Friday, August 22, 2014

Ceasing to Fire Gazan Articles

Related:

Six Zionist Companies Own 96% of the World's Media
Declassified: Massive Israeli manipulation of US media exposed 

I'm tired of talking about it. Just wanted you to know why.

"Palestinians revive dream of a Gaza seaport in peace talks" by Jodi Rudoren | New York Times   August 12, 2014

I returned at the same time.

SHEIK EJLEEN, Gaza Strip — An unmarked dirt lot about the size of a football field, on a cliff above the crashing waves of the Mediterranean, could be a crucial element in ending the monthlong battle between Israel and Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip.

It was here that a European contractor began building a commercial seaport back in July 2000, only to have its work destroyed by Israeli tanks and bombs within three months.

That was before Hamas took over.

Now, Palestinian leaders trying to negotiate terms in Cairo for a durable truce have made the revival of the seaport project a prime demand.

The port has become the embodiment of Palestinian aspirations to break the siege of Gaza, at once an icon of independence and a potential economic engine that would reduce the territory’s reliance on increasingly hostile neighbors.

Instead, Israel has kept them on starvation rations.

First promised by the Oslo Accords in 1993, the idea of a seaport — or at least an interim proposal for a floating pier under international supervision — has won some backing from Europe, Egypt, and the United Nations, albeit with caveats to address Israeli security concerns.

Not good enough.

Gazans “view this as a stepping-stone toward exercising some greater sovereignty over their own borders,” said Nathan Thrall, a senior analyst for the International Crisis Group, a nonprofit research group. “It’s enormously important practically and symbolically. It is establishing that there are these two powers that are squeezing us from both ends, and we are now going to change that situation and create a new opening for Gaza.”

The price tag for a port would top $100 million, with the money probably coming from European donors. Construction would take at least three years. Although the seaport was included in three previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements, Israel insists that Gaza must first be disarmed.

So, once again, Israel broke an agreement.

Sari Bashi, founder of Gisha, an Israeli nonprofit that promotes expanding access to and from Gaza, said that while a seaport “could open new horizons,” it would not address the most basic complaint of Gaza’s 1.7 million residents: They cannot travel freely — most notably to Jerusalem, to Israel, and to the West Bank, where many have relatives they have not seen in years.

“The seaport is a focal point for negotiators — the extent to which it’s a top priority for the population is an open question,” Bashi said. “A seaport is not going to reunite families. It’s not going to help farmers and manufacturers to market in Israel and the West Bank. It’s not something that’s going to have an immediate effect.”

So it is not worth doing?

Israel and Hamas, the militant Islamist movement that dominates Gaza, agreed to hold their fire for 72 hours starting at midnight on Monday, a truce that the Egyptians brokering the talks have said should be enough time to hammer out an agreement.

This article that was giving me what I want, information about inside Gaza, and now it is starting to turn.

Related: 

New York Times Clears Reports Through Israeli Censor
Israel Makes Things Clear to the New York Times
Israeli Censors Cleared This New York Times Report (Updated) 

Twitter took down the photograph!!! They are an obvious propaganda front after the tweets we saw in Ferguson.

Besides the seaport, topics of discussion were expected to include the reopening of the Rafah crossing between southern Gaza and Egypt with Palestinian Authority guards — not Hamas — on patrol; an increase in goods and people allowed through Israeli-controlled crossings; a doubling of the permitted fishing zone to 12 nautical miles; and the release of Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the remains of an Israeli soldier killed early in the conflict.

It's all Israel's position. Those are not talks.

In a phone interview with the Associated Press, Finance Minister Yair Lapid of Israel on Monday argued that in addition to patrolling the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza, Palestinian Authority officials should be in charge of any aid the world community donates to the rehabilitation of Gaza.

A British-French-German document regarding cease-fire arrangements drafted last week included a call to study “the implementation of an internationally supervised mechanism to enable trade to and from Gaza by sea.” Several people who have been briefed on the Cairo talks said that would probably mean, at first, a temporary pier a short distance from the shoreline, with ships mainly carrying humanitarian goods between Gaza and Cyprus, where European and perhaps even Israeli monitors would ensure security.

Meaning there would be NO CHANGE AT ALL! A CEASE FIRE means the SIEGE STAYS!

Egyptian leaders are “on board” with the idea, according to Thrall, because it “relieves them of pressure” in terms of opening Rafah for commerce and, more broadly, of taking responsibility for Gaza’s future.

Egypt trying to wash its hands of it all!

--more--"

Also see:

"Another member of the Palestinian delegation reported some progress, saying Israel had offered a number of gestures aimed at improving life for Gaza’s 1.8 million residents. They included an increase in the number of trucks permitted to deliver goods into the territory from Israel each day, and the transfer of funds by Abbas’s Palestinian Authority to Hamas-affiliated government employees in Gaza. 

The funds are taxes Israel generously collects for Palestinians, then withhold from them. 

Also included in the purported Israeli package, the official said, was an eventual quadrupling — to 12 miles — of the sea area in which Gaza fishing vessels are permitted to operate."

The rest is literally all talk.

"Negotiators announce extension of Israel-Hamas truce" by Mohammed Daraghmeh and Tia Goldenberg   |  Associated Press   August 14, 2014

CAIRO — Even as the extension was announced just minutes before a previous truce was set to expire at midnight, violence spiked, with Palestinian militants firing five rockets at Israel and Israel targeting sites across the Gaza Strip in response.

It was proved later that Israel acted first. The narrative is just old and instantly dismissed now.

****************

The lull in violence had been a welcome reprieve for Israelis and Palestinians living in Gaza. During the temporary cease-fire, Israel halted military operations in the war-battered coastal territory and Gaza militants stopped firing rockets, aside from the ones late Wednesday.

The two sides were considering an Egyptian proposal that partially addresses their demands, but deep differences have kept the deal in doubt.

Hamas is seeking an end to a crippling blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt in 2007. The blockade has greatly limited the movement of Palestinians in and out of the territory of 1.8 million people. It has also restricted the flow of goods into Gaza and blocked virtually all exports.

Israel says the closure is necessary to prevent arms smuggling, and officials are reluctant to make any concessions that would allow Hamas to declare victory.

And yet Israel then turns and screams about what a threat they are under. 

Then the blockade didn't work, huh? Just brought a lot of suffering.

Israel wants Hamas to disarm, or at least be prevented from re-arming. Hamas has recovered from previous rounds of violence with Israel, including a major three-week ground operation in January 2009 and another weeklong air offensive in 2012.

See: Memory Hole: Cast Lead II

It now controls an arsenal of thousands of rockets, some powerful, with long ranges. Gaza militants fired more than 3,000 rockets toward Israel during the war...

*******************

Israel, meanwhile, signaled it was ready to respond to renewed fire from Gaza following the end of the cease-fire.

‘‘We will continue to defend, continue to operate. We will be ready for any effort, any way, at any time,’’ Israel’s chief of staff, Lieutenant General Benny Gantz, told reporters.

The war began on July 8 with Israel’s air campaign against Gaza’s Hamas rulers, whom Israel blamed for the kidnapping and murder in June of three Israeli teenagers in the West Bank.

I love it when the background paragraph is a lie.

Nine days later, Israel sent in ground troops to destroy Hamas’ underground cross-border tunnels constructed for attacks inside Israel.

The fighting has so far killed more than 1,900 Palestinians, the majority of them civilians, Palestinian and UN officials say. On the Israeli side, 67 people have died, all but three of them soldiers.

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"AP video journalist, translator killed in Gaza" by Ibrahim Barzak and Josef Federman | Associated Press   August 14, 2014

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Six people — including an Associated Press video journalist — were killed Wednesday when leftover ordnance believed to have been dropped in an Israeli airstrike blew up in the Gaza Strip.

Simone Camilli and his Palestinian translator, Ali Shehda Abu Afash, were covering the war between Israel and militants in Gaza when they were killed. The blast occurred as Gaza police engineers were trying to defuse unexploded ordnance fired by Israel.

Four police engineers also were killed, police said. Three people, including AP photographer Hatem Moussa, were badly injured.

Moussa told a colleague that they were filming the scene when an initial explosion went off. He said he was hit by shrapnel and began to run when there was a second blast, which knocked him out. He woke up in a hospital and later underwent surgery before he was transferred to a hospital in Israel for more advanced care.

Police officials in Gaza said the blast took place at a special site set up in the northern town of Beit Lahiya where authorities have collected unexploded ordnance to be defused. The cause of the blast was not immediately known.

All in one spot? Bad idea.

An official said an Israeli tank shell caused the first explosion, triggering the more powerful secondary blast that included several bombs, including unexploded missiles dropped in Israeli airstrikes. The Israeli military carried out nearly 5,000 airstrikes over a month of fighting.

Hamas police posted photos of what it said was the site shortly before the explosion showing a senior bomb disposal expert surveying the area with piles of unexploded bombs behind him. Even after the blast, the lot, surrounded by a low wall, was strewn with piles of unexploded shells. There appeared to be about 10 missiles dropped by Israeli warplanes and dozens of tank shells.

Iyad al-Bouzm, a spokesman for Gaza’s Interior Ministry, estimated that Israel dropped about 10,000 tons of explosives on Gaza, including shells fired by tanks, artillery batteries, and gunboats, as well as more powerful missiles delivered in airstrikes. He said there was no estimate on how many unexploded shells remained.

Camilli became the first foreign journalist killed in the Gaza conflict, which has taken more than 1,900 Palestinian lives and 67 on the Israeli side. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a US-based press-freedom advocacy group, four Palestinian journalists or media workers have been killed in the fighting.

The 35-year-old Italian national had worked for the AP since 2005, when he was hired in Rome. He relocated to Jerusalem in 2006 and often covered assignments in Gaza. He had been based recently in Beirut, returning to Gaza after the war began last month.

He leaves a longtime partner and a 3-year-old daughter in Beirut, as well as his parents and two sisters.

Camilli is the 33d AP staffer to die in pursuit of the news since AP was founded in 1846 and the second this year. On April 4, AP photographer Anja Niedringhaus was killed and veteran AP correspondent Kathy Gannon was badly wounded by a gunman in Afghanistan.

Happened during the Afghan election and it got a flood of coverage.

‘‘Simone was well known throughout Europe, and especially to our video team in London, where his death has hit AP deeply,’’ Gary Pruitt, the AP’s chief executive, said in a memo to staffers.

‘‘As all of you know, this has been a very difficult year for AP,’’ he said. ‘‘As conflict and violence grows around the world, our work becomes more important but also more dangerous. We take every precaution we can to protect the brave journalists who staff our front lines. I never cease to be amazed at their courage.’’

He said the AP was providing assistance to Camilli’s family.

Pope Francis prayed for Camilli and Abu Afash aboard the papal plane en route to South Korea after he was informed of their deaths by the Rev. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, who noted the tremendous risks taken by journalists in covering conflict.

Francis, who came to the back of the plane to greet the press, was clearly moved.

‘‘I have to make a silent prayer for Simone Camilli, one of yours, who today left us in service. Let us pray in silence,’’ the pontiff said.

Look, I'm not happy a reporter, or anyone else died, but all this print for the death of one of their own when the stories of Gaza have been ignored. We know why, but it's obvious when one is looking for news in his newspaper and there is nothing there.

Abu Afash, a 36-year-old Gaza resident, leaves his wife and two daughters, ages 7 and 2½. He often worked with the international media as a translator and news assistant, and he worked as a part-time administrative assistant for Agence France-Presse.

Hundreds of people attended Abu Afash’s funeral in Gaza City. Mourners sobbed and shrieked in grief, with many people kissing Abu Afash on the forehead before his body was taken away for burial.

‘‘He is not a journalist. He’s not a terrorist, nor a politician. He’s an innocent man who loves to help everyone,’’ said his wife, Shireen, a doctor who heads the neonatal unit at the al-Nasr Pediatrics Hospital in Gaza City and spent much of the war treating the wounded. 

And he's second of concern, and I guess I shouldn't be complaining because he got three paragraphs. Left wife and daughters, huh? Oooooh.

--more--"

Related:  Five-day cease-fire in Gaza buys time for peace talks

I'm sure they will get to the bottom of the explosion, if you get the hint.

EU offers to take over Gaza border crossings

Thanks for the offer, but....

(At this point blog editor did not that there was no Sunday Globe Special about Gaza for the elite crowd that kicks back upon a Sunday. I don't blame them anymore; just want you to note it. No need to trouble certain minds)

Palestinian factions seen as split on Mideast truce talks

Well, it's a technocratic unity government both agreed upon, so.... sigh.

"Israel, Hamas to keep talking; Agree to extend truce by one day" by Mohammed Daraghmeh | Associated Press   August 19, 2014

CAIRO — Egypt late Monday announced a 24-hour extension in talks between Israel and the Hamas militant group aimed at salvaging a long-term arrangement that would allow reconstruction of the Gaza Strip after a monthlong war that killed more than 2,000 people.

Wasn't much of a "war," but be that as it may.

The news came just minutes before a temporary truce was set to expire at midnight, averting a resumption of the fighting that has caused devastating damage across Gaza and disrupted life throughout southern Israel.

‘‘Palestinians and Israelis agreed on extending the cease-fire by 24 hours to continue current negotiations,’’ the Egyptian government said in a statement. Palestinian and Israeli officials confirmed they had accepted Egypt’s request for an extension.

Since last week, Egypt has been hosting indirect talks between Israel and Hamas aimed at ending the war.

Gaza Health Ministry official Ashraf al-Kidra said Monday the Palestinian death toll from the fighting had risen to more than 2,000, the majority of them civilians, while United Nations officials, who often take more time to verify figures, put the number at 1,976. Thousands of homes were destroyed, and tens of thousands of people remain huddled in UN shelters.

Israel lost 67 people, all but three of them soldiers.

The disparity there, over 30-to-1, is all you need to know regarding the aggressor and everything else. Most of those Israelis lost because of military action, would be alive today were it not for this fool's quest.

Egyptian mediators shuttled between the sides Monday. Hamas is demanding an end to a seven-year Israeli-Egyptian blockade of Gaza that has devastated the local economy.

Yeah, me, too!

Israel wants guarantees that Hamas, which fired thousands of rockets into Israel during the fighting, will be disarmed.

And Israel will disarm at the same time, right?

In an apparent attempt to pressure Hamas, Egypt said early Monday it would cohost an international fund-raising conference for Gaza but only if a deal were reached. Israel, meanwhile, said in recent months it had arrested nearly 100 Hamas operatives in the West Bank in an alleged plot to topple Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. 

What was that? 

They FORMED a UNITY GOVERNMENT! Why would they try a coup in the West Bank?

That is a PLATE of ISRAELI SQUAT!

The Gaza blockade, imposed after Hamas gained power in Gaza in 2007, remains the main stumbling block. It has greatly limited the movement of Palestinians in and out of the territory of 1.8 million people, restricted the flow of goods into Gaza, and blocked virtually all exports. 

How did Hamas gain power?

Israel says the blockade is needed to prevent arms smuggling, but critics say the measures have amounted to collective punishment. 

It is; there is no other way to see it, and its for other goals

An Egyptian compromise proposal has called for an easing of the blockade to allow more movement of goods and people in and out of Gaza. Although it would not disarm Hamas, it would give Abbas, whose forces were routed by Hamas in the 2007 takeover, a foothold back in Gaza and put him in charge of border crossings and internationally backed reconstruction efforts.

The cease fire deal is basically a deal where Hamas ceases to exist. 

Who does that deal? Not even Israel accepts that vision of the future!

Larger issues, including Israel’s calls for disarmament and Hamas demands to reopen Gaza’s sea and airports, would be left for later talks.

Nope. Not good enough. Israel gets what they want up front!

An official in Abbas’s office said the Palestinian leader was supposed to arrive in Qatar, the base for top Hamas leaders, on Tuesday and stay until Friday.

Meanwhile, Israel’s Shin Bet security service said Monday it had thwarted what it described as a Hamas coup attempt in the West Bank aimed at toppling Abbas, though it offered few details.

(Blog editor begins to chuckle. This is ha-ha-ha-ha..... the propaganda is so bad these days it's.... ha-ha-ha-ha)

The security agency said Hamas operatives had tried to stir up an uprising that would have led to the collapse of Abbas’s Western-backed Palestinian Authority.

They just formed a unity government. This is nothing but Israeli deception to make war!

Abbas said he had ordered authorities to look into the reports.

Never heard back from the Globe!

--more--"

RelatedRockets shatter cease-fire for Hamas, Israel; Exchange of fire ensues; prospect for talks dims" by Isabel Kershner | New York Times 

Didn't buy the paper that day, gonna pass on reading it for the obvious reasons."

"Israeli airstrike kills wife, child of Hamas leader" by Ibrahim Barzak and Tia Goldenberg | Associated Press   August 21, 2014 

I wonder if Israel clears their stuff.

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Hamas’s shadowy military chief escaped an apparent Israeli assassination attempt that killed his wife and infant son, the militant group said Wednesday as Israel’s prime minister warned that the bombardment of Gaza will continue until rocket fire out of the Palestinian territory stops.

It's just further back in the paper now, what with ISIS everywhere and nowhere, and the great USraeli $ecurity $y$tem and $pying apparatu$ apparently impotent and u$ele$$. 

Will have to get rid of that after the nuclear false flag on 9/11 this year, obiliterating Chicago in a direct attack at Obama's heart -- and AmeriKa's. The city with big shoulders in the heartland? We are all in danger then, and martial law must be imposed with an ENABLING ACT allowing Obama to TAKE FULL CONTROL for the GOOD of the HOMELAND!

The airstrike on a home where Mohammed Deif’s family members were staying — and the tough talk from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — came after the collapse of cease-fire talks in Cairo on Tuesday.

In a nationally televised address, Netanyahu showed little willingness to return to the negotiating table after six weeks of war with Hamas.

‘‘We are determined to continue the campaign with all means and as is needed,’’ he said, his defense minister by his side. ‘‘We will not stop until we guarantee full security and quiet for the residents of the south and all citizens of Israel.’’

Yeah, we know. See you in hell.

More than 2,000 Palestinians have been killed in the fighting, most of them civilians, according to UN and Palestinian medical officials. Sixty-seven people have died on the Israeli side, all but three of them soldiers.

A six-day temporary truce collapsed into heavy fighting after Egyptian-mediated talks broke down without an agreement on an extended cease-fire. Hamas has demanded an end to an Israeli-Egyptian blockade of Gaza. Israel has demanded that Hamas disarm.

Palestinian militants launched dozens of rockets into Israel, while Israel carried out numerous airstrikes across Gaza. One airstrike on a Gaza City house killed Deif’s 7-month-old son and one of his wives.

After remaining quiet for most of the day Wednesday, Hamas officials announced that Deif was not in the targeted home at the time and was still alive. Deif, who lives in hiding, has survived multiple assassination attempts.

Abu Obeida, the spokesman for Hamas’s military wing, said Israel was ‘‘unable to get to our commander Deif,’’ adding that he will ‘‘lead the army that will enter to liberate the holy al-Aqsa mosque’’ in Jerusalem.

Why bring that up? Another distorted translation?

Asked whether Deif had been targeted, Netanyahu said: ‘‘The leaders of terror organizations are legitimate targets. No one is immune.’’

Well, if it comes back on you don't complain, and if it does it means the masters above you are cutting you loose. 

The house belonged to a family of known Hamas supporters. In footage taken after the strike, rescue workers were seen searching for survivors in the rubble where the building once stood.

No big deal about Israel DECLARING FAMILY MEMBERS LEGITIMATE TARGETS, though. 

Thousands of people attended the funeral for Deif’s family, with a relative carrying the body of his son, shrouded in a white burial cloth. Mourners chanted ‘‘revenge’’ during the procession. 

I don't blame them, and it's a touching scene. That's why it is one paragraph. 

In a televised statement, Obeida, the Hamas spokesman, also warned international airlines against flying into Israel starting Thursday.

A-HA! That means a FALSE FLAG is IN THE WORKS!

Earlier in the conflict, airlines suspended flights into Israel after a rocket landed in a town near Israel’s main international airport.

Maybe not.

Since the truce collapsed, at least 22 Palestinians have been killed and more than 120 wounded, Gaza Health Ministry official Ashraf al-Kidra said.

The Israeli military said that it carried out nearly 100 airstrikes on Gaza targets, and that Palestinians had fired more than 140 rockets at Israel since the truce fell apart.

About 2,000 reserve soldiers who had been sent home two weeks ago were called up for duty again Wednesday, the military said.

Air raid sirens wailed in southern Israeli cities Wednesday morning, warning of incoming rockets from Gaza. There were no reports of injuries, though a piece of a rocket that was intercepted near Tel Aviv fell on a busy road on Tuesday night.

Turns out being under the dome is worse than anyone was told

What a waste of U.S. taxpayer dollars as Congre$$ shovels them more!

--more--"

"Israeli airstrikes kill 3 Hamas commanders" by Fares Akram and Jodi Rudoren | New York Times   August 22, 2014

Already not liking it, and haven't even read it yet.

RAFAH, Gaza Strip — About 10,000 mourners on Thursday buried three senior commanders of the armed wing of Hamas who were killed in predawn airstrikes by Israel, the most significant blow to the group’s leadership since Israel’s operation in Gaza began more than six weeks ago.

“Oh, beloved Qassam, strike, strike Tel Aviv,” some chanted, referring to the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, as the body of Mohammed Barhoum, 45, was carried on a red stretcher to a mosque here in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

A man who gave his name only as Abu Mohammed said of the most senior of the three slain leaders, Mohammed Abu Shamalah, 41, “All Rafah loves him — all Gaza.”

This coverage does leave you feeling like Gaza is nothing but terrorists, doesn't it? 

I love my Jewish War Pre$$. They tell you truth even when its pure propaganda. Just gotta read it right.

The attack, which also killed the father of a human rights advocate and at least two children, followed Israel’s assassination attempt Tuesday night on Mohammed Deif, the chief of Hamas’s military operations who has topped Israel’s most-wanted list for years. Deif’s fate remains unknown, but his wife and son were killed in the airstrike.

Amazing how Israel can assassinate people and no big deal, but a fake video put out by ISIS raises hackles across the Zionist-controlled AmeriKan ma$$ media and propaganda pre$$.

It was also unclear whether the back-to-back attacks on Hamas commanders indicated a shift in Israeli strategy or simply a seizing of opportunity after the men emerged from underground bunkers during the recent halt in hostilities after a month of fierce fighting that began July 8.

And with nothing but ISIS in front of us. World attention now diverted, so Israel can smash!!

But Israeli analysts said the targeting of such leaders had both tactical and morale-breaking ramifications for Gaza-based militants, and provided the Israeli public with a tangible achievement without drawing the world’s wrath about civilian casualties.

The wife and kids already forgotten, and my analysis was just validated. I'm reading along with you know, folks. I circle the articles with red pen and say I'll get to it. 

Btw, I find it REPREHENSIBLE that Israel must spill more Palestinian blood to prove a point to their public and make sure they show they won. If they gotta do that, they didn't win at all. They lost.

“It’s not that they’re not going to function; they will function, but it’s still a blow to Hamas — these people are senior people, they carry responsibilities,” said Michael Herzog, a retired brigadier general in Israel and a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “It’s not easy to replace them.

 The "expert" in my paper is from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy?? 

Quite a crew, huh?

“These are more quality targets than just merely taking out junior guys. People in Gaza know exactly who they are; people in Israel know exactly who they are,’’ Herzog said. “In our bilateral context, it resonates strongly.”

The strikes came on the second day of renewed violence after the collapse of Egyptian-brokered cease-fire talks that had halted hostilities for nearly nine days, in what many saw as a new phase of the conflict.

Without all the pre$$ blather and world attention -- just as Israel wanted!

They also followed the first direct claim of responsibility by a Hamas leader — Salah el-Aruri, who is based in Turkey — for the June 12 abduction and murder of three Israeli teenagers in the occupied West Bank, an event that many see as one of the triggers of the Israel-Gaza escalation.

That is an OUTRIGHT LIE, folks! Even the ISRAELI POLICE ADMITTED the suspects were NOT HAMAS, and the actual claim was submitted by ISIS of all people! 

Thanks, NYT, for clearing this stuff through Israel!

Hamas, the Islamist movement that dominates Gaza, said in a statement that the three commanders represented the “founding generation” of the Qassam Brigades and that they “fed pain to the enemy for more than 20 years.”

You know what? F*** this Jew York Times dog sh**!

Raed Attar, who was born in 1974, led Qassam’s Rafah brigade and was known as “the blond.” He was killed along with Abu Shamalah, the chief of Qassam’s southern division whose nickname was “the fox,” and Barhoum — “the white-haired” or “the old” — who Hamas said was among Israel’s first wanted men, starting in 1992.

Attar and Abu Shamalah sat on Qassam’s elite military council, led by Deif, and were involved in the 2006 abduction of an Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, who was held for five years and later exchanged for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners. Attar was shown leading Shalit by the arm from a truck in a video during his release in 2011.

A statement from the Israeli military said Attar also had been involved in smuggling weapons into Gaza, he had constructed tunnels into Israeli territory, and he had plotted attacks from the Sinai Peninsula.

Abu Shamalah, the statement said, orchestrated the July 17 tunnel incursion near Kibbutz Sufa that led to Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza and was involved in a 2008 attack on the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza that wounded 13 soldiers.

“These are two senior terrorists that have been in our sights for the last 15 years,” Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner, an Israeli military spokesman, said in an interview.

--more--"

Of course, at bottom Hamas is all terrorist. 

Kind of makes you wonder why Israel created them, huh?

"US victims of Hamas terror attacks go after bank" by Tom Hays | Associated Press   August 14, 2014

NEW YORK — Steve Averbach was on a packed commuter bus in Jerusalem in 2003 when a Hamas suicide bomber disguised as an Orthodox Jew set off an explosion that left the New Jersey native paralyzed.

Looks like another false flag attack to me.

More than a decade later, Averbach’s family — he died in 2010 — and about 140 other US victims of two dozen terrorist attacks in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank during a Palestinian uprising from 2001 to 2004 want the Jordon-based Arab Bank to pay a price as well.

A civil trial set to begin Thursday in US court in Brooklyn will see the victims try to convince a jury that the bank helped Hamas finance a ‘‘death and dismemberment benefit plan’’ for martyrs. It comes after a legal battle over what evidence jurors will see and amid a backdrop of hostilities between Israelis and Palestinians.

That is where they make their most money, yeah.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs call it the first terrorism financing case to go to trial in the United States and say it could result in the bank paying unspecified damages. Arab Bank, which has hundreds of branches around the world, including in New York and in the Palestinian territories, has denied it knew it was doing business with terrorists when it processed electronic transfers.

‘‘Arab Bank has great sympathy for all victims of terrorism but is not liable for the tragic acts described by plaintiffs,’’ it said in a statement.

This could have HUGE RAMIFICATIONS for the DRUG-MONEY LAUNDERING BANKS!

How many people have the Mexican cartels killed? 100,000?

A lawsuit filed in 2004 accused the bank of violating the US Anti-Terrorism Act, which allows victims of US-designated foreign terrorist groups to seek compensation. The US State Department designated Hamas a terrorist group in 1997.

The suit accuses Arab Bank of setting up accounts to channel funds from an organization run by the Saudi government, the Saudi Committee for Supporting Al Quds Intifada, to at least two militant groups, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Their oil and mischief in the Middle East puts them above the law.

It also alleges bank officials were aware that the funds were for an insurance program that provided a standard benefit worth more than $5,000 to the families of Palestinians who were killed in attacks on Israel, including suicide bombers.

The case had stalled in recent years as the bank fought demands that it turn over customer account information and other financial records, contending that doing so would violate banking secrecy laws in Jordan and elsewhere.

No one else has secrecy so why should banks? Just go get the NSA records that have been collected.

In 2010, a judge issued sanctions against the bank for its ‘‘recalcitrance’’ in withholding evidence — a penalty that would allow the court to instruct the jury that it could infer that it knowingly worked with terrorist organizations.

Now the CIA has been opened up to lawsuits.

The ruling was later upheld by an appeals court. When Arab Bank asked the Supreme Court to intervene, the court sought the US government’s input on whether it should hear the case — a request that reportedly created a dilemma for President Obama’s administration on how to respond in a way that would not harm diplomatic relations with Jordan.

Ah-em. There is supposed to be a SEPARATION of POWERS and those things should not factor into the Court's decision. This is no longer a Republic, folks.

A brief filed by Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. described the Arab Bank as ‘‘a constructive partner with the United States in working to prevent terrorist financing’’ and ‘‘a leading participant in a number of regional forums on anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism.’’ But Verrilli concluded the Supreme Court should not intervene and should let the case play out, and the court agreed. 

So they are taking their orders from the executive these days, huh? What does the NSA have on all those judges?

Another federal judge in the same Brooklyn courthouse threw out the case of a US man wounded in the Middle East who sought to hold Arab Bank liable for providing material support to Hamas.

I suspect this one will get tossed, too. Banks made to pay for crimes? Pah!


Oh what a deadly web we weave when by way of deception thou shalt do war.