Israel Responds To Being Bombed

[Annie]

http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/005506.php

September 25, 2005
Palestinians Discover Self-Delusion Not Contagious

The Palestinians acted surprised when Israel responded to the launching of dozens of Katyusha rockets at their cities by bombing Gaza and arresting hundreds of Hamas terrorists, an act that the Palestinian Authority refuses to contemplate. As the Israeli response to the Palestinian provocation became clear, the PA proved its disconnection from reality by warning that the cease-fire might not hold if Israel didn't stop its retaliation:

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has ordered "unrestricted" military strikes against Palestinian militants after rocket attacks from Gaza.

Overnight Israeli aircraft launched a series of air raids, injuring several people, and arrested more than 200 suspected militants in the West Bank.

Israel has also taken the unprecedented step of posting artillery pieces on the border with Gaza, and practice-firing.

Palestinians warned the moves could force a ceasefire to collapse.

As I wrote yesterday, the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza brought an entirely new set of circumstances to the use of military force. The abandonment of the settlements and the removal of Israeli troops took away the excuse of a 'legitimate fight against an unjust occupation' that the UN allowed the murderers and terrorists of Hamas and Islamic Jihad to spew for killing women and children in pizzerias and buses. It makes such rocket attacks open acts of war, for which the government nominally in control of the territory must take responsibility.

That means that the Israelis have every right to respond to an attack on their country when presented with such a casus belli, and they have done so. The Palestinians appealed to the US, which has all too often yanked a diplomatic leash on Israel, but not this time. The BBC reports that the American response, translated from Diplomatese, says, "Don't expect us to pull your bacon from the fire this time." The EU and UN, useless as ever, appealed to "both sides" for "restraint", instead of forcing the Palestinians to take responsibility for security in Gaza. Had the Palestinians not fired 40 rockets at Israeli cities, then this reponse would not have happened.

Israel also captured the leader of Hamas in their West Bank raids yesterday, Hassan Yousef, and announced that they would once again resume targeting the leaders of terrorist groups for military attack. In return, Hamas demonstrated its own self-delusion by warning Israel that it would once again start attacking within "the Zionist entity", a threat which seems empty when the rockets have already fallen within Israel.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad couldn't live in unoccupied Palestinian territory for two weeks without launching such attacks, and the PA couldn't or wouldn't prevent them from doing so. They provoked an appropriately major military response from Israel and now want to hide behind the tired rhetoric and failed excuses of the past. All they have done is prove Ariel Sharon's political brilliance.
Posted by Captain Ed at September 25, 2005 08:40 AM

 

[manu1959]

kath,

if you recall i said that israel would withdraw.....the terrorists would not be able to help themselves then israel would obliterate them.

 

[Annie]

kath,

if you recall i said that israel would withdraw.....the terrorists would not be able to help themselves then israel would obliterate them.

I hate to say this, but I hope they do.

 

[Annie]

kath,

if you recall i said that israel would withdraw.....the terrorists would not be able to help themselves then israel would obliterate them.

Looks like you were correct:

http://www.imemc.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=14075&Itemid=1

Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, officially launched his continuous military assaults called “First Rain” against the Palestinian areas, giving his army a “free hand” to operate in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

“There are no plans for one time operation”, Sharon said, “This is a continuous action against the Palestinian factions, Qassam launchers”.

Israeli military sources reported, on Sunday, that the military attacks are against Hamas, Al Aqsa Brigades, and the Islamic Jihad.

At least twenty residents were injured overnight after the Israeli air force shelled several areas in the Gaza Strip. 207 Palestinians were arrested in a wide-scale operation in the Wets Bank.

Sharon stated that he instructed the Israeli Army to operate in the Palestinian areas “with no limit on the means” they use to hurt the fighters, their equipment and hideouts.

“All means must be used against them”, Sharon said, “Everything must be done to fighter them”.

Also, Sharon added that this is a one-time operation, but a long one, and includes continuous military attacks, and operations.

The Israeli cabinet, decided in its weekly session, to shell targets in Gaza, and the renewal of the assassination policy in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip; the strikes include shelling Palestinian infrastructure.

Israeli army positioned cannons and tanks along the Gaza borders, earlier on Sunday at dawn, and conducted what was described as “practice-fire” into open areas, according to an Israeli military source.

 

[Annie]

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050925/ts_nm/mideast_explosion_dc

11 minutes ago

GAZA (Reuters) - An Israeli air strike on a car in the
Gaza Strip killed at least two Palestinians on Sunday, witnesses said, against the backdrop of Israeli threats to target militants after a series of rocket attacks on
Israel.


Witnesses said an Israeli aircraft attacked a car on Gaza's coastal road and that one of the dead wore military fatigues.

Four Palestinians were also wounded in the strike.

"We confirm the military carried out an air strike in Gaza," an army spokeswoman said in Jerusalem. She gave no other details.

Earlier, Israel arrested more than 200 suspected militants in the
West Bank as Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon ordered the army to use any means to stop rocket salvoes from Gaza, where Israel completed a troop withdrawal two weeks ago.

Sharon gave the order after a helicopter fired two missiles in northern Gaza. A military source said buildings used by militants were targeted. Similar strikes on Saturday killed two militants and hurt 20 people.

A spiral of violence intensified when a blast on Friday killed 16 people at a Hamas rally in Gaza. One of the victims, a 12-year-old boy, died of his wounds on Sunday.

Hamas blamed Israel and militants fired at least 40 rockets into the Jewish state in response, though Israel denied responsibility and the
Palestinian Authority said it appeared to be an accident caused by Hamas members carrying explosives.

 

[dilloduck]

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050925/ts_nm/mideast_explosion_dc

A strategic withdrawal followed by a massive counter attack--Did anyone ever doubt the Israeli strategy would succeed?

 

[Annie]

First 'real war.'

http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/005511.php

September 25, 2005
Hamas: Oops. Our Bad.

The BBC reports that Hamas has cried "Uncle!" in its first-ever outright war against Israel after two days of one-sided fighting. Hamas now says it will refrain from launching rockets out of Gaza after watching the IDF pound Gaza in an unprecedented show of force, with the Israelis no longer handcuffed by the standards of occupation:

The Palestinian militant organisation Hamas has announced an end to rocket attacks on Israel from the Gaza Strip.

At least 30 rockets have been fired at Israel in recent days, following Israel's withdrawal from Gaza earlier this month.

In response to the rockets, Israel resumed its policy of targeting militant leaders in air strikes.

On Sunday, an Israeli missile strike killed two Islamic Jihad militants, including a top commander.

At a cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon ordered "unrestricted" strikes against Palestinian militants. ... Overnight on Saturday, Israeli forces launched air strikes against alleged weapon storage sites, and a school linked to the militant group Hamas. At least 19 people were reported injured in the strikes.

The Israeli army said it arrested more than 200 militants in West Bank, including activists from Hamas and Islamic Jihad. It also test-fired artillery rounds into northern Gaza.

If one tried to construct the most foolish strategy possible on the part of Hamas and the Palestinians, it would have been to use Gaza as an attack site immediately after the withdrawal of the occupation. Hamas just found out that not only does that constitute an act of war, it also makes Hamas at best partisans, not covered under the Geneva Convention. The Israelis have no responsibility to treat them as POWs once captured, but as spies -- unless Mahmoud Abbas wants to claim them as the Palestinian Army, which would then make the West Bank a legitimate theater of war as well as Gaza.

On the plus side for Hamas, the operation has given them an opportunity to look for new leadership, since Israel captured theirs during the operations in the last two days. Perhaps that will improve their strategic thinking, but somehow I rather doubt it.
Posted by Captain Ed at September 25, 2005 06:21 PM

 

[Gunny]

First 'real war.'

http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/005511.php

I was skeptical at first, but giving the Palestinians their own chunk of land to anchor themselves to was a stroke of genius.