Posts Tagged ‘Turkey’

More On What Hamas Did And Didn’t Say

Posted in Bibi Netanyahu, Gaza, Media, tagged , , , , , , , , on August 22, 2014 | 1 Comment »


I explained yesterday how the media was running with a non-story which was being twisted to create the illusion that Israel’s sweep

An IDF photo of the three Israelis murdered in June

An IDF photo of the three Israelis murdered in June

through the West Bank in June after the murders of three Israeli youths was justified. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intentionally seized upon that horrific crime in order to strike a blow at Hamas to some extent but mostly at the new Palestinian unity government. The story was based on the words of Salech al-Aruri, Hamas’ lead representative in Turkey, who had been applauding the despicable act since it occurred.

A few other folks have been trying to correct the false story in the mainstream media, but it’s obviously an uphill battle. Few of Netanyahu’s defenders seem to have noticed that Israeli officials have remained thoroughly silent on this story. You’d think, would you not, that if it were what was being portrayed – that there is now “proof” that Hamas was behind the murders all along – Netanyahu would be crowing in the same hubris-filled manner that he did when one of the ceasefires was broken over a battle in a Gaza tunnel near Rafah. Yet the only sound is that of the proverbial crickets chirping. (more…)

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No, Hamas Did Not Take Responsibility For Three Israeli Youths’ Kidnapping And Murder

Posted in Hamas, Media, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 21, 2014 | 7 Comments »


In another piece I’ll be publishing later today, I take some time to discuss how the Israeli daily Ha’aretz has been marginalized in

Salech al-Aruri

Salech al-Aruri

Israel and no longer represents a “vibrant debate” as it once did. Now I must also take a moment to reflect on what is only the latest example of how their journalistic standards have fallen as well.

Ha’aretz today reports, uncritically, on the widespread story about leading Hamas activist Salach al-Aruri purportedly claiming that Hamas was, in fact, behind the kidnapping and murder of the three young Israelis earlier this year. That incident, you will recall, was the catalyst for a massive Israeli crackdown in the West Bank and eventually led to the horrors in Gaza these past weeks, which are ongoing. The problem is that this is a non-story, wherein al-Aruri said nothing we didn’t already know. Nothing he said should change anything about how we perceive this crime.

There has always been debate over whether the kidnappings were planned by Hamas or done by a rogue unit. The debate hasn’t really been a sensible one; speak to people with knowledge of the politics in Palestine and, in particular, the various armed factions as well as different familial groupings within the political system and resistance movements and you will realize quickly which side of the debate is correct. But such is the state of our media that such people are rarely spoken to, so we live in ignorance. (more…)

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Ceasefire in Gaza: Where Things Stand

Posted in Gaza, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 6, 2014 | 1 Comment »


This article originally appeared at LobeLog. Used to be our house

With a 72-hour truce apparently holding and Israel also apparently having ended its ground operation in Gaza, it seems a fair time to assess where things stand now. Has anyone emerged from this in a better position than it was in before? Is there anything that can, at least in a cynical and Machiavellian sense be called a victory?

Palestine

It goes without saying that the overwhelming majority of the physical destruction was borne by the people of Gaza. At this point, the numbers are just horrifyingly grim. 1,968 dead, of whom 1,626 were civilians. 7,920 wounded, and while there is not a precise percentage of civilians among the wounded, we do know there were 2,111 children and 1,415 women among them.

The already damaged and sole power plant in Gaza was damaged even further, leaving most of the Strip without electricity. The United Nations Development Program estimates between 16 and 18,000 homes were severely damaged or destroyed and over half a million Gazans (out of a population of roughly 1.8 million) have been internally displaced. (more…)

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A Tale of Two Ceasefires

Posted in Gaza, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 18, 2014 | 1 Comment »


A slightly edited version of this article first appeared at LobeLog. It’s the best resource on the web for analysis of US foreign policy. Please check it out. 

The two ceasefire proposals aimed at ending the accelerated violence in Gaza and Israel offer one of the best illustrations of the

Relatives and friends of the al-Kaware family carry 7 bodies to the mosque during their funeral in Khan Yunis, in the Gaza Strip, on July 9, 2014. The father, a member of the Fatah movement, and his 6 sons were all killed the day before in an Israeli air strike that targeted their home. Credit: AFP/Thomas Coexthomas Coex/AFP/Getty Images/Used under a Creative Commons license

Relatives and friends of the al-Kaware family carry 7 bodies to the mosque during their funeral in Khan Yunis, in the Gaza Strip, on July 9, 2014. The father, a member of the Fatah movement, and his 6 sons were all killed the day before in an Israeli air strike that targeted their home. Credit: AFP/Thomas Coexthomas Coex/AFP/Getty Images/Used under a Creative Commons license

Israel-Palestine conflict one could ask for. The circumstances and the content of each proposal demonstrate very well why outside pressure is necessary to end this vexing, seemingly endless struggle and just how differently Israelis and Palestinians view both current events and the conflict as a whole.

Let’s look at the two proposals. Egypt, acting as the United States normally does, worked out the details of their ceasefire idea with Israel primarily. The deal reflects the Israeli and Egyptian agenda: it mostly follows the formula of “quiet for quiet,” essentially bringing back the status quo ante of early June. It offers Hamas a vague promise of future negotiations to address the siege of the Strip. But this is hardly something Hamas will put stock in. The 2012 ceasefire agreement, which was negotiated by then-Egyptian President Muhammad Morsi, a man much friendlier to Hamas than the current Egyptian leadership, also made such a promise and it never came to anything. Finally, Egypt says it is willing to open the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt more widely but only if Hamas allows PA security to police it instead of their own people. (more…)

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Hamas’ Options: Bad and Worse

Posted in Gaza, Hamas, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 16, 2014 | Leave a Comment »


An edited version of this piece originally appeared at LobeLog. 

The fighting in Gaza will continue for some time, as a ceasefire agreement brokered by Egypt fell apart. Despite the bellicose

The remains of the Ministry of Interior’s Civilian Affairs office after Israeli bombardments in Gaza City, November 2012. UN Photo/Shareef Sarhan

The remains of the Ministry of Interior’s Civilian Affairs office after Israeli bombardments in Gaza City, November 2012. UN Photo/Shareef Sarhan

language Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has employed over the past week, it was Hamas and not Israel that rejected the proposal. This was, to be sure, the direct result of that proposal not meeting any of Hamas’ demands for a ceasefire and, because as one Israeli official put it, “…we discovered we’d made a cease-fire agreement with ourselves.” The dynamics of this turn of events are important and tell us much of how the ground has changed in the region.

We first must ask why Hamas rejected the Egyptian proposal. They have been rather clear about their reasons:

  • One, Hamas felt, quite correctly, that Egypt had essentially negotiated this deal with Israel, then presented it as a fait accompli to Hamas. In fact, they said they first heard about it through social media.
  • Two, Hamas has declared that they intend to come out of this round of fighting with some gains. In particular, they want to see the siege that Israel has imposed on the Gaza Strip since 2007, the release of all the prisoners who had been re-arrested recently after being freed in exchange for Hamas freeing Gilad Shalit in 2011, and the negotiation of a long term truce, as was agreed in 2012, but never acted upon. The terms of the proposal offered no such relief, or any real change to the status quo.
  • Three, many among Hamas and other groups believe this proposal was deliberately put forth by Egypt as one Israel would accept and Hamas would reject, in order to legitimize further attacks on Gaza. The way things have unfolded, they may very well be correct.

(more…)

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Obama of Arabia

Posted in Iran, Israel, Middle East, United States, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on October 25, 2013 | Leave a Comment »


The talks between the P5+1 and Iran are stirring up an already bubbling cauldron in the Middle East. The US’ position in the region is going to change in the next few years, though how that change manifests remain to be seen. One thing is certain, and that is that a deal between the United States and Iran is desired by both of those parties and scares the hell out the US’ closest regional allies, Israel and Saudi Arabia. I explore in this week’s column at Souciant.

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A Holocaust Double Standard

Posted in Anti-Semitism, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on August 22, 2013 | Leave a Comment »


This piece originally appeared at Souciant’s new blog. Check it out for a great deal of brilliant and different progressive thought.

I wrote recently about the apoplectic reaction of some members of Russia’s Jewish community to Stephen Fry’s very accurate

Avigdor Lieberman

Avigdor Lieberman

comparison of the atmosphere in Germany at the beginning of Adolph Hitler’s Fascist regime and Vladmir Putin’s incitement to hate and violence against LGBT people in Russia.

Today, Israel’s very own hatemonger, Avigdor Lieberman, from the obscurity of his forced suspension from his post as Foreign Minister on corruption charges, raises the Holocaust specter, though this time on much more specious (though, I certainly grant, not entirely non-existent) grounds. (more…)

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