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The Israeli misinformation campaign is moving into full swing, along with its gratuitous bombings and continued collective punishment of the Palestinian people.
Here’s my comment at the Israeli Consulate blog waiting to be now passed through their checkpoint, in response to How Did the Cease Fire End:
“More hasbara – this is getting old.
Here’s what your own ex Shin Bet said of Israel’s cease fire breach – you didn’t mention there were several killed, did you. In fact it was at least 5 people and several others wounded, including a woman. Then there were the other breaches committed by Israel before that day you didn’t mention.
“Last week, Israeli forces entered Gaza, destroyed an underground border tunnel, and battled Hamas fighters, leaving several militants dead. In response, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fired around eighty rockets into southern Israel, including the Israeli city of Ashkelon”.
“On June 19, 2008, Israel and Hamas began observing an Egyptian-mediated ceasefire, which was intended to last six months with an option to extend. In general, Hamas has observed the ceasefire; the number of attacks and rocket launches has decreased significantly, and Hamas has prevented other Gaza militant organizations from striking Israel”.
You also haven’t mentioned Israel continued its crippling, humiliating 18 month blockade during the ‘state of calm’ – a very significant omission by you, as the continuance of the siege breached the nature if not terms of the truce. From August to October, the rockets practically stopped – of the few that were fired, were any fired by Hamas, one has to wonder? Yet Israel kept up its excruciating siege, turning the screws on the entire Gazan population ever tighter. Also pertinent is the fact that there’s plenty of evidence that Israel had been cooking up its current slaughter many months before whilst dishonourably pretending to seek a truce, to time conveniently with Bush’s departure.
You also fail to admit that Hamas was willing to renew the truce on the 23rd December – if the stultifying blockade – collective punishment, a breach of the Geneva Conventions – was lifted. Yet for Israel, the lives of Palestinian people were not worthy of relief in this cruel great game.
As Jews for Justice for Palestinians said:
“The Israeli government steadily sought to break down the ceasefire, not just in Gaza since early November, but also in the West Bank. Israeli forces have carried out an average of 33 incursions, 42 arrests or detentions, 12 woundings and 0.84 killings a week in the West Bank during the ceasefire. The tactic has been to continue attacking Hamas and other militants in the West Bank, provoking responses in Gaza, and to use the responses as the pretext for the massive attacks of the last 24 hours.”
“On 23rd December Hamas offered to renew the ceasefire if Israel would undertake to open border crossings for supplies of aid and fuel, and halt incursions. For those of us appalled at the collective punishment involved in the ongoing siege, and concerned that Israelis should not fear death or injury from Qassam rockets, that seems a truly reasonable response.”
Do you think Israel can bomb and torment civilians en masse with impunity forever, whilst its allies act as a human shield for its misdeeds?
Brutality never works, it rebounds to damage its practitioner. As Gandhi said, “When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall — think of it, always.”
The worse Israel behaves, the shorter will be its existence in its current form. And that, my friends, may be a very good thing, as there’s no such thing as a “democracy” which offers and provides democracy’s complete and true essences to only one sector living within it.
One day soon your leaders will know just what imprisonment feels like. At Le Hague.”
Sphere: Related Content
Jonathan Cook in EI:
[...] Lebanon and Gaza. Who are the Israeli hegemons planning on tricking into a conflagration this time on yet another false pretext to perpetuate victimhood and an overweaning need for self-defence? How many of the 57 states that [...]
[...] which destroyed Gaza under false pretexts, having planned its massacre since before its truce with Hamas last June, deliberately refusing to [...]
[...] as we’ve illustrated several times on this blog, the hasbara machine has proved inept in defending its distortions and [...]
[...] Israel’s hasbara campaign is in full swing – the truth about who breached the ceasefire (Israel), why the Israelis never stopped occupying Gaza (Israel breached the 4th Geneva Conventions ever since it ‘withdrew’ from Gaza with its blockade), how the UN School came to be attacked by the IDF, the hideous Zeitoun massacre of 30 people by the IDF and many more memes are dissembled, sanitised, spun and respun by the mendacious Israeli spiel machine. [...]
Thanks guys … appreciated
it was published here : http://www.israelpolitik.org/2009/01/07/how-did-the-cease-fire-end/
I agree Shahid. Excellent journalism.
Here’s my latest on the Australian Greens, its Gaza response and Palestine policy.
See A New Script for Dr Brown
Really well set out points. I like the way you managed to inject your argument with sufficient passion without losing any of the cogency.
[...] Gazan population ever tighter. Also pertinent is the fact that there’s plenty of evidence that Israel had been cooking up its current slaughter many months before whilst dishonourably pretending to seek a truce, to time conveniently with Bush’s [...]