Jewish Peace News
[JPN Commentary: On Wednesday, Palestinian qassam rockets hit the Israeli town of Sderot near the Gaza trip. Two children, aged 4 and 2, were killed. There are no words for the depths of such a tragedy or for the magnitude of such a crime.
But the commission of a great crime does not excuse the commission of another. Israel has already retaliated and some 30 Palestinians have been killed and well over 100 wounded since the attack on Sderot. Two Israeli soldiers and a woman in an Israeli settlement in Gaza have also been killed. Now, Israel has begun a massive, long-term attack on Gaza. The Palestinian Authority has reissued its call for international intervention, and such intervention is sorely needed, but the call is falling on deaf ears, just as it has in the past.
Early statements from the Sharon government indicated that the goal of the invasion is to ensure that Hamas forces were pushed farther away from the Gaza border, out of range of Sderot. The article below gives a clearer statement; "'exacting a price' from terror organizations in Gaza, and preparation for an extended stay in the territory." In other words, simple revenge, and an attempt to silence the Hamas claim that the proposed Gaza withdrawal is happening "under fire", the idea that Hamas is trying to make it seem that Israel is retreating from its attacks in Gaza.
As usual, civilians continue to pay the price. At least 20 homes were demolished before the latest large-scale invasion of Gaza began. Most of the dead and wounded have been non-combatants, and even the militants killed have no apparent connection to attacks on Sderot. Gaza is walled off and, while this ha been effective in stopping suicide bombing attacks from that region, that effort has merely forced Hamas to find other ways of attacking Israelis, such as the qassam rockets. The same will eventually be borne out in the West Bank, with its wall.
Finally, a word must be said about the appalling name the Sharon government has given to its latest campaign of pointless revenge and criminal military acts. The name of this invasion is "Operation Days of Penitence". The Days of Penitence, also called the Days of Awe, are the 10 days between the beginning of Rosh Hashanah and the end of Yom Kippur, which has just passed. These are days when Jews everywhere are supposed to open their hearts, examine the transgressions of the past year and atone for the sins we have committed and will commit in the coming year. To name an invasion after these days, an invasion which will include the killing and wounding of innocent civilians and the destruction of the homes of may families, is an affront to the very essence of Judaism and an insult to our religion, history and culture and to all of those millions of Jews who have died for their Judaism over the centuries. – MP]
Palestinians: Large IDF force enters northern Gaza
By Aluf Benn, Amos Harel, Arnon Regular and Nir Hason, Haaretz Correspondents
http://ga3.org/ct/UpaCgtM1qaVi/
A large number of Israel Defense Forces troops, accompanied by 100 tanks and helicopters flying overhead, entered the northern Gaza Strip early Friday, Israel Radio quoted Palestinian security officials as saying. The sources said that tanks had entered Beit Lahiya, the Jabalya refugee camp, and Beit Hanun.
The move comes after the security cabinet approved unanimously on Thursday Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plans for an expanded military ground operation in the Gaza Strip in response to the launching of Qassam rockets and the recent escalation of hostilities in the region.
Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and the heads of the Israel Defense Forces presented the plan to Sharon on Thursday evening prior to the cabinet meeting.
The plan, code-named "Days of Penitence," will include an expanded IDF ground operation in areas from where Qassam rockets can be launched in the direction of Sderot, "exacting a price" from terror organizations in Gaza, and preparation for an extended stay in the territory.
A number of cabinet ministers will propose applying heavy pressure on the Palestinian civilian population in the Gaza Strip in an effort to compel residents to prevent the firing of Qassam rockets into Israel proper.
Senior diplomatic sources said on Thursday evening that the current escalation in Gaza will have no effect on Sharon's disengagement plan.
Mofaz announced on Thursday a "large-scale and prolonged operation" aimed at pushing Qassam rockets out of range of the hard-hit Negev town of Sderot, ordering the IDF to step up the campaign already underway in Gaza and to prepare to take over a buffer zone in the northern Gaza Strip.
The announcement follows Wednesday's Qassam rocket attack on Sderot, which claimed the lives of two pre-schoolers.
On Thursday, three Israelis and at least 13 Palestinians were killed in separate incidents in the Gaza Strip.
Mofaz announced his new directives after a special assessment meeting with the heads of Israel's security branches.
Mofaz declared that Wednesday's "murder of children" was an "unforgivable and intolerable" act, to which Israel must respond.
The operation is also aimed at handing the terror infrastructure in Gaza a heavy blow. The third objective set forward was the improvement of the defenses of the area's settlements.
"Israeli army activities in the Gaza Strip have a clear objective of enabling Israelis to sit in their living rooms and backyards in peace and without fear of being bombarded by Palestinian rockets and missiles," said David Baker, an official in the Prime Minister's Office.
"This is our inherent right, the right to live in peace and Israel is committed to the security of its citizens," Baker said.
The chairman of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, MK Yuval Steinitz (Likud), called for an IDF takeover of the entire Gaza Strip, saying, "Israel should wage operation Defensive Shield number two in Gaza, take control of the entire Strip in a wide-spread operation over a period of a few weeks to gather information, destroy the terrorist organizations' infrastructure and wipe out any slicks of arms as well as the foundations for manufacturing Qassam rockets."
Steinitz added that he would bring these issues up in planned meetings with Sharon. "Since the technology for laser interception of missiles has yet to be realized, we must significantly damage terrorist infrastructures. It is our only option to ease the situation."
MK Ophir Pines-Paz (Labor) said that Sharon and Defense Minister Mofaz must halt the deteriorating security situation, which is in danger of embroiling Israel in an endless war of attrition against Palestinian militants, according to Israel Radio.
Pines-Paz also called on the prime minister to speed up implementation of the disengagement plan.
PA calls for international intervention
The Palestinian Authority on Thursday called for the international community to put a stop to Israel's actions in Gaza.
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, an advisor to chairman Yasser Arafat, said the PA is requesting "the UN Security Council, the Quartet, and the United States to get involved immediately to put an end to the massacres Israel is committing in Gaza."
----------------------------------------------------------------
[JPN Commentary: The aggressive behavior of Israeli settlers is the sort of thing that is well known yet rarely enters into the calculus of the conflict in many people's minds. Here is just one example of the behavior of the settlers.
The issue that bears repeating is that this sort of behavior on the part of settlers is a regular occurrence in the West Bank. The usual targets are Palestinians, but increasingly the brazen settlers are attacking Israeli peace activists and international volunteers. Unfortunately, the story is most likely to reach us only when Americans are attacked, as was the case here. But settler attacks are commonplace occurrences. And they are unnecessary. Most Israelis are willing to see the settlements relegated to the dustbin of history where they belong. The settlers know this, and their violent behavior is in part a way of instilling fear that any steps toward removing them will lead to civil war. But this is an empty threat—only a small percentage of the settlers are truly willing to take up arms against Israelis to keep their illegal communities standing.
The simple fact is, the settlements should not even be there. The Israeli Attorney General, Menachem Mazuz recently affirmed what the rest of the world has known for years—that Israel is bound by the Fourth Geneva Convention regarding occupied territories. One provision of that Convention is that the occupying power may not relocate its citizens into the occupied territory. The settlements are flatly illegal. Beyond that, they are the root cause of the spiraling violence from both sides. There is no substitute for ending Israel's occupation of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, and there is no other way to begin than to remove all the illegal settlements in occupied lands. Until Israel and its patron, the United States, accepts this, there is no hope of ending the violence. – MP]
West Bank Assailants Beat U.S. Activists
NASSER SHIYOUKHI
Associated Press
http://ga3.org/ct/y1aCgtM1qaVk/
HEBRON, West Bank - Two American volunteers in a group helping Palestinians were beaten with baseball bats and chains by five men, including one who spoke English with an Israeli accent, one of the victims said Thursday.
The Americans, Chris Brown, 40, from San Francisco, and Kim Lamberty, 44, from Washington, were escorting Palestinian children to their school in a West Bank village Wednesday when they were attacked, Brown said.
The two are members of the Christian Peacemakers Team, a group that has been active in and around the West Bank city of Hebron for several years.
Brown remained hospitalized in Israel on Thursday with a punctured lung. Lamberty was released after receiving treatment for a broken arm and swollen knee.
The identity of the assailants was not known, but Bourke Kennedy, another member of the group, said the volunteers have been harassed in the past by Jewish settlers on the same road, which runs near the Maon settlement.
"We've been spat at, hit, and almost run down on occasion," Kennedy said.
The group said it would file a complaint with the Israeli authorities. Israeli soldiers arrived at the scene 30 minutes after the attack. However, the army said police would have to handle to case. Police could not be reached for comment.
The attack took place early Wednesday when Brown and Lamberty were escorting several Palestinian children from their homes to a school in a nearby village. At about 7:15 a.m., five men with black scarves wrapped around their heads attacked the Americans, Brown said in a telephone interview.
"They whipped us with chains and beat us with a stick. Then they threw stones at me and continued punching me in the face, hitting and kicking me in the back," Brown said.
The children escaped unharmed, he said.
Jewish Peace News Editors:
Judith Norman
Alistair Welchman
Mitchell Plitnick
Lincoln Shlensky
Ami Kronfeld
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
John Wilner
Joel Beinin
But the commission of a great crime does not excuse the commission of another. Israel has already retaliated and some 30 Palestinians have been killed and well over 100 wounded since the attack on Sderot. Two Israeli soldiers and a woman in an Israeli settlement in Gaza have also been killed. Now, Israel has begun a massive, long-term attack on Gaza. The Palestinian Authority has reissued its call for international intervention, and such intervention is sorely needed, but the call is falling on deaf ears, just as it has in the past.
Early statements from the Sharon government indicated that the goal of the invasion is to ensure that Hamas forces were pushed farther away from the Gaza border, out of range of Sderot. The article below gives a clearer statement; "'exacting a price' from terror organizations in Gaza, and preparation for an extended stay in the territory." In other words, simple revenge, and an attempt to silence the Hamas claim that the proposed Gaza withdrawal is happening "under fire", the idea that Hamas is trying to make it seem that Israel is retreating from its attacks in Gaza.
As usual, civilians continue to pay the price. At least 20 homes were demolished before the latest large-scale invasion of Gaza began. Most of the dead and wounded have been non-combatants, and even the militants killed have no apparent connection to attacks on Sderot. Gaza is walled off and, while this ha been effective in stopping suicide bombing attacks from that region, that effort has merely forced Hamas to find other ways of attacking Israelis, such as the qassam rockets. The same will eventually be borne out in the West Bank, with its wall.
Finally, a word must be said about the appalling name the Sharon government has given to its latest campaign of pointless revenge and criminal military acts. The name of this invasion is "Operation Days of Penitence". The Days of Penitence, also called the Days of Awe, are the 10 days between the beginning of Rosh Hashanah and the end of Yom Kippur, which has just passed. These are days when Jews everywhere are supposed to open their hearts, examine the transgressions of the past year and atone for the sins we have committed and will commit in the coming year. To name an invasion after these days, an invasion which will include the killing and wounding of innocent civilians and the destruction of the homes of may families, is an affront to the very essence of Judaism and an insult to our religion, history and culture and to all of those millions of Jews who have died for their Judaism over the centuries. – MP]
Palestinians: Large IDF force enters northern Gaza
By Aluf Benn, Amos Harel, Arnon Regular and Nir Hason, Haaretz Correspondents
http://ga3.org/ct/UpaCgtM1qaVi/
A large number of Israel Defense Forces troops, accompanied by 100 tanks and helicopters flying overhead, entered the northern Gaza Strip early Friday, Israel Radio quoted Palestinian security officials as saying. The sources said that tanks had entered Beit Lahiya, the Jabalya refugee camp, and Beit Hanun.
The move comes after the security cabinet approved unanimously on Thursday Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plans for an expanded military ground operation in the Gaza Strip in response to the launching of Qassam rockets and the recent escalation of hostilities in the region.
Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and the heads of the Israel Defense Forces presented the plan to Sharon on Thursday evening prior to the cabinet meeting.
The plan, code-named "Days of Penitence," will include an expanded IDF ground operation in areas from where Qassam rockets can be launched in the direction of Sderot, "exacting a price" from terror organizations in Gaza, and preparation for an extended stay in the territory.
A number of cabinet ministers will propose applying heavy pressure on the Palestinian civilian population in the Gaza Strip in an effort to compel residents to prevent the firing of Qassam rockets into Israel proper.
Senior diplomatic sources said on Thursday evening that the current escalation in Gaza will have no effect on Sharon's disengagement plan.
Mofaz announced on Thursday a "large-scale and prolonged operation" aimed at pushing Qassam rockets out of range of the hard-hit Negev town of Sderot, ordering the IDF to step up the campaign already underway in Gaza and to prepare to take over a buffer zone in the northern Gaza Strip.
The announcement follows Wednesday's Qassam rocket attack on Sderot, which claimed the lives of two pre-schoolers.
On Thursday, three Israelis and at least 13 Palestinians were killed in separate incidents in the Gaza Strip.
Mofaz announced his new directives after a special assessment meeting with the heads of Israel's security branches.
Mofaz declared that Wednesday's "murder of children" was an "unforgivable and intolerable" act, to which Israel must respond.
The operation is also aimed at handing the terror infrastructure in Gaza a heavy blow. The third objective set forward was the improvement of the defenses of the area's settlements.
"Israeli army activities in the Gaza Strip have a clear objective of enabling Israelis to sit in their living rooms and backyards in peace and without fear of being bombarded by Palestinian rockets and missiles," said David Baker, an official in the Prime Minister's Office.
"This is our inherent right, the right to live in peace and Israel is committed to the security of its citizens," Baker said.
The chairman of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, MK Yuval Steinitz (Likud), called for an IDF takeover of the entire Gaza Strip, saying, "Israel should wage operation Defensive Shield number two in Gaza, take control of the entire Strip in a wide-spread operation over a period of a few weeks to gather information, destroy the terrorist organizations' infrastructure and wipe out any slicks of arms as well as the foundations for manufacturing Qassam rockets."
Steinitz added that he would bring these issues up in planned meetings with Sharon. "Since the technology for laser interception of missiles has yet to be realized, we must significantly damage terrorist infrastructures. It is our only option to ease the situation."
MK Ophir Pines-Paz (Labor) said that Sharon and Defense Minister Mofaz must halt the deteriorating security situation, which is in danger of embroiling Israel in an endless war of attrition against Palestinian militants, according to Israel Radio.
Pines-Paz also called on the prime minister to speed up implementation of the disengagement plan.
PA calls for international intervention
The Palestinian Authority on Thursday called for the international community to put a stop to Israel's actions in Gaza.
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, an advisor to chairman Yasser Arafat, said the PA is requesting "the UN Security Council, the Quartet, and the United States to get involved immediately to put an end to the massacres Israel is committing in Gaza."
----------------------------------------------------------------
[JPN Commentary: The aggressive behavior of Israeli settlers is the sort of thing that is well known yet rarely enters into the calculus of the conflict in many people's minds. Here is just one example of the behavior of the settlers.
The issue that bears repeating is that this sort of behavior on the part of settlers is a regular occurrence in the West Bank. The usual targets are Palestinians, but increasingly the brazen settlers are attacking Israeli peace activists and international volunteers. Unfortunately, the story is most likely to reach us only when Americans are attacked, as was the case here. But settler attacks are commonplace occurrences. And they are unnecessary. Most Israelis are willing to see the settlements relegated to the dustbin of history where they belong. The settlers know this, and their violent behavior is in part a way of instilling fear that any steps toward removing them will lead to civil war. But this is an empty threat—only a small percentage of the settlers are truly willing to take up arms against Israelis to keep their illegal communities standing.
The simple fact is, the settlements should not even be there. The Israeli Attorney General, Menachem Mazuz recently affirmed what the rest of the world has known for years—that Israel is bound by the Fourth Geneva Convention regarding occupied territories. One provision of that Convention is that the occupying power may not relocate its citizens into the occupied territory. The settlements are flatly illegal. Beyond that, they are the root cause of the spiraling violence from both sides. There is no substitute for ending Israel's occupation of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, and there is no other way to begin than to remove all the illegal settlements in occupied lands. Until Israel and its patron, the United States, accepts this, there is no hope of ending the violence. – MP]
West Bank Assailants Beat U.S. Activists
NASSER SHIYOUKHI
Associated Press
http://ga3.org/ct/y1aCgtM1qaVk/
HEBRON, West Bank - Two American volunteers in a group helping Palestinians were beaten with baseball bats and chains by five men, including one who spoke English with an Israeli accent, one of the victims said Thursday.
The Americans, Chris Brown, 40, from San Francisco, and Kim Lamberty, 44, from Washington, were escorting Palestinian children to their school in a West Bank village Wednesday when they were attacked, Brown said.
The two are members of the Christian Peacemakers Team, a group that has been active in and around the West Bank city of Hebron for several years.
Brown remained hospitalized in Israel on Thursday with a punctured lung. Lamberty was released after receiving treatment for a broken arm and swollen knee.
The identity of the assailants was not known, but Bourke Kennedy, another member of the group, said the volunteers have been harassed in the past by Jewish settlers on the same road, which runs near the Maon settlement.
"We've been spat at, hit, and almost run down on occasion," Kennedy said.
The group said it would file a complaint with the Israeli authorities. Israeli soldiers arrived at the scene 30 minutes after the attack. However, the army said police would have to handle to case. Police could not be reached for comment.
The attack took place early Wednesday when Brown and Lamberty were escorting several Palestinian children from their homes to a school in a nearby village. At about 7:15 a.m., five men with black scarves wrapped around their heads attacked the Americans, Brown said in a telephone interview.
"They whipped us with chains and beat us with a stick. Then they threw stones at me and continued punching me in the face, hitting and kicking me in the back," Brown said.
The children escaped unharmed, he said.
Jewish Peace News Editors:
Judith Norman
Alistair Welchman
Mitchell Plitnick
Lincoln Shlensky
Ami Kronfeld
Rela Mazali
Sarah Anne Minkin
John Wilner
Joel Beinin
posted by R7 | 10/02/2004 12:39:00 AM
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