When terrorists disguise themselves as civilians, it can only end badly for civilians. Today, a senior Hamas operative was targeted while driving a press vehicle, effectively disguising himself as a reporter. By doing so, he risked the lives of all journalists in the Gaza Strip.
Over the past several days, the IDF has carefully pinpointed and targeted sites used by terror groups in the Gaza Strip, most notably the Hamas and the Islamic Jihad. Terrorists complicate the task by systematically using civilian facilities and locations as a cover for their operations.
The “human shield” method, as it is commonly known, has forced the IDF to target seemingly non-military targets, resulting in some of the civilian casualties. It has also endangered all residents of the Gaza Strip who, without their consent, were unwittingly dragged into the conflict.
One such example came in today, when a senior Hamas operative was targeted while driving a press vehicle. Muhammed Shamalah, commander of Hamas forces in the southern Strip and head of the Hamas militant training programs, was targeted by an Israeli air strike while driving a car clearly labelled “TV”, indicating it to be a press vehicle, abusing the protection afforded to journalists.
“There is a very effective anti-Israel propaganda machine and there has been for some time. It’s partly from the Palestinians, partly from other Arab states and many people in the West—from Europe in particular but also the United States—see Hamas as the underdog and Israel as the bully and their natural inclination is to side with the underdog; but it’s to misunderstand the reality: Hamas is not a small group of lone freedom fighters. Hamas is a terrorist organization supported, financed and directed by Iran. Israel on the other hand is not a bully. It has shown amazing restraint—far more restraint than most other countries would show in the face of this sort of provocation.”
"We are not the Goliath in this story, we are David up against Islamic fundamentalist terror supported by Iran. Support Israel and you support the democratic and humanist values of the free world.
Support our enemies and you undermine those very values and play into the hands of those who despise freedom and love."
Egypt intercepts 108 warheads from Libya to Sinai and Gaza
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Israel demands 15-year lull, Morsi guarantee
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Melanie Phillips: Yet more (real) news
Here’s yet more information about the war between Hamas and Israel that unaccountably you may not have come across in today’s UK mainstream media. Today’s entries are all for the Hall of Shame, which is getting mighty crowded.
"According to an insidious article he penned this week, Hamas is the victim of backwards-looking Western policy. Inverting cause and effect, Beinart asserts that Hamas is obstructionist and violent because it hasn't been fairly and properly "engaged." Poor Hamas, you see, has never been given an "incentive" to abide by a cease-fire."
"Hamas officials at the hospital were asked how firing rockets from such a built-up area could be justified as it is likely to provoke Israeli action. One said Palestinians were merely defending themselves, another that it was probably the work of the Islamic Jihad militia."
IDFBlog: Senior Terrorist in Gaza Disguises Himself as Journalist
"When terrorists disguise themselves as civilians, it can only end badly for civilians. Today, a senior Hamas operative was targeted while driving a press vehicle, effectively disguising himself as a reporter. By doing so, he risked the lives of all journalists in the Gaza Strip." [poster coming up -EoZ]
“So Gazans are an occupied people and have the right to resist, including by armed force (though not to target civilians), while Israel is an occupying power that has an obligation to withdraw – not a right to defend territories it controls or is colonising by dint of military power."
"Early in the construction, one of the Jewish contractors wrote in his memoirs, workers discovered buried human remains, apparently from an ancient section of the Mamilla Muslim cemetery across the road. Husseini (the Nazi, Mufti of Jerusalem) instructed the contractor to quickly and quietly rebury the bones lest his political rivals discover the desecration. But they did find out, and a nasty public relations and religious court battle ensued."
"None of them would refuse an opportunity to move to Israel, he said. Many Ethiopians see Israel as a land of plenty and a way out of Africa’s desperate poverty. For many, aliyah is the realization of a lifelong dream.“Every beginning is hard, but the hardship gets canceled out because of the happiness,” Bahta said. “You realized the dream. What, they shouldn’t come? There’s nothing like that. This will change their lives.”
Challah Hu Akbar grabbed the text of the cease-fire agreement that is supposed to be going into effect right about now:
Understanding Regarding Ceasefire in Gaza Strip
1. a. Israel shall stop all hostilities on the Gaza Strip land, sea and air including incursions and targeting of individuals.
b. All Palestinian factions shall stop all hostilities from the Gaza Strip against Israel, including rocket attacks, and attacks along the border
c. Opening the crossings and facilitating the movement of people and transfer of goods, and refraining from restricting residents free movement, and targeting residents in border areas and procedures of implementation shall be dealt with after 24 hours from the start of the ceasefire.
d. Other matters as maybe requested shall be addressed.
2. Implementation Mechanism:
a. Setting up of the zero hour for the Ceasefire Understanding to enter into effect.
b. Egypt shall receive assurances from each party that the party commit to what was agreed upon.
c. Each party shall commit itself not to perform any acts that would breach this understanding. In case of any observations, Egypt – as the sponsor of this understanding – shall be informed to follow up.
Fairly generic as far as I can see. One immediate issue, though, is that it sounds like it is requiring Israel to no longer enforce the buffer zone - the 300-to-1000 meters that Israel requires to remain clear so that there won't be any attempted explosives along the fence or other attempts to infiltrate Israel.
I can see that being a problem, and possibly it will be interpreted differently by each side.
Not that I am optimistic that this will last the night anyway - there are enough nutty jihadist groups that will be happy to lob a few rockets to prove their manhood.
UPDATE: So far, 23 minutes after the "cease-fire" was to go into effect, there have been rockets towards Hof Ashkelon, Beer Sheva, Shaar HaNegav and Eshkol. It appears that this is the world's definition of a cease fire - only Israel can break one.
Following are excerpts from a TV report featuring the family of Hamas member Muhammad Al-Homs, who was killed alongside Ahmad Jaabari. The report aired on Al-Aqsa TV November 16, 2012.
Brother of Muhammad Al-Homs : Allah be praised, all the young Muslims in Gaza love martyrdom, just as our enemies, the infidel Jewish dogs, love life. We continue on the same path and pray to meet him in Paradise.
[...] Mother of Al-Homs : This is the martyr's youngest boy. His name is Mash'al. He named him after the great leader Khaled Mash'al. Allah willing, little Mash'al will become like the big Mash'al. We are all moving forward for the sake of Allah.
Daughter of Al-Homs : I want to fire missiles at the Jews and be martyred like my father.
Mother of Al-Homs: We all hope to become martyrs for the sake of Allah. Even if they kill us all, we will continue to fire missiles. We will not stop the Jihad.
Son of Al-Homs : I am following the path of Jihad and want to be martyred like my dad.
I'm most proud of my "infidel Jewish dog" status when I see the alternative shown here.
Imagine a schoolgirl attending class, knowing that both her teacher and principal share the same husband. Awkward much?
Well, for a Saudi man who married the three women, it may just be an example of love conquering all.
The man, 50, was not named by the Saudi-based Okaz newspaper which reported the marital muddle.
But his attraction to all things academic does not end there. The man is also married to a fourth wife, who works as an educational supervisor, mostly supervising the school that her husband’s other wives attend and work at.
Meanwhile, the schoolteacher told the newspaper that the way she interacts with her husband’s wives at work is “no different” to how she treats other students and superiors.
Islamic Jihad reported on a vigilante lynching of a "collaborator" in Gaza City on Friday as well.
Shahwan also warned Gazans about Israeli intelligence using emails and phone calls to turn them into spies. He said that some will impersonate government officials.
Furthermore, Shahwan warned Gazans to ignore any Israeli leaflets that are dropped, warning them that bombs will be dropped in their area. He urged them to stay home instead.
One of the most iconic - and tragic - photos from the current fighting in Gaza is surely this one, showing BBC Arabic journalist Jihad Mishrawi mourning his dead son:
[At 16:15] an Israeli warplane fired a missile at a house belonging to Ali Nemer al-Masharawi in al-Zaytoun neighborhood in the east of Gaza City. Two members of the family (a woman and a toddler) were killed: Hiba Aadel Fadel al-Masharawi, 19, and Omar Jihad al-Masharawi, 11 months.
Electronic Intifada reported this as a "missile strike" but described it this way:
According to neighbors and witnesses, a mass of fire hit the roof of the Masharawi family home in a densely packed area in southern Gaza City.
“Our area is void of any suspicious activity and I can assure you there are no armed persons here and the area is always calm and inhabitants know each other,” Jihad said, showing the missile’s damage to his home. “I never imagined that my home would be an Israeli target. Why has it been hit?”
An Israeli round hit Misharawi’s four-room home in Gaza Wednesday, killing his son, according to BBC Middle East bureau chief Paul Danahar, who arrived in Gaza earlier Thursday. Misharawi’s sister-in-law was also killed, and his brother wounded. Misharawi told Danahar that, when the round landed, there was no fighting in his residential neighborhood.
“We’re all one team in Gaza,” Danahar told me, saying that Misharawi is a BBC video and photo editor. After spending a “few hours” with his grieving colleague, he wrote on Twitter, ”Questioned asked here is: if Israel can kill a man riding on a moving motorbike (as they did last month) how did Jihad’s son get killed.”
Danahar also shared the following photos of Misharawi’s small Gaza home, which appears to have been heavily damaged. The place where the round punctured his ceiling is clearly visible.
In the first picture, doesn't the hole in the ceiling look a lot like what Qassam rocket damage looks like when they hit homes in Israel?
I am far from a munitions expert, but these photos look nothing like the damage to Gaza buildings from purposeful Israeli airstrikes that we've seen over the past week.
On Wednesday, when Omar was killed, the media was not attuned to the idea that Hamas rockets sometimes fall short. As the comments above show, even the Arabs living there were wondering how Israel with its pinpoint accuracy could have failed so badly - yet no one considered that this could have been because of Hamas rockets falling short, as was the case with Mahmoud Sadallah.
I received an email from someone with serious military experience. Here is the analysis:
First of all, Israel isn’t using incendiary weapons, and won’t, so any “mass of fire” that hits anyone is going to be a secondary effect from the original high-explosive effect, and will involve something like a propane container, chemical container, etc. Israeli bombs and air-to-surface missiles don’t produce masses of fire hitting people’s roofs.
Second, if the “round” of an Israeli weapon had literally come through the roof where the hole is visible in the photo, there’d be no house to take pictures of now. Compare the photos of the Masharawi house with the photos of the wreckage of the Al-Dalu (Doula) house. Then compare the Masharawi photos with photos of the Israeli homes hit by Hamas rockets.
Dalu home
Qassam damage in Israel
This isn't definitive, of course, and there are other things to consider, like whether Hamas rockets were flying at the time. [Which they most definitely were on the first day of the operation - EoZ].
OK, now I’m looking at the second photo of damage. If the blast from an Israeli weapon had occurred inside this home, the wood on the windows would be entirely gone. No trace left. The walls wouldn’t be intact. Their top portions, at least, would be a pile of rubble around the base of the wall. The iron grilles on the windows would probably be lying on the ground somewhere.
The story doesn’t hang together. An Israeli bomb could not have penetrated the roof of this structure, then exploded, and have left the structure looking as it does: charred on some surfaces, but still intact.
I note that a Hamas rocket could have done exactly this damage, including the projectile-through-the-roof feature. There are other conceivable scenarios in which secondary damage could have been done by an Israeli hit nearby, but in no case would it have been possible for an Israeli weapon to penetrate the roof as described, and then do nothing more than char the surfaces and rearrange the furniture.
I want to stress that I am not nearly as certain about this as I was about Mahmoud Sadallah. But to my mind, this appears far more consistent with a Hamas rocket that then ignited something highly flammable inside the house. Most Gaza homes rely on propane heaters and gasoline-powered generators, and they have to keep the fuel somewhere - in fact, unless I'm mistaken, there appears to be a damaged fuel can on the top shelf of the first photo from inside the house above.
A lot has happened since then and it seems doubtful that anyone is going to revisit this on the ground, but someone should at least ask Paul Danahar from the BBC whether he even considered that this could have been the work of an errant Gaza rocket.
What would a conflict be without photographers staging photos?
And what better staging is there than dolls?
A Palestinian boy holds a doll as he walks amid the rubble of a destroyed house after what witnesses said was an Israeli air strike, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip November 20, 2012
A Palestinian man picks up a doll lying on shattered glass in a damaged house following an Israeli air raid in Gaza City on November 17, 2012. (AFP)
A Palestinian boy salvages a stuffed toy from a building destroyed by an Israeli air strike in the Gaza Strip (Picture: EPA)
A Palestinian man carries a stuffed toy through a street littered with debris after an air raid on a sporting center in Gaza City on Monday. (CNN)
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