press

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Israeli tanks and infantry rolled into Gaza after nightfall Saturday, launching a ground offensive in a widening war against Hamas that the Israeli defense minister said "will not be easy and will not be short."

The ground operation was preceded by several hours of heavy artillery fire after dark, igniting flames in the night sky. Machine gun fire rattled as bright tracer rounds flashed through the darkness and the crash of hundreds of shells sent up streaks of fire.

Artillery fired illuminating rounds, sending streaks of bright light drifting down over Gaza's densely packed neighborhoods. Gunbattles could be heard, as troops crossed the border into Gaza, marching single file. They were backed by helicopter gunships and tanks.

By AFP

The United States gave Israel free reign Friday on whether to send troops into the Gaza Strip, insisting that the key to a ceasefire is an Israeli demand for Hamas to permanently halt rocket fire.

But the White House said it has asked Israel to try hard to avoid civilian casualties as reserves were called up for an expected ground incursion on top of a week of air strikes that has killed more than 400 Palestinians.

"We've been in regular contact with the Israelis," White House deputy press secretary Gordon Johndroe told reporters when asked if US officials were trying to prevent a possible ground offensive.

US officials have urged the Israelis "to be mindful that any of the actions that they're taking in Gaza avoid unnecessary civilian casualties and also to help continue with the flow of humanitarian goods," he said.

From: annas_peacework_palestine@yahoogroups.com:

Please, everyone, stop what you're doing. This is not just any report
from Palestine, but the worst in my lifetime, the worst in 40 years.
At this moment, Israel is raining bombs down on Gaza, an enclosed tiny area that is home to 1.5 million men, women, and children, most of them innocent civilians. This space is tightly sealed by Israel, which constantly denies Gazans electricity, food, medicine, and the ability to leave. Gaza is one big prison being bombed from above. The death toll is up to 428 in the past 7 days. That's more than the number of Israelis killed in the last 7 years. This is what I would call a massacre.

Yes, more Palestinians killed in 7 days than Israelis in 7 years, and
yet no comments from President Bush or President-elect Obama.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice places blame solely on Hamas for

It may well be that in denouncing "Israel's" attack on Gaza one, in an important way, unwittingly does a disservice to the cause of holding the Bush Administration accountable for its crimes.

Is there any doubt that the Bush Administration approved this assault? Is there any doubt that it could not have taken place without the Bush Administration's approval?

Is there any doubt that it could not continue without the support of the Bush Administration and the protective umbrella of its veto at the UN Security Council? Is there any doubt that it will stop the very day that the Bush Administration says that it must?

If so, is it in the interest of humanity that we Americans engage in the charade that the Israeli government is an autonomous actor in this matter?

All these observations are true in general, but we have plenty of specific evidence in this case.

By Cynthia McKinney

Yesterday, we met with the President of Lebanon, the Chief of the Military, and the Interior Minister who all thanked us for responding and risking our lives on a mission of mercy; we profusely thanked them for rescuing us.

What would we have done, stranded out at sea, prohibited from reaching our destination, low on fuel, with a badly damaged boat if Lebanon had not accepted us? Lebanon sent their ships to find us. Lebanon rescued us. Lebanon welcomed us. And we are truly thankful.

By Dave Lindorff

The deafening silence from American government officials and from the US media regarding the criminal Israeli assault against civilians in Israel’s ghetto of Gaza, where nearly 1.5 million Palestinians are trapped every bit as brutally as were the Jews of the Warsaw Ghetto, is beyond unconscionable.

` As Israeli shells and bombs and rockets rain down on university buildings, clearly marked ambulances, and homes, it has to be pointed out that much of the ammunition being used, as well as the planes that are delivering this death and mayhem, are provided by the United States and by American taxpayers—with no strings attached.

By Cynthia McKinney

Oh What a Day!

I'm so glad that my father told me to buy a special notebook and to write everything down because that's exactly what I did.

When we left from Cyprus, one reporter asked me "are you afraid?" And I had to respond that Malcolm X wasn't afraid; Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. wasn't afraid. But little did I know that just a few hours later, I would be recollecting my life and mentally preparing myself for death.

When we left Cyprus, the Mediterranean was beautiful. I remember the time when it might have been beautiful to look at, but it was also filthy. The Europeans have taken great strides to clean it up and yesterday, it was beautiful. And the way the sunlight hit the sea, I remember thinking to myself that's why they call it azure. It was the most beautiful blue.

But sometimes it was rough, and we got behind on our schedule. We stayed on course, however, despite the roughness of the water and due to our exquisite captain.

In response to mounting international pressure for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza and Israel, Secretary of State Rice is reportedly engaged in "furious telephone diplomacy with officials in the region, pressing them on the need for a 'durable and sustainable' cease-fire."

The Bush Administration is saying that they don't want an "immediate ceasefire," they want a ceasefire that has certain features, such as a permanent end to Hamas rocket attacks into Israel. This is also, of course, the Israeli position.

Meanwhile, Hamas also has issues with an "immediate ceasefire." They also want a ceasefire that has certain features, such as an end to the blockade of Gaza.

Israel, Hamas, and the Bush Administration all agree. They all want a ceasefire with certain conditions. They disagree on the conditions.

By Star-Bulletin

Demonstrators protesting Israel’s bombardment of the Gaza Strip tried to get President-elect Barack Obama’s attention this morning in Kailua.

About six demonstrators assembled near the security checkpoint fronting the entrance to the $9 million rental home where Obama and his family are staying. Some carried signs urging Obama to address U.S. foreign policy when he takes office.

Ann Wright, a retired Army colonel, wore a T-shirt that read: “We will not be silent” and carried a sign that read: “Change U.S. foreign policy. Yes we can.”

Wright, 62, of Honolulu, said the demonstrators represented various groups, including her organization Veterans for Peace.

Other signs read “War is Terror” and “Free Palestine.”