The Israeli military is ordering more tanks and ground troops to the Gaza border on Monday, with officials having reportedly green-lit the military to continue attacking the strip. Hamas has warned they will respond to continued Israeli aggression with more rocket strikes, and at longer range.
The entire matter started with an overnight Israeli military raid which went wrong, leading to a firefight that killed seven Hamas members, and one Israeli military officer. This led to Gaza rocket fire, which led to more Israeli attacks, and a day-long escalation.
By Monday evening, some 300 Gaza rockets were reported fired, having done some damage in the area immediately surrounding the strip. Israel attacked and destroyed a TV station in Gaza, and also killed several people over the course of the day.
This precipitous escalation fueled a lot of anger on both sides, and led to calls for revenge against the other side from both sides. There is little sign anyone is looking to calm the situation in the near-term, and that likely means more violence in the days to come.
This happens unfortunately often on the Gaza-Israel border, where years of tensions mean both sides are always waiting for the next conflict, and officials are only too willing to try to reap near-term political benefit by escalating the conflicts.
Iran will be blamed, so what the heck, give Iran credit for irritating the Palestinian invaders.
Israel occupation is illegal. Israel has no business in Gaza! HAMAS has a legitimate right to resist Israel’s illegal invasion. HAMAS should lob a few
more long range missiles across the border.
Israel’s occupation of Gaza was legal because Israel was attacked just as America’s occupation of Japan was legal because America was attacked. Israel ended its occupation of Gaza in 2005. Hamas has no right to attack innocent Israelis – every one of the thousands of rockets & mortars that Hamas fired at innocent Israeli civilians is a war crime. Setting crops on fire is also a war crime.
So is setting civilians on fire, but that didn’t stop the Israelis from using white phosphorous on them during Cast Lead.
It’s legal to use white phosphorous for illumination.
There would not a been a Cast Lead if Palestinians had not been firing rockets & mortars at innocent Israeli civilians.
“… a study published by the United Nations showed “that the ratio of civilian to combatant deaths in Gaza was by far the lowest in any asymmetric conflict in the history of warfare.”
More than 200x the UN has ruled Israel annexation of Palestinian land is illegal! Nothing outside Israel borders as enshrined in the UNGA is legitimate.
HAMAS was elected as Legal rep.of the Pales. in a US supervised election and as such has the legit. right to defend their people, who are victims of Israeli genocide and land thievery, for no other reason than that Israelis covet Pales. land and res.
Israel bombing unarmed Pales. women and children with sophisticated US weaponry wp and du, is cowardly and a war crime. Israel is locked in a battle, it knows it cannot win, with the neighbours and dragging the US into another futile war a la Iraq is a pointless sacrifice and a senseless waste of lives.
HAMAS has been living under Israelis bombs and rockets for decades. Let the bullies now have a taste of their own medicine.
Racist Palestinians are the bullies.
Before the Zionists arrived:
“The Jews “walked with a shuffling, cringing step that told of blows received and blows expected. No one could mistake the difference between oppressor and oppressed—“between those poor creatures and the Arabs who jostled them in these crowded alleys. The Arabs stride along with a spring in every step.”19
Well, make up your mind — did it start in 1929, or did it begin before that?
What’s so special about 1929 versus, say, 1919, 1519, or the fall of Canaan to the invading Hebrews?
What’s special about 1929 is that Hebron, the second holiest city in Judaism, & Gaza were ethnically cleansed of their Jews.
In other words, “pick a point in the middle and pretend that’s where everything started.”
World War One began at Belleau Wood when US Marines attacked German troops. World War Two began at Midway when the US attacked the Japanese fleet. Vietnam began during Tet 1968 when the NVA and NLF attacked Hue. The Civil War began at Fredericksburg when Burnside tried to invade Virginia across the Rappahannock.
Nice trick if you can get away with it — “the war started whenever, and in whatever way, makes my side look like the good guys.”
But you can’t get away with it because it’s almost always a lot more complicated than that.
Jason, you sound a bit too even-handed! Equal guilt????
It’s not equal guilt.
If Palestinians had not been attacking innocent Israeli civilians, Israel would not be shooting anyone.
If Israel were not shooting, racist Palestinians would murder every Jew.
Racist Palestinians teach their children to exterminate the Jews.
Here’s what Palestinians kids see on Palestinian TV:
• A song in a children’s cartoon includes the lyrics, “Zionist man, run away, Zionist woman, run away, very soon you’ll be killed by a car.”
• A Palestinian singer is shown in another clip, singing the lyrics, “Oh Martyrdom-seeker, make them cry. Make the fire engulf them. Turn them into body parts, roast them.”
• A Palestinian child declaims in a speech into which he has been indoctrinated, “Oh sons of Zion, oh the most evil of creatures, oh barbaric apes.”
• In a children’s TV show, a Mickey Mouse figures asks a child, “How will you sacrifice your soul for the sake of Al-Aqsa? What will you do? The child replies, “I will shoot. We want to… We will annihilate the Jews”
Palestinian’ God given right to resist Israel illegal occupation is carved in stone.
When penniless EU migrants invade Palestine to steal land and resources, they should expect resistance from people who have lived, traded and worshipped on the land for centuries.
It’s naive to think oppressed people wouldn’t fight back with every means available, even the kitchen sink
lydia476 but
Thanks and congratulations to Jason Ditz. I may have missed something, but this is the first news report I have ever read or heard in which actions by Hamas have been reported to be IN RESPONSE TO Israeli actions. It has always been reported (falsely) the other way round.
The matter started with the Israeli Army invading Gaza, to kill someone there. They got hit by a larger response than they’d expected, and had to fight their way out. They got out with the use of some massive fire support, which of course killed many people (as intended).
That was starting something.
The matter started with racist Palestinians ethnically cleansing Gaza of its Jews in 1929.
Israel never existed before 1948 when it Unilaterally declared its Jewish State and the Palestinians were never mandated.
Cease fire now, Israel got a wake-up call from Hamas rockets and missiles. The Jewish state has been shown up again, after failures in Lebanon and Syria. Now we need Russia as a mediator to replace the US as in other combat locales. Please, Vlad!
In 1947, the scholars at Al-Azhar University (The highest authority in Sunni Islam.) declared holy war to return Palestine to Islamic rule. Therefore, as long as most Palestinians are devout Muslims (85% of Palestinian Muslims want sharia law.) and as long as the Jewish State controls even one square inch of land, peace is impossible.