The Palestine thread

[dec]

He's perfectly entitled to hold that view, and seeing as he does, it only goes to strengthen the veracity of his statement.   

And I quote.......

Professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard Law School stated that the 2008 figure of 1:30 represents the lowest civilian to combatant casualty ratio in history in the setting of combating terrorism. Dershowitz criticized the international media and human rights organizations for not taking sufficient note of it. He also argued that even this figure may be misleading because not all civilians are innocent bystanders

Did you actually read the link. How does his very pro Israel viewpoint "strengthen the veracity of his statement"?

[seafoid]

http://www.haaretz.com/news/idf-in-gaza-killing-civilians-vandalism-and-lax-rules-of-engagement-1.272379

During Operation Cast Lead, Israeli forces killed Palestinian civilians under permissive rules of engagement and intentionally destroyed their property, say soldiers who fought in the offensive.



http://www.countercurrents.org/lendman240709.htmOperation Cast Lead Testimonies

One soldier said:

"....In training you learn that white phosphorus is not used, and you're taught that it's not humane. You watch films and see what it does to people who are hit, and you say, 'There, we're doing it too.' That's not what I expected to see. Until that moment I had thought that I belonged to the most humane army in the world."

Other testimonies describe white phosphorous used in densely populated neighborhoods, wanton killing and destruction "unrelated to any direct threat to Israeli forces, and permissive rules of engagement that led to the killing of innocents."

More comments reflected the "moral deterioration" of the army and Israeli society, even affecting the rabbinate that blessed mass slaughter and destruction prior to engagements.

Soldier testimonies bear witness to disturbing Israeli values "on a systemic level." Operation Cast Lead's rein of terror was "a direct result of IDF policy, and especially (its) rules of engagement (that sanction) shoot (first) and (don't) ask questions."

Breaking the Silence participants offered their testimonies as "an urgent call to Israeli society and its leaders to sober up and investigate anew the results of our actions....(a disturbing) slide together down the moral slippery slope" that affects them and all Jews globally.

Testimony 1 - Human Shield

People are called "Johnnie. They're Palestinian civilians" in Gaza neighborhoods. In checking out houses, "we send the neighbor in, the 'Johnnie,' and if there are armed men inside, we (use) 'pressure cooker' procedures....to get them out alive....to catch the armed men." When necessary, combat helicopters are called in to fire anti-tank missiles at civilian homes. Then send a "Johnnie" in to check for dead and wounded.

In one home, two were dead and another alive, so supersized Caterpillar D-9 bulldozers start "demolishing the house over him until the neighbor went in" and got him out.

Human shields were also used to check for booby-traps and perform other services. "Sometimes the force would enter while placing rifle barrels on a civilian's shoulder, advancing into the house and using him as a human shield. Commanders said these were the instructions and we had to do it."

Testimony 2 - House Demolitions

Residential buildings at strategic points were taken over by force. Neighborhoods were described with "lots of destroyed houses....ruins....more and more ruins, and even the houses still standing, most of them kept getting shelled...." Other houses were blasted....blown "up in the air" with explosives.

"Operational necessity" sometimes meant a whole neighborhood was destroyed so as "not to jeopardize Israeli soldiers (and with) the day after" in mind, meaning to disrupt Gaza life to the maximum and leave it that way after forces pulled out.

Testimony 3 - Rules of Engagement

Descriptions included "enter(ing) a yard and out of sheer fear the family was waiting in an exposed spot - a father, grandfather, young mother and babies. As we were coming in, the commander was firing a volley, and mistakenly killed an innocent. We got to the house....he goes in with live fire....the family was hiding from the bombings....he happened to kill an elderly guy....it really seems insane....if I look at it from the (other) side, there are people who deserve to go to jail."

Testimony 4 - Rules of Engagement & Home Occupation

Tactics taught are "dry" and "wet" entries. In Gaza, there was "no such thing as a dry entry. All entries were wet," meaning free-firing with missiles, tank shells, machine guns, grenades, everything. On the ground, wet entry orders were to "shoot as we enter a (house or) room (so) no one there could fire at us."

Testimony 5 - Atmosphere

What "bothered me? Many things....all that destruction. All that fire at innocents. This shock of realizing with whom I'm in this together....the hatred, and the joy of killing....I killed a terrorist....blew his head off....There's nothing to hold you back." They're just Arabs.

Testimony 6 - Bombardment

The new 120mm Mortar was used in Gaza with "95 - 100%" accuracy. When it hits, it scatters shrapnel all around. It was used against neighborhoods. Innocents were hit, and "our artillery fire there was insane...."

"Most of the time firing was for softening resistance I think....We simply received orders. If we hit terrorists, then I guess that was the purpose."

Testimony 7 - Rules of Engagement

The commander stressed using "fire power" from the air and on the ground. "You see something and you're not quite sure? You shoot....Fire power was insane. We went in and the booms were just mad. The minute we got to our starting line, we simply began to fire at suspect places....a house, a window....In urban warfare, anyone is your enemy. No innocents." Houses were taken over with soldiers positioned inside "according to plan."

Testimony 8 - Rules of Engagement & Use of White Phosphorous

Some of the younger soldiers "think it's cool to wield such power with no one wanting to rein them in. They (were given) permission to open fire" even at most people who "definitely (are) not terrorists." Free fire used all weapons against "everything (including) houses," whether or not they looked suspect. "I know (that some) crews....even fired white phosphorous. Our battalion mortars (and tanks) were also using phosphorous."

Sometimes an order was given: "Permitted, phosphorous in the air." At times, it was used "because it's fun. Cool. I don't understand what it's used for."

Testimony 9 - Rules of Engagement & House Demolitions

"From the onset....the brigade commander and other officers made it very clear to us that any movement must entail gunfire" with or without being shot at. Alerts were given about a suicide bomber or sniper in the area, but "none of (these) materialized as far as our company was concerned."

"Houses were demolished everywhere." They were fired at "with tremendous power. We didn't see a single house that remained intact....The entire infrastructure, tracks, fields, roads (were) in total ruin." D-9 bulldozers demolished everything "in our designated area. It looked awful, like in those World War II films where nothing remained. A totally destroyed city."

Testimony 10 - Briefings

Formal briefings covered "going off to war (and in war) no consideration of civilians was to be taken. Shoot anyone you see....this pretty much disgusted me. There was a clear feeling, and this was repeated whenever others spoke to us, that no humanitarian consideration played any role in the army at present."

Language used in one briefing was something like: "Don't let morality become an issue. That will come up later. Leave the nightmares and horrors that will come up for later, now just shoot."

Testimony 11 - Use of White Phosphorous & Rules of Engagement

"We walked (with another battalion) and saw all the white phosphorous bombs....we saw glazing on the sand (resulting) from white phosphorous (use), and it was upsetting." Houses were targeted and many around them were destroyed with people inside them.

Testimony 12 - Rules of Engagement

Moving into an area, orders were to "hold the junction, control it." Vehicle movement wasn't allowed and those advancing were fired on. Whole areas were abandoned. In entering houses, strict procedure is followed, including "setting red lines. It means that whoever crosses this line is shot, no questions asked." Orders always were shoot to kill, including women and children.

Testimonies 13 and 14 - Rules of Engagement

Houses were entered with gunfire and taken over. Some civilians were killed. Anyone out at night was called a terrorist even if it was clear he had no weapons.

Testimonies 15 and 16 - Rabbinate Unit

Promoting "Jewish Awareness," rabbis talked with soldiers and gave out materials, the Book of Psalms and some brochures. War got a religious tone against "four enemies:" Hamas, Iran, the Palestinian Authority even though it doesn't control Gaza, and Arab citizens of Israel. Rabbinate briefings said "they (all) undermine us."

Also that Israel was fighting a "war of choice, (a) holy war (with) differing rules." The message "aimed at inspiring the men with courage, cruelty, aggressiveness (and feeling) no pity, God protects you, everything you do is sanctified....Palestinians are the enemy....everyone."
Soldiers were told to be "crusaders," to have a "proper fighting spirit," and show no mercy. Distributed pamphlets said: "Palestinians are like the Philistines of old, newcomers who do not belong in the land, aliens planted on our soil which should clearly return to us."

One man introduced as Rabbi Chen presented his talk in points, also covered in pamphlets. First was "the sanctity of the People of Israel. He put it this way: he said while going in there, we should know there is no accounting for sins in this case." In other words, "whatever we do is fine."

[seafoid]

http://www.juancole.com/2012/10/creepy-israeli-planning-for-palestinian-food-insecurity-in-gaza-revealed.html

An Israeli human rights organization, Gisha, sued in Israeli courts to force the release of a planning document for 'putting the Palestinians on a diet' without risking the bad press of mass starvation, and the courts concurred. The document, produced by the Israeli army, appears to be a calculation of how to make sure, despite the Israeli blockade, that Palestinians got an average of 2279 calories a day, the basic need. But by planning on limiting the calories in that way, the Israeli military was actually plotting to keep Palestinians in Gaza (half of them children) permanently on the brink of malnutrition, what health professionals call "food insecurity". And, it was foreseeable that sometimes they would slip into malnutrition, since not as many trucks were always let in every day as the Israeli army recommended (106 were recommended, but it was often less in the period 2007-2010).

Planning for keeping people on the edge is nearly as bad as planning actually to starve them. A prudent person would know that a blockade is a blunt enough instrument, with shipments up and down in a given week, that such a policy would from time to time produce real misery. Were any physicians involved? They should be boycotted by the international community.

And, the Israeli army's way of trying to minimize the document must be the worst example of propaganda in history! They are saying that the plan was produced but not consulted. But this document aimed at making sure just enough trucks got in to keep people on the edge. If the government didn't consult it, does that mean it did not care if the food shipments slipped below the basic calorie allowance? Wouldn't it have been better if they had known about the 106-truck recommendation?

The food blockade had real effects. About ten percent of Palestinian children in Gaza under 5 have had their growth stunted by malnutrition.

A recent report [pdf] by Save the Children and Medical Aid for Palestinians found that, in addition, anemia is widespread, affecting over two-thirds of infants, 58.6 percent of schoolchildren, and over a third of pregnant mothers.

I mean, don't those figures make you want to do something for those mothers and children? Wouldn't they melt anyone's heart?


A UN Report out last month predicts that if Israel does not change its policies toward Gaza, the strip will be uninhabitable by 2020, when the population will likely be 2.1 million (think Houston).

[Mike Sheehy]

Seafoid, seriously, Why do you hate jews..?

[Ball DeBeaver]

Which rules of engagement do the Palestinians adhere to?

[seafoid]

Which rules of engagement do the Palestinians adhere to?

Whataboutery isn't an acceptable defence in international law. Israel is obliged to follow the Geneva Conventions regarding the treatment of civilians in war and it doesn't do so.

[seafoid]

Mike Sheehy

Wonderful to see you back. Maybe some day you could actually make a point.

Did you know that the O Donovans in Gnieveguillia had a great grandmother from Gaza on the mother's side? She got married to an Ambrose O Donovan who was serving in the British Army in 1918 after the fall of the Ottoman empire. The wedding was in Beer Sheva. 

[give her dixie]

Hopefully before the end of the year, this documentary, "Shalom Belfast" will be shown on BBC. I was interviewed a couple of times for it, and didn't hold back on my views......

http://www.haaretz.com/weekend/week-s-end/how-the-irish-view-the-israel-palestinian-conflict.premium-1.471003

How the Irish view the Israel-Palestinian conflict

In the first part of the documentary "Shalom Belfast?" the filmmaker Ithamar Handelman Smith comes to visit what he calls two of the shadier pubs in Belfast. Alongside the flags of the United Kingdom and of Northern Ireland, a number of Israeli flags are on display. They seem to generate great enthusiasm from the patrons.

"I was shot three times and blew up twice. They blew up my car and I lost a child at 5 years of age," relates one of the people at the bar, Steve Mailin. "They blew my car up, killed my child and it turned me nasty. Then I went to ..."

"To avenge [his death]?" asks the interviewer, and Mailin nods.

When Mailin is asked about the understanding the loyalist Protestants like himself in Northern Ireland evince for Israel, he explains: "The vast majority of that community could sympathize with Israel. Israel is an example for the rest of the world, and I think all Israelis are brilliant people ... I will die for Israel, if needed, not a problem. The only place that I can put close to my heart would be Israel, because it is oppressed, nobody likes them, and nobody likes us."

When Handelman Smith directs his camera at the other side - at extremist Catholics - their support is for the Palestinians. Extremists on both sides of the violent and long-standing conflict in Northern Ireland who choose to take sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict repeatedly mention the similarities between the two hate-filled clashes.

"Shalom Belfast?" was screened last week at the Tel Aviv Cinematheque and will be broadcast tomorrow (Saturday evening ) on Channel 8. Israeli-born Handelman Smith, a journalist and writer, began working on the film, his first, three years ago when he moved to the capital of Northern Ireland. His wife got a job with the British Council there and he joined her.

"Ever since I was a child, I loved certain Irish bands, like the Pogues, and I romanticized Ireland," he related, in a recent interview in Tel Aviv. "I was interested in the idea of a Western European country that's still stuck in a civil war and a conflict that is somewhat reminiscent of our own conflict. I was interested in the idea that the Irish Catholics are like the 'Palestinians of Europe,' at least in their own mind: an occupied people, robbed of its land and rights, with very strong anti-British sentiments. But I also was anxious because I had never been there and it was clear to me that this place wouldn't be like it is in books and the records of my youth."

In July 2009, he left a broiling-hot Israeli summer and landed straight into a particularly chilly Irish day.

"We landed on July 11 and took a taxi through some especially tough neighborhoods. We saw all the graffiti and the flags and suddenly I was struck by the connection between this place and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I immediately realized there was something I needed to research."

Belfast was covered in flags that day, among them Israeli ones. Handelman Smith had arrived in the city on the day before the most important holiday for the Protestants in Ireland, Orangemen's Day: the day they celebrate King William of Orange's victory over his Catholic cousin King James II in 1690. The Protestants commemorate the occasion date by lighting bonfires and throwing into the flames effigies of the pope, flags of Catholic Ireland (the Republic of Ireland ) - and just to spice things up, some Palestinian flags.

Journalist and writer Handelman Smith, who was born in 1976, wrote and edited for the Israeli press from the time he was 17 years old, mostly focusing on cultural issues; he also published personal columns in Time Out and Akhbar Ha'ir. Over the years he also published four books: a novel, two collections of short stories and one book of poetry (under the name Itamar Ben Canaan ). When he decided to leave Israel and move to Ireland, his friend Aviv Giladi suggested making a film about the move.

"I have always been interested in making films," he said. "I studied cinema in high school and also a bit at the university. I wanted to make a film but I didn't know about what. The moment I landed in Belfast and saw Israeli flags flying in the street I contacted my [Israeli] producers and Channel 8 and told them I thought I had a film."

According to Handelman Smith, 70 percent of the funding for the film comes from British sources; the BBC supported the endeavor along with Channel 8. He relates that the British-American documentary filmmaker Louis Theroux was a main source of inspiration for him as he went out to meet with Irish extremists from both sides - people who range on a scale from hallucinatory to scary, he says. Situations that sometimes were reminiscent of Theroux's experiences among various marginal American sub-cultures arose.

Central figure

Handelman Smith says his intention was to make a straightforward, journalistic documentary and to avoid personal soul-searching. Nevertheless, he does figure prominently in the movie: He leads the documentary journey, converses with the interviewees, argues with them, eggs them on, laughs with them, spends time with them, drinks with them.

"True, I am at the center of the film," he admitted. "After all, I am not just a journalist ... I felt I was part of the story. I encounter [the people in] this story and the film is about how I see them. This is also the angle that interested the Britons who invested in the film. The foundations I applied to in Israel for support expected me to expose my own life, but I wasn't interested in that. Today I am doing everything I can to get away from the image I once had, of a person who is always probing himself. I am tired of it; it doesn't seem interesting to me any more."

He decided that the film would be a personal account of an Israeli filmmaker who comes to Belfast and encounters the strange phenomenon of how the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is reflected in the local conflict. "I pondered a lot about how to build a story around this and in the end it was my wife, Julia Carolyn Ann [Handelman Smith], who gave me the idea: my own journey, in which I go back and forth between the extremes - and try to get everyone to like me."

He and his wife wrote the script together and devoted their whole first year in Belfast to research: "We traveled to every hole in Northern Ireland, we went around to scary pubs and looked for activists, figures whose lives we could follow."

Among the interviewees who appear are, among others, an Irish Protestant who says he feels like an Israeli, decides to convert to Judaism and dreams of moving to a West Bank settlement; a key activist in the Free Gaza movement in Northern Ireland; a Catholic who stands in the city squares wearing a keffiyeh and explaining the plight of the Palestinians; and the head of the "Protestant Messianic Peace Congregation," a church in a chilly coastal town where congregants sing songs in Hebrew, pray for the welfare of the State of Israel, its soldiers and police, and dream of moving one day to live in the Holy Land.

Handelman Smith admits that the encounters with extremists on both sides were sometimes unpleasant.

For example, the conversation with the Protestant paramilitary man Crazy Joe (the nickname for the Steve Mailin mentioned above ) was, he said, "a scary experience. Oddly enough in the Protestants' pubs - where there are supporters of Israel and people are sometimes wrapped in Israeli flags - that's where I felt more on edge. They are soccer hooligans and belong to the British National Front [the extreme right-wing party]: They hate blacks and Muslims and admire Israel because they see in it anti-Muslim might. At all those pubs, they asked me whether I had been in the army and had killed Arabs, and I admit I sometimes had to lie."

Another nerve-racking encounter was with Danny Boyle, a pro-Palestinian terrorist and former member of the Irish Republican Army, who spent 20 years in prison. "I knew he was an extremist, but I didn't know just how extreme. He was terribly violent in his speech. He said Israel had to be burned down and all the Zionists thrown out of there. I'm not a typical Israel who's not scared of anything, but Itai Lev [Handelman Smith's collaborator in the direction of the film] said to him, 'Don't talk that way. Either you talk like a human being or you leave us alone.' So Boyle asked, 'What do you want, to come to my home and drink tea?' And Itai said yes. I got nervous and I asked him in Hebrew, 'Are you crazy? They'll abduct us - this guy works with Hamas.'

"But Itai insisted and we did go to his home, in the scariest neighborhood in Londonderry, which is spookier than Belfast. In the end, only a very small bit of that conversation with him made it into the film. And a month and a half after we met with him, the guy went to prison because he was caught in a car carrying half-a-ton of explosives."

After his extensive investigative journey in Northern Ireland, we wondered, how does Handelman Smith explain the Catholics' extreme support for the Palestinians and the Protestants' backing for Israel?

"Glenn Peterson, an Irish writer I interview in the film, told me something nice," Handelman Smith replied. "When you live in a place like this [Northern Ireland], people look for a context for themselves. They want to think they are not the only ones stuck in a city that's split up according to religion and ethnic origin. They've found a parallel for themselves in Israel and Palestine, and thus feel some sort of identification with that issue.

"After the occupation in 1967, the Catholics became pro-Palestinian and there were close ties between the IRA and the Palestine Liberation Organization. So it's very clear - they really were partners to the Palestinian struggle. On the other side, the Protestants, many of whom are evangelical Christians, are by definition supporters of Israel for religious reasons. Peterson explains that ... in the Orange Lodges [an Irish Protestant fraternal organization], people believe they are descendants of one of the tribes of Israel, the lost 13th tribe. This feeling is embedded deep in their culture.

"Ultimately, Northern Ireland is a very small place, with a lot of madness, and in this sense it is also very similar to Israel," continued Handelman Smith. "In Israel we say there is hardly a single family that doesn't have someone who was wounded in a war or a terror attack. Well, it's that way there too - only there everything is on a smaller scale."

Did Handelman Smith know in advance what awaited him in Northern Ireland? "I knew but I also didn't know. I knew Northern Island is a place with a problematic past, but I also knew there is peace there - there's calm and normal life there ... [But] I was surprised to find that entire communities there are still engaged with their conflict, that there is lively activity surrounding it still. So that too, in fact, is exactly like here."

[nifan]

And the poor who don't have the money to pay for food? Would everyone in a society have access to the same number of calories if less than 2300 is the average for the whole territory ? Mothers who are so weak they can't breastfeed their kids and have no money to pay for formula, for example.

10% of kids are stunted because of Israeli policy.

Israel is a disgrace.

First, I find Israels actions in gaza abhorrent. However this argument with the average calories helps nothing, as it is misreported at best.
the average as i said would be right for adults, but much of the poupulation would be a lot younger and therefore have less needs, easily countering the number of breastfeeding mothers who require what - 600 calories a day extra?
Are you also implying that wealthy palestinians are taking much more than they require and the poor are starving accordingly?

As I say, I dont know all the details here, and im not defending israel, but reporting the average calories above and saying this is just enough to keep them alive is false - 1800 a day average minimum given by  Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

[give her dixie]

For some Israelis, Gazans receive 2,279 calories too many

http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/for-some-israelis-gazans-receive-2-279-calories-too-many.premium-1.471214

The closet is about to burst from the number of skeletons stuffed inside it. Occasionally one falls out, threatening to wake up complacent Israelis, until it's quickly pushed back inside, out of sight. But the skeletons are still there, deep in the closet, and they will continue to haunt Israelis for many years. One skeleton forced its way out last week: The Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories was forced to hand over its "Red Lines Report," of 2008, in which it calculated the minimum number of calories Gaza residents would need so as not to starve. This followed a successful three-and-a-half year legal battle by the Gisha - Legal Center for Freedom of Movement association. Amira Hass reported on the document, and Haaretz gave it the proper play as its lead story last Wednesday. Some parts of the document had already appeared in Haaretz in 2009, in a report by Uri Blau and Yotam Feldman.

In neither case, however, did the reports raise a storm. The country has plenty of ways (this newspaper being an exception) of burying skeletons deep in the closet so that Israelis shouldn't be overly disturbed. But the skeleton sticking out now belongs to a monster. The COGAT office insists that this was an "internal staff document" and a "working paper" that was never implemented. That's doubtful, but in any case the very fact that work was done and such a working paper was produced is disgusting.

Who came up with the idea of calculating the caloric intake for 1.5 million people under siege? What train of thought even gives Israel the right to enter the mouths and invade the stomachs of the people living under its jackboots? So now it's not just their bedrooms that are brutally broken into every night; now it's also their digestive system.

Even after the writing of this document, Israel continued to brazenly claim that the occupation of Gaza had ended. The very fact that such a document was composed, whether it was used or not, points to a satanic way of thinking. But the reason that army didn't want this document made public had nothing to do with its diabolical content. Nor did it fear a public storm, which it knew wasn't likely to happen in a country afflicted with blindness. The reason the Israel Defense Forces was reluctant to publicize this document was because it would make Israel look even worse in world opinion than it already does. It's a matter of image, you know; the goyim shouldn't find out. It's not nice for the goyim to know how low Israeli racism could sink. The document details the "model formulated by the Health Ministry - according to average Israeli consumption," and the IDF plan for the Palestinians, whose figures were "adjusted to culture and experience" in Gaza. The IDF, the new "Israel food association," knows how to distinguish between what types of foods enlightened types need, and what the savages and natives need. More fruits and vegetables for the enlightened, more sugar and oil for the savages. Since they are so humane, they took into account "'sampling' by toddlers under the age of 2," by adding another 34 tons of food a day as charity that would save them from death. Though the people at the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories made mathematical calculations, from time to time their resolve weakened: At the end of 2008 they approved the entry of shampoo into Gaza, but not conditioner; hummus, but not pine nuts. Imagine that.

Now that the document has been released, it's time to attach names to it. The government headed by Ehud Olmert was the one that in 2007 decided to restrict the entry of goods into Gaza even further. It tightened its grip in an effort to achieve the release of captured soldier Gilad Shalit and to bring down the Hamas regime, but this collective punishment, which is illegal under international law, achieved nothing. Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilna'i, a man of the Labor Party, Atzmaut and the Israel "left," approved the composition of the document. Maj. Gen. Amos Gilad was the Coordinator of Government Activities who ordered the policy to be translated into tables and statistics. Vilna'i and Gilad still serve in senior positions and enjoy public prestige; Olmert was tried on totally unrelated issues. War criminals? Are you kidding? That's a term reserved for Serbs and Congolese.

Of course, there are a lot of Israelis who believe that even the 2,279 daily calories that Israel in its great mercy approved for every Gazan is 2,279 calories too many. If you don't believe me, just ask them.

[Ball DeBeaver]

But the Palestinians are just peace loving tree huggers. They wouldn't hurt a fly. 


Just this months rocket attacks on Israel. Although the majority of them don't cause injury, it's only a matter of time before they start to find their range.


October 1
According to the Israel Police, Palestinians fired a rocket into Israel. No injuries or damage were reported.[251]
October 4
In the evening, according to an Israel Defense Forces spokesperson, Palestinians fired a Qassam rocket into the Ashkelon area.[252]
October 8
On the morning of the Jewish holiday of Shemini Atzeret, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other terrorist groups fired more than 50 rockets and mortars into Israel. One of the rockets landed in a petting zoo in the Eshkol Regional Council, killing two goats and wounding nine other goats. A worker stated that the zoo was usually "packed with children" but was empty at the time because of the holiday. A residential building was also damaged, but no human injuries were reported. Israelis in the Eshkol Regional Council were instructed to remain in shelters for several hours. This marked the first time since June that Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, claimed responsibility for rocket attacks on Israel. The group's stated aim was vengeance against "Zionist crimes"; this was an allusion to an Israeli air strike the previous day against Muhammad Jerbi, a jihadist militant from Rafah, and Abdullah Mohamed Hassan Maqawi, a member of the The Mujahideen Shura Council of Jerusalem, a Gazan militant group.[253][254]
October 9
Palestinians fired 6 rockets into Israel. No injuries or damage were reported in any of the attacks.
Around 6 am, a rocket was launched into the Eshkol Regional Council.[255]
In the afternoon, a Qassam rocket was fired into the Sha'ar Hanegev Regional Council.[256]
After nightfall, two Qassam rockets landed outside Sderot, and three Grad missiles landed outside Netivot.[255][257]

Israel responded with an air strike on an infiltration tunnel in the northern Gaza Strip.[258]
October 10
In the morning, Palestinians fired a rocket into the Eshkol Regional Council.[259] Another rocket exploded in an open area in the city of Netivot.[260] In the evening, a Grad missile was fired toward Netivot.[261] No injuries or damage were reported in any of the attacks. Israel responded with an air strike on a Hamas training camp, causing no injuries.[262]
October 12
Around 19:30, Palestinians from the Mujahideen Shura Council in the Environs of Jerusalem fired a Grad missile into Netivot, which exploded in the backyard of a family home. Shrapnel pierced the walls of the home and penetrated a child's bedroom. Though there were no physical injuries, two people were hospitalized for acute stress reaction. Israel responded with an air strike on two Mujahideen Shura Council terrorists riding a motorcycle in the northern Gaza Strip. One was killed and the other was injured.[263][264][265]
October 14
Palestinians fired two rockets into the Eshkol Regional Council, causing no injuries or damage. In a separate incident, Israeli forces targeted Palestinians terrorists as they were preparing to fire rockets into Israel, killing one and injuring another.[266]
October 16
Palestinians fired a rocket that landed near a home in the Ashkelon Coast Regional Council. The building was damaged and two people were treated for acute stress reaction. A second rocket landed in an open area in the Lachish Regional Council. Local residents were urged to stay close to bomb shelters. The attacks followed a threat against Israel by Sinai-based Salafist group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdes. Israel responded with an air strike on a base of Hamas' armed wing in the northern Gaza Strip, causing no injuries.[267][268][269]
October 17
Palestinian terrorists fired at least seven rockets into southern Israel, one of which struck a kindergarten. The building was damaged, but no one was in it at the time and no injuries were caused. The other rockets landed in open areas. Israel returned fire at the source of the rockets and hit some of the terrorists, according to Palestinian media.[270]
October 18
Palestinians fired a rocket into the Eshkol Regional Council, causing no injuries or damage.

[seafoid]

Hopefully before the end of the year, this documentary, "Shalom Belfast" will be shown on BBC. I was interviewed a couple of times for it, and didn't hold back on my views......

Presumably you are an "extremist catholic"...

It sounds like another attempt at Hasbara

[seafoid]

But the Palestinians are just peace loving tree huggers. They wouldn't hurt a fly. 


Just this months rocket attacks on Israel. Although the majority of them don't cause injury, it's only a matter of time before they start to find their range.


October 1
According to the Israel Police, Palestinians fired a rocket into Israel. No injuries or damage were reported.[251]
October 4
In the evening, according to an Israel Defense Forces spokesperson, Palestinians fired a Qassam rocket into the Ashkelon area.[252]
October 8
On the morning of the Jewish holiday of Shemini Atzeret, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other terrorist groups fired more than 50 rockets and mortars into Israel. One of the rockets landed in a petting zoo in the Eshkol Regional Council, killing two goats and wounding nine other goats. A worker stated that the zoo was usually "packed with children" but was empty at the time because of the holiday. A residential building was also damaged, but no human injuries were reported. Israelis in the Eshkol Regional Council were instructed to remain in shelters for several hours. This marked the first time since June that Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, claimed responsibility for rocket attacks on Israel. The group's stated aim was vengeance against "Zionist crimes"; this was an allusion to an Israeli air strike the previous day against Muhammad Jerbi, a jihadist militant from Rafah, and Abdullah Mohamed Hassan Maqawi, a member of the The Mujahideen Shura Council of Jerusalem, a Gazan militant group.[253][254]
October 9
Palestinians fired 6 rockets into Israel. No injuries or damage were reported in any of the attacks.
Around 6 am, a rocket was launched into the Eshkol Regional Council.[255]
In the afternoon, a Qassam rocket was fired into the Sha'ar Hanegev Regional Council.[256]
After nightfall, two Qassam rockets landed outside Sderot, and three Grad missiles landed outside Netivot.[255][257]

Israel responded with an air strike on an infiltration tunnel in the northern Gaza Strip.[258]
October 10
In the morning, Palestinians fired a rocket into the Eshkol Regional Council.[259] Another rocket exploded in an open area in the city of Netivot.[260] In the evening, a Grad missile was fired toward Netivot.[261] No injuries or damage were reported in any of the attacks. Israel responded with an air strike on a Hamas training camp, causing no injuries.[262]
October 12
Around 19:30, Palestinians from the Mujahideen Shura Council in the Environs of Jerusalem fired a Grad missile into Netivot, which exploded in the backyard of a family home. Shrapnel pierced the walls of the home and penetrated a child's bedroom. Though there were no physical injuries, two people were hospitalized for acute stress reaction. Israel responded with an air strike on two Mujahideen Shura Council terrorists riding a motorcycle in the northern Gaza Strip. One was killed and the other was injured.[263][264][265]
October 14
Palestinians fired two rockets into the Eshkol Regional Council, causing no injuries or damage. In a separate incident, Israeli forces targeted Palestinians terrorists as they were preparing to fire rockets into Israel, killing one and injuring another.[266]
October 16
Palestinians fired a rocket that landed near a home in the Ashkelon Coast Regional Council. The building was damaged and two people were treated for acute stress reaction. A second rocket landed in an open area in the Lachish Regional Council. Local residents were urged to stay close to bomb shelters. The attacks followed a threat against Israel by Sinai-based Salafist group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdes. Israel responded with an air strike on a base of Hamas' armed wing in the northern Gaza Strip, causing no injuries.[267][268][269]
October 17
Palestinian terrorists fired at least seven rockets into southern Israel, one of which struck a kindergarten. The building was damaged, but no one was in it at the time and no injuries were caused. The other rockets landed in open areas. Israel returned fire at the source of the rockets and hit some of the terrorists, according to Palestinian media.[270]
October 18
Palestinians fired a rocket into the Eshkol Regional Council, causing no injuries or damage.

The collective punishment of 1.5 million people is inconsistent with the moral principles of Judaism. The IRA bombed places in England but the catholics of NI were never denied access to food.
They were never bombed with white phosphorous either.

[give her dixie]

Just another day at the office as Israel bomb the shit out of northern Gaza, killing 3 young men and injuring several others. Plus, they attacked a ship in international waters, kidnapping everyone on board, many of whom are European politicians.

[seafoid]

Just another day at the office as Israel bomb the shit out of northern Gaza, killing 3 young men and injuring several others. Plus, they attacked a ship in international waters, kidnapping everyone on board, many of whom are European politicians.

http://shiptogaza.se/en/Pressrum/Pressmeddelanden/human-consequence-blockade-true-story-pediatrician-henry-ascher

"As a pediatrician and a professor of public health, I strive against elements that limit people's right to health. In Gothenburg, this primarily means dealing with increasing social inequalities, ignorance concerning the needs of refugees and child refugees and limitations of the right to medical treatment of people not possessing identification papers. In other parts of the world, people are dying as a result of political decisions.
Let's call her Mona. She is 32 years old and a mother of 2 young children. She discovers two lumps in her breast. Soon she finds out that she has breast cancer. She gets an operation and begins chemotherapy—cytostatics—to kill the remaining cancer cells. She undergoes two treatments and, aside from the usual side effects of chemotherapy, everything goes well.
That's when the problems start.
At the hospital there is no medicine left and there isn't any to be found anywhere else. Why? Mona was born and lives in Gaza. Along with 1.6 million other people, most of whom are children, she lives on a small strip of land which is less than one third the size of Öland. For more than five years, Mona and all Gazans have been living under a land and sea blockade enforced by Israel. The import of goods is very restricted and many items are not allowed in at all. Essentially all exports have been halted.

For Mona this has become a question of life and death. She must receive cytostatics in the right amount at the right time in order for her healthy cells to have enough time to regenerate between treatments without the cancer cells having time to spread. She applies to have treatments at a hospital in Israel. Her application is approved and she applies for a permit to cross the Gazan border into Israel. When the day for her treatment arrives, she still has not received her permit to enter Israel. After the hospital puts some pressure on the Israeli authorities, Mona gets her permit some weeks later, but by that time her appointment at the hospital is long gone.
Eventually Mona is finally able to get her third treatment, but several months too late. When it is time for her fourth treatment, the whole charade begins again. She has to wait many months before she gets her fourth treatment. Finally she gives up.
At this point, Mona's breast cancer should be treated with radiation, but this is impossible—not because Gaza hospitals lack the competence, but because the radio-active substances that are needed are not allowed into Gaza.

After some months, Mona begins to get intense pain in her back. The doctors at the Gazan hospital suspect that her cancer has spread. They want to find out if they are right and to see if the new tumor can be removed, but this diagnostic examination, scintigraphy, requires a weak radio-active isotope, which Israel does not allow into Gaza.

Mona's story is told by Dr. Rebecka Gardell Abu Asba at a seminar about the health situation in Gaza at Karolinska University Hospital during Almedalen Week. Dr. Gardell Abu Asba met Mona during a visit to Gaza last spring. Unfortunately, Mona is not the only one in this situation. The blockade is often discussed in general political terms. It's about terrorism, Hamas, fundamentalism and rockets. Mona's story shows just one of the effects the blockade has on average Gaza citizens. Roughly 12,000 people have been denied travel to Israel for medical treatment. The lack of fuel is also taking a great toll on health care. Diseases also spread, because 90% of the drinking water is polluted and over 90 million liters of water a day run into the Mediterranean without adequate treatment. Why? The import of spare parts for the treatment plants is blocked.

When the Swedish doctor Rebecka Gardell Abu Asba meets Mona in Gaza, she knows that Mona will not live much longer. She is in severe pain, but she doesn't receive any real treatment for the pain. The medication she needs is not available, since its import is prohibited under the blockade.
I don't know if Mona is alive today, or if her two young children have become motherless, but I know that she might have had an 80% chance to be cured from her cancer under normal circumstances. Health care in Gaza is high quality and with modern-day breast cancer treatments, the prognosis is good.

Mona's story brings up many questions. Does access to cancer medicine constitute support for Hamas? Do painkillers for the dying equal support for terrorism? In what way does a block on building materials, which prevents the reconstruction of the schools and homes destroyed by Israel during Operation Cast Lead in 2008-2009, reduce the risk of rocket attacks? And how can spare parts for water plants, sewage treatment plants and power plants be construed as a threat to Israel, one of the world's strongest military powers?