- 4 nov 2010
Not just another warning
Op-ed: IDF intelligence chief's grim prediction for next regional war should be taken seriously.
The IDF intelligence chief provided a thick hint regarding Israel's interest in two nuclear programs in enemy countries; he was not only talking about Iran. Was it a slip of the tongue? Hard to believe.
When Israelis woke up the day after the nuclear reactor in Syria was attacked and heard that Israel was suspected of carrying out the strike, officials here were gravely concerned about a looming Syrian missile offensive. They estimated that the Syrians would have to respond to the very revelation of the strike, if only to maintain their honor.
However, for a while now, the International Atomic Energy Agency has been addressing Syria as a state that attempted to produce nuclear weapons in the bombed reactor. Hence, as he is about to complete his tenure, Major General Amos Yadlin was able to let his tongue loose and boast of his achievements. Why not? He deserves it.
In the past, Yadlin also boasted of the IDF's capabilities on the cyber warfare front (without anyone understanding why). So why did he expose that secret? Actually, why not? Let the enemy know.
Yet we were barely able to digest the first secret, when Yadlin told us, almost in the same breath, that soon the Iranians will possess enough enriched uranium to produce two nuclear bombs. The IDF intelligence chief is not yet another academic expert providing his assessments. His words have operative significance. And when the intelligence chief exposes such information to the world, this is his way of calling on someone to do something.
The real thing
However, the most surprising revelation in the intelligence chief's speech was in fact a warning. Yadlin described what the next war would look like. He said it will not be managed in one theater only we will not enjoy the luxury of facing Lebanon alone. The war will simultaneously take place in two, three, or even four different theaters.
Central Israel will be attacked by missiles not only from the north, but also from the Gaza Strip, which is home to missiles that today threaten Tel Aviv and its environs. Yadlin made it clear that Operation Cast Lead and the Second Lebanon War are both a scenario from the past. The next regional war would be of different scope, and the casualty toll would be of different dimensions than we've known so far.
So this is not just another general warning. This is solid intelligence information. It's the real thing.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3979444,00.html 29 oct 2012, 11:49 , Respect -
Maria 4 nov 2010
Jerusalemite beaten, hospitalized
JERUSALEM (Ma'an) -- The family of a Jerusalem resident said undercover Israeli officers beat Haitham Samih Darwish while he was working near the Austrian Hospice in the Old City on Thursday night.
When Haitham's brother Abed As-Salam intervened, he was detained, they added, along with at least four others on the same job site.
The men, who did not identify themselves as police or Israeli border guards, as far as Haitham recalled, beat him severely, he said. The man was brought to the Hadasssa Hospital in Jerusalem for treatment, where medics told the family he was in stable condition and released hours later.
Haitham's colleagues remained in detention into Friday afternoon.
Speaking to Ma'an, relative said the undercover forces beat Haitham unprovoked and without reason.
An Israeli police spokesman could not be reached for comment by phone.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=330997 29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 4 nov 2010
First US targeted assassination in Gaza pre-empts next Al Qaeda offensive
A missile fired from an American warship in the Mediterranean hit the car in which Muhammad Jamal A-Namnam, 27, was driving in the heart of Gaza City Wednesday, Nov. 3 and killed him, debkafile's exclusive counter-terror sources report. Namnam was an operational commander of the Army of Islam, Al-Qaeda's Palestinian cell in the Gaza Strip.
He was on a mission on behalf of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula AQAP to plan, organize and execute the next wave of terrorist attacks on US targets after last week's air package bomb plot.
According to our sources, the Palestinian cell members were planning to infiltrate northern Sinai from the Gaza strip over the coming weekend and strike American personnel serving with the Multinational Force and Observers Organization MFO, which is under American command and is stationed at North Camp, El Gorah, 37 kilometers southeast of El-Arish.
In a coordinated operation, Al Qaeda fighters hiding up in the mountains of central Sinai were to have attacked US Marines and Air Force troops stationed at the South Camp in Naama Bay, Sharm el Sheikh.
The twin attacks were scheduled for Sunday, Nov. 7, or the following day.
Our sources say that, just as US-Saudi intelligence cooperation led to the interception of package bombs from Yemen last week, so too US intelligence-sharing with Egypt and Israel foiled a major Al-Qaeda terrorist attack on American personnel in Sinai. Egyptian intelligence picked up on Namnam's scouting forays of US forces and discovered him caching weapons and explosives ready for the Al Qaeda strike force's arrival from Gaza.
Israeli intelligence tracked Namnam's movements in Gaza City. It is quite likely, said a high-ranking Western military source in the Middle East, Thursday, Nov. 4, that the Israelis pinpointed Namnam for targeting by the US ship-borne missile that killed him.
Hamas security sources in Gaza now suspect that Israel had its own reasons for permitting new cars to be imported to the Gaza Strip for the first time in two years, knowing that they would be commandeered for the personal use of the chiefs of armed organizations, including Namnam. They believe Israel planted tracking devices in those vehicles.
The Palestinian sources also say that the blast which killed the Army of Islam man was unusually powerful and reverberated through most of the enclave. Witnesses denied sighting Israeli UAVs or other aircraft over the skies of Gaza.
The Al Qaeda operative's death by a US missile is the first American targeted assassination in the Gaza Strip against an Al Qaeda target. Up until now, US missions of this kind took place in Iraq, Yemen and Somalia.
debkafile's military sources report that, even after the abrupt passing of Al Qaeda's operational commander in the Gaza Strip, the two MFO camps in Sinai remain on high terror alert. The Al Qaeda cell or cells assigned to hit the South Camp in Sharm el Sheikh are still at large, the objects of a massive manhunt by Egyptian forces. It is also feared that Namnam's own cells could split and sections head out to North Camp in northern Sinai to complete his mission.
http://www.debka.com/article/9124/ 29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 4 nov 2010
Jewish settlers annex Palestinian land south of Nablus
9 Palestinians seized in overnight raids
29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 5 nov 2010
Israel legalises property and land theft in Jeruzalem
Israeli media report: Government illegally transferred land in East Jerusalem to settlers
Lawyer calls for end to cell raids in Negev prison
29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 6 nov 2010
'New Gaza war will riddle occupied lands'
The Palestinian Islamic Jihad's Secretary General Ramadan Shallah
Palestinian Islamic Jihad has warned against any Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip, saying that any attack would permeate through all the occupied territories.
Speaking on the martyrdom anniversary of the movement's founder, Fathi Shaqaqi, the group's Secretary General Ramadan Shallah said on Friday that a fresh Israeli onslaught on the impoverished coastal sliver will spread through all the "cities and villages where Zionist dwellers reside," IRNA reported.
Shaqaqi, who was assassinated in 1995 by Israel's spy agency, Mossad, in Malta, established the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in 1987.
General Shallah also lauded the Islamic Republic of Iran for its 'moral support' for Palestinians and said, "The US and Israel are opposing Iran due to its rightful position about Palestinians."
The Islamic Jihad secretary general, who is also a notable academic, further criticized the Palestinian Authority (PA) for engaging in direct talks with Israel and noted that Palestine belongs to all Palestinians.
Direct negotiations between Israel and the PA resumed in Washington recently after about 20 months.
Talks broke off at the turn of 2009, when Israel launched a full-scale war on the Gaza Strip, killing more than 1,400 Palestinians.
http://www.presstv.com/detail/149819.html
29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 6 nov 2010
PA: Israel raided thousands of homes in October
Rights group: Female detainees in Talmond denied medical treatment
29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 7 nov 2010
Israelis open fire on young Palestinian
A Palestinian carries rubble from a building at an abandoned airport after an Israeli airstrike in the southern Gaza Strip on May 30, 2010.
Israeli forces wound a Palestinian scrap metal collector in yet another act of aggression against those who resort to scavenging to cope with Tel Aviv's siege of Gaza.
The Sunday casualty was caused inside a Tel Aviv-declared "buffer zone" near the Gaza Strip's border with Israel, which is closely monitored by Israeli troops, Reuters reported.
The victim was identified as 20-year-old K.A, Gaza medics said.
An August study by the United Nations said, "Palestinians have been totally or partially prevented from accessing land located up to 1,000-1,500 meters" from Gaza's border with Israel -- apparently referring to the Israeli military's recurrent shootings of the Gazans in the general area of the so-called "restricted" zone.
The scrap collectors would sell the gleaned materials to factories and contractors across the strip as a coping strategy in the face of an all-out Tel Aviv-imposed land, aerial and naval blockade.
The siege has been depriving 1.5 million Gazans of food, fuel and other necessities for more than three years.
The enclave's medics say 60 scavengers have been wounded and two killed in the border zone since January 2009.
Adie Mormech from the Palestinian-led organization International Solidarity Movement told Press TV last month that the rubble collectors "are actually the biggest victims of shootings in the buffer zones. The reasons why no one can go there is because Israel shoots on sight and they are trigger-happy."
"According to the UN aid agency, UNRWA, about 80 percent of the Gaza population depends on assistance from UN agencies as unemployment has soared [to] above 40 percent," our correspondent said.
http://www.presstv.com/detail/150037.html 29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria Gaza: Soldiers shoot worker near Beit Lahiya
GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- A Palestinian man was injured Sunday when Israeli forces opened fire at a group of workers collecting stone aggregates near an evacuated Israeli settlement in northern Gaza.
Eyewitnesses said 19-year-old Karam Al-Adham was shot in his left leg near the abandoned Eli Sinai structure northwest of Beit Lahiya. He was evacuated to hospital, where medics said he sustained moderate injuries.
An Israeli military spokesman did not immediately return a call seeking comment.
As Israel bans concrete and crushed stone for construction, young men go to evacuated settlements to collect gravel from buildings that Israeli forces demolished before the unilateral withdrawal in 2005. Every day the workers set out to Nissanit, Elli Sinai, and Dugit, using donkey carts to haul sacks of small stones and gravel.
The workers are targeted nearly every day. Defense for Children International documented 14 cases between March and October of this year of Palestinian youths under the age of 18 who were shot by Israeli forces while collecting gravel in the border zone.
While a few of these teens were shot as close as 50 meters from the border, others were 500, 600, even 800 meters from the border when the shooting occurred. The youngest of these children was 13, the oldest 17. Twenty-five Palestinian civilians have been killed in the border area since the end of Israel's three-week offensive on Gaza in January 2009.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=331505
Gaza scrap gleaners risk life in tense border zone
* Close to border fence, there's a risk of bring shot
* But steel and rubble for recycling bring in cash
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
BEIT LAHIYA, Gaza Strip, Nov 7 (Reuters) - A Palestinian was wounded by Israeli forces on Sunday while collecting scrap from a no-go border zone in the Gaza Strip, the latest casualty in the blockaded enclave's most dangerous way to scrape a living.
He was identified by his initials as K.A., 20 years old, by medics who say the Gaza Health Ministry ordered them not to give out names unless a shooting were fatal.
Gaza medics say 60 scavengers have been wounded and two killed in the tense border zone since January 2009.
A spokesman for the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said two men were spotted inside the buffer zone within 300 metres (yards) of the border security wall and fence, where they are not permitted.
"The soldiers fired warning shots and when they were not heeded they fired at the lower body and detected a hit."
Thousands of Gazans, mainly young men and boys, go close to the zone daily to pick over the wreckage of factories and houses flattened by Israel in the past few years in its conflict with Islamist Hamas militants who control the enclave.
Most of the shootings occur near the Erez crossing point in the north of the Gaza Strip, where gleaners are a common sight among the steadily dwindling heaps of pancaked concrete that are all that remains of an industrial zone bombed by Israel.
Most load the scrap onto donkey carts and take it to be recycled for use in construction. Israel restricts import of steel and cement into Gaza to stop Hamas using it for military ends, and a cartload of rubble fetches 50 shekels ($15).
Since Israel's three-week offensive in Dec 2008-Jan 2008, Israel troops have warned Palestinians not to come in a range of 300 meters (yards) of the border fence or wall in all areas.
Some Palestinians with land in the border zone say they can't tend their fields now without fear of being shot.
RUBBLE EXPERTISE
Adham Abu Selmeya, a spokesman of the Hamas-run medical service, told Reuters most of the casualties were shot in the legs, in northern areas where the border with Israel is formed by a high concrete wall with watchtowers and machineguns.
He said the Palestinians clearly did not pose real danger, otherwise the Israelis would not be firing at their legs.
Israel says Palestinian militants in the past have been detected in the act of trying to plant explosives in the buffer zone, in hopes of harming IDF patrols.
The unemployment rate in Gaza is roughly 50 percent.
"This is a suicide job, a deadly job," said Mohammed Abu Halawa, who nearly lost a leg after being shot and wounded.
Halawa, 23 and father of two girls, said he and other workers were collecting rubble from a former Israeli settlement in the north when soldiers opened fire.
"We ran away. And then we returned to fetch what we had collected. The Israeli soldiers opened fire again and I was hit," said Halawa who needed metal implants to save the leg. Israel ended its occupation of Gaza in 2005. It has blockaded the territory since Hamas seized control in 2007, to prevent the militants obtaining arms or materials to use for military purposes, and to weaken support for the Islamists among Gaza's 1.5 million people.
Despite Hamas's 2010 pledge to clamp down on militants who persist in firing rockets and mortars into Israel, the Israeli army says about 180 have been fired this year. Israel forces usually retaliate, often with air strikes at military targets.
Halawa said rubble collectors were, naturally, afraid of being shot at in the border zone but had to run the risk.
"You need to raise a family, you need to feed your children and therefore, you have no choice, there is no other work," said the former tailor.
Gaza's recycling workers have also become experts in extracting cement, gravel and steel from heaps of broken concrete and straightening reinforcing rods for re-use.
Thousands of buildings wrecked in the winter offensive of 2009 have yet to be rebuilt. The U.N. says there is currently a shortage of gravel for reconstruction.
"The job is tough," said recycler Kamel Al-Shenbari, who earns 30 shekels a day at the work, or "enough to make a meal."
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/LDE6A60EJ.htm 29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 7 nov 2010
Israeli jets bomb homes in Gaza
Israeli war planes have attacked the Gaza Strip, bombing Palestinian houses in Khan Yunis and the tunnel network in Rafah in the south of the enclave.
Israeli jets flew over Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip on Saturday, bombing civilian houses in the city, a Press TV correspondent in Gaza reported.
It was not immediately known if there were any casualties in the airstrike.
The second blitz, which struck Rafah, targeted the Palestinians' underground tunnels leading to Egypt and left one person injured.
The Israeli army frequently bombs the tunnel network, saying Palestinian resistance fighters use the tunnels for storing and smuggling weapons.
But the Palestinians dismiss the allegations, arguing they have resorted to the underground tunnels to bring basic needs to the impoverished Gazans because the territory has been sealed by an Israeli blockade for over three years.
In September, the al-Mezan Center for Human Rights said that 160 Palestinians had lost their lives while digging cross-border tunnels. It blamed falling standards of living and unprecedented levels of unemployment, together with unrelenting poverty, as factors leading many young Gazans to risk their lives in tunnels to make a living.
Some of the victims were killed during Israeli bombardments of the tunnels, while others died after inhaling poisonous fumes released inside the tunnels by Egyptian security forces. Tunnel collapses account for the rest of the deaths.
After Israel's assault on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla in international waters on May 31, in which nine civilians were killed, Tel Aviv slightly eased the land blockade of Gaza, allowing in more consumer goods.
However, the naval siege of the Gaza Strip remains in place, exports are banned, and imports of raw materials and construction materials are restricted.
http://www.presstv.com/detail/149912.html 29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 7 nov 2010
IDF bombs Gaza tunnels
One Palestinian wounded in two strikes army says came in response to rocket fire on Negev.
The Air Force carried out two strikes Saturday night in southern Gaza, wounding one Palestinian, witnesses and Hamas officials said.
The first strike occurred near Khan Younis and the second was aimed at smuggling tunnels in Rafah near the Egyptian border, Palestinian sources said.
A Palestinian who was in his house during the second attack was injured by shattering glass, they added.
In the morning, Palestinian militants fired a rocket into southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, causing no casualties. The rocket exploded in a field near the border with the Palestinian territory, the IDF said.
The IDF Spokesperson's Office said both attacks had been launched "in response to rocket fire." The army says about 180 rockets and mortar shells were fired from Gaza into Israel since the beginning of the year.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3980551,00.html
Israeli war jets hit southern Gaza targets
GAZA CITY (DPA) -- Israeli war jets struck two targets in southern Gaza Strip Saturday night in response to an earlier homemade projectile fired from Gaza at southern Israel.
No injuries were reported, witnesses and medics said.
The witnesses said that F16 war jets hovered over the southern Gaza Strip area and carried out two successive airstrikes. Air-to-ground rockets were fired and caused two huge explosions.
The first airstrike targeted an empty olive farm east of the city of Khan Younis and the second targeted a smuggling tunnel under the borderline between Egypt and the salient, ruled by the Hamas movement.
Medics at southern Gaza hospitals said that ambulances and rescue crews rushed to the theatre of the airstrikes; no injuries were reported.
The two Israeli airstrikes were carried out several hours after unknown militants fired earlier on Saturday a homemade rocket from Gaza at southern Israel. No one claimed responsibility for the attack.
Israeli Radio quoted Israeli army sources as saying that the rocket landed on an empty area in southern Israel causing no damages or injuries.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=331430 29 oct 2012, 11:57 , Respect -
Maria 7 nov 2010
Settlers carry out work on seized Jerusalem home
Israeli Occupation Army Arrests 6 International Activists Accompanying Farmers in Saffa
29 oct 2012, 11:58 , Respect -
Maria 8 nov 2010
IOF troops fire at residential quarters in Rafah, round up more West Bankers
RAFAH, (PIC)-- Israeli occupation forces (IOF) fired at Palestinian citizens' homes and land east of Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip, on Sunday night but no casualties were reported.
Media sources said that the soldiers stationed at military watchtowers in the vicinity of Karm Abu Salem military base opened intermittent, indiscriminate fire at the Dehniya and airport areas.
Meanwhile, IOF soldiers rounded up five Palestinians in the West Bank cities of Al-Khalil, Ramallah, Bethlehem, and Nablus after searching citizens' homes.
http://bit.ly/alzlhd
29 oct 2012, 11:58 , Respect -
Maria 8 nov 2010
Gaza worker dies collecting rubble
GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- A 19-year-old worker died of asphyxiation Sunday after he fell in a ditch and was buried under rubble as he collected stone aggregates in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip.
Gaza medical services spokesman Adham Abu Salmiyya identified the victim as Mahmoud Salem Abu Araqa, and said his body was transferred to Nasser Hospital.
Another teenager was injured Sunday when Israeli forces opened fire at a group of workers collecting rubble near an evacuated Israeli settlement in northern Gaza. He was identified as 19-year-old Karam Al-Adham.
Workers are targeted nearly every day by Israeli soldiers patrolling the buffer zone, an area of Palestinian territory along Gaza's northern and eastern borders.
As Israel bans concrete and crushed stone for construction, young men often go to evacuated settlements to collect gravel from buildings that Israeli forces demolished before the unilateral withdrawal in 2005.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=331784