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326 Palestinian children killed as Israel plunges Gaza into darkness

Defense for Children International – Palestine | October 11, 2023

Israeli authorities prohibit food, fuel, electricity, and water into the Gaza Strip as Defense for Children International – Palestine has so far confirmed the killing of at least 105 Palestinian children since Saturday, with the total now surpassing 300.

DCIP has confirmed the killing of at least 105 Palestinian children in direct Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip between October 7 and 11, while the Ministry of Health in Gaza announced today that over 326 children have been killed. DCIP staff in Gaza and the West Bank continue to document and confirm Palestinian child fatalities as hostilities continue between Palestinian armed groups and Israeli forces. Intensive Israeli bombardment throughout the Gaza Strip, lack of electricity, Israeli airstrikes on telecommunications infrastructure, and the unprecedented rate of daily child fatalities has resulted in a lag between confirmed fatalities by DCIP and the overall total child fatalities published regularly by the Ministry of Health in Gaza.

“Israeli forces are destroying entire neighborhoods in the Gaza Strip as an apparent full-scale ground assault is imminent,” said Ayed Abu Eqtaish, accountability program director at DCIP. “Immediate humanitarian relief is necessary to protect civilians as Israeli forces prepare to intensify attacks and Israeli officials declare their intention to commit further war crimes and crimes against humanity.”

Around 6 p.m. on October 9, Israeli warplanes targeted, without prior warning, a two-story building behind the Golden Hall in the Americana area west of Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, killing at least 14 Palestinians, including at least six children: siblings Karam, three, Akram, 10, Watan, one, Mahmoud, nine, Amani, four, and Fatima Mohammad Abdulrahim Al-Madhoon, seven, according to documentation collected by DCIP. Rescue teams were able to recover seven bodies.

An Israeli airstrike targeted without prior warning a residential building in Jabalia refugee camp around 9 a.m. on October 10, killing four Palestinians, including three children: Mohammad, two, Karam, three, and Naheda Mousa Yousef Al-Hesi, 11, according to documentation collected by DCIP. Other children were also injured in the attack.

Israeli warplanes targeted a residential building without prior warning around 11 a.m. on October 10 in Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, killing 14 Palestinians, including seven children, according to documentation collected by DCIP. The airstrike killed seven children from the Ahmad family: siblings Mustafa, nine, and Elayn Tamer Mohammad Ahmad, four, their cousins Sidra, five, Haidy, one, Linda, seven, and Qusai Mohammad Aladdin Ahmad, three, as well as another cousin, two-year-old Obaida Rafat Aladdin Ahmad.

Israeli warplanes completely destroyed a three-story residential building without warning in the Tal Al-Zaatar area of Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip around 9:25 p.m. on October 10, killing everyone inside, including at least one child, 10-year-old Mohammad Baraa Taysir Shahin, according to documentation collected by DCIP. Palestinian civil defense teams have recovered two bodies from the building, while an estimated 10 Palestinians were inside during the bombing.

In addition to these incidents, DCIP has verified the killing of an additional 11 Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip in other attacks, though DCIP field researchers are still gathering and verifying details of the incidents. Those killed include:

  • Ali Omar Mousa Al-Qatnani, four, from Jabalia
  • Siblings Layan, two and Majd Mohammad Ismail Salah, two, from Beit Lahia
  • Haitham Khaled Abdulazeem Asayleh, 17, from Jabalia
  • Hassan Mohammad Ismail Salah, nine, from Jabalia
  • Malak Mohammad Majed Al-Daqs, two, from Jabalia
  • Kenan Mohammad Mahmoud Farhat, two, from Jabalia
  • Cousins Nadeen Mohammad Abdulati Salah, 13, and Diaa’ Ahmad Abdulati Salah, six months, from Jabalia
  • Mohammad Hassan Ali Al-Zain, seven, from Khan Younis
  • Sham Mohammad Saleh Al-Sawalha, eight months, from Jabalia

Israeli forces unleashed a massive military offensive on the Gaza Strip on Saturday after Palestinian armed groups fired rockets toward Israel and breached the Israeli perimeter fence surrounding Gaza early on October 7, launching attacks inside Israel. Israeli forces initiated a large-scale military operation dubbed Operation Iron Swords.

At least 1,100 Palestinians, including at least 326 children, have been killed in the Gaza Strip since Saturday morning, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza. DCIP is working to document additional attacks and killings. Israeli forces have shot and killed six Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank since October 7, including 12-year-old Ahmad Abdulnaser Adnan Rabi.

DCIP previously confirmed the killing of at least 74 Palestinian children in direct Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip between October 7 and 10, 2023, in a report issued yesterday.

Over 263,934 people in the Gaza strip have fled their homes as mass displacement escalates with intensifying Israeli attacks, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA). More than 175,486 internally displaced Palestinians are sheltering in 88 United Nations schools throughout the Gaza Strip, while over 73,900 Palestinians, whose homes have been destroyed or damaged, are hosted by relatives and neighbors, according to UN OCHA.

October 11, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Cheap Hamas drones made Israel’s border wall ‘useless’ – NYT

An Israeli watchtower with a remotely-controlled machine gun at the border with Gaza ©  Majdi Fathi / NurPhoto via Getty Images
RT | October 11, 2023

Deceiving Israel about its intentions and finding a key vulnerability in the surveillance infrastructure on the Gaza border were some of the crucial elements of the plan which allowed Hamas to inflict the worst breach of the country’s security in five decades, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.

The newspaper spoke to senior Israeli security officials about the preliminary conclusions that their agencies made about last Saturday’s incursion of Hamas fighters into southern Israel. The Palestinian militants raided more than 20 towns and military bases, killing hundreds of troops and civilians and capturing dozens of hostages.

Prior to the attack, Israel had considered Hamas successfully deterred since clashes in May 2021. Intercepted calls between militants appeared to confirm the assessment that the organization was not an imminent threat, sources said. An analysis is underway on whether those conversations were staged.

Israel was over-reliant on the sophisticated wall it built along the Gaza border, which has multiple types of sensors and remotely operated machine guns. Officials believed it to be virtually impenetrable and kept a relatively small military force nearby, prioritizing other areas for deployment, the report said.

Hamas took out at least four communication towers using drone-dropped munitions in the early phase of its attack, rendering the system “useless,” NYT said. The Israelis could not see the consequent breach of the physical barrier, which turned out to be an easier task than they expected it would be. Hamas used explosives and bulldozers to create nearly 30 gaps for some 1,500 fighters to pour through.

An operational lapse by Israel resulted in the clustering of its senior commanders in the area at a single base, which was overrun in a lightning offensive by the militants. With the leadership mostly killed or taken hostage, Israeli response to the emergency was disorganized and slow, sources said.

People higher up in the command chain did not initially realize the scale of the incursion amid the chaos. It took Israeli warplanes hours to provide air support to responding forces, despite their being based just minutes’ flying time from the area.

A thorough investigation of the Israeli failures is pending, as its forces are currently focused on retaliatory military action in Gaza. The newspaper suggested that the Hamas raid had shattered the nation’s sense of safety and undermined its international reputation as a reliable security partner.

October 11, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

Operation Al-Aqsa Flood has altered the relationship between Palestine and Israel

By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | October 10, 2023

Regardless of the precise strategy of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, or any other Palestinian faction for that matter, the daring military campaign deep inside Israel on Saturday, 7 October was only possible because Palestinians are simply fed up. Israel, remember, has imposed a hermetic siege on the Gaza Strip for the past 17 years.

The story of the siege is often presented in two starkly different ways. For some, it is an inhumane act of “collective punishment”; for others, it is a necessary evil so that Israel may protect itself from so-called Palestinian terrorism. Largely missing from the story, however, is that 17 years is long enough for a whole generation to grow up under siege, enlist in the Resistance and fight for freedom.

According to Save The Children, nearly half of the 2.3 million Palestinians living in Gaza today are children. This fact is often infused to delineate the suffering of a population that has never stepped outside the tiny, impoverished Strip of 365 square km, approximately 141 square miles. Again, although numbers may seem precise, they are often employed to tell a small part of a complex story.

This Gaza generation, which either grew up or was born after the imposition of the siege, has experienced at least five major, devastating wars, in which children like them, along with their mothers, fathers and siblings, were the main targets and thus the main victims.

“If you surround your enemy completely, give them no chance to escape, offer them no quarter, then they will fight to the last,” wrote Sun Tzu in The Art of War, the ancient text that is still used in military academies the world over. Yet, year after year, this is precisely what Israel has done. This strategy has proved to be a major strategic miscalculation.

Even attempts to protest against the injustice of the siege by gathering in large numbers at the fence separating besieged Gaza from Israel, was not permitted by the occupation state. The mass protests, known as the Great March of Return, were answered with Israeli sniper bullets. Images of youngsters carrying other young people bleeding from gunshot wounds and shouting “God is Great” became a regular feature at the fence. As the casualties mounted, the media interest in the story simply faded over time.

The hundreds of fighters who crossed into Israel through four different entry points at dawn last Saturday were the same young Palestinians who know nothing but war, siege and the need to protect one another. They have also learned how to survive the hard way, despite the shortages or complete lack of almost everything in Gaza, including clean water and proper medical care.

This is where the story of this generation intersects with that of Hamas, or Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian groups.

Yes, Hamas chose the timing and the nature of its military campaign to fit into a very precise strategy. This, however, would have not been possible if Israel did not leave these young Palestinians with no other option but to fight back.

Videos circulating on social media showed Palestinian fighters yelling in Arabic, with that distinct, often harsh Gaza accent: “This is for my brother,” and “This is for my son.” They shouted these and many other angry statements as they fired at panic-stricken Israeli settlers and soldiers. Many of the latter, apparently, had abandoned their positions and run away.

The psychological impact of this war will most certainly exceed that of October 1973, when Arab armies made quick gains against Israel, also following a surprise attack. This time, the devastating impact on the collective Israeli thinking will prove to be a game-changer, since the “war” involves a single Palestinian group, not a whole army, or three combined.

The October 2023 surprise attack, however, is linked directly to the October 1973 Arab-Israeli war. By choosing the 50th anniversary of what Arabs regard as a great triumph against Israel, the Palestinian Resistance wanted to send a clear message: the Palestine cause is still the cause of all Arabs. All of the statements made by senior Hamas military commanders and political leaders were loaded with such symbolism and other references to Arab countries and peoples.

This pan-Arab discourse was not random, and was delineated in statements made by the Commander of Al-Qassam Brigades, Mohammed Deif; the founding commander of Al-Qassam, Saleh al-Arouri; the Head of the Hamas Political Bureau, Ismail Haniyeh; and Abu Obeida, the Brigades’ masked spokesman. They all urged unity and insisted that Palestine is but one component of a larger Arab, Islamic struggle for justice, dignity and collective honour. Hamas called its campaign “Al-Aqsa Flood”, re-centring Palestinian, Arab and Muslim unity around Al-Quds, Jerusalem, and all of its holy places.

Everyone seemed shocked, including Israel itself, not by the Hamas attack per se, but by the coordination and daring of the relatively massive, unprecedented operation. Instead of attacking at night, the Resistance attacked at dawn. Instead of striking at Israel using the many tunnels under Gaza, they simply drove, paraglided, paddled by sea and, in many cases, walked across the nominal border.

The element of surprise became even more baffling when Palestinian fighters challenged the very fundamentals of guerrilla warfare: instead of fighting a “war of manoeuvre” they fought, albeit temporarily, a “war of position”, holding for many hours the areas that they had gained control of inside Israel.

Indeed, for the Gaza groups, the psychological aspect of warfare was as critical as the physical fighting. Hundreds of videos and images went viral on social media, as if hoping to redefine the relationship between Palestinians, the usual victims, and Israel, the military occupier.

The insistence on not killing the elderly and children was stressed by field commanders. This was not just intended for Palestinians. It was also a message to an international audience, that the Palestinian Resistance will play by the universal rules of war.

The number of Palestinians that Israel kills, and will kill in the future, in retaliation for Al-Aqsa Flood, will be tragic, but it will not salvage the tattered reputation of an undisciplined army, a divided society and a political leadership that is focused solely on its own survival.

It is too early to reach sweeping conclusions regarding the outcomes of this unprecedented war. What is crystal clear, however, is that the fundamental relationship between the Israeli occupation and the occupied Palestinians is henceforth altered, probably permanently.

October 10, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , | Leave a comment

UN: Israel’s total Gaza blockade amounts to war crime

Press TV – October 10, 2023

The United Nations human rights chief has warned that Israel’s imposition of a total blockade on the Gaza Strip amounts to a war crime and violates international law.

Volker Turk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in a statement on Tuesday that the blockade “seriously” risks the already dire humanitarian situation in the Palestinian enclave.

Turk underscored the limited capacity of medical facilities to operate, especially in light of the growing number of injured. He said Israel’s “imposition of sieges that endanger the lives of civilians by depriving them of goods essential for their survival is prohibited under international humanitarian law.”

“This risks seriously compounding the already dire human rights and humanitarian situation in Gaza, including the capacity of medical facilities to operate, especially in light of increasing numbers of injured,” Turk said, adding that a siege may amount to “collective punishment.”

Separately on Tuesday, UN Human Rights spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani clarified that such acts may amount to a war crime. Findings of the UN rights chief are based on a review of available material, including from its own monitors on the ground, she added.

Furthermore, UN children’s agency spokesman James Elder sounded alarm over the siege on Gaza.

“UNICEF is extremely alarmed about measures to cut electricity, to cut food, to cut water, to cut fuel from entering Gaza. This will add another layer of suffering to the existing catastrophe faced by families in Gaza.”

Israel launched deadly strikes on the densely-populated Gaza Strip on October 7, after the resistance movement Hamas waged the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the usurping entity.

Hamas said its operation came in response to Israel’s violations at al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East al-Quds and growing settler violence.

According to the Gaza Health Ministry, at least 830 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli bombardment.

October 10, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

DR MAHATHIR BIN MOHAMAD – THE PALESTINE-ISRAEL CONFLICT

October 9, 2023

1. The reactions to the latest hostility between Palestinians and the Israelis actually underscores why the conflict, which has been more than seven decades, would not find a solution.

2. Firstly, the responses that came from powerful Western nations and their apparatus, including their media, are hypocritical, bigoted and pathological.

3. Instead of addressing the conflict for what it actually is, they chose to continue with their deceptive narrative that it is an attack on Israel by terrorists – their blame being obviously against Hamas, the Hezbollah and Iran.

4. With that narrative, they stoke fear in the Western community, claiming that it is an attack on democracy and peace loving people.

5. With that, the US in particular feel justified to extend military support to Israel to “retaliate” against Palestinians attacks.

6. All these are far from the truth. Instead they are outright lies which had been perpetuated unashamedly by Western leaders and their media.

7. The truth is actually very simple.

8. For decades, the Israelis had been committing war crimes, massacres, genocide and unthinkable atrocities against the Palestinians.

9. These are not one-off acts but rather systematically conducted without respite throughout the seven decades.

10. Apart from Palestinian land which the Israelis acquired illegally through unilateral agreements and treaties with former occupiers of Palestine, the Israeli settlers have been forcefully seizing lands and farms belonging to Palestinians.

11. The Palestinians are chased out of their land and any attempt to seek some form of restitution from the Israeli authorities are met with violence backed most times by the Israeli security forces namely the Israel Defence Forces (IDF).

12. The Palestinians, pushed to the corner, while Gaza was turned into an open air prison, attempted sporadic retaliations, which in turn were met with the full force of the IDF with weapons supplied by superpowers in particular the US.

13. This episode is not any different from previous retaliations except that probably this time around they are more focussed with a bit more assistance externally.

14. But the Western powers and their apparatus continue with their lies, with their narratives that the hostility is an act of terror committed by terrorists, ignoring the fact that it is retaliation by a people whose freedom and rights to their land had been forcefully taken away from them.

15. They refuse to view the hostility is committed by freedom fighters who are up against an injustice committed by an apartheid regime which had been perpetrating genocide on the Palestinians.

16. The Western powers and the US are party to apartheid, genocide and crimes against humanity for as long as they support the heinous Israeli regime.

17. With that, any attempt towards finding a just and fair solution for the Palestinians becomes an exercise in futility.

18. In the meantime, the Israelis can be expected to carry out their genocide with impunity and with total disregard of international laws.

October 10, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Israel airstrikes have destroyed seven Gaza mosques since Saturday

Israeli warplanes blow up the Yarmouk Mosque in Gaza city on October 09, 2023 [Mohammed Asad/Middle East Monitor]
MEMO |October 9, 2023

Israeli attacks have destroyed seven mosques in the Gaza Strip since Saturday, Anadolu Agency reports.

Israeli warplanes attacked the Al Abbas Mosque in central Gaza with many rockets.

The attacks have now led to the destruction of seven mosques, with the most recent being the Al-Abbas Mosque.

Israel had previously hit the Al-Susi, Al-Yarmouk, Al-Amin Muhammad, Ahmed Yassin, Al-Habib Mohammad, and Al-Garbi mosques in Gaza.

The Israeli army’s intensified attacks on the Gaza Strip continue.

The Gaza-based Resistance group, Hamas, launched Operation Al-Aqsa Flood against Israel early Saturday, firing a barrage of rockets. It said the surprise attack was in response to the storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied East Jerusalem and increased settler violence.

In retaliation, the Israeli army launched Operation Swords of Iron against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

At least 800 Israelis have been killed and over 2,300 others wounded in the fighting, according to the Israeli Ministry of Health.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said that over 560 Palestinians died and over 2,900 were wounded.

October 9, 2023 Posted by | War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Russia warns of foreign involvement in Palestinian conflict as US moves warships

Press TV – October 9, 2023

Russia has warned against any involvement of a third party in the ongoing tension in Palestine after the United States relocated its warships to waters close to the Israeli-occupied territories.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday that it would urge all parties involved in the ongoing tension to try to reduce any escalation rather than seek a military solution.

“The risk of third forces becoming involved in this conflict is high … It is very important to find ways as soon as possible to move towards some kind of negotiation process in order to reduce this escalation and move away from a military solution,” Peskov was quoted as saying TASS news agency.

The comments came a day after US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said it will send multiple military ships and aircraft closer to waters controlled by Israel as a show of support for the regime just after it was caught off guard by a massive attack by the Palestinian resistance group Hamas.

In a statement, Hamas has condemned the US decision as “aggression” against Palestinians, saying, “The announcement of the US that it will provide an aircraft carrier to support the occupation [Israel] is actual participation in the aggression against our people.”

Nearly 800 Israelis have been killed and many more have been injured in rocket attacks and ground operations launched by Hamas from the Gaza Strip, where the group in based.

Israel has launched rounds of airstrikes on Gaza since Saturday, killing more than 560 people and injuring thousands more.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday that the way out of the Palestinian conflict is for the Israeli regime and its backers to recognize Palestine’s right to create an independent state.

Speaking in a press conference in Moscow alongside the visiting head of the Arab League Ahmed Aboul Gheit on Monday, Lavrov said that Russia doubts the West’s policy on the Israeli regime would work at all.

“They say that (fighting) should be stopped immediately, that Israel should destroy the terrorists,” Lavrov said, referring to the way Israel and its backers describe Palestinian fighters.

“But this was done before… and never after the situation calmed down did they come to the fact that the main reason (for the conflict) needs to be eliminated … The Palestinian problem should not be delayed further,” he said.

October 9, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | Leave a comment

Israeli settlers captured as Hamas and PIJ fighters overrun the Israeli army near the Gaza border

The Cradle | October 7, 2023

Palestinian resistance factions from the Gaza Strip have taken control of over a dozen illegal settlements in southern Israel as part of ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Floods,’ which has been raging since the early hours of 7 October.

Fighters from Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) say they hold at least 50 prisoners of war (POW) after overrunning many Israeli checkpoints and neighborhoods. Israeli media says the death toll from the operation has reached 100, with close 1,000 injured.

In describing the operation, Hamas deputy chief Saleh al-Arouri told Al Jazeera: “We managed to kill and capture many Israeli soldiers. The fighting is still on. As to our prisoners, I say, your freedom is looming large. What we have in hand will see you set free. The longer fighting continues, the higher the number of prisoners will become.”

Footage across social media has shown the extent of the resistance’s advance, as Israeli soldiers lay dead in many streets while settlers had to run for their lives or surrender to the armed groups.

https://twitter.com/TheCradleMedia/status/1710605327501017461

Among those captured is Israeli General Nimrod Aloni, the commander of the Depth Corps, a unit that coordinates the army’s long-range operations “deep in enemy territory.”

The spokesman for Hamas’ armed wing, Abu Hamza, confirmed that fighters from the Al-Quds Brigades and the Al-Qassam Brigades were at the front of today’s incursion, saying that the Gaza resistance recorded “a new chapter of victory” and “broke the prestige of the enemy entity,” with “a resounding historical shock.”

“Al-Aqsa Flood [revealed Israel] as an illusion made of dust and capable of being defeated and broken.”

In response, Tel Aviv has been conducting air raids inside the Gaza Strip, a coastal area considered the world’s largest open-air prison, leaving over 200 Palestinians dead and 1,600 injured. Survivors of the onslaught say they are “bracing” for the continued Israeli response as Hamas declared, “We are ready for an [Israeli] land invasion.”

Saturday’s operation caught the world by surprise, with even former Israeli security officials calling it a “colossal failure” of the intelligence apparatus, which failed to detect the launch of about 7,000 rockets from Gaza.

“All of Israel is asking itself: Where is the [army], where is the police, where is the security?” the former head of the Israeli Navy said during a TV interview. “It’s a colossal failure; the hierarchies have simply failed, with vast consequences.”

In response to the crisis, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared his country at “war” to the support of his western allies. However, the offensive may throw a wrench at ongoing normalization talks with Saudi Arabia.

In a statement, kingdom officials said: “[Saudi Arabia] repeatedly warned of the consequences of [the deterioration] of the situation as a result of the occupation as well as of depriving the Palestinian people of their legitimate rights and [not halting] systematic provocations against their holy [sites].”

The UAE, which normalized ties with Israel in 2020, issued a statement “[expressing] its deep concern over the escalation of violence between Israelis and Palestinians,” also calling “for an immediate cessation of the escalation and protection of the lives of civilians.”

Support for the operation has poured in from the regional resistance, with Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah calling it a “triumphant operation [and] a decisive response to the ongoing crimes of the occupation.”

Nasrallah also said the Lebanese resistance is “closely following the significant developments [in Palestine]” and “looking at the field conditions with utmost interest.”

Similarly, Yemen’s Ansarallah said that “[Operation Al-Aqsa Flood] revealed the weakness, fragility, and impotence of the temporary zionist entity and showed the world the strength and effectiveness of the resistance in Palestine and its ability to strike the ‘Israeli’ depths, storm the settlements, kill the zionists, and capture their soldiers.”

For Israel, support has poured in from the west, with French President Emmanuel Macron saying via statement, “France stands in solidarity with Israel and the Israelis, committed to their security and their right to defend themselves.”

The White House issued a similar statement, describing Saturday’s resistance operation as “appalling terrorist attacks.”

October 7, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , | Leave a comment

Israel’s twisted logic makes the murder of Palestinian children a matter of state policy

By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | September 5, 2023

Israel murders Palestinian children as a matter of state policy. This claim can be demonstrated easily and is supported by the latest findings of a Human Rights Watch report. The question is: why?

When the police or army shoot a child anywhere in the world, it can usually be argued, at least in theory, that the killing was an unfortunate and tragic mistake. But when thousands of children are killed and wounded in a systematic, “routine” and comparable method within a relatively short period of time, there has to be something very deliberate about it.

In a recent report — “West Bank: Spike in Israeli Killings of Palestinian Children” — HRW reaches a strong conclusion based on an exhaustive examination of medical data, eyewitness accounts, video footage and field research, the latter pertaining to four specific cases.

One is the case of Mahmoud Al-Sadi, a 17-year-old Palestinian boy from the Jenin Refugee Camp. He was killed last November, 320 metres away from fighting between invading Israeli forces and Jenin resistance fighters. Mahmoud was on his way to school and carried nothing that could be seen, from the soldiers’ point of view, as threatening or suspicious.

The story of the Jenin boy is typical and is repeated often throughout the occupied West Bank, sometimes daily. The predictable outcome, as HRW puts it, is that these killings are followed with “virtually no recourse for accountability”.

As of 22 August, 34 Palestinian children in the West Bank have been killed in 2023, adding yet more tragic numbers to a foreboding year that promises to be the most violent since 2005. This year “already surpasses 2022 annual figures, and the highest figure since 2005,” in terms of casualties, reported Tor Wennesland, the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East, during a UN briefing on 21 August.

These statistics, among other factors — including the expansion of illegal Israeli Jewish settlements in the West Bank — “threatens to worsen the plight of the most vulnerable Palestinians,” according to Wennesland.

Those “most vulnerable Palestinians”, however, exist beyond the realm of statistics. When Israeli soldiers killed 2-year-old toddler Mohammed Tamimi on 5 June, the little boy’s name was added to an ever-expanding roll call of shame. The memory of the infant, however, like the memory of all other Palestinian children, is etched into the collective consciousness of all Palestinians. It deepens their pain, but also compels their struggle and their resistance.

For Palestinians, the killing of their children is not a random act of a military that lacks discipline and fears no repercussions. Palestinians know that the Israeli war on children is an intrinsic component of the larger Israeli war on every single one of them.

Of course, Israel does not declare officially that it is targeting Palestinian children on purpose. That would be a public relations disaster. Some Israeli officials in the past, however, have let their guard down, offering a strange and troubling logic.

Palestinian children are “little snakes”, wrote Israeli politician Ayelet Shaked in 2015. In a Facebook post, published in the Washington Post, Shaked called for the killing of “the mothers of the [Palestinian] martyrs.” In doing so, she declared war on all Palestinians. “They should follow their sons,” she wrote, “nothing could be more just.” Shortly afterwards, Shaked rather ironically became Israel’s justice minister.

But not all Israeli officials are candid about the killing of Palestinian children, and even their mothers. Data collected by international rights groups, however, leaves no doubt that the nature of the killings is part of a comprehensive strategy developed by the Israeli military. “In all cases,” recently investigated by HRW, “Israeli forces shot the children’s upper bodies.” This was done without the “issuing of warnings or using common, less lethal measures.”

Specifically, the killing of Palestinian children is a centralised and deliberate Israeli military strategy. The same twisted logic, now applied to the West Bank, has already been used in the besieged Gaza Strip. UN figures show that, in the Israeli war against the Palestinians in Gaza in 2008-9, 333 Palestinian children were killed; other estimates put the figure at 410. In the 2012 Israeli offensive against Gaza, 47 children were killed; in 2014, there were 578 killed; in 2021 it was 66; and in 2022 17 children were killed in the besieged territory by Israeli soldiers.

Between 2018 and 2020, 59 Palestinian children were killed in what was known as the “March of Return” protests that took place at the fence separating Israel from the Gaza Strip. All the children were killed from a distance by Israeli snipers.

When the numbers of dead and wounded children are tallied, they are in the thousands. According to the UN, there were precisely 8,700 Palestinian child casualties between 2015 and 2022.

Even the callous and often dehumanising term “collateral damage” cannot justify such statistics. And although the war on Palestinian children is clearly intentional, protracted and ongoing, not a single Israeli military or government official has ever been held accountable in an international court. Moreover, the UN “List of Shame for Killing Children” has never branded Israel, although other countries have been “named and shamed” for far fewer crimes against children.

As the killing of children is perceived — according to the twisted logic of the likes of Shaked — to be functional for Israel, given the absence of any accountability, the occupation state finds no reason or urgency to end its war on Palestinian children. And with the constant loosening of the rules of military engagement in Israel, and the terrifyingly genocidal language used by its extreme far-right ministers and their massive constituency, more Palestinian children are likely to lose their lives in the near future.

Despite this, the most that UN officials and rights groups seem to be able to do now is to count the alarming number of child casualties. Alas, no number is large enough to dissuade Israel from killing Palestinians, including children.

The problem for Palestinians is not just that of Israel’s violence, but also the lack of international will to hold Israel accountable. Accountability requires unity, decisiveness of will and action. This task should be a priority for all countries that genuinely care about Palestinians and universal human rights. Without such collective action, Palestinian children will continue to be killed in large numbers and in the most brutal ways, a tragedy that will continue to pain, in fact, shame, us all.

September 5, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Gaslighting Gaza: Israel’s deceptive extraction approval prioritizes economics over politics

The Cradle | August 1, 2023

A significant breakthrough has emerged as the Hamas authorities in the Gaza Strip have expressed their willingness, in principle, to grant the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority (PA) access to a natural gas field off the Gaza coast.

This groundbreaking development comes as part of a US-brokered deal that involves the PA, an Egyptian gas company, and Israel. If the plans proceed, the potential benefits are far-reaching, holding the promise of bolstering the economy and improving living standards in the besieged Gaza Strip.

Moreover, this agreement opens up the possibility of indirect negotiations between Hamas and the Israeli occupation, following a path similar to the recent developments in neighboring Lebanon. Notably, Hezbollah has given its approval for the Lebanese government to engage in talks with Israel over maritime demarcation lines, while asserting the country’s rights to its natural resources and threatening the use of force to secure it. It appears that Hamas may now be inclined to adopt a pragmatic approach, mirroring Lebanon.

Israeli green light for Gaza gas field

In parallel with the Israeli government’s decision to delegate enhanced powers to pro-settler Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, aimed at expediting settlement procedures, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office announced on 18 June, preliminary approval for the development of the Gaza Marine gas field.

According to the prime minister’s office, the move will place emphasis “on Palestinian economic development and maintaining security stability in the region.”

The approval paves the way for the Egyptian EGAS company to assume responsibility for the administrative and technical aspects of gas exploration, with plans to transport the gas to the Damietta station for liquefaction and subsequent export to Europe and beyond.

Notably, the agreement between Egypt, the PA, and Israel was announced in October 2022, pending Israeli approval, which has now been granted. However, the announcement did not address the share of the Gaza Strip governed by Hamas, who have remained silent on the matter. Analysts attribute this silence to a potential understanding between Hamas leadership and Egypt regarding a positive approach to the agreement.

One policy for Gaza, another for West Bank 

This development poses a challenge as the resistance factions in Gaza have previously warned against any agreement that deprives the Strip’s residents of their rightful gas revenues. One Palestinian official was quoted by Reuters as saying: “We are waiting to know what exactly the Israelis have agreed to in detail. We can’t make a position based on a statement to the media.”

Hamas official Ismail Rudwan was also quoted by the news agency as saying: “We reaffirm that our people in Gaza have the rights to their natural resources.” In a rally held last September under the slogan “Our Gas is Our Right,” the factions expressed their firm stance on the matter, raising concerns about the potential repercussions.

Suhail al-Hindi, a member of the political bureau of Hamas, commented on the matter on Arabi21, saying: “In no way can Gaza be absent from this natural wealth, and every Palestinian has the right to benefit from the country’s wealth, including this field, with emphasis that the Palestinian people have the right to obtain this gas.

Al-Hindi stressed that “the Israeli occupation cannot be allowed to steal Palestinian wealth, and besieged Gaza has the right to live like all cities in the world, and for our people to enjoy their natural wealth.”

Discovered in 1999, the Gaza Marine gas field holds significant reserves, estimated at 1.1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. The British Gas Group and its partners, Consolidated Contractors Company (CCC), were granted a gas exploration license by the PA. Located 603 meters below sea level, approximately 22 miles west of Gaza, the field has a production capacity of 1.5 billion cubic meters annually over a span of 20 years.

Map of gas fields east of the Mediterranean Sea

Economic analyst Muhammad Abu Jayab tells The Cradle that the US implicitly agreed to provide part of the revenues from the Gaza Marine field to Hamas, which explains why the latter did not comment on the recent agreement. According to Abu Jayab “Egypt is at the forefront as a guarantee that Hamas will deal positively with the agreement, due to Cairo’s influence on the Palestinian factions.”

Nevertheless, the Israeli approval of the Gaza Marine gas field agreement comes at a sensitive time, especially for the resistance factions, as it coincides with the establishment of over 5,000 new illegal settlement units in the face of escalating tensions in the occupied West Bank. Israeli security warnings about the potential consequences of right-wing policies and international opposition, including from the US, further compound the situation.

Plans like the E1 proposal, which connects the Ma’ale Adumim settlement with occupied Jerusalem, and effectively bifurcates the West Bank, have garnered significant criticism due to their potential to impede any future prospects for the so-called two-state solution.

Calm before the storm 

Sources close to the decision-making circles of the resistance factions inform The Cradle that the Israeli approval serves as a bargaining chip to buy restraint and non-interference from Gaza Strip resistance groups in events unfolding in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

However, from the perspective of the resistance factions, the cost Israel demands exceeds the economic gains, as recent actions by Hamas underscore its commitment to prioritize resistance over financial incentives.

Mustafa al-Sawaf, a political analyst close to Hamas, tells The Cradle:

“The attack on Eli settlement, which was carried out by two members of the al-Qassam Brigades [armed wing of Hamas] on 20 June, came in response to all attempts to buy calm and silence. It was a clear message from Hamas to all regional and international parties not to dream of exchanging resistance for economic gains.”

Lessons from Lebanon 

Meanwhile, political researcher Ismail Muhammad points out that all regional and international parties realize that there is no possibility of bypassing Hamas in the gas file. He explains to The Cradle that:

“The resistance in Gaza was inspired by Hezbollah’s experience in imposing its conditions and obtaining Lebanon’s rights in the Karish field. It sent clear messages, that whatever the pressures, it will not accept being an idle witness while the country’s wealth is stolen before its eyes. The most important conclusions of the Lebanese experience are that investment needs calm, and that none of the Arab or international companies will operate under the threat of fire. At least by disabling it. The resistance possesses the military capabilities that enable it not to bomb the gas fields, but rather to disrupt work in them at least.”

Gas deals: A tool for dividing Palestinians 

Politically-speaking, Israel’s pursuit of gas agreements carries broader political implications beyond immediate security concerns. Political analyst Ziyad Abu Ziyad believes that Israel is leveraging these agreements to foster internal Palestinian divisions.

Egypt’s assumption of management responsibilities for Gaza Marine, in the absence of Palestinian reconciliation, and Israel’s refusal to demarcate the maritime borders with the PA, “reminds us of the solution that Israel previously proposed to the Palestinian leadership: a Palestinian state without borders.”

This approach focuses on improving the Palestinians’ economic situation by harnessing their own resources, essentially implementing an economic solution to the conflict without addressing its underlying political dimensions.

The occupation state’s approval of gas extraction from the Gaza Marine gas field has exposed the delicate balance between geopolitics, security, and economic interests in the region. As resistance factions draw inspiration from past experiences and assert their conditions, the path forward remains uncertain, casting doubt on the regional stability that Netanyahu’s office claimed would be maintained with the extraction approval.

August 1, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Israel drone bombs Palestinian cyclist in Gaza

MEMO | May 15, 2023

There has been widespread anger after a video began circulating on social media recorded by a security camera in Gaza showing an Israeli drone bombing a Palestinian while he was riding his bike in the southern city of Rafah.

The Palestinian was travelling along a road when he was attacked by the Israeli drone during the occupation’s latest offensive on Gaza.

The video triggered anger on social media, with users highlighting that the cyclist was doing nothing suspicious.

During a five-day Israeli offensive on Gaza, the occupation killed 34 Palestinian, including six children and three women, and wounded 157 others, including 48 children, 26 women and ten senior citizens.

May 15, 2023 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, Video, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Israeli ploy to divide PIJ and Hamas in Gaza a grave miscalculation

By Robert Inlakesh | Press TV | May 12, 2023

The Israeli regime’s new assassination campaign in the besieged Gaza Strip has essentially sought to isolate the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) resistance movement from Hamas, in what Palestinian resistance leaders, across the board, believe is a miscalculation.

The Israeli occupation military carried out a barrage of deadly strikes on the residences of PIJ leaders in the Gaza Strip in the wee hours of Tuesday morning.

The strikes were carried out just after 2:00 AM local time and claimed the lives of Khalil Bahtini, Jihad Ghanem and Tariq Ezz Ad-Din, three senior leaders of the Gaza-based PIJ movement, along with their spouses and children.

The three resistance leaders were reportedly supposed to head to the Egyptian capital Cairo that day to discuss rising tension in the occupied territories and the regime’s relentless aggression, due to which PIJ had loosened its state of emergency a day earlier.

On Thursday, two more PIJ officials, part of the al-Quds brigades, were assassinated in Israeli drone strikes, prompting a massive barrage of rockets from Gaza towards Tel Aviv and other occupied areas in retaliation.

According to a PIJ military source, who spoke to the Press TV website on the condition of anonymity, Zionists launched the attack to “save their image” and to “isolate the resistance groups”.

“They wanted to see Islamic Jihad isolated from our brothers in Hamas. This has failed and we fight as one force, an attack on one is an attack on all,” he said.

Divide and conquer fails

This statement reflects the sentiment of the PIJ leadership too, who view this battle as a means to demonstrate unity among the resistance movements, which has been established through the Joint Room for the resistance factions in Gaza, which rose to prominence during the Battle of Saif al-Quds in May 2021.

Head of the Islamic Jihad’s political department, Muhammad al-Hindi asserted that there is political communication at the highest level between the two movements and “attempts to drive wedge will fail”.

Hamas has also explicitly said that it is part of the response and its armed wing, the Qassam brigades, is the most powerful force in the Palestinian Joint Room.

The Joint Room also released a statement affirming that the resistance “will remain on all fronts of the homeland as one unit, a sword and a shield for our people, our land, and our sanctities.”

The component of dividing the Palestinian resistance factions has been integral to the Zionist entity’s assassination campaign in Gaza, with the Israeli military warning Hamas to stay out of the confrontation after it carried out its initial strikes.

Yoav Gallant, the Israeli minister of war, stated after the first extrajudicial killings were carried out that “the goals of the operation have been achieved; the leadership of Islamic Jihad in Gaza has been eliminated”, without mentioning Hamas.

Calculated response

However, the resistance forces managed to flip the script on their enemy, waiting for over a day before retaliating, despite continued Israeli missile strikes.

The decision to make the Israelis wait for the response caused hysteria, keeping bomb shelters open for settlers throughout occupied Palestine, as they waited for the anticipated response to high-profile assassinations.

Notably, the response of the resistance forces was not anticipated in the way that it happened. Although there were preparations made for rocket fire toward Tel Aviv, many Israeli analysts believed that past strategies of slowly expanding the range of fire would be adopted.

The wait was perhaps the most important component of the initial retaliatory rocket fire, building anticipation and causing bickering amongst Israelis.

Another key component of the Israeli offensive has been the game of political point scoring, claiming imaginary victories and making tall and deceptive statements following the assassination strikes.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right coalition partners – Likud and Otzma Yehudit – had been in dispute over what was labeled by Israel’s security minister Itamar Ben Gvir as a “feeble” response to the PIJ rocket fire last week.

Adnan’s murder

The rocket fire came as a response from the Joint Room to the custodial murder of Palestinian political icon and PIJ West Bank spokesperson, Khader Adnan, who was allowed to die a slow death inside his cell in an Israeli military prison, denied basic medical aid.

Adnan went on hunger strike for 86 consecutive days and according to the Palestinian Prisoners Society organization his custodial murder came as a result of deliberate medical negligence by prison authorities, therefore making it an assassination, or as one Palestinian group said, “cold-blooded execution”.

Before the killing of Adnan, another exchange of fire occurred between the occupation forces and Gaza’s resistance groups during the holy month of Ramadan.

After the Israeli forces stormed the al-Aqsa Mosque compound, attacked worshippers, desecrated the holy site, and arrested and injured over 400 Palestinians, rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip.

The following day, a barrage of rockets also came from southern Lebanon, followed by two batches of rockets fired from Syria into the occupied Golan Heights.

Israeli strikes in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria were lackluster against the backdrop of major threats from the Zionist entity at the time. In both Gaza and Lebanon, Israeli strikes hit open areas of no strategic value, which even made it to social media memes.

Wary of backlash

It is because of the two previous exchanges that the Zionist regime has gone through a process of repeated embarrassments. Its leadership is wary of the political backlash that would come with the outbreak of a real war with all sides, so it settled for a low-scale battle.

In the case of the latest aggression on the besieged Gaza Strip, the PIJ movement has been chosen as what Israel believes to be an easier target, however, as Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh stated this Tuesday, the regime has “severely miscalculated” and instead of being able to isolate PIJ, they have been dragged into a battle with a unified resistance front this time.

On November 12, 2019, the Zionist regime carried out a brief military operation that targeted only the PIJ movement, assassinating the group commander Baha Abu Atta, which sparked days of fierce fighting.

At that time, Palestinian Islamic Jihad fought separately from Hamas even though the relations between both groups remained friendly, contrary to the hideous Israeli propaganda.

Last year, in August, under former Israeli prime minister, Yair Lapid, the Zionist military launched another military operation to assassinate leading members of PIJ, managing to kill Khaled Mansour and Tayseer Jabaari.

In response, the PIJ movement, as part of the Joint Room, launched “Operation Unity of Squares”, which involved heavy coordination with Hamas throughout.

The aim of dividing the groups failed, yet the Zionist regime managed to keep Hamas from getting involved with full force.

It was using this model that Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu launched an attack this time, however, what was planned to be a short assassination campaign failed to isolate the PIJ movement from the other resistance groups and rather unified the resistance front against the occupying entity.

Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer and political analyst, who has lived in and reported from the occupied West Bank.

May 12, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , | Leave a comment

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