Israel's War Against Hamas - Updates

[Sixties Fan]

The chief of the military’s Home Front Command, Maj. Gen. Rafi Milo, says the slow rate of rocket fire over the past day indicates Hamas is preparing itself for a long war.

“We have identified the behavior of Hamas, which realizes that it is entering a long war,” Milo says in a call with reporters.

“Hamas is managing the fire in a way that is meant for weeks [of fighting], and they dropped to a rate of fire of around 200-400 rockets per day, to allow themselves a very long fight,” he says.

IDF: Slow rate of rocket fire suggests Hamas readying for long war

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www.timesofisrael.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

The Israeli death toll since the start of the war has continued to climb, reaching 1,300, according to Hebrew media reports.

Israeli death toll from Hamas shock onslaught reaches 1,300

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www.timesofisrael.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

Synagogue security in Europe raised as Jews brace for antisemitism after Hamas assault

European Jewish communities prepare for reverberations far from the frontlines

www.timesofisrael.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

Hamas’ torture, rape, kidnapping, and murder of 1,200 Israelis, most of them civilians, is “a dream come true,” says Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal.

Senior Hamas official Khaled Mashaal made a special speech to celebrate Hamas’ horrific atrocities. He sent “Allah’s blessings” to all the Hamas leaders involved in the planning of the Hamas pogrom, specifically mentioning Muhammad Deif and Yahya Al-Sinwar and “to everyone who prepared, organized, arranged, and made this dream come true… They brought about this glory.”

In addition, he sent “Allah’s blessings” to the “heroes” who committed the atrocities.

As of this writing, Hamas’ “dream come true” includes 1,200 murders of Israelis, at least 3,100 injured, 150 kidnapped men, women and children, rape, and mutilation of dead bodies.

Senior Hamas official Khaled Mashaal: “Allah’s blessing to the Izz A-Din Al-Qassam Brigades (i.e., Hamas’ military) who are adorned with victory, to their [Hamas’ elite] Nukhba forces, and to all their heroes. Allah’s blessing to the [Islamic Jihad’s] Al-Quds Brigades and to all their heroes… Allah’s blessing to you, my brother [Hamas leader, Muhammad] Deif … Allah’s blessing to you who lit the spark of the Al-Aqsa Flood (i.e., the slaughter in Israeli cities)… Allah’s blessing to you, my brother [Hamas leader] Yahya Al-Sinwar… Allah’s blessing to everyone who prepared, organized, arranged, and made this dream come true on the land… They brought about this glory.”

[Almahriah TV (Yemen), YouTube channel, Oct. 10, 2023]​

Hamas leaderâs âdream come trueâ: Slaughter of Israeli civilians | PMW Analysis

Hamas: Slaughter Israeli civilians

palwatch.org

 

[Sixties Fan]

Leader of a terror group killed days ago, no one noticed​

Major terror groups always avoid mentioning their "martyrs" at the start of any war, trying to give the impression that Israel is only killing civilians.

But smaller terror groups cannot exactly hide when their top person is killed.

From the Nasser Salah al-Din Brigades of the Popular Resistance Movement:

We mourn the companion of the path, the martyr, Commander Abu Al-Abd Abu Hilal, the leader of the Al-Nasser Brigades, and the martyr Umm Raafat Abu Hilal, ... killed in a cowardly assassination operation at dawn today, Monday 10/09/2023 AD, after a bombing of the house they was in.

Given that they share the same last name, it appears that the woman was a relative who was a human shield.

Leader of a terror group killed days ago, no one noticed

Blogging about Israel and the Arab world since, oh, forever.

elderofziyon.blogspot.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

Why Israel must wage all-out war​

Normal Westerners try to find win-win solutions, and are expected to respond to goodwill with goodwill of their own.

Palestinians look at everything as a zero-sum game and look at any goodwill gestures as proof of weakness, and an opportunity to double down on demands.

The biggest single mistake that Westerners make is thinking that everyone thinks and acts like we do. As a result, for decades, the West has gotten this conflict spectacularly and fatally wrong.

This is why they pressure Israel to always make more concessions, as the stronger party in the conflict. But it doesn't work unless your partner shares the same basic mindset. But the Palestinians and much of the Arab and Muslim world do not.

This year, according to UN-OCHA figures, the supposed "siege" of Gaza effectively ended. Western media didn't report it, but Israel has been loosening restrictions on Gaza for years to the point that the amount of goods and people crossing the borders with Israel are at higher levels since before the Hamas takeover of the area. Israel has given work permits to many thousands of Gaza workers - a couple of years ago it was zero. They have allowed more "dual use" items. August was a record month for Gaza imports of goods. The number of people entering and exiting also have been higher than before 2007. There have been no restrictions on fuel, no restrictions on medicine, no restrictions on food in over a decade (except during wars.) Gaza has luxury car dealerships, high-end hotels and resorts, glittering jewelry stores. Life wasn't wonderful - unemployment was still very high, for example - but things were getting better for average Gazans under every metric.



To Western thinking, this should result in Hamas reacting in kind - or at least wanting the improvements to continue.

Hamas knows the difference in the mindsets between themselves and Israelis - and took advantage. They didn't participate in the Islamic Jihad mini-war earlier this year. They kept rockets mostly quiet. They pretended that they were acting in a western way, and trading the effective end of the closure of Gaza for calm with Israel. A win-win for all.

But all that time while life has been improving in Gaza they were planning this mega-attack on Jews.

Some of the workers Israel allowed in gave intelligence to Hamas to maximize the number of Jews to be murdered. Some of the residents in the towns and kibbutzim attacked recognized the terrorists as people who worked there every day. They murdered their employers and the Jews who considered them friends and co-workers.

Before Saturday, the thinking was that Hamas wants calm and doesn't want to upset the people it rules. The previous military operations in Gaza were waged with a carrot and stick approach, thinking that reminding Hamas they have something to lose would keep things calm and following up with further moves to make the lives of Gazans better.

It was a fatal miscalculation. Hamas never intended for long term calm. It wanted (with its Iranian masters) to take advantage of what they think of as a weak, stupid Western mentality. Arabic media, especially that aligned with Iran (from Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, Syria, and Yemen) have been filled with articles about how Israel is as weak as a spider web. This intentional slaughter of ordinary Israelis is regarded by Hamas and most Palestinians (yes, most) as the paradigm of regaining honor and dignity and as only the first salvo in the war to ultimately destroy Israel.

There is not even a hint in Palestinian media - whether Fatah or Hamas or independent - that looking into the eyes of a frightened Jewish baby and then slaughtering her is something to be ashamed of. Right now, the Hamas baby killers are more popular than ever. Mahmoud Abbas and PA prime minister Mohamed Shtayyeh didn't make even a pretense of a condemnation of their political rivals this time - they called the murder and rape of innocents "defending the land."

That's why this war has to be different from the previous ones. A limited war that leaves the murderers and rapists in power, and an Iranian-controlled statelet mere meters from Jewish communities, is no longer acceptable or even thinkable The evil cannot be allowed to stay. Israel has to adopt the Hamas mentality of eradicating the enemy, and treat the terrorists like Hamas wants to treat every Israeli man, woman and child.

Israel has to wipe out Hamas and the other terror groups. No matter the cost.

Hamas is embedded in houses, buildings, tunnels, bunkers, all in populated areas. Israel needs to take them all out, not some. It needs to kill or imprison all the terror leaders, not some. It cannot tolerate having these monsters living freely next door.

Being nice was repaid with the worst day in Jewish history since Auschwitz. Israel's entire purpose is to protect Jews. It must eradicate the terror organizations completely and ruthlessly - no matter the cost.

Doing anything less would be immoral.

(This is an expansion on an essay I wrote on X/Twitter.)

Why Israel must wage all-out war

Blogging about Israel and the Arab world since, oh, forever.

elderofziyon.blogspot.com

 

[Ringo]

Pakistan's Chief of General Staff said that if Israel launched a ground operation against the Gaza Strip, Pakistan would hand over ballistic missiles to Hamas.

Israel is already in Gaza. Let's wait for the ballistic missiles....

 

[Sixties Fan]

Daniel Lifshitz shares an account of his kidnapped grandparents, Yocheved and Oded Lifshitz, who resided in the very first house on the Gaza border in Kibbutz Nir Oz.

Tragically, they were seized by Hamas in Saturday’s savage attack, underscoring Hamas’ cruelty towards all vulnerable populations.

Their story serves as a painful reminder of the terror group’s brutality and the horrific reality that Israelis are experiencing.

WATCH: Grandson Speaks on Grandparents’ Hamas Abduction | United with Israel

Their story serves as a painful reminder of Hamas' brutality and the horrific reality that Israelis are experiencing.

unitedwithisrael.org

 

[Sixties Fan]

Pakistan's Chief of General Staff said that if Israel launched a ground operation against the Gaza Strip, Pakistan would hand over ballistic missiles to Hamas.

Israel is already in Gaza. Let's wait for the ballistic missiles....

1) Israel is not IN Gaza, yet. But soon.

2) Pakistan does not want to be pounded by Israel, the way Lebanon and Syrian Iranian sites, planes and weapons are being pounded already.

3) Cheer for terrorists who want all Jews dead, that makes you one of them.

 

[Sixties Fan]

 

[Sixties Fan]

 

[Ringo]

 

[Sixties Fan]

Photos of babies being burnt, decapitated confirmed​

By JERUSALEM POST STAFFOCTOBER 12, 2023 16:37Updated: OCTOBER 12, 2023 16:57


The Jerusalem Post can now confirm based on verified photos of the bodies that the reports of babies being burnt and decapitated in Hamas's assault on Kfar Aza are correct.

The photos were shown to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during his visit to Israel by the Public Diplomacy Directorate in the Prime Minister's Office.

Photos of babies being burnt, decapitated confirmed

The photos were shown to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during his visit to Israel on Thursday.

www.jpost.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

Part 1

The media - and the world - has been excusing Hamas for a long time​

In 2009, Amnesty International wrote a report on the Gaza war of 2008-9 called "Operation 'Cast Lead': 22 days of death and destruction.". It summarized the war this way:

At 11.30am on 27 December 2008, without warning, Israeli forces began a devastating bombing campaign on the Gaza Strip codenamed Operation “Cast Lead”. Its stated aim was to end rocket attacks into Israel by armed groups affiliated with Hamas and other Palestinian factions.

What it doesn't mention is that Hamas had a different name for the war - calling it "Operation Oil Slick." And that Hamas declared that war three days before Israel's response, with a salvo of rockets and mortars sent to Israel on December 24. It wasn't a 22-day war started by Israel, but a 25-day war started by Hamas.

This has been how NGOs and the media have been writing about Hamas for over a decade - downplaying its terror, ignoring its own actions, not reporting its public threats to murder Israeli civilians, erasing its genocidal nature. Instead, Hamas is portrayed as merely reacting to Israeli actions.

Excusing Hamas in the West is standard operating procedure. And Hamas has taken full advantage of that - by manipulating Western analysts to believe that it is a pragmatic ruler in Gaza, it wants peace and that it really isn't antisemitic anymore.

In 2011, the New York Times had a scoop: Hamas accepted a two state solution!


But if one reads what Meshal actually said, he did not in any way accept Israel's existence. He said he would accept a Palestinian state in the territories, but not a word about stopping there and ending terror attacks to take over the rest of Israel.

Meshal didn't lie. He just knew that the reporter was too enamored with interviewing him that he could lead him to report things he never said. And it worked like a charm - throughout the 2010s, the tantalizing idea that Hamas accepted a two state solution kept popping up when they said no such thing - and explicitly denied accepting two states in Arabic..

Unless, of course, that second state is also Arab.

The media - and the world - has been excusing Hamas for a long time

Blogging about Israel and the Arab world since, oh, forever.

elderofziyon.blogspot.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

Part 2

Hamas' main PR problem in the 2010s was that Hamas' charter was antisemitic and that fact was slowly becoming known thanks to Israelis mentioning it in TV interviews. The charter explicitly calls for the genocide of Jews, quoting a hadith, "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him." It has lots of incitement to kill Jews, such as

We should not forget to remind every Moslem that when the Jews conquered the Holy City in 1967, they stood on the threshold of the Aqsa Mosque and proclaimed that "Mohammed is dead, and his descendants are all women."

Israel, Judaism and Jews challenge Islam and the Moslem people. "May the cowards never sleep."

To counter this, in 2017 Hamas fooled the entire Western world into claiming that it has changed. It announced with fanfare a new manifesto that didn't have the same explicit antisemitism as the charter.




And they knew that the media, wanting to give them the benefit of the doubt, would misinterpret this document as a replacement for the antisemitic, genocidal Hamas charter .



There was only one problem: Hamas never claimed that this "political document" replaced the charter, this was all wishful thinking by Western "experts." It didn't need to lie - the clueless Western media was happy to fill in the blanks with their wishful thinking.

In Arabic, Hamas explicitly said that the charter - and its antisemitism - was still its legal covenant. And if you carefully read the new political document you can see that it doesn't contradict the charter.

And in Gaza, Hamas still held explicitly antisemitic events, like this 2014 rally:







Hamas knows how badly Westerners want to believe that it was moderating. it was a masterful manipulation of "experts" because wishful thinking about Hamas trumped sober analysis.

Hamas has never said one word that indicates that it has changed its positions since the charter was written. Yet pundits, professors, world leaders and the media have wanted to see a two state solution for so long, and wanted so much for the Hamas obstacle to such a solution to be removed, that they deluded themselves into thinking that Hamas has changed from the organization that proudly blew up Jewish children during the 1990s and 2000s.

Wishful thinking is no substitute for reality. I don't think there will be anyone apologizing for getting Hamas so wrong for so long, though.

The media - and the world - has been excusing Hamas for a long time

Blogging about Israel and the Arab world since, oh, forever.

elderofziyon.blogspot.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

• Senior Hamas official calls on Muslims and Arabs around the world “to [do] more creative things than what we are used to. We want this to be at a higher level”

Following Hamas’ terror attack on Israel in which more than 1,200 Israelis were murdered, Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal has announced that it’s time for Arabs and Muslims around the world to be “more creative” than in the past and let the world know that they “are part of this battle.” Mashaal urged Arabs and Muslims in their own countries and in “the streets of the diaspora everywhere” to turn tomorrow, Friday, October 13, into a day of “rage” tomorrow against Zionists and Americans in support of Hamas’ terror war against Israel.

The following is an excerpt of Mashaal’s speech in Doha:

Senior Hamas official Khaled Mashaal: “What is our responsibility? … I call upon all of you, together with me and all of us… to [do] more creative things than what we are used to. We want this to be at a higher level. First, the rage – let us go down to the squares and plazas, to the Arab and Islamic street, and throughout the diaspora everywhere. There is a call on Friday [Oct. 13, 2023], a Friday of the Al-Aqsa Flood (Hamas' name for slaughter of Israeli citizens; see note below -Ed.). But before Friday, and after it, and on it, we want to say to the Zionists, their criminal leaders, and their extremists, and to the Americans who rushed to their aid, that they have double standards. In their eyes the Ukraine War is just, and the Palestinian people’s war is unjust. Send a message throughout the squares and plazas – a message of rage – that we are the people of Palestine, the people of Gaza, the people of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and Jerusalem, and that we are part of this battle.”

[Almahriah TV (Yemen), YouTube channel, Oct. 10, 2023]​

Palestinian Media Watch exposed that in the same speech, Mashaal referred to Hamas’ torture, rape, kidnapping, and murder of 1,200 Israelis, most of them civilians, as “a dream come true.”

Hamas leader Mashaal calls for day of ârageâ tomorrow against Zionists and Americans by Muslims and Arabs all around the world | PMW Analysis

Hamas leader calls for day of “rage” tomorrow against Zionists and Americans

palwatch.org

 

[Sixties Fan]

[ Jews come from all over the world and have dual citizenship, oh worthless barbarian. That is that worried this terrorist? Keep lying for as long as you can as to why Hamas attacked]

Hamas’s deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri says that Hamas does not target civilians “as a policy,” and that its Saturday attack only targeted the IDF’s Gaza Division stationed along the border — despite overwhelming evidence, footage and testimonies that its terrorists systematically targeted and massacred civilians.

“We knew that there were [Israeli] plans to launch a massive attack against us after the [Jewish] holidays,” al-Arouri says, according to a report in the pro-Hamas Shehab news outlet. “We preempted it by surprising the commanders of the Southern Command,” which includes the Gaza Division.

He provides no evidence that Israel had planned to attack Gaza.

“The bloated army collapsed in less than three hours, faster than we expected. Only 1,200 members of the Izz al-Din al-Qassam brigades entered the enemy camps,” he says, referencing Hamas’s military wing. Israel has said forces have killed 1,500 terrorists in Israeli territory.

Al-Arouri reiterates that prisoner swap negotiations will only take place after the end of the battle, and adds that in the meantime, the terror group has devised a defensive plan that is “much stronger” than the offensive one, and that it is prepared to respond to any action Israel will take.

“We are fighting for the world to recognize the right of our people to live like other peoples,” the terror leader continues.

“How is it right for a soldier to be wearing an Israeli army uniform, and then it turns out that the soldier holds American or French citizenship?” he asks.

With regard to the potential expansion of the fighting to other fronts — mainly the Hamas-allied Hezbollah terror group — al-Arouri says that “all possibilities are 100% open.”

Hamas deputy chief lies: We don’t target civilians, we only attacked IDF, Israel planned Gaza offensive

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www.timesofisrael.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

 

[Sixties Fan]

 

[Sixties Fan]

Part 1

On October 10th the IDF took members of the international press to Kibbutz Kfar Aza where soldiers were still going house to house to retrieve the bodies of those slaughtered by the Hamas terrorists who had infiltrated that community and others located near the border with the Gaza Strip three days earlier.

The BBC’s representative on that tour was its international editor Jeremy Bowen and three reports – two filmed and one written – were subsequently published on the BBC News website.

One of those filmed reports published on October 10th is titled ‘Elite Israeli soldiers gain control of border areas’.

With the exception of three brief unexplained frames showing damaged houses on Kfar Aza, that report does not provide BBC audiences with any explanation of what happened there.

Bowen’s second filmed report is titled ‘Kibbutz Kfar Aza: Hamas killed whole families’. In its synopsis, the events in that community are qualified – “Israeli soldiers said that…” – and its third and final paragraph relates to events in a different location: the Gaza Strip.

The first 1:37 minutes of that four-minute and thirty-eight-second report show footage of Israeli soldiers accompanied by commentary from Bowen. Viewers then see images of the same damaged houses in Kfar Aza as Bowen tells them that: [emphasis in italics in the original, emphasis in bold added]

Bowen: “Kfar Aza was taken by surprise like everywhere else Hamas attacked. The kibbutz guard – armed civilian volunteers – died fighting back. Hamas stormed in, burning homes and killing families according to the soldiers.”

Viewers are not told that the “armed civilian volunteers” making up “the kibbutz guard” were – as is the case on all kibbutzim – residents of the community. Neither are they told why Bowen found it necessary to append the qualifying phrase “according to the soldiers” to his description of the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas – which of course he failed to point out is a terrorist organisation.

Following more footage of soldiers, viewers see seven seconds of intentionally blurred images of two dead bodies covered in purple cloth as Bowen tells BBC audiences that:

Bowen: “As it took so long to secure the kibbutz, the army couldn’t cover all the civilian dead until this morning. These were the bodies of Israelis. Decomposing Hamas gunmen are still lying where they were killed. The murder of Israeli civilians here was without doubt a war crime. But what about the Palestinian civilians Israel is killing in attacks on Hamas?”

At 02:22 Bowen speaks to an unidentified Israeli soldier, continuing to promote (as he has often done in the past) false equivalence between deliberate and pre-planned attacks against Israeli civilians and Palestinian civilians unintentionally killed during attacks against a terrorist organization he refuses to name as such.

Bowen: “As you know, all armies have obligations under the laws of war to protect civilian lives even in war zones. Are you doing this with this level of airstrikes that are going on at the moment and any ground operation that might happen?”

BBC’s Bowen does whataboutery in Kfar Aza

On October 10th the IDF took members of the international press to Kibbutz Kfar Aza where soldiers were still going house to house to retrieve the bodies of tho

camera-uk.org