'Coward' Brown won't condemn Gaza slaughter

[Thinking Man's Idiot]

'Coward' Brown won't condemn Gaza slaughter

(Sunday 28 December 2008)

by PAUL HASTE




HORROR: Victims of Israeli bombing raids at the security headquarters in Gaza City.



ANTI-WAR campaigners fiercely condemned Britain's "cowardly" leaders on Sunday for failing to oppose Israel's relentless terror attacks on Palestinians in Gaza.

Medics in the besieged territory revealed that more than 280 Palestinians have so far been killed by US-supplied warplanes in Israeli assaults on mosques, TV studios, police stations and even a hospital emergency room.


The Middle East's only nuclear-armed state has massed thousands of soldiers and tanks at the frontier, sparking fears that the siege of Gaza could escalate into a full-scale invasion.


But Prime Minister Gordon Brown refused to demand that Israel calls off its attack on the impoverished Palestinian territory, backing Israeli leader Ehud Olmert's claim that the massacre had been "provoked."


All that Mr Brown could say on Sunday was that he was "deeply concerned by Israel's response to missile strikes from Gaza" and that "peaceful means" were the only way to a lasting solution.


"I call on Gazan militants to cease all rocket attacks on Israel immediately," he said, failing to add a call for Israeli pilots to stop firing missiles into the streets of one of the most densely populated cities in the world.


Mr Brown's customary refusal to condemn foreign military attacks against the Palestinian people was contemptuously dismissed by Palestine Solidarity Campaign chairwoman Betty Hunter as "cowardly."


Britain "has supported the two-year blockade of Gaza because of the Palestinians' crime of exercising their democratic rights in a manner not to Israel's liking," she explained, referring to the election of Hamas in 2006.


"Israel is attacking an unarmed, captive civilian population who have been reduced to beggars. The British government must condemn outright this assault and immediately demand an end to the siege of Gaza."


Stop the War Coalition spokeswoman Ghada Razuki pointed out that, "even before these latest murderous attacks, Israel's siege of Gaza had driven Palestinians into poverty and despair.


"According to the UN, nine out of 10 Gazans are living below the poverty line, 1.5 million people only receive running water once every five days and even the bakeries have warned they will have to close down because flour supplies are not getting through," she said.


Oxfam International director Jeremy Hobbs added that Israel's attacks "could completely destroy essential infrastructure for sewage treatment, water provision and electricity for hospitals."


Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn, a long-standing supporter of the Palestinian people, branded Israel's violence "nothing more than wanton aggression against defenceless people."


In a letter to Foreign Minister David Miliband, Mr Corbyn demanded that the "very well-armed Israeli state cease its assault on a population living in the virtual open-air prison of Gaza.


"I hope the British government will state clearly and firmly to Israel that this is illegal under the Geneva conventions," he insisted.


Israel's killings have prompted tens of thousands of people in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Arab towns inside Israel to take to the streets in protest.


The Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Stop the War and the Muslim Association of Britain have called an emergency solidarity demonstration for 4pm on Monday at the Israeli embassy in London's Kensington High Street.

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[Thinking Man's Idiot]

Israel begins fresh airstrikes on Gaza

(Sunday 28 December 2008)




BLOODY ONSLAUGHT: An injured Palestinian prisoner shouts for help as he is trapped in the rubble of the prison.

ISRAEL launched a fresh wave of airstrikes against Gaza on Sunday after the UN security council issued a non-binding statement calling on it to bring its military activities in Gaza to an immediate end.

Washington used its veto powers to block a resolution calling for an end to the ongoing Israeli blitz, which has so far killed over 280 and wounded 900.

Gazans cowered in their homes for a second day as Israeli F-16s and Apache helicopters blitzed pharmaceuticals warehouses, a police station, the homes of resistance commanders, a mosque and dozens of other targets.

Aircraft targeted a petrol tanker and destroyed a mosque outside Gaza's main hospital in Gaza City and the main medicine warehouse that supplies local pharmacies in southern Gaza.

Israel's cabinet has authorised a call-up of at least 6,500 reserve soldiers and armoured units have massed on the Gaza border for a possible ground invasion.

Palestinian resistance fighters fired dozens more rockets and mortars into Israel on Sunday.

Two rockets struck close to Ashdod, some 23 miles from Gaza.

One Israeli civilian was killed by a Palestinian rocket on Saturday.

Hamas called for a "third Intifada" against Israel.

Hamas MP Mushir al-Masri said: "These strikes fuel our popular support, our military power and the firmness of our positions," adding: "We will survive, we will move forward, we will not surrender, we will not be shaken."

Egypt strongly condemned the Israeli military action on Saturday and summoned the Israeli ambassador in Cairo, while Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Saniora denounced the air raids as "criminal."

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hassan Qashqavi said that the Israeli attack was "proof of the aggressive attitude" of the "zionist regime."

Mr Qashqavi called for urgent action from the UN security council and the Organisation of the Islamic Conference to "prevent this regime from continuing its crimes."

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad called "on Arab nations and the international community to use all available means to pressure Israel to stop this aggression."

The Libyan Foreign Ministry issued a statement calling on Arabs to take action "in response to the Israeli brutality."

European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana has urged an immediate halt to military action by both Israel and Palestinian guerillas, saying: "There is no military solution," while Washington blamed Hamas for the bloodshed.

Hundreds of thousands demonstrated in the streets of cities around the Middle East yesterday.

In Amman, over 5,000 lawyers marched to demand the Israeli ambassador's expulsion and the closure of the embassy.

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[Thinking Man's Idiot]

An Israeli blitzkrieg

(Sunday 28 December 2008)


WHEN Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert addressed Gazans directly on Saturday, claiming that Israel did not want them to suffer, that Hamas, not ordinary Gazans, were Israel's enemy, even the BBC admits that his words were met with bitter scepticism by Palestinians and there are certainly enough reasons for that bitterness and that scepticism.



The Gaza Strip borders the Mediterranean between Israel and Egypt. It is about 25 miles long and seven miles wide and is home to about 1.5 million Palestinians in one of the world's most densely populated areas.

So, when Israel launches an airborne blitz on the territory, the inevitable result is carnage, in which children and the elderly suffer as much if not more than the militants that Israel claims to be aiming at.


And since when has a democratically elected government, which Hamas undoubtedly is, become a legitimate target for a neighbouring country?


Israel uses the sporadic rocket attacks that it suffers from, with home-made ordnance, as a blanket excuse for launching a bombing blitz that has already killed nearly 300 people, attacking targets including a mosque and a TV station in densely populated areas.


At least 20 raids were carried out on Saturday and were continuing on Sunday.


Mr Olmert claims that the military offensive is calculated to bring about a "fundamental improvement in the security situation" of the residents of the southern part of his country.


If that is the case, there would be serious questions to be asked about his military and political judgement.


But such is clearly not the case.


Israel has abundant evidence that military terror has not and will not cow the Palestinians in their search for political freedom and national autonomy.


In fact, the blitzkrieg tactics that it employs have only ever stiffened Palestinian resistance to Israeli dominance. And that resistance will continue as long as Israel continues a war which it cannot lose, but cannot win, against a people with nowhere to turn.


And the feeble Western interjections, which attempt to equate a few miserable, home-made rocket attacks with the wholesale slaughter of Palestinians, will not improve matters.


Gordon Brown's mealy-mouthed plea for Hamas to cease rocket attacks, while only urging "restraint" on Israel, are worse than useless. They amount to muted approval of Israel's barbarous assault.


Let us not mince our words. Israel is attacking a huge, densely populated prison camp called Gaza.


It controls the land boundaries of Gaza with a vast metal fence. It controls the airspace with a technically advanced airforce and it controls the sea lanes with a naval blockade.


Israel has mounted an 18-month embargo on the territory, forcing Palestinians to deal with starvation, power cuts and economic collapse.


Aid agencies say that the blockade has left the territory paralysed, threatening to destroy infrastructure for sewage treatment, water provision and electricity for hospitals and homes.


Conditions are poor, with many people living with raw sewage flowing in their roads.


This latest attack constitutes nothing more or less than a pogrom, calculated to bring the population to its knees. It cannot be allowed to succeed.


This is Israel's last throw of the dice under the tutelage of a compliant George W Bush.


Incoming US president Barack Obama and our own Mr Brown must be warned that the world will no longer tolerate the sponsorship of such barbarity.

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VICTORY TO THE INTIFADA!

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http://electronicintifada.net/

[Thinking Man's Idiot]

Britain's Communists demand action against Israeli aggression

Sunday, 28 December 2008 15:44

The Communist Party condemns the barbaric attack of the Israeli armed forces on largely defenceless police and residential areas of Gaza.

The callous slaughter of innocent Palestinian lives cannot be justified by mostly ineffectual and token missile attacks from Palestinian militias on Israeli territory.



These latter are the product of Israel's breach of the letter and spirit of the ceasfire brokered by Egypt, during which the Israeli government tightened its economic stranglehold on the Gazan population and continued to launch armed raids into Gaza in pursuit of Hamas leaders.This latest brutal assault on the people of Palestine confirms that the Israeli regime has no sincere intention of negotiating a lasting and just settlement with the elected representatives of the Palestinian nation.



The Communist Party therefore calls for mass demonstrations and mobilisations against Israeli aggression, and demands that the United Nations and individual states impose economic, political and military sanctions on the state of Israel until its government declares a commitment to negotiate with the Palestinian Authority on the basis of UN resolutions against illegal Zionist settlements and the theft of Palestinian land, and in favour of a sovereign Palestine based on its
pre-1967 borders.


We also call upon the British and US governments to withdraw their support for Israeli imperialism and instead to exert pressure on the Israeli government to abide by international law.

[Thinking Man's Idiot]

GAZA CARNAGE SETS
WEST BANK AFLAME


Across Mideast, Thousands Protest Israeli Assault

[Thinking Man's Idiot]

Home »Main Photo
Gaza Casualties Mount As Israelis continue attack, toll near 300 By Taghreed El-Khodary , Isabel Kershner , New York Times News Service Published on 12/29/2008




A Palestinian family rushes by a burning building hit during an Israeli attack on Gaza Sunday.
Gaza City, Gaza Strip - Israeli aircraft pounded Gaza for a second day on Sunday, increasing the death toll to nearly 300, as Israeli troops and tanks massed along the border and the government said it had called up reserves for a possible ground operation. The continued strikes, which Israel said were in retaliation for sustained rocket fire from Gaza into its territory, unleashed a furious reaction across the Arab world, raising fears of greater instability in the region.
Much of the anger was also directed at Egypt, seen by Hamas and some nearby governments as having acceded to Israel's military action by sealing its border with Gaza and forcing back at gunpoint many Palestinians who were trying to escape the destruction.
Witnesses at the Rafah border crossing described a chaotic scene as young men tried to force their way across into Egypt, amid sporadic exchanges of gunfire between Hamas and Egyptian forces. Egyptian state television reported that one Egyptian border guard was fatally shot by a Hamas gunman. A Palestinian man was killed by an Egyptian guard near Rafah, Reuters reported.
In Gaza on Sunday, officials said medical services, stretched to the breaking point after 18 months of Israeli sanctions, were on the verge of collapse as they struggled to care for the more than 600 wounded in the past two days.
At Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, women wailed as they searched for relatives among bodies that lay strewn on the hospital floor. One doctor said that given the dearth of facilities, not much could be done for the seriously wounded and that it was “better to be brought in dead.”
The International Committee for the Red Cross appealed on Sunday for urgent humanitarian assistance, including medical supplies, to be allowed to enter Gaza. Israeli officials said some aid had been allowed in through one of the crossings; on Saturday, Egypt temporarily opened the Rafah crossing to allow the wounded to be taken to Egyptian hospitals.
Israel made a strong push to justify the attacks, saying it was forced into military action to defend its citizens. At the same time, heated statements from the supreme leader of Iran and the leader of Hezbollah expressed strong support for Hamas.
Across Gaza, families huddled indoors as Israeli jets streaked overhead. Residents said there were long electricity blackouts and that they had no cooking gas. Some ventured out to receive rationed bread at bakeries, or to brave the streets to claim their dead at hospitals. There were few mass funerals; rather, families buried the victims in small ceremonies.
At dusk on Sunday, Israeli fighter jets bombed more than 40 tunnels along Gaza's border with Egypt. The Israeli military said the tunnels that were attacked, on the Gaza side of the border, were used for smuggling weapons, explosives and fugitives. Gazans also use many of them to import consumer goods and fuel in order to get around the Israeli-imposed economic blockade.
Over the past two days, Israeli jets destroyed at least 30 targets in Gaza, including the main security compound and prison in Gaza City known as the Saraya, metal workshops throughout Gaza that are suspected of manufacturing rockets, and Hamas military posts.
Hamas said Israel bombed a government ministry compound and Gaza's Islamic University, an important symbol and training ground, late Sunday night. The Hamas-owned television station Al Aqsa was also struck, as was a mosque that the Israeli military said was being used as a terrorist base.
Israel appeared to be settling in for a longer haul. The government Sunday approved the emergency call-up of thousands of army reservists in preparation for a ground operation.

as Israeli troops, tanks, armored personnel carriers and armored bulldozers massed along the border.
Speaking before the weekly Cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Israel's defense minister, Ehud Barak, said the army “will deepen and broaden its actions as needed” and “will continue to act.” Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Israel's goal was not to reoccupy Gaza, which it left unilaterally in 2005, but to “restore normal life and quiet to residents of the south.”
Tzipi Livni, Israel's foreign minister, appeared on the Sunday Washington talk shows to press Israel's case. She said on “Fox News Sunday” that the operation “is needed in order to change the realities on the ground, and to give peace and quiet to the citizens in southern Israel.”
Militants in Gaza again fired barrages of rockets and mortar shells further into Israel on Sunday. One rocket fell in Gan Yavneh, a village near the major port city of Ashdod, almost 20 miles north of Gaza. Two others landed in the coastal city of Ashkelon. Several Israelis were wounded.
Fawzi Barhoum, a spokesman for Hamas, told reporters that Israel had started a “war” but that it would not be able to choose how it would end. He called for revenge in the form of strikes reaching “deep into the Zionist entity using all means,” including suicide attacks.
Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority and the leader of Fatah, blamed Hamas on Sunday for the bloodshed in Gaza and said it could have been prevented. The hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens now within rocket range have been instructed by the authorities to stay close to protected spaces.
In Lebanon, the leader of the Shiite militant group Hezbollah, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, put his fighters on alert, expressing strong support for Hamas and saying he believed Israel might try to wage a two-front war, as it did in 2006. He called for a mass demonstration in Beirut today. And he, too, denounced Egypt's leaders. “If you don't open the borders, you are accomplices in the killing,” he said in a televised speech.
Iran's supreme religious leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, condemned the silence of some Arab countries, which he said had prepared the grounds for the catastrophe, ISNA news agency reported.
”The horrible crime of the Zionist regime in Gaza has once again revealed the blood-thirsty face of this regime from disguise,” he said in a statement. “But worse than this catastrophe is the encouraging silence of some Arab countries who claim to be Muslim,” he said, in an apparent reference to Egypt and Jordan.

Egypt has mediated talks between Israel and the Palestinians and between Hamas and Fatah, leaving it open to criticism that it is too willing to work with Israel. In turn, Egypt and other Western-allied Sunni Arab nations are deeply opposed to Hezbollah and Hamas, which they see as extensions of Iran, their Shiite nemesis.
Across the region, the Israeli strikes were being broadcast almost continually on Arab satellite networks, in grisly detail.
In the Syrian capital, Damascus, a large group of protesters marched to Yusuf al Azmeh Square, where they chanted slogans and burned Israeli and American flags.
In Beirut, protesters were bused into the capital to rally outside the U.N. building, holding up Palestinian flags and Hamas banners. Muhammad Mazen Ibrahim, a 25 year-old Palestinian who lives in one of the refugee camps here, choked up when asked about the assault on Gaza.
”There's an agreement between Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Israel against Hamas,” he said. “They want to end them, all the countries are in league against Hamas, but God willing, we will win.”
That sentiment is widespread here. Many see Livni's visit to Cairo last week as evidence that Egypt, eager to be rid of Hamas, had consented to the airstrikes.
The anger echoes what happened in July 2006, when the leaders of Saudi Arabia and Egypt publicly blamed Hezbollah for starting the conflict with Israel. Popular rage against Israel soon forced the leaders to change their positions.
Hamas, sworn to the destruction of Israel, won Palestinian parliamentary elections from its rival, Fatah, in 2006 and forcibly took control of Gaza the next year. An Egyptian-brokered six-month truce between Israel and Hamas, always shaky, began to unravel in early November. It expired 10 days ago.http://www.theday.com/re.aspx?re=e4c...b-fed3f0b7c879

The Terror State of Israel has stopped killing Women & Children in South Ossetia and started on the Palestinians again to rob them of yet more land.

Shame on Israel and all who are blind enough to support what is effectively a Fascist Terror State!