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Thread: :icon_sadangel2: Palestine Peace a dream?

  1. #111
    Israeli tanks enter Gaza City
    Thu, 19 Feb 2009 01:01:40 GMT
    Israeli tanks crossed the border into the Gaza Strip.
    Israeli tanks backed by helicopters have crossed the border with the Gaza Strip, triggering clashes in Gaza City.

    Witnesses told AFP that the military forces entered Gaza City early Thursday with Palestinian fighters exchanging fire with them.

    The military forces however left the strip after the fighters fired antitank rockets at them.

    No casualties have been reported in the attack.

    There was no comment by the Israeli military on the incident.

  2. #112
    OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israel's security cab voted unanimously on Wednesday, February 18, to condition a Gaza truce on the release of its soldier Gilad Shalit, a move criticized as a setback for Egyptian efforts to broker a long-term ceasefire. "The security cab unanimously decided that the release of the soldier Shalit is a condition to any agreement with Hamas and the opening of border crossings," Interior Minister Meir Sheetrit told journalists after the meeting.

    "It would be unthinkable for anybody to reach an accord with Hamas, whether through Egypt or not, without the release of Shalit."

    Israeli outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Saturday, February 14, that Israel would not agree to any truce with Hamas without the release of Shalit, who was taken prisoner by Palestinian groups in 2006.

    The new position throws a spinner into Egypt's efforts to mediate a truce between Israel and Hamas since the end of Israel's three-week war on Gaza, which killed nearly 1400 people and left a rail of massive destruction.

    Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak stressed earlier this week that Shalit's fate should not be linked to the ceasefire talks.

    "Egypt will not change its position on the truce, the matter of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit is a separate issue which can in no way be linked to the truce negotiations."

    Hamas has always maintained that the release of Shalit be negotiated as part of a separate prisoner exchange involving hundreds of people held in Israeli jails.

    Blackmail

    Israel's new conditions for the truce drew rebuke from its chief negotiator Amos Gilad.

    "Suddenly, the order of things has been changed. Suddenly, first we have to get Gilad," the Maariv daily quoted him as telling an associate.

    "I don't understand that. Where does that lead, to insult the Egyptians? To make them want to drop the whole thing? What do we stand to gain from that?" he fumed.

    "The Egyptians have shown extraordinary courage. They've given us maneuvering room, they're trying to mediate, they're investing efforts, they're showing goodwill of a kind they've never shown before," said Gilad who visits Cairo frequently for the truce talks.

    "Mubarak has been fair and courageous...What are we thinking? That they work for us? That they're a subordinate unit of ours?"

    Hamas also lashed out at the Israeli government for changing the rules of the negotiations.

    "Hamas vehemently rejects Israel's conditions," its spokesman Fawzi Barhum said in a statement.

    He insisted that Shalit's release shall be negotiated separately as part of a prisoner exchange involving hundreds of Palestinians jailed by Israel.

    "This Zionist position imposes new conditions at the last minute. This completely contradicts the Egyptian and Palestinian positions."

    Hamas political leader Khaled Meshal also lashed out at the Israelis.

    "A truce can come about only in exchange for a lifting of the blockade and the reopening of the crossing points," he told Agence France Press (AFP).

    Israel has been closing Gaza's six crossings since Hamas took over control in 2007, leaving its 1.6 million population without food, water, power and sewage services.

    "It is unacceptable to combine the truce issue with the question of Shalit."

    Source: IslamOnline

  3. #113
    BBC News, Gaza

    Hundreds of Palestinian schoolchildren used to come to the Gaza Zoo every week, but not now.

    Tanks rolled through the area during the Israeli offensive. Much of the zoo was badly damaged, most of the animals died.

    Cage after cage lies empty. Ostrich feathers are strewn close to a crater in the ground, beside the mangled steel bars of what was the birds' pen.

    The burnt carcass of a camel by its former enclosure is one of the few sets of remains that have yet to be taken away.

    "Some were killed in air strikes," says the zoo's manager, Emad Qassim, "but some of the animals were shot dead."
    The burnt carcass of a camel at Gaza Zoo
    The camel's remains are almost unrecognisable

    "Thank God our two lions survived, but we used to have over 400 animals and birds, now there are just 10 left."

    Many of the animals died of starvation.

    The zookeepers say that for more than two weeks, Zeitoun, the southern suburb of Gaza City where the zoo is located, was simply too dangerous to access because of the presence of troops and tanks.

  4. #114
    Israeli TV's blasphemous show sparks outrage
    Thu, 19 Feb 2009 01:39:14 GMT
    Pope Benedict XVI
    Christian and Muslim leaders have called on Pope Benedict XVI to cancel his trip to Israel after an Israeli TV channel aired a sacrilegious show.

    The TV show hosted by comedian Lior Shlein contained blasphemous material against Jesus and Virgin Mary (PBUT).

    Religious leaders denounced Shlein as Christian lawyers mulled over taking legal steps against the comedian and Channel 10.

    In a letter to lawyers, Shlein has pledged to publicly apologize for the show.

    Christian leaders said the show was "hurtful and humiliating to Christianity."

    Pope Benedict XVI is scheduled to visit Israel in May amid worsening ties between Tel Aviv and the Vatican.

    The Vatican's decision to lift the excommunication of Bishop Richard Williamson who denied the Holocaust sparked a row between the two sides.

  5. #115
    GAZA CITY: US Democratic representatives Brian Baird and Keith Ellison expressed shock at the plight of the war-shattered Gaza Strip during a visit to the Hamas-run Palestinian enclave yesterday.

    “The amount of physical destruction and the depth of human suffering here is staggering” Baird said in a statement issued jointly with Ellison during their visit which coincided with a similar trip by US Senator John Kerry.

    The visits were the first by US lawmakers since Hamas took control of the territory in June 2007.

    Ellison, a representative from Minnesota, harshly criticized restrictions on the delivery of desperately needed goods into the coastal strip that has been under a crippling Israeli blockade imposed after the Hamas takeover.

    “People, innocent children, women and non-combatants, are going without water, food and sanitation, while the things they so desperately need are sitting in trucks at the border, being denied permission to go in,” he said.

    “The stories about the children affected me the most,” said Ellison. “No parent, or anyone who cares for kids, can remain unmoved by what Brian and I saw here.” Baird, from Washington state, said the situation he saw was “shocking and troubling beyond words.” “The personal stories of children being killed in their homes or schools, of entire families wiped out, and relief workers prevented from evacuating the wounded are heart wrenching,” he said.

    Ellison, the first Muslim elected to the US Congress, hailed US President Barack Obama for acting “quickly to send much needed humanitarian funding to Gaza for this effort.” “However, the arbitrary and unreasonable Israeli limitations on food, and repair and reconstruction materials are unacceptable and indefensible,” he added.

    Ellison and Bair both stressed that their visit did not have the official sanction of the Obama administration.

    They said they held talks with civilians and relief workers, while Palestinian officials stressed they did not meet with any representatives of Hamas.

    During their visit, the pair visited Izzbet Abed Rabbo, a community in northern Gaza devastated during the deadly 22-day Israeli offensive that ended on Jan. 18.

    An estimated 14,000 to 20,000 homes and other buildings were damaged or destroyed during the military offensive in which more than 1,300 Palestinians were killed.

    “The first and most urgent priority must be to help the people in Gaza. At the same time, the rocket attacks against Israeli cities must stop immediately,” Baird and Ellison said in their joint statement.

    “Just as the people of Gaza should not be subject to what they have experienced, the Israeli civilians should not have to live in fear of constant and indiscriminate rocketing,” they added.

    Today, the two plan to tour the Israeli towns of Sderot and Ashkelon, which are regularly targeted by rocket attacks from Gaza. ¬
    Source: Arab News

  6. #116
    Israeli troops kill two Gazans
    Sat, 21 Feb 2009 08:18:38 GMT
    Israeli troops have killed two Palestinian men in the village of Juhr al-Dik southeast of Gaza City, Palestinian medical sources say.

    The two men were killed by Israeli shelling and gunfire in the village, according to Muawiya Hassanein, the head of Gaza emergency services, who identified the men as resistance fighters, AFP reported.

    Israel continues to hit targets in the Palestinian sliver on a regular basis after it announced a so-called "unilateral ceasefire" on January 18 which helped Tel Aviv divert media attention away from its three-week offensive into the long blockaded region. The military operation killed at least 1,330 Palestinians and wounded 5,450 others.

    On Friday, Hamas condemned Israel for hampering efforts for truce by linking a prisoner exchange negotiation to the ceasefire.

    Hamas insists opening of the crossings into the blockaded Gaza Strip as one of its main demands for truce but Israel has refused it.

  7. #117
    RAMALLAH: The Palestinian Ministry of Prisoners’ Affairs yesterday strongly condemned the decision of Israeli military courts to deport Palestinian prisoners holding Arab and foreign passports from the Palestinian territories.

    The ministry said that the Israeli courts issued a decision to deport two Palestinian brothers, Omar and Talib Oudeh, from Jenin to Jordan, after they served their jail term despite the fact that they are holding Palestinian IDs.

    It added that the Israeli courts also decided to deport Marwan Farraj from Bethlehem to Jordan. The ministry said that Farraj “refused to sign the expulsion decision and the prison administration is exercising huge psychological pressure against him to force him to sign the court decision.”

    The ministry said Ibrahim Hamdiya, was separated from his wife and children, who live in Jenin, and was deported to the Gaza on the pretext that he had resided in the West Bank illegally.

    The ministry said that the decisions are a “violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention which forbids Israel as an occupying power from altering the demographic composition of territories it has seized, either by expelling Palestinians or by settling Jews there.”

    The ministry called on international human rights organizations to “urgently intervene to put an end to this Israeli policy of deportation which is backed by a legal cover provided by the Israeli High Court of Justice in order to pass violations against Palestinian civilians”, warning that the “international community’s silence encourages Israel to deport more Palestinians”.

    Meanwhile, a senior Hamas official said yesterday that his movement is not ruling out the possibility that some so-called “heavyweight” Palestinian prisoners will be expelled to Syria should they be released by Israel in the framework of a possible exchange deal for captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.

    Mahmoud Al-Zahhar told the Arabic-language daily newspaper Al-Hayat that the movement was “considering the issue of expelling the prisoners from the West Bank.” “Any such decision will be implemented with the prisoners’ consent,” he said in the interview, published Saturday.

    Media sources said that Israel has accepted Hamas’ demand to free eight “heavyweight” prisoners, but insists that four of them be deported to Syria.

    The sources said that Israel has prepared a new list of Palestinian prisoners it is willing to release and is ready to relay it to Hamas as quickly as possible in order to further a possible swap arrangement, after a cabinet decision on Wednesday to make Shalit’s release a precondition to any new cease-fire agreement in the Gaza Strip.

    The four prisoners slated for expulsion are: Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) Secretary-General Ahmad Sa’adat; Ibrahim Hamed, Hamas’ military commander in the West Bank; bomb-maker Abdullah al-Barghouthi and Abbas el-Sayed of Hamas military wing.

    Zahhar said Israel has issued fresh demands in the ongoing Egyptian-mediated ceasefire negotiations, including tying the truce to a prisoner exchange deal that would see Shalit returned to Israel.

    “The Israelis are in the midst of a major crisis regarding the establishment of the new coalition,” he said. “In any case, we are not desperate to reach a ceasefire agreement, and the prisoner swap has its own special price tag.”

  8. #118
    RAMALLAH: An Israeli police dog yesterday attacked 105-year-old Salem Bani Odeh during an arrest raid in West Bank town of Tammoun, family sources said.

    The sources said that the Israeli soldiers raided Bani Odeh’s house, to the south of Jenin, in search for “wanted Palestinian activist.”

    They added that the dog jumped on the handicapped Odeh, biting his chest and chewed off his left ear. Odeh’s son said that his father was rushed to Rafidia Hospital in the city of Nablus for treatment. The soldiers arrested two Palestinians during the house-to-house search.

    Palestinian Minister of Health, Dr. Fathi Abu Moghli, condemned the incident saying, “It is an Israeli crime against Palestinian people and humanity.” He said the Israeli police dog dragged Bani Odeh from his bed and attacked him for 30 minutes.

    He said that on arrival to the hospital, medics found that the victim was suffering from deep wounds in the shoulder, scratches on his face, body, and a chewed left ear which necessitated a surgery to reconnect it.

  9. #119
    RAMALLAH: As part of Israeli attempts to Judize the disputed city of Jerusalem, the Jewish-dominated Jerusalem Municipality may offer to voluntarily relocate some 1,500 Palestinian residents of the city’s Silwan neighborhood to alternative lots in East Jerusalem, Arab residents said.

    The daily Haaretz said that the option was brought up by city council and East Jerusalem portfolio holder Yakir Segev, in meetings with the Arab residents. The 88 houses at issue were allegedly constructed without permits in the Al-Bustan area of Silwan and are slated for demolition by Israeli authorities. They stand in an area known as the King’s Garden, defined as being of great archaeological importance by the Israel Antiquities Authority.

    Silwan, a Palestinian neighborhood of 10,000 people, is set in a beautiful valley just outside the Old City walls, Jews claim it to be there ancient city. Therefore, according to the Jewish National Fund, it is “historical justice” that only Jews should live on this land.

    The nasty and obviously racist battle to cleanse Silwan of non-Jews is under way with a vengeance. Palestinian residents call it “house-to-house combat.” According to attorney Ziad Qa’awar, the last meeting took place in early February and saw Segev proposing two alternative locations, one on a different hill in Silwan, and the other in the neighborhood of Beit Hanina, in the northeast of the city. The proposition was unanimously rejected by the residents.

    Fathi Abu Diab, a member of the residents’ committee, said that they “told him (Segev) that these were lands we inherited from our parents, and we were not going to give them up.” “We were born here, and our children were born here too.”

    Abu Diab added the families would be happy to cooperate with any development of the area that does not harm the houses. “But forcing us to evict will never work,” he said. Haaretz quoted Segev as saying that no compensation plans was in place.

    “These houses have been issued with demolition orders, to which we have to comply,” he said. “This was just an idea that came up in the talks.” However, Palestinian participants in the meeting said most of it focused on the voluntary evacuation issue.

    The demolition orders have been in place for several years, but have yet to be carried out, with international pressures running high. An alternative plan proposed by the residents was rejected by the city’s planning committee.

    Israeli left-wing activists said the demolition orders were fueled by settler activists seeking to take over the land, in particular by the Elad association, which promotes the “Judaization” of East Jerusalem by settling of Jews in Silwan.

    Elad has been operating in East Jerusalem for about 20 years. It has acquired and received many properties belonging to Palestinians in Silwan and manages the national park on behalf of Israeli government.

    The policy of house demolitions and settlement building in East Jerusalem are being used by the Israeli authorities and Jerusalem municipality to increase Jewish presence and manipulate the composition of the population in order to gain more control over the city prior to final status talks with the Palestinian Authority.

    In those talks, the issue of Jerusalem looms as the stumbling block of all stumbling blocks. More than 2,000 houses in East Jerusalem have been demolished since its occupation by Israel in 1967, and several hundreds are slated for demolition to Judize the city.

    ¬
    Source: Arab News

  10. #120
    Israel-Hamas arms embargo urged
    Palestinians run for cover during an Israeli strike over a UN school in Beit Lahia, 17/01
    Israel has denied allegations of illegal use of white phosphorus rounds

    Amnesty International has called for a freeze on arms sales to Israel, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups following the recent Gaza conflict.

    The human rights group said it had evidence both Israel and Hamas had used weapons sourced from overseas to carry out attacks on civilians.

    It called for the UN Security Council to impose the embargo on all parties.

    Both Israel and Hamas have rejected the conclusions of the report, in which Amnesty accuses each of war crimes.

    In the report, Israel is accused of illegal use of white phosphorus and other armaments supplied by the US in Gaza, while Hamas is condemned for launching unguided rockets into Israel.


    [Israeli] attacks resulted in the death of hundreds of children and other civilians and massive destruction of homes and infrastructure
    Donatella Rovera
    Amnesty International

    Israel defends use of phosphorus
    Q&A: White phosphorus injuries
    Israel has denied the allegations.

    Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev told the BBC: "The IDF, the Israeli Defence Forces, only use weapons that are in accordance with international law.

    "We did not use any such munition as an anti-personnel weapon; we are investigating ourselves."

    White phosphorus, which is used to lay smokescreens, is legal for use on open ground but its use in built-up areas where civilians are found is banned under international conventions.

    'War crimes'

    Donatella Rovera, the head of an Amnesty fact-finding mission to southern Israel and Gaza, said: "Israeli forces used white phosphorus and other weapons supplied by the USA to carry out serious violations of international humanitarian law, including war crimes.

    Palestinian Qassam rockets are fired by Hamas militants from Gaza towards Israel, 6 Jan 2009
    Amnesty said the firing of rockets from Gaza into Israel was a war crime
    "Their attacks resulted in the death of hundreds of children and other civilians and massive destruction of homes and infrastructure.

    "At the same time, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups fired hundreds of rockets that had been smuggled in or made of components from abroad at civilian areas in Israel.

    "Though far less lethal than the weaponry used by Israel, such rocket firing also constitutes a war crime and caused several civilian deaths."

    The charity's report said it had found fragments and components of artillery, tank shells, fins from mortar rounds and aircraft-launched missiles and bombs in school playgrounds, hospitals and homes in Gaza.

    Israel's weaponry predominantly came from the US, the report said.

    In southern Israel, meanwhile, the remains of rockets fired indiscriminately at civilian areas by Hamas and other armed Palestinian groups were also recovered, the report said.

    'Tainted' report

    Mr Regev told Reuters news agency the Amnesty report was "fundamentally flawed" and "tainted" because it used data provided by Hamas.

    He said Israel made every effort to avoid civilian casualties.

    "The report ignores the fact Hamas deliberately used the Palestinian civilian population as a human shield," he told Reuters.

    Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum called the report "unfair", telling Reuters there was no comparison between the Israeli forces' weaponry and Palestinian "people who defend themselves with some rifles and other primitive means".

    He denied that Hamas had acquired weapons from other countries.

    Around 1,300 Gazans and 13 Israelis died in 22 days of fighting last month.

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