Why Isn't Gaza Being Rebuilt?

Jonathan S. Tobin 25.08.2015 -

See full article at http://tinyurl.com/p4h4wyu  

It’s been a year since the last summer’s war in Gaza ended and those who lost their homes during the fighting are still waiting for them to be rebuilt? To listen to Palestinian propagandists, this is the fault of Israel. That’s the conceit of an op-ed published Monday in the New York Times by author Mohammed Omer. 

According to Omer, Gaza is a “Gulag on the Mediterranean” still suffering under Israel “occupation” even though the Jewish state withdrew every last soldier, settler and settlement ten years ago. All the strip’s problems can, he writes, be attributed to an Israeli siege that imprisons and stifles the Palestinians living there. But, oddly enough, a slightly more realistic evaluation of their problems was to be found in a news article published by the Times the day before. The reason why not a single one of the 18,000 homes destroyed or damaged in the war has not been made habitable isn’t because the Israelis are preventing it from happening.

Even Hamas government officials concede that the Israelis haven’t stopped the shipment of cement and other building materials designated for civilian reconstruction from entering Gaza. Some of the problem lies in a cumbersome process needed to approve such shipments. The failure of international donors, especially from the Arab world, to make good on their pledges to help Gaza is also huge. But the main problem is that although homes aren’t being rebuilt, there is a lot of construction going on in Gaza. Unfortunately, the work is concentrated on the building of terror tunnels and other military infrastructure that will enable Hamas to launch another war on Israel if it suits their political needs or the whims of their Iranian allies.

Omer’s argument is a familiar one. Israel ought not to be allowed to prevent free entry in and out of Gaza for people or goods. The siege — in which Egypt plays as much a role as Israel though Omer barely mentions that point — reduces the Hamas government to a “municipal authority.” But this is nonsense. The reason why the international community has no problem with the loose blockade of Gaza is that it is run by a terrorist organization.

Gaza is an independent Palestinian state in all but name, and its government believes its main purpose is to wage a war on Israel to end the “occupation.” But by occupation, it doesn’t refer to an effort to get the Israelis to withdraw from the West Bank or even Jerusalem. Rather, as Hamas tells us over and over again in the public statements made by their leaders and its charter, occupation refers to all of Israel. Their war is not a limited one but an existential conflict whose only goal is to end Israel’s existence. It maintains its tyrannical control over the strip by trying to focus public anger at the Israelis and their Fatah rivals in the West Bank.

The reconstruction problem is terrible for the people of Gaza, but it also points out how the propaganda about Israel creating a humanitarian crisis there is a myth. Every day truck convoys of food, medicine and construction material approved by the joint commission run by United Nations, the PA and the Israelis arrives. But somehow that has not resulted in the rebuilding of homes since, as the Times reports, homeowners who are able to purchase the needed material resell it on the black market. That ensures it winds up being used, alone with Iranian aid smuggled into Gaza, to build more tunnels along the border with Israel or other military projects. Everyone knows that the joint monitoring system has failed to stop the use of international aid for Hamas terror projects.

Meanwhile, as the Times notes, 37,000 tons of cement allowed in by Israel sits unused in warehouses. This is largely due to Hamas incompetence and the fact that the Arab world is dubious of sending money to Gaza that won’t be used to help people.

This is a tragedy, but sympathy for suffering Palestinians and criticism of Israel won’t make anything better for them. Had the Palestinians used the Israeli withdrawal to build a free society and their economy, it might have thrived. Instead, the bloody Hamas coup enabled the terror group to transform the strip. But instead of a prison, it is a terror fortress.

If demands by so-called human rights groups for granting Gaza an open border were agreed to, it would result in the strip becoming even more of a military menace both to Israel and Egypt, not freedom for its people.

The problems of Gaza will only be solved when it is run by leaders that value the lives and the property of their people as much as the Israelis do. With Iran looking to invest some of the vast wealth that will come to it under the nuclear deal in aiding Hamas, there is little doubt there will be more bunkers and tunnels built in Gaza but few homes. It’s time for the international community to focus on the real problem. When they are no longer under the thumb of a group that is obsessed with an ideology of hate that prompts them to fight for Israel’s destruction, the Palestinians will rebuild Gaza and there will be no more danger of another war.

Today's @Amnesty Deceptions and Lies

This  posting has been cross posted from Elder of Ziyon  http://tinyurl.com/no3xc2y 

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As Amnesty continues to add to the anti-Israel rhetoric accompanying its "50 Days for Gaza" campaign, we will continue to expose their deceptions and lies.

Amnesty tweeted this:

Here's the event that they are linking to:

At approximately 23:00 on 9 July 2014, 9 Palestinian civilians were killed while they were in a beach coffee shop watching a match of the Football World Cup as Israeli warplanes bombarded the coffee shop. The victims were identified as: Ibrahim and Mohammed Kahlil Qannan, 24 and 26; Suleiman and Ahmed Saleem Mousa al-Astal, 17 and 18; Mousa Mohammed Taher al-Astal, 15; Mohammed Ihsan Farawana, 18; and Hamdi, Ibrahim and Saleem Sawali, 20, 28 and 23.

This is a lie. There were not 9 civilians. The cafe was hosting a gathering of the Fatah Abu Rish Brigades. Two brothers, Mohammed and Ibrahim Qanan, as I documented here.

Three other brothers from the same group listed in this "martyr's" poster, Hamdi, Ibrahim and Saleem Sawali:

And Mohammed Ihsan Farawana has another Fatah martyr's poster:

Civilians?

Amnesty lied again.

Amnesty silently changed the blood libel video first reported. They changed the video of a "roof knocking" to a different one, that can be seen here in full from YNet:

While the video does indeed show less than a minute between a small explosion and the one that destroys the house, what Amnesty doesn't tell you is that the target was Hamas rocket unit head Ayman Siam. And Amnesty's own Gaza Platform tells us that there was a much earlier warning that allowed all five families who lived in that house to escape well before either of these explosions. They number this as Incident 1475:

At approximately 10:22 pm on Friday, 11 July 2014, an Israeli warplane fired three missiles at a house belonging to Mohammed Mohammed Abdul Hadi Siyam (70 year old), located next to UNRWA clinic in Al-Shate’ refugee camp, west of Gaza. The attack has completely destroyed the 4 storey house, which was inhabited by 5 families (30 individual), including 15 children. IDF soldiers informed the owner of the house before they attacked targeted the house.[sic]

SOURCE: Al Mezan

Um Schmum

This says it all. No words are necessary!!

The UN Schabas Commission

It seems totally reasonable (if one can considerable any international action against Israel as reasonable) that the Schabas committee is not a commission of inquiry but rather a committee of foregone conclusions pretending to conduct an investigation before publishing its conclusions. Thus Israel has stated that it  will not cooperate with the committee established by the UN Human Rights Council to investigate the conflict between Hamas and Israel (summer 2014). This decision was made taking into account the council's obsessive hostility towards Israel, the committee's one-sided mandate and the publicly expressed anti-Israel positions of the committee's chair.

While Hamas launched thousands of rockets at Israel, the Human Rights Council decided in advance that Israel was guilty and established a committee to act as a rubber stamp for its predetermined positions. This is evident in the fact that the committee was instructed to investigate only the events occurring after the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers by Hamas terrorists. Further evidence of bias can be seen in the appointment of Prof. William Schabas - who is known for his anti-Israel views - to head the committee.

Many examples of Schabas' anti-Israel statements are recorded:

a) 7 January 2013: "My favorite would be Netanyahu within the dock of the International Criminal Court" (in connection with Operation Cast Lead in 2009, when Netanyahu was head of the opposition).

b) On 26 December 2010 he wrote: Netanyahu is "the single individual most likely to threaten the survival of Israel." 

c) Again in connection with Operation Cast Lead, Schabas said, "Why are we prosecuting the president of Sudan for Darfur at the International Criminal Court, and not President Peres for Gaza?"

d) Schabas has also defended past president of Iran, Ahmadinejad, and claimed that his repeated calls "to wipe Israel off the map" were not calls to genocide, but merely "political opinions".

e) In media interviews, Schabas refuses to call Hamas a terror organization, although it is defined as such in the United States, the European Union, Britain, Canada, and numerous other countries.

f) The Council's obsessive treatment of Israel since its establishment, revealed in its disproportionate focus on Israel and its unjust accusations against it.

The unreasonable mandate of the committee and appointment of its chairman prove once again that the Human Rights Council has betrayed its original purpose - instead of investigating war crimes perpetrated by terror organizations such as Hamas, the Council has again chosen to focus blame on Israel while granting legitimacy to terrorism.

Israel has stated that it is committed to international law and in all of its actions during Operation Protective Edge adhered to the standards and rules incumbent upon states fighting terrorism and thus has been confirmed by several  independent military sources. In contrast, Hamas deliberately committed heinous war crimes.

Israel has already set in motion investigations into the events of Operation Protective Edge in accordance with the highest international standards.

Houses Hit in Gaza Used For Military Purposes

Throughout the initial stages of Operation "Protective Edge" – initiated in order to restore security to Israel's civilian population under constant rocket and mortar fire from the Gaza Strip – the IDF struck a number of houses throughout the Gaza Strip belonging to Hamas operatives used for military purposes.

Hamas conducts its military activities deep within residential areas in the Gaza Strip. By doing so, Hamas exploits the IDF's desire and efforts to avoid harm to the Palestinian civilian population. In many cases, Hamas uses its commanders' own homes, where their families and other civilians may be residing, for military purposes. These houses may be used for activities such as weapons storage, command and control centers and communications. The cynical use of such homes can be seen in the following video, where a secondary explosion can be identified as the result of the detonation of weapons stored under the building: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5KJ3WMxArk&app=desktop

When such houses are used for military purposes, they may become legitimate military targets under international law. The IDF only aims its attacks against legitimate military targets as defined under the relevant rules of international law. In order to accurately determine military targets, the IDF employs advanced methods, including multiple levels of intelligence, the provision of legal advice and extensive prior training provided to operational commanders.

Even where a house is considered a lawful military target, the IDF takes great efforts to minimize any potential harm to the surrounding civilian population. It does so by using tools that may be available at the time, such as real time visual coverage in order to assess the civilian presence at the time of the attack, by carefully choosing weaponry and ammunition which will help to minimize any harm caused and by providing advance warnings in certain instances. Many of the IDF's efforts in this regard go over and above its legal obligations and the accepted practice of other militaries conducting hostilities in urban areas. Unfortunately, many of the IDF's attempts to provide advance warning are exploited by Hamas, who uses civilians as human shields in order to deter attacks.

Further, where a commander determines that an attack is expected to cause collateral damage which would be excessive in relation to the military advantage anticipated, the attack will not be carried out.

Nevertheless, regrettably, the IDF cannot guarantee that no civilian harm at all will be caused during its operations. When terrorist organizations such as Hamas deliberately use civilian homes for terrorist purposes, it is unavoidable that some civilians will be harmed when the IDF acts against these targets. Unfortunately, Hamas exploits such instances to claim that the IDF deliberately seeks to harm the civilian population in the Gaza Strip – but fails to acknowledge that it has intentionally put these citizens in grave danger by masking their terrorist activities behind a civilian veil.

The IDF is continuing to conduct its operations in full accordance with international law – including by only attacking legitimate military targets, and will continue its efforts to minimize the harm to the civilian population. In contrast, Hamas deliberately and constantly fires indiscriminately towards Israel's civilian population, and celebrates when Israel's civilians are harmed. These actions constitute the most heinous war crimes. The IDF will continue to defend its citizens from such terrorist activity.

"Protective Edge" Videos

Example of "roof Knocking" technique to minimize civilian casualties. Also, in this video you can see civilians surging onto the home that had just be warned to act as human shields.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTArVIHDelg&feature=share&list=PLObnKQho8o8PNUxfldeGNOsDFdazchJH8&index=9

 

Hamas Spokesman admits and calls for more human shields:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXZEzbT0H1s&feature=share&list=PLObnKQho8o8PNUxfldeGNOsDFdazchJH8&index=11

Example of an IDF aircraft pinpoint strike on a weapons cache embedded in within a civilian area. A large secondary blast reveals there was a lot of weaponry hidden.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ayyXgRVWHk&feature=share&list=PLObnKQho8o8PNUxfldeGNOsDFdazchJH8&index=12

Article about Hamas' use of Human shields

http://www.idfblog.com/blog/2014/07/08/hamas-uses-human-shields/

Israel's Response to Hamas Rocket Attacks

Talking points for use in the present crisis:

·       Israel has every right to defend itself and has the duty to protect its civilian population under attack according to international law

·       Hamas bears responsibility for the escalation. 

·       Hamas and the terrorist organizations deliberately target Israeli civilians  and cynically use Palestinian civilians as human shield, which is clearly against international law.

·       There is clear evidence that Hamas is calling on Palestinian civilians to serve as human shields for its terrorist infrastructure.  

·       Hamas is similar to other extremist Islamist organizations such as ISIS and al-Qaeda. 

·       Israel showed great restraint during the past three weeks of continuous rocket fire from Gaza and made every attempt to avoid escalation, only to be met by further barrages. 

·       Israel is making every effort to avoid causing harm to genuine civilians, phoning them, texting them before an attack.

·       Israel cannot tolerate a situation in which millions of its citizens are forced to live under a barrage of missiles.  

·       The main objective of the operation is to restore stability and quiet to the residents of Israel.

·       Israel’s actions are measured and directed at the missile launchers and the terror infrastructure. 

·       Israel left the Gaza Strip completely in August 2005 and does not have any territorial claims there.  

·       There is no blockade of the Gaza Strip: goods enter and exit the Gaza Strip freely as long as Hamas rocket fire doesn’t prevent it.

 

 

 

 

Operation Protective Edge - Background

(With thanks to the Israel Project)

In addition to demanding all sorts of concessions from Israel - prisoner releases, lifting restrictions on Gaza, etc - Hamas has also in the last 48 hours demanded a bunch of non-starters from Egypt and the Palestinian Authority. Just in the last 48 hours, they've demanded, as part of a ceasefire:

(1) That Palestinian Authority transfers money to pay for Hamas government employees, which wasn't happening when the Fatah/Hamas unity govt was stable, and definitely won't happen now.  http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/.premium-1.603649

(2) That Egypt ease movement through the Egyptian-Gaza border, which is a non-starter because the Egyptians fear that jihadists will use the transit in and out of the Sinai Peninsula. http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4539644,00.html

(3) That Israel fully lift security-based import/export restrictions on the Gaza Strip, which is a non-starter as long as Iran continues trying to deliver advanced missiles to Hamas.  http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4539644,00.html

(4) That Israel release a bunch of prisoners arrested after the murder of the three Israeli teens, which the Israelis won't do because they're seeking to deter future kidnappings/murders.  http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=710735

Just to be clear and explicit about how insane this is: Hamas has declared they'll keep firing on Israeli civilians until Cairo and Ramallah make a bunch of concessions to them, which Israel has no power over.

Even if those demands weren't non-starters - and they are - how could Netanyahu going to convince Sisi to let jihadists into the Sinai, or convince Abbas to release precious PA funds to his rivals in Hamas?