"The Popular Resistance Committees" Terrorist Organization

From The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, 23 August, 2011:


The Popular Resistance Committees: 
Portrait of the Terrorist Organization Responsible for the Series of Combined Terrorist Attacks North of Eilat, Israel's Southernmost City.
________________________________________

Overview
1. On August 18, 2011, beginning at noon, a terrorist organization operating from the Gaza Strip called the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) carried out a series of combined terrorist attacks against a number of targets, among them a number of civilian vehicles. The attacks occurred north of the Netafim crossing, about 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) north of Eilat, (Israel's southernmost city). In our assessment the terrorists came from the Gaza Strip. Eight Israelis were killed in the attacks and 30 were wounded. No organization publicly claimed responsibility, and the Popular Resistance Committees denied all connection to the terrorist attack (as they have done in similar cases in the past). However, the Israeli prime minister and other Israeli sources have indicated that the PRC was the organization which carried out the attack.

2. In response, the Israeli Air Force attacked a house in the southern Gaza Strip city of Rafah which served as a PRC command site where prominent members of the organization were gathered. Kamal al-Nairab (Abu Awad), commander of the PRC's main Gaza Strip faction, and two other prominent PRC terrorists were killed in the attack. Also killed were two terrorist operatives from the organization's military wing. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that "those who gave the order to murder our citizens, while hiding in Gaza, are no longer among the living."

3. Following the Israeli response, the terrorist organizations operating in the Gaza Strip attacked Israeli population centers. They fired almost 160 rockets, of which about 120 fell in Israeli territory (as of August 22). The IDF retaliated by attacking terrorist targets in the Gaza Strip. The PRC participated in the rocket attacks, claiming responsibility for the dozens of attacks on Beersheba and other southern Israeli cities. On August 22, Hamas and the PRC announced their acceptance of a lull in the fighting; however, even after the announcement several rockets were fired into Israeli territory.

4. The Popular Resistance Committees is a small terrorist organization with extensive operational capabilities. Several years ago it split into three factions, two of which collaborate with Hamas and in effect operate under its aegis. The third faction, called the Army of Islam, is affiliated with the global jihad, and carries out terrorist attacks independently, occasionally challenging Hamas and its restrained attack policy. Kamal al-Nairab and the other prominent terrorists killed in the Israeli Air Force attack on August 18 belonged to one of the PRC factions collaborating with Hamas.

5. An analysis of the PRC's modus operandi indicates a preference attacking Israel through the route of the Sinai Peninsula. Such attacks were carried out by both the PRC and Hamas even before Operation Cast Lead, and to a greater extent after it. The organizations exploited the Egyptian government's difficulty in enforcing law and order in the Sinai Peninsula (a situation which worsened after the fall of Mubarak) and were supported by a vast network of Bedouin collaborators living in Sinai.

6. Since Operation Cast Lead the importance of the indirect route through the Sinai Peninsula from the Gaza Strip to Israel has increased in the eyes of both Hamas and the PRC factions, the result of Hamas' policy of restraint within the Gaza Strip, which has usually been enforced on the terrorist organizations operating there. In the two years since Operation Cast Lead the Sinai Peninsula has served as a highway for terrorist squads of both Hamas and the PRC planning to infiltrate Israel to carry out various types of attacks (mass-murders, abduction, penetration deep into Israeli territory and firing rockets at Eilat). However, the PRC, like Hamas, has never claimed responsibility for such attacks, fearing repercussions from the Egyptian authorities.3

7. This document examines the nature and modus operandi of the PRC factions and their relations with Hamas, as follows:

1) The establishment of the PRC and its split into factions.
2) The involvement of Hamas and the PRC in terrorist activities carried out from the Sinai Peninsula, 2009-2011.
3) Various types of terrorist attacks carried out by the PRC, 2009-2011.
4) Development of the PRC's military capabilities since Operation Cast Lead.
5) PRC activity from the Gaza Strip before Operation Cast Lead.
6) PRC attempts to launch terrorist attacks against Israel from the Sinai Peninsula before Operation Cast Lead.
7) PRC cooperation with Hamas.
8) Participation of the Zakaria Dughmush faction in the Egyptian conference in support of the "option of resistance" [i.e., terrorism].

>> To download the Full Document in PDF Format Click Here >>

Don't retaliate; pre-empt!!

From "Israel Hayom" Newsletter, Aug. 22, 2011, by Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger:


... the most effective defense against terrorism – operationally, financially and morally – is not retaliation and a limited, surgical offensive, but a comprehensive, decisive, sustained and disproportionate preemptive ground offensive, which aims to obliterate terror infrastructures and capabilities, and bring the enemy to submission. 

A decisive defeat of terrorism requires a victory over – and not coexistence or ceasefire agreements with – terrorism; uprooting – and not just stopping – terrorism.

Any response to terrorism which is short of devastating the ideological, political, financial, logistic and operational terrorist infrastructures, reassures terrorists that they are immune to annihilation. Moreover, it nurtures their hope-driven terrorism: the hope to whack Israel’s psyche of defiance, wreck Israel’s steadfastness, and sustain the 1993-2011 trend of sweeping Israeli ideological and territorial retreats.

Furthermore, a limited response to terrorism exacerbates wars of attrition – the dream of terrorists and nightmare of democratic societies. The limited-retaliation response to terrorism adds fuel to the fire of terrorism, feeds the self-defeating assumption that, supposedly, there is no military solution to terrorism, hence significantly eroding Israel’s posture of deterrence.

Contrary to that self-defeating assumption, Palestinian terrorism was curtailed by 90% - when, in 2002, Israel's military took over the Palestinian breeding ground of terrorism in Beit Jallah, Bethlehem, Hebron, Ramallah, Jenin, Nablus and other major towns in Judea & Samaria. Israeli military re-engagement with these areas ...reasserted Israel's initiative in the battle against Palestinian terrorism.

The more defensive and retaliation-driven the Israeli response to terrorism, the more emboldened are Palestinian terrorists, the less confident are Israelis in their government’s capability to safeguard personal and national security, the more taxing is mental fatigue, and the less convinced are Israelis in their cause.

The addiction to defense, and to limited response, has been embraced by Israel since signing the 1993 Oslo Accord, in order to resuscitate the “peace” process, which has triggered dramatically more hate-education, terrorism and non-compliance than the pre-Oslo reality. 250 Israelis were murdered by Palestinian terrorism in the 15 years prior to Oslo, but over 2,000 have been murdered in the 18 years since Oslo.

Limited response has also been implemented, in order to soothe international public opinion - which is never satisfied with Israeli concessions - thus recklessly subordinating national security to public diplomacy considerations. Sometimes it yields false sense of security and enhances short-term tactical popularity. However, limited response always undermines long-term strategic interests and international respect towards Israel, generating more pressure on Israel, radicalizing Palestinian terrorism and distancing the area from peace.

Will Israel’s response to the current wave of Palestinian terrorism perpetuate the terrorist-preferred war of attrition? Or, will it be a milestone on the road to reclaiming the pre-Oslo Israeli posture as the role-model of deterrence, defiance of odds, determination and gumption in the battle against terrorism, which paved the road to the 1948 Declaration of Independence, the 1967 Six Day War, the 1970 deterrence of the Syrian invasion of Jordan, the 1976 Entebbe Jonathan Operation and the 1981 bombing of Saddam’s nuclear reactor?

Rather than retreating toward the pre-1967 ceasefire lines, Israel should take charge of the breeding ground of terrorism, which would enhance Israel's power of deterrence, human-intelligence and interception capabilities. It would reduce the Palestinian capability to conduct hate-education, to incite, to recruit, to train, to manufacture and smuggle terrorist and military hardware, to plan, to maneuver and to perpetrate terrorist activities. It would reduce Palestinian terrorism by 90%!

Tough decisions on terror

From Word from Jerusalem, August 22, 2011, by Isi Leibler:

The latest terrorist attack...may easily have resulted in a far greater number of casualties, but the ongoing barrage of missiles threatens to broaden into a much wider conflict.

Emboldened by the overthrow of Mubarak and empowered by the flow of arms across the Egyptian borders, the jihadists are testing our mettle. Hamas also succeeded in intensifying hostility between us and the new Egyptian regime.

In the days and weeks ahead, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will be facing some difficult decisions. While his initial response to the attacks - the deadliest since he assumed office - cannot be faulted, his boast that terrorism would always be contained under his watch will now be put to the test.

Israel's will to react firmly to this provocation will signal whether we retain the ability to deter Hamas from future attacks.

The Sinai Peninsula is rapidly becoming a scorpion's den for radical Islamists, including Al Qaida-inspired factions. The border with Egypt, which had been relatively stable, is now clearly porous, and represents a new entry point for terrorists who now move freely from Gaza to Sinai. The extent of the disastrous decision of the Sharon government to cede control of the Philadelphi Corridor can only now be understood. The IDF is therefore investing major additional resources to beef up the IDF presence and construct a 200-km security fence on the Egyptian border.

If we exercise genuine deterrence, we will undoubtedly face additional global pressure. After receiving ritualistic condolences, we are already being urged to display restraint. When Hezbollah-controlled Lebanon (a rotating member of the UN Security Council) prevented a condemnation of the most recent terrorist attacks, the UN Security Council even dispensed with condemning the outrage.

More significantly, we are also likely to find ourselves at total loggerheads with the Obama Administration. The enormous - but fortunately unsuccessful - efforts exerted by the Americans to force us to make a groveling apology to Turkey over the flotilla reflects the extent the current Administration is willing to humiliate its closest allies to appease the Islamists. Now we may soon encounter threats to withhold the US veto on Palestinian statehood at the UN unless we display "restraint" - a code word for not exercising genuine deterrence.

But even if most of the world, including the hypocritical and sanctimonious Europeans, condemn us for responding in a "disproportionate" manner, the security of our citizens must remain our priority.

DEFENSE MINISTER Ehud Barak, with his consistent record of making empty threats in the wake of terrorist incidents, will undoubtedly seek to persuade the Prime Minister to act with "restraint." Our delusionary Left will also urge us not to "force Hamas into a corner."

Should Prime Minister Netanyahu succumb to these pressures, we will undoubtedly again undergo a cycle of lethal attacks met by hollow threats, which would inevitably be followed by increased terror, until our lives become unbearable, and we are once more obliged to launch a war to defend our citizens.

Tough and immediate military responses are thus required to deter future attacks.

Hamas leaders must be made aware that for failing to rein in the terror, their own political/military leaders will be targeted for assassination.

We must do more than weep for our victims. Israel should have no inhibitions in depicting our murderous enemies as barbarians, and drawing attention to the spontaneous public celebrations in areas under PA and Hamas jurisdiction every time there's news of an Israeli being murdered. And when spokesmen for our "peace partner," like senior PA official Nabil Shaath, issue press releases condemning us for committing "war crimes" by responding to the murders, Israel should demand that the US condemn such statements and extract an apology.

We must make the American people and Congress understand that deterrence is defense, not revenge, and that irrespective of the negative political repercussions, our government must protect its citizens. This should also be an opportune time to draw the attention of the American people to the implications for Israel of the "Arab Spring," and the consequences if we give in to President Obama's pressure, accept the 1949 armistice lines with swaps, and subsequently find ourselves surrounded by Hamastan and jihadists.

INDEED, WITH the impending Egyptian elections in which the genocidal Muslim Brotherhood - creators of Hamas - will emerge as a highly influential force, prospects for border stability will become even shakier. Israel's fraying relationship with Egypt, and the explosive atmosphere over the terrorist attack reflect the rising influence of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Egyptian army will of course seek to maintain the immense subsidies it receives from the US. But unless the Administration threatens to suspend payments, the Egyptian army is likely to simply stand aside and give the Jihadists a free hand, as long as they concentrate their attacks on Israel. Regrettably, the Obama Administration hardly has a positive track record of acting appropriately in this climate. But Congress could assume an important role.

There is a genuine risk that tough responses by us may lead to greater regional turbulence. But the alternative - not exercising deterrence - will most certainly erode our security if the Jihadists are able to continue their terror attacks and launch missiles against our citizens with impunity. Our lives would become unbearable and we would once again be forced into a full-blown conflict.

Tehran pulls strings of Gaza missile war, proxy Jihad Islami leads offensive

From a DEBKAfile Exclusive ReportAugust 21, 2011:


Iran's trap for Israel on the Eilat Highway

... Iran and Hizballah ...planned, orchestrated and funded the coordinated attacks on the Eilat Highway Thursday, Aug. 18 - in which gunmen shot dead eight Israelis and injured 40 - and its sequel: volleys of 90 missiles launched day and night from Gaza against a million Israeli civilians since then.

Yossi Shoshan, 38, from Ofakim, was killed by one of the dozen Grad missiles hitting Beersheba and his home town Saturday night. More than a dozen people were injured, at least one critically.

The prime mover in the missile blitz is Tehran's Palestinian arm, the Jihad Islami, which is responsible for 90 percent of the launches. Hamas is left on the sidelines, cut off for the first time from top levels of authority in Tehran and Damascus.

...Tehran managed to transfer to its Palestinian arm in Gaza, the Jihad Islami, more than 10,000 missiles well in advance of the violence launched three days ago. Most of them are heavy Grads bringing Beersheba, capital of the Negev and Israel's 7th largest town (pop. 200,000), within their 30-kilometer range for a sustained, massive missile offensive.

Tehran has now launched the hardware smuggled into the Gaza Strip ready for a Middle East war offensive for five objectives:
1. To leave Syrian President Bashar Assad free to continue brutalizing his population and ignoring President Barack Obama's demand backed by Europe that he step down.
2. To manufacture a direct military threat on the Jewish state, whose destruction is a fundamental of the Islamic Republic of Iran's ideology.
3.  To thwart the Egyptian military junta's operation last week for regaining control of the lawless Sinai Peninsula and destroying the vast weapons smuggling network serving Iran in its capacity as the leading international sponsor of terror.
4.  To render the Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and his bid for UN recognition of an independent state on Sept. 20 irrelevant.  His isolation was brought home to him last Thursday by the coordinated Palestinian terrorist attacks near Eilat last Thursday.
5.  To plant ticking bombs around Israel for potential detonation and explosion into a full-blown regional war.
debkafile's Washington sources disclose that US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton outlined this peril to Egypt's military ruler, Field Marshall Muhammad Tantawi, Saturday night, Aug. 20, to dissuade him from recalling the Egyptian ambassador to Israel over the deaths of three or five Egyptian police in the melee over the Palestinian terror attack near the Sinai border.

This danger was on the table of Israel's inner cabinet of eight ministers when they met early Sunday to decide on IDF action for terminating the Palestinian missile war.

... three facts stand out from the fog of uncertainty:

First, the security crisis besetting Israel has the dangerous potential for dragging the Middle East into a regional war.

Second, America and Israel are paying in full the price of their quiescence in the face of Iranian, Hizballah and extremist Palestinian belligerence and active preparations for war, including the stockpiling of thousands of increasingly sophisticated weaponry on Israel's borders.

Third, the first step an Israeli soldier or tank takes into the Gaza Strip to silence Jihad Islami's  missile fire is more likely than not to precipitate a second Iranian-orchestrated assault on another of Israel's borders.

Sunday morning, no one in any of the capitals concerned was ready to risk guesstimating how far Tehran was ready to go in its current offensive and what orders Hizballah and its Palestinian puppets had received.  

Hamas looks forward to "the great massacre" of Jews

From The Wire, Thurs. 30 Jun. 2011:

Hamas foreign minister: as a ‘matter of principle’ Hamas will never relinquish ‘a single inch of the Palestinian land’.

‘In just a few years, all the Zionists and the settlers will realize that their arrival in Palestine was for the purpose of the great massacre, by means of which Allah wants to relieve humanity of their evil.’

Mahmoud Zahar, Hamas’ foreign minister, has used a recent interview to clarify the ideological difference between the Gaza-based Islamist party, and Fatah. According to the translation from Memri, Zahar stated during his 23 June appearance on the Hamas-affiliated Al-Aqsa TV that:

‘The difference between [Hamas and Fatah] is that we will not give up a single inch. We say that we should establish a state on any piece of the land, but without relinquishing a single inch. That’s it, in a nutshell. That’s the difference between us and them. They want to establish a state within the 1967 borders, with certain land swaps, and to forget about 78% of the Palestinian land of the past. We say that we should establish a state on any piece of the land – not necessarily [the entire] 1967 territories, but any inch of land – but without giving up a single inch of the land.’

The clear message is that, while Fatah might be willing to accept two states as a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Hamas would only ever view the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel as an interim solution – the claim to the whole of Israel would continue.
Zahar further clarifies that this is a ‘matter of principle’ which ‘pertains to our strategy for the future’:

‘That is the different between us and them, and it is a matter of principle – a historical, ideological, and political dispute, which pertains to our strategy for the future. The difference is clear… We say that we accept the 1967 borders, but without recognizing Israel, and without giving up our right to the rest of Palestine.’

He concludes by arguing that if it weren’t for this ‘matter of principle’, Hamas would simply be a ‘carbon copy’ of Fatah:

‘I think it is wise to stress this issue, because it is misunderstood. We say that we will establish a state on any inch of land that is liberated, but without relinquishing a single inch of Palestine. This is how we should put it. But when we start talking about readiness to accept 1967 or 1948… This makes you seem like a carbon copy of Fatah. We are not a carbon copy of Fatah. I take full responsibility for saying this. We will never relinquish a single inch of the Palestinian land, which has been and remains Palestinian – the 1948 [borders].’

Zahar’s clarification of Hamas’ position in relation to Israel is in line with an interview he gave in May 2011, when he told the Palestinian news outlet Ma’an that Hamas would never recognise Israel since this would ‘preclude the right of the next generations to liberate the lands.’
The explicit claim by Hamas’ foreign minister that he regards all of Israel as Palestinian land is only the latest in a series of rejectionist statements from the Islamist group. In May, Osama Hamdan, head of Hamas’ international relations department, stated that ‘armed confrontation’ would remain ‘the backbone of the resistance’. Earlier that month, Ismail Haniyeh, de-facto prime minister of Gaza, argued that ‘the Zionist project in Palestine must end’, while a Hamas cleric claimed that:

‘In just a few years, all the Zionists and the settlers will realize that their arrival in Palestine was for the purpose of the great massacre, by means of which Allah wants to relieve humanity of their evil.’

Flotilla 2 supports terrorism

From the Jerusalem Centre for Public Affairs Vol. 11, No. 6 29 June 2011, by Ehud Rosen:

• The second flotilla is coordinated by Muhammad Sawalha, a senior Muslim Brotherhood figure connected to Hamas. Many of the participating organizations can be directly linked with the Union of Good (UoG), a coalition of European charities affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, which in 2008 was designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. Treasury for transferring funds to Hamas. The UoG was initiated by Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, leader of the Muslim Brotherhood on a global scale, shortly after the outbreak of the Second Intifada in 2000.
•  Other main organizers include the anti-Israel International Solidarity Movement (ISM), as well as far-left socialists from Europe and the United States. According to the flotilla's main organizers, its prime aim is to create provocations and harm Israel's image.
•  Following Israel's Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, which ended in January 2009, a series of international conferences was held in Turkey to restructure the struggle against Israel. A conference in February 2009 featured 200 radical Islamist scholars who came to meet with senior Hamas officials to plot a new, "third jihadi front" (in addition to Pakistan and Iraq) centered on Gaza. The conference gave birth to the infamous, pro-Hamas Istanbul Declaration, which also provided justification for attacking foreign navies which might try to prevent arms smuggling to Gaza.
•  In general, the same organizers stand behind the second flotilla, with several changes. The most important may be the IHH decision not to send the Mavi Marmara, the ship which brought the first flotilla its publicity following violent clashes between IHH activists and the IDF in which nine Turks were killed. Rather than take a leading role, it appears that the IHH will settle this time for sending activists to sail on other ships.
•  Thus, the flotilla is far from being a peaceful, humanitarian effort to support the Palestinians in Gaza. It should instead be seen as a major, pro-Hamas effort to delegitimize Israel by a "red-green alliance" of leftists and Islamists.

Follow the link to read more.

US should not tolerate Hamas

From Politico 17 May 2011, by Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), House majority leader, and Rep. Peter Roskam (R-Ill.), chief deputy whip:

Terror in the Palestinian territories has taken a decisive step forward. Peace is in retreat.

Under the new accord, for the first time, Hamas’s TV broadcasts are to be sent into the West Bank. Shows designed to poison the minds of young Palestinians by lauding the ways of jihad and perpetuating hateful lies about Israel, Jews and the U.S. will likely further radicalize the West Bank.

Remember, these are the same broadcasts that notoriously aired a Mickey Mouse-like cartoon character teaching children to “annihilate the Jews.”

The last time the PA partnered with Hamas, the latter forcibly removed the former from the Gaza Strip and created a virtual terrorist state on Israel’s borders. Six years and thousands of rockets and mortars later, many Israeli civilian communities are still paying the price. The U.S. must not allow this to be repeated in the West Bank.

Given the dire risks this agreement poses to Israel’s security, Washington must draw a hard line and suspend aid to the Palestinian government. U.S. tax dollars have no place going to governments composed of terrorists.

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gets set to visit Washington this week, the PA has made its move against peace. It has embraced a regime of terror — one that mourns bin Laden’s death — even as it now hopes for the U.N. to unilaterally grant it a state in a vote this coming September. The Obama administration must stand united with the American people, and with Israel, to oppose this vote.

In a dangerous region, Israel is a democratic ally bound to us by a shared set of beliefs in freedom, peace and human progress. Serving on the front lines of the struggle against terrorism and Iranian-backed aggression, Israel is our vital strategic asset that provides stability to a volatile neighborhood.
The Hamas-Fatah reconciliation agreement empowers Hamas terrorists and endangers Israel.

The U.S. must use every tool in our diplomatic arsenal to make clear that we will not tolerate a Palestinian government that includes Hamas. It is our duty, as leader of the free world, to do no less.

Sceptical Reaction to Obama's speech

From IsraelNationalNews.com, 19 May 2011, by Gavriel Queenann:

Nationalist Israeli lawmakers were taken aback by US President Barack Obama's "new chapter in American diplomacy" outlined Thursday during his much expected Mideast policy address at the State Department.

Obama ambushed Netanyahu, who had outlined Israel's conditions for peace earlier this week, and demanded a "full and phased withdrawal" by Israel from "occupied lands" citing the "1967 border." Before his address, Obama had assured Israeli officials he would not address specifics of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

"President Barack Hussein Obama adopted the phased plan of Yasser Arafat,"  ... noting Arafat's plan was not for peace, but for the gradual destruction of Israel, piece by piece. "He is demanding [of] Netanyahu a withdrawal from all of Judea and Samaria without even ending the conflict. He left the Prime Minister only one option, which is to tell him to 'forget about it,'" [MK Danny] Danon said.

Danon also lauded Prime Minister Netanyahu's strong response to Obama's position, which included the demand that the US honor commitments made to the Jewish state in 2004 by former President George W. Bush.

"I commend the prime minister for issuing a clear response that this policy is unacceptable," Danon said.

[MK] Aryeh Eldad (National Union) said Obama's position was nothing knew – and definitively insane.

"I wonder why all the pundits were so excited about Obama saying '1967 borders' as if he invented something knew. We tend to forget these were the Clinton guidelines, that Barak negotiated with Arafat based on them. Ehud Olmert also negotiated on these terms with Abu Mazen - and they all failed," Eldad said.

"It is a wonder the American president forgot Einstein's definition of insanity ...doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.'"...

From Fox News, 19 May 2011, by Associated Press:

JERUSALEM – Israel's prime minister on Thursday gave a cool reception to President Barack Obama's Mideast policy speech, warning a withdrawal from the West Bank wold leave Israel vulnerable to attack and setting up what could be a tense meeting at the White House.

In his speech, Obama endorsed the Palestinian position on the borders of their future state, saying it should be based on Israel's lines before the 1967 Mideast war. Israel captured the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza Strip in the fighting, and the Palestinians claim those areas for their state.

...The U.S., the international community and even past Israeli governments have endorsed a settlement based on the 1967 lines, but Obama was far more explicit than in the past. His position appeared to put him at odds with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has not accepted the concept.

Reacting to Obama's speech, Benjamin Netanyahu rejected a full withdrawal from the West Bank, saying the 1967 lines were "indefensible" and would leave major Jewish settlements outside Israel. Netanyahu rejects any pullout from east Jerusalem.

Netanyahu heads to the White House on Friday and said he would seek clarifications.

Behind the rhetoric, though, was the possibility of finding common ground. Obama said he would support agreed-upon territorial swaps between the Israel and the Palestinians, leaving the door open for Israel to retain major West Bank settlements, where the vast majority of its nearly 300,000 Jewish settlers live.

Netanyahu said he would urge Obama to endorse a 2004 American commitment, made by then President George W. Bush, to Israel. In a letter at the time, Bush said a full withdrawal to the 1967 lines was "unrealistic" and a future peace agreement would have to recognize "new realities on the ground."

Israelis have interpreted Bush's commitment as U.S. support for retaining the major settlement blocs. Earlier this week, Netanyahu said Israel would have to retain the blocs as part of any future peace agreement.

But Netanyahu also wants to keep other parts of the West Bank, including a strategic section of land along the Jordanian border that he believes is vital to Israel's security. The Palestinians oppose any Israeli presence in their future state.

Netanyahu said he would reiterate his security demands at Friday's meeting.

Netanyahu said he plans to raise other demands: Palestinian recognition of Israel as the Jewish homeland, guarantees that Palestinian refugees be resettled outside of Israel and condemnation of an emerging Palestinian government that is to include the anti-Israel Hamas militant group.

With peacemaking stalled for months, the Palestinians have said they will ask the United Nations to recognize their independence in September, with or without a peace deal.

In his speech, Obama rejected the U.N. push. "Symbolic actions to isolate Israel at the United Nations in September won't create an independent state," Obama said.

It was not immediately clear whether Obama's statement on the 1967 borders as the basis for negotiations — something the Palestinians have long sought — would be sufficient to persuade the Palestinians to drop their quest for U.N. recognition...

Why Is the World Expecting Israel to Make Peace With Hamas?

From New York Post, May 11, 2011, by Michael Goodwin:

Imagine this nightmare. Instead of sending a team of SEALs to ice Usama bin Laden, President Obama sent a team of negotiators to see if we could talk the terror lord into promises of peace. All he had to do was say the right words, and we'd say 9/11 and all the threats about destroying the Great Satan were forgiven, and gee, let's be friends.

It's a sickening scenario, yet it's not far from what the world, including the United States, is asking Israel to do with Hamas. The Israelis are expected to break bread with the people who still threaten to wipe them off the face of the earth and regularly fire rockets into towns and cities.

The Palestinian terror group, which gets its funding and weapons from Iran and its joy in murder from Al Qaeda, has signed a "unity" compact with Fatah, the main Palestinian faction. The groups have waged a low-grade civil war for years, with Hamas controlling Gaza while Fatah controls the West Bank. They now say they're joining forces and will hold winner-take-all elections in a year.

It's far from clear the truce will hold, and the jockeying for power has begun. Yet pressure is already building on Israel to make a deal that will lead to a unified Palestinian state, despite the fact that Hamas has not met the American and European demand that it renounce violence and accept Israel's right to exist.

Indeed, one top Hamas leader told Al Jazeera this week that Hamas would never recognize Israel and "the rule of Poles and Ethiopians in their land." Another denounced the killing of Bin Laden and called him "an Arab holy warrior" and martyr.

Those sentiments are hardly a surprise, but what is surprising is that the Obama administration doesn't see them as red flags. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton swatted away concerns, saying, "We are going to be carefully assessing what this actually means, because there are a number of different potential meanings to it, both on paper and in practice." She said the United States has not changed its demands on Hamas, but would make a decision when "we actually see what unfolds."

That's the wrong answer. As Elliott Abrams writes on his blog at the Council on Foreign Relations, "The United States needs to be far clearer: we cannot and will not support any government where Hamas has a real influence and the security forces stop fighting terror."

A deputy national security adviser for Mideast affairs under President George W. Bush, Abrams adds that "we must certainly not fund such a government."

That's got to be the American bottom line, but by taking such a wait-and-see attitude, the White House is doing something far worse than merely kicking the can down the road. It is effectively giving a green light to letting Hamas join, and maybe run, the Palestinian government without giving up its charter, which calls for the elimination of Israel. Coming as Israelis celebrate their 63rd anniversary of independence, it's a mighty strange gift.

Alarmed by the White House approach, 27 Democratic senators wrote to Obama, reminding him that the U.S. cannot legally provide aid to any government that includes Hamas, which is a listed terror group. It also cited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's warning that Fatah can have "peace with Israel or peace with Hamas" but "there is no possibility for peace with both."

The letter, signed by both New York senators, Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, has the right tone of urgency and makes all the right points. But it is distressing that the issues needed to be spelled out for the president, because they are so obvious.

Hamas prepares for genocide of the Jews

From The Wire, 16 May 2011:

Hamas MP argues that Jews were brought to Palestine for a ‘great massacre’, in order to ‘relieve humanity of their evil’.

Following the comments made last Wednesday by Hamas’ foreign minister, Mahmoud Zahar, reiterating that the Islamist group would never recognise Israel, further statements by senior figures have emerged that also highlight the group’s extreme ideology.

The Hamas cleric Yunis Al-Astal, who is a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, argued that:

‘All the predators, all the birds of prey, all the dangerous reptiles and insects, and all the lethal bacteria are far less dangerous than the Jews.’

According to Memri, Al-Astal made the comments on Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV channel on 11 May, expressing his belief that Allah had brought Jews to Palestine in order to ‘relieve humanity of their evil’:

‘The [Jews] are brought in droves to Palestine so that the Palestinians – and the Islamic nation behind them – will have the honour of annihilating the evil of this gang.’
‘In just a few years, all the Zionists and the settlers will realize that their arrival in Palestine was for the purpose of the great massacre, by means of which Allah wants to relieve humanity of their evil.’

The translation of Al-Astal’s words comes the day after Ismail Haniyeh, the incumbent leader in Gaza, told hundreds of Palestinians to ‘pray for the end of the state of Israel’. According to official website of Hamas’ Al-Qassam Brigades:

‘The Zionist project in Palestine must end,’ Haniya told participants at the dawn prayers at al-Omari Mosque, as Palestinians were marking Nakba Day.’

Haniyeh’s comments were widely cited during the coverage of the Nakba protests, which saw hundreds of Palestinians in various locations stream towards Israel’s borders. Notably, there was no mention of his statement in any of Harriet Sherwood’s coverage for The Guardian, despite her authoring five different articles on the subject for the broadsheet.

Violence on Israel's borders

From Reuters, 15 May 2011, by Haim Shafir, MAJDAL SHAMS, Golan Heights*:


Violence erupted on Israel's borders with Syria, Lebanon and Gaza on Sunday, leaving at least eight dead and dozens wounded, as Palestinians marked what they term "the catastrophe" of Israel's founding in 1948.


Israeli troops shot at protesters in three separate locations to prevent crowds from crossing Israeli frontier lines in the deadliest such confrontation in years.

Israeli and Syrian media reports said Israeli gunfire killed four people after dozens of Palestinian refugees infiltrated the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria, along a disputed border that has been quiet for decades.

Witnesses on the nearby Lebanese frontier said four Palestinians were killed after Israeli forces fired at rock-throwing protesters to prevent them from crossing the border.

The Lebanese army had also earlier fired in the air in an attempt to hold back the crowds.

On Israel's tense southern border with the Gaza Strip, Israeli gunfire wounded 60 Palestinians as demonstrators approached Israel's fence with the Hamas Islamist-run enclave, medical workers said.

In Tel Aviv, Israel's commercial hub, a truck driven by an Arab Israeli slammed into vehicles and pedestrians, killing one man and injuring 17 people.

Police were trying to determine whether the incident was an accident or an attack. Witnesses said the driver, who was arrested, ran amok with his truck in downtown traffic.

...In the Druze village of Majdal Shams, on the Golan Heights captured by Israel from Syria in 1967, Mayor Dolan Abu Salah said between 40 and 50 Nakba demonstrators from Syria tore through the frontier fence.

...Israeli troops attempted to mend the breached fence..."We are seeing here an Iranian provocation, on both the Syrian and the Lebanese frontiers, to try to exploit the Nakba day commemorations," said the army's chief spokesman, Lieutenant-Colonel Yoav Mordechai.

Syria is home to 470,000 Palestinian refugees and its leadership, now facing fierce internal unrest, had in previous years prevented protesters from reaching the frontier fence.

"This appears to be a cynical and transparent act by the Syrian leadership to deliberately create a crisis on the border so as to distract attention from the very real problems that regime is facing at home," said a senior Israeli government official who declined to be named.

...in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian youths threw rocks at Israeli soldiers, who fired tear gas and rubber bullets in a clash at the Israeli military checkpoint outside the city of Ramallah ...

(*Additional reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza, Jeffrey Heller, Dan Williams and Ori Lewis in Jerusalem, Ali Sawafta in Ramallah and Yara Bayoumy in Beirut, Writing by Douglas Hamilton; editing by Crispian Balmer)

PA capitulates to Hamas

From JPost, 29 April 2011, by KHALED ABU TOAMEH:

No matter how one looks at it, the Palestinian reconciliation deal is a victory for Hamas.

...Moreover, the timing could not have been better for Hamas.

The Egyptian-sponsored deal came amid signs that Hamas was beginning to lose its grip on the Gaza Strip, as a result of the continued blockade and boycott by the international community.

Last month, thousands of Palestinian demonstrators clashed with Hamas security forces for the first time since the movement seized control over the entire Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007.

Many Palestinians, including Fatah, said that the confrontations reflected increased resentment of Hamas.

But the unity deal with Fatah will now help Hamas reassert its authority over the Gaza Strip. It will also help Hamas emerge from political isolation by turning it into a legitimate and key player in the international arena.

One of the biggest achievements for Hamas is the fact that the unity deal does not require it to relinquish control over the Gaza Strip. In fact, Hamas would be permitted to keep its security forces in the Gaza Strip, further tightening its grip on the area.

Nor does the deal require Hamas to accept the Middle East peace process or accept the two-state solution.

Hamas will be brought into the unity government as an equal partner.

Until a few days ago, Hamas and Fatah were detaining and torturing each other’s supporters.

For the past three-and-a-half years, security forces loyal to Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayyad worked round the clock to eliminate Hamas’s presence in the West Bank.

Under the terms of the reconciliation accord, Fatah will have to release all “political detainees” belonging to Hamas. This will only help Hamas regain its strength in the West Bank.

The deal also allows Hamas to run again unconditionally in elections, as was the case in the 2006 parliamentary vote. There’s no guarantee that Hamas would not win again in the next elections, which are expected to take place within a year.

Hamas has been recognized as a legitimate partner and player not only by Fatah, but also by the most populous Arab country, Egypt.

The popular uprising that forced Hosni Mubarak out of office earlier this year has been nothing but a blessing for Hamas. The new Egyptian regime has since been working to improve its ties with Hamas through a series of goodwill gestures that include the reopening of the Rafah border crossing and permitting the movement to have its own “representative office” in Cairo.

Although some Palestinians remained skeptical about the prospects of the unity deal holding for a long period of time, many agreed that Hamas stood to benefit the most from the agreement.

See this TIP Timeline of Terror Attacks by Hamas Since Israel’s 2005 Gaza Withdrawal.

PM Netanyahu responds to the Palestinian Authority-Hamas agreement

From the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 27 April 2011 (Communicated by the Prime Minister's Media Adviser):

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this evening (Wednesday), 27 April 2011, referred to the anticipated agreement between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas:

"The Palestinian Authority needs to choose between peace with Israel and peace with Hamas. Peace with both is impossible because Hamas aspires to destroy the State of Israel and says so openly. It fires missiles at our cities; it fires anti-tank rockets at our children.

I think that the very idea of this reconciliation shows the weakness of the Palestinian Authority and causes one to wonder if Hamas will seize control of Judea and Samaria like it seized control of the Gaza Strip.

I hope that the Palestinian Authority chooses correctly, i.e. that it chooses peace with Israel. The choice is in its hands."

Hamas and Fatah try reconciliation (again)

From Christian Science Monitor, April 27, 2011, by Kristen Chick, Correspondent:
Rival Palestinian factions Hamas and Fatah say they've agreed to end a four-year rift. If the agreement holds, it could pave the way for the first Palestinian elections since 2006 and end a period of simmering hostilities...
In a deal brokered by Egypt, the two sides agreed in principle to form an interim government made up of “independents” and to hold elections in a year, officials said at a press conference. Officials said they would formally ink the deal within weeks.

... Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza have watched regional revolutions and held small protests against their own leaders, whom they see as unaccountable and corrupt. They've also urged the factions to put aside their differences for the sake of creating a Palestinian state. That has dragged Fatah's Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas's Khaled Mashaal back to the negotiating table.

Yet many observers are skeptical that the deal will hold, particularly when its comes to implementation.

“Looking at the past four years, at the lack of trust, the lack of confidence, the incitement on both sides, it makes every reasonable person question whether this will be implemented on the ground,” says Mkhaimer Abusada, political science professor at Al Azhar University in Gaza...

Schism developed in 2007
The schism between Hamas and Fatah opened in 2007, when Hamas wrested control of Gaza from Fatah in a bloody conflict. Since then, Fatah has controlled the West Bank and Hamas has ruled Gaza. The divide has complicated efforts to restart Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. Egypt, under the rule of former President Hosni Mubarak, tried unsuccessfully for years to bring the two Palestinian factions together. Some Hamas officials were skeptical he was an honest broker however, since Mubarak detested their movement, an offshoot of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood...

The quick success of the new government in brokering a deal will be a source of pride for Egypt, whose regional influence has declined....

Israel and the US, however...have said in the past they will not recognize a Palestinian government that includes the Islamist organization unless Hamas first renounces violence and recognizes Israel’s right to exist.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected the agreement. “The Palestinian Authority must choose either peace with Israel or peace with Hamas. Peace with both is not possible,” he said.

Officials in Cairo tried to head off a confrontation with Israel, implying the interim government would be made up of technocrats and not factional figures. They also said they had agreed on security cooperation, a key area in the ongoing dispute, but did not go into detail. Mr. Abusada said the agreement stipulated that Hamas would remain in control of security in Gaza and Fatah in the West Bank until new elections are held and the government restructures the security apparatus. Hamas’s armed wing, the Al Qassam Brigades, has rejected laying down arms or giving control of security to the very forces they fought fiercely in 2007.

...Hamas ...with a more neutral arbiter in the new Egyptian government, essentially ran out of excuses not to agree, says Emad Gad, an analyst at Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo.

Gad says the upheaval currently under way in Syria, which hosts Hamas’s politburo, was likely a factor pushing the organization to the table. And it also couldn’t ignore the impatience of Gazans, who were tired of living under the blockade Israel imposed after Hamas took control of Gaza. As the wave of protests swept the region, Gazans organized protests of their own against Hamas, which were swiftly put down by Hamas security forces.

But the initial signs on the ground in Gaza were not positive, says Abusada. When Gazans went to a central Gaza City square to celebrate the announcement, they were dispersed by baton-wielding Hamas policemen. “That makes me wonder whether Hamas on the ground and Al Qassam is going to accept this and is ready to implement it,” he says.

US radicals participate in planning the next blockade-busting "flotilla"

From Canada Free Press, Sunday, April 24, 2011, by Jim Kouri:

The main organizers of last year’s so-called Gaza Flotilla ...and assorted radical-left leaders such as President Obama’s friends and colleagues William Ayers and Jodie Evans, are preparing a new blockade-busting voyage, the operation’s leader said Saturday.

Bulent Yildirim, leader of the planned flotilla, said his group and supporters are getting the flotilla ready and warned that there will be a ship from every country in Europe. He said the Turkish-registered ship “Mavi Marmara” will be part of it.

The participants have warned that until the Israeli defense blockade is lifted on Gaza, the intifada will continue by land, by sea and by air. The blockade is a result of weapons, rockets, and other contraband being smuggled into the Palestinian territory in the Gaza Strip and being used against the Israeli people.

...The organizer of [last year's] blockade-busting action was a known radical group called Free Gaza. The “Free Gaza” flotilla was far more than a collection of innocent “peace activists” trying to provide humanitarian aid to Gaza, as they were portrayed by many news organizations.

Free Gaza sponsored the flotilla that engaged in deadly clashes with Israeli special forces troops. Among its members were Weather Underground founders William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn—who perpetrated a series of terrorist attacks—as well as Jodie Evans, the leader of the radical activist organization Code Pink. Besides the U.S. radicals, Islamic groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah and Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood contributed to the flotilla.

As is well-known in the United States, Ayers and Dohrn were close associates of President Obama for years in Chicago. Meanwhile, Jodie Evans was a fundraiser and financial bundler for Obama’s presidential campaign. In fact, one of Obama’s fundraisers was held in the home of Ayers and Dohrn.

Evans later worked on Attorney General Jerry Brown’s successful run for the governorship of California.

“Ayers’ and Dohrn’s continued activities appear to elude the attention of the people responsible for reporting the news without bias. They are terrorists, plain and simple, so why would anyone be surprised to discover their connection to an anti-Semitic organization that supports terror groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah, the Muslim Brother and even al-Qaeda?” asks former New York Police detective Michael Snopes.

The passengers reportedly included 100-plus members of various Muslim Brotherhood chapters, at least 20 of whom taped al Qaeda-style “martyr” videos before embarking on their anti-Israel mission, according to terrorist expert Steve Emerson, founder of The Investigative Project on Terrorism

According to Emerson’s IPT investigation, the chief organizers had more than “peaceful” intentions for the flotilla.

The respected Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) reported that a Gaza-based Hamas leader declared three days before the voyage started that the captain of the [Gaza Flotilla] ship had told him: “We will not allow the Zionists to come near us, and we will wage resistance against them.”

Meanwhile, Congressman Trent Franks (R-AZ) responded to ongoing criticism of Israel following the incident near Gaza where Israeli Defense Forces personnel engaged the flotilla of six ships attempting to overrun an Israeli naval blockade.

Rep. Franks cited reports indicating that individuals on board the ships were carrying weapons and attacked Israeli soldiers as they were trying to stop the advance of the flotilla. The blockade exists to keep the terrorist organization Hamas, which has routinely launched attacks against innocent Israeli citizens, from supplying its forces with weapons and other materials while allowing necessary humanitarian supplies to reach those living in Gaza, Franks stated.

“The conflict that took place aboard the Turkish flotilla was a completely unnecessary and deliberate attempt to provoke Israel to action. The Gaza blockade was put into place in an attempt to prevent Hamas from continuing to use the Gaza strip as a launching pad for literally thousands and thousands of rockets fired into innocent Israeli citizen populations. Humanitarian shipments into Gaza are routinely used to smuggle weapons and other dangerous materials into Gaza for Hamas,” said Congressman Franks.

“The United States must maintain a strong position of support for Israel as the U.N. once again tries to make them a punching bag for the rest of the world. The Obama Administration must also commit to vetoing any resolution from U.N. Organizations like the Security Council or the Human Rights Council that would condemn Israel and encourage the terrorist groups who provoked the raid,” said the Arizona lawmaker.

Obama supporters in the midst of discussion regarding the current Egyptian civil unrest are claiming that the Muslim Brotherhood is not a terrorist organization and that its members are not major players in the Egyptian protests and uprising. They also claim there are no connections between the Obama administration and radical Islamists such as the Muslim Brotherhood, in spite of the activities of Ayers, Dohrn and Evans, who are known associates of the U.S. President.

“If the House Republicans, who are now the majority, wish to investigate the current administration and its abysmal performance on national security incidents, they should start with the President’s relationship with far-left radicals and Islamic fascists,” said Det. Snopes.

What is the point of dragging Israel, victim of Hamas terrorism into the question of Arrigoni’s death?

From Il Giornale, April 16, 2011, by Fiamma Nirenstein:

The cruelty of the public execution of a young man who had family and friends, as it was the case with Vittorio Arrigoni's killing, is always awful. And this is clear.

What isn’t clear to the European public is that it is patently evident that the killers are his old Islamic Jihadists friends from Gaza. But they could have been Afghanis, or Iraqis.

In 2002, Daniel Pearl was killed in Karachi with similar methods because he was a Jew; in 2004 the decapitation of the American Nick Berg in Iraq was filmed, the Jihadists said, «to give a clear message to the West»; the Italian Fabrizio Quattrocchi was executed because he was «an enemy of God, an enemy of Allah» and Vittorio Arrigoni, as his butchers say it in the video, in the words that scroll across the screen, because «he was spreading western immorality in Gaza» and because «Italy fights against Islamic countries».

It has been repeated again and again that Hamas, with whom Arrigoni was on friendly terms, has condemned the crime. But in actual fact it doesn’t matter if the assassins are members of Hamas or not. They have been, they will be, they are all controlled by Hamas. Even Al Qaida, which has a presence in Gaza, is seen by Hamas in a better or worse light, depending on the moment. But Hamas is always top dog in Gaza.

Hamas is responsible for the captivity of Gilad Shalit; it was responsible for the armed destruction of the UN recreational camp for children, which did not abide by Islamic dictates; it was responsible for arresting 150 women under the accusation of witchcraft and the execution of several of them; it is Hamas that has introduced by law death penalty, whipping, cutting off hands and crucifixion, according to Sharia. Hamas killed the 32-year old Christian book salesman Rami Khader Ayyad, guilty of selling Bibles.

Not all those who carry out these operations, or which Hamas gives orders to fire Qassam missiles against Israel, are members of the terrorist organization that rules Gaza; indeed at times it pretend to fight them.

Hamas is a movement, a party, a fundamentalist State. Its statute stipulates that it wants to destroy the Jewish State, to exterminate Jews and impose an Islamic caliphate on the entire world. Salafite fringes and those linked more to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, those influenced to a greater or lesser extent by Iran or Al Qaeda and based in the Gaza Strip, join up and leave Hamas by turns. The fact that Hamas has now disowned the killers of Arrigoni is not of the slightest importance. In any case, they were still employed by Hamas as members of the Al Qassam Brigades.

To understand the death of this Italian activist, one important fact must be grasped: his death was triggered by the spurious way he mixed his humanitarian ideals with the cause of fundamentalist Gaza, by the fact that he mixed his life with that of his potential enemies, that he thought about as his best friends.

But fundamentalists do not have stable affinities. Only their interpretation of Quran counts. Hamas Gaza, where Arrigoni has been killed, is for us a land ruled by awful and distant laws. Arrigoni loved the Palestinians, but he remained a total foreigner for them. It is for us unconcivable, even if you are a militant like Arrigoni, to live alongside those who fire missiles on civilians, wear belts packed with explosives and hand out sweets when an Israeli family is killed in Itamar, including a three months baby, a four years old child and another of nine.

This is a crucial issue: when you go to Gaza, or Afghanistan, you have to realise that our conception of life, is complitely different from any Islamic political conception of life. You can die because you are Jewish, because you are Italian, or Christian, because you are an apostate, or a corrupt Westerner... the extremist mentality, make no bones about it, cancels out friends and allies.

No matter how much you have worked against the «Zionist power» or that you have called Zionists «rats» (and Arrigoni did this), nothing is of any worth if you break their rule, a rule which will remain unclear until the knife blade comes. Arrigoni was fan of political Islamism because he was an enemy of the Jews, but this did not save him from a cruel execution in front of the camera, just as the one of many others friends or enemies of Hamas or the Islamic Jihad, never mind.

So it is intellectually sad and even dangerous that a demonstration in front of the Italian Parliament blamed Israel and Italy for Arrigoni’s death; or that the ISM, the pro-Palestinian NGO Arrigoni belonged to, attributed «moral responsibility to the State of Israel». These reactions seem to be triggered only by ideological hatred.

But what is more striking still, with sincerest respect for the figure of the President of Republic, was the statement of condolences which Giorgio Napolitano rightly delivered; instead of laying the blame on Islamic fundamentalism, he asked that «a negotiated solution be found to the conflict which sees bloodshed in the region». With the same coherence, he could have invoked any good cause: the fight against world hunger, or child prostitution.

Yet instead, Israel is being summoned to face some mysterious responsibility.

But the fault is only of Islamic fundamentalism; what is the point of dragging the pained witness and victim of Hamas terrorism into the question?

Hamas is to blame for Palestinian misery

From an interview of IDF spokesman Captain Avichai Adraee on Al Jazeera, 24 October 2009, but freshl;y relevant now:

(In Arabic with English subtitles)

"...if they store weapons in a civilain house then we will strike it because otherwise they'll use those missiles against us."

Abbas prefers Hamas to the US

From JPOST.COM, 28 March 2011, by STAFF*:

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is willing to give up hundreds of millions of dollars of US aid if that is what is necessary to forge a reconciliation deal with Hamas, the Associated Press quoted his adviser as saying on Monday.

...According to official Palestinian Authority news agency WAFA, Abbas also requested that the Palestinian Liberation Organization's (PLO) Executive Committee convene the body's Constitution Committee as quickly as possible, either in Amman or Cairo, in order to begin drafting amendments to the organization's charter.

...Since 2005, the committee has not successfully drafted amendments to the PLO charter, and has not convened since Hamas was elected to power in 2006.

Over the weekend, Abbas met with a Hamas delegation from the West Bank in Ramallah to discuss ways of ending the dispute between his Fatah faction and the Islamist movement. It was the first such meeting in more than a year.

... While some [Hamas leaders] have welcomed it, others have announced that Abbas was unwelcome in the Gaza Strip.

Abbas briefed the Hamas officials on his initiative, saying it was aimed at discussing the formation of a new government that consists of independent figures to prepare for presidential and legislative elections, and rebuild the Gaza Strip.

Hours after the meeting, a senior government official said that Israel will stop dealing with the Palestinian Authority if it brings Hamas into the government.

“Abbas has to choose whether he wants peace with Israel, or peace with Hamas,” the official said. “He can’t have both. If he chooses peace with Hamas it will bury the peace process.”

*Khaled Abu Toameh and Herb Keinon contributed to this report.

Canada condemns rocket fire on Israel

From AFP, 26 March 2011:

OTTAWA — Canada "vigorously condemns" a spate of rocket fire by Gaza militants against Israel, Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon said Friday.

"Canada vigorously condemns the rocket attacks on Israel launched from the Gaza Strip. These terrorist attacks, which indiscriminately target civilian areas, are abhorrent and criminal. Israel has a right to defend itself against such terrorist acts," he said in a statement.

"Terrorism is never justified. We call on all parties in Gaza to cease these criminal attacks. Those responsible should be brought to justice."

Since the weekend, dozens of rockets have hit southern Israel. The vast majority of them were fired by Islamic Jihad's military wing, the Al-Quds Brigade.

Here's why Gaza is blockaded

From idfnadesk, Mar 17, 2011:



A two-minute ummary of the incident in which the IDF Navy uncovered on-board the cargo ship "Victoria" weaponry intended for the use of terrorist organizations operating in the Gaza Strip. The ship had come from Lattakia, Syria and made a quick stop in Turkey before its final destination to Egypt. According to assessments, the weapons were intended to be smuggled through Egypt into the Gaza Strip. Turkey and Egypt are not believed to be involved with the weapons smuggling.

The weaponry discovered on the vessel included thousands of mortar shells, ammunition, and six anti-ship missiles which may have significantly shifted the regional balance of powers in favor of the terror organizations. These missiles could have been used to threaten Israeli Navy ships, civilian ships, and gas reserves off the coast of Israel.

In addition, Iranian documents found along with the weaponry including a missile identification manual written in Persian containing emblems of the Iranian government, point to the involvement and cooperation between Iran and Syria to further arm terrorist organizations.