By bombing the hospital, Israel’s “civilized” brutality surpasses itself. If this is progress, deprived of human sense and morality, then it is precisely what should be rejected more violently than the rejection of simple barbarism. He who is not satisfied with the avenger for a blow, driven by a sense of security from a mania, is a serious medical condition that the world must manage and address sooner or later, otherwise the tragedy we are witnessing today in Gaza will expand and become the standard of behavior prevailing in the world. And then peace on the universe.
Following the bombing of Al-Ahli hospital last Tuesday night, Israeli government spokesperson initially confirmed that Israeli forces had targeted the hospital before backtracking.
Israel has a long inglorious history of cover up its crimes- denying them and then working to push disinformation such as smearing Palestinians as unreliable sources.
Israel has bombed at least 22 hospitals since the War on Gaza, including previously striking AL-Ahli hospital with missiles a day before the devastating attack.
We share the below collection of commentary from analysts amid the heartbreaking news of the Israeli army’s massacre at al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City, reportedly killing at least 500 Palestinians seeking shelter and treatment from previous bombardments. To date, Israeli forces have murdered over 3,000 Palestinians in their latest assault on Gaza, with no end in sight.
Sy Hersh offers in his article, THE PLAN TO WIPE OUT HAMAS scenario, based on contacts with Israeli insiders, of what Israel’s planned all-out assault against Gaza might look like.
It’s worth highlighting some of the “Insider’s reported information in Heersh’s article:
- Israel has been trying to convince Qatar, to join with Egypt in funding a tent city long abandoned chunk of land in northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, near the border crossing from Gaza for the million or more refugees awaiting across the border.
- Asked why the Israeli planners thought the Egyptian government would agree, even if under pressure from the Biden administration, to accept the more than one million refugees from Gaza, the insider said: “We’ve got Egypt by the balls.”
- The major issue for the Israeli war planners is that “The Israeli planners don’t trust their infantry,” the insider said, nor their willingness to go to war but what could be a disastrous lack of combat experience.”
- The current Israeli war planners are convinced, the insider told me, that the upgraded version of JDAMs with larger warheads would penetrate deep enough underground before detonating—thirty to fifty meters—with the blast and resulting sound wave “killing all within one-half mile.”
- The insider said it was his understanding that the Hamas leadership wanted some civilians to stay put because of their need for “human shields.”
- The systematic destruction of the remaining buildings in Gaza City will start within days, the Israeli insider said. The bunker-buster JDAMs could come next. Then, in the planners’ scenario, I was told, the Israeli infantry will be assigned to mop-up operations: searching out and killing those Hamas fighters and workers who managed to survive the JDAM attacks.
- The insider also said the current planning calls for the JDAMs attack, if authorized, to come as early as Sunday or Monday, depending on the efficacy the forced expulsion of Gazi City and south proceeds, with a ground invasion to follow immediately.
In Yesterday’s Fareed’s Global Briefing, the focus was on the Misery in Gaza. Since after Hamas unprecedented attack on October 7, attention has turned to the aftermath—especially the plight of Palestinian civilians trapped in Gaza, where at least 3,000 people have been killed according to Palestinian health officials, adding to that, hundreds are believed killed as result of Israeli bombing of Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza City. Israel has warned more than 1 million Palestinians to flee northern Gaza. As Yahya Abou-Ghazala reports for CNN, some who’ve fled have died anyway. The Economist writes: “Tens of thousands of people have descended on Khan Younis, the first major city in the south (of the Gaza Strip). It might be safer than the north once Israel starts its ground offensive—but it is not safe. Samir Tabash, a resident of Khan Younis, says his family had just finished morning prayers when their street was bombed. ‘In an instant, the windows and walls of our apartment collapsed,’ he says. ‘We saw the blood all over the kids. The house turned into one open-air room as all the walls collapsed’ (they all survived).” Water and food supplies are dwindling in Gaza after Israel cut them off, along with electricity. Israel says water access has been restored to southern Gaza, but the Hamas-led government disputed that on Monday. What are Israel’s responsibilities under international law? Israel has said it does not target Palestinian civilians and has long accused Hamas—deemed a terrorist group by the US and European Union—of deliberately placing Palestinian civilians in harm’s way. At The Conversation, American University law professor Robert Goldman writes: “The foremost requirement in all conflicts is that combatants must always distinguish between civilians and combatants, and that attacks can only be directed at combatants and other military targets.” At the same time, Goldman notes the use of “human shields” is illegal. If Israel launches a ground invasion, things could get worse. At CNN Opinion, former UN official and University of Manchester professor emeritus of global health and humanitarian affairs reflects on the deadly complications of modern, urban warfare: “Often, the frontlines of urban conflicts cannot be clearly demarcated when fighters and civilians are intermingled. Protecting the latter is easier said than done amidst the general pandemonium. … In truth, there are no good ways to conduct urban wars—but short ones are preferable. Unfortunately, that makes for high intensity warfare and heavy casualties.” |
War on Gaza will force a “new paradigm” in the Middle East
RASHID KHALIDI, in an interview with Democracy NOW lays out how the ongoing extreme violence between Hamas and Israel will force “a paradigm shift.” Colonial powers will no longer believe they can force people to live under the conditions Israel has subjected Palestinians to and expect no retaliation of the oppressed, says Khalidi.
Khalidi, who calls the blockade of Gaza “a pressure cooker had to explode.” In response to the escalated conflict. Khalidi calls on Biden to defuse the situation instead of escalating it. “You cannot make peace over the bodies of Palestinians.”
Rashid Khalidi believes that the context which lead to the horrible situation is the occupation and the imprisonment of 5,000 Palestinians and the administrative detention of hundreds, and, finally, the siege of Gaza.
He thinks that “the context is not just occupation. The context is settler colonialism and apartheid. The people of Gaza, the refugees in Gaza, originate in the areas where Hamas fighters were attacking in the last couple of days. Those were Palestinian towns and villages in 1948. The ethnic cleansing of Palestine led to the scooping up of what are now 2.4 million people in Gaza. Today is Indigenous Peoples’ Day in the United States. These are the Indigenous people of the southern parts of Israel that the Hamas fighters were attacking over the past few days. That’s the first thing.”
Khalidi envisions a paradigm shifts to the Israeli/ Palestinian conflict as result of Israeli settlers colonial occupation since 1948. “The idea that you can coop up 5 million people, put them behind walls, tighten the siege on them, use an eyedropper to allow them some food, some water, some electricity, that idea has exploded because of the horrific events of the past two-and-a-half days. This cannot continue. It’s not just a matter of occupation. We have to recognize that you cannot treat an entire people the way Israel, not just under this neofascist government, but under all of its previous governments, have treated them. You cannot expel three-quarters of a million people in 1948 and not expect the return of the repressed. You cannot commit daily violence against Palestinians — one Palestinian has died every day this year — in fact, slightly more — in the occupied West Bank. You cannot expect that not to lead to a reaction. The reaction will be violent. The reaction sometimes may include things that are unquestionably war crimes.”
“But I think we have to see that this may be the end of an era, when people in Washington and people in Arab capitals assume you could just fly over Palestine, ignore it and pretend that we’re in a new Middle East of peace, while an entire people is living under this kind of incredible oppression, in a pressure cooker. It had to explode.”
In his article “We are on the brink of a historic catastrophe, involving Israel as well” Gideon Levy expects Israel upcoming ground invasion of Gaza to be a liable that is going to end to end in a fiasco the likes of which Israel and Gaza have never experienced. It could make the pictures coming from Gaza over the past several days look like a promo. We may be looking at mass slaughter.
Israel is embarking on a dangerous and losing operation. She can ask her allies in Washington what futile wars have brought to the United States to replace the regimes in the world? How many millions of people were killed in vain and who ruled the American bayonets? But we don’t need America, and we don’t even need to think about the catastrophe of the Palestinians to know that we are on the brink of a historic catastrophe for Israel as well. If the mission is really completed and the Israel will launch a disastrous ground operation in the Gaza Strip. This invasion could end in a fiasco that neither Israel nor Gaza has seen before. This invasion could bring the images that have recently come from Gaza to the fore; we will stand before a mass massacre. Many soldiers will be killed aimlessly, the people of Gaza will face a second Nakba, the initial signs of which are visible on the ground. No one will profit from these atrocities.