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TOP 5 LIES ABOUT ISRAEL’S ASSAULT ON GAZA? CAN THIS BE TRUE?
Question by ♂Real World Problem Is Back♂:
Top 5 Lies About Israel’s Assault on Gaza? Can This Be True?
Lie #1) Israel is only targeting legitimate military sites and is seeking to protect innocent lives. Israel never targets civilians.
The Gaza Strip is one of the most densely populated pieces of property in the world. The presence of militants within a civilian population does not, under international law, deprive that population of their protected status, and hence any assault upon that population under the guise of targeting militants is, in fact, a war crime.
Moreover, the people Israel claims are legitimate targets are members of Hamas, which Israel states is a terrorist organization. Hamas has been responsible for firing rockets into Israel. These rockets are extremely inaccurate and thus, even if Hamas intended to hit military targets within Israel, are indiscriminate by nature. When rockets from Gaza kill Israeli civilians, it is a war crime.
Hamas has a military wing. However, it is not entirely a military organization, but a political one. Members of Hamas are the democratically elected representatives of the Palestinian people. Dozens of these elected leaders have been kidnapped and held in Israeli prisons without charge. Others have been targeted for assassination, such as Nizar Rayan, a top Hamas official. To kill Rayan, Israel targeted a residential apartment building. The strike not only killed Rayan but two of his wives and four of his children, along with six others. There is no justification for such an attack under international law. This was a war crime.
Other of Israel’s bombardment with protected status under international law have included a mosque, a prison, police stations, and a university, in addition to residential buildings.
Moreover, Israel has long held Gaza under siege, allowing only the most minimal amounts of humanitarian supplies to enter. Israel is bombing and killing Palestinian civilians. Countless more have been wounded, and can’t receive medical attention. Hospitals running on generators have tiny or no fuel. Physicians have no proper equipment or medical supplies to treat the injured. These people, too, are the victims of Israeli policies targeted not at Hamas or legitimate military targets, but directly designed to punish the civilian population.
Lie #2) Hamas violated the cease-fire. The Israeli bombardment is a response to Palestinian rocket fire and is designed to end such rocket attacks.
Israel never observed the cease-fire to start with. From the beginning, it announced a “special security zone” within the Gaza Strip and announced that Palestinians who enter this zone will be fired upon. In other words, Israel announced its intention that Israeli soldiers would shoot at farmers and other individuals attempting to reach their own land in direct violation of not only the cease-fire but international law.
Despite shooting incidents, including ones resulting in Palestinians getting injured, Hamas still held to the cease-fire from the time it went into effect on June 19 until Israel effectively ended the truce on November 4 by launching an airstrike into Gaza that killed five and hurt several others.
Israel’s violation of the cease-fire predictably resulted in retaliation from militants in Gaza who fired rockets into Israel in response. The increased barrage of rocket fire at the end of December is being used as justification for the continued Israeli bombardment, but is a direct response by militants to the Israeli attacks.
Israel’s actions, including its violation of the cease-fire, predictably resulted in an escalation of rocket attacks against its own population.
Lie #3) Hamas is using human shields, a war crime.
There has been no evidence that Hamas has used human shields. The fact is, as previously noted, Gaza is a small piece of property that is densely populated. Israel engages in indiscriminate warfare such as the assassination of Nizar Rayan, in which members of his family were also murdered. It is victims like his dead kids that Israel defines as “human shields” in its propaganda. There is no legitimacy for this interpretation under international law. In circumstances such as these, Hamas is not using human shields, Israel is committing war crimes in violation of the Geneva Conventions and other applicable international law.
Lie #4) Arab nations have not condemned Israel’s actions because they comprehend Israel’s justification for its assault.
The populations of those Arab countries are outraged at Israel’s actions and at their own governments for not condemning Israel’s assault and acting to end the violence. Simply stated, the Arab governments do not represent their respective Arab populations. The populations of the Arab nations have staged mass protests in opposition to not only Israel’s actions but also the inaction of their own governments and what they view as either complacency or complicity in Israel’s crimes.
Moreover, the refusal of Arab nations to take action to come to the aid of the Palest
Moreover, the refusal of Arab nations to take action to come to the aid of the Palestinians is not because they concur with Israel’s actions, but because they are submissive to the will of the US, which fully supports Israel. Egypt, for instance, which refused to open the border to grant Palestinians wounded in the attacks to get medical treatment in Egyptian hospitals, is heavily dependent upon US aid, and is being widely criticized within the population of the Arab countries for what is viewed as an absolute betrayal of the Gaza Palestinians.
Even Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has been regarded as a traitor to his own people for blaming Hamas for the suffering of the people of Gaza. Palestinians are also well aware of Abbas’ past perceived betrayals in conniving with Israel and the US to sideline the democratically elected Hamas government, culminating in a counter-coup by Hamas in which it expelled Fatah (the military wing of Abbas’ Palestine Authority) from the Gaza…
Strip. While his apparent goal was to weaken Hamas and strengthen his own position, the Palestinians and other Arabs in the Middle East are so outraged at Abbas that it is unlikely he will be able to govern effectively.
Lie #5) Israel is not responsible for civilian deaths because it warned the Palestinians of Gaza to flee areas that might be targeted.
Israel claims it sent radio and telephone text messages to residents of Gaza warning them to flee from the coming bombardment. But the people of Gaza have nowhere to flee to. They are trapped within the Gaza Strip. It is by Israeli design that they can’t escape across the border. It is by Israeli design that they have no food, water, or fuel by which to survive. It is by Israeli design that hospitals in Gaza have no electricity and few medical supplies with which to treat the hurt and save lives. And Israel has bombed vast areas of Gaza, targeting civilian infrastructure and other sites with protected status under in
international law. No place is safe within the Gaza Strip.
http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/articles/2009/01/03/hammond_top-5-lies-about-israels-assault-on-gaza.html
This is a question my friend… It is a Yes or No question. Read the title my friend and you will find out what is what.
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Answer by JOAN C
This is more a debate than a question…
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What do you think? Answer below!
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about 1 year ago
israel from the first place is based on a lie, so what should we expect ?
And like the old saying, you can fool some people sometimes but you can’t fool all people all times.
about 1 year ago
I guess you don’t care about Sudanese soldiers ordered to rape and kill children in Darfur?
about 1 year ago
I cannot fault any part of your long question . One point I can add.How would anyone here feel if they were occupied , treated as sub human where 4 million were driven into exile and tens of thousands murdered for 60 long years, and its still going on today.
about 1 year ago
Henry Siegman, former national director of the American Jewish Congress and of the Synagogue Council of America said:
“Western governments and most of the Western media have accepted a number of Israeli claims justifying the military assault on Gaza: that Hamas consistently violated the six-month truce that Israel observed and then refused to extend it; that Israel therefore had no choice but to destroy Hamas’s capacity to launch missiles into Israeli towns; that Hamas is a terrorist organization, part of a global jihadi network; and that Israel has acted not only in its own defense but on behalf of an international struggle by Western democracies against this network.”
“let me state bluntly that EACH OF THESE CLAIMS IS A LIE.”
about 1 year ago
1) Its kinda hard not to hit “innocent civilians” when Hamas hides weapons, rockets, guns etc. in mosques, residential areas and schools. If you can think of a way to destroy the weapons and not kill innocent i’d love to hear it. Oh, and if you hear what I’m saying is all propaganda there are videos from Israeli airplanes showing the attacks on mosques, schools and residential areas which show secondary and thirdly explosions. Furthermore there are videos of Hamas militants loading and taking rockets from residential areas, firing rockets from UN schools and stockpiling rockets and other weapons in mosques.
2) Hamas did violate the ceasefire, they only signed the ceasefire to rearm. After that they quickly started firing rockets into Israel which in turn provoked Israel into protecting its civilians and continuing its attack on Gaza.
3) Hamas is using human shields they put rockets into ambulances, when they were targeted by Israel they ran into hospitals and put on doctors uniforms putting every other doctor at risk. They hid behind women and children. They put rockets into houses with innocent civilians, they put rockets into hospitals, schools, mosques because they know if Israel attacked the amount of collateral damage would be massive.
4) I also believe other Arab countries attack and threaten Israel every other day. Lebanon, another Arab country, currently in firing rockets into southern Israel. The six day war was started because the surrounding Arab wanted to quote “push the jews into the sea”. Hmmmmmmm I would find it hard to get an unbiased opinion from them. Plus what about the constant rockets being fired into Israel. 6500 rockets have been fired into Israel over three years and they did nothing, what about those actions. Where is that rage, where are those protests? Where are the people boycotting these despicable actions? I’ve had to search for even a mention of these attacks that give Israelis terror each and everyday.
5) Well Israel is responsible for killing them but only in part, Israel HAS dropped flyers into Gaza telling people that that part of Gaza was going to be attacked, but their elected government Hamas told them not to leave because the more civilian deaths the better for them, the worse for Israel.
Next time your looking for a fight LOOK UP what your saying and maybe you won’t come off as someone who knows nothing about what they’re talking about.
about 1 year ago
amazing how all non-Israelis think they know so much about what goes on here, you guys have no leg to stand on, go do something productive!