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Thread: Today's Top Islamic News (DAILY)

  1. #111
    GAZA CITY — Having nowhere to hide even inside UN-run schools, the latest Israeli target, more than 215 children have been killed so far in Israel's ongoing military offensive against the sealed off Gaza Strip. But for many, that's not the worst part of the nightmare.

    Having lost a father, mother, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, friend or neighbor, about every child in the bombed-out costal enclave has been traumatized and will keep physical and mental scars for years.

    IslamOnline has interviewed several children to talk about their feelings regarding Israeli onslaught.



    Huda, 7

    I hate this war and I hear that Israel will come to our house soon. I always get nightmares of rockets hitting my house. I dreamt of my father being killed by one of the rockets and my mother got her neck racked.

    In the nightmare, I was searching for my brothers who were taken far away by the Israeli tanks.

    I'm unhappy and I want to play again in my house. I hope no bad things happen.



    Abed, 3

    I don't like darkness. It's when the sounds of bad things come out.

    Ahmed Elwan, 6

    We are afraid. I saw many children killed. Rockets came near my house. My younger sister cried ardently and my mother also. My dad was in my grandmother's house.

    I don't want to be afraid but I want to be strong man for my mother and sister.



    Nasim Udawn, 14

    I'm used to the sound of bombings, but this time it gets louder and louder. I live in Al-Shati refugee camp in Gaza where some houses around us were destroyed. Many people were killed. Our own home was hit by shrapnel.

    The problem is my brother, Nader, who started to suffer from involuntary urination. He gets up crying when he hears the sound of missiles.



    Zeyda Nima, 12

    I am not afraid of the bombings or the rockets, no of course, but my siblings are. I don't care for these sounds but my sister was taken to the hospital because she is not hearing very well now because of the air raids and bombings.



    Yehia, 5

    The young boy was too traumatized to speak. His mother, Zinat, said that since the beginning of the Israeli attacks, he has been suffering from involuntary urination out of fear of the bombings. Yehia also suffers from nightmares every night.



    Muhammad Jmasi, 6

    I get scared from the sound of bombings when it comes near my home. I go to my Dad and he tries to comfort me. But, when my dad is not around, my brothers and I become very afraid.

    I want to play again with my friends on the street and I want to have new ball to play soccer.



    Source: IslamOnline

  2. #112
    'US responsible for war on Gaza'
    Thu, 08 Jan 2009 09:53:02 GMT
    US Congressman Dennis Kucinich lashes out at Washington's arm support for Tel Aviv and Israel's violation of the Arms Export Control Act.

    Kucinich in a statement on Wednesday lambasted Israel's disproportionate use of force against defenseless people of Gaza with US weapons, paid for by American taxpayers.

    The disproportionate and collective punishment nature of the attacks on Gaza assure an escalation of conflict in violation of the AECA, the Ohio senator said.

    In a letter to the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday Kucinich informed the US administration of a violation of the Arms Export Control Act (AECA) of 1976. The breach, under AECA law, should result in a Presidential report on the violation.

    According to the AECA any defense articles sold or leased by the United States must not be used to escalate conflict.

    "We can not truly celebrate a New Year, a new Congress and a new administration if all we see is the same old destruction in the Middle East with US weapons being illegally used to kill children," Kucinich said in his statement.

    "I oppose Hamas' rocket attacks on Israel. The rocket attacks, even to try to end the blockade, have no moral justification, are illegal and must stop," the statement added.

    "But how can Israel claim self defense when it bombs Gaza which has no army, no air force, no navy and has been under a constant blockade? How can Israel claim self defense when its bombs destroy UN schools, killing children? "

    Many Palestinian children have been the target of Israeli airstrikes over the past 13 days.
    The Democrat senator criticized the US administration for its silence on Israel's use of American weapons against people of Gaza which he said was in an apparent violation of the Arms Export Control Act.

    "Israel was given US weapons on condition they would not be used for aggression or escalation. The outgoing Administration must finally stand for the rule of law, not the rule of force. "

    "The children of Palestinians and the children of Israel both deserve life. But the lives of the children of Gaza are cynically discounted as 'human shields'," Kucinich added.

    The Gaza Strip is faced with a serious humanitarian crisis since it came under massive Israeli fire beginning on December 27. Tel Aviv had claimed that its offensive is aimed at halting Hamas rocket attacks on southern Israel.

    However, a spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert later unveiled that the main objective of the assault was to topple the democratically-elected Hamas government in the Gaza Strip.

    Over 710 Palestinians have been killed and more than 3,100 others have been wounded in nearly two-week long Israeli aggression on the coastal enclave.

    Gaza residents are suffering from a shortage of fuel, medicine, food and water and the Israeli Army has been preventing Red Cross aid convoys from entering the populated region. Hospitals are also running out of fuel required for the operation of generators that provide power supply to health facilities.

    AO/MMN

  3. #113
    World rallies behind victims of Israeli war
    Shadiah Abdullah | Arab News



    SHOW OF UNITY: Protesters shout slogans condemning Israeli airstrikes on Gaza in Dubai on Friday. (AN photo by Yusuf Alamir)


    DUBAI: As Israel continues its aggression on Gaza, protests across the world are getting more pronounced.

    In UAE, thousands of residents took part in several marches held yesterday to protest the ongoing Israeli bombardment.

    More than 15,000 people took part in the demonstrations held in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah and Ras Al-Khaimah. Carrying placards showing pictures of babies killed during the onslaught on Gaza, protesters demanded international action to stop Israeli aggression.

    Sharjah witnessed the biggest demonstration where more than 9,000 people attended. Under heavy police presence, the demonstrators, led by representatives from the emirate’s NGOs, marched through the Sharjah Corniche starting from the Al-Noor Mosque. The protestors, many of whom were women and children, were calling for a jihad to liberate the Palestinian territories.

    Addressing the crowds, Mohammed Al-Rokn, an Emirati human rights activist, blasted the international community for keeping silence while innocent civilians were being slaughtered.

    “This is the beginning of changing the status quo,” he said. “The Israeli Army always boasts that they defeated three Arab armies in six days and occupied the Palestinian land in a matter of days. But it has now taken them more than two weeks to occupy a few meters of Gaza.” In Egypt, more than 50,000 people rallied after Friday prayers to condemn Israel’s ongoing assaults, in the biggest such protest of the day worldwide. Legislators affiliated with the opposition Muslim Brotherhood led the protest in the ancient Mediterranean port city of Alexandria that echoed to such slogans as “Down with Israel and with every collaborator.”

    Riot police were seen by an AFP correspondent in Alexandria trying to prevent the demonstration from taking place — only to give up because of the sheer numbers of protesters.

    In the Egyptian capital, riot police foiled demonstrations outside a number of mosques. In the West Bank city of Ramallah, fistfights broke out between supporters of Hamas and the rival Fatah faction during a “day of wrath” protest, prompting police to intervene with tear gas and baton charges. Thirteen people were taken to hospital, and several others detained.

    Some 3,000 demonstrated at the behest of Hamas in Hebron, throwing stones at Israeli soldiers who responded with rubber bullets. Several thousands, meanwhile, shouted “Death to Israel” in Nablus, while young Palestinians clashed with police in Jerusalem.

    In Kuwait, around 3,000 gathered outside Parliament and the seat of government, shouting “shame, shame” against Arab inaction vis-a-vis Gaza.

    In Jordan, police stopped more than 2,000 demonstrators from reaching the Israeli Embassy in the capital Amman. The crowd had set off from Friday prayers at the Kaloti mosque, about a kilometer away.

    The protesters — wearing checkered Palestinian kaffiyehs (scarves), and carrying Palestinian and Jordanian flags — chanted “No Israeli Embassy on Arab territory.” Unable to reach the embassy, protesters instead set up a symbolic cemetery in memory of the nearly 800 killed so far in Gaza, with the word “Gazan” scrawled on each mock grave.

    In Europe, more than 2,000 demonstrated in Athens and Thessaloniki at the behest of the Greek Communist Party, setting fire to the US and EU flags outside the US Embassy and the Israeli flag outside the Israeli mission.

    Smaller protests, varying from several dozen to several hundred people, took place in Bucharest, Vienna, Prague, and The Hague where the Dutch Parliament’s foreign affairs committee debated the Gaza conflict.

    In Asia, about 200 women protested outside the Egyptian Embassy in Jakarta, brandishing posters of dead and wounded Palestinian children and urging Egypt to open its border with Gaza.

    “As mothers, we feel sad for the women who lost their children in Palestine,” said Nani Handayani, of women’s welfare group Salimah or Muslim Sisterhood. “They are in our prayers.”

    — With input from agencies

  4. #114
    MUMBAI: An aging Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray is known for creating controversies. In an editorial in his party mouthpiece Saamna yesterday, Thackeray lashed out at the wife and daughter of slain Maharashtra Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) chief Hemant Karkare and questioned their wisdom that the lone arrested Mumbai terror terrorist Mohammed Ajmal Qasab should be pardoned on “humanitarian grounds.”

    Launching an attack on Kavita Karkare and his daughter, Thackeray said that the country did not share their stance of pardoning the alleged terrorist as he had committed a heinous crime. He said that though the Karkare family may have their own opinion, it is not the opinion of the family members of the 15 other policemen that were killed in the November terror attacks.

    Thackeray quoted the sentiments expressed by the daughter of constable Tukaram Ombale, who was alleged to have been killed by the bullets fired by Qasab, that the souls of the slain 16 policemen will get peace only if Qasab is hanged.

    Kavita, in her interview to several print and electronic media journalists had said that her daughter who is studying in London feels that Qasab should be pardoned and given another opportunity to live a civilized so that he can realize what a grave and heinous crime he has committed.

    In a double speak outbursts, Thackeray also did not spare the former ATS chief. On the one hand he said that Karkare’s “martyrdom” and “sacrifice” he respected, but on the other hand he wrote that the ATS was formed to counter terrorists and foil their attacks like that of Nov. 26 in Mumbai.

    But Karkare left that task and job aside and got entangled in Malegaon blast case. He alleged that the arrest of Army officer Prasad Purohit in the Malegaon blast case was nothing but an attempt to appease the Muslims and done under political pressure.

    Thackeray did not even spare Priyanka Gandhi, the daughter of Congress party President Sonia Gandhi, and former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. He said that Priyanka wanted Nalini, the killer of her father Rajiv to be pardoned. “What she should know was that Nalini had not only killed her father but also a former prime minister of India and, besides him, 90 other innocent people were also killed. Who will compensate for the trauma and sufferings of those 90 people killed by Nalini,” he asked.

  5. #115
    Israeli massacre at UN school exposed
    Sat, 10 Jan 2009 10:07:20 GMT
    The Israel massacre of civilians in a UN school has been confirmed as unprovoked, despite claims by officials in Tel Aviv.
    The Israeli military has reportedly admitted that the shelling of a UN school, which killed dozens of Gazan civilians, was "unprovoked".

    UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness said senior Israeli military officials have confessed that there was no gunfire emanating from the school when it came under fire from one of its tanks.

    "In briefings senior officers conducted for foreign diplomats, they admitted the shelling to which IDF forces in Jabaliya were responding did not originate from the school," The Haaretz quoted Gunness as saying on Saturday.

    Tel Aviv has attempted to justify its Jan 6 attack on the United Nations school as a response to "militant gunfire" and has released footage of the incident to substantiate its claims.

    Gunness, however, asserted that the footage released by Israel dated back to 2007 and was not related to the current incident.

    Israeli attacks on three UN-run schools has killed at least 45 civilians and injured over 150 others -- most of whom were seeking shelter inside the school to escape the arbitrary Israeli strikes.

    The United Nations had reacted in shock to the incident and stepped up calls for an independent inquiry into the attack -- perhaps the deadliest since Israel's Operation Cast Lead on Gaza began on December 27.

    "There must be a serious and independent investigation into the shocking loss of civilian life that took place near the UN school and that has characterized this conflict," said deputy Middle East director for Human Rights Watch, Joe Stork.

    The Israeli offensive has so far killed 804 Palestinians and wounded at least 3,330 others. According to the UN, one-third of the dead or injured in Gaza are children.

    A UN report released on Friday has also revealed that Israeli forces moved nearly 110 Palestinians into a house and 24 hours later shelled the building repeatedly, killing about 30 people.

    UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, pointing to the mass killing of Gazan civilians, has demanded that echelons in Tel Aviv be tried for war crimes.

    The Swiss Foreign Ministry has also called for an international investigation into Israel's violations of humanitarian law in the Gaza Strip.

    The rising civilian death toll in Gaza starkly disputes Tel Aviv's promises that it would not target "children and women or prevent humanitarian aid."

    An Israeli military official claimed that Tel Aviv could not always be concerned about the welfare of Palestinian civilians and that its soldiers are its top priority.

    SBB/AA

  6. #116
    BBC: Israel 'shelled civilian shelter'

    Israeli tank along Israeli-Gaza border on 8/1/09
    Israel's offensive in Gaza has been under way for nearly two weeks

    Israeli forces shelled a house in the Gaza Strip which they had moved around 110 Palestinians into 24 hours earlier, the UN quotes witnesses as saying.

    The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) called it "one of the gravest incidents" since the beginning of the offensive.

    The shelling at Zeitoun, a south-east suburb of Gaza City, on 5 January killed some 30 people, the report said.

    Israel says it has looked into the allegations and they are unfounded.

    Israeli foreign ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said no Israeli soldiers had been in the area on the day the incident was supposed to have happened.

    The OCHA report said: "According to several testimonies, on 4 January Israeli foot soldiers evacuated approximately 110 Palestinians into a single-residence house in Zeitoun (half of whom were children) warning them to stay indoors.

    "Twenty-four hours later, Israeli forces shelled the home repeatedly, killing approximately 30."

    The UN said those who survived and were able walked 2km to the main north-south road to be transported to hospital in civilian vehicles.

    "Three children, the youngest of whom was five months old, died upon arrival at the hospital," the report said.

    'No safe haven'

    Allegra Pacheco, of OCHA in Jerusalem, said they were not accusing the Israelis of a deliberate act, but said the incident needed to be investigated.

    She also said they were concerned at claims by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) that ambulances were only allowed access to the neighbourhood on Thursday - four days after the alleged incident.

    The ICRC on Thursday accused Israel of failing to fulfil its duty to help wounded civilians in Gaza.

    "In Gaza, there is a severe protection of civilians crisis. There is no safe haven, no safe space, for all the civilians, particularly children," Ms Pacheco told the BBC.

    "Since the ground operation, the number of children killed has risen by 250%."

    An estimated 770 Palestinians and 14 Israelis have died in nearly two weeks of Israel's air and ground offensive against the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

    The UN Security Council has called for an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza.

  7. #117
    Israel keeps pounding Gaza, hits children's hospital
    Mon, 12 Jan 2009 08:19:58 GMT
    A medic carries a wounded Palestinian baby, Gaza City
    Israeli forces have attacked a children's hospital in Gaza in a fourth day of attacks after a UN Security Council call for ceasefire.

    The al-Dorra children's hospital was targeted by Israeli forces, the Palestinian al-Aqsa TV station reported early on Monday.

    The attack came as clouds of smoke filled Gaza's skyline in day 17 of Israel's deadly military onslaught in the region.

    On Sunday, Israeli aircraft also bombed and destroyed a clinic in the Gaza Strip after firing warning shots close to the building.

    Although evacuation of the clinic prevented any human casualties, all the clinic's equipment and supplies were destroyed. This is while the region faces serious medical shortages, which make treatment of the wounded extremely difficult.

    Since the beginning of its military campaign in the Gaza Strip, Israel has targeted several registered medical facilities, which were given assurances that they would not come under attack.

    It seems that even Gaza's main hospital, al-Shifa, is not save from the threat of deadly raids as the Israeli website Ha'aretz quotes intelligence sources as claiming that Hamas fighters are hiding in its basement.

    A Palestinian man holding his wounded baby
    This is while two Norwegian doctors who have been working in the al-Shifa hospital say that the medical center is nearing collapse, as patients die because of a lack of specialist doctors and basic medical equipment.

    The Israeli army's indiscriminate killing of civilians, denial of humanitarian aid, and attacks on aid workers forced the UN Security Council to pass a binding resolution for immediate and durable ceasefire in the region on Thursday. The US, Israel's main ally, abstained from the vote.

    The International Committee of the Red Cross, which earlier limited its activities to Gaza City alone, has now stopped escorting ambulances to hospital as medics and aid convoys are still targeted by Israeli forces, Press TV's Yousef Al-Helou reports from Gaza.

    This is while rights groups and medics confirm that the Israeli military's is using banned weapons, such as phosphorus bombs, in its attacks on Gaza.

    On Sunday, Human Rights Watch said that Israel had fired artillery shells with the incendiary agent white phosphorus into Gaza.

    A Gazan woman who was burnt along with her sons, in an Israeli phosphorus bomb attack
    Phosphorus bombs are extremely deadly weapons which cause fires on the ground and serious burns on the skin and in the lungs when inhaled. They can also cause severe heart, liver and kidney injures.

    “My family was inside our house when a shell hit it spraying sparks like lava. Two more shells hit the house separately. The sparks set my sons on fire. But I couldn't put out the blaze because my face was on fire. I couldn't see. They were screaming mom, we're dying. One of my sons was burned to death, burned to a crisp,” a Gazan woman told our Press TV reporter.

    MJ/DT

  8. #118
    Willie Pete burns Gazan residents again
    Mon, 12 Jan 2009 11:28:35 GMT
    Israel targets eastern Gaza City with phosphorous bombs as resistance fighters prevented Israeli forces from advancing into the city.

    White phosphorus, classified as 'chemical weapon' by the US intelligence, is an incendiary material that causes horrific burns, severe injuries or death when it comes in contact with human skin.

    Under the Geneva Treaty of 1980, the use of white phosphorous as a weapon is prohibited, however, there is no blanket ban on its use as a smokescreen or for illumination.

    On Sunday, Human Rights Watch warned about the use of white phosphorus in Gaza saying its researchers had observed the use of the chemical weapon by the Israeli military in Gaza City and Jabaliya on Saturday and Sunday.

    Despite the presence of photographic evidence proving that Israel has been using the controversial weapon during its offensive in Gaza, Israeli military denies using the chemical against the civilians saying it is using white phosphorus shells to create smokescreens to allow its ground forces to operate.

    Tel Aviv has refused to comment on the types of munitions it is using in the conflict which has so far left over 900 Palestinians dead and more than 4,000 others wounded. Israel has admitted using white phosphorus during its 33-day war with Lebanon in 2006.

    Israel continued its onslaught on Monday for the 17th consecutive day, regardless of UN resolution 1860 which calls for and 'immediate' and 'durable' ceasefire in the region.

    Israeli warplanes attacked several locations in Ziytoun neighborhood, destroying a number of houses.

    "My family was inside our house when a shell hit it spraying sparks like lava. Two more shells hit the house separately. The sparks set my sons on fire. But I couldn't put out the blaze because my face was on fire. I couldn't see. They were screaming mom, we're dying. One of my sons was burned to death, burned to a crisp," a Gazan woman told our Press TV reporter.

  9. #119
    I never imagined I'd see this’
    12/01/2009 08:52:00 AM GMT Comments (0) Add a comment Print E-mail to friend

    GAZA CITY: The medics who brave Israel's assault on Gaza have come under fire from tanks and faced days-long delays in getting to the scene of attacks, sometimes finding animals gnawing at corpses when they finally reach the dead and wounded.

    Few are more exposed to the carnage of Israel’s two-week military offensive than Gaza’s medics, who number around 400 including volunteers. They work long hours, get little sleep and risk their lives daily. Many have lost friends and family, but the overwhelming workload leaves no time to process what they’ve seen.

    Awaiting coordination with Israel often delays access to the injured, medics said. Some reported finding people stranded in their homes for days, or bodies lying in the streets uncollected.

    “Disgusting is not the word,” said Shawki Saleh, 24, a volunteer medic at Kamal Adwan hospital. “If it’s not a dog, it’s rats around the bodies. ... I’ve been doing this volunteer work for two years but I never imagined I’d see this. Who knows how many people are still under the rubble? We were carrying them out screaming.”

    In one long workday, medic Haitham Adgheir carried five corpses, saw six more at a Gaza hospital, and his medical convoy took Israeli tank fire that showered a driver with glass.

    “My mind is like a video of body parts and injured people,” said Adgheir, 33.

    Israel launched airstrikes across the Gaza Strip on Dec. 27 and sent in ground troops a week later in an attempt to halt years of Hamas rocket fire on southern Israel. More than 800 Palestinians have been killed, about half of them civilians, according to Palestinian medical officials. Thirteen Israelis have also been killed. Israel says it targets only Hamas sites, but has hit mosques and apartment buildings throughout the crowded seaside territory. Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of using civilians as human shields and launching attacks from schools, mosques and homes.

    Since the fighting began, 21 Palestinian medical staff have been killed, 30 have been injured and 11 ambulances have been damaged, according to the World Health Organization. The International Committee of the Red Cross made a rare public criticism of Israel this week, saying there were “unacceptable” delays in letting rescue workers reach the injured. And Gaza staff say soldiers sometimes fire on ambulance crews.

    Earlier this week, after waiting four days for coordination, ambulance crews entered the Zeitoun neighborhood and found at least 12 bodies and four small surviving children next to their dead mothers, the Red Cross has said.

    Ahmed Abu Sal, 26, a volunteer medic who responded to the scene, recalled finding a young girl still clutching her dead mother. The girl, who was perhaps 9, was unable to speak from dehydration, her lips shrunken and dry, he said Saturday. He carried her from the building. Elsewhere in the rubble he found a woman quietly weeping and still holding the bodies of two young men who appeared to be her sons, he said.

    Red Cross officials working with ambulance crews coordinate with the Israeli military by cell phone before moving, said Red Cross spokesman Simon Schorno in Geneva. At other times, fighting breaks out near authorized crews, putting them at risk. The Red Cross has similar lines of communication with Palestinian militants, Schorno said, though they are less organized. He knew of no recent run-ins with Palestinian militants.

    An army spokesman said Israel works hard to coordinate with aid crews and that soldiers don’t fire at clearly marked medics. “The area is a combat zone, and obviously the risk of any medic working in a combat zone is that there is fire from all sides,” said Capt. Benjamin Rutland.

    But many medics say they are deliberately targeted, though ambulances in Gaza are clearly marked.

    Adgheir, a medic with the Palestine Red Crescent at Al-Quds Hospital, said Israeli soldiers fired toward him four times in the past week, despite Red Cross coordination. On Tuesday, he waited more than 12 hours for coordination with Israeli forces before he could reach a car full of people who had been shot at by an Israeli tank along the beach road near the town of Khan Yunis. The tank fire sent shards of glass into the driver’s eyes.

    Only able to reach the car after dark, Adgheir said Israeli soldiers shot at his ambulance as he approached.

    He also said an Israeli tank fired on Thursday at an ambulance convoy that he was part of at the Netzarim crossing in central Gaza. One of the ambulance drivers, who was showered with glass, was lightly injured and the convoy aborted its mission. The medics say they have no time to deal with the psychological toll of their job. They report nightmares, short tempers and feelings from numbness to rage.

    The fighting allows little time to pause — even to pray.

    On Friday, doctors and medics at Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital joined relatives of the injured in a communal prayer outside the emergency room. In blood-spattered smocks, the medics prayed for the dead.

    Moments later, an ambulance rushed in with the body of a man killed by shelling and the medics rushed back to work.

    Mohammed Azayzeh, a central Gaza medic, said the hardest thing to handle is not seeing the dead but rescuing the wounded, some of whom have horrific injuries such as missing limbs that leave them screaming for help.

    “What can you do?” he said. “I want to smash my head against a wall.” ¬
    Source: Arab News

  10. #120
    Israeli soldiers refuse to serve in Gaza
    Tue, 13 Jan 2009 10:36:11 GMT
    Israeli reservists walk toward the northern Gaza Strip on January 12. The war on Gaza has been a bone of contention in Tel Aviv as Israel has been forced to increase troops several times.
    Ten Israeli reservists have reportedly refused to enter the war on Gaza in protest at the ongoing killing of women and children.

    An Israel reservist, along with his unit, refused to join the forces in the Gaza Strip on "grounds of conscience" and preferred 14 days in prison than Gaza, Ma'an News Agency has reported.

    The ten may be tried for violating orders. The soldiers say they will not take part in a war that has killed hundreds of civilians, including women and children.

    No'em Levna, a first lieutenant in the Israeli army, refused to serve in Gaza saying, "We killed 900 Palestinians in 17 days, including hundreds of children."

    "If violence must be used, it should be used minimally, and that isn't what's happening," he continued. "Killing innocent civilians cannot be justified. Nothing justifies this kind of killing. It's devilish."

    "It is Israeli arrogance based on logic. It's saying, 'if we hit more, everything will be okay,'" he said. "But the hatred and anger we are planting in Gaza will rebound on us."

    This is the first time since Israel launched its massive air, sea and ground assault on the Gaza Strip that such a number of soldiers have chosen prison terms over deployment.

    NAT/JG/AA

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