Are the Israeli strikes on Gaza justified?

[RSS News]

Palestinian hospital sources say 200 people have been killed in Israeli air strikes. How will this affect the region?

(Feed provided by BBC News | Have your Say (http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/2/hi/talking_point/default.stm))

[Guerrilla22]

It will make life in Gaza even more miserable than it usually is.

[Q]

"Elections are coming up in Israel: what do we do to gain more votes?"
"Ah, lets just bomb Gaza in order to boost confidense that we're handling our nations' security well!"

:glare:

[Dean]

Well, you know what disgusts me? All throughout the cease-fire, Israel was squeezing Gaza. And yet, a day after 70 rockets are fired into Israel, they let in trucks filled with tonnes of oil and grain. Israel is sendign the message, as they always have, that they will step up their violence whenever Gazans are peaceful. It benefits Israel to fight a constant war, and this method is meant to act as justification for that war. It allows them to justify more land theft, more incursions. This has been the status quo for 50 years, why would they want the violence to stop?

The strikes are political tools, they serve no purpose to security. Do you think that is justification?

[Guerrilla22]

Oh but they have no other recourse. They have to "defend" themselves. :rolleyes:

So some kazam rockets killed one Israeli, so they kill hundreds in response then state that they have only just begun. this fucking bloodbath should have everyone in the world completely outraged. The so called international community will stand and watch and issue some statement about how unfortunate the situation is and the need to resolve the conflict while bodies pile up outside of morgues in Gaza, fucking makes me ashamed to be a human being.

[Pogue]

Waiting for Yehuda Stern in this thread.

[Yehuda Stern]

First of all, I am always appalled by the way in which the NewsBot phrases questions, but this time it's really disgusting - can you really ask on a left-wing forum if the murderous air strikes of the Zionist state on the oppressed Palestinians in Gaza are justified? No one who answers positively should be allowed to write in these boards, anyway.

I have published our line on Gaza here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/defeat-zionist-army-t97996/index.html). In short, we oppose the strike resolutely and call on the world working class to do all it can to support the Palestinian struggle against Zionist brutality. The only way there will be any peace in this region is if the Zionist state is overthrown and a Palestinian workers' state is created instead of it.

We would like to say that the question of "who started it" is completely irrelevant. If the Palestinians were to shoot first, they would be right to do so. However, even that is not the case. Hamas has made its bid for the position of the imperialist tool in Palestine in place of the PLO. Israel is uncomfortable with not having an enemy. These strikes express the murderous insanity of the Zionist ruling class, realizing that it is facing its final hour.

We will continue with more analysis as the situation develops.

[Pogue]

Basically, continue fighting the state and capitalism guys. :)

[8bit]

We're oppressed for thousands of years, and then Israel goes and shits on our image.

I hate how the mainstream U.S. media doesn't see the murder of hundreds as terrorism, but the firing of what are little more than bottlerockets into the those whom have forced them to live without food, water, transportation, and power is terrorism.

[OneNamedNameLess]

The US media is under the thumb of the US elites who, along with the White House, support Israel. Israel's assault on Islamic nations benefits the west whether it's Syria, Lebanon or Palestine.

[Glenn Beck]

Unfathomable, unconscionable and unjustifiable.

[Guerrilla22]

We would like to say that the question of "who started it" is completely irrelevant.

Smartest comment I've heard in a while. It isn't a matter of who started what, when and how. It's about respect for human life, or lack there of.

[KurtFF8]

Are the strikes justified? Judge for yourself: One Israeli was killed by the Hamas rocket attacks while the Israeli strikes have killed over 200

[ckaihatsu]

http://fightbacknews.org/2008/12/chicago-protest-condemns-israeli-massacres-in-gaza.htm

Chicago: Protest condemns Israeli massacres in Gaza

By Stephanie Weiner

Chicago, IL - 500 people gathered here Dec. 28 for an emergency rally and press conference to condemn the Israeli attacks in the Gaza. The crowd formed a circle around the speakers in front of the Water Tower at noon. The real anger was felt when most of the group moved to the corner to chant at the lone Zionist with an Israeli flag across the street. The militant chanting ranged from, "Free, free Palestine!" to "End the occupation now!"

The young crowd, almost all wearing Palestinian scarves or carrying flags, called for an end to U.S. money to Israel. They said it most simply in their chant, "Down, down with Israel." The protesters left with plans to pass on the word about an even larger rally called for this coming Friday afternoon, Jan. 2, at the Tribune Plaza, which is one block from the Israeli Consulate.

__________________________________________________ ___
Fight Back News Service | www.fightbacknews.org

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[ckaihatsu]

[labor_action] GAZA braces for all-out war

[From http://english.aljazeera.net/]
[Updated Monday, December 29, 2008, 02:31 GMT]

Gaza braces for all-out war [Edited]

Residents of Gaza are bracing for an all-out war, as Israeli forces
continued a massive onslaught on the heavily populated strip for a
second day.

So far almost 300 people have been killed and hundreds more injured
and there are growing fears of a ground attack after the Israeli army
called up thousands of reservists and tanks massed along the Gaza
border.

Palestinian officials said several children are among the casualties
while United Nations officials in New York said nine of its staff had
been killed in the attacks.

In the latest raid on Sunday night Israeli aircraft bombed the
Islamic university in Gaza City, with witnesses reporting a series of
explosions across the campus.

A government compound was also hit.

Israel has made no comment on the latest strikes other than to say
they will press ahead with the campaign in the face of mounting
international criticism.

Earlier on Sunday Israeli aircraft bombed the length of the Gaza-
Egypt border, taking out tunnels used to smuggle in vital goods to
the besieged strip.

Dozens of tunnels are said to criss-cross between southern Gaza and
Egypt's Sinai desert, providing a lifeline to residents who are
starved of basic supplies due to an 18-month-long Israeli blockade....

Border gunfire

Gunfire was heard close to the Egyptian border with reports
suggesting that Palestinians were attempting to break through, while
the aerial bombardment continued over Gaza City.

Ayman Mohyeldin, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Rafah, a town split in
half by the border, said at least one person died and 42 others were
injured in the strikes on the tunnels.

"It's certainly a devastating blow to the civilian population in
Gaza," he said, adding that speculation the tunnels might be hit had
already caused the price of fuel and other goods to soar.

At the Rafah border, Palestinian fighters traded fire with Egyptian
security forces, our correspondent said.

At least one Egyptian border guard and one Palestinian youth were
killed in the clashes.

Medical aid

Tensions at the crossing with Egypt, bypassing Israel, had risen
during the day, with Egypt blaming Hamas for not letting wounded
Palestinians through and Hamas asking for medical aid to be handed
over.

A Gaza health ministry official at the border, Alaa el-Din Mohammed
el-Batta, said that transporting the seriously wounded was difficult
and further complicated by Israeli air assaults.

"We have 25 in very critical condition," he said. "Because of the
distance, there are fears that many will die on their way to Cairo.

A security official said that an Egyptian plane with 50 doctors on
board as well as medical supplies had arrived in el-Arish near the
border with Gaza.

Two Qatari aircraft carrying 50 tonnes of medical supplies have been
waiting at the same airport.

Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah has ordered three plane-loads of medical
aid sent to the Gaza Strip, the MENA news agency reported.

Iran says it is sending plane-loads of food to Cairo to be taken by
the Egyptian Red Crescent to Gaza.

Haniya office hit

Earlier on Sunday afternoon, Israeli forces struck east of Gaza City,
in Khan Yunis, and Jabaliya, in the north.

A police station and a factory were among the sites reportedly hit,
after a mosque and the headquarters of al-Aqsa television were struck
overnight.

The Reuters news agency said that at least one missile hit the
offices of Ismail Haniya, the Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip, but he
was not in the building at the time.

Ehud Barak, Israel's defence minister, warned that the air raids
could be followed by a ground incursion....

Israeli television has reported that hundreds of infantry and
armoured forces were massing on the border of the territory, and on
Sunday the army was given approval to call up reservists to bolster
its fighting strength.

Mustafa Barghouthi, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council,
rejected the Israeli government's claims that the air raids were in
self-defence.

"This is a bloodbath, the bloodiest bloodbath since 1967," he told Al
Jazeera. "This is an attack on the civilian population of Gaza" ...

Hospitals, already suffering from shortages due to an 18-month
blockade on the Gaza Strip, said they were struggling to cope with
the number of injured, which includes women and children.

One of the buildings hit on Sunday was reportedly a warehouse used to
supply local pharmacies with medicines....

[ckaihatsu]

http://wsws.org/articles/2008/dec2008/pers-d29.shtml

World Socialist Web Site
wsws.org

Published by the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI)


Washington bears guilt for Gaza war crimes


29 December 2008

The Israeli massacre of Palestinians in Gaza is a war crime for which not only the government of Israel but also that of the United States bears full responsibility.

The relentless bombing campaign, which in its first 48 hours has left at least 300 dead and 1,000 wounded, is a deliberate slaughter of innocent civilians and an act of state terror. The toll of casualties, many of them women and children, is certain to rise. As Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Lieutenant-General Gabi Ashkenaz put it, "This is only the beginning."

The pretense that this assault is an act of retaliation for the recent scattered rocket attacks that have been carried out against Israeli territory from inside Gaza is preposterous. Israel, with the collaboration of Washington, has been preparing the current bombing campaign and threatened ground assault for months, under the cover of the supposed cease-fire with Gaza's Hamas-led administration.

"These people are nothing but thugs," said White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe, who insisted that Israel was only acting to "defend itself" against "terrorists."

This is the official story that is largely echoed by the mass media and endorsed by the leadership of the Democratic Party.

Few bother to point out that not a single Israeli was killed by the homemade rockets that supposedly justified Israel launching its Gaza bombardments and killing 300 (one Israeli died in a rocket attack afterwards.) Such a disproportionate response is hardly an aberration. During the last eight years, barely a score of Israelis have died in rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza. During the same period, Israeli forces have killed nearly 5,000 Palestinians.

Nor is there much concern over the fact that Israel chose to launch its bombing in the most crowded and desperately poor urban area on the face of the earth precisely at the hour that schoolchildren were making their way home. Under these conditions, ritualistic US statements urging Israel to "avoid civilian casualties" amount to mocking the victims.

Having maligned an entire people as "thugs," the White House has given the green light for a bloodbath. More importantly, it has provided the indispensable resources for carrying out this crime, assuring Israel more than $3 billion a year in US military aid and supplying the IDF with the deadly tools of its trade—F-16 fighter jets, Apache attack helicopters, TOW and Hellfire missiles and the fuel and spare parts needed to keep them in operation.

The dispatches from inside Gaza provide a graphic accounting of what Washington got for its arms and money.

Safa Joudeh, a freelance journalist in Gaza City, writes: "There were piles and piles of bodies in the locations that were hit. As you looked at them you could see that a few of the young men were still alive, someone lifts a hand, and another raises his head. They probably died within moments because their bodies were burned, most had lost limbs, some of their guts were hanging out and they were all lying in pools of blood."

Ewa Jasiewicz reports from Gaza: "We saw a bearded man, on a stretcher on the floor of an intensive care unit, shaking and shaking, involuntarily, legs rigid and thrusting downwards. A spasm coherent with a spinal chord injury. Would he ever walk again or talk again? In another unit, a baby girl, no older than six months, had shrapnel wounds to her face. A relative lifted a blanket to show us her fragile bandaged leg. Her eyes were saucer-wide and she was making stilted, repetitive, squeaking sounds."

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz carried a report from its correspondent on the scene: "Relatives search among the bodies and the wounded in order to bring the dead quickly to burial. A mother whose three school-age children were killed, and are piled one on top of the other in the morgue, screams and then cries, screams again and then is silent."

The New York Times, hardly known for its sympathy for the Palestinians, acknowledged: "Still, there was a shocking quality to Saturday's attacks, which began in broad daylight as police cadets were graduating, women were shopping at the outdoor market, and children were emerging from school.

"The center of Gaza City was a scene of chaotic horror, with rubble everywhere, sirens wailing, and women shrieking as dozens of mutilated bodies were laid out on the pavement and in the lobby of Shifa Hospital so that family members could identify them. The dead included civilians, including several construction workers and at least two children in school uniforms."

This is not self-defense; it is premeditated mass murder. The aim of the "shock and awe" campaign, as the assault on Gaza is widely described in Israel, is similar to that conducted by the US against Iraq—regime change.

Neither the Zionist regime nor Washington accepted the victory of Hamas in the 2006 Palestinian election—hailed by the Bush administration (before the results were known) as part of a flowering of democracy in the Middle East wrought by American militarism.

In response, the US and its Israeli ally did their best to provoke a Palestinian civil war and military coup and, when this proved ineffective in ousting Hamas from power in Gaza, subjected the territory's one-and-a-half million people to relentless collective punishment. They imposed a siege that choked off supplies of food, medicine, potable water and electricity, condemning masses of people to poverty, unemployment, hunger and disease. The present killing represents a qualitative escalation of this merciless policy of making life for the people of Gaza so intolerable that the Hamas regime would fall.

The New York Times Sunday gave a concise analysis of the real relationship between the Israeli blockade and the rocket attacks from Gaza. The siege, it stated, had led to "the near death of the Gazan economy," adding, "While enough food has gone in to avoid starvation, the level of suffering is very high and getting worse every week."

Hamas had entered a cease-fire with Israel in a bid to reopen trade and alleviate this suffering. While the rocket attacks, supposedly Israel's main concern, fell "dramatically in the fall to 15 to 20 a month from hundreds a month," the Times noted, "Israel said it would not permit trade to begin again because the rocket fire had not completely stopped..." It was this intransigence that led to the collapse of the Israeli-Hamas cease-fire.

From the outset, Israeli actions have been motivated not by concerns for security, but rather by political aims. In the first instance, there is the desire to oust the Hamas administration in Gaza. Also in play are the desires of the Zionist establishment and military to offset the humiliation they suffered in Lebanon in 2006.

For Washington, support for and direct complicity in Israeli war crimes is bound up with a wider strategic policy of creating a new order in the Middle East, one designed to assure undisputed US domination of the region and its oil wealth. Israel represents the junior partner in this bloody venture and is allowed to satisfy its aggressive appetites because they are seen as furthering US imperialist interests.

Regime change in Gaza is viewed by US policymakers as a steppingstone to similar changes elsewhere, particularly in Syria and Iran. Indeed, the unfolding events in Gaza foreshadow a broader intervention in the Middle East and the threat of a new war against Iran.

It is not, it must be noted, merely a question of the US and Israel. The assault on Gaza has enjoyed the direct or tacit support of the Arab bourgeois regimes, in the first instance that of Egypt, which has set up machineguns on its border with Gaza to shoot down fleeing Palestinians. The West Bank-based Palestinian Authority of President Mahmoud Abbas has likewise offered justifications for Israel's crimes.

The Bush administration has pursued its policy in the Middle East with relentless violence for the past eight years. There is no indication, however, that it will fundamentally change with the transfer of the White House to President-elect Barack Obama in less than a month.

Obama has maintained a discreet silence on Gaza, while consulting with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice from his vacation home in Hawaii. His aides have complacently insisted that there is "one president at a time" and it would be inappropriate for the advocate of "change we can believe in" to voice an opinion on the slaughter being carried out with US-supplied warplanes, bombs and missiles.

Elements of the Zionist establishment in Israel have voiced suspicion about Obama's policies, and there have been some suggestions that his approaching January 20 inauguration may have played a role in the timing of the Israeli assault.

It strains credulity, however, that Israel would have carried out its actions without prior consultations not only with the Bush administration, but with the Obama camp as well. Rather than trying to push through its Gaza attack out of fear of a less sympathetic environment in Washington after Obama enters the White House, it is far more likely that the Israeli government was doing Obama a favor by carrying out a crime that he supported before he had to take public responsibility for it.

The reality is that the Democratic president-elect has sworn to maintain US support for Israel and has repeatedly defended Israel's "right to self-defense," including during its criminal war against Lebanon in 2006 and in regard to its repeated attacks on Gaza. He has likewise promised to maintain the US pledge of $30 billion in arms aid to Israel over the next decade.

Those he has chosen as his top aides—the congressman and former Israeli citizen Rahm Emanuel as chief of staff and his former presidential rival Hillary Clinton as secretary of state—are known for having criticized the Bush administration for being insufficiently supportive of Israeli aggression.

During the election campaign last summer, Obama made a trip to the southern Israeli town of Sderot, which had been a target of rocket attacks from Gaza, to provide an explicit justification for the kind of assault now being waged.

"If somebody was sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I'm going to do everything in my power to stop that," Obama said during the visit. "And I would expect Israelis to do the same thing." He uttered not a word of sympathy for the Palestinians and gave no indication of what actions he expected from parents in Gaza who have watched their children torn to pieces by US-supplied bombs and missiles.

Meanwhile, Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi issued a statement providing an explicit endorsement of the Israeli bombing campaign. "When Israel is attacked," she said, "the United States must continue to stand strongly with its friend and democratic ally."

The response of Obama and the Democrats to the ongoing atrocity in Gaza represents a stark warning. Far from representing a last gasp of militarist aggression on the part of the lame duck Bush administration, the assault on Gaza is an indication of the shape of things to come.

The coming to office of the new Democratic administration will not spell an end to the crimes associated with US imperialism, but rather their continuation. Driven by the deepest economic crisis since the Great Depression, American militarism will play an ever more prominent role in Washington's desperate struggle against its rivals for the domination of dwindling markets and vital resources.

The struggle against war and the fight to hold accountable the authors of war crimes from Iraq to Gaza can be advanced only through the independent mobilization of the working class in a new mass political movement based upon a socialist program.

Bill Van Auken

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[ckaihatsu]

http://chicago.indymedia.org/newswire/display/85230/index.php


[PHOTOS] Hundreds Rally Against Israeli Bombings in Gaza


* Chris Geovanis/Chicago Indymedia

Protesters came by the hundreds to voice their opposition to U.S.-backed Israeli bombing raids on Gaza in the last 24 hours that have left hundreds dead and hundreds more wounded. The next action is planned for next Friday at Tribune Plaza.

[JimmyJazz]

One Israeli was killed by the Hamas rocket attacks while the Israeli strikes have killed over 200

That's what it says in an Al Jazeera video I watched, but it's misleading...that's only including the rocket attacks that have happened since the Israeli air strikes began.

I googled for a long time trying to find out the total number of Israelis killed by rockets since the 2005 cease fire, but couldn't find it.

Not that it matters, you don't fucking punish a civilian population for rocket attacks by a few people from a militant organization.

[Bilan]

Is killing working people ever justified?

[not_of_this_world]

What no one knows or refuses to acknowledge is how America contributes to the slaying and mayhem in the Gaza Strip. There is a complete blackout on the control Israel exercises on America. In short, we are ruled by Israel and that rule costs us untold trillions of dollars to bolster their war machine. When someone hints at the Israeli control of our government they are labeled Anti-Semitic! So what, they are milking America dry in their demands on us! Let's put the blame for the carnage on America and for letting Israeli dictate their need to murder Palestinians! All our problems with the east can be traced to the fact that Israel is running our foreign policy and our country and Hamas is only trying to defend the Palestinians. The terrorists are America and Israel in this equation!





semitic

[Killfacer]

palestinian hospital sources say 200 people have been killed in israeli air strikes. How will this affect the region?

(feed provided by bbc news | have your say (http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/2/hi/talking_point/default.stm))

stay away robot.