Saturday, December 27

Today in Palestine! ~ Headlines December 27, 2008 ~

Two waves of Israeli airstrikes kill 210 Palestinians; Brigades respond killing one Israeli with projectile
(27 Dec) second wave of airstrikes is raining down on the Gaza Strip, after a first strike killed at least 210 Palestinians and injured at least 340 others on Saturday afternoon. Medical sources say most arriving to hospital in "pieces." Military factions responded by sending projectiles into Israel, killing one man and injuring five in Netivot. As fighting petered out Saturday evening Palestinian militants launched a Russian-made Grad missile at the Israeli city of Ashkelon. The projectile did not explode. Shortly after the incident an Israeli warplane launched a single bomb on a field near Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, causing no injuries. Head of Emergency and ambulance department in the Ministry of Health Mu'awieyah Hasaneen confirmed that medical crews were still pulling dozens from underneath rubble. Hasaneen sent a plea to all Arab governments to send medications and operating supplies to Gaza, saying most of the injured were too badly injured to be moved outside the Strip. Hospital corridors are filled with bodies and gurneys, and local morgues have run out of space. Anyone with mild or moderate wounds has been sent home and refused follow-up treatment.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34246

Gaza City hospital a gruesome scene; families pick through body parts to identify loved ones
(27 Dec) Death shrouds the hallways of Gaza City's Ash-Shefa medical compound Saturday, its smell creeping in from all corners. Amputated bodies are strewn throughout hallways because morgues in the city can no longer accommodate the dead. In one corner a man stands with his seven year old son in a cardboard box because the hospital ran out of sheets to cover the dead with. This is how he will carry him home and bury him. Another man stands dazed, in shock after watching his son Mohammed killed during his graduation ceremony at the de facto police headquarters. The father of one of Mohammed's classmates stood next to his son as he was decapitated. The man is still screaming.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34268

Gaza-based foreigners witness catastrophic violence
(27 Dec) "The bombs began to fall just as the children were on the streets walking back from school. I went out onto the stairs and a terrified five-year-old girl ran sobbing into my arms."-Sharon Lock, Australia. "The home I am staying in is across from the Preventive Security compound. All the glass of the house shattered. The home has been severely damaged. Due to the siege there is no glass or building materials to repair this damage. One little boy in our house fainted. An eight-year-old little boy was trembling on the ground for an hour. In front of our house we found the bodies of two little girls under a car, completely burnt. They were coming home from school. This is more than just collective punishment. We are being treated like laboratory animals. I have lived through the Israeli bombardment of Beirut and Israel's message is the same in Gaza as it was in Beirut—the killing of civilians. [loud blast] There was just another explosion outside!"-Natalie Abu Eid, Lebanon
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34279

VIDEO-Scores die in Israeli airstrikes
(27 Dec) Israeli F-16 bombers have launched a series of air strikes against key targets in the Gaza Strip, killing at least 155 people, medical chiefs say. Gaza officials and the Hamas militant group said about 200 others were hurt as missiles hit security compounds and militant bases across the territory.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7800985.stm

VIDEO: Witness describes Gaza attacks
(27 Dec) Fikr Shallpoot, a health worker and resident in Gaza, spoke to the BBC about the attacks that she witnessed.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7801291.stm

Sinai governor: Rafah crossing opened to transfer injured
(27 Dec) Egypt has opened the Rafah border crossing to transfer injured Palestinians, according to the Sinai governor. Egypt announced that it opened the Rafah crossing to receive dozens of injured at Egyptian hospitals. It sent dozens of ambulances there, as well.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34252

Hundreds killed in a series of bloody IAF raids
(27 Dec) GAZA, (PIC)--Israeli warplanes on Saturday launched a series of bloody air raids on the Gaza Strip that left at least 120 people killed and 200 others wounded. Witnesses described the intensified raids as a "real war" where they targeted almost all security headquarters in the Strip killing scores of Palestinians. They said that IOF F-16s raided residential neighborhoods in north, central and south of the Gaza Strip, noting that the raids coincided with the students' return to their homes from school. Medical sources said that a preliminary estimate indicates that 120 people were killed and hundreds injured including women and children.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/

Palestinians: At least 155 dead, 200 injured in IAF Gaza strikes
(27 Dec) Israel launched Saturday morning the start of a massive offensive against Qassam rocket and mortar fire on its southern communities, targeting dozens of buildings belonging to the ruling Hamas militant group...The first wave of air strikes was launched by a 60 warplanes which hit a total of 50 targets in one fell swoop. The IAF deployed approximately 100 bombs, with an estimated 95 percent of the ordnance reaching its intended target. Most of the casualties were Hamas operatives. Prior to the operation, Israel sought to catch Hamas off guard by luring it into a false sense of security through certain measures, including the opening of Gaza border crossings on Friday. Immediately following the first wave, some 20 IAF aircraft struck 50 Palestinian rocket launchers in an effort to minimize Hamas' retaliatory strikes. The IDF emphasized that civilians located in areas whence Palestinians launch rockets and who quarter Hamas operatives in their homes are liable to be hurt.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050359.html

Barak: It won't be easy, it won't be short
(27 Dec) Defense Minister Ehud Barak convened a press conference on Saturday afternoon to formally announce the beginning of the IDF's operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Barak laid out the three objectives of the offensive – dealing Hamas a forceful blow, fundamentally changing the situation in Gaza, and bringing to the cessation of rocket attacks against Israeli citizens. "There is a time for calm and there is a time for fighting, and now is the time for fighting. The operation will expand as necessary," said Barak. "I don't want to mislead anyone. This won't be easy and it won't be short, but we must be determined," he added.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3645073,00.html

Hamas source: Israeli strike unexpected
(27 Dec) A Hamas source in Gaza confirmed Saturday that the Israeli Air Force attack on the Gaza Strip caught the organization completely off guard. Hamas, said the source, did not believe the IDF would launch a strike on Shabbat. Earlier in the week, many Hamas operative went underground, fearing an Israeli assault, but despite the precautions taken by Hamas, many of its police stations across the Strip were operating as usual, again – believing an Israeli attack will not begin over the weekend. Hamas spokesman Fauzi Barhum told the media that the organization learned on Friday that Israel was not going to launch any military operation in Gaza. Egypt had recommended Hamas cease all rocket fire immediately, in order to allow Israel to postpone its planned offensive in the Strip. According to a Hamas source, the organization believed an Israeli offensive would mimic past ones and target Hamas training and other minor facilities, and not offices meant to provide services to the general population. Among the offices hit were the Gaza passport bureau and the Preventive Security Headquarters.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3645001,00.html

Palestinians rally to condemn Gaza attacks, call Israeli move 'bloody massacre'
(27 Dec) All Palestinian sides have condemned the Israeli attacks on Gaza, calling the action a "massacre," and encouraging Palestinian factions to rally in support of the people in the Strip.communicating through his spokesperson Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he "condemns the Israeli attacks against the Gaza Strip." His spokesperson Nabil Abu Rudeineh added that Abbas "calls on the Israeli government to stop these attacks immediately, and to stop such massacres." Member at the executive committee for the PLO Taysir Khaled accused Israel of using weapons in Gaza that are banned internationally and condemned the Israeli attack. He called for immediate intervention to stop the military action, which he said has been in the works for months.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34248

Demonstrations erupt across West Bank in protest of Israeli violence in Gaza

(27 Dec) Demonstrations in Hebron, Bethlehem and Ramallah erupt in protest of Israeli actions in Gaza. Clashes erupt between protesters and Israeli troops in Hebron. The Fatah party in Ramallah organized a rally for hundreds of people Saturday, and called a general strike that saw all shops in the city close for the day. Demonstrators and international community institutions lifted banners and slogans saying "one blood, one nation, Gaza we are with you." One Palestinian official in the ministry of Prisoners Affairs Ziyad Abu Ein said the event showed that Palestinian unity can oppose Israeli aggression, and called on all Palestinians to unite in dark days. Palestinian Legislative Council member Mustafa Barghouthi attended the rally and called the latest Israeli violence "their harshest crimes against Palestinians," and condemned other Arab states for their silence.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34263

'Israeli ministers war criminals'
(27 Dec) Arab-Israeli leaders slammed the Israeli assault on Gaza Saturday, referring to it as a "war crime." Knesset Member Jamal Zahalka, who participated in a rally in Nazareth, called for a general strike by Israel's Arab community in protest of the operation in Gaza. "Following this offensive, the world should punish Israel and impose a siege on it, because if the Gaza blockade is the result of the firing, then Israel fired in one day what the Palestinians have fired in five years," he said. "I call for the indictment of Barak on war crime charges in Gaza," he said. "Barak is attempting to win votes in exchange for Palestinian blood, yet it's not only Barak; all Israeli government ministers are war criminals."
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3645080,00.html

Barhoum: IOF air raids mass execution of Gaza inhabitants
(27 Dec) GAZA, (PIC)--Hamas on Saturday charged that the Israeli occupation forces' carnage in the Gaza Strip was made with the green light of regional parties and constituted a mass execution of the Gaza people. Barhoum, in a statement, pointed out that the raids came 24 hours after Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni's visit to Cairo where it met with the Egyptian president and senior officials then talked in a press conference about toppling Hamas's rule in Gaza. He said that such a massacre was possible thanks to Arab silence, European collusion and American support for Israeli occupation. "This bloody day was never witnessed before in the Gaza Strip", Barhoum underlined, adding that 150 martyrs fell in less than half an hour while 200 others were injured. He finally asked the Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, to strongly retaliate to the IOF aggression and to use all means available to defend the Palestinian people.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/


Fatah in Hebron condemns Israeli attacks, organizes blood drive to save Gazan lives

(27 Dec) Three days of mourning for the Gaza dead and a general strike have been declared by Hebron's Fatah party. Fatah will organize a mass blood drive to support the beleaguered hospitals in Gaza and ensure as many Palestinian lives as possible are saved.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34262

Abbas in 'urgent contact' with other states over Gaza strikes
(27 Dec) RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) – Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said on Saturday that he was in "urgent contact" with numerous countries over the deadly Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip. "We have carried out urgent contacts with numerous Arab countries and other nations to stop the cowardly aggressions and massacres in the Gaza Strip," Abbas told AFP from Saudi Arabia which he is currently visiting.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081227/wl_mideast_afp/mideastconflictgazaabbas_ 081227131918

Top UNRWA rep expresses 'horror' at Israeli violence in Gaza

(27 Dec) Commissioner General of UNRWA Karen AbuZayd expressed her "horror" at the extensive destruction in the Gaza Strip Saturday, and communicated her "deep sadness at the terrible loss in human life," in a press statement. The UNRWA said in the statement that it "strongly urges the Israeli Government to heed calls for ceasing its bombardment on Gaza." And reminded Israel that it is a signatory of "international conventions that protect non-combatants in times of conflict," and added that "these conventions are worthless if they are not upheld."
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34266

Foreign Ministry to mount emergency int'l public relations effort in wake of Gaza campaign
(27 Dec) Livni instructed senior ministry officials to open an aggressive and diplomatic international public relations campaign, in order to gain greater international support for Israel Defense Forces operations in the Gaza Strip. Livni instructed ministry officials currently on vacation in Israel to return immediately to their posts abroad, and to immediately mount public relations campaigns in their station countries, focusing on local media and public officials. Livni will hold a series of talks with foreign officials in the coming days, in which she will attempt to explain the rationale for the expanded IDF operations in the Gaza Strip.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050402.html

One Israeli killed, 4 hurt as Palestinian rockets hit Negev home
(27 Dec) Palestinians in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip fired at least 25 Qassam and Grad rockets into southern Israel on Saturday after Israeli air strikes killed more than 155 Palestinians in Gaza. One of the rockets directly struck a home in the town of Netivot, causing extensive damage. One person was killed in the attack and four suffered moderate to serious injuries. One rocket struck just outside Kiryat Gat, some 20 kilometers from Gaza. The strike marked the first time in the eight years since Hamas has been firing rockets into Israel that a rocket has struck the southern Israeli city.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050399.html

Rafah police station hit by Israeli missile
(27 Dec) Israeli warplanes targeted the police station in Rafah, leading to the collapse of several tunnels. Residents saw witnesses running from the tunnels as they collapsed behind them. Among the police officers killed in the Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip was de facto Police Chief Imad Al-Amsi.
http://www.maannews.net/en/index.php?opr=ShowDetails&ID=34251

New air attack on Gaza leaves a Palestinian Authority destroyed
(27 Dec) Palestinian sources in Gaza reported a fresh round of Israeli air attacks targeting the Palestinian Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs in the Tall Al Hawa area of the Gaza Strip on Saturday afternoon. The sources said that the building was totally destroyed, no injures were reported.
http://imemc.org/article/58168

Palestinian killed in Egypt-Gaza tunnel collapse
(27 Dec) GAZA CITY (AFP) – A Palestinian man was killed and four were injured on Saturday when a tunnel used by smugglers collapsed under Egypt's border with the Gaza Strip, the emergency services chief of the territory said. The cave-in happened at around 1:30 am on Saturday (2330 GMT Friday) near the border town of Rafah, Dr Moawiya Hassanein told AFP. "One Palestinian was killed and four others were injured," he said. Scores of tunnels, used by Palestinians and Egyptians to smuggle contraband [??] into the besieged territory, have collapsed in recent months, killing more than 40 people.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081227/wl_mideast_afp/mideastgazaegypttunnel_ 081227112624

US demands Hamas end terrorist attacks, urges Israel to avoid civilian casualties
(27 Dec) The United States on Saturday urged Israel to avoid civilian casualties in air strikes on Gaza, and said Hamas must stop rocket attacks into Israel for the violence to cease. The White House did not call for an end to the Israel Air Force strikes that have killed at least 155 people in Hamas-ruled Gaza.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050396.html

Gazan voices, American silence
(27 Dec) By Kenneth Ring. [Author's note: Just after this article was written, it became evident that Israel is likely to launch at least a limited attack on Gaza, which only heightens the sense of urgency for action that is advocated here.] The baby is crying again. You wake up. Cold. There is no electricity in the house; it went off during the night. For the last week – weeks, months – it has been on only sporadically. You throw on a coat and go to check on the baby. It seems listless. There is no milk in the house, and very little food. The UN shipments have stopped again, and you are not sure when they will resume.In the other room, you hear your husband coughing. He has been sick for weeks and lately he has been spitting up blood. He has tried to get permission to get to a hospital in Israel, but every time he has been denied permission to leave....
http://palestinethinktank.com/2008/12/27/kenneth-ring-gazan-voices-american-silence/

Arab journalist blasts Egyptian FM for failing to censure Livni Gaza threats
(27 Dec) In an editorial penned for the London-based pan-Arab daily Al-Quds al-Arabi , the paper's editor in chief, Abd al-Bari Atwan, takes Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit to task for failing to voice displeasure with Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni's threats against Hamas during Livni's meetings with senior officials in the Egyptian capital this week. Atwan wrote that Aboul Gheit's conduct-and his demand that both Israel and Hamas act with restraint and refrain from steps that would inflame tensions-did not distinguish him from that of a foreign minister of Sweden or Costa Rica, according to Israel Radio. The editor also doubted whether Egypt would allow a Hamas official to make similar threats towards Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050385.html

EU calls for immediate ceasefire in Gaza
(27 Dec) BRUSSELS (Reuters)-The European Union called for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza on Saturday. "We are very concerned at the events in Gaza. We call for an immediate cease-fire and urge everybody to exert maximum restraint," a spokesman for European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana said. "Everything must be done to renew the truce," he said. The EU's executive body, the European Commission, also called for "utmost restraint." EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said in a statement both sides must stop the escalation of violence which endangers the civilian population and called for an immediate return to the cease-fire.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUKTRE4BQ10Q20081227

Gaza braces for invasion as Barak threatens children
(27 Dec) GAZA CITY: The specter of a military invasion on Friday hung over Hamas-run Gaza Strip, where two children were killed as Palestinian militants fired more rockets despite Israeli threats of harsh retaliation...The Israeli government issued dire warnings to Gaza militants, saying it would strike back hard if attacks continue. "I will not hesitate to use Israel's strength to strike at Hamas and Islamic Jihad," Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in an interview with Al-Arabiya television on Thursday, adding ominously that "tens of thousands of children and innocents" would be at risk "as a result of Hamas' actions."
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10& categ_id=2&article_id=98704

Gaza massacres must spur us to action
(27 Dec) By Ali Abunimah. "I will play music and celebrate what the Israeli air force is doing." Those were the words, spoken on Al Jazeera today by Ofer Shmerling, an Israeli civil defense official in the Sderot area adjacent to Gaza, as images of Israel's latest massacres were broadcast around the world. A short time earlier, US-supplied Israeli F-16 warplanes and Apache helicopters dropped over 100 bombs on dozens of locations in the Israeli-occupied Gaza Strip killing at least 195 persons and injuring hundreds more. Many of these locations were police stations located, like police stations the world over, in the middle of civilian areas. The US government was one of the first to offer its support for Israel's attacks, and others will follow. Reports said that many of the dead were Palestinian police officers. Among those Israel labels "terrorists" were more than a dozen traffic police officers undergoing training. An as yet unknown number of civilians were killed and injured; Al Jazeera showed images of several dead children, and the Israeli attacks came at the time thousands of Palestinian children were in the streets on their way home from school.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10055.shtml

Gush Shalom: The war in Gaza-vicious folly of a bankrupt government
(27 Dec)-and Amos Oz will soon regret having supported it. The war in Gaza, the bloodshed, killing, destruction and suffering on both sides of the border, are the vicious folly of a bankrupt government. A government which let itself be dragged by adventurous officers and cheap nationalist demagoguery, dragged into a destructive and unnecessary war which will bring no solution to any problem – neither to the communities of southern Israel under the rain of missiles nor to the terrible poverty and suffering of besieged Gaza. On the day after the war the same problems will remain – with the addition of many bereaved families, wounded people crippled for life, and piles of rubble and destruction. The escalation towards war could and should have been avoided. It was the State of Israel which broke the truce, in the 'ticking tunnel' raid on the night of the US elections two months ago. Since then the army went on stoking the fires of escalation with calculated raids and killings, whenever the shooting of missiles on Israel decreased.
http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/events/1230387660

Analysis /Israel wants to teach Hamas a lesson, but not to reconquer Gaza
(27 Dec) By Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff. It took less than a week for Israel's decision makers to change their minds entirely. Exactly the same people-who last week presented convincing reasons to justify continuing the policy of restraint in the Gaza Strip, and expressed the fear that a large-scale military action would result in an expected imbroglio-have now changed their tune completely. There are several factors behind the change in policy. The central one, simply put, is the situation on the ground: Close to 200 Katyushas, Qassam rockets and mortar shells have been fired at the Negev since Hamas said it would not renew the tahadiyeh (lull) that had expired on December 19....
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050155.html

Analysis /A hard look at Hamas' capabilities
(26 Dec) By Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff. Approximately 15,000 armed Palestinians. That's the size of the military force the Israel Defense Forces will face if a major operation in the Gaza Strip goes forward. These militants, from various Hamas factions, will presumably be aided by a few thousand militants from other Palestinian groups. For two years Hamas, with Iranian assistance, has been working hard on developing its military power, using Hezbollah as a model. Gaza Palestinians are preparing to step up their offensive, with rockets and mortar shells directed at Israel's civilian population in the south, as well as their defense, digging in to retard the IDF's progress and cause heavy Israeli casualties. Nevertheless, military experts in Israel and the West believe the IDF is capable of retaking Gaza. Israeli reservations about a broad military operation, therefore, are mainly linked to the question of what happens afterward, when the IDF controls a large area that it doesn't want and is in constant friction with terrorists and the civilian population.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050282.html

War clouds over Gaza
(26-28 Dec) By Rannie Amiri. Why Must Israeli Electioneering Always Require Spilling of Palestinian Blood? is " … no one had been killed by the rocket barrages after the official end of the cease-fire [with Hamas]. This doesn't mean the situation is possible to live with, but it appears the hysterical reaction by the public as a whole and politicians in particular stems mainly from the fact that the country is in an election period. And when elections are in the offing people speak from the gut rather than the brain and demagogueryrampant."-Yoel Marcus, writing in Haaretz , 23 Dec. 2008.
http://www.counterpunch.org/amiri12262008.html

VIDEO: Gaza in crisis
(repeat, 9 Dec) This video describes in pictures and words the shocking details of Israels deliberate ravaging of Palestinian life and society in Gaza. Its purpose is to call attention to the plight of a people under siege, which so far has been chillingly ignored by governments and the world media unwilling to call Israel to account for its criminal execution of the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians from their own land . The video was created by Sonja Karkar for Australians for Palestine on 9 December 2008 using images captured by various courageous photographers on the ground in Gaza, and the haunting sounds of Sada ( Echo ), composed and played on the oud by Ahmad Al-Khatib . See , http://www.australiansforpalestine.com
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v =DSzn7XLLM7c&eurl=&feature=play er _ embedded

Slouching toward a Palestinian Holocaust
(written June 29, 2007) By Richard Falk .There is little doubt that the Nazi Holocaust was as close to unconditional evil as has been revealed throughout the entire bloody history of the human species. Its massiveness, unconcealed genocidal intent, and reliance on the mentality and instruments of modernity give its enactment in the death camps of Europe a special status in our moral imagination...Against this background, it is especially painful for me, as an American Jew, to feel compelled to portray the ongoing and intensifyingabuse of the Palestinian people by Israel through a reliance on such an inflammatory metaphor as 'holocaust.'...Is it an irresponsible overstatement to associate the treatment of Palestinians with this criminalized Nazi record of collective atrocity?I think not. The recent developments in Gaza are especially disturbing because they express so vividly a deliberate intention on the part of Israel and its allies to subject an entire human community to life-endangering conditions of utmost cruelty. The suggestion that this pattern of conduct is a holocaust-in-the-making represents a rather desperate appeal to the governments of the world and to international public opinion to act urgently to prevent these current genocidal tendencies from culminating in a collective tragedy.
http://www.transnational.org/Area _ MiddleEast /2007/Falk_PalestineGenocide.html

Ready to fire
(25-31 Dec issue) Saleh Al-Naami examines the prospects for Gaza after the ending of the ceasefire with Israel. A climate of impending war looms over Gaza in the wake of Israeli news reports of the Israeli government's plans for a major military offensive in Gaza. Resistance factions have set up more posts around towns, villages and refugee camps, especially those close to the border with Israel. Fighters have been seen taking up positions in nearby fields in order to prevent Israeli special forces units from infiltrating residential areas to carry out assassinations. Booby traps have been planted on roads along which Israeli tanks and other military vehicles are expected to pass. Many training areas have been vacated, forces have been spread to reduce their visibility and, Al-Ahram Weekly has learned, instructions have been issued to military rank and file to reduce their travel by car to avoid being picked out by the unmanned reconnaissance aircraft that have been continuously patrolling Gaza airspace for some time.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2008/927/fr1.htm

Real events of the year 2008
(27 Dec) By Reham Alhelsi . ...Although I wasn't that enthusiastic to read the list because as they say: you know the message from its title, and I knew the message from its composer, I nevertheless wanted to see if anything, any single word, would be mentioned about Palestine, other than Palestinian "attacks" on Israelis or Palestinian internal fights. The DPA didn't "disappoint" me and kept the German tradition: despite all the registered violations of Palestinian human rights on the hands of the Zionist state, and despite all the crimes starting from the Gaza siege, the Judaization of Jerusalem, the terrorist attacks carried out by fanatic Jewish settlers throughout the West Bank, the continuousconfiscation of Palestinian land, the Palestinians were mentioned only 2 times (other than Bush's visit to Israel and the Palestinians Territories).
http://palestinethinktank.com/2008/12/27/reham-alhelsi-real-events-of-the-year-2008/

Fighting for health
start, there will be people to (23 Dec) If one breaks a leg, one goes to the hospital, if one has a heart attack, one can count on prompt medical care, if one is pregnant, one can be sure that once contractionshelp deliver the baby in good health. But what if these daily things which have become so normal, cease to exist?What happens if you are seriouslybleeding, but no ambulances can reach you?What if you are about to deliver, but you cannot reach the hospitals because there happens to be a wall separating you from the medical care you so desperately need?Even if you tried to apply for a permit months in advance, but it has not been granted to you. And what if you are suffering from a serious disease that can only be treated in a specific hospital, but soldiers do not let you pass the checkpoint?Then one must return home and wait to die, with the knowledge that just beyond the wall, there are people with the skills to save your life, the life of your child or unborn baby. Once the right to health is taken from you, it becomes of omnipotentimportance.
http://www.palestinemonitor.org/spip/spip.php?article733

Palestinian children bear brunt of blocade
(26 Dec) Dubai: An international relief agency executive called on the international community to help children in Gaza, whom he said are literally facing extinction as a result of almost two years of an Israeli blockade against the strip. Steve Sosebee , president and chief executive of the Palestine Children's Relief Fund ( PCRF ), told Gulf News the UN, the US and the EU should help children in Gaza who are faced with extremely severe conditions.
http://archive.gulfnews.com/region/Middle_East/10270266.html

Palestinian children get a helping hand
(26 Dec) Dubai: "I don't know what I want to be in the future. There are no opportunities in Khalil, (West Bank)," said 10 year old Islam Samouh with a these , who came to Dubai to get fittedprosthetic limb. He lost his right arm following an electric shock while trying to place a Palestinian flag on the roof of his house. Due to political restrictions, the environmentunderprivileged children are forced to live in, in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip is unsafe. Poorly maintained construction sites and hanging electric wires in householdscause misdiagnosed illnesses and accidents. One such case is Yousuf Mahmoud, an 11 year old child who lost his right foot when a heavy piece of iron fell on it while he was playing at a construction site in Khalil, West Bank.
http://www.gulfnews.com/nation/Society/10270326.html

Fatah postpones convention
(25-31 Dec issue) By Khalid Amayreh. With the "peace process" going nowhere, and beset by chronic internal divisions, Fatah has once again postponed convening its long-overdue Sixth Congress. The last time Fatah held its general congress was in Algiers nearly 20 years ago. Fatah leaders, including Palestinian Authority President (PA) Mahmoud Abbas, had been vowing ad nauseam to hold the convention before the end of 2008. However, Fatah's inability to put its house in order and the lingering showdown with Hamas , which is in control of the Gaza Strip, have made the holding of a successful congress virtually impossible.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2008/927/re51.htm

PCHR weekly report : 2 Palestinians dead, 10 wounded in 25 incursions
(26 Dec) In its weekly report of Israeli human rights violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (West Bank and Gaza) for the week of 18-23 December 2008, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) reported that 10 Palestinians, including 3 children and a journalist, and an Israeli journalist, were wounded by Israeli forces in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. One Palestinian resistance fighter was killed, and one man died of earlier wounds. In addition, Israeli forces attacked 2 Palestinian ambulances, conducted 25 incursions, abducted 18 Palestinian civilians, including 4 children, stormed a medical center in Hebron , and continued to impose a total siege and have isolated the Gaza Strip from the outside world.
http://www.imemc.org/article/58158

Troops invade village near Jenin
with dozens of (26 Dec) The Palestine News Network reported on Friday evening that Israeli soldiers invaded Arraba town, south west of Jenin, in the northern part of the West Bank, and clashedyouth who hurled stones at them. One youth was treated by field medics after inhaling gas fired by the army.Soldiers fired rounds of live ammunition in several directions while invading the town, and broke into a number of homes. Eyewitnesses reported that soldiers detained several youths in Abu Ali Mustafa Street. Dozens of youthsclosed the street with rocks and hurled stones and empty bottles at the invading forces. The army fired gas bombs and rubber coated bullets; one youth was wounded. Furthermore, soldiers closed the Al Hamra roadblock, near Jenin, for two hours and searched dozens of vehicles attempting to cross. Later on, soldiers kidnapped one youth and took him to an unknown destination.
http://imemc.org/article/58162

IOF troops violently quell peaceful Bil'in march
(27 Dec) RAMALLAH , (PIC)--Two Palestinian citizens were wounded on Friday with Israeli occupation forces' rubber-coated bullets while participating in a peaceful march to protest confiscation of their Bil'in village land west of Ramallah ... IOF troops entrenched behind cement blocs separating the villagers from the wall fired teargas canisters and rubberbullets at the march wounding two demonstrators while tens suffered from suffocation. In another incident, Jewish settlers in the Ramallah district bulldozed Palestinian agriculturelands on Friday. Locals said that the citizens confronted the settlers in three villages and forced them to flee, adding that it was not the first incident of its kind. They pointed out that the settlers cut hundreds of olive trees a few days ago in the same area, adding that the olive trees are the main source of sustenance for villagers in those areas.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/


Southern Bethlehem confronts occupation: engagement party prevented from moving
from and (26 Dec) Bethlehem /Najib Farrag – Due to Israeli land confiscation in the southern Bethlehem villages, an engagement party hit a major barrier when it was prevented by soldiersmoving forward. Twenty-one year old Yasim Zoahra, the daughter of an organizer of the local nonviolent resistance, was travelling from Bethlehem City 12 kilometers to the north in order to complete her engagement party. Israeli soldiers held her caravan behind barbed wire for two hours. The soldiers did not let her pass while demonstrators were unable to reach their lands. This week's demonstration in southern Bethlehem was held in honor of the besieged Gaza Strip and the leftist leader Ahmad Sa'adat. While Al MasraUmm Salamuna villages protest in solidarity with other Palestinians under siege, the southern Bethlehem nonviolent resistance continues to face the major problem of nonstopland confiscation.
http://english.pnn.ps/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=4293&Itemid=1

Genocidal settlers
(18-24 Dec issue) By Khalid Amayreh in the West Bank. ...It is no exaggeration to say that genocide of non-Jews in Israel and Palestine is the ideology of Jewish settlers, and religious Zionism in general. A few weeks ago, one Jewish settler leader in Hebron who was arguing with an American tourist had this to say about how the Jewish state should deal with Arabs. "You are a Christian, aren't you?" "Yes," said the American. "Do you believe in the Bible?" "Yes," said the American. "Well then, you should know that Godordered the ancient Israelites to wipe off the goyem from the holy land of Israel. If that was right then, why can't it be right now?" Startled by the settler's rationale, the American tourist walked away in disbelief.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2008/926/re71.htm

Olmert orders completion of apartheid wall around Jerusalem
(26 Dec) OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)--The outgoing Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert has ordered the completion of the apartheid wall around occupied Jerusalem by the end of 2009, according to Israeli sources. After a tour of the apartheid wall's path around Jerusalem, that the Israeli occupation calls the "Jerusalem envelope", Olmert many claimed that the apartheid wall was a necessity for Israel's security. The apartheid wall around Jerusalem excludes many Palestinian neighbourhoods of Jerusalem, divides others and isolatesneighbourhoods from one another and from services. The Israeli sources stated that the length of the apartheid wall around occupied Jerusalem is 164.5 Kilometres, of which 110 Kilometres were completed.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/

Israeli Arab party meets with leftist Palestinian faction led by convicted terrorist
(26 Dec) A far-left Israeli political party met in Ramallah on Thursday with representatives of left-wing Palestinian factions, one of whose leaders was sentenced on Thursday to 30 years in prison for being a member of the group. Hadash , the predominantly Arab political party which is represented by three Knesset members , began a round of meetings with leftist Palestinian factions, including the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine , the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine , and the Palestinian People's Party .
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050381.html

Saturday: 31 Iraqis killed, 76 wounded
more were (27 Dec) Excerpt: Baghdad suffered a significant attack in the Shi'ite enclave of Khadamiya, but there were also notable attacks elsewhere. At least 31 Iraqis were killed and 76woundedacross the country. No Coalition deaths were reported. In Baghdad, 25 people were killed and as many as 54 were wounded during a car bombing that targeted a Khadhamiya area taxi stand.
http://antiwar.com/updates/

Iraq prison riot leaves 13 dead
(27 Dec) Reporting from Baghdad--A suspected Sunni Arab insurgent with ties to the group Al Qaeda in Iraq persuaded a prison guard to open his cell door, then overpowered him and stole his weapon, setting off a deadly riot that left 13 people dead in Ramadi, west of Baghdad, authorities said.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/mideastemail/la-fg-iraq27-2008dec27,0,1560268.story

US military deaths in Iraq at 4, 217
than the Defense and As of Friday, Dec. 26, 2008, at least 4,217 members of the U.S. military had died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figureincludes eight military civilians killed in action. At least 3,398 military personnel died as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers. The AP count is three higherDepartment's tally, last updated Wednesday at 10 a.m. EST. The British military has reported 178 deaths; Italy, 33; Ukraine, 18; Poland, 21; Bulgaria, 13; Spain, 11; Denmark, seven; El Salvador, five; Slovakia, four; Latvia and Georgia, three each; Estonia, Netherlands, Thailand and Romania, two each; and Australia, Hungary, KazakhstanSouth Korea, one death each. [ Estimated Iraqi deaths : 1,297,997]
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081227/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_us_deaths

How can anyone believe there is progress in the Middle East ?
the (27 Dec) By Robert Fisk. If reporting is, as I suspect, a record of mankind's folly, then the end of 2008 is proving my point. Let's kick off with the man who is not going to change Middle East, Barack Obama, who last week, with infinite predictability, became Time's "person of the year". But buried in a long and immensely tedious interview inside the magazine, Obama devotes just one sentence to the Arab-Israeli conflict: "And seeing if we can build on some of the progress, at least in conversation, that's been made around the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will be a priority." What is this man talking about?"Building on progress?" What progress?On the verge of another civil war between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, with Benjamin Netanyahu a contender for Israeli prime minister, with Israel's monstrous wall and its Jewish colonies still taking more Arab land, and Palestinians still firing rockets at Sderot , and Obama thinks there's "progress" to build on?
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/fisk/robert-fiskrsquos-world-how-can-anyone-believe-there-is
-progress-in-the-middle-east-1212434.html


Richard Falk , Israel, and the New York Times
those of (26-28 Dec) By Ellen Cantarow. As Israel nails shut the coffin that is Gaza under a siege that has lasted nearly three years, steadily intensifying so that malnutrition rates rivalsub-Saharan Africa, sewage runs raw in the streets and pollutes the ocean, homes are still being bulldozed to super-add collective punishment upon collectivepunishment; men, women and children are still being sniped at and killed; children are deafened by continuing sonic booms, the vast majority of them suffer from post-traumaticstress syndrome, and many of that majority have no ambition other than becoming "martyrs," Israel in mid-December denied entry to Richard Falk , UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur on the occupied territories. It is Dr. Falk's responsibility to report to the UN on conditions in the occupied territories. Israel is blocking him from carrying out this job. In an article that reads as if it rolled off the computers in Israel's Government Press Office (no quotes by anyone friendly to Falk's point of view, for instance), The New YorkTimes, tells us Dr. Falk "has long been criticized in Israel for what many Israelis say [emphasis mine] are unfair and unpalatable views." The blind attribution is typical.
http://www.counterpunch.org/ca ntarow12262008.html

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www.TheHeadlines.org


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