Saturday, December 27, 2008 Gaza: the slaughter of a people .. a nip ..
The targets were mostly police stations, and the most striking image is that of dozens of new cadets lying dead on top of each other at Gaza City's main police station. They had been taking part in their graduation ceremony. I want to make a point here lost on many Western news agencies: the police force in Gaza is not the 'Hamas police'. Like any other police force in the world, it are an institution independent of the ruling party. It was around at the time Gaza was ruled by Fatah, by Hamas and by a unity government. The head of the police force, Tawfiq Jaber was amongst the first killed. He was a lifelong Fatah man.
A decisive loss for Israel ///////////////////// Insert: From the previous .. Shortly after the Six Day War, 40 years ago, Shlomo Gazit was put in charge of Gaza and the West Bank. Today, the retired general is in favour of talks with Hamas, describes the road map as a "pretext" for Israel not to negotiate with the Palestinians, and thinks the idea that the US can or should veto a peace process between Jerusalem and Damascus is a "nonsense".
My comment below .. The fact that the refugees and the illegal settlements as the root of the problem has been the only fair and logical perspective for 40+ years indicates the Zionists would rather a 'Greater' Israel than peace. ///////////////////// Hamas has emerged from the war stronger. Now we look to Obama to repair the errors of silence Mousa Abu Marzook .. The Guardian .. 22 January 2009 .. video inside
UN secretary general visits Gaza Strip and city of Sderot, in southern Israel, as part of Middle East peacekeeping tour Link to this video
Israel's objectives from the war on Gaza were set long before its launch: to remove the Hamas movement and government, achieve the reinstallation of the Fatah leader, Mahmoud Abbas, in Gaza, and end the armed resistance. Two other objectives were not announced. First, restore the Israeli public's wavering confidence in its armed forces after its defeat by Hezbollah in 2006. Second, boost the coalition government in the coming elections.
Accordingly, we declare that Israel lost, and lost decisively. What did it achieve? The killing of large numbers of civilians, children and women, and the destruction of homes, ministry buildings and other infrastructure with the most advanced US weapons and other internationally banned chemical and phosphorous elements. Almost 2,000 children were killed and injured in desperate pursuit of political goals. Many international organisations called these attacks war crimes, yet barely a word of denunciation was uttered by any western leader. What message does the EU mean to send Palestinians by its shameful silence on these crimes, when it speaks incessantly on human rights?
If anything, the last three weeks, and previous 18 months, have proved that the Palestinians can never be broken by either starvation, economic strangulation or brutal attack. European leaders have only one option: to recognise the outcome of a democratic process they had called for and supported.
The aggression failed to undermine or weaken the Hamas-led government, or turn Palestinians against Hamas. If anything, public support is stronger than ever in Palestine and worldwide. Hamas's military capabilities have not been hurt, either. This explains Israel scurrying to sign such a strange agreement with the US to stop arms reaching Hamas. It is doomed to fail. As the former Israeli chief of staff Moshe Ya'alon and Binyamin Netanyahu agreed, Israeli forces failed to achieve their objectives.
Why is Israel allowed a continuous flow of the most lethal arms, including banned weapons, while national resistance movements are denied the means of defence? International laws permit occupied nations to resist their occupiers, and that is a right we aim to utilise to the full.
Israel must accept the reality that it is incapable of breaking the Palestinian resistance. Similarly, Europe must accept that bringing back Abbas on an Israeli tank is not an option. Nor are attempts to win by "diplomacy" what the might of the Israeli military failed to secure by force. To state that all aid for Gaza reconstruction must go through the illegal government of Salam Fayyad suggests there is no end to some parties' exploitation of Palestinians. We will never cease to pursue national unity, but we will never allow it to be attained by compromising Palestinian rights.
And to President Obama we say: the wave of hope that met your election was heavily dampened by your silence on the Gaza massacre. This was compounded by your pre-election statement siding with the Israeli settlers of Sderot. You would do well to know the history of the places of which you speak. Sderot, which may be known to some as an Israeli town, lies on the ruins of Najd, a Palestinian village ransacked in May 1948 by Zionist terrorist gangs. Villagers were forced from their beds and homes with nothing but the clothes they were wearing, rendering them refugees for the next 61 years. That is the story of Sderot. It is never a good start to get your tyrant and victims mixed up, but there is still room for a revival of passionate optimism. Only if you decide to fairly address the issue of the 6 million Palestinian refugees and the ending of occupation of Palestinian lands, including Jerusalem, will you be able to start a new relationship with the Muslim world.
• Mousa Abu Marzook is deputy chief of the Hamas political bureau mousa.abumarzook@gmail.com
The fact that the refugees and the illegal settlements as the root of the problem has been the only fair and logical perspective for 40+ years indicates the Zionists would rather a 'Greater' Israel than peace.
French FM: Coming days are a test for Israel Last update - 13:37 18/11/2009 By Haaretz Service and DPA
fp: Shortly after the Six Day War, 40 years ago, Shlomo Gazit was put in charge of Gaza and the West Bank. Today, the retired general is in favour of talks with Hamas, describes the road map as a "pretext" for Israel not to negotiate with the Palestinians, and thinks the idea that the US can or should veto a peace process between Jerusalem and Damascus is a "nonsense".
Israel needs quickly to advance the peace process, visiting French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Wednesday as he began a round of meetings with Israeli officials.
"The coming days are a test for the Israeli government, since time is not on the side of both parties [to the Israel-Palestinian peace process]," Israeli media quoted Kouchner as saying in a meeting with Minority Affairs Minister Avishay Braverman.
Kouchner arrived in Israel after meeting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Amman, Jordan, on Tuesday, where he urged Israelis and Palestinians to resume peace talks from the point they reached when suspended one year ago, rather than beginning from scratch.
The French foreign minister also met with chairwoman and opposition leader Tzipi Livni, who referred to the controversial plan to construct 900 new homes in the Gilo neighborhood in East Jerusalem.
"Gilo is part of the Israeli consensus...and it is important to understand this for all discussions of borders in any future agreement," said Livni.
Gilo, where some 40,000 Israelis live, was built on West Bank land Israel captured in the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed as part of Jerusalem.
Livni and Kouchner also discussed Iran's nuclear aspirations. "The time has come for harsh sanctions against Iran," said Livni. "The international community must be clear on this, and all dialogue must have a time frame."
Livni is expected to make an official visit to Paris in early December.
He also called on Abbas to remain in office, saying his leadership of the Palestinian people was indispensable to the success of the peace process.
Abbas said last week he would not contest the next Palestinian Presidential elections, after Israel refused his demand to freeze settlement activity in East Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank as a condition for resuming peace talks.
Kouchner last week said that France fears Israel no longer desires a Middle East peace deal, adding that Paris remained deeply opposed to settlement building in the West Bank.
"What really hurts me, and this shocks us, is that before there used to be a great peace movement in Israel. There was a left that made itself heard and a real desire for peace," Kouchner said.
"It seems to me, and I hope that I am completely wrong, that this desire has completely vanished, as though people no longer believe in it," he added.
When Sarkozy took office in 2007 he worked hard to improve sometimes frosty French relations with Israel, believing Paris would never be a credible partner in Middle East peace talks if it was seen as biased in favor of the Arab world.
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