More Savagery in Jerusalem

What more needs top be said following the tragedy of another terror attack in Jerusalem- this from a friend who lives in Jerusalem. 

My granddaughter is doing her national service in this neighbourhood, I have to wonder what her thoughts will be.

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I wish to G-d I did not have to write this letter but write it I will because you need to know.

This morning in the religious neighborhood of Har Nof, Jerusalem, at 07:01, men were saying their morning prayers, prayer shawls about their shoulders and phylacteries on their foreheads as is commanded; two terrorists walked in to the synagogue armed with machetes and guns and hacked four Jews to death, maiming and injuring 13 others.The lives of 5 others hang in the balance including two policemen that rushed to the synagogue when they heard the gunshots.  So far there are 26 newly-orphaned Jewish children

The terrorists knew each and every one of the men they attacked. One was the janitor of the synagogue, one worked opposite in the convenience store; both were Israeli citizens, with blue Israeli ID's, both were incited to hatred by others and found themselves capable of the most horrific of all. Perhaps they saw the Da'esh broadcasts of beheadings because this is no different.

The immediate reaction of Hamas leader Khaled Mashal was to announce that Israeli Arabs are in the best position to slaughter Jews since they have freedom of movement. The terrorists were from Jabel Mukaber (next to Armon ha Natziv) and the UN HQ was just a tiny village with 10 houses and during the last Intifada while we were busy with exploding buses they built thousands of houses and imported residents from Hebron. 

The BBC barely mentioned it; CNN on line actually said 6 people died in an attack, 4 Israelis and 2 Palestinians after the suspected hanging of an Arab bus driver. The bus driver, a respected member of Egged, committed suicide but the Palestinian Authority spread a rumour he was killed.

Until the world wakes up to the horror of what these people do, that it has nothing to do with human rights or supposed stolen lands, that their single intent is to kill Jews, this will not stop. Thanks to the vast sums of "aid" and the evil UNWRA Hamas is currently the second wealthiest terror organisation in the world but they will not spread the wealth to provide succour to their people because then they will not be angry.

Israel does not release the names of the slain until their families have been informed and until now just two names have been released - Rabbi Meir Twerski, renowned and highly respected Rabbi and humanist. 

Reb  Avrohom Shmuel  Goldberg originally from Liverpool in the UK.

May their souls rest in peace; their families be consoled among the mourners of Zion. Baruch Dayan Emet.

  

Jerusalem is crying; Israel is crying; I am crying. Will no-one wipe my tears?

With love

Sheila

Hamas’s Financial Success

Jerusalem Post  16^th Nov. 

For full article see http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Hamass-riches-381890

Hamas, which rules Gaza, has been named as the world’s second-richest terrorist organization in the latest issue of Forbes Israel. It rakes in around $1 billion annually, outdone only by Islamic State which – with an annual income of some $2b. – tops the chart of terrorist moneybags.

Hamas’s financial success by far eclipses that of Hezbollah, Taliban and al-Qaida.

Hamas’s chief source of earnings, according to the exhaustive Forbes report, comes from skimming hefty sums off foreign NGO donations and putting the squeeze on ordinary Gazans – the very ones the NGOs ostensibly seek to aid.

Hamas taxes them to the hilt, imposes harsh penalties and fees, and trades in the black market. All provisions and material that enter the Gaza Strip fall under the control of Hamas gangsters who garner lavish profits from their distribution and/or sale.

Such supplies enrich Hamas such as their using cement earmarked for civilian construction to reinforce labyrinthine attack tunnels into Israel.

The Forbes data should, if nothing else, induce a sobering reassessment among donor organizations who, for all intents and proposes, are supporting the terrorist hierarchy that brings misery to Gaza and then pleads for overseas assistance to fix the damage.

The overlords who inflicted disaster on the population under their sway happen to be extremely affluent. Instead of going hat in hand to the international community, they might be asked to bankroll the reconstruction themselves. They have deep pockets. More than anything, Hamas uses cash from abroad to line its pockets further and underwrite its military capabilities.

The incontrovertible fact of the matter is that there is very little supervision over the foreign aid funneled into the Strip. Worse yet, the few token procedures that pass as pro forma oversight are sorely inadequate.

In December 2013, the European Court of Auditors could not account for a whopping €400 million of the aid the EU earmarked for the Palestinian Authority and Gaza, he noted. This money is missing, and it is anyone’s guess in whose hands it ended up and for what nefarious purposes.

Gericke added that this month the Court of Auditors found that 2.6 percent of the EU’s budget for “external relations, aid and enlargement” was misused. There’s no indication where the money is.

Gericke reckons that if this proportion is applied to the €450m. pledged to Gaza by the EU, it may plausibly (and quite conservatively) be deduced that in due course at least €11.7m. is likely to bolster Hamas’s coffers.

The international community, NGOs and assorted charities cannot insure fair play. They need to ask themselves whether they want their benevolent contributions to fall into the wrong hands. Do they want to prop up villainous fat cats instead of help the needy? The solicitation of contributions for the Hamas-run domain is part of an elaborate con. The international donors who promised $5.4b. to the Gaza regime in Cairo last month would do well to ascertain that they are not cast as dupes in a massive scam.

Misplaced generosity does far more harm than good.

Losing Control of the News Following Terror Attack

This article courtesy of Honest Reporting http://honestreporting.com/losing-control-of-the-news/ describes the emotions of a parent as reports of a terror attack unfold with rumours and more rumours until the facts unfold.

It’s a parent’s worst nightmare. I was outside walking my dog when I got the call from my daughter.

“Dad, there’s been a terrorist attack at my school. The teachers told us all to call home.” “Where are you now?” I asked.

“We’re at the school and the Army and police are everywhere, but I don’t know what happened yet.”

“O.K., call me again when you know more.”

From my phone, I checked out a few websites of Israeli media. There were stories about the stabbing in Tel Aviv earlier in the day, but no breaking news of a local terrorist attack yet.

My eldest daughter and my youngest son go to schools in an educational complex (referred to as the “Matnas”) near the community of Alon Shevut. The complex houses two girls high schools, an elementary school, a swimming pool, basketball court, and the regional municipal offices. A couple thousand kids go to school there (including two of mine) and in the afternoon, they often walk over to the bus stop on the corner and take either an Egged bus or catch a ride with someone. Right down the road is the regional police station and an army base. People pick their kids up from there after school all the time.

The bus stop across from the school entrance is very close from the one where the three teenagers were kidnapped and murdered at the beginning of the summer. Yet the kidnapping took place at night long after the schools were closed for the day. Usually, with school in session and armed guards right at the entrance, it is considered a safe enough place.

Five minutes after my daughter’s call, my other daughter called me. This year she started school on the Golan, a few hours away. But many of her friends still attend school at the Matnas.

“Dad, I heard a girl from the school was just killed. She was 14.” I could hear the panic in her voice. She is 14.

“How did you hear?” I asked. “People are putting this on ‘WhatsApp” (a texting app)

I told her to hold on, that nothing official had appeared in the media yet.

At this point, the kids in the schools started posting all sorts of rumors. At one time, two school girls were reported killed, a 14 year old and a 17 year old. Even though I had just spoken with both my daughters, they happen to be 14 and 17. I furiously started checking out every website for more information.

At this point, the media knew there was a story. But since only minutes had passed, there was little concrete information available. So what did they do? Not wanting to risk missing the story, they started reporting some of the rumors spreading on the internet as facts. The Times of Israel ran a headline referring to a murdered 14 year old. Other articles said that the terrorist had been killed by soldiers.

Now that it was in the media, many people started posting the news reports on social media. Facebook and Twitter fed the media which in turn fed the social networks. It was a huge cycle of disinformation caused by an immense desire to know everything instantly. Something that is just not possible.

It took about 45 minutes for the full details to come to light. That is actually amazingly fast.

But it seemed to take forever.

A terrorist had driven his car into the bus stop, missing the people there. He then jumped out of his car and stabbed to death 26 year old Dalia Lemkus. He then turned his knife on another man waiting at the stop. A passerby saw what was going on, stopped his car, and tried to wrestle the attacker to the ground. While this was happening, one of the high school girls who was at the scene ran to the school gate and yelled for the guard. He responded immediately and ran about 50 meters to where he could shoot the terrorist. The girl who had called for help gave her version of events to other girls there. Within seconds, the schools were locked down, and the news was flying from the students’ phones.

It is an important lesson in the way we get information today. Sometimes stories are written that report inaccuracies because of the bias of the journalist. We certainly have seen our share of those, and it’s what we spend most of our time at HonestReporting fighting.

But other times, the nature of how information spreads these days and our need to know what happened instantly is what allows false information to be published.

I was standing outside with my phone, going from one site to another trying to figure out what had happened. While I knew the first reports would most likely be wrong, with my daughter so close to the scene, I was desperate for information. I did not want to wait those 45 minutes — and I’m someone who works with the media every day.

The proliferation of smart phones and other mobile internet devices means that not only can one be a consumer of news at any time, but also that anyone can be a journalist within seconds. Anyone who happens to be be close to where a news event occurs becomes a reporter. And the media take those reports as seriously as those filled by professional correspondents.

It’s just something to keep in mind that unless you have actually seen something in person, it would be best not to post on social media before the facts come to light. I am sure I was not the only one using every source I could think of at the time to learn what happened. Reporting news is a huge responsibility, and what you put on social media can spread further than you could imagine.

Terror attack in Jerusalem

According to initial media reports, a Palestinian terrorist used his car to deliberately drive into a crowd of Israelis near a light-rail train station in Jerusalem around noon today (Israel time). 

The driver from eastern Jerusalem (member of Hamas) sped away and then crashed into a second group of pedistrians and other cars. Shortly afterwards, the terrorist exited his car and attacked passers-by with a metal pole. The terrorist was shot dead by the police.

One person was killed and approximately nine people were injured, including two in serious condition.

This is the second deliberate attack on a Jerusalem light-rail station using a vehicle in recent times. The last car attack, which took place exactly two weeks ago (Wednesday, 22 October), killed Chaya Zissel Braun, a three-month-old dual Israeli-American citizen and 22-year old Karen Jemima Mosquera, originally from Ecuador. 

Amnesty Presents the "Hamas Report" as Theirs!!

Amnesty's report on this summer's conflict between Israel and the Hamas terror group accuses Israel of wrongdoing while producing no evidence. It is a report which could easily be interpreted as a plagiarized Hamas report

The report ignores documented war crimes perpetrated by Hamas, including the use of human shields, as well as ammunition storage and firing at Israeli civilian population centers from within schools, hospitals, mosques and civilian neighborhoods in Gaza.

The report does not mention the word terror in relation to Hamas or other armed Palestinian groups, nor mentions tunnels built by Hamas to infiltrate Israel and perpetrate terror attacks. By ignoring the nature of the enemy Israel faced in Gaza - a terror group recognized as such by the European Union, the United States and others - Amnesty's report fails to contribute to the important discussion needed to solve the conflict. Instead, Amnesty serves as a propaganda tool for Hamas and other terror groups.

In Israel, investigations are currently underway by several bodies, inside and outside the Israel Defense Forces, into over 90 incidents. Two criminal investigations are underway. These measures are dismissed by Amnesty as insufficient yet in comparison to Israel's rigorous procedures Amnesty's own methodology raises questions: The report was not written by Amnesty staff but by local contractors not mentioned by name and referred to only as "field workers". Their own credibility in producing the testimonies detailed in the report is never questioned; independent verification of their claims apparently not deemed necessary.

The extreme bias of the report is best displayed in its recommendations: Hamas is not mentioned, as if the group has no responsibility for the bloodshed; meanwhile, the report dismisses Israel's security challenges. Amnesty should understand that producing a narrow, decontextualized report restricts its capability to advance positive change. 

Hamas dependants can go to Israeli hospitals but not Gazans!

Israel's Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, Major General Yoav Mordechai, on Monday accused Hamas of a double standard for allowing the daughter of the group's leader Ismail Haniyeh to receive medical treatment in Israel.

"When there is a personal interest, Hamas has no problem in allowing patients to come into Israel," Mordechai said during an interview with the Palestinian news agency Ma'an.

Mordecai criticized Hamas conduct during Operation Protective Edge, claiming that the group's leaders prevented injured Gazans from reaching the field hospital set up by Israel on the Gaza border.

The hospitalized girl is one of Haniyeh's 13 children. She suffered complications from routine treatment, was transferred to Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv via the Erez Crossing, and sent back to her home last week.

When Israel receives a request for treatment, it is not interested in the relatives of the patient, whether it's Haniyeh or some other people," said Mordecai.

"Haniyeh's daughter is one of more than the one thousand patients from the Gaza Strip and the Palestinian Authority areas, both adults and children, that we treat each year," said Ichilov Hospital in response.

A Palestinian source told the Asharq al-Awsat newspaper that the treatment and transfer of the patient had been coordinated with the Palestinian Authority, and that relatives of other Palestinian officials had also been treated in Israel in the past.

Gazans Speak Out: Hamas War Crimes

 Mudar Zahran September 19, 2014

Full report at http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4706/gazan-hamas-war-crimes#

Mudar Zahran is a Palestinian writer and academic from Jordan, who resides in the UK.

"If Hamas does not like you for any reason all they have to do now is say you are a Mossad agent and kill you." — A., a Fatah member in Gaza.

"Hamas wanted us butchered so it could win the media war against Israel showing our dead children on TV and then get money from Qatar." — T., former Hamas Ministry officer.

"They would fire rockets and then run away quickly, leaving us to face Israeli bombs for what they did." — D., Gazan journalist.

"Hamas imposed a curfew: anyone walking out in the street was shot. That way people had to stay in their homes, even if they were about to get bombed. Hamas held the whole Gazan population as a human shield." — K., graduate student

"The Israeli army allows supplies to come in and Hamas steals them. It seems even the Israelis care for us more than Hamas." — E., first-aid volunteer.

"We are under Hamas occupation, and if you ask most of us, we would rather be under Israeli occupation… We miss the days when we were able to work inside Israel and make good money. We miss the security and calm Israel provided when it was here." — S., graduate of an American university, former Hamas sympathizer.

While the world's media has been blaming Israel for the death of Gazan civilians during Operation Protective Edge, this correspondent decided to speak with Gazans themselves to hear what they had to say.

They spoke of Hamas atrocities and war crimes implicating Hamas in the civilian deaths of its own people.

Although Gazans, fearful of Hamas's revenge against them, were afraid to speak to the media, friends in the West Bank offered introductions to relatives in Gaza. One, a renowned Gazan academic, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that as soon as someone talked to a Western journalist, he was immediately questioned by Hamas and accused of "communicating with the Mossad". "Hamas makes sure that the average Gazan will not talk to Western journalists -- or actually any journalists at all," he said, continuing:

       "Hamas does not want the truth about Gaza to come out. Hamas 
        terrorizes and kills us just like Daesh [ISIS] terrorizes kills Iraqis. Hamas           is a  dictatorship that kills us. The Gazans you see praising Hamas on TV           are either Hamas members or too afraid to speak against Hamas. Few               foreign [Western] journalists were probably able to report what Gazans             think of Hamas."

Many more comments in the full report at  http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4706/gazan-hamas-war-crimes#

Palestinians and the "Death Boats" Scandal

Khaled Abu Toameh  September 27, 2014  

Full article http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4734/palestinians-and-the-death-boats-scandal

Summary

As the past few weeks have, shown, hundreds, if not thousands, of Palestinians would rather risk their lives at sea than live under Palestinian governments and leaders whose only goal is to enrich their bank accounts.

Instead of creating job opportunities for young men and women, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority have spent the past seven years fighting over money and power. They are now busy planning how to lay their hands on the millions of dollars that are supposed to go to the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip. Hamas wants to use the Palestinian Authority as a tool through which the international community channels funds to he Gaza Strip — a move that would  ultimately empower Hamas to tighten its grip over the Palestinian population there.

They said that Hamas officials are providing the emigrants with forged visas and travel documents to to enable them to enter Europe.

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Over the past few weeks, dozens of Palestinian immigrants from the Gaza Strip have been killed or injured while trying to reach Europe by sea.

At least 500 Palestinians have gone missing after the boats carrying them sank in the sea. Some reports have suggested that rival gangs deliberately sunk the boats. The gangs are fighting for the cash the Palestinians are prepared to pay to leave the Gaza Strip. Palestinians refer to the situation as their "Death Boats" scandal.

The Palestinian immigrants are said to have paid thousands of dollars to Hamas officials and Egyptian smugglers to facilitate the exodus from the Gaza Strip. Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister Riad al-Malki claimed that each Palestinian paid $1,000 to Hamas personnel at the Rafah border crossing with Egypt. Others are believed to have paid $5,000 each to leave the Gaza Strip.

Malki said that preliminary investigations have revealed that the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have fallen victim to Hamas and Egyptian gangsters who managed to lure them with false promises.

According to various reports, some 13,000 Palestinians have already fled the Gaza Strip to Europe with the help of the gangsters. Most left through Hamas's smuggling tunnels or by bribing its security officials at the Rafah terminal. Another 25,000 Palestinians from the Gaza Strip have applied to various European countries for immigration.

Although Hamas has denied any connection to the mass exodus, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip revealed that the Islamist movement had set up special offices to register those wishing to start a new life in Europe. They said that Hamas officials are providing the emigrants with forged visas and travel documents to enable them to enter Europe.

A Palestinian journalist in Gaza City said that at one of the mosques in the southern Gaza Strip, a leading Hamas preacher told worshippers: "Those who are not happy can always emigrate to Europe. We do not force anyone to stay here."

Most of the immigrants left the Gaza Strip through a two-kilometer tunnel belonging to a senior Hamas operative. Survivors told a Palestinian Authority Commission of Inquiry that when they reached the Egyptian side of the border, Egyptian gangsters intercepted them and robbed them of their money.

"Hamas gangsters worked in cooperation with gangsters on the Egyptian side of the border," said a senior Palestinian Authority official involved with the inquiry commission. "They operated like a real mafia, exploiting the predicament of the people, especially young men who were hoping to find jobs and better lives in Italy and other European countries."

Palestinians say that the emigration began long before the last military confrontation between Hamas and Israel. But the trend has witnessed a dramatic increase since the end of the fighting in late August.

"Hamas has failed to help the Palestinians ever since it came to power in 2007," said Ahmed Bader, whose son managed to leave the Gaza Strip through a tunnel one week after the end of the fighting. "There is nothing for the young people to do in the Gaza Strip: no jobs, no entertainment and no security. Young men who graduate from universities cannot find work if they are not members of Hamas."

Both Hamas and the Palestinian Authority bear responsibility for the tragedy of the Palestinian immigrants. The two rival parties have failed to improve the living conditions of their people in the Gaza Strip.  Instead of creating job opportunities for young men and women, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority have spent the past seven years fighting over money and power.

Hamas says that Palestinians are fleeing the Gaza Strip because their leader (Mahmoud Abbas) is a helpless 80-year-old man "who suffers from half the diseases of the universe." The Palestinian Authority, for its part, says that the Palestinians are fleeing the "hell of Hamas.". Hamas and the Palestinian Authority are trading allegations and abuses while their people are being exploited emotionally and financially, then robbed, drowned and fed to sharks.

Hamas and the Palestinian Authority are now busy planning how to lay their hands on the millions of dollars that are supposed to go to the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip.

At last week's "reconciliation" talks between the two sides in Cairo, they completely ignored the tragedy of the Palestinian immigrants. Once again, Hamas and Fatah officials exchanged kisses and hugs as they announced yet another agreement to implement a previous agreement. 

In fact, this is what Hamas and Fatah have been doing since 2006 – signing one reconciliation agreement after the other without tangible results. Needless to say, so far none of these agreements has been implemented. Skeptics say the most recent agreement between Hamas and Fatah is also likely to remain ink on paper due to the wide gap between the two parties.

Hamas appears to be willing to bring the Palestinian Authority back to the Gaza Strip not because it has changed its ideology. Rather, Hamas wants to use the Palestinian Authority as a tool through which the international community channels funds to the Gaza Strip – a move that would ultimately empower Hamas to tighten its grip over the Palestinian population there.

But many Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have obviously lost their confidence in both Abbas and Hamas. As the past few weeks have shown, hundreds, if not thousands, of Palestinians would rather risk their lives at sea than live under Palestinian governments and leaders whose only goal is to enrich their bank accounts.

Hamas: Give Us West Bank So We Can Destroy Israel

 Khaled Abu Toameh  September 7, 2014

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4676/hamas-west-bank

What Hamas and Iran are saying is that if and when Israel pulls back to the pre-1967 lines, they, together with other Palestinians, would bring weapons into the West Bank to achieve their goal of eliminating the "Zionist entity."

Abbas's initiative also ignores that Hamas could easily seize control of the West Bank through force or through the promised free and democratic elections, which recent polls show Hamas is assured of winning. Abbas is demanding something that would bring about his own demise.

If the West Bank had one quarter of the weapons that the Gaza Strip has, Israel would be eliminated in one day. This is what Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar told worshippers during a sermon he delivered on September 5.

Zahar, who delivered his first sermon since the Egypt-brokered cease-fire between Hamas and Israel was announced in late August: he chose to remind Palestinians and the rest of the world of his movement's dream to destroy Israel.

"If only the West Bank had one quarter of what Gaza has of resistance tools, the Israeli entity would end in one day," Zahar declared, reiterating the claim that Hamas had scored a "big victory" in the war.

The Hamas leader went on to criticize those who still have doubts as to whether Israel could be destroyed.

"Those who were skeptical as to whether Palestine could be liberated are no longer doubtful after the enemy was hit from the Gaza Strip," Zahar said. "Can you imagine what would happen if the enemy is targeted from the West Bank, which makes up 20% of the size of Palestine?"

Zahar's wish to see the West Bank flooded with rockets and mortars and other "tools of resistance" was echoed by other Hamas and Islamic Jihad leaders and spokesmen after the recent war in the Gaza Strip.

Zahar himself was quoted recently as saying that Hamas's goal now was to "move the Gaza example of resistance" to the West Bank.

Even the Iranians seem to think that the time has come to turn the West Bank into a launching pad for attacks on Israel.

During the war in the Gaza Strip, a senior Iranian commander of the Revolutionary Guard Corps, Mohamed Reza Naqdi, announced that Tehran had plans to "arm Palestinians in the West Bank" in order to destroy Israel.

Naqdi boasted that the weapons used by Hamas and other Palestinian groups during the recent war had been manufactured and supplied by Iran.

The threats by Hamas and Iran regarding the West Bank show why it is critically important for Israel (and the Palestinian Authority) to insist on the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip as part of any long-term cease-fire agreement.

Even more significantly, these threats underline the need to keep the West Bank a demilitarized area in any future peace agreement, especially one that would see the establishment of an independent and sovereign Palestinian state.

Moreover, these threats support Israel's insistence on maintaining permanent security control over the border with Jordan. Without such a presence, Iranian-made weapons would easily find their way into the West Bank.

What Hamas and Iran are saying is that if and when Israel pulls back to the pre-1967 lines, they, together with other Palestinians, would bring weapons into the West Bank to achieve their goal of eliminating the "Zionist entity."

Zahar does not even believe that there is a need for large amounts of weapons – just one fourth of what Hamas and Islamic Jihad already have in the Gaza Strip are sufficient, in his eyes, to destroy Israel in one day.

In the aftermath of Operation Protective Edge, it is not difficult to understand why flooding the West Bank with weapons poses an existential threat to Israel.

But this is also something that would wreak havoc on Palestinians in the West Bank.

Fortunately, Mahmoud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority are fully aware of attempts by Iran and Hamas to turn the West Bank into a base for terrorism and jihadis.

Thanks to Israel, they are also aware of Hamas's effort to topple the Palestinian Authority and replace it with an Islamist government.

Last month, Israel announced the arrest of more than 90 West Bank Hamas members who planned to stage a coup against Abbas and renew terror attacks against Israelis. Were it not for Israel's effort, Abbas and his top officials would have been either killed or imprisoned by Hamas.

That episode explains why Abbas has now ordered a massive crackdown on Hamas members 

and supporters in the West Bank. During the Gaza war, Abbas refrained from such measures against his Hamas rivals out of fear of being accused of "collaboration" with Israel.

Since the cease-fire went into effect, Abbas's security forces in the West Bank have detained more than 80 Hamas men. They have also stopped Hamas-affiliated preachers from delivering sermons during Friday prayers.

Abbas will be able to rein in Hamas in the West Bank only if he pursues security coordination with Israel.

However, it would be unrealistic to expect Abbas or any Palestinian government to disarm Hamas and its allies in the Gaza Strip.

Abbas and the Palestinian Authority would not be able to survive for one day in the West Bank without the presence of the IDF, especially given Hamas's rising popularity among Palestinians in the aftermath of the war.

Last week, Abbas sent two senior officials, Saeb Erekat and Majed Faraj, to Washington to present his "new peace initiative" to Secretary of State John Kerry.

Abbas's initiative envisages the establishment of a Palestinian state within three years either through negotiations or by having the UN Security Council impose a solution on Israel.

Abbas's initiative, however, ignores the threat from Hamas and Iran to use the West Bank as a launching pad for destroying Israel. It also ignores that Hamas could easily seize control over a future Palestinian state by force or through the promised free and democratic elections, as assured by a recent public opinion poll published by the Ramallah-based Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research.

Abbas is demanding a full Israeli withdrawal to the pre-1967 lines (including the border with Jordan). But he cannot offer any assurances that Hamas and Iran would not use this border to smuggle weapons into the West Bank.

In fact, Abbas is demanding from the Israelis and Americans something that would bring about his own demise. His only option for now is to hold onto power in the West Bank and continue to work with Israel against the common enemy – Hamas. The day Hamas agrees to lay down its weapons and abandon its dream of destroying Israel, he will then be able to go to the U.S. and Security Council and ask for an independent state next to Israel.

Hamas Vows to Re-Arm for “Devastating Battle of Liberation”

by TheTower.org Staff | 08.27.14 

The Iran-backed terror organization Hamas is already broadcasting strong signals that it has no interest in peace and is gearing up for its next war against Israel.

The Izzadin Al-Qassam Brigades tweeted (Arabic link):

We won, and swore by Allah that we will continue to dig (tunnels), and create more (rockets), and recruit thousands more, and develop thousands of weapons and we recharge the mortars and weapons towards the coming devastating battle of liberation.

Senior Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar recently emerged from hiding and pledged that the terrorist group, which initially seized power in a bloody 2007 military coup, would continue “arming itself and developing its resistance capacity.”

Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, who is currently being hosted by the Gulf state of Qatar, praised Iran for its support. Meshaal said ties with Iran were strong, despite a rift that developed when Hamas leaders supported the rebellion against the Iranian-supported dictator, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

An Iranian press report said that Meshaal “stressed that Iran’s financial and military support has played an influential role in the achievements” of Hamas. A few weeks ago, top Iranian officials boasted of the military support they had given Hamas to fight against Israel.

However, veteran Arab affairs analyst Ehud Yaari wrote (Hebrew link) that Hamas was still facing an uphill struggle to return to the same military capacity it had two months ago:

Yesterday they did the inevitable and got people into the streets for a victory celebration. But there weren’t thousands, certainly not tens of thousands. During the past day you saw some of the (Hamas) military commanders, not all of them, beginning to emerge from the bunkers after 50 days.

Hamas has no real feeling of achievement. There’s an attempt to manufacture an air of accomplishment, “we did it, we held our own for 50 days, yes,” but when they measure the results of what we see now – they’ll see the slim chances that they’ll achieve their (demands of) crossings, sea port, airport, etc in the round of talks that will start in Cairo – they will say to themselves the it’s the same ceasefire they could have obtained a month ago.

Prof. Beverley Milton-Edwards, a British specialist on Hamas, was quoted saying that “Hamas has a record of engaging in spoiler violence in order to have a negative impact on peace implementation.”

Gazans must get rid of Hamas -Palestinian view

We Palestinians can no longer deny our responsibility for the death of our own people.

Bassem Eid 08.12.14 (described as a Palestinian from East Jerusalem)

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4557777,00.html

 For 26 years I have been devoting my life to the mission of defending human rights. I have seen wars and terror. And yet, the past month has been one of the most difficult times in my life.

  

I live in East Jerusalem and witness the destruction of life around me. Highway 1 has once again turned into the line separating between east and west. The Palestinians in the capital attacked traffic lights and damaged the Light Rail and power supply lines. But I cannot accept that as a social protest – it's pure vindictiveness.

The coexistence I have been fighting for my entire life has been executed in the city square.

There is no doubt that the death and destruction Gaza has been hit by are like a tsunami. Both people are in pain, but each side denies the other side's pain, and so the pain gets worse.

And still, as a Palestinian, I must admit: I am responsible for part of what has happened. We can no longer deny our responsibility for the death of our own people.

Most of the Palestinians were against the rocket fire on Israel. They realized that the rockets would not give us anything. They called on Hamas to stop firing, knowing that it had paved the way for the death of its own people.

We knew that Hamas was digging the tunnels which would to lead to our destruction. We knew that three people live on every square meter in Gaza. And Hamas knew that an attack on Israel would lead to mass death, but it's leaders are more interested in their own victories than in the lives of their victims.

Indeed, Hamas depends on death, which gives it power and allows it to raise funds and purchase weapons. Hamas has never been interested in liberating the Palestinian people from the occupation. And Israel will never be able to destroy the infrastructures it has built. Only we, the Palestinian people, can do that.

It was the Gazan residents' responsibility to rebel against the Hamas rule. We knew what they were doing to us, but we let ourselves off easy and allowed it to happen.

Will all this death finally teach us a lesson? I hope so. The lesson is that we must get rid of Hamas and completely demilitarize Gaza. And then open the crossings.

I'm saying this as a loyal Palestinian. I'm saying this because I am concerned about my people's future.

The Myth of an Israeli Siege on Gaza

There is no Israeli "siege" on the Gaza Strip. First of all, Gaza shares borders not only with Israel, but with Egypt as well. There is a 13 kilometer (8 mile) frontier between Gaza and Egypt. That country, and not Israel, controls the Rafah crossing into Gaza which has been used primarily by people travelling to and from Egypt, and from there to the rest of the world.

Most importantly, for the past four years all goods are allowed to enter Gaza from Israel, except for weapons and a short list of dual-use items which can be exploited by terrorists. The ban on weapons and the restrictions on dual-use items stem from the fact that since 2007, Gaza has been ruled by a terrorist organization, namely Hamas, whose declared aim is the destruction of Israel. They are in place solely to protect Israel's citizens from Hamas' ongoing terrorist attacks.

Not only do food, medicine, fuel and aid enter freely at all times, but in peacetime, commodities and consumer goods of every type are transferred daily from Israel to Gaza through the land crossing. The types and amounts of consumer goods are determined by Palestinian merchants and depend primarily on market forces in Gaza. For the more affluent, Gaza offers a variety of consumer opportunities, from a modestly-sized mall to upscale restaurants. Even during the latest hostilities in Gaza, an international journalist reported on shopping at one of Gaza's supermarkets, which offered "all kinds of goods." 

Given the free entry of almost all goods, it is impossible to legitimately claim that the Gaza Strip is under siege. For example, in the first five months of 2014, over 18,000 trucks carrying nearly 228,000 tons of supplies entered Gaza. Included in the deliveries were construction materials: since January, over 4,680 trucks carrying 181,000 tons of cement, wood, gravel, iron and other building supplies passed through the Kerem Shalom land crossing into Gaza.

In addition to facilitating the transfer of goods, humanitarian aid and fuels, Israel also supplies the Gaza Strip with 10 million cubic meters (2.6 billion US gallons) of water annually and more than half of its electricity.

While Israel faces a serious threat from terrorists in Gaza, it still allows the supervised movement of people into Israel. In the first five months of 2014, approximately 60,000 individuals entered Israel from the Gaza Strip. Many of these were patients and their escorts who received medical treatment in Israel and elsewhere, while large numbers of Gazan businessmen and merchants also visited Israel.  

In light of all these facts, not only is it obvious that there is no siege on Gaza, but it is also not reasonable to say that as a whole the Gaza Strip is under an Israeli blockade.

Anti-Israeli activists often cite the maritime blockade as proof of a general blockade on Gaza itself, but that is deliberately misleading.

In modern times, Gaza has relied almost exclusively on land crossings for the import of goods: it has never had the type of port capable of handling shipping containers (and only had a functioning airport for approximately three years). 

The maritime blockade is legal under international law. In 2011, a special panel convened by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon examined the maritime blockade. The UN Panel found both the naval blockade and its enforcement, including in international waters, to be legal. This panel of experts emphasized that all assistance to Gaza should be transferred only through the designated land crossings.

The panel also found that Israel had legitimate security concerns regarding violence by Hamas and that weapons trafficking to Gaza permitted Israel to enforce a naval blockade. Repeated attempts to smuggle dangerous weapons via the sea - including powerful long-range rockets from Iran - attest to the fact that the maritime blockade is an essential security measure.

Indeed, the dangers posed by Hamas are well-documented. It is internationally recognized as a terrorist organization, including by the European Union, Australia, Japan, Egypt and the US.

The economic plight of the Gaza Strip does not stem from a mythical siege, but from its rule by a recognized terrorist organization dedicated not to the welfare of its people, but to violence and destruction. When Israel left Gaza in 2005, its aspiration was that the Gaza Strip would become a prosperous and peaceful territory. These hopes, and concrete plans for developing Gaza, were dashed by the incessant cross-border terrorist and rocket attacks, particularly after Hamas seized control in 2007.

Furthermore, Gaza's existing resources are systematically abused by Hamas for its own nefarious goals. Enormous amounts of money are used for procuring and producing weapons, training and funding terrorists, building terror infrastructures and for the enrichment of Hamas' leaders. Almost unimaginable quantities of cement were diverted from the construction of housing, schools and hospitals to building an underground city of terror tunnels and bunkers for Hamas members.

Hamas would like the world to believe that it launched its rockets at Israeli cities and towns in an attempt to "end the siege." It would like the international community to think it is acting in the interests of residents of Gaza. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

If Hamas cared about the welfare of the civilians in Gaza, it would not have started the current hostilities with its rocket barrages. It would have agreed to the Egyptian-proposed ceasefire already on 15 July (before the ground operation began), saving many lives on both sides. It would have respected the numerous humanitarian ceasefires Israel initiated for the benefit of the residents of Gaza. Most tellingly, it wouldn't have launched frequent rocket and mortar attacks on the Kerem Shalom border crossing, the main entry point into Gaza for goods and humanitarian aid.     

What Hamas truly cares about is advancing its agenda to destroy Israel. This terrorist organization seeks to end any control or supervision over what enters and exits Gaza so that it can freely import offensive weapons, including long-range rockets, explosives, military technologies, terrorist trainers, funds and supplies for its terrorist infrastructures. None of these things will help the residents of Gaza; rather, they will only serve to ignite future conflict. 

Hamas' media policy and treatment of journalists

During the operation, foreign and local correspondents followed Hamas’ policy guidelines, for the most part, and mainly reported on the suffering of the local population and other civilian aspects of the fighting.
Source: ITIC report

Hamas' media policy forged during Operation Protective Edge restricts local and foreign correspondents covering the fighting in their reports on military-combat activity or military-related information (especially regarding rocket fire and the use of civilians as human shields). During the operation, foreign and local correspondents followed Hamas' policy guidelines, for the most part, and mainly reported on the suffering of the local population and other civilian aspects of the fighting.

During the first days of Operation Protective Edge, Hamas established a policy for media reports to be implemented by local and foreign correspondents covering the fighting. Its objectives were to prevent reports that would prove Israel's claims of Hamas use of Gazan civilians as human shields, and to reinforce the propaganda theme that Israel deliberately attacked civilians and committed "war crimes." As a result, during the first days of the fighting the information bureau of the Hamas-controlled ministry of the interior in Gaza issued instructions on how the social networks in the Gaza Strip were to report events (YouTube, July 10, 2014).

Instruction number five read, "Do not publicize [information about] and do not share pictures or video clips showing rocket launching sites or the movement of resistance [operatives] in Gaza." Those responsible for news pages on Facebook were told "don't use close-ups of heavily armed masked operatives, otherwise your Facebook page will be closed for incitement to violence."

Hamas issued similar instructions to correspondents in other ways. For example, the Palestinian Journalist Bloc, a media group in the Gaza Strip affiliated with Hamas," instructed the media and correspondents in the Gaza Strip not to photograph or publicize information about rockets fired by military-terrorist operatives belonging to the various organizations so as not to play into the hands of Israeli public diplomacy" (Hamas' Al-Aqsa TV, July 8, 2014).

The local and foreign media reports generally followed Hamas policy. They emphasized civilian suffering, the many civilian casualties and the increasing humanitarian distress, while severely criticizing Israel's conduct. On the other hand, reports of the military aspects of the fighting and the sensitive issue of the use of the civilian population as human shields received relatively scant coverage.

A foreign correspondent, who preferred to remain anonymous, told Yedioth Aharonoth's Daniel Batini (August 7, 2014) that :-

"First, Hamas said its spokesmen could only be interviewed in the courtyard of the Al-Shifa'a Hospital in Gaza City. That meant there were long lines of correspondents waiting for interviews, and as a result they watched the bleeding wounded arriving at the hospital for treatment. That [system] created exactly the impression Hamas wanted, of an immediate emergency situation and a human and humanitarian catastrophe. 

Second, Hamas never allowed foreign correspondents access to military sites attacked by Israel, whether they were bases, rocket launching sites or other targets. The organization's dead and wounded operatives were not photographed and therefore, from a media point of view, they do not exist. All that serves Hamas' objective of representing all the casualties as civilians. 

Third, it was obvious that Hamas was firing rockets from civilian areas, but Hamas operatives forbid camera teams from filming them, because they did not want to reveal the tactic or the locations of the launch sites." 
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On August 11th Foreign Press Association in Israel protested Hamas methods.

The FPA protests in the strongest terms the blatant, incessant, forceful and unorthodox methods employed by the Hamas authorities and their representatives against visiting international journalists in Gaza over the past month.

The international media are not advocacy organisations and cannot be prevented from reporting by means of threats or pressure, thereby denying their readers and viewers an objective picture from the ground.

In several cases, foreign reporters working in Gaza have been harassed, threatened or questioned over stories or information they have reported through their news media or by means of social media.

We are also aware that Hamas is trying to put in place a "vetting" procedure that would, in effect, allow for the blacklisting of specific journalists. Such a procedure is vehemently opposed by the FPA.