Palestinian Blog - Our Quds, Israeli Criminalities



"I'll confess it, at least, like thousands of other typical Jewish kids of my generation, I was reared as a Jewish nationalist, even a quasi-separatist. Every summer for two months for 10 formative years during my childhood and adolescence I attended Jewish summer camp. There, each morning, I saluted a foreign flag, dressed in a uniform reflecting its colors, sang a foreign national anthem, learned a foreign language, learned foreign folk songs and dances, and was taught that Israel was the true homeland. Emigration to Israel was considered the highest virtue, and, like many other Jewish teens of my generation, I spent two summers working in Israel on a collective farm while I contemplated that possibility. More tacitly and subconsciously, I was taught the superiority of my people to the gentiles who had oppressed us. We were taught to view non-Jews as untrustworthy outsiders, people from whom sudden gusts of hatred might be anticipated, people less sensitive, intelligent, and moral than ourselves. We were also taught that the lesson of our dark history is that we could rely on no one." Steinlight, Stephen. (2001). Backgrounder. Center for Immigration Studies. October.

Muslims mark Ramadan Bayram amid pandemic, violence in Palestine

Muslims on Thursday celebrated the second consecutive Ramadan Bayram, also known as Eid al-Fitr, under the shadow of the COVID-19 pandemic.

This year the holiday marking the end of Islam's holiest month of Ramadan also comes amid Israeli violence against Palestinians and continuous assaults on the Al-Aqsa Mosque, one of the holiest sites for Muslims.

Worshippers in Turkey headed to mosques wearing masks to perform communal bayram prayers while practicing social distancing. Imams also called on the attendees to refrain from carrying out traditional family visits amid the pandemic.

Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation, allowed mosque prayers in low-risk areas, but mosques in areas where there was more risk of the virus spreading closed their doors, including Jakarta's Istiqlal Grand Mosque, the largest in Southeast Asia.

Indonesians and Malaysians were banned for a second year from traveling to visit relatives in the traditional Eid homecoming.

In Bangladesh, however, tens of thousands of people were leaving the capital, Dhaka, to join their families back in their villages for Eid celebrations despite a nationwide lockdown and road checkpoints. Experts fear a surge in cases in a country grappling with a shortage of vaccines and fear of Indian variants of the coronavirus spreading.

''I understand that we all miss our relatives at times like this, especially in the momentum of Eid,'' Indonesian President Joko Widodo said in televised remarks. ''But let's prioritize safety together by not going back to our hometowns.''

With no congregational prayers at mosques, no family reunions, no relatives bearing gifts and cookies for children, ''Eid is not a grand event anymore,'' Jakarta resident Maysa Andriana said. ''The pandemic has changed everything... this is too sad!'' she said.

In Malaysia, Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin unexpectedly announced another nationwide lockdown from May 12 until June 7 to curb a spike in cases. Interstate travel and all social activities are banned, which means that like in Indonesia, Muslims cannot visit each other or family graves.

Muhyiddin acknowledged that many are angry with the lockdown but defended the need for drastic measures, saying hospitals have almost reached their capacity.

Meanwhile, weary Palestinians prepared for a somber bayram, as Gaza braced for more Israeli airstrikes and communal violence raged across Israel after weeks of protests and violence in Jerusalem.

Gaza residents are bracing for more devastation as Israel carries out waves of bone-rattling airstrikes, sending plumes of smoke rising into the air. Since Monday, Israel has toppled two high-rise apartment buildings allegedly housing Hamas facilities.

Israeli airstrikes have struck around 600 targets inside Gaza, the defense military said.

Gaza's Health Ministry said the death toll rose to 69 Palestinians, including 16 children and six women.

The current eruption of violence began a month ago in Jerusalem, where heavy-handed Israeli police tactics during Ramadan and the threatened removal of dozens of Palestinian families from their homes by Jewish settlers ignited protests and police attacks on Palestinians. A focal point was the Al-Aqsa Mosque, built on a hilltop compound that is revered by Jews and Muslims, where police fired tear gas and stun grenades at protesters.

The violence has set off violent clashes between Arabs and Jews in Israel, in scenes unseen in more than two decades. Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that he was prepared to use an ''iron fist if necessary'' to calm the violence.

But violence erupted across the country late Wednesday. The Jewish mobs attacked the Arabs in the central city of Lod, the epicenter of the troubles, despite a state of emergency and nighttime curfew. In nearby Bat Yam, a mob of Jewish nationalists attacked an Arab motorist, dragged him from his car and beat him until he was motionless.

Many Muslim-majority countries slammed Tel Aviv for the violence and called for an immediate stop to the Israeli aggression.


The 73rd anniversary of Deir Yassin massacre

By Jeremy Salt

''If our dreams for Zionism are not to end in the smoke of assassins' pistols

and our labor for its future to produce only a new set of gangsters worthy

of Nazi Germany, many like myself will have to reconsider the position we

have maintained for so long in the past.''

 — Winston Churchill, November 1944, from his address to the House of Commons on the murder of Britain's Resident Minister in the Middle East, Lord Moyne, by two members of the zionist terrorist organization, Lehi

Israel's crimes against Iran in the past decade include the sabotage through the Stuxnet virus of the centrifuges in its nuclear development program,  the killing through missile attack of its militia members in Syria, the sabotage of its Natanz nuclear plant in July this year and the murder in recent years of five of its leading nuclear scientists,  most recently, a few days ago, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.

Each of these attacks would have been carried out with at least the approval of the US government,  if not the active involvement at some level of both the US and its puppet Iranian terrorist organization, the MEK (Mujahedin e-Khalq). In reverse,  Israel would have been closely involved in the US assassination of Qasim Suleimani in Iraq in January this year. 

These murders might be state operations but are no different in their brazen nature,  their illegality and their brutality from hits organized by Mafia gangs. In the case of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a distinguished physicist, he was apparently dragged from his car during the attack and finished off in the middle of the road. The crime was so heinous that even voices usually hostile to Iran (including the New York Times and former CIA director John Brennan) were appalled.

Each of these attacks is a casus belli for war. Two can play at this game, which means that by these attacks, Israel is virtually inviting the assassination of its own political leaders and military commanders, or its senior representatives abroad. That Iran does not strike back, in the same way, is not necessarily a sign that it does not have the capacity to organize such retaliation. Apart from the criminality and violations of international law that such actions represent, Iran is never going to strike back at a time of Israel's choosing.

Nevertheless, the government is under pressure from its own people to deal with a devastating counter-blow, not necessarily against individuals but against Israeli infrastructure such as the port at Haifa. Each of these provocations pushes Iran closer to the edge, as intended by Israel.  The repeated refusal of the government to respond is being criticized in Iran as a sign of weakness, as the more Israel gets away with the more it will try to get away with.

At the same time, even though Israel is responsible, an Iranian reprisal would trigger off a large-scale military response by Israel and a full-scale war that no one in their right mind would want. It is a further sign of the moral void at their center that Netanyahu and many of the fanatics around him do want such a war and are prepared to drop bombs on live nuclear reactors to achieve their aims.

The general view seems to be that Israel did this so Biden would not be able to sign back on to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear agreement from which Trump withdrew the US in 2018. That may be so, but Netanyahu might have calculated that this latest savagery would be the final spark igniting the war he has wanted for years. Either of these outcomes would suit him.

There are always parallels in history and for Israel's attempts to provoke an open war with Iran, one parallel would be Israel's attempts to draw Egypt's President Gamal Abd al Nasser into war in 1967. This was no 'preemptive' war but another war of choice. 1948 was the first, because only through war could the zionists seize  Palestine, at least most of it. 1967 was the second launched to destroy Egypt's armed forces, to destroy Nasser's Arab world leadership, and to occupy the rest of Palestine. 

It was strikingly successful. All Palestine ended up under occupation and the Egyptian military was shattered. Nasir's pan Arab leadership was not destroyed but gravely weakened by Egypt's failure to see the war coming and defend itself.

Just as Israel has been trying to draw Iran into the open through the assassination of its scientists and the sabotage of its nuclear plants, so in the year before the 1967 war it set out to draw Nasser into the open through provocations along the Syrian armistice line. These took the form of incursions by armored tractors into the DMZ, triggering off shelling by the Syrian army and then air attacks by Israel.  

Although Israel was determined to destroy any Arab nationalist government and to destroy Arab nationalism itself, the main target of these provocations was Nasser. He was the foremost Arab champion and Israel wanted him where it could get at him. It knew that sooner or he would have to respond to its provocations on the Syrian front by taking action on the Egyptian front.

When Israel shot down six Syrian planes in April 1967, the ball started to roll. Israeli politicians talked of going further than ever before, of teaching Syria a lesson, and even of invading Syria and occupying Damascus, 15 years ahead of its invasion of Lebanon and occupation of Beirut. 

By the second week of May, war was regarded as inevitable. Nasser moved troops and tanks into Sinai and called for the withdrawal of the UN Emergency Force (UNEF) from the armistice line. Although Israel was the aggressor in the 1956  war, UNEF forces were inside Egypt because Israel refused to accept them on its side of the armistice line and as usual, it got its way. 

On May 22, Nasser closed the Straits of Tiran, the entrance point to the Gulf of Aqaba, but without actually blocking them to Israeli shipping. Under pressure, however, to stand up to the Israelis, he had moved the final piece on the board that set the stage for war. 

Israel repeated the rhetoric of 1948. İt was again being threatened with extermination and annihilation at the hands of an Arab 'ring of steel.' In fact,  it knew, and so did the CIA, that it would easily defeat any Arab army or combination of Arab armies.  Behind the panic deliberately set in motion among the Israeli population,  the generals could not wait to get going. They vowed to be on the banks on the Suez Canal within a week. This was an opportunity  – one they had created – that Israel could not afford to miss. The military would deliver a knockout blow: according to Yigal Allon, ''There is not the slightest doubt about the outcome of this war and each of its stages.''

And so it turned out to be. On the Arab side, there is not the slightest doubt that Nasser did not want war. His threats were those of the Arab champion and his intended audience the Arab world,  but behind the scenes, he was looking for a way out of the crisis into which he had been maneuvered. An Egyptian delegation led by Vice-President Zakaria Muhi Al-Din was due to fly into Washington on June 7 for talks to begin the following day on bringing the crisis to an end. However, on June 5, with the window of the opportunity for war about to close, Israel attacked.

There is symmetry in all of these wars. Israel plays the role of the victim even while preparing to attack.  In 1948 Chaim Weizmann talked of extermination while assuring the Americans behind the scenes that the Arab armies counted for nothing. Israel's arrogance was checked in the first week of the 1973 war, with humiliation at the hands of Hizbullah waiting in 2000 and 2006. Yet if there is a learning curve Israel does not see it, an example of what long ago US Senator J. William Fulbright called the ''arrogance of power.''

Israel applies the same tactics at the micro as well as the macro level. On the West Bank and Gaza, it murders and massacres, and when there is a Palestinian response it has its rationale for more crushing blows. On the West Bank, this usually takes the form of enlarging settlements or building new ones. 

From the Zionist point of view, this has been a good year. Following the establishment of diplomatic relations with Israel by the UAE and Bahrain, the UAE has gone as far as blocking entry visas to the citizens of a dozen Muslim countries while allowing Israelis visa-free entry.  Talks in Saudi Arabia between Netanyahu and Muhammad bin Salman – apparently arranged without the knowledge of the king – open the way to the establishment of diplomatic relations, although for the time being this is not expected. MBS can give Israel most of what it wants without needing to come into the open, and as the nominal custodian of the two holy places, such a move would enrage Muslims around the world, with explosive consequences possible at the time of the hajj.

Israel's strategic advances also include the commercial, military and strategic relationship it is establishing in the eastern Mediterranean with Greece and the Greek government of southern Cyprus, which has already allowed Israeli military units to train on the island because of the similarity of the topography to southern Lebanon. Successfully playing off fears of Iran in the Gulf,  Israel plays off Greek rivalry with Turkey in the eastern Mediterranean.  

Able to attack from the very center of the central Arab lands – occupied Palestine – Israel is now steadily moving into a position that will eventually enable it to threaten Arab states and Iran from the periphery, from the gulf in the southwest and from the northeastern corner of the Mediterranean. It has pushed these doors open and on the basis of all its past behavior, it will keep pushing until it gets what it wants.

The assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh has antecedents dating back to the barrel bomb murders in Palestinian markets in the 1930s, the assassination of Lord Moyne in Cairo on November 6,  1944,  the blowing up of the King David Hotel in 1946, the assassination of Count Folke Bernadotte in 1948  and the massacres and destruction that have marked the zionist presence in the Middle East ever since.

Whether the enemy is a state, an organization or an individual,  the enemy must be destroyed. The standing refusal of the international 'community' to punish Israel for any of these crimes only encourages the zionist state to go still further.

Speaking to the House of Commons after the murder of Lord Moyne, Churchill, a strong advocate of Zionism all along, remarked that ''If there to be any hope of a peaceful and successful future for Zionism  these wicked activities must cease and those responsible for  them must be destroyed root and branch.'' These wicked activities have never ceased, those responsible for them have never been destroyed root and branch, the smoke of the assassins' pistols now hangs over an entire region and Zionism has produced generations of criminals fully worthy of Nazi Germany.    

No state can endlessly endure Israel's provocations. Iran and Hezbollah are playing the long game, compared to Netanyahu's greed for instant satisfaction but at some point, there will be a limit to what they can endure and then there will be war, possibly if not probably the most devastating in the modern history of the Middle East. What will the international 'community' say then? It will be far too late to regret that it should have done something to stop Israel earlier.

– Jeremy Salt taught at the University of Melbourne, at Bosporus University in Istanbul and Bilkent University in Ankara for many years, specializing in the modern history of the Middle East. Among his recent publications is his 2008 book, The Unmaking of the Middle East. A History of Western Disorder in Arab Lands. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.


State terrorism requires more action than condemnation

Today, the entire world is witnessing Israeli violations in occupied Palestinian territories as Tel Aviv continues to particularly target peaceful worshipers in the Al-Aqsa Mosque during the holy month of Ramadan.

Israel also continues its attempt to evict Palestinians from their homes and steal them for the Jewish settlers, who came from different countries to live in Palestine.

The audacity and illegality of Israel naturally fueled the Palestinian anger, but, the attacks on the holy Al-Aqsa compound played a major role in further inflaming that anger.

The crisis erupted first following an eviction attempt in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem which then escalated with the Al-Aqsa attack.

Israeli occupation forces also prepared an atmosphere especially in the Bab al-Amoud area to enable ultra-Orthodox Jews to enter the Al-Aqsa compound to hold celebrations on May 10, which corresponds to Ramadan 28 – a holy day for the Muslims.

Behind these two events, we can read Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's desire to please the Israeli extremists in order to obtain their support and secure his position in the prime minister's office. This is also why he provided protection for settler attacks on the Palestinians.

Sheikh Jarrah case

With regards to Palestinian homes in the Sheikh Jarrah area in East Jerusalem, Israeli organizations have been trying for a long time to evict 28 Palestinian families that have lived in the neighborhood since 1965, when it was under the Jordanian administration.

Zionist gangs had evicted these families from their homes in 1948. Bear in mind that there is a law in Israel called "the Absentees' Property Law of 1950" which does not allow Palestinians to recover property lost before 1948 and instead allows assets to be transferred to the Israeli state.

Therefore, after the 1948 eviction these familiesrestarted their lives in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, which back then was not under Israeli control because East Jerusalem was only occupied in 1967 during the Six-Day War.

After a few years, the Zionist organizations began distributing Palestinian lands to settlers coming from European countries, and they were not satisfied with that. The occupation government, whenever the opportunity arose, has worked to displace Palestinians to confiscate their properties and use all the tools of pressure like restricting movement, imposing high taxes and preventing the reconstruction or expansion of homes.

The struggle of these families began in 1972 in the Israeli courts, when the Sephardic Community Committee and the Knesset Committee of Israel (Committee for Ashkenazi Jews) claimed that they owned the land on which the homes were built in 1885.

Until 1991 the Israeli courts couldn't prove ownership of the lands to the Zionist organizations. Palestinian citizen Suleiman Darwish Hijazi, based on the documents of Ottoman-era title deeds, which were brought from Turkey in 1997, filed a lawsuit with the Supreme Court of Israel, confirming his ownership of the land on which the houses were built in Sheikh Jarrah. But the court refused to accept the documents.

One of the families was evicted in 2008 and this Ramadan, attempts were made to forcibly evict the rest of the families.

As for the events of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, they are also not new. The occupation tried two years ago to place electronic gates at the gates of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and tried to divide the mosque so that Jewish settlers could enter it. Today, it has managed to do so.

This time, Israeli attacks are being broadcast live on traditional and social in all languages, and the world is seeing the attacks on worshipers at the holy mosque.

A video of an Israel settler arrogantly telling a Palestinian woman whose home he was stealing that "if I don't, someone (else) will steal it," has gone viral. It was just one of many such incidents.

Israel can no longer conceal its continuous crimes since 1948. We live in the 21st century with a communications revolution, but Israel still wants to steal in plain sight of the whole world.

Israel occupies, steals

Israel has stolen the lands of an entire Palestinian people during the 70 years of conflict, and it wants more.

Well, will the Sheikh Jarrah case be an end to the injustice and turn the tables on Israel? Israel cannot market its story to the world any longer. Despite all the support from the Zionist lobby most international media, their lies are no longer deceiving anyone.

Every illegal occupation has a dilemma. The more an occupation causes crimes and anger, the more mobilization it faces.

For this reason, we saw the strong stand of the Palestinians in the Al-Aqsa Mosque to defend their honor and sanctities. We saw the resistance in Gaza to defend legitimate rights according to international law.

By increasing its attacks on the Palestinians, the Israeli occupation has endangered the security of its entity, as the reaction in Jerusalem sparked a Palestinian uprising that now extends to several cities and even inside Israel. And these cities had not witnessed any kind of chaos or demonstrations for decades.

The resistance in Gaza also responded strongly to the attacks more than ever before.

The Palestinians including men and women, old and young, have done whatever they must. They have paid a heavy toll from their blood and property and they will not back down on this path.

Anyone who says supports freedom must now support the steadfastness of the Palestinian people and support their resistance against the Israeli occupation.

History has taught us that the occupying power does not care about condemnations or international laws. Therefore, what is required is more than a mere condemnation and denunciation. There must be accountability for the occupying power for what it is doing.

Finally, Jerusalem today is a humanitarian address that brings together all those who yearn for global and regional stability. This is why what is happening in Jerusalem and the Al-Aqsa Mosque must be a catalyst for unity between the countries of the region and for a reality to be aware of whom is the true enemy of humanity and civilization.

The countries that rushed to normalize with the occupying power must retreat from these regrettable steps. The regional countries must work together to isolate the occupying state and delegitimize it and strive hard to hold it accountable for any aggression.

In fact, the Palestinians have revealed the impotence and lies of the occupation state as its security and social structure is fragile. It is also a terrorist state and not a democratic state as its public diplomacy envisages.

*Researcher at SETA Foundation.


Israeli energy pipeline hit as Iron Dome fails to intercept missile

 A pipeline belonging to an Israeli state-owned energy company was hit in a rocket attack as Iron Dome failed to intercept the projectile late Tuesday, Reuters reported citing an Israeli government official and an energy sector official.

Video broadcast by Channel 12 showed flames rising from what appeared to be a large fuel vat near the Israeli Mediterranean city of Ashkelon, south of Tel Aviv.

Operations at a power plant in Ashkelon were not interrupted, Channel 13 TV said.

Earlier on the same day, the death toll of Palestinian civilians killed in Israeli airstrikes on blockaded Gaza Strip rose to at least 28, including children amid an escalation sparked by violent unrest at Jerusalem's flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.

10 children and one woman were among those killed in the blockaded Gaza that is controlled by Hamas and 152 people there were wounded, Palestinian Health Ministry said.

Two Israeli women were also killed by rockets fired from Gaza in response to recent Israeli aggression in the heavily-targeted coastal city of Ashkelon, just north of Gaza, said the emergency service Magen David Adom. The local Barzilai medical center said it was treating 70 injured.

Hamas' Qassem Brigades had vowed to turn the town "to hell" and rained down an intense volley, claiming to have fired 137 rockets towards Ashkelon and nearby Ashdod within just five minutes. Loud booms again rocked the town on Tuesday, where a rocket had ripped a gaping hole into the side of an apartment block, an Agence France-Presse (AFP) reporter said.

Over 90% of recent rockets from Gaza were reported intercepted by the Iron Dome missile defense system, Israeli army spokesperson Jonathan Conricus said earlier.

Israel fighter jets and attack helicopters have carried out more than 130 strikes on military targets in the enclave, said Conricus. Israeli officials said they have killed 15 Hamas commanders, while the group Palestinian group Islamic Jihad confirmed two of its senior figures were also killed.

Tensions in Jerusalem have flared into the city's worst disturbances since 2017 in the days since Israeli riot police clashed with large crowds of Palestinians on the last Friday of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan.

Nightly unrest since then at the Al-Aqsa compound in occupied East Jerusalem has left more than 700 Palestinians wounded, drawing international calls for de-escalation and sharp rebukes from across the Muslim world.

Hamas had Monday warned Israel to withdraw all its forces from the mosque compound and the East Jerusalem district of Sheikh Jarrah, where the looming forced expulsion of Palestinian families has fuelled angry protests.

Sirens wailed across Jerusalem just after the 3 p.m. GMT deadline set by Hamas as people in the city, including lawmakers in the Knesset legislature, fled to bunkers for the first time since the 2014 Gaza conflict.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Hamas had "crossed a red line" by targeting Jerusalem and vowed that the Jewish state would "respond with force."

Hamas' Qassam Brigades said, "this is a message that the enemy must understand well: if you respond we will respond, and if you escalate we will escalate."

Several properties in Israel have been damaged by rockets, including an apartment in the southern city of Ashkelon, and a house in Beit Nekofa, west of central Jerusalem.

An Israeli Arab died from gunshot wounds in clashes with Israeli Jews in the central city of Lod, police said Monday, without providing detail.


We will never forgetThe 73rd anniversary of Deir Yassin massacre

Deir Yassin

At midnight on 09/04/1948, Zionist gangs treacherously attacked Deir Yassin village, west of Occupied Jerusalem, killing and maiming hundreds of Palestinian civilians. 

The massacre was committed by two Zionist military organizations, the Irgun, which was led by Menachem Begin who became the Israeli prime minister later on, and Stern Lehi, which was headed by Yitzhak Shamir, who succeeded Begin in the premiership, with prior coordination with the Haganah gang.

On that night, the gangs began to blow up the homes of the village one by one and burned other homes with residents inside.

Women and children tried to flee the village but the Zionist gangs fired at them and killed every one trying to escape. 360 Palestinians were killed in the massacre, according to the Red Cross delegate, Dr. Jacques de Renée.

The bodies of the martyrs were dumped in the village well and its door was closed tightly to hide the evidence of the crime while Haganah members gathered dozens of other bodies and blew them up to mislead the delegates of international institutions and to claim that the victims had died during armed clashes.

After 32 years, Israel expressed its pride of the Deir Yassin massacre, as it decided to call the names of the Zionist gangs: Irgun, Etzel, Palmach, and Haganah on the settlement streets that were built on the ruins of the village.

The Deir Yassin massacre was a fundamental pillar in the implementation of the ethnic cleansing plan in Palestine.

Menachem Begin, the former Israeli prime minister, wrote in his book titled The Revolution that the Deir Yassin massacre, along with other massacres, contributed to emptying the country of 650,000 Arabs. "If it were not for Deir Yassin, Israel would not have been established," he added.


The massacre of Ibrahimi Mosque

By Belal Yasin

Twenty-seven years ago, on 25 February, 1994, an Israeli settler named Baruch Goldstein shot at hundreds of Palestinians gathering for Al-Fajr prayer at the Ibrahimi Mosque in the occupied city of Hebron.

Goldstein took advantage of the gathering of the worshippers in the prostration position and the closure of the mosque's doors by the occupation soldiers, to kill 29 Palestinians and wound more than 150 others.

The massacre did not end until the Israeli forces shot at the attendees of the victims' funeral, raising the death toll of the massacre to 60.

Despite the atrocity of the massacre, it was widely supported by the Israeli occupation and settlers. When asked if he felt sorry for those killed by Goldstein, Jewish Rabbi Moshe Levinger remarked: "The death of an Arab makes me feel sorry as much as I pity the death of a fly."

Goldstein is considered a saint by Israeli authorities, who transformed his grave into a shrine and assigned a number of honor guards to perform the military salute every day before his grave.

The Arab and Muslim countries were outraged and condemned the criminal attack via peaceful demonstrations, demanding an end to the Israeli settlements and the prosecution of the occupation for its repeated crimes. However, the Israeli authorities argued that Goldstein was insane and was receiving treatment, making it legally impossible to hold him responsible for his actions. This is how the occupation managed to escape the legal responsibility for this crime.

Despite the attempts of Israeli media to mislead the public about what really happened during the massacre, the United Nations (UN) Security Council approved, on 18 March, 1994, a resolution condemning the Ibrahimi Mosque massacre, and called on the Israeli authorities to take measures to protect the Palestinians, including the disarming of settlers.

This decision resulted in the formation of an international mission in the city of Hebron, with the aim of monitoring the practices of the occupation. Because of a report issued by the international mission, which between 1994 and 2019 monitored more than 42,000 violations committed by the Israeli authorities against the Palestinians, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu refused in January 2019 to extend the stay of the international observers.

The media office of Netanyahu quoted him stating: "We will not allow an international force that works against us to stay any longer," considering that the mission of the observers, which consisted of documenting violations of his soldiers against the Palestinians, is an anti-Israel act.

The Ibrahimi Mosque massacre was not just a passing event, but rather an act planned to impose a new reality through which the occupation could achieve its goals, seeking to expel the Palestinians from the Old City and control the Ibrahimi Mosque – exactly what Hebron is witnessing now.

Since the massacre, the city of Hebron has been subjected to a series of measures that changed its historical features and strengthened Israeli settlement, including:

-Closing the Ibrahimi Mosque and the Old City for six months, under the pretext of holding investigations.

-Unilaterally forming the investigation committee, known as "Shamgar".

-The most prominent recommendations of the committee consisted of dividing the Ibrahimi Mosque into a synagogue and a mosque.

-Imposing tight security measures on the mosque, with electronic gates placed at its entrances.

-Granting settlers the right to sovereignty over 60 per cent of the Ibrahimi Mosque.

-Closing the roads leading to the mosque, except for one gate that was subjected to heavy security measures.

-Closing the Hisbah market, the Hebron Khan Khalil, Khan Shaheen, Al-Shuhada and Al-Sahla streets.

-Closing more than 1,800 shops in the Old City.

-Preventing Adhan (the call to prayer) in the mosque dozens of times a month.

-1,400 families abandoned their homes, fearing for their lives.

According to the aforementioned, it is clear that the Israeli authorities are encouraging settlers to commit more massacres against the Palestinians by iconizing the perpetrator of the Ibrahimi Mosque massacre, and refusing to commit to the UN Security Council resolution, recommending the protection of Palestinians and disarming the settlers.

On the other hand, the occupation state restricted the movement of Palestinians and gave the green light to settlers to expand their settlements and kill Palestinians, destroying their property and attacking their religious sanctities. This prompted many residents of the Old City to leave for fear of being harmed by Zionist gangs. Therefore, the international institutions must work harder to end the Israeli occupation and implement UN Resolution 242 to ensure that such massacres do not happen again, and to end the daily violations against Palestinians in the city of Hebron.

- Dr Belal Yasin is a political activist. His article appeared in MEMO.


Israeli police attack worshipers in Al-Aqsa Mosque, 295 injured

Muslim worshipers inside Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem's Old City were attacked by Israeli police late Friday.

Israeli police attempted to disperse worshipers inside the Haram al-Sharif area using stun grenades and gas bombs, causing many injuries, an official from the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf (an Islamic religious trust) told Anadolu Agency (AA) on condition of anonymity.

The number injured rose to 295 on Sunday in Israeli attacks at Al-Aqsa Mosque, Damascus Gate of the Old City and the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent.

A total of 88 were taken to hospitals in Jerusalem, while others were treated as outpatients, said a statement. Six Israeli officers were also reported wounded.

Most of the injuries were caused by rubber bullets fired by Israeli police, it added.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said that he held the Israeli government "responsible" for the unrest and voiced "full support for our heroes in Aqsa."

International observers urged calm, with U.N. Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Tor Vennesland tweeting his concern, urging all parties to "respect the status quo of holy sites in Jerusalem's Old City in the interest of peace & stability."

The police attacked worshipers who were praying in the Masjid al-Qiblatain inside Al-Aqsa with stun grenades and rubber bullets.

Meanwhile, clashes took place between Israeli security forces and Palestinians trying to enter Al-Aqsa through the Bab Al-Silsila, one of the gates to the mosque.

The intervention by Israeli police, who also attacked young Palestinians in front of the Damascus and Es-Sahire gates of the Old City, caused panic among women and children.

Police allow for controlled passage through the gates of the Old City.

Al-Aqsa Mosque is the world's third-holiest site for Muslims. Jews call the area the "Temple Mount," claiming it was the site of two Jewish temples in ancient times.

Israel occupied East Jerusalem, where Al-Aqsa is located, during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. It annexed the entire city in 1980 in a move never recognized by the international community.

Earlier Friday Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu urged Israel to stop expanding illegal settlements in East Jerusalem, as he reiterated Turkey's support for Palestine in a joint news conference with his Palestinian counterpart Riyad al-Maliki in the capital Ankara.


Qatar, Malaysia condemn Israeli brutal attack

DOHA, (PIC)

Qatar condemned on Saturday the storming of the Israeli occupation policemen of Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem on Friday night, describing the attack on the Muslim worshipers inside it as ''brutal.'' 

The Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a press statement that this attack is a provocation to millions of Muslims around the world and a flagrant violation of human rights and international covenants.

The Ministry stressed the need for urgent action by the international community to halt the repeated Israeli attacks against the Palestinians and the holy Al-Aqsa Mosque.

It reaffirmed the firm position of Qatar in support of the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, including the exercise of their religious rights and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the borders of 1967, with East Jerusalem as its capital.

Meanwhile, Abdul Hadi Awang, the Malaysian prime minister's special envoy for Middle East affairs, strongly condemned the violent attack by the Israeli police on Muslims in the Al-Aqsa Mosque which resulted in more than 200 injuries among the worshipers.

Awang added in a statement on Saturday, ''The Israeli Zionists committed atrocities by firing smoke and hand grenades and ruthlessly attacking Muslim worshipers with rubber bullets.

He also pointed out that the occupation police carried out large-scale arrests of worshipers in Al-Aqsa while they were performing the Qiyaam prayers during the last ten nights of the blessed month of Ramadan.

The prime minister's envoy called on all Muslims to continue protesting in solidarity with the Jerusalemites, stressing that the Palestinian cause is not only a Muslim issue but a global humanitarian issue.

Awang appealed to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the League of Arab States and the entire Islamic world to take firm measures and condemn the Israeli aggression.


Israel's Celebration of Destruction, Dispossession and Desecration

By Jeremy Salt

On May 10 this year the state of Israel … but wait a moment … before we go any further … in talking about this state, its 'independence' was announced in 1948 by a colonial settler minority, putting it in exactly the same category as the 'unilateral declaration of independence' made in 1965 by Ian Smith, representing the colonial settler minority of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).

The notion of independence being declared by a settler minority over the wishes of the indigenous majority was absurd and naturally rejected by the world when declared by Rhodesia's colonial settlers. How odd that it could have been accepted when declared by Palestine's colonial settlers, especially at a time when decolonization and self-determination were the order of the day.

So this is the first issue hanging over the state of Israel to this day. In any case, to continue, on May 10 the colonial-settler state of Israel will ''celebrate'' Jerusalem Day, marking the anniversary of the capture in 1967 of the ''Temple Mount'' and the ''eastern parts of the city,'' as the Times of Israel puts it (the Hebrew calendar is lunar, so the date, 28th Iyar, shifts year by year).

And here we have to stop again because what was captured in 1967, first, was not the 'Temple Mount' but the Haram al-Sharif, a Muslim compound containing two of the holiest sites outside Mecca, Al Aqsa (the farthest) mosque and the Qubbat al Sakhra (dome of the rock) sanctuary. There is a mount but there is no temple and strive as they might, as they have done ever since 1967, archaeologists have never found the evidence that one was ever there. This is not to say there was not but for no ruins to remain after a comparatively short time in history, it cannot have been anything like the gigantic structure described in the Bible.

Next are the ''eastern parts'' of the city but let's not forget the western parts. In 1948 Palestinian Muslims and Christians still owned 70 percent of land and property in West Jerusalem and almost all of it in the east, where by 1948 the Jewish community consisted of about 2000 people: most of what is known today as the 'Jewish quarter' is property stolen from the Palestinians.

In the partition plan of 1947 Jerusalem was to serve as a corpus separatum between the Palestinian and Jewish states. In 1948 Zionist militias occupied as much of the city as they could before the diplomats intervened. With more time, they would have taken all of it, but the point here is that in 1948, just like 1967, the Zionists had no legal claim to west Jerusalem. The ethnic cleansing of Palestinians included about 70,000 driven out of west Jerusalem and its immediate environs.

In any case, what happened on the ground in 1967 when the Zionists seized the eastern part of the city? What will they actually be ''celebrating?'' on May 10? A short list begins with the destruction of the 135 buildings in the 40 dunums (2.5 acres) of the Harat al Magharibah (the Maghrebi or more commonly the 'Moroccan' quarter'), bordering the western wall of the Haram al-Sharif, and built in the late 12th century by Malik al Afdal, son of Salah al-Din al Ayyubi (Saladin) as a waqf (inalienable Islamic endowment) to accommodate travelers and scholars arriving from North Africa.

On the evening of June 10, five days after Israel attacked Egypt and Syria, about 650 residents of the Magharibah quarter were turned out into the streets at short notice, taking with them only whatever they could carry of their personal possession. The entire quarter, including the contents of all the homes, was then dynamited and bulldozed to make way for a 'plaza' for Jews.

Those who refused to leave were forced out: the body of a woman who had not left was later found buried in the rubble. Several other bodies were also reportedly found.  Some of the families driven into the street were taken in by relatives but most ended up in the Shu'fat and Qalandiyya refugee camps. Within two days, nothing was left of the Magharibah quarter.

Apart from the homes, the destruction included two mosques, a Sufi lodge, the Afdaliyya madrasa (school), built for jurists of the Maliki school of Islamic law and the Hakurat al Khatuniyya (the garden of the noblewoman), a site containing Roman and Byzantine ruins and the foundations of an Umayyad palace.

Two years later the occupiers destroyed the nearby Fakhriyya madrasa and residence of the mufti of the Shafi'i school of law along with a house near the Haram that had been lived in by generations of the same family since the 16th century. The building itself was regarded as an outstanding example of Mamluq architecture.

During the conquest of the West Bank, some 300,000 Palestinians were driven out/fled across the Allenby Bridge into Jordan. The 5000 Palestinians turned out of Jerusalem and then the West Bank (on the all-purpose grounds of 'security') included the former mayor of East Jerusalem, Rouhi al-Khatib. Several villages and hundreds of buildings elsewhere were completely destroyed in the name of 'security.'

The occupation of the Syrian Golan Heights was followed by the displacement of a further 120,000 people, Syrian nationals as well as about 17,000 Palestinian refugees from 1948. In June 1974 Israel withdrew from some of the Golan Heights but not before deliberately dynamiting most of the city of Quneitra. These are some of the realities being celebrated on May 10.

But let's return to the Times of Israel's account of the fun times to be had in Jerusalem on May 10. The activities include visits to the Tower of David Museum and the City of David, and again, we have to stop right here. This citadel site near the Jaffa Gate has been dated back to King Herod's time (although, as a vantage point in the city, it would have been a natural defensive position for anyone occupying Jerusalem long before the Hebrews arrived in Palestine.

In turn, Salah al-Din al Ayyubi, the Mamluqs and the Ottomans all rebuilt the site: what the tourist guides call the 'tower of David' is actually the minaret of a Mamluk mosque, As for the 'city of David,' despite endless digging under and around the Haram, outside the scriptural accounts, it is still questionable whether a king called David ever ruled Jerusalem or that he even existed.

But let's move on to where to stay while joining the celebrations in Jerusalem. The options given by the Times of Israel include the Mamilla Hotel.   Jerusalem has many hotels and private houses that are stolen Palestinian property but the Mamilla is an interesting example because of what else it signifies. Occupied west Jerusalem in 1948 included the Mamilla cemetery.

As a burial site, Mamilla dates back to Byzantine times, as a Muslim cemetery back to the 7th century. The graves and tombs include, reputedly, companions of the Prophet (sahaba) religious scholars, Sufi sheikhs, judges, the descendants of some of the city's oldest families as well as the thousands of soldiers, Christian and Muslim, who fought and died for the city during the Crusades.

After seizing west Jerusalem in 1948 the Israeli administration pledged to respect the Mamilla cemetery. ''Israel will always know to protect and respect this site,'' in the words of the Ministry of Religious Affairs. In practice, while promising to safeguard Muslim religious sites, the state oversaw their destruction. Village cemeteries were ploughed over or left to fall into disrepair from calculated neglect and mosques were turned into chic art galleries, museums and cafes. None of this was accidental or collateral damage or the unforeseen consequences of war. It was all deliberate because if Israel was to exist, Palestine had to be destroyed.

As a symbol of Palestinian Jerusalem alongside the Haram al-Sharif the Mamilla cemetery was a prime target for 'redevelopment.' Far from protecting the site, the government soon authorized its piecemeal destruction, once it was taken over by the Custodian of Absentee Property. Over the decades the cemetery was cut up for access roads, a car park, a school and playing field, a lavatory block, a park ('Independence Park') and café, a hotel and a government building, as well as being dug up around the graves for the laying of electricity cables.

Of the thousands of headstones on the site in 1948, only a few were still standing in 1967 and only an estimated five percent are left now. Only about eight percent is left of the original 134.5 dunums (33 acres) of the cemetery. The original Mamilla water pool/cistern is empty, with vandalism adding to the picture of deliberate neglect by the municipality.

The current threat to what is left of the cemetery is the construction of a 'Centre for Human Dignity – Museum of Tolerance.' This grotesque tying together of dignity, tolerance, and desecration was the initiative of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in the US. The ground was broken in 2004 and digging began in 2005. In the following years, headstones were bulldozed, hundreds of graves were opened and the bones of the dead removed. The museum will take up 10 percent of what is left of the cemetery and given plans approved to build a hotel and hundreds of homes on the site, it is safe to predict that in time nothing will be left.

Conquest, destruction, dispossession and desecration are the realities behind what will be celebrated in the streets of Jerusalem on May 10. The occasion will be a standing invitation for the thugs who have been running wild in the streets of Sheikh Jarrah to inflict more pain on the Palestinians. ''Death to the Arabs'' they cry, as they have cried over the years, in Jerusalem and across Palestine. These are the ''extremists,'' Lehava (Prevention of Assimilation in the Homeland, aimed not just at Palestinians but all Christians) and Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Strength), both of them, in their ideology and street brutality, the heirs of Rabbi Meir Kahane and his Kach (Thus) Party.

But they are only slightly more extreme, slightly more open in their genocidal intentions than the extremists inside the government and Knesset and the extremists waiting for their turn to take power. They are not an aberration but the inevitable product of a racist ideology and the state on which it has been built. Israel is on a destructive path, destructive of the world around it, destructive of itself, but can still celebrate what has brought it to this point.

– Jeremy Salt taught at the University of Melbourne, at Bosporus University in Istanbul and Bilkent University in Ankara for many years, specializing in the modern history of the Middle East. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.


Torturing children is normal for Israel

By Asa Winstanley

In 2018, veteran Palestine solidarity campaigner and Jewish anti-Zionist Tony Greenstein was expelled from the Labor Party after being smeared as an anti-Semite. As has been seen so often during Labor's manufactured anti-Semitism crisis, the charges cited by party lawyers referred not to actual "anti-Semitism", but to legitimate criticism of Israel.

On his blog, Greenstein had pointed to the anti-Palestinian record of the then Labor MP Louise Ellman. She's been a leading pro-Israel lobbyist in Britain for decades. At that time she was the vice-chair of Labor Friends of Israel, and later became the group's chairperson.

While in parliament, Ellman frequently asked questions on behalf of Israel and its lobby. As Greenstein put it, her habit was to "put forward the standard Israeli security argument." He wrote that she was an "apologist for Israel's occupation forces" and a "supporter of Israeli child abuse."

This was no mere rhetorical attack, though. As Greenstein detailed on his blog, in one parliamentary debate, Ellman strongly defended the Israeli army's practice of detaining Palestinian children during night raids on their homes.

Ironically, Greenstein's condemnation of Ellman's defense of Israeli child abuse was considered to be "abusive language" by Labor's desiccated bureaucrats. There was plenty of evidence, even then, that Israeli practice towards Palestinian children constitutes child abuse.

Now a new report by Defense for Children International – Palestine provides detailed new evidence in exhaustive detail. The report concludes "overwhelmingly" that Israel's practice of isolating Palestinian child detainees "amounts to torture under international law."

The 73-page report — "Isolated and Alone: Palestinian children held in solitary confinement by Israeli authorities for interrogation" — evaluates and details the patterns of arrest, detention conditions and interrogation practices used by the Israeli authorities.

This is child abuse sanctioned by the Israeli government, not an aberration, or a case of a few bad apples. This is standard Israeli practice towards Palestinian children. Torturing children is normal for Israel.

"Israel has the dubious distinction of being the only country in the world that systematically prosecutes between 500 and 700 children in military courts each year," DCIP states. The organization estimates that, since the year 2000, approximately 13,000 Palestinian children have been imprisoned, detained, and prosecuted by Israel's occupation forces.

The report examined 108 cases of child detention in detail. In all of those cases, the child was interrogated without a lawyer or parent being present. And in 94 per cent of those cases, the child in question was given no access to a legal consultation before interrogation.

The interrogation techniques used by Israeli forces are mentally and physically coercive, the report explains. They combine intimidation, threats, verbal abuse and physical violence with the clear intention of obtaining a confession.

Eighty per cent of the children "reported being subject to stress positions during interrogation, most commonly having their limbs tied to a low metal chair for prolonged periods, a position they described as acutely painful."

This is torture by any standard; torture used to coerce these children into making a "confession". This goes a long way towards explaining why Israel's racist military courts — they are used for Palestinians only — have a 99.7 per cent conviction rate.

If you were tortured into testifying against yourself, then any court would probably make light work of "convicting" you. Imagine the terror that these children must feel. DCIP describes this as "cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment."

It points out that this form of torture is practiced by Israel "almost exclusively, during pre-charge and pre-trial detention" and that it's not generally used after the kangaroo court has secured a conviction. This is evidence that Israel is torturing children solely in order to obtain confessions or gather intelligence under interrogation, DCIP argues.

"International law prohibits the use of solitary confinement and similar measures constituting cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment against children," explains DCIP's Khaled Quzmar, "and yet Israeli authorities frequently detain children in this manner. It is widely acknowledged that this practice causes both immediate and long-term psychological harm to children. It must end immediately, and the prohibition must be enshrined in law."

Israel and the propagandists in its lobby in the West claim that it is "the only democracy in the Middle East." As this report demonstrates, the routine use of torture — and against children at that — is the action of a dictatorship, not a democracy.

- Asa Winstanley is an investigative journalist living in London who writes about Palestine and the Middle East. He has been visiting Palestine since 2004 and is originally from south Wales. He writes for the award-winning Palestinian news site The Electronic Intifada where he is an associate editor and also a weekly column for the Middle East Monitor.


The Qibya massacre 67 years on

GAZA, (PIC)

Israeli military units stormed Palestinian houses in Qibya village, which is located 11 km northwest of Ramallah, amid heavy firing of machineguns and bombs before blowing the houses up on the heads of their residents. This is one of the Israeli massacres against the Palestinian people that took place on October 14th, 1953.

On that date, two Israeli military units led by the Zionist war criminal Ariel Sharon besieged the village and isolated it from the rest of the neighboring villages. Then they began bombing it with mortars before the soldiers stormed it and raided the houses. In this massacre, 67 Palestinian civilians were killed, dozens were wounded and dozens of houses were bombed and blown up.

Details of the massacre

On October 14, 1953, Israeli Special Operations Unit 101 led by Ariel Sharon and Unit 890 of the Paratroopers along with 600 soldiers besieged the village at 7:30 in the evening and began bombing it until the following morning at 4 a.m., forcing the Palestinian inhabitants to stay inside their homes.

The Israeli soldiers then started raiding one house after the other. Israeli army soldiers threw bombs inside homes, fired randomly through open doors and windows and shot at anyone who tried to flee.

At the time, the Israeli troops planted mines on various roads so that the village was completely isolated and infantry forces entered it while shooting in various directions. The inhabitants and the National Guard, led by Mahmoud Abdel Aziz, confronted the Israeli forces despite their small number and simple weapons. They fired back at the Israeli soldiers and they continued to resist until they ran out of ammunition and most of them were killed.

The commander of the National Guard managed to reach Deir Qaddis village where he contacted the Jordanian military leadership in Ramallah calling for help and ammunition. The Jordanian military moved from Budrus village to rescue the village but it was intercepted by the Israeli forces stationed in the roads and was unable to reach Qibya.

The Israeli forces then started to blew up houses with their inhabitants still inside. The number of village inhabitants was about 200 on the day of the massacre and the number of houses that were blown up was estimated at 56, in addition to a mosque, two schools and a water tank.

The events of this massacre took place after the Israeli authority escalated its raids against the Palestinian villages near the border after the signing of the armistice agreement with the Arab countries. 

Qibya village

Qibya village is located 11 kilometers to the northeast of Lod city and west of Ramallah. Its population is currently estimated at 1,635, in addition to about four thousand migrants from other cities and villages. It is located to the northeast of Jerusalem, about 32 km away from it, and has an area of about 16,000 dunums.

Painful scenes

The number of martyrs in this massacre of men, women and children reached 67 of the people of Qibya and dozens were wounded.

One of the most painful scenes was the scene of a woman helplessly sitting on a pile of rubble where parts of small hands and feet protrude from under the rubble. They are the remains of her six children. Her husband's body was torn into pieces from the hail of bullets fired at him and it was lying on the road facing her.

Many families were completely wiped out in this massacre including: Abu Zaid family of four members, the family of Mahmoud al-Masloul which consisted of six children, Mahmoud Ibrahim's wife and her three children, Hussein Abdel-Hadi, 64, and Latifa Hussein Abdel-Hadi, 12 years old.

Why Qibya?

The massacre happened in retaliation for infiltration that happened on October 12, 1953, from Jordan into a Jewish settlement, in which the Palestinian militants (fedayeen) threw a bomb inside the settlement killing two Israelis and wounding a third.

The next day, the Israeli Prime Minister at that time, David Ben-Gurion, and his government decided to launch a harsh reprisal operation against Qibya which the Palestinian infiltrators had passed through.


The day Israel ruthlessly killed worshipers

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)

On Monday noon 08/10/1990, the Israeli police forces committed a terrible massacre in the courtyards of the holy Al-Aqsa Mosque in which the sound of the bullets was deafening and blood spilled profusely.

This massacre resulted in the death of 22 Palestinian worshipers, and dozens of injuries, when the Israeli policemen fired indiscriminately at the worshipers and innocent people in the courtyards of the holy Islamic site.

The heinous massacre was met with international condemnation in which the observers declared that the Israeli forces had violated taboos and their massacre exceeded all red lines.

On Monday, October 8, 1990, before the noon prayer, settlers of the so-called "Temple Mount Faithful" group attempted to lay the foundation stone for the alleged Third Temple in the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Thousands of worshipers confronted them and the occupation soldiers intervened and opened fire randomly towards the worshipers stationed in the Mosque which led to the death of 22 Palestinian citizens, wounding more than 200 and arresting 270 others. Meanwhile, the movement of ambulances was blocked by the Israeli occupation police.

The spark and the dark hatred

The danger was exacerbating in the usurped holy site, Israel was not satisfied with its occupation of the Mosque in 1967 and it was not satisfied with burning large parts of the prayer hall -the main prayer hall in the Al-Aqsa Mosque- in 1969, and not even with the attack on the worshipers by Jewish extremists in 1982 or the excavations and tunnels weakening its foundations. 

The Israeli occupation tried to control the holy site many times especially in 1986/1987, and organizations and groups supported by official Israeli institutions began to prepare the equipment, draw up plans, program stages and clearly announce that they have begun to prepare for the construction of the alleged temple at the expense of Al-Aqsa Mosque.

On that day, there were limited incursions into Al-Aqsa by Jewish settlers but calls for regular Jewish prayers in it began to increase and escalate. They have gone so far as to demand to lay the foundation stone for the Temple inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque and practice rituals toward that end to be the first step for the construction of the alleged Temple.

Gershon Salmon and his so-called group Temple Mount Faithful announced that they would lay the foundation stone for the Temple and organize rituals for that in the Al-Aqsa Mosque in conjunction with Jewish feasts and prepared for the event. The Israeli court initially had allowed the procedure. On Monday, 08/10/1990, the atmosphere was tense, and the Jerusalemites sensed the danger and they called for mobilizing before the aforementioned date to protect the Al-Aqsa Mosque and flocked to the Mosque since the early morning hours.

The day of the crime

On the evening of that same day, the Israeli police had drawn up a plan to confront the worshipers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque and they decided to brutally attack anyone heading to the holy Islamic site on Monday morning.

Half an hour before the massacre, the Israeli police forces set up military checkpoints on all roads leading to the Al-Aqsa Mosque to prevent Palestinians from reaching the place. Nevertheless, the worshipers had gathered in the Mosque hours before that time in response to the calls launched from inside the Mosque.

The shooting of live bullets that had been preceded and accompanied by toxic bombs, tear gas canisters and rubber bullets, were directed at the worshipers without distinguishing between a child, a woman and an elderly. This led to the death of 22 Palestinian citizens, wounding more than 200 and 270 persons were arrested inside and outside the Mosque. The Israeli security forces attacked the wounded and detainees brutally. The pictures of the detainees in the courtyard of the Dome of the Rock and the Marwani area still bear witness to the ugliness of the Israeli occupation. The Israeli policemen threw the detainees to the ground, handcuffed and humiliated them.

The Jerusalemite masses in particular and the Palestinians in general gathered on that day to defend their historic Islamic right in the Al-Aqsa Mosque. It was a spontaneous gathering and a natural and spontaneous reaction to the plans of the Israeli occupation. The masses were mostly from Jerusalem also from the West Bank and from 1948 Occupied Palestine. The martyrs were from all areas and Palestinian blood was spilt in defense of the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

The Israeli police forces remained in the Mosque's courtyards and prevented the bodies of the martyrs and the wounded from being evacuated for six hours after the beginning of the massacre.

A few days before the massacre, the Israeli authorities had distributed a statement calling on the Jews to participate in a march to the Al-Aqsa Mosque. This was followed by a statement by the Jewish extremist Gershon Salmon endorsing the authorities' call.


Remembering Israel's botched attempt to assassinate Khaled Meshaal

By MEMO

What: On 25 September, 1997, Israelis from the Mossad spy agency attempted to assassinate Palestinian political leader Khaled Meshaal in Amman, the capital of Jordan. The brazen attempt on the life of the then 41-year-old head of the Hamas Political Bureau sparked a diplomatic row which threatened to wreck the newly-signed peace deal between Jordan and Israel. The crisis ended with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu making a number of humiliating concessions.

Where: Amman, Jordan.

When: 25 September, 1997.

What happened?

In an attempt to cripple the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, Netanyahu, then in his first term as prime minister, authorised the assassination of Meshaal. The little-known Palestinian leader was born in 1956 in Silwad, which was then in the Jordanian administered West Bank. In 1967, Meshaal's family and 300,000 other Palestinians were expelled from their homes by Israeli occupation forces in a second wave of ethnic cleansing that came to be known as the Naksa (Setback). Netanyahu is said to have personally picked Meshaal from a number of Hamas operatives for Mossad agents to kill. The attempt on Meshaal's life came in the wake of a series of suicide bombings in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

A six-member Mossad team arrived in Amman a week before the assassination using false Canadian passports. The plan was clear: kill the exiled Hamas leader using a lethal toxin without leaving any trace of the killers. The idea was that after the toxin had been administered covertly, Meshaal would go about the rest of his day as normal and then, when tiredness overcame him, he would take a nap, never to wake up again; he was expected to die within 48 hours.

On the morning of the assassination attempt, two of the six agents moved into position to deliver a lethal dose of toxin — identified later as fentanyl — as Meshaal entered his office. The other four Israeli agents are said to have been deployed around the block either as drivers or as lookouts.

The Mossad agents delivered the toxin using an aerosol device and fled from the scene. One of Meshaal's bodyguards gave chase and managed to apprehend the assassins after some hand to hand combat. Their capture was to have major ramifications.

What happened next?

Hours after the arrest of the two agents by the Jordanian authorities, the Israelis hatched a plan to diffuse the situation. With the diplomatic consequence of his actions dawning on Netanyahu, he attempted to conceal the botched assassination attempt from the rest of the world. He dispatched Mossad head Danni Yatom to plead with King Hussain of Jordan for the agents' release. Yatom's pre-emptive disclosure and plea for help from the Jordanian monarch exploded in Israel's face, sparking a diplomatic crisis with the Hashemite Kingdom, which had normalised relations with the Zionist state three years earlier.

While the Israelis tried frantically to keep a lid on the botched plot, Meshaal's health deteriorated. The toxin had done its job and within 48 hours he would be dead. King Hussain warned Israel that if the Hamas leader died, the Mossad agents would be hanged as murderers. The King had gone out on a limb to sign a peace treaty with Israel against the wishes of his people, so he called US President Bill Clinton to enlist his support. It was said that US anger was such that no one within the normally pro-Israel White House was willing to make Netanyahu's case for him. ''This man is impossible,'' Clinton is reported to have said upon hearing that the Israeli Prime Minister had authorised the assassination attempt with little regard for Jordanian sovereignty, and thus endangered the fragile peace treaty.

Having been stonewalled by Netanyahu for the antidote to the toxin at the first time of asking, an angry King Hussein relayed his message through Clinton, insisting that the Israelis must deliver a vial of the antidote, which was the only way to save Meshaal's life. ''If Meshaal dies, the peace treaty dies with him,'' he insisted. With the US applying pressure, Israel had no choice but to comply. A light aircraft delivered the antidote.

The indignity for Netanyahu did not end there. The two Mossad agents were still under arrest facing a death sentence and the Israeli Embassy in Amman, in which the other four members of the six man Mossad team had taken refuge, was surrounded by Jordanian security forces. In exchange for allowing them to leave Jordan, King Hussain was determined to exact a heavy price. He demanded a prisoner exchange, which was agreed.

Under the deal, Israel released the ailing Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the quadriplegic founder and spiritual leader of Hamas who was one of the most notable Palestinians in its prisons, along with 70 other Palestinian prisoners.

Meshaal was saved with just hours to spare. His reputation grew within the Palestinian resistance movement as ''the man who wouldn't die''. He became the leader of Hamas when Israel assassinated Yassin in 2004.

Meanwhile, a chastened Netanyahu was forced to apologise. His act of contrition came two days later when he arrived in Amman to pledge that Israel would not make another attempt on Meshaal's life. This was not the end for the humiliated Israeli Prime Minister. He lost his bid for re-election in 1999, after which he retired temporarily from politics.

- Source: Middle East Monitor (MEMO).


Top Israeli Official Admits Underestimating Gaza Fighters

 A senior army intelligence official has admitted that Israel underestimated the tenacity of Gaza fighters and did not expect a 50-day conflict to last so long, but he insisted they were soundly beaten.

The conflict, which ended with a ceasefire last week, killed more than 2,100 mainly civilian Palestinians, as well as 66 soldiers and six civilians on the Israeli side.

"If you'd asked me two months ago, I wouldn't assess that it's going to take us 50 days," the official told journalists in English at a briefing in Tel Aviv late Tuesday.

"We thought it's going to take them a shorter time to understand what happened, and we are mistaken here. It's a tactical assessment mistake, but it's a mistake," said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

He said the training of some Hamas fighters had impressed him, but that there were no "surprises" for Israeli forces.

"They were in pretty good shape and pretty well trained," he said of amphibious commando-style raids by Hamas fighters on Israeli shores.

"You can see for sure they were trained outside of the Gaza Strip," the official said, but added "we haven't seen anything that has surprised us" militarily.

But the official said Hamas, the main power in Gaza, and Islamic Jihad, the next biggest group, were soundly beaten.

"We think they are in very bad shape," he said, claiming that two-thirds of their rocket stores had been wiped out and several hundred of them killed.

Hamas and Israel agreed an Egyptian-mediated ceasefire on August 26, with both sides hailing it as a victory.

Abu Zuhri: Israel's Recruitment Of New Gaza Division Commander Sign Of Defeat

The appointment of a new commander for the Israeli army's Gaza Division is a proof of Israel's admission of defeat in the Gaza offensive, Hamas spokesman, Sami Abu Zuhri said, dubbing the move an episode in a series of sanctions imposed on Israeli war ''losers.''

Abu Zuhri's statement came following the appointment of Brigadier General Itai Virov as new Gaza Division Commander, replacing Mikey Edelstein who served in this post for the past two years.

Edelstein will serve as commander of the Sinai Brigade and head of the infantry training center in Negev, Israeli military sources said.

The ceremony, held at the division headquarters, was attended by the General Officer Commanding of the Southern front, Sami Turgeman.

Meanwhile, Israeli military sources on Sunday said the Israeli army will carry out investigations into the operations performed by the Givati Brigade unit in Rafah.

The investigation will make use of the suspected capture of an Israeli soldier as the most efficient investigation tool to refute projected accusation, to be charged by the UN and human rights organizations, over Israel's perpetration of war crimes during the notorious Rafah massacre.

Human rights organizations documented the mass-murder of 190 Palestinians in Rafah after Israel stepped up its offensive under pretext that an Israeli soldier had disappeared in its vicinity.

Maan, PIC, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Israeli Captive Soldiers . . . The Mysterious Labyrinth

Israel's failure to decipher the mystery of the two captured Israeli soldiers in the wake of the Gaza offensive, has turned into the most nightmarish of all of mazes, Al-Majd security website said.

Hamas claimed responsibility for the capturing of an Israeli occupation soldier, identified as Shaul Aarun, and refused to release any further details as long as nothing is to be gained from Israel.

According to Al-Majd security website, the Israeli intelligence apparatuses will step up their search operations in an attempt to decode the cryptograms of the enigma by all means.

Intimidating text messages, money blackmailing, anti-resistance leaflets, smear campaigns, ad hominem moves, online and field collaborators along with spying equipment and personnel, are among the tactics to be used by the Israeli occupation throughout the large-scale operation search as it already did, and failed, in 2006 in its vain hunt for ex-captive Gilad Shalit. -- PICZahhar: The Soldiers In Our Hands Will Be A Price For Our Prisoners' Freedom

Senior Hamas official Mahmoud Al-Zahhar said that the Israeli prisoners who were captured by the resistance during the last war would be used to release Palestinian prisoners from Israel's jails.

"The Israeli prisoners in the hands of the resistance would be a price for the release of our prisoners of all affiliations from Zionist jails," Zahhar stated in an interview on Al-Quds satellite channel on Monday.

The Hamas official also ruled out that Israel would resume its war on Gaza and affirmed that it had desperately wanted a ceasefire in one way or another.

In another context, Zahhar considered what had been declared by Fatah faction about the formation of a committee to decide the fate of the unity government with Hamas "either a threat to dissolve the government or an invitation to reactivate it."

He stressed that his Movement rejects outright such threat, but if the intention was otherwise, Hamas is ready to contribute further to the government's success, pointing out that the Movement had already made concessions beyond expectations in order to end the division and form the unity government.

The central committee of Fatah had decided during a meeting chaired by Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah on Monday to form a committee of five members to engage in talks with Hamas over the fate of the Palestinian unity government. -- PIC.


American Columnist: Gaza Has Won A Landslide Victory

Israel's failure to divide, disarm or defeat the heroic resistance in Gaza is seen as a historic political victory, Columnist Sara Flounders wrote in an article published by The American Workers World newspaper on Tuesday.

The article, entitled ''Gaza - political victory for Palestine,'' reported: ''Israel caused massive destruction in Gaza and killed, according to a United Nations report, 2,104 people, including 1,462 civilians of whom 495 were children.''

''The attacks further destroyed essential infrastructure, water, electricity, schools, medical centers and almost one-third of the housing. This devastation has created international outrage. Many in Israel view the war as a devastating political setback,'' the report went.

According to Sara Flounders, the seven-week military onslaught utterly failed in its objectives of defeating the elected Hamas government and dividing the new Palestinian unity government of Hamas and Fatah. All Palestinian political forces took part in the resistance, coordinating their defensive actions.

''The Palestinians' greatest accomplishment was to prevent the high-tech, heavily armed Israeli Defense Forces from accomplishing its goal of disarming a determined Palestinian resistance, which used hundreds of tunnels, simple rockets and smuggled, hand-held weapons,'' Flounders wrote.

In Founders' terms, rallies in Gaza, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and by thousands of Palestinians living within Israel's 1967 boundaries make it clear that the Palestinians believe they won.

''Thousands of Palestinians celebrated in streets of Gaza City on Aug. 27. Deputy Head of the Hamas Politburo, Ismail Haniyeh, and other resistance leaders joined the public celebration. Haniyeh explained that the resistance had been preparing for the battle for years: ''The victory is beyond the limits of time and place. This battle is a war that lacks a precedent in the history of conflict with the enemy,'' she added.

''Hamas spokesman Abu Ubaida told a large crowd gathered in Gaza City's eastern Shujaiyya neighborhood — devastated during Israel's ground assault: 'Resistance unified the people, and that is our big achievement. We will not return to divisions or disputes,' Flounders wrote down.

''There is still no signed agreement. Israel's primary demand — the disarmament of Gaza's resistance organizations — is not even open for discussion,'' she added in a section of the article dubbed ''A ceasefire — no agreement''

In the writer's view, Israel always violated both signed ceasefire agreements and agreements to open the border. Israel has violated all other agreements made with the Palestinians, including the 1993 Oslo Accords.

Flounders further pointed to the Gaza victory rally of more than 2,000 people held on August 28 in Galilee, within Israel's 1948 borders, where marchers waved Palestinian flags and held pictures of slain children in Gaza.

The columnist referred to Palestinian elected Knesset (parliament) member, Hanin Zoabi, who said during the rally: ''The Palestinian resistance and the people as a whole in Gaza defeated all the military and political objectives that Israel set for itself. Our people's struggle thwarted all of Israel's objectives.''

In an outspoken reference to Israel's defeat, outlined in a section of the critique entitled ''Zionists' great fear: Israel has lost'', the writer called Israeli premier Netanyahu a ''war criminal'' who ''hollowly proclaimed victory'' and pretended that Israel had secured both a great military achievement and a political achievement.

''But the Zionist establishment now fears that the war was a howling blunder,'' Sara Flounders wonders.

Flounders quoted Amir Oren of Haaretz, a major Israeli publication, in a stunning admission of how much Israel has been set back: ''What Netanyahu and his colleagues have brought down on Israel, in a conflict between the region's strongest army and an organization numbering 10,000, is not just a defeat. It's a downfall.''

On July 23, Israeli polls claimed 82 percent of Israelis approved of Netanyahu's leadership. On Aug. 28 the Jerusalem Post says his support is down to 38 percent and falling further, she explained.

According to Flounders, the Israeli military suffered its highest casualty rate since it attempted to invade Lebanon in 2006. This time, the Palestinian resistance was able to carry out cross-border raids and target military sites in addition to firing small rockets into Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Haifa. This has given new confidence to the desperate Gaza population, which has lived decades under a brutal occupation.

The writer referred to the evaluation of Ali Abunimah of Electronic Intifada who wrote: ''Israel lost! If 'victory' is measured in the number of civilians an army kills and injures, or the number of homes, hospitals, mosques or schools it destroys, Israel is the clear champion once again.''

 PIC, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Hamas Asks Abbas To Renounce Negotiations With Israel

Hamas Movement has called on PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas to abandon the negotiations process with Israeli occupation authorities and to focus on accelerating the implementation of national unity in response to Israeli confiscation policy.

Spokesman for the Movement Fawzi Barhoum described on Tuesday the Israeli confiscation of Palestinian lands as a flagrant attack on the Palestinian people's rights. He added that the IOA was encouraged by the Arab silence and international and US complicity.

He called on Abbas to adopt a comprehensive national strategy to protect Palestinian lands and holy sites.

Barhoum also called on the Palestinian people to confront this Israeli racist policy by all possible means.

The Israeli army decided on Saturday to confiscate 4,000 dunums of Palestinian lands in order to expand Gush Etzion settlement southern Bethlehem.

Israeli TV Channel Seven quoted Yoav Mordechai, Israeli coordinator of government activities in the Palestinian territories, as saying that the Israeli confiscation policy came in response to the kidnapping and killing of three Israeli settlers three months ago. -- PIC.


Haartez: Gaza Siege Merely Foments Violence

Haaretz Hebrew newspaper stated that lifting the siege on Gaza and opening all the border crossings would achieve a permanent ceasefire and a durable peace in Gaza Strip especially that "it is proven that the blockade merely foments violence."

The newspaper addressed, in its report titled ''There's no whitewashing the Gaza blockade'' on Monday, the 8-year Israeli siege on Gaza Strip. ''The Gaza Strip doesn't need generosity or favors. Netanyahu must end the blockade; fully open the crossings between Gaza and Israel.''

Haaretz quoted a senior military officer as saying that it is in Israel's interest to avoid intense social and economic pressure on Gaza.

According to the newspaper, this statement raises three questions: Why did the defense establishment remember to examine the ramifications of the Gaza blockade on its residents only after the war? Why is the Israeli army suggesting that the politicians ease the blockade, instead of the politicians initiating this crucial step on their own? And what is the practical meaning of this generosity?

Haaretz considered that even this positive suggestion, if adopted, cannot whitewash the perverse blockade. ''Easing its terms alone, as we've seen in the past, doesn't create conditions for normal life, doesn't offer any economic or diplomatic horizon, and at best serves as insufficient cover for the government's claim that it has no dispute with the people of Gaza, but only with Hamas.''

''Moreover, the version of relief the IDF is suggesting has in the past been no more than symbolic gestures, like allowing in equipment to finish building a new hospital in Gaza, or worse, took the form of an inhumane calculation of how many calories each resident needed, which was used to derive what products would be allowed into the Strip.''

The Gaza Strip, with its 1.8 million people, according to the newspaper, doesn't need generosity or favors. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who speaks vaguely of a ''diplomatic horizon,'' must end the blockade, fully open the crossings between Gaza and Israel and give a real chance for development to bring quiet, after it has been proven that the blockade merely foments violent rebellions against Israel.

The Israeli newspaper concluded by saying that ''this doesn't mean that Israel must give up the close inspection of the goods that enter or leave the Strip. But there is a big difference between security checks and even a minimum security prison. Israel has the power to close that gap and work on behalf of its mutual interests with the residents of Gaza.''

 PIC, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Netanyahu Concedes Disarming Palestinian Hamas Resistance Inapplicable

Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu said during a closed-door meeting with Israeli senior leaders that disarming Palestinian resistance is an inapplicable demand during the near or long-term future, media sources revealed.

Israeli TV channel 10 said Monday night that Netanyahu has also ruled out taking any decision concerning Gaza airport and seaport at this current stage.

Netanyahu confirmed during the meeting that Hamas has received some privileges in return to the ceasefire agreement including relieving Gaza siege and increasing the fishing zone.

According to the sources there is no intention to resume talks in Cairo late this month.

Regarding peace negotiations with PA, Netanyahu said that ''any withdrawal from the West Bank will lead to tunnels in Kfar Saba and Sharon towns'' in reference to his total rejection to evacuate settlements in the West Bank in any future peace agreement. Danes: Israel Is A Child-killer State

The Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten said that a recent opinion poll it conducted showed that more than 70 percent of the Danish people believe that Israel is a child-killer state.

According to the newspaper, Denmark has been witnessing since the start of Israel's last war on Gaza widespread solidarity with the Palestinian people and their national cause.

Different pro-Palestinian groups also emerged recently in Denmark and launched popular initiatives to help the Palestinians in Gaza, most notably the 112 Gaza campaign that aims to send ambulances and medical supplies for the population.

During the war, Danish activists and Arab and Muslim residents took to the streets to protest Israel's military aggression against the civilians in Gaza.

Noted Danish writers and intellectuals also denounced Israel's violations against the Palestinian people and said that its blockade and military attacks on Gaza as well as its occupation of east Jerusalem and the West Bank are factors preventing the achievement of peace and generating incessant violence. -- PIC.


#WeAreHamas, The Topmost Hashtag On Twitter Internationally: Assassination Of Qassam Leaders Will Not Break Our Will

Activists launched hashtag #WeAreHamas on social networking websites in response to MP Benjamin Netanyahu's statement saying that "The entire Arab world is against Hamas''.

The hashtag achieved the Arab world first place on Twitter, and the second in the global frequency to reach the first place in a few hours in the wake of Netanyahu's speech on Wednesday.

Thousands of Arabs and Muslims Interacted with the hashtag and expressed their support and full solidarity with Hamas, denouncing Netanyahu's speech and Arab positions against the Gaza Strip.

A specialist account for monitoring and statistics said that the hashtag #WeAreHamas was active in the last few hours to reach more than 34 thousand tweets in a record time.

Only Qatar, Turkey, and Iran support Hamas, and "all the Arab countries are against it,'' Netanyahu said. Assassination Of Qassam Leaders Will Not Break Our Will

Hamas Movement said on Thursday that Israel will pay a heavy price for the assassination of three leaders of the Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, in Rafah.

Spokesman for the Movement said that the assassination of Qassam leaders at dawn Thursday is a ''big Israeli crime'' that would not succeed in breaking the Palestinian people's resoluteness and resistance.

Qassam Brigades said on Thursday morning that Israel assassinated three of its senior commanders in the Gaza Strip. The Brigades identified the commanders as Mohammed Abu Shamallah, Raed al-Attar, and Mohammed Barhoum.

Seven others were also killed and 25 people were injured in the Israeli airstrike that targeted a house in the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah.

Rafah Division commander Al-Attar, a father of two children, was on the top of Israel's wanted list. He was involved in the planning and commanded the operation to kidnap Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, and other resistance operations against Israeli targets.

Al-Attar, 40, has participated in the two previous battles against the occupation in 2008/2009 and 2012. He was one of the architects of the tunnel project in the south of the Strip.

Yediot Aharanot accused al-Attar early August of capturing an Israeli soldier, saying that "commander of the Qassam Brigades in Rafah city Raed al-Attar is apparently the only person who knows the fate of the missing Israeli soldier Hadar Goldin."

Mohammed Abu Shamallah, 41, was the senior commander in southern Gaza. He spent 9 month is Israeli jails and 3 years in PA prisons.

He was also on the top of Israeli wanted list since 1991. He survived three assassination attempts. His home was bombed more than once by Israeli warplanes.

He was responsible for a number of resistance operations against Israeli military targets.

Mohammed Barhoum, 45, was on the same list since 1992. He was one of the founders of Hamas's elite unit and travelled to a number of countries.

Thousands march in funeral of 3 Hamas commanders

Thousands of Palestinians marched in the funerals of three Hamas leaders and seven members of the Kallab and Younis families in Rafah on Thursday, as Israel continued to pound Gaza throughout the day.

Representatives and members of a wide variety of Palestinian political factions marched in the funerals, which set off from al-Awdah Mosque in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.

In addition to the three Hamas commanders Muhammad Abu Shammala, Raed al-Attar and Muhammad Barhoum that were killed in Israeli airstrikes, Hasan Hussein Younis, 75, his wife Amal Ibrahim Younis, Ahmad Nasser Kallab, 17, Nathira Kallab, Aisha Attiya, and children Abdullah Kallab and Youssef Kallab were also mourned in the funeral march.

More than 2,070 Palestinians have been killed and more than 10,300 injured in more than 40 days of Israeli bombardment, which has also left more than 100,000 homeless.

Mishaal: We will never compromise on our demands

Head of Hamas's political bureau Khaled Mishaal said that the Palestinians could return to the indirect truce talks with Israel if there was a genuine indication that it would accept the Palestinian demands.

"We will never backtrack on our Palestinian demands, especially with regard to ending the blockade on Gaza," Mishaal said, reiterating his Movement's position in an interview with Anadolu news agency on Thursday.

"Our message to the world is that it is time to deal with the root cause of the problem by ending the [Israeli] occupation and settlement construction, and allowing the Palestinian people to live in peace on their own land," he added.

He said that the resistance would continue to fight in defense of their own people and land, affirming that the Palestinian people have been fighting the occupation for long decades and cannot stop now.

He denied that his Movement violated the last temporary ceasefire first and accused Israel of lying once again to the international community as it had done before by breaching the first truce at the pretext that one of its soldiers was captured.

The Hamas official also criticized Palestinian premier Rami Al-Hamdallah for exaggerating the size of damage that had been inflicted upon Hamas's infrastructure, affirming that the Movement's military losses are limited.

He described Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu as a child killer and accused his army of perpetrating a "holocaust" in the Gaza Strip.

"What Israel has done in the Gaza Strip over the last 45 days is an obvious holocaust," Mishaal told Anadolu agency. "They are killing children, destroying residential areas, mosques, hospitals and UNRWA-run schools."

He said that more than 2000 Palestinians, a quarter of whom were children, had been killed in the recent Israeli attacks.

"Israel is replicating what [Nazi leader Adolf] Hitler did years ago," Mishaal said.

Agencies, PIC, Maan, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Hamas Confirms Israel Violated Truce After False Rocket Fire Claims: Israel Murdered 4 While Burying Relatives in Gaza Cemetery

A Hamas spokesman on Wednesday accused Israel of having violated the temporary ceasefire on Tuesday, saying that Israel had failed to offer a serious partner for peace in ongoing negotiations in Cairo.

Hamas spokesman Moussa Abu Marzouq told Ma'an via telephone on Wednesday that Israel "ended the truce and claimed that three rockets hit Israel, which Hamas had no information about."

Abu Marzouq added that "all options" are on the table now, saying that the group was ready for peace but was not afraid of continuing to defend itself if Israel continued to choose war.

"All options are open now: a new truce, keeping the war going, or signing an agreement," he added.

He said that Egypt is currently making efforts with both sides as part of ongoing attempts to reach a lasting agreement to bring to an end a six-week Israeli assault that has left more than 2,040 Palestinians dead.

"We presented a new proposal (that offered) the least of our rights to the Egyptian side, who gave it to the Israelis yesterday. Instead of responding, they were ordered to leave," Abu Marzouq he said.

Abu Marzouq said that Israel had failed in negotiations and that on Wednesday they attempted to assassinate the military leader of Hamas' military wing, Muhammad Deif, but had failed.

Indirect negotiations between Palestinians and Israel have failed to achieve results, with Hamas accusing Israel repeatedly of "stalling" and refusing to make any concessions.

Palestinians have demanded that Israel end its eight-year blockade of the Gaza Strip, which has crippled the tiny coastal enclave's economy and led to widespread suffering.

Israel, however, has demanded Gaza demilitarize, a demand that Palestinian resistance groups have scoffed at.

 4 killed by airstrikes while burying relatives in Gaza cemetery

Israeli forces killed four Palestinians in Gaza City on Thursday after targeting a cemetery in the Sheikh al-Radwan district, Gaza health official Ashraf al-Qidra said.

The bodies of Muhammad Talal Abu Nahl, Rami Abu Nahl, Haitham Tafesh and Abed Talal Shuweikh were taken to al-Shifa medicial center.

The victims were burying relatives who had been killed overnight by Israeli airstrikes.

The latest airstrikes bring the total death toll since midnight to 25 Palestinians.

Hamdan Hadayid, 42, succumbed to wounds he sustained in an airstrike that targeted a motorcycle in eastern Khan Younis.

Earlier, two Palestinians were killed and three injured in an Israeli airstrike targeting a car in the al-Nasr neighborhood west of Gaza City.

Before that, Israel killed three of Hamas' most prominent military commanders in airstrikes targeting a building in Rafah.

The al-Qassam Brigades said in a statement that Muhammad Abu Shammala, Raed al-Attar and Muhammad Barhoum were killed in the al-Sultan neighborhood of Rafah.

Five other civilians were killed in the attack and at least 40 injured.

In the al-Nuseirat refugee camp, Israel killed two men after targeting a motorcycle. They were identified as Jumaa Matar, 27, and Omar Abu Nada, 22.

In northern Gaza, Israeli shelling killed Surour Tambora and his son Hasan, 13, medical sources said.

An Israeli airstrike also killed five Palestinians, including three children, in Gaza City on Thursday, a medical official said.

Meanwhile, a body was recovered under rubble from the al-Dalou home, which was targeted by Israel on Tuesday.

 5 Palestinians, including 3 children, killed in Gaza City

An Israeli airstrike killed five Palestinians, including three children, in Gaza City on Thursday, a medical official said.

Ashraf al-Qidra, Gaza's ministry of health spokesman, identified one of the victims as Nasr Ziad al-Rifi, 35. Four others were seriously wounded.

The latest fatalities bring the death toll in Gaza to 18 since midnight.

Earlier, Israel killed three senior Hamas military commanders and nine civilians in airstrikes across Gaza.

Over 2,065 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched a military offensive in July.

Israeli onslaught on besieged Strip kills 22 Palestinians in single day

At least four Palestinian citizens were killed in a wave of Israeli strikes near Sheikh Redwan cemetery while they were holding funerals for their murdered relatives on Thursday morning, bringing Gaza death toll to at least 22, all slaughtered in no more than 24 hours' time.

Health Ministry spokesman, Ashraf al-Qudra, identified the casualties as: Muhammad Talel Abu Nahl, Rami Abu Nahl, Haithem Tafesh, and Abed Talel Shweikh.

Sheikh Redwan cemetery has become Gaza's sole graveyard, crammed with dead bodies all recovered from beneath Gaza debris on a daily basis.

At least 14 more Palestinians, including three elderly civilians and four children were killed in barrages of Israeli rocket fire unleashed in Rafah and central and northern Gaza.

Other waves of Israeli airstrikes east of Rafah killed three senior Hamas top commanders early morning on Thursday, Palestinian media sources reported.

According to the New York Times, the attack, which also killed the father of a leading Gaza human-rights advocate, followed Israel's assassination attempt Tuesday night on Muhammad Deif, al-Qassam commander-in-chief who has topped Israel's most-wanted list for years and lost his wife and baby son in an Israeli strike on Tuesday evening in a flagrant breach of the then ceasefire.

Gaza death toll has hit 2,060, mostly children and women; all killed in the Israeli aggression targeting besieged Gaza since July 7.

 Maan, PIC, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Hamas Insist Information On Soldiers Will Not Be Free As Palestinian Negotiators Remain Mum On Talks In Cairo Over Gaza Blockade - In Face Of Israeli Gaza War Redeployment

Member of Hamas political bureau, Muhammad Nazzal, vowed that Hamas will be withholding updates about the fate of the captured Israeli soldiers until Israel is made to pay a heavy price in return.

Alressalah Net website quoted Nazzal as reiterating the preconditions set by the Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, over being provided with the profiles of the Israeli spies in the West Bank and Gaza in exchange for reports on the fate of the captured soldiers.

The Qassam Brigades claimed responsibility for the capture of the Israeli soldier Shaul Aaron in a clash with the Israeli occupation forces (IOF) in al-Toffah neighborhood, east of Gaza. The Israeli occupation has announced the disappearance of another soldier east of Rafah.

Israel has been seeking ways to discern the fate of the missing soldiers, appealing to Egypt and other truce-broker parties to work out the affair, Nazzal pointed out.

''Israel got into the habit of acquiring pieces of information for free. Now this has become an out-of-the-question possibility,'' he pledged.

According to Nazzal, the following round of swap talks will be independent of the ongoing ceasefire talks and quite apart from any Israeli wordplay, vowing Hamas is ready for another round of swap talks.

A renewed Egyptian-brokered ceasefire hearing is being currently held in Cairo following an agreement Monday on extending the truce for 72 hours.

Palestinian negotiators remain mum on talks

Political bureau member of Hamas and member of the Palestinian negotiating team in Cairo Ezzet al-Resheq said that the Palestinian delegates have agreed to stay mum about progress of the ceasefire talks.

He attributed this position to ''public interest'' in a statement posted on his Facebook page on Wednesday.

Another member of the delegation and also political bureau member of Hamas Dr. Mousa Abu Marzouk reiterated the same position on his Facebook page on Wednesday.

He pointed out that on the opposite side the Israeli media outlets were rife with statements on the negotiations, which could lead to negative impacts.

Meanwhile, Hebrew daily Yediot Ahronot quoted Israeli diplomatic sources as saying on Tuesday night that the negotiations were still ''complicated and difficult''.

They said that Cairo was pressuring both the Palestinians and the Israelis to extend the truce in order to allow more time for talks.

Israeli forces redeploy near Gaza border as ceasefire end looms

As negotiations between the Palestinian and Israeli delegations faltered on Wednesday during a 72-hour ceasefire, Israeli forces began redeploying near the Gaza border in advance of the midnight deadline.

Earlier, Egypt called for a three-day renewal in order to press for more time to reach a long-term agreement, even as Israel refused to accede to Palestinian demands for an end to the eight-year Israeli siege on Gaza.

A Palestinian official was reported to have said that Egypt had also suggested a new ceasefire proposal that would include easing the Israeli siege on Gaza as well as restrictions caused by Egypt's closure of the Rafah crossing, a key demand of the Palestinian leadership.

Despite the negotiations, the Israeli army was reportedly deploying forces at the border with the Gaza Strip and authorities on Wednesday afternoon said they were considering calling up more reservists.

The military wing of Hamas, the al-Qassam Brigades, said they would to give a televised speech Wednesday evening to update the public on negotiations and the preparations being made by Palestinian resistance forces.

The move comes as negotiations for peace have reached an impasse amid a five-week Israeli assault on Gaza that has left nearly 2,000 Palestinians dead and around 10,000 injured.

Hamas has insisted that Israel end its eight-year siege on the Gaza Strip, release dozens of prisoners whom Israel has re-arrested that were released in 2011 as part of the Gilad Shalit exchange, the re-opening of a seaport and airport in Gaza, and the creation of a safe passage between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

Hamas' demands are consistent with the terms of the Oslo Accords signed between Israel and the Palestinians in the 1990s, but which Israel has failed to abide by amid its refusal to consider direct negotiations of any kind with Hamas, which it considers a terrorist group.

Israeli authorities have said that they would be willing to extend the ceasefire indefinitely but have also stressed that a long-term agreement should include the demilitarization of the Strip.

Hamas has scoffed at this demand, saying it was al-Qassam fighters who prevented the full-scale infiltration and re-occupation of Gaza by Israeli forces in recent weeks.

Before another temporary ceasefire last week, Israeli forces pulled out of major Gaza cities and redeployed on the Israeli side of the border, although airstrikes and shelling on Gazan cities continued between temporary ceasefires.

Britain suspends 12 army export licenses used by Israel in Gaza offensive

The British government has ruled for the suspension of 12 arms export licenses to the Israeli occupation after having found out about their potential usage in carrying out attacks throughout the Gaza offensive.

The British Foreign Ministry said in a press release on Wednesday that most of the military items exported to Israel are not to be used in carrying out military operations in Gaza.

The statement concluded that 12 licenses might involve items used by the Israeli army throughout the conflict.

''A ceasefire is being currently put into effect. Britain has been urging both parties, during the Egyptian-brokered talks, to preserve the terms of the truce and stop the fighting,'' the statement added.

''In case the truce breaks down the British government would not perhaps be able to tell whether the terms of the export licenses have all been met. In light of that uncertainty we have taken the decision to suspend these existing export licenses as a precautionary measure,'' the statement concluded.

 Agencies, PIC, Maan, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Israel Sabotages Truce Talks, Hamas Cannot Extend Under Siege Ceasefire As Obama Makes A U-Turn To Open Gaza - Too Little Too Late?

A spokesman for Hamas's armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, warned Thursday of renewed fighting with Israel if talks in Cairo to extend a 72-truce in Gaza collapsed.

"We appeal to the Palestinian delegation to not accept a ceasefire, unless it satisfies the demands of our people," a spokesman using the nom-de-guerre Abu Obeida said in a televised address, adding that Hamas fighters were "ready to return to battle."

The three-day truce ending four weeks of bloodshed between Israel and Hamas is due to end at 0500 GMT Friday.

The sides have so far failed to negotiate an agreement to extend the truce, with the Palestinians accusing Israel of "procrastinating".

Abu Obeida said the main demand of Hamas was the opening of a sea port for the blockaded enclave.

"We will not agree to stop the battle without a real end to the (Israeli) aggression and a real lifting of the siege," he said.

"If there is an agreement, it will be possible to extend the truce, but if there is not, we will ask the delegation to withdraw from the talks."

Speaking from Cairo, senior Hamas political official and delegation member Ezzat al-Rishq, said: "The resistance in Gaza and the delegation in Cairo are in one trench."

Palestinians say Israel 'stalling' truce talks

Israel had still not replied to its ceasefire offer and threatened that there would be an "escalation" in hostilities if Israel failed to do so, just over twelve hours before a three-day ceasefire was set to expire at 8 a.m. on Friday. Palestinian officials accused Israel on Thursday of stalling the truce talks.

"The Israeli delegation is proposing extending the ceasefire while refusing a number of the Palestinian demands," said a senior Palestinian official.

"If Israel continues its procrastination, we will not extend the ceasefire."

The statements came after US President Barack Obama appeared to support Hamas' demands for an end to the siege earlier in the day by saying that Gaza could not be isolated forever, while Israel refused to budge, leaving the threat of a return to hostilities Friday morning looming.

On Thursday, US President Barack Obama put pressure on intensive ceasefire negotiations in Cairo by saying Gaza could not remain cut off from the world forever.

Britain, France and Germany have put forward an initiative that could bring EU representatives to the Gaza border, a diplomatic source said.

With the ceasefire due to end at 8 a.m. on Friday, Egypt's intelligence chief Mohamed Farid Tohamy was holding a new round of talks with the parties on Thursday afternoon, with the focus on extending the deadline.

But the Israeli delegation was headed back home on Thursday afternoon, an official told AFP. It was not clear whether they would return to Cairo later in the day.

Israel has said it would be prepared to prolong the ceasefire "unconditionally."

But Hamas said agreement had still not been reached to extend the calm which went into force on Tuesday.

"There is no agreement to extend the ceasefire," Hamas' exiled deputy leader Mussa Abu Marzouq wrote on Twitter.

Obama's U-Turn: Open Gaza - Too Little Too Late?

US President Barack Obama upped the pressure on the talks by saying Gaza could not remain forever cut off by Israel's blockade which has been in place since 2006. Ahead of Thursday's talks, Obama insisted that Gaza could not remain forever cut off by Israel's blockade, now in its eighth year.

"Long-term, there has to be a recognition that Gaza cannot sustain itself permanently closed off from the world," he told a news conference in Washington, saying the Palestinians needed to see "some prospects for an opening of Gaza so that they do not feel walled off."

Lifting the blockade is the main Palestinian demand in the ceasefire talks in Cairo.

Although Israel has expressed willingness to extend the truce indefinitely, there was no immediate word on its response to that.

"Today will be a crucial day," a member of the Palestinian delegation told AFP.

If a truce extension was proposed "we will think about it .. and that depends on how negotiations proceed today."

And London, Paris and Berlin tabled an initiative offering an outline for rebuilding Gaza while ensuring Israel's security concerns were properly addressed, a diplomatic source said.

The proposal aims to strengthen the hand of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority.

It also envisages opening the Rafah border crossing with Egypt then eventually opening other crossings to Israel. It also refers to the opening of a commercial port in Gaza, the source said.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that Gaza would be rebuilt -- but hopefully for the last time, as international patience showed signs of wearing thin.

"The senseless cycle of suffering in Gaza and the West Bank, as well as in Israel, must end," he said.

"Do we have to continue like this -- build, destroy, and build and destroy?

"We will build again but this must be the last time -- to rebuild. This must stop now."

Before the ceasefire, Israeli forces pulled out of major Gaza cities and redeployed hundreds of meters inside the border, although air strikes and shelling on Gazan cities continued.

More than 1,886 Palestinians have been killed and nearly 10,000 injured in the month-long conflict. Figures released by UNICEF, the UN children's fund, indicate that 73 percent of the victims - or 1,354 people - were civilians.

Of that number, at least 429 were children -- around 30 percent of the civilian casualties.

67 Israelis -- 95 percent of whom have been soldiers -- have also died.

Thousands rallied in the streets of Gaza City earlier on Thursday in support of the Palestinian delegation currently in Cairo trying to negotiate a long-term ceasefire with Israel.

Marches called for by Hamas set off from different mosques across the Gaza Strip heading to the Palestinian Legislative Council, the equivalent of the parliament, while speakers urged the talks delegation to ensure that Gazans' "rights" were guaranteed.

"We are here today united to show that we support the Palestinian delegation in Cairo," Hamas member of parliament Mushir al-Masri said, adding: "We tell them to not return unless our conditions and demands have been accepted."

"We have won the military battle and with the permission of God we'll win the political battle," he said during the rally.

Abu Ubaida, the spokesman of the Hamas-affiliated al-Qassam Brigades, said in a televised address Thursday night that the military wing had given the political leadership "the opportunity to negotiate to stop Israel from hurting our people," but insisted that there would be no ceasefire unless Israel agreed to end the siege.

Hamas has insisted that Israel end its eight-year siege on the Gaza Strip, release dozens of prisoners whom Israel has re-arrested that were released in 2011 as part of the Shalit exchange, the re-opening of a seaport and airport in Gaza, and the creation of a safe passage between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

Al-Masri pointed out that the demands of Palestinians are their "rights," calling upon Egypt and the Arab World to stand behind them in these demands.

At the same time, al-Masri stressed that if Israel failed to respond and give Palestinians their rights, Hamas was prepared to continue fighting.

"Fighters still have their fingers on the trigger and their missiles targeted towards Israeli cities," he said.

"If Netanyahu does not accept our demands, you will not return to your homes," he added in a pointed statement to the residents of Israeli cities near the Gaza border that have been subjected to Palestinian rocket fire.

Hamas' demands are consistent with the terms of the Oslo Accords signed between Israel and the Palestinians in the 1990s, but which Israel has failed to abide by amid its refusal to consider direct negotiations of any kind with Hamas, which it considers a terrorist group.

Israel, meanwhile, has said that they would be willing to extend the ceasefire indefinitely but have also stressed that a long-term agreement should include the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip. Hamas has scoffed at this demand, pointing out that it was Hamas fighters that had prevented the full-scale infiltration and re-occupation of Gaza by Israeli forces in recent days.

OIC to convene emergency meeting over Gaza

The executive committee of the organization of Islamic cooperation (OIC) will convene next Tuesday, August 12, an emergency meeting to discuss the developments of the tragic humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip and the avenues to confront Israel's crimes.

The session, which will be attended by the ministers of foreign affairs at the OIC headquarters in Jeddah, will discuss ways of exposing Israel's war crimes in Gaza and holding its leaders accountable at the international level.
The OIC executive committee includes Turkey, Senegal, Guinea, Kuwait, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Meanwhile, OIC secretary-general Iyad Madani contacted relevant international players and urged them to step in and stop Israel's aggression against the Palestinian people in Gaza.

Agencies, PIC, Maan, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Never Ask Me About Peace Again? For We All Become Hamas - Women, Children And Innocent Families

By Asmaa al-Ghoul

Tears flowed until my body ran dry of them when I received a telephone call on Aug. 3, informing me that my family had been targeted by two F-16 missiles in the city of Rafah. Such was the fate of our family in a war that still continues, with every family in the Gaza Strip receiving its share of sorrow and pain.

My father's brother, Ismail al-Ghoul, 60, was not a member of Hamas. His wife, Khadra, 62, was not a militant of Hamas. Their sons, Wael, 35, and Mohammed, 32, were not combatants for Hamas. Their daughters, Hanadi, 28, and Asmaa, 22, were not operatives for Hamas, nor were my cousin Wael's children, Ismail, 11, Malak, 5, and baby Mustafa, only 24 days old, members of Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine or Fatah. Yet, they all died in the Israeli shelling that targeted their home at 6:20 a.m. on Sunday morning.

Their house was located in the Yibna neighborhood of the Rafah refugee camp. It was one story with a roof made of thin asbestos that did not require two F-16 missiles to destroy. Would someone please inform Israel that refugee camp houses can be destroyed, and their occupants killed, with only a small bomb, and that it needn't spend billions to blow them into oblivion?

If it is Hamas that you hate, let me tell you that the people you are killing have nothing to do with Hamas. They are women, children, men and senior citizens whose only concern was for the war to end, so they can return to their lives and daily routines. But let me assure you that you have now created thousands — no, millions — of Hamas loyalists, for we all become Hamas if Hamas, to you, is women, children and innocent families. If Hamas, in your eyes, is ordinary civilians and families, then I am Hamas, they are Hamas and we are all Hamas.

Throughout the war, we thought that the worst had passed, that this was the pivotal moment when matters would improve, that they would stop there. Yet, that real moment of pain, of extreme fear, was always followed by something even worse.

Now I understood why the photographs of corpses were so important, not only for international public opinion, but for us, the families, in search for an opportunity to bid farewell to our loved ones, so treacherously killed. What were they doing in those last moments? What did they look like after their death?

I discovered the photos of my dead relatives on social networking sites. The bodies of my cousin's children were stored in an ice cream freezer. Rafah's Abu Yousef al-Najjar Hospital was closed after being shelled by Israeli tanks, and the Kuwaiti Hospital that we visited just a day earlier had become an alternate venue, where this freezer was the only option available.

Al-Najjar's director, Abdullah Shehadeh, told Al-Monitor, ''We decided to move the patients when shells hit the main gate. Some patients, out of fear, ran out, despite the gravity of the security situation. We are now working out of this ill-equipped hospital.''

The Emirati Red Crescent Maternity Hospital, west of Rafah, has been transformed into a large container for corpses, with fruit and vegetable freezers filled with dozens of bodies.

I saw corpses on the floor, some with nametags on their chests, while others remained unknown. We held our noses, for the stench was unbearable, as flies filled the air.

Ibrahim Hamad, 27, removed his five-year-old son's shroud-wrapped body from a vegetable freezer. Fighting back tears, he told Al-Monitor, ''He died as a result of a reconnaissance drone missile attack. His body has been here since yesterday. The dangerous situation prevented me from coming to take him any sooner.''

I thank God that my relatives were quickly buried, and that my cousins Mustafa, Malak and Ismail did not remain long in a freezer, lest their bodies freeze, and their souls now rest in peace, leaving us with nothing but the silence of death and bodies forever trapped in the postures of their passing.

On the fifth day of the war, when I went to write my Rafah report about the shelling of the Ghannam family, I stopped by to visit my cousin's house. I saw my relatives and we took photographs together. During the war, my cousin Wael's wife had given birth to twins, Mustafa and Ibrahim, who were like two tiny angels, harbingers of hope and joy.

How could I have known that this would be our last meeting? I wish I had stayed longer and talked to them some more. Hanadi, Asmaa, my uncle and his wife laughed as they joked about the twist of fate that brought us together in the middle of a war, at a time when Israeli occupation forces had not yet begun perpetrating their wanton war crimes against Rafah.

Endings are so strange, as are living moments that suddenly become relegated to the past. We will never see them again, and the pictures that I took of the twins are now so precious, as one of them, Mustafa, was killed, while the other, Ibrahim, remained alive.

I wonder how they could differentiate between them, for they looked so much alike. Who identified them when their father died and their mother lay wounded in intensive care? Who was Mustafa, and who was Ibrahim? It was as if they had merged upon one twin's death.

In the photos taken after their death, my family looked so peaceful, asleep with their eyes closed. None of them were disfigured or burned, unlike hundreds of dead children and civilians that US-made weapons killed before them. We wondered if they died in pain. What happened when the missile, carrying tons of explosives, impacted their modest house and exploded, creating air pressure so fierce that their internal organs burst? Their suffering was perhaps lessened by the fact that they were sleeping.

I didn't see them when I went to Rafah on Aug. 2. I wrote about the death of the Ayad Abu Taha family, which was targeted by warplanes, and saw the corpse of Rizk Abu Taha, one year old, when it arrived at the Kuwaiti Hospital.

I observed him at length. He looked alive. One could see that he had been playing when he died, dressed in his pink pants. How could he be at such peace? The bodies of war victims look so different from how they appear on television. They are so real, so substantial, suddenly there before you, without any newscast introductions, music or slogans.

Bodies lay everywhere, and it was if everything in life had been to prepare us for this moment. Suddenly, the dead left their personal lives behind: their cell phones, homes, clothes, perfumes and daily chores. Most importantly, they left the fear of war behind.

Distances in the small Gaza Strip have grown larger, distances and time expanding as a result of the fear and death that shrank the life expectancy of the populace. We were unable to join the family for the funerals. My uncle, Ahmad al-Ghoul, later told me over the phone, ''Because of the inherent danger, our goodbyes to them lasted mere seconds. Malak's eyes laid open, as if to ask, 'What wrong did I commit?'''

I was born in 1982, in that same house in Rafah's refugee camp, where the family's large household expanded. I grew up there, and everything else grew with us: the first intifada, the resistance, my nearby school that I walked to every day. There, I saw my first-ever book library. There, I remember seeing my grandfather fall asleep as he listened to the BBC. And there, I laid eyes on the first Israeli soldier in my life, striking my grandfather to force him to erase the national slogans that adorned the walls of our refugee camp home.

Now, the house and its future memories have been laid to waste, its children taken to early graves. Homes and recollections bombed into oblivion, their inhabitants homeless and lost, just as their camp always had been. Never ask me about peace again.

Asmaa al-Ghoul is a Palestinian journalist from the Rafah refugee camp based in Gaza.


How Can Israel Keep Biting The Hand That Feeds?

By Thalif Deen

There is an age-old axiom in politics, says a cynical Asian diplomat, that you don't bite the hand that feeds you.

But that longstanding adage never applied to Israel - which although sustained militarily by the United States - has had no compunction at lashing out at Washington if the US is ever critical of illegal settlements or human rights violations in the occupied territories.

Although its military survival depends largely on all the US weapon systems at its command, Israel lambasted the United States last week, unofficially describing US Secretary of State John Kerry's support for a peace plan in Gaza as "a strategic terrorist attack."

Angry at the remarks, State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki countered: "It's simply not the way partners and allies treat each other."

Still, the United States, per its usual norm, continued to absorb the punches thrown by Israel - right or wrong - in a veritable act of political masochism.

"If one is to parody a metaphor," the Asian diplomat told IPS, "while Israel continues to bite the hand that feeds, the United States continues to feed the hand that bites."

Despite the vitriol from Israel, the administration of President Barack Obama was quick to supply some $225 mn in ammunition and spares to Israel as emergency aid last week to bolster its defences in the month-long conflict with Hamas.

The conflict is now under an extended 72-hour truce.

William D. Hartung, director of the Arms and Security Project at the Center for International Policy, told IPS: "If the Obama administration had wanted to exert leverage during the recent Israeli attacks on Gaza, it could have threatened to cut off military aid until the Israeli government ceased disproportionate attacks that killed large numbers of civilians."

Instead, he said, the US administration re-supplied Israel with ammunition in the midst of the conflict.

Norman Solomon, executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy, told IPS: "The US government has continued to serve as an enabler for Israeli slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza."

He said the humane rhetoric from the Obama administration functions in tandem with huge US military and intelligence help from Washington.

Last month, as the latest Gaza crisis escalated, the White House flashed an unmistakable green light for Israel to massacre - and keep massacring, said Solomon, co-founder and coordinator of RootsAction.org, a 450,000-member online activist group based in the United States.

The bilateral relationship between the US and Israel has combined tragedy and farce in gruesome ways, he noted.

Both governments have regularised the matter-of-fact killing of civilians in Gaza as though they were nothing more than incidental to the geopolitical agendas of those two dominant military powers, said Solomon, author of "War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death".

At last count, about 1,875 Palestinians, including 426 children, were killed in the conflict - virtually all of them with US supplied weapons.

In contrast, the Israeli death toll was 64 of its soldiers and three civilians.

A preliminary survey by international organisations says the Israeli bombings destroyed some 37 mosques, 167 schools, six universities and more than 10,000 homes in Gaza.

Addressing the General Assembly Wednesday, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said international humanitarian law clearly requires protection by all parties of civilians and civilian facilities, including UN staff and UN premises.

Ban said perhaps nothing symbolised more the horror that was unleashed on the people of Gaza than the repeated shelling of UN facilities harbouring civilians who had been explicitly told to seek a safe haven there.

"These attacks were outrageous, unacceptable and unjustifiable," he added.

"Our UN flag must be respected and assure protection to those in need. UN shelters must be safe zones, not combat zones. Those who violate this sacred trust must be subject to accountability and justice," he added.

Ban also pointed out that in the most recent case of shelling of a UN facility, the Israelis were informed of the coordinates 33 times.

On Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu regretted the civilian casualties, but blamed it all on Hamas.

"Every civilian casualty is a tragedy, a tragedy of Hamas's own making, " he added.

Hartung told IPS although Israel has its own production capacity - particularly in areas like drones - the military is heavily dependent on US aid.

From F-16 fighter planes to bombs and ammunition, the Israeli attacks on Gaza prominently featured weapons made in the United States and paid for by US taxpayers, he pointed out.

In all, he said, the United States has provided over $25 bn in military assistance to Israel in the 2000s - all in the form of grants that do not need to be paid back.

And while countries like Canada, France, Italy and Germany have supplied some military equipment to Israel, their sales are dwarfed by the equipment provided by the United States, Hartung added.

Solomon told IPS: "From Obama, no amount of discreet handwringing or personal dislike of Netanyahu has made an appreciable difference to the Israeli government."

He said it can count on Washington to supply a steady stream of platitudes about seeking a broad solution via a peace process.

Directly aided and abetted by the US government, Israel has opted for an ongoing iron fist - truly terrifying for the civilian population of Gaza, said Solomon. This US-Israeli mode of operation remains highly functional in terms of diplomatic cover, military help and intelligence aid. In human terms, for Palestinians, the results continue to be catastrophic, he declared.

Before 9/11, he said, the scholar Eqbal Ahmad voiced a truth that is more cogent and crucial than ever: A superpower cannot promote terror in one place and reasonably expect to discourage terrorism in another place. It won't work in this shrunken world.

Ahmad has passed away, but those words from him remain very much alive. They are true, and they condemn the US role as enabler of Israel's mass killing, said Solomon.

More than a decade ago, as the war on terror was gaining momentum, Martin Luther King III spoke at a commemoration of his father's birth and asked: "When will the war end?...We all have to be concerned about terrorism, but you will never end terrorism by terrorising others."

Today, the wisdom of his statement serves as an indictment of what Israel does in Gaza - and what the United States does to help Israel do it, declared Solomon.


No Forgiveness For Jewish Nazism

By Khalid Amayreh

I will no longer be using euphemistic language in reference to Jewish Nazism, especially in light of the latest Dresden-like bombing of Gaza by the Judeo-Nazi state, also known as Israel.

The pornographic death and destruction inflicted by the Judeo-Nazi state on the innocent population of Gaza must be treated as a watershed. It is the Auschwitz, Mauthauzen and Dachau of Palestine. The victims are the helpless children and women of Palestine. And the perpetrators are the Nazi-minded Jews who wanted to avenge the German-perpetrated holocaust in the course of the Second World War.

From now on, I will not listen to anyone preaching about peace with the Judeo-Nazi state. In the final analysis, peace with Israel would be very much like peace with Hitler if only because Hitlerian Nazism and Jewish Nazism are carbon copies of each other.

At the end of the day, no person with an iota of common sense would seek safety in a hole where venomous snakes live. The same logic applies to the Judeo-Nazi state whose inhabitants gleefully celebrate the mass murder of children and breast-feeding mothers as a national victory.

Therefore, we Palestinians must mobilize the entire international community to boycott the Judeo-Nazi state at all levels. We owe it to the victims of Jewish Nazism in Gaza and elsewhere to desist from erstwhile naïve behavior of trying to build bridges with the Nazis of our time. Bridges can't be built with those calling for our destruction and extermination. Thinking otherwise would be infinitely stupid, self-defeating and disastrous.

We must also mobilize Muslim communities everywhere to treat Judeo-Nazis in a way befitting their nefarious ideology and evil behavior. After all, these are the murderers of our children.

We must abandon once and for all any propensity to be nice where being nice is interpreted as weakness and cowardice.

Please, no more efforts to normalize with the murderers of our kids. No more inter-religious encounters, no more friendly soccer matches and no more courtesy calls. We must never allow the evil Judeo Nazis to beguile us into dancing in our children's funerals.

This is the message we need to communicate to the Palestinian Authority (PA) and its often obsequious officials who have repeatedly displayed eagerness to normalize with the murderers of our children.

Yes, there must be no more betrayal of our children's blood, spilled knowingly and deliberately by the very people our generosity has often been meted out to them.

We don't want to see these Judeo-Nazi killers in our cities or villages or convention centers. Period.

I am not suggesting violence against anyone, although violence is going to be an inevitable reaction to the Judeo-Nazi rampage of death and terror against our people.

However, we must always maintain the psychological barrier between us and them.

Let the world, including the West level all sorts of accusations against us. Let them call us anti-Semites and all other epithets. A world which stood utterly silent while our children and women were being slaughtered on a daily basis for nearly thirty days obviously doesn't deserve respect.

This world has been and is effectively accomplice to Judeo-Nazi efforts to exterminate our people in order to build an ethnically pure society following the Nazi style.

The Judeo-Nazi blitz against our people should have decimated all doubts as to who are our real friends and our real enemies. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. We must not be fooled again.


We must never forget that the whoring Arab regimes around occupied Palestine have been instrumental in enabling the Judeo-Nazi state to murder our people and destroy our towns.

At the top of these whoring regimes is the criminal regime in Cairo, headed by Charlatan General Abdul Fattah al Sissi, who has morphed Egypt from a country with the weight of 90 million people to a country with the weight of a dwarf.

The same thing applies to Saudi Arabia who has utterly failed to utilize its financial and other resources to support the Palestinian people, leaving Gazans totally vulnerable to the wrath of Jewish Nazism.

Other silent dwarfs in various Arab capitals deserve a similar condemnation.

At the same time, every Palestinian must thank Turkey for its moral solidarity with our people. We must also convey our deepest thanks to the governments and peoples of South America, especially states that have withdrawn their ambassadors from the Judeo-Nazi state in protest against the Judeo-Nazi blitzkrieg against Gaza.


Hamas Victory Echoed In Resistance Brigades Firing New Rocket Attacks, France Slamming Israel Security Unjustifiable For Slaughtering Civilians, Erdogan Likening Israel Acts To The Nazi State Of Adolf Hitler And Britain Reviewing Israel Arms Export Licences

As Egyptian official declared Israel-Palestinian truce agreed to start at 0500 GMT Tuesday as Cairo to host ' further negotiations', drums of Netanyahu's mission failure beat louder across the Middle East as Hamas' al-Qassam Brigades continue to stage spectacular long range rockets deeper into the enemy territories just before the so-called truce take effect.

Hamas' al-Qassam Brigades targeted Israeli soldiers in eastern Juhr al-Dik with three 120 mortar shells, the Zikim military site with two shells and Kfaz Azza with two others on Monday.

Although, there had been no immediate comment from Israel over the truce deal announced by Cairo, the fact that Israel failed to bring the fighting to an end without the involvement of Hamas resistance has made all military powers of Israel and its backers only defeatable.

Egyptian regime was the first of all anti-Hamas parties to realize there is no peace without the formidable Palestinian recistance in line with the stance of Qatar and Turkey, the two other regional powers who had maintained that any deals including the initial Egyptian ceasefire without Hamas the major player was unworkable.

A Palestinian delegation, including Hamas representatives, has been holding talks in Cairo with Egyptian mediators for a durable truce in Gaza, but Israel has not yet sent any negotiators to the Egyptian capital. Sisi government has finally conceded to the need to open the Rafah Crossing in order to achieve a workable framework for a lasting ceasefire. Hamas has emerged victorious after all with due recognition of its power-based role in the Middle East peace process and irreconcilable position at the very heart of all the Palestinians.

The victory must have emboldened the Palestinian resistance bloc as its Islamic Jihad's Al-Quds Brigades targeted Ashkelon with five more grad missiles later on the eve of Egypt ceasefire announcement, confirming the total failure of Netanyahu and his Nazi regime to demilitarize the ruling party of Gaza. It was so incredible that despite all Israel's atrocities, the PRC's al-Nasser Salah al-Din Brigades was still able to target the Zionist state's soldiers near the Zikim military site with four 107 missiles as Egypt new approaches were unfolding.

According to the Middle East monitoring groups, the al-Mujahidin Brigades targeted Malaka with three 107 missiles, an Israeli vehicle with an RPG shell in eastern al-Shujaiyya, Ofokim military site with two grad missiles, and Eshkol with three 107 missiles.

France: Israel security does not justify 'slaughter of civilians'

Israel's right to security does not justify its actions in Gaza, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Monday, as he called for a political solution to be "imposed" by the international community.

"How many more deaths will it take to stop what must be called the carnage in Gaza?" Fabius said in a statement.

"The tradition of friendship between Israel and France is an old one and Israel's right to security is total, but this right does not justify the killing of children and the slaughter of civilians."

The statement comes amid global outrage over an Israeli strike next to a UN school where ten people were killed, among them civilians who had been seeking refuge from the violence.

Fabius said that Israel was not justified in carrying out what UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called "a criminal act" with the attack near the school.

"That is why we support and demand the establishment of a real ceasefire as proposed by Egypt and why we are ready, as French and Europeans, to contribute to it in a concrete way," he said.

"It is also why a political solution is essential ... and should in my opinion be imposed by the international community," Fabius said.

 Erdogan: Israel acts like the Nazi state of Adolf Hitler

Israeli premier Recep Erdogan on Sunday launched a scathing attack on Israel and likened its war crimes in Gaza to those of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.

Addressing a sea of cheering supporters at his biggest rally so far ahead of the August 10 presidential elections, Erdogan accused the Jewish state of deliberately killing Palestinian mothers, fathers and their children to quash their struggle for liberation from its occupation.

"Just like Hitler, who sought to establish a race free of all faults, Israel is chasing after the same target," the Turkish leader said.

"They (the Jews) kill women so that they will not give birth to Palestinians; they kill babies so that they will not grow up; they kill men so they cannot defend their country... They will drown in the blood they shed," he added.

For his part, Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi demanded Israel in a news conference held in Cairo on Sunday to halt its military operations in Gaza to avoid further loss of civilian lives.

He also called on Israel to end its blockade on Gaza and release all Palestinian prisoners.

Britain reviewing Israel arms export licences

Meanwhile, Britain is reviewing licences to sell arms and military goods to Israel in the light of ongoing operations in Gaza, Prime Minister David Cameron's office said Monday.

Britain's government has approved licences for the sale of military goods to Israel worth at least £42 million ($71 million, 53 million euros) since 2010, according to government figures obtained by the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT).

These are mostly to supply weapons control and targeting systems and components for ammunition, drones and armoured vehicles.

"We are currently reviewing all export licences to Israel to confirm that we think they are appropriate," said a Downing Street spokeswoman.

"Clearly the current situation has changed compared to when some licences will have been granted, and we're reviewing those existing licences against the current situation, but no decisions have been taken beyond going back again and reviewing," the spokeswoman said.

The decision to review the contracts was taken last week, she added.

CAAT spokesman Andrew Smith welcomed the review but called for an immediate embargo on the selling of military equipment to Israel, insisting the government "should never have agreed the licences in the first place".

"It not only facilitates, but signals approval to the actions of the Israeli government," he added.

Cameron said earlier Monday that the United Nations was "right" to condemn the shelling of a UN school in Gaza which killed 10 people but declined to say whether he thought it breached international law.

The opposition Labour Party in recent days has criticised Cameron for not taking a tougher line against Israel.

 PIC, Maan, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Transcript of Address By Muhammad Al-Daif, General Commander Of The Izz Ad-Din Al-Qassam Brigades

By Abu Khaled, Muhammad Al-Daif

Below is the full text of the speech made by Muhammad Al-Daif, General Commander of the Izz Ad-Din Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas.

In the name of Allah, Most Merciful Most Compassionate

Praise be to Allah, the Lord all of worlds, Peace and prayer be upon the Imam of the mujahideen our Prophet Muhammad, his family and his companions and those who follow their way until the Day of Judgement.

[Quoting the Quran]: ''Fight them, and Allah will punish them by your hands, cover them with shame, help you (to victory) over them, heal the breasts of Believers.''

O Allah, it is with Your help that we spring to action, it is with Your help that we manoeuvre, it is with Your help that we fight; and we have neither power nor strength without You.

The Abraha of this age has transgressed against our Ummah and against our people in Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza employing the most lethal war machinery. The enemy has laid siege, starved the people, terrorised the innocent, murdered children, women and the elderly and destroyed their houses on top of their heads in the largest bank of civilian targets ever known in history. The enemy is seeking to convince its people that it invaded Gaza and destroyed its tunnels and rocket launchers and to delude them of a false victory. As a result, the enemy has trapped its own defeated army and its troops who have been brought into battle as if being herded to death. As they consider the predicament of the so-called ground operation, we promise them what will make them feel worse and would like to affirm the following:

1. The balance of power in the battlefield has changed. Today, you are fighting righteous soldiers who love to die in the cause of Allah just as much as you love to live. They compete for martyrdom just as you run away from death or fighting. The ranks of all the forces and factions of our people have been united in resisting the aggression.

2. What the fighter planes, artillery and military boats have failed to achieve will not be achieved by the defeated troops on the ground. By the Grace of Allah, these troops have now become easy prey for our guns and the ambush of our mujahideen. There is no better evidence to proof this than the ongoing landings behind enemy lines, the most recent of which was the operation to the east of Al-Shujaya yesterday despite the massacres and the razing to the ground of houses on top of the heads of their inhabitants. This has been possible despite the multi-layered reconnaissance systems the enemy has in place. Now the enemy realises that the mission is much tougher and much bigger than initially thought. The enemy is sending its troops to a definite hell, God willing.

3. We have opted to confront and kill the enemy's armed troops and its elite soldiers rather than assault civilians in the neighbouring villages. This is despite the fact that the criminal enemy has been shedding the blood of civilians, perpetrating massacres and razing entire neighbourhoods to the ground levelling houses on top of the heads of their inhabitants whenever more of their soldiers are killed.

4. The usurping Zionist entity will not enjoy security until our people are secured and live in freedom and dignity. There will not be a ceasefire until the aggression is stopped and the siege is lifted. We shall not accept any compromise at the expense of the dignity and freedom of our people.

5. We affirm our full readiness for this moment. We work in according with scenarios and plans already laid down. We do not simply react or act foolishly as the leaders of the criminal enemy do. We have exerted every possible effort and we are confident that Allah will provide us with victory, for Allah provides victory for whoever he wills, and Allah is mightiest and most compassionate.

Our Ummah, our people. We appreciate your stance and your cohesion with and support for the resistance. Let it be known to you that with you, after Allah, we are stronger and that they will not do you but a little harm. Victory comes with patience, and victory is but an hour's patience. Such victory and great accomplishment would not be possible had it not been for your steadfastness, patience and embrace of the resistance. You are our folks and the crown on our heads. We promise you that we shall remain your protective shield and your servants. May Allah be your guardian and protector, for Allah is the best protector and the most merciful. May Allah have mercy on our martyrs, heal the wounds of our wounded and free our captives. Until Allah's great victory.

[Quoting the Quran]: ''Verily, We will indeed make victorious Our Messengers and those who believe (in the Oneness of Allah) in this world's life and on the day when the witnesses will stand forth, (i.e. Day of Resurrection).''

Your brother

The General Commander of Izz Ad-Din Al-Qassam Brigades

Abu Khaled, Muhammad Al-Daif


Hamas Maintain Its Steadfast People Will Achieve Victory: Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Saudi Arabian King Abdullah Slams World Silence On Israel War Crimes Inexcusable

Hamas Maintain Its Steadfast People Will Achieve Victory: Saudi King Abdullah Slams World Silence On Israel War Crimes Inexcusable

''You are re-writing history through the very ink of perseverance, self-abnegation and support you've been providing the resistance with,'' Hamas said as it acclaimed the Palestinians' steadfastness and their eagerness to stand firm in their historic battle against the Israeli occupation.

''Every single drop of blood you've shed on behalf of Gaza is a harbinger of an imminent victory; every single tear you've dropped for the death of a dear person foreshadows the downfall of darkness and the launch of a new dawn,'' Hamas statement declared.

''Our People in Gaza have been an epitome of resistance, sacrifice, and patience in the face of the Israeli offensive against our children, women, and elderly people. Despite the agony inculcated in us by all such agonies, our offspring have been standing tall, so tall to protect their sacred soil and reclaim not only their honor but also that of an entire nation.''

''Gazans have been enduring years of tough blockade, heavy shelling and ruthless destruction. Yet, they have never thrown in the towel. Our people has been standing its ground like an unbreakable mountain, never conceding defeat, never yielding in, forever craving for victory,'' Hamas added.

''We are standing here today to express our honor and pride of what you've done to face up to the ongoing Israeli terrorism. The occupation jets, tanks, and watchtowers have all failed to dash your hopes. You've made proof of an unparalleled vigor despite the wounds and pains you've had to endure.''

Hamas hailed Gaza children, who have been snatching smiles from beneath the ruins that fell upon them, seeking to recover their toys from within the very mounds of stones into which their own and only homes have turned.

''Gaza children have been waving victory flags to remind all of Gaza's mosques, families, homes, souls, martyrs, and even trees that victory is coming out soon,'' Hamas concluded.

Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Saudi Arabian King Abdullah: World Silence On Israel 'War Crimes' Inexcusable'

Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Saudi Arabian King Abdullah said Friday that world silence over Israeli "war crimes" in the Gaza Strip was "inexcusable" and would only breed more violence in the future.

"We see the blood of out brothers in Palestine being shed in collective massacres that have spared nobody, and in war crimes against humanity," the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques said in a speech carried by state news agency SPA.

He said it was "all taking place under the eyes and ears of the international community ... that has stood indifferently watching events in the whole region."

"This silence is inexcusable" and will "result in a generation that rejects peace and believes only in violence," the king said.

The conflict that broke out on July 8 has killed nearly 1,500 on the Palestinian side, mostly civilians, and 63 Israeli soldiers, two Israeli civilians, and a foreign national. In his reaction to the statement of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, Lebanese Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri described Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah's speech to the Arab world as ''historic and very important'' Friday, lauding the kingdom's head for warning of the painful reality in the region and urging an international response to Israeli war crimes committed in Gaza.

Hariri hailed the speech ''because it accurately reflects the painful reality that has ravaged the Arab region - the growing phenomenon of terrorism disguised under the cloak of Islam,'' adding that terrorism's ''sole purpose is to tear communities apart, and bring hatred and conflict instead of brotherhood to the sons of the nation.''

Israel Bombs Gaza Ambulance As Friday Death Toll Surpasses 100

An Israeli airstrike hit an ambulance and killed a paramedic Friday as Israel stepped up its bombardment of the besieged Gaza Strip following the collapse of a ceasefire earlier in the day.

Palestinian medical sources said that paramedic Atef Zamili was killed in an airstrike on his vehicle and that seven passengers were wounded.

Zamili's death brings to 16 the number of health workers who have been killed in Israeli strikes since the beginning of the assault 25 days ago. This is third 13th ambulance to be targeted in an Israeli attack, according to the ministry of health.

Meanwhile, Israeli forces widened their assault across the Gaza Strip on Friday afternoon, launching further ground movements in Shujaiyya in eastern Gaza City, Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip, and Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip.

The expansion of the invasion comes after Israel said one of its soldiers was captured during an attack on its military position east of Rafah inside the Gaza Strip.

Hamas said that it attacked the position an hour before a ceasefire was due to start at 8 p.m., saying that it was a response to Israeli troop movements in the area as well as the deaths of 16 Palestinians in continued Israeli shelling and airstrikes overnight.

It did not, however, take responsibility for the capture of the soldier, saying that Israel had fabricated the claim.

Israeli forces pounded the Gaza Strip all Friday afternoon following the attack, as Israeli authorities vowed a "crushing" response to what they called a ceasefire violation.

At least 40 were killed in intense shelling of Rafah during the Hamas attack on the military post, and at least a dozen more have been killed in air strikes and shelling since then.

The deaths bring the total in Israel's assault to more than 1,600 as well as nearly 9,000 injured, in one of the deadliest sustained campaigns against Palestinians in recent history.

Many more are believed to be dead but stuck under the rubble of destroyed buildings, and thus as of yet unaccounted for by Gaza medical officials.

A Palestinian was killed in an Israeli attack on al-Maghazi refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip late on Friday, health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qidra said.

The dead man was identified as Atef Suheil Qandil, 24.

Another Palestinian was killed in al-Nusairat refugee camp, also in central Gaza.

He was identified as Ab al-Malek Abu Ma'ala, 37.

Additionally, three Palestinians were killed when an Israeli airstrike hit a three-wheeled "tuk-tuk" vehicle in the al-Zaytoun neighborhood of Gaza City.

The three were identified as Fayiz Tariq Yasin, 16, Muhammad Nihad Yasin, 24, and Hassan Ismail Yasin, 32.

Earlier, a Palestinian woman and a young girl were killed as Israeli artillery shells hit a house in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip.

Two people were also killed and six wounded when an Israeli shelling hit a car near the University in Tel al-Hawa in southern Gaza earlier Friday.

Of the more than 60 Palestinians killed in Rafah since the collapse of the ceasefire, 19 others were identified by medical officials as of 5:00 p.m.

They were identified as Ibrahim Suleiman al-Madri, 50, Nadiyah Youssef al-Masri, 45, Ibrahim al-Masri, 6, Muhammad Anas Arafat, 4 months, Anas Ibrahim Hamad, 5, Sabri Sheikh al-Eid, 35, Muhammad Khalid al-Alul, 30, Ibrahim Mustafa Ghneim, Amina al-Zamli, Yahiya Abd al-Karim Lafi, Moussa Muhammad Abu Imran, Hilal Eid Abu Imran, Salama Muhammad al-Zamli, Nuha Jamal Abu Ziyada, Taysir Ali Muammar, Hussein Salim al-Jaafari, Yusra Muhammad Abu Jazar, Itaf Hammad al-Mahmoum, Moussa Ibrahim Abu Jazar, Muhammad Rizq Hasanein, 20.

PIC, Maan, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Hamas Captured An Israeli Soldier Before Ceasefire: Israel Violated The Ceasefire, Committed Bloodbath In Rafah

Member of Hamas's political bureau Mousa Abu Marzouk confirmed on Friday that an Israeli officer was captured hours before a 72-hour humanitarian cease-fire went into effect. Two other soldiers were killed during the operation, Anadolu News Agency reported.

Israeli media sources stated that an Israeli soldier has been missing since Friday morning during a ''tough operation'' in Rafah.

Abu Marzouk said that Israel has officially informed the UN of the capture of its officer and the killing of two other soldiers in Rafah.

In its turn, the UN informed Egypt about the capturing operation as it plays the role of mediator.

On other hand, Abu Marzouk said that Palestinian delegation's visit to Egypt was delayed for tomorrow.

For his part, spokesman for Hamas movement Fawzi Barhoum charged that the ceasefire was first broken by Israeli forces.

Barhoum called on international community to intervene urgently to put an end the Israeli crimes and aggression on Gaza.

Dozens of Palestinian casualties were reported since the morning hours despite the declaration of ceasefire late last night.

Speaking to Yediot Ahronot Hebrew newspaper, a senior Israeli military source said that the possible kidnapping of an Israeli soldier was carried out during clashes near a tunnel and was aided by a ''suicide bomber.'' According to him, ''terrorists appeared while the Israeli forces were searching for tunnels, one of them then blew himself up during which time others kidnapped the soldier.''

''His family has been informed and massive clashes are still underway'', the sources continued.

Hamas's armed wing al-Qassam Brigades said that its fighters have carried out this morning a special operation after targeting a home used by Israeli soldiers.

More than 40 people were killed and around 200 others were injured on Friday during Israeli violent shelling of displaced civilians who tried to return to their homes on the border of Gaza after ceasefire was declared.

Israel Violated The Ceasefire, Committed Bloodbath In Rafah

Hamas has slammed the Israeli occupation for having breached the ceasefire agreement and stepping up its genocides in Rafah, vowing Hamas will only provide consensus over truce bids if observed by Israel.

A responsible source in Hamas said in a statement Friday the Israeli occupation has violated the terms of the 72-hour ceasefire tender by stepping up its military offensive against Gaza civilians.

Israeli repeatedly breached the ceasefire, Hamas charged, adding the violations included a series of raids into Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip, where the Israeli occupation forces raided civilians' homes and deployed over their rooftops.

''The Israeli offensive has been taking away the lives of our offspring in besieged Gaza Strip. The shelling east of Rafah and the raids carried out at around 2 a.m. do not only manifest of Israel's pre-planned violations of the truce but also of its indifference towards all regional and international mediators,'' Al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas armed wing, declared in a statement Friday.

''The incursion leaves no doubt that Israel's infringement of the ceasefire bid is a pre-planned conspiracy targeting our land and innocent people,'' Al-Qassam added.

''Our fighters at 7 a.m. clashed with the Israeli soldiers advancing in eastern Rafah, leading to a number of deaths and wounds among the Israeli occupation army,'' the statement concluded.

 PIC, Maan & Several Media Outlets


Palestine's Mohammed Deif Is The Resistance Real 'Seif': Hamas Leader Of The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades Eluding The Zionists And Their Superpower Supporters

Hamas's top military commander Mohammed Deif, who has survived assassination attempts and defied the Middle East's most powerful forces, is proving a redoubtable foe for Israel in its latest incursion in Gaza.

As Israel presses its deadly offensive aimed at halting militant rocket fire and eliminating Hamas's tunnel network, Deif has warned there will be no truce in the Palestinian enclave until Israel ends its eight-year blockade.

Born in the Khan Yunis refugee camp in southern Gaza in 1965, Deif has been involved in Hamas's operations for more than 20 years, plotting suicide bombings inside Israel, kidnapping soldiers, firing rockets and helping plan the tunnels used to launch attacks.

He was appointed head of Hamas's military wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, in 2002 after the death of his predecessor, Salah Shehade, in a raid.

But Deif had had a long yet shadowy career as a militant before then.

His involvement with the Islamist movement in Gaza began in the 1980s when, as a biology student close to the Muslim Brotherhood, he headed the Islamists' union at Gaza Islamic University.

With the eruption of the second Palestinian Intifada in 2000, he escaped, or was freed, from a prison run by Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority.

His escape -- or liberation, as it is unclear whether he was freed or not -- angered the Israelis, who had had him in their sights for more than a decade by then.

Shortly after he was named Hamas's military head, Israel launched its fifth bid to assassinate him in Gaza.

That attack left him severely wounded, and some rumors suggested he had been left paraplegic, although these were never confirmed, largely due to the secrecy surrounding the details of his life.

He delegated the leadership of the brigades to his deputy, Ahmed Jaabari, thus earning the nickname the "cat with nine lives" among his enemies, and cementing his reputation inside Gaza.

Master of disguise

Only a few, poor-quality photographs of Deif are known to exist, the most recent taken some 20 years ago.

His hiding place is unknown, and he is reported to be a master of disguise who is able to blend seemlessly into the population.

The mysterious commander also uses no technology that might allow the Israelis to track him, a Hamas official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

He may have learned caution from the death of his mentor, Yahya Ayash, who was killed in 1996 by a mobile telephone booby-trapped with explosives by Israeli secret services.

Deif's real name is Mohammed Diab al-Masri, and he owes his 'nom de guerre,' which is Arabic for guest, to his habit of constantly changing his location, the Hamas official said.

He described Deif as a man who is "polite, discreet, softly spoken" and fascinated by "military strategy."

The elusive leader's public statements are extremely rare. In 2012, he warned Israel against launching the operation "Pillar of Defense," which was aimed at halting rockets fired by militants in the Gaza Strip.

After the death of his mentor Ayash, who passed on his explosive-making expertise, he took on the role of "engineer for the Ezzedine al-Qassam brigades," the Israeli army says in its blog.

The Israelis see him as "the brains" behind the campaign of suicide bombings that targeted buses and public places in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem until 2006 and consider him "personally responsible for the deaths of dozens of civilians".

He also played a key role in the strategic development of Hamas, the Israelis say.

They claim that Deif was among the militants "who designed the Qassam rockets" -- the Islamist movement's signature weapon that had a range of eight kilometers (five miles) until Iran supplied them with more advanced weapons.

 AFP & Several Media Outlets


16,000 Reserves Called Up In Israel As US Provides More Arms For Gaza Offensive

86,000 reserve troops have now been called up since 7 July while the Americans say they have sold Israel more grenades and mortar rounds

Israel called up 16,000 additional reserve soldiers on Thursday, boosting army numbers amid their deepening military offensive in Gaza.

The move comes after the US revealed on Wednesday they have restocked the Israeli army with ammunition and plans to allow them further access to an emergency munitions store based in Israel.

The death toll in Gaza now stands at 1,364 according to health officials who say nearly 8,000 have been injured in the offensive that began on 7 July. Human rights organisations say 80 percent of those killed have been civilians, including some 315 children.

The announcement of 16,000 additional reservists in Israel means a total of 86,000 troops have now been called up since the Gaza assault began, according to an army spokesperson.

A senior military source told Ynet news that the reservists have been called up ''to give the army the time needed to complete the mission. We'll decide today where to place them and in which commands.''

Israel's security cabinet, which met for five hours on Wednesday, unanimously decided to pursue attacks against Hamas ''terrorist targets'' including a network of tunnels, public radio said.

The additional soldiers could be used to supplement an expansion in the Gaza offensive, at a time when ceasefire efforts appear to be failing.

An Israeli official told Haaretz on Thursday that a truce is not close: ''When we get a ceasefire proposal that answers our needs it will be examined.''

''The [military] will expand attacks against Hamas and the rest of the terror organisations,'' the official said.

Nevertheless a two-member Israeli delegation travelled to Cairo late on Wednesday to discuss a possible ceasefire with Egyptian officials, who are also expected to host a Palestinian delegation later this week.

Doubling Prejudice: US Decides To Replenish Israel Ammunition

Meanwhile, the American Pentagon decided on Wednesday to meet Israel's demand and restock its dwindling supplies including mortar shells and ammo for machineguns.

''The United States is committed to the security of Israel, and it is vital to US national interests to assist Israel to develop and maintain a strong and ready self- defense capability'', Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby said in a statement .

He said that the ammunitions are located inside Israel as part of a program managed by the U.S. military and called War Reserves Stock Allies-Israel (WRSA-I), which stores munitions locally for U.S. use that Israel can also access in emergency situations.

Amnesty International has called on the U.S. administration to stop military assistance to Israel, and to pressure the United Nations to ban arms sales to parties involved in the Gaza conflict..

An unnamed defence official told Reuters that Israel has already used the stockpile to refill supplies of grenades and mortar rounds in the past week.

The official said that although the ammunition came from the War Reserves Stock Allies-Israel, which is in place for emergency situations, the Israelis had not asked to use this store specifically.

State Department deputy spokesperson Marie Harf responded on CNN to concerns about whether rearming Israel could cause criticism of the US if they result in more civilian casualties in Gaza.

''We are going to stand by Israel and do a number of things to help it defend its security, whether it's Iron Dome, which is of course a defensive system, or helping the Israelis with security funding,'' she told CNN's Wolf Blitzer. ''We're going to stand by them as they fight this threat but that doesn't mean when we think they could do more we won't say that.''

Amnesty International, however, has urged Washington to halt arms supplies to Israel.

''It is time for the US government to urgently suspend arms transfers to Israel and to push for a UN arms embargo on all parties to the conflict,'' it said in a petition to US Secretary of State John Kerry.

News of the US allowing Israel to refill their munitions supplies came after a bloody day in Gaza, when more than 100 Palestinians were killed in military strikes.

17 people were killed in an Israeli strike on a crowded market in Shejaiya, which came during a four-hour ceasefire announced earlier by Israel. Early Thursday morning,15 people were killed in an attack on a UN school in Jabaliya, north of Gaza City, where several hundred displaced families had been seeking shelter. USA an accomplice in Israel's murder of Gaza children

Member of Hamas Political Bureau, Ezzat Resheq, has held the USA partly responsible for the Israeli genocides against Gaza children, slamming Washington's military assistance to the Israeli occupation all along the Gaza offensive.

''The American decision-makers are directly involved in such Israeli rivers of blood,'' Resheq said in a brief statement posted on his Facebook page on Thursday.

The American Department of Defense admitted having approved the transfer of rounds of mortars and bombs to the Israeli occupation.

The Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby said: ''The USA is committed to the security of Israel. It is vital to assist Israel's self-defense potentials.''

Amnesty International has called on the USA to stop exporting weapons to the Israeli occupation and to urge the UN to issue an international ban on restocking all parties to the Gaza conflict with arms.

PIC, Maan, EsinIslam.Com & Several Media Outlets


Death Toll Of Israeli Soldiers On The Rise: Netanyahu's Remarks Reflect His Defeat, Begging Obama For Help On Hamas Truce

PIC -- The Israeli army has officially acknowledged Tuesday morning the death of 5 Israeli soldiers in an infiltration carried out by al-Qassam resistance Brigades into Nahal Oz military base, bringing the total number of Israeli soldiers killed since the launch of the Gaza offensive to 53 according to the Israeli sources.

Five more soldiers were killed Monday evening south of the Gaza Strip in a Hamas mortar attack launched in response to the wave of Israeli missiles targeting Gaza civilian homes and institutions.

According to al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, the death toll of Israeli soldiers has hit 110 after 19 soldiers were killed Monday in a retaliatory fire unleashed in response to the ongoing Israeli offensive on Gaza, which took away the lives of at least 1100 Palestinian civilians so far and left thousands of other citizens, including women and children, severely wounded.

The resistance brigades hit Tel Aviv with four M75 rockets early Tuesday morning as a response to the Israeli genocides against Gaza civilians, al-Qassam further revealed.

Hamas: Netanyahu's Remarks Reflect His Defeat

Hamas Movement said that Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu's remarks concerning the ongoing Israeli military operation in Gaza reflect Israel's defeat before Palestinian resistance.

Spokesman for the Movement Sami Abu Zuhri said in a press statement on Monday evening that Netanyahu's threats do not scare his movement nor the Palestinian people. The occupation will heavily pay the price for its crimes, he continued.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Israel must be ready for a "prolonged" military campaign in the Gaza Strip. "We must be prepared for a prolonged campaign in Gaza. Israeli citizens cannot live with the threat from rockets and from death tunnels," he said.

"We will not end this operation without neutralizing the tunnels whose sole purpose is killing our citizens."

Abu Zuhri pointed out that Palestinian resistance fighters have managed to kill ten Israeli soldiers after infiltrating into 1948 occupied territories in response to Eid's massacre.

Palestinian Health Ministry said that 10 children were killed and 45 people were injured after bombing a children's playground on the first day of Eid al-Fitr.

Abu Zuhri denied Israeli claims that Palestinian resistance were using hospitals in their operations, saying that such allegations aim to justify Israeli crimes and war crimes. Defeated Netanyahu Asked For US Help On Gaza Truce

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has asked for fresh US help in trying to broker a ceasefire in Gaza, top US diplomat John Kerry said Tuesday.

"Last night we talked, and the prime minister talked to me about an idea and a possibility of a ceasefire. He raised it with me, as he has consistently," Kerry said.

Netanyahu had said he "would embrace a ceasefire that permits Israel to protect itself against the tunnels and obviously not be disadvantaged for the great sacrifice they have made thus far."

PIC, AFP, EsinIslam.Com & Several News Outlets


Israel Has Completely Destroyed 5,000 Gaza Homes, Damaged 26,000; Knocked Out Power Plant Needing At Least Year To Repair

The Palestinian Ministry of Health said on Tuesday that nearly 5,000 homes had been destroyed in Gaza as of late Monday, a number expected to rise amid renewed bombardment.

Ministry spokesman in Gaza Ashraf al-Qidra said that a total of 4,987 homes have been completely destroyed by Israeli shelling and airstrikes in the last 22 days.

26,270 homes, meanwhile, have been partially destroyed, of which 4,136 are no longer suitable for habitation.

The statements come after Israeli authorities gave evacuation orders to more than 400,000 residents of northern Gaza on Monday, including two major neighborhoods in Gaza City.

The United Nations said on Tuesday that 215,000 Gazans had fled their homes amid the bloodiest Israeli assault on the besieged coastal enclave since 2009.

All borders in and out of Gaza, however, are completely shut, forcing the majority to take shelter in UN-designated shelters.

Last week, Israel shelled four UN shelters, killing more than 20 and injuring dozens.

Gaza Power Plant Damage Needs At Least Year To Repair

The only power plant supplying electricity to the Gaza Strip was knocked out of commission by Israeli shelling and will need at least a year to repair, deputy director of the energy authority in the Palestinian territory said Tuesday.

"Gaza's sole power plant has stopped working due to Israeli shelling last night, which damaged the steam generator and later hit the fuel tanks which set them on fire," Fathi al-Sheikh Khalil told AFP.

The power authority also said that the damage could take up to a year to fix, meaning that already severe power outages in the besieged coastal enclave could be worsened even further.

As a result of an eight-year Israeli siege on Gaza that limits the supply of fuel into the Strip, power is only allotted in eight-hour stretches, with frequent cuts.

An AFP reporter saw huge fires raging near the plant Tuesday morning, noting that fire department vehicles were still unable to reach the area.

The damage of the power plant exacerbated the heavy damage to civilian infrastructure in Gaza already inflicted during the 22 days of the Israeli offensive aimed at stamping out militant rocket fire and destroying attack tunnels.

Besides the power plant, Gaza also purchases electricity from Israel, but many of the supply lines have been badly damaged by the recent fighting, Sheikh Khalil said.

"Five out of 10 of the Israeli electricity lines into the Gaza Strip were also damaged because of Israeli shelling, and maintenance still cannot reach the areas and fix them," he explained.

Gaza has been forced into dependence on Israeli electricity as a result of the siege, which has crippled domestic production and repair capabilities.

 AFP, Maan, EsinIslam.Com & Several News Outlets


World Must Call The Spade A Spade: Israel Is A Nazi State

By Khalid Amayreh

By now, it is crystal clear that the Judeo-Nazi state of Israel has committed a real holocaust in the Gaza Strip. The shocking scenes of incinerated children and women are indescribable as the odor of death is wafting out everywhere. The magnitude of death and destruction simply defies linguistic description. It is stronger than all the words in the world.

The ongoing holocaust is by no means an aberration or anomaly as far as the Zionist Jewish mindset is concerned.

Israeli officials and ordinary Jews are quite gleeful and boastful about the murder of civilians. (Up to 80% of the Palestinians massacred so far are children and other innocent civilians).

Hence, there is no escape reaching the conclusion that the genocidal aggression is an accurate expression and reflection of the Zionist-Jewish mindset, a nefarious mindset by every imagined standard, which is also unmatched in its evilness and barbarianism in the annals of human history.

For example, even the Nazis didn't pride themselves on murdering children, women and other civilians en mass.

But as we have seen, Israeli Jews, including so-called intellectuals, rabbis and university professors, not to mention ordinary Jews, are voicing their deep satisfaction at the extermination of Palestinian civilians rather brazenly.

Mordechai Kedar, a professor at Bar Illan University, last week issued a statement calling on Judeo-Nazi soldiers to rape Palestinian women in order to deter the Palestinian resistance against Israel's decades-old Nazi-like occupation.

The widely-circulated remarks of the two-legged animal didn't raise eyebrows throughout Israel, which suggests that much of the Israeli Jewish society is very much suffering from the same moral callousness the German society had experienced seven decades ago.

A prominent Israeli rabbi, Dov Lior with tens of thousands of followers, urged soldiers to "not to hesitate to shoot and kill enemy civilians, including children".

"There is no such a thing as enemy civilians in war," the cannibalistic rabbi said.

We are not talking about isolated incidents or unrepresentative voices in the Israeli Jewish society. Some Israeli thinkers argue convincingly that people like Kedar and Lior more or less do represent the mainstream in today's Israel.

The ongoing holocaust in Gaza carried out by the very people who have left no stone unturned in order to demonize Germans and generate sympathy for Zionism, is a definitive game-changer. From now-on the world must recognize that Zionist Jews are the Nazis of our time, period.

People around the world must challenge their respective governments and media and call the spade a spade. Surely, this is not going to be easy especially at the beginning.

After all, Zionist-Jewish circles long succeeded in colonizing the western mind through sustained mendacity and decades of brainwashing. They succeeded in changing the black into white and the big lie into a virtual "truth" glorified by millions.

Hence, westerners must start a process of liberating their mindset from the virulent Zionist stranglehold.

A final note to Muslims: Forget about "peace" with the Judeo Nazis. These murderers and child-killers are out there to murder our children and exterminate our people from the face of earth.

They are the antithesis of everything human and civilized. They are against life, against peace and against light. How can we wish for peace with a people who believe that non-Jews are animals in human shape whose lives have no sanctity? Can anyone make peace with a venomous cunning snake? More Article From Khalid Amayreh On EsinIslam

Khalid Amayreh is a veteran Palestinian journalist and political commentator living in occupied Palestine


US Plays Decisive Role in Israel's Attack on Gaza

By Jonathan Cook

Two reporters for major US TV channels were summarily ''removed'' last week from covering Israel's attack on Gaza, moments before Israel launched a ground invasion.

NBC pulled out Ayman Mohyeldin, who has been widely praised for the even-handedness of his reporting from Gaza, just as he landed a harrowing scoop. He had kicked a football with four boys who were killed moments later by an Israeli missile.

Mohyeldin managed a few tweets before being removed, allegedly on ''security'' grounds. But why then did NBC immediately send in a replacement? After a public outcry, Mohyeldin was reinstated, but no proper explanation of the decision has been provided.

Shortly afterwards, CNN ''reassigned'' its reporter in Israel, Diana Magnay, after a tweet in which she labelled as ''scum'' an Israeli mob that threatened her with violence as she filmed them celebrating missile explosions in Gaza. The tweet was deleted within minutes, followed by her rapid departure.

The impression left by these incidents and the generally deferential tone towards Israel in US coverage is that, faced with huge pressure from the Israel lobby, media executives are frantically policing their correspondents' output, including on social media.

That view was confirmed to Max Blumenthal by an NBC producer after the channel axed Rula Jebreal, a Palestinian contributor, following her on-air complaints about the massive over-representation of Israeli officials in US coverage. The producer said there was a ''witch-hunt'' being conducted by NBC executives, led by the media corporation's president, Phil Griffin.

The obvious shortcomings in US coverage of a story in which Washington itself is a key player deprive us of a vital piece of the puzzle about what is going on in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

US Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in the region on Monday to intensify ceasefire efforts, the day after a studio microphone captured his sarcastic comment that it was ''a hell of a pin-point operation'' by Israel. He had just been informed of a horrifying assault on the Shujaiiya neighbourhood, which left dozens of dead, taking Palestinian casualties so far to more than 650 killed and thousands wounded.

Washington's good faith as honest broker goes largely unquestioned in the US, even though the country annually provides Israel with billions of dollars in aid and military support of the kind that enables these repeated attacks on Gaza.

The claim is only tenable because Washington's actual behaviour is rarely scrutinised in detail.

Two recent investigations by the Israeli media illustrate the profoundly unhelpful role played by the US. They suggest that, whatever its public statements, the US is assisting Israel not only in what President Barack Obama called its right to ''self-defence'' but in actively damaging Palestinian interests.

And it seems not to matter whether the Palestinians in question are Hamas or the preferred negotiating partner, Mahmoud Abbas.

The first disclosure concerns the offer of an Egyptian ceasefire last week. This was presented as a crucial chance to end the bloodshed, one generously seized by Israel and shunned by Hamas. Only footnoted in some reports were Hamas ''claims'' that it had not been consulted.

Israel's liberal daily Haaretz soon confirmed Hamas' account with Israeli officials and western diplomats.

The reality, according to Haaretz, is that Kerry secretly dispatched to Cairo peace envoy Tony Blair, who in turn lobbied the Egyptian president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, to coordinate the ceasefire's terms with Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

Sisi is currently waging an all-out war against Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas' ideological ally. He has harshly punished Hamas too by tightening the siege on the shared border with Gaza. Like Israel, Sisi's Egypt is a major beneficiary of US aid.

In short, Sisi and Netanyahu share a keen interest to weaken and humiliate Hamas. And yet, the US encouraged them to negotiate a ceasefire over Hamas' head. Since then, Washington has rebuffed an alternative proposal from Qatar and Turkey, who are more sympathetic to Hamas.

It was a foregone conclusion that Hamas would reject the Egyptian offer. It failed to address key concerns, not least that the suffocating siege be ended and that Israel honour earlier agreements, particularly on prisoners.

The ceasefire proposal was nothing more than a trap - one whose purpose was to elicit a Hamas rejection and thereby provide Israel with a pretext to launch its ground invasion.

Netanyahu, backed by the US, is using the current attack to terrorise Gaza's civilian population, deplete Hamas' rocket stockpile, and then force it to accept terms of surrender.

The second investigation comes from journalist Raviv Drucker, this time concerning the peace talks that collapsed in April. Washington officials have told him that US negotiators spent the talks' key phase coordinating positions exclusively with Netanyahu. Abbas was then presented with a fait accompli of hardline Israeli demands.

Despite its public pronouncements, Washington was also secretly conspiring with Israel on a huge expansion of settlement projects. These were announced - to loud condemnation by Kerry - each time a batch of Palestinian prisoners was released, a condition Abbas had set for his participation.

But US opposition was feigned, writes Drucker. In reality, Washington was ''informed of the [settlement] tenders in advance''.

It is no surprise that Netanyahu has been acting in bad faith, and that his military campaigns in the West Bank and Gaza are designed to disrupt the recent reconciliation between Hamas and Abbas' Fatah.

As Israeli analyst Noam Sheizaf points out, Netanyahu is opposed to a peace deal of any kind. For him, ''Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas are pretty much the same. Any gain by either one of them is a loss to Israel.''

But of far greater concern should be the Obama administration's decision to back Israel to the hilt and the US media's silence on the matter. There can be no hope of a peaceful solution ever gaining traction - or these bouts of blood-letting in Gaza coming to end - unless Washington is finally unmasked as Israel's abettor-in-chief. More Article From Jonathan Cook On EsinIslam

Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His latest books are ''Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East'' (Pluto Press) and ''Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair'' (Zed Books). His website is www.jonathan-cook.net.


UN Report - Israel's Offensive In Gaza Has Killed One Child In Gaza Every Hour, Murdering More Children Than Fighters

Israel has been accused of waging "war on the children" of Gaza after it emerged that over a quarter of the dead are under 18 years old, the ''Telegraph'' said on its website on Friday.

''The Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights, a Gaza-based human rights organization which works with the UN, has verified the deaths of 132 children between July 7 and July 21 via its field workers,'' the British newspaper said.

It added, ''The impact of the conflict on children has been brought home in part by social media, which has streamed distressing photographs of small, mutilated corpses around the world. One incident, in which four boys were killed while playing football on a beach, was particularly striking, partly because journalists had been playing with them shortly beforehand and witnessed what had happene''.

Human Rights Watch said in a statement that investigations of cases where there were similar casualties with no apparent military objective suggested Israel had committed war crimes.

"Israeli forces' failure to direct attacks at a military target violates the laws of war," a statement said. "Israeli forces may also have knowingly or recklessly attacked people who were clearly civilians, such as young boys, and civilian structures, including a hospital - laws-of-war violations that are indicative of war crimes."

UN report: One Child Has Been Killed In Gaza Every Hour

The Under-Secretary-General for humanitarian affairs, Valerie Amos, has described the situation in Gaza as ''dire'', as the organization revealed that one child has been killed every hour in the conflict for the past three days.

According to the latest situation report from Gaza by the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the Israeli shelling had caused damage to six UN-run schools out of 83 hosting at least 140,000 people who have been forced to evacuate their homes, the Independent British newspaper said.

Baroness Amos said: ''People are sheltering in UN schools which as a result cannot be used for education. They are running out of food, and water is also a serious concern''.

''About 44 per cent of the total area of Gaza is not fit for living'', she said, adding that people leaving their homes due to the shelling makes things worse.

''The majority of those killed in Gaza are women, children and men who have nothing to do with the fighting. That we have had children, so many children killed as a result of the violence in the last few days is a terrible, terrible situation.''

UNICEF also reported that 33 per cent of civilian deaths are children.

As the ongoing Israeli aggression on Gaza has entered its third week, more than a thousand Palestinians have been killed while around six thousand others were injured.


'Hug A Terrorist?' Palestinian, Syrian Girls Act To Save Gaza Victims

In this short clip, two Palestinian, Syrian girls in Toronto, Canada called on strangers to "hug a terrorist."

Produced by the social media activist group Like for Syria, the video portrays two young girls hugging people to inform pedestrians about the escalating death toll in Gaza.

They asked people for hugs, holding a banner that read ''Hug A Terrorist'' and recorded the reactions of people.

One passer-by said: ''I say on both sides: we are all people that should be loved, no fighting and I love you. I love you guys.''

The video endeavored to display some of the actual victims of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's ''defensive operation'' - children, not terrorists.

As tensions continue to mount in Gaza, Israeli troops are expanding operation ''Protective Edge'' farther into the Strip. The death toll has risen on both sides with more than 840 Palestinians and 37 Israelis killed in almost two weeks, according to current estimates.

While the majority of people who have been killed in the coastal enclave are civilians, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu maintains that his nation has the right to defend itself from ''terrorists.''

In the past week, many people have taken to the street across the world, to express their solidarity with Palestinians.

International charity organization Save The Children stated that ''one out of every five people'' killed in Gaza has been a child since the hostilities flared up, adding the sum of children dying has increased by more than 40 percent since the ground assault into Gaza started on July 17.

 Professional Footballer Joey Barton In Solidarity With Palestinians

Professional footballer Joey Barton on Friday showed demonstrated his solidairty with the oppressed Palestinians on Twitter against the Israeli attack on Gaza.

Barton, the 31-year-old midfielder, who has more than 2.6 million followers, used the social media site to illustrate his strong opinion on the Middle East conflict - but the clash was unlikely to end on good terms as both players leapt in at full steam.

Barton, a midfielder for Queens Park Rangers and Twitter aficionado, spoke out about the 18-day-old crisis which has resulted in at least 850 deaths - the large majority of which have been Palestinian.

"The attack on the school in Beit Hanoun is deplorable. #StopKillingChildrenInGaza," wrote Barton on Monday morning.

He continued: "If this was anybody else but Israel the West would intervene. It cannot continue. Innocent children being slaughtered. This must stop."

"How can a God stand by and watch this? Or even condone this? Is this all part of his master plan?"

"The U.N. attempting to evacuate the school when the bombing took place? Asked IDF for window to evacuate. Not given. Children die as a result."

Barton, who used to play for Manchester City and Newcastle also tweeted a picture of Palestinian children in tears.