Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, May 06, 2019

"Israel Studies" and fighting words (Divest This!)

If you want to see an example of what “fighting back” looks like in the rarified environment of academia, check out the latest edition Israel Studies, a journal published by Indiana University Press.

Actually, you’ll only be able to look at the whole thing if you have access to JSTOR, the online source for major academic journals and articles, or can find a print copy at a university library (although you can look at the first and last essay in the volume with a couple of extra mouse clicks). But even this glimpse sets the stage for long-overdue analysis of the corrupt language that has infested Middle East studies and now threatens to take down other disciplines.

As regular readers know, Israel’s enemies have not just twisted the language of history, scholarship and human rights towards their own political ends, but have so monopolized discourse that any attempt to take back the language (by claiming that words like “genocide” and “occupation” have actual meaning, beyond their selective use to slur a single state) is met by hysterical resistance.
I’ve seen this on a small scale whenever I have used the word “settlement” to apply to both Jewish and Arab communities in Israel or the disputed territories (or simply used the word “disputed” – rather than “occupied” to describe Judea & Samaria/The West Bank). Invariably the response is either aggression (usually involving shouts of “racism” for not handing an opponent control of the vocabulary immediately and unconditionally) or avoidance (i.e., my “debating partner” fleeing to find someone uninformed to propagandize).

Given this auto-response by those who live by BDSthink, one can only imagine the response to the latest issue of Israel Studies where credentialed scholars subject each and every one of the boycotter’s favorite terms (“colonialism,” “apartheid,” “the Israel Lobby”) to honest analysis fueled by sound scholarship.

Actually, you don’t have to imagine since the response to publication of that journal was as immediate as it was predictable.

Within days of the Word Crimes issue of Israel Studies hitting the streets, dozens of professors petitioned the organization sponsoring the journal to denounce and withdraw it, calling it a political propaganda exercise not worthy to be treated as genuine scholarship. This from “scholars” who have spent decades publishing the most outlandish fabrications and gobbdygook about the Middle East, awarding honors and prizes to whoever can make the most absurd accusations against the Jewish state, usually based not on fact but on post-modern claptrap.

Some of the most hilarious accusations came from academics “concerned” over the areas of expertise of by some contributors to the Word Crimes journal. Again, this is coming from groups ready to welcome academic birthday clowns like Stephen Salaita into the fold of Middle East studies solely based on his embrace of the anti-Israel narrative.

Fortunately, those behind Word Crimes are standing their ground, labeling their opponents as academic thugs who want to shut down discourse they don’t like, and can’t respond to (a nice use of language on its own).

Giving credit where it is due, the co-editors of the volume, Professors Miriam Elman and Asaf Romirowsky have found the right pressure point and a tactic to press it that does not involve sacrificing an ounce of academic integrity. Yes, the essays that make up the volume are all trying to counter misuse of specific terms coopted and corrupted by the forces of BDS. But the only reason the exercise is necessary is because proponents of the “Israel Must Go” narrative have made such a correction imperative.

Those who spend lots of time anguishing over lack of punch-back by Israel’s defenders might see the publications of a relatively obscure journal insufficient to turn back the tide of anti-Israel invective engulfing the academy. But battles on campuses are primarily being waged with words (at least for now), which makes seizing back the language one of the most powerful and effective ways to bring the fight to the enemy in a war where ideas count.

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05/06 Links Pt1: As ceasefire goes into effect, PM says Gaza campaign not over; Amb Danon: When Hamas is exterminated, the people in Gaza will celebrate; Israel Should Adopt Barack Obama’s Counter-Terror Strategy

From Ian:

As ceasefire goes into effect, PM says Gaza campaign not over

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday commented on reports of an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire deal in Gaza, after two days of fighting in which four Israelis were killed, saying that Israel was readying for further confrontations with terrorist groups in the coastal enclave.

“Over the past two days, we have hit Hamas and Islamic Jihad with great force, attacking over 350 targets and terrorist leaders and activists, and destroying terrorist infrastructure,” Netanyahu said in a statement.

“The campaign is not over and requires patience and judgment. We are preparing to continue,” the prime minister added. “The goal was and remains to ensure the peace and security of the residents of the south. I send condolences to the families and wish a speedy recovery for the wounded.”

A spokesperson for Hamas similarly said, in response to the prime minister’s statement, that although the recent flareup in violence had come to an end, the wider conflict would continue.

“The resistance managed to deter the IDF,” said Sami Abu Zuhri, according to the Kan public broadcaster, referring to the Gaza terror groups. “Our message is that this round is over, but the conflict will not end until we regain our rights.”

The ceasefire between Israel and the Gaza terror groups went into effect at 4:30 a.m. Monday, according to the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terror groups, ending two days of intense fighting that saw more than 600 rockets fired at Israel and four Israeli civilians killed.

Over two days, in response to the rocket fire, the Israeli military conducted hundreds of strikes from the air and land, including one highly unusual targeted killing of a terrorist operative who the IDF said funneled money from Iran to terror groups in the Strip.

Palestinian medical officials reported 29 dead since Friday, including at least 11 terrorists, The Times of Israel confirmed.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Hamas, Islamic Jihad again celebrate ‘victory’ - analysis

Hamas and Islamic Jihad officials see the ceasefire agreement that was reached with Israel early Monday as a “big achievement.”

In their view, the last round of fighting, during which the two groups fired hundreds of missiles towards Israel, has “deterred” Israel and forced it to commit to the implementation of previous Egyptian-sponsored understandings, which include easing restrictions imposed on the Hamas-ruled coastal enclave.

According to Hamas and Islamic Jihad, this time they received assurances from Egypt, Qatar and the United Nations that Israel will fulfill its obligations under the previous understandings reached earlier this year.

The two groups claimed that Monday’s ceasefire agreement requires Israel to stop shooting at Palestinians during the weekly protests near the border with Israel, also known as the Great March of Return; the implementation of the previous understandings, especially with regards to easing the blockade on the Gaza Strip; allowing international relief organizations to assist families whose houses were destroyed in the last round of fighting; an end to Israeli targeted assassinations and expanding the fishing zone for Palestinian fishermen.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad feel that the price they paid for launching hundreds of missiles toward Israel during the two days of fighting was relatively small compared to the losses and damage inflicted on Israel.

As far as they are concerned, the fact that none of their senior leaders was killed is sufficient to celebrate victory. Also, the fact that Israel did not launch a ground offensive in the Gaza Strip is seen by the two groups as proof that Israel is afraid of an all-out war with the Gaza-based groups. Each round of fighting that ends with Hamas and Islamic Jihad remaining the two dominant forces in the Gaza Strip is also seen by the two groups as a type of victory.

“The Palestinian resistance groups succeeded in deterring Israel and forcing it to implement the Egyptian-brokered understandings,” said Musab al-Braim, a spokesman for Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian groups, he said, are now expecting Israel to step up the pace of implementing the understandings, especially in light of the “assurances” reportedly provided by Egypt, Qatar and the UN.

The last 48 hours in Gaza:

We targeted 350 Islamic Jihad & Hamas targets including:

• rocket launch sites
• terror squads & operatives
• command and training centers
• weapon facilities
• observation posts
• military compounds

Terror targets civilians, we target terror. pic.twitter.com/9wSS22PEjt
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) May 6, 2019

Amb Danon on CNN: When Hamas is exterminated, the people in Gaza will celebrate

Last week, a series of Instagram posts were released, showing what the Holocaust would have looked like from the perspective of a 13 year old girl of smartphones existed during World War II.

Called Eva Stories, is based on the diary of the real Eva Heyman, a 13 year old in Budapest who recorded her story in 1944.

The account gained a million subscribers in no time - and critics immediately slammed it. A Haaretz op-ed said "a fictitious Instagram account of a girl murdered in the Holocaust is not and cannot be a legitimate way" to teach today's youth about the Holocaust. Others accused the posts of trivializing the Holocaust.

Here it is all together as a video.

The same criticisms of Eva Stories have been hurled at all other media that have tried to tackle the Holocaust - books, novels, plays, movies, miniseries, graphic novels, poetry, art. It is true that nothing can ever capture the horrors of the Holocaust - it is impossible. Even survivors only experienced a slice of the total horror.

All that can be done is to describe it as best as one can, and hope that the effort is serious and not trivializing it.

Eva Stories is powerful because it immediately allows you to connect to Eva as a real person, which she was. If it had been completely fictionalized it indeed could have been seen as a gimmick, but Eva Heyman's real diary captured her crushes, her fun with friends, and the horror as her life fell apart over the course of only a few months. The Instagram version allows people to feel the immediacy and fear and helplessness felt by Jews.

Eva Stories is a worthwhile addition to the pantheon of Holocaust literature.

My only quibble is that the original diary is not easy to find for a reasonable price in book form, and I wish that the creators of this story had reissued the diary in a trade paperback to make it available to everyone.

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Gaza Health Ministry claims Israel TARGETS pregnant women!

The Gaza Health Ministry issued a statement Sunday claiming that Israel's "targeting of pregnant women and embryos in their womb... reflects the extent of criminality and hostility to the meanings of life and requires clear and firm positions from UN institutions concerned with the protection of women and pregnant women."

The ministry says that 25 people were killed in Gaza - and it includes two unborn children in their count. Three of those in their count were confirmed to have been killed by Gaza rockets, not Israel, and almost certainly other civilians were also killed by Hamas or Islamic Jihad as reports indicated some 90 rockets fell short in Gaza.

The idea that Israel is targeting pregnant women is obviously absurd. If it was shooting at Gaza indiscriminately, the percentage of civilians being killed would reflect Gaza's actual demographics rather thanbeing heavily weighted towards men between 19 and 39:

If Israel wanted to target civilians, there would be thousands dead from airstrikes, rather than hitting buildings emptied after warnings of residents to get out.

The Gaza Health Ministry is, of course, an arm of the terror group Hamas. Yet it is quoted by the media as if it is an accurate source.

Haaretz, in yet another example of journalistic malpractice, parroted the Gaza Health Ministry claims as accurate in a headline.

Reporters have been guilty of taking Hamas' propaganda through the "health ministry" seriously for years.

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Here is the entire press release from the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor NGO regarding the mini-war this weekend in Gaza:

Geneva - We condemn in the strongest terms the Israeli air and artillery shelling of the Gaza Strip, which started on Saturday morning, May 4, 2019, said Sarah Pritchett, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor's spokeswoman. The Israeli strikes have resulted in the death of four civilians, including a pregnant mother and her child, the injury of more than 30 others, and the demolition of a residential building and 3 other buildings containing offices for media agencies, charities and shops.

The Israeli leadership has once again demonstrated its policy of using excessive force against 2 million civilians who have been besieged for more than 13 years. The Israeli authorities have not only deprived them of basic rights through the blockade, but by repeatedly targeting their person and property by airstrikes and shelling, in a clear disregard to all international conventions and treaties guaranteeing the protection of civilians in times of armed conflict.

The continuation of the Israeli army behavior towards the Gaza Strip of killing and targeting civilian objects and the continuation of the collective punishment policy through the blockade clearly represent war crimes under the Rome Statute and require a serious action to bring the perpetrators to justice.

We stress the necessity of urgent action by the United Nations and the actors in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to contain the escalation in the Gaza Strip before the situation deteriorates to a more serious level. We also warn that the catastrophic living conditions in the Strip are not likely to bear any further deterioration.

Obviously, to this "human rights" NGO, Jews have no human rights. Even the right to life. Four dead Jews and hundreds of deadly rockets are simply not worth mentioning.

Here are some of Euro-Med's partners, who are all damned by association to an organization that is clearly a propaganda front and not interested in human rights at all:

Some are fake organizations, like the "European Youth for Human Rights" who cannot spell "Rights" and whose Facebook page has not been updated in nearly a year.

Others are serious NGOs, like Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. They should be asked why (or if!) they partner with Euro-Med.

Not surprisingly, the Chairman of Euro-Med's Board of Trustees is Israel-hater Richard Falk.

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Delusional Ma'an editor: "Arabs don't hate Jews, but Jews hate Arabs"

The editor of Ma'an Arabic, Dr. Nasser Al-Laham, has a delusional essay in response to the news that an Israel-Jewish delegation will visit Saudi Arabia next year in response to an invitation from the Muslim World League.

He's quite upset, and he is trying to argue that while Arabs have never had a problem with Jews (only Zionists,) Jews have always hated the Arabs.

"The rebels [meaning, terrorists] do not hate the Jews, but the Jews hate the rebels. he says.

"The Arabs do not hate the Jews, but the Jewish Zionists hate the Arabs."

Well, every survey of antisemitism shows otherwise, but why mess up a great essay with facts?

"The PLO erred when it agreed a quarter of a century ago at the United Nations to withdraw the request to classify the Zionist movement as a racist movement, and we still pay the price of this mistake to this day."

"Saudis do not hate Jews, but Jews hate and despise Saudi Arabia."

It gets better.

"The Palestinians do not hate the Jews and have hosted them when they fled the massacres of Hitler and the frost of Europe to the port of Haifa. They came sick with scabies, famine, typhoid, poverty, lice and humiliation. The Palestinians hosted them as cousins and thought 'naively' that it was about religious tolerance and the result was that they [the Jews] committed the most horrible and the most terrible massacres against those who hosted them."

What an inversion of truth! The Arabs of Palestine didn't welcome the Jews fleeing the Holocaust - they doomed them!

"The Arab capitals do not hesitate to open embassies for Israel and as long as the red carpets are available for Israeli delegations and tourists, but the Arabs are barred from entering Tel Aviv !!"

Again, this is news to me. Israel always welcomed Arab diplomats to Israel.

He goes on to call the Arabs who are trying to improve relations with Israel "fools."

This is, remember, the editor of a newspaper respected in the West. He cannot put together two sentences without lying.

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05/05 Links: At least three Israelis dead, dozens wounded after barrage of rockets; A premeditated Ramadan offensive; US may review ties with countries deemed anti-Israel

From Ian:

At least three Israelis dead, dozens wounded after barrage of rockets

Three Israelis have been killed and dozens have been wounded since Hamas and Islamic Jihad began sending non-stop barrage of rockets into Israel over the weekend.

A rocket was fired towards Ashkelon on Sunday afternoon, hitting a factory in Ashkelon, injuring three people. One was rushed to the hospital in critical condition and later died of his wounds. Two more people are still considered to be in critical condition.

A 60-year-old man was directly hit by a Hamas rocket and killed Sunday in the southern city of Sderot, near KIbbutz Yad Mordechai. The man was driving in his car and the rocket hit his vehicle just as a bus full of soldiers were passing by.

The man was evacuated to Barzilai Hospital in Ashkelon, where he was pronounce dead - two others were reportedly injured in the attack. Following the death, the road the driver was traveling on, Route 34 as well as Highway 232 have been shut down to traffic.

The direct hit took place as President Reuven Rivlin was touring Gaza border communities.

"When we arrived, we saw a vehicle completely crushed after it was hit by a rocket, a 60-year-old man was lying next to the car unconscious," said Ravit Martinez, a Magen David Adom paramedic.

"He suffered from a shrapnel wound in the thigh and lost a lot of blood. We attempted to give him life-saving medical treatment...on the way we had to perform CPR and evacuated him to the hospital as he was in critical condition," the paramedic said.

A premeditated Ramadan offensive

The fact that Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad fired some 300 rockets toward Israel even as their senior leadership convenes in Cairo for talks shows that this latest escalation premeditated. It began with the trickling of rockets early last week, followed by incendiary airborne devices, provocations along the Gaza Strip fence, and then the latest barrage.

As Hamas prepares for the holy month of Ramadan, which begins this week, it would like to extract more concessions from Israel and present them to Gazans a victory vis-à-vis Israel. Its chief goal is to make Israel transfer more cash from Qatar so that it can pay its employees running the Gaza Strip.
The fact that the Qatari intermediary has not shown up in the region proves that funds have already been transferred. But Hamas wants more funds, and Israel has so far vehemently refused.

Senior Hamas military leader Yahya Sinwar, unlike Hamas political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh, knows how to read Israeli society, having spent decades locked up in an Israeli prison. He knows Israel will shy away from a full-fledged confrontation in the Gaza Strip just before Independence Day and the Eurovision Song Contest. That is why Sinwar took a calculated risk by telling his operatives to launch rockets on Israel even while he was away in Cairo.

It is still unclear how this latest escalation will end, but what is clear is that Israel’s killing of two Hamas operatives on Friday after two Israeli troops were shot on the Gaza fence, was not the trigger for the massive rocket barrage.

Palestinian Islamic Jihad started a fire

The Iranian-backed Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorist organization – the second largest armed faction in Gaza – is responsible for the latest escalation in Gaza and Israel.

In recent weeks, PIJ, whose rocket arsenal is larger than that of Hamas, has conducted a string of attacks that it did not take responsibility for. The goal of these attacks appears to be the sabotage of Egyptian-led efforts to stabilize Gaza.

PIJ’s attacks include the launching of a rocket on April 29, which exploded in the Mediterranean Sea near a southern Israeli city. More recently, on May 3, the PIJ conducted a sniper attack on Israel Defense Forces soldiers on the Gaza border, during a Hamas-organized border riot. That shooting wounded an Israeli officer and a female soldier. It is that event that triggered the current flare-up. Starting on Saturday, hundreds of rockets and mortars have been fired from Gaza.

Israel accused the PIJ’s commander in northern Gaza, Bahaa Abu Al Ata, of being behind the April 29 rocket attack, which no group took responsibility for.

One possibility is that PIJ’s Syria-based radical secretary-general, Ziad Nakhala, who is extremely close to Iran and a frequent visitor to it, passed along orders to the faction’s commanders in Gaza to keep attacks on Israel going.

Egypt has worked hard to push Gaza away from the brink – efforts that the PIJ, Iran’s direct proxy, is apparently trying to undo.

MEMRI and the Investigative Project on Terrorism reported on Friday about an obscene presentation at the Muslim American Society in Philadelphia where kids wearing Palestinian scarves sang: "Glorious steeds call us and lead us [to] the Al-Aqsa Mosque. The blood of martyrs protects us... Flow, oh rivers of martyrs!" A young girl read a poem: "We will defend [Palestine] with our bodies... We will chop off their heads, and we will liberate the sorrowful and exalted Al-Aqsa Mosque... We will subject them to eternal torture."

Local Philadelphia media, and Fox News, picked up on the story. The Muslim American Society responded with two "clarifications" - both of which are not plausible in the least.

The first one, from MAS Philly:

The Muslim American Society - Philadelphia Center rejects a statement made at an event held in April at a local community center in Philadelphia. The center celebrated “Ummah Day” where children sang songs from their cultural traditions. While we celebrate the coming together of different cultures and languages, not all songs were properly vetted. This was an unintended mistake and an oversight in which the center and the students are remorseful. MAS-Philadelphia Center will conduct an internal investigation to ensure this does not occur again.

First of all, it wasn't only songs - it was songs and poems. Multiple adults were there, applauding, not to mention the ones who taught the kids, trained them to do their hand motions in sync with the songs, and so on. This was no oversight, and the only remorse is that they were caught.

Secondly, if you take this statement at face value, that means that some Muslim "cultural traditions" include calls to behead Jews in Israel.

Now, a new statement has been released that contradicts the earlier one, from MAS headquarters in DC:

Our investigation revealed that the school that organized the event on April 17, 2019 is a separate entity renting space from MAS Philadelphia. The school board has informed us that it has taken immediate actions and dismissed the person in charge of the program. In addition, they will form a local commission to aid in sensitivity training and proper supervision for future programs.

Unfortunately, the video from the school was uploaded to the chapter’s Facebook page without verifying the content of the video for appropriateness and making sure it conforms to our hate-free policy and values. The chapter will take further steps in assuring strict adherence to publishing and posting policies.

This is not plausible in the least. MAS Philly wouldn't upload dozens of photos and videos for an event from a school only renting the space.

This Facebook post from MAS Philly makes it obvious that they organized and hosted the event:

The backdrop at the front of the auditorium is the same as the one in the MEMRI video, so it wasn't two separate Ummah Day celebrations.

Not only that, but the photos from the post listed here includes a bunch of displays of famous Muslim historic figures, including this one:

Look a little closer:

"Islam is under obligation to gain power over all nations."

I am afraid that the few journalists that reported on this story will not bother to push back on the obvious falsehoods that were given in "explanation." They wanted some sort of excuse that they can print and end the story there, to avoid being accused of Islamophobia. Who will be brave enough to point out that the "apology" was a bunch of lies in an attempt to end the story?

But the children who repeat the words of Ibn Khaldun, that Islam is obligated to subjugate every non Muslim nation, know the truth of what they are taught.

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JPost reports:

In a bold move, a Palestinian businessman from Hebron announced over the weekend the establishment of a new party that calls for focusing on economic prosperity for Palestinians.

The founder of the party, called Reform and Development Party, is Ashraf Jabari, 45, who belongs to a prominent clan from Hebron.

Palestinian Authority officials claimed that Jabari is working with the US administration to undermine the PA. They said that the timing of the announcement of the party was linked to US President Donald Trump’s upcoming plan for peace in the Middle East, also known as the “deal of the century.” The PA is strongly opposed to the plan on the pretext that it aims to “liquidate the Palestinian cause and national rights.”

In an interview with The Jerusalem Post, Jabari said that he has long been thinking of establishing a party that would offer hope to Palestinians. “Three days ago, I launched my new party together with many people,” he said. “We’re not offering ourselves as an alternative to anyone. We just want to focus on the economy and ensure a better future for our people. The status quo can’t continue.”

Jabari, who previously worked for the Palestinian Authority security forces, said that his party’s platform supports the idea of a one-state solution “because the two-state solution is no longer viable.”

The Palestinians, he said, are anyway living under Israeli rule. “We are all living under Israeli military rule,” Jabari added. “Even the Palestinian Authority, which is a self-rule authority, is under Israeli control. The Palestinian Authority is not a state; rather, it’s a self-rule authority. Israel controls everything. The ID cards the Palestinians hold are written in Arabic and Hebrew. Besides, Israel has full control over the borders.”

Jabari said that Palestinians prefer to live under Israeli sovereignty. “We want to have the same rights of Palestinians living under Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem,” he explained. “Of course, it would be better for Israel if it accepted an independent Palestinian state on the 1967 borders. But no Israeli prime minister would dare to accept such a solution. On the other hand, no Palestinian leader can give up Jerusalem or make concessions.”

Last February, Jabari participated in an Israeli-Palestinian economic conference in Jerusalem, where US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman was the key speaker. In his speech, Friedman described Jabari as a “man of courage and vision who is practical but committed to peace and to coexistence.” The US administration, Friedman said, “couldn’t ask for a better partner in this effort. I’m proud to call you my friend.”

Naturally, the Palestinian Authority and Fatah are very upset, and are threatening Jabari and his party.

TheMarker reports that on May 1, the same day Jabari announced the party, Fatah issued a leaflet warning the residents of Hebron against even any contact with his Reform and Development Party.

The flyer accused the heads of the new party of supporting normalization with Israel and mentioned that they recently met with Israelis in Tel Aviv.

"Fatah will not allow such parties to stand up because they call for normalization with Israel and try to bypass the Palestinian legitimacy and the national factions, and it will eliminate the existence of the party within 48 hours," the flyer said.

Jabari claims the party has some 5,000 activists throughout the West Bank.

The Jabari clan is well known to have a good relationship with Israel and withJews in Judea and Samaria, and it is also heavily armed, so Fatah is seeking ways to undermine it in public opinion.

Of course, no mainstream Palestinian media is reporting on the founding of this party, because they don't report what Fatah doesn't want reported.

(h/t Yoel)

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Israel allowing fuel into Gaza even now?

Ma'an quotes Israeli media as saying that Israel is still pumping fuel into Gaza for its power plant even while hundreds of rockets are being shot from Gaza to Israel.

I couldn't corroborate it yet.

If true.....it is bizarre.

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05/04 Links: 250 rockets fired at Israel; IDF bombs 120 Gaza sites, including attack tunnel; Israel's first Ethiopian-born woman Knesset member describes her journey

From Ian:

250 rockets fired at Israel; IDF bombs 120 Gaza sites, including attack tunnel

The Israel Defense Forces on Saturday bombed more than 120 targets in the Gaza Strip, including a cross-border attack tunnel, an underground rocket factory and a six-story building used by Hamas’s military intelligence, in response to the hundreds of rockets and mortar shells fired at southern Israel throughout the day, the army said.

The army said it was prepared to continue conducting airstrikes if the attacks from the Strip continue.

Terror groups in Gaza made similar threats, saying they were prepared to attack deeper into Israel, including toward the city of Beersheba, if the IDF continued its strikes on targets in the enclave.

The fresh exchange began on Friday evening when Palestinians in the Strip shot two soldiers on patrol near the border in southern Gaza. A male soldier was moderately wounded, and a female soldier was lightly hurt, the IDF said. In response, the Israeli military bombed a Hamas post, killing several of the terror group’s operatives.

On Saturday morning, terror groups in the Strip began launching rockets and mortar shells at Israel. As of Saturday night, over 250 projectiles had been fired, most of them at the towns closest to the Gaza border, but some reached as far as Rehovot and Ashdod. At least two Israeli civilians were wounded in the attacks.

In response, the military launched a series of strikes from air and land, hitting targets throughout the coastal enclave connected to Hamas, which rules Gaza, and the Iran-backed Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

200+ rockets rained down on the homes of Israeli families today. WATCH: pic.twitter.com/XZoqPabuQ6
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) May 4, 2019

RAW FOOTAGE: Incoming rocket fire from Gaza at Israeli civilians, as filmed by the Israeli civilians that Hamas is targeting. pic.twitter.com/Kz1d1KwCle
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) May 4, 2019

After 2 soldiers shot, IDF checks whether Gaza sniper targeted senior officer

The army was investigating the possibility that a Palestinian sniper targeted a senior Israel Defense Forces officer during riots on the Gaza border Friday.

The army’s Gaza division would conduct an investigation into the shooting, which injured two soldiers who were part of a patrol near the border in the southern Gaza Strip, the Walla news site reported.

One soldier was moderately wounded in the attack and a female soldier was lightly hurt, the IDF said. Both were evacuated by helicopter to the Soroka hospital in Beersheba. Media reports said the male soldier, an officer and a tracker, had a gunshot wound in the thigh, while the female soldier was hit by shrapnel.

In response to the shooting, an IDF aircraft attacked a nearby Hamas post, the army said.

The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry said two people were killed in the strike and two others were wounded. The ministry identified the two killed as Abdullah Ibrahim Mahmoud Abu Salouh, 33 and Alaa Ali Hasan al-Boubli, 29.

Hamas, an Islamist terror group, confirmed the two men killed in the airstrike were members of its military wing and pledged to respond to what it called an “Israeli aggression.”

Attack tunnel discovered and destroyed as IDF strikes hit Gaza

IDF tanks and helicopters began attacking terrorist targets belonging to Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip, managing to destroy a Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) attack tunnel entering Israel from the southern part of the strip, the IDF Spokesperson's Unit reported on Saturday.

The tunnel was, until Saturday, under surveillance by the IDF. It was destroyed by fighter planes. The tunnel was dug by members of the PIJ in order to carry out a terror attack inside Israel. It was over 20 meters deep with several entrances.

"The resistance is always ready to respond to the crimes of the occupation," the Hamas Spokesperosn in Gaza said, while the Islamic Jihad claimed that "We are committed to protecting our people and to deter Israel at all costs and under all circumstances."

Islamic Jihad Deputy Khalil al-Hayya added that "There is no escape but that the occupation will be committed to understandings and to break the siege. The resistance has tools capable of forcing Israel to maintain the understandings reached."

The Islamic Jihad leader Baha Abu al-Ata was invited to Cairo and immediately left Gaza through the Rafah border crossing. Israel has threatened to kill Abu al-Ata more than once, since he is responsible for the launching of many rockets into Israeli territory.

Since the beginning of the weekend, five Palestinians have been killed according to Palestinian sources. The Gaza Health Ministry, however, reports that one was killed and nine injured.

Gaza Factions Launch Dozens of Rockets at Israeli Territory

Once again, world media assumes baby probably killed by Hamas rocket was killed by Israel (update)

We've seen this happen so many times before.

On Saturday evening, the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry reported that a 14-month-old Palestinian child, Saba Mahmoud Hamdan Abu Arar, had been killed and her mother, Falastin Saleh Abu Arar, when an Israeli airstrikes hit their house in Gaza City. Several hours later, the ministry said that Falastin had succumbed to her wounds.

On Twitter, the Israel Defense Forces’ Arabic-language spokesman said the mother and child did not appear to have been killed in an Israeli attack.

Adraee indicated that the deaths may have been caused by a failed rocket attack against Israel, noting that many of the projectiles fired at Israel were launched from within populated areas.

“There are more and more indications reaching us from the Gaza Strip that put serious doubt on the truth of the statement from Hamas’s healthy ministry about the death of the baby Saba Mahmoud Hamdan Abu Arar and her mother Falastin Saleh Abu Arar,” Maj. Avichay Adraee wrote in a tweet.

“According to these indications, the death was caused by terrorist activities by Palestinian militants and not by an Israeli strike,” he said.

But AFP headlines the story, "250 rockets fired from Gaza, Israeli response kills four including baby."

The Independent wrote "A pregnant mother and her 14-month-old baby girl have been killed by an Israeli airstrike, as cross-border violence continues near Gaza."

ITV: "Palestinian baby and pregnant mother killed in Gaza airstrikes."

CNN: "250 rockets fired from Gaza at Israel; 1-year-old child among those killed in retaliatory airstrikes."

Reporters have made this mistake before. I listed a bunch of them a few years ago in an open letter to journalists on not making assumptions during these flareups in Gaza:

Mistake #1: Assuming that all Gaza casualties are the result of Israeli airstrikes

Traditionally, the number of Gaza rockets that fall short and never reach Israel, or that explode as they are fired, is over 35% -and sometimes as high as 80%!.

Between June 12-25 (2014), terrorists fired 41 rockets at Israel, of which 24 exploded in Gaza, killing one child and injuring six more children. That is a 58% failure rate.

At least three Gaza civilians have been killed this year by terrorist rockets.

Egyptian politician kissing dead baby killed by Hamas

During Operation Pillar of Defense, the media was fooled at least twice - and possibly three times - with false Arab reports that children were killed by Israeli airstrikes when they were killed by errant terror rockets from Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Even schools have been hit by terrorist rockets.

Also, several civilians have been killed from gunfire during funerals of terrorists.

When terrorists are firing rockets hurriedly, as they are now, the chances for misfires is even greater. Not to mention "work accidents" (which have killed dozens this year [2014] alone) are probably more likely to occur in Gaza weapons workshops and laboratories.

Also Gaza spokespersons are known to lie and blame Israel for deaths caused by internal explosions.

For all these reasons, journalists must be especially careful when reporting on civilian deaths in Gaza.

The rule of thumb is that if the IDF denies an airstrike in an area where people were killed, the people were not killed by an Israeli airstrike.

Journalistic standards go out the window when reporting on Israeli airstrikes, and reporters conveniently forget the many times that Hamas and islamic Jihad rockets have killed Gazans over the years.

I see in Arab media photos of the targets that Israel admits, and those buildings are flattened. I have not yet seen any photos of the building that this mother and baby were in. An AFP reporter said it was heavily damaged, but I don't know what that means. If we had photos we could know with more certainty. But even without it, the reports indicate that the Gaza Health Ministry is lying, because "witnesses" are contradicting themselves:

“The Israeli plane fired a missile near the house and the shrapnel entered the house and hit the poor baby,” Seba’s aunt said.
“They were sitting at the yard in their house with their mother.” said Abu Nidal Abu Arar, a relative living next door.
“They were shocked by a missile landing on them. This occupation is criminal.”

If it was shrapnel, then there must be a huge impact crater or a collapsed building right nearby. No one is claiming that.

It sure looks like a Hamas rocket so far.

UPDATE: Gaza News Agency - not a fan of Hamas nor of Israel - says flatly it was a Hamas rocket.

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