In defence of Israel

No one can condone the civilian suffering in Gaza of the past two weeks. Nor should anyone doubt who is, in the end, responsible

The pictures do not lie. Laser-guided but blind to the distinction between fighter and civilian, Israeli bombs have reduced schools, apartment blocks and police parade grounds to visions of hell. Aid workers and relatives have removed bodies and pieces of bodies, and survivors too traumatised to talk. On Boxing Day: at least 50 cadets killed at Gaza City's main police station alone. On Monday: reports, not denied by Israel, of phosphorus shells used over civilian neighbourhoods. On Tuesday: 40 children and teachers found dead in the wreckage of a school. And yesterday: reports of up to 30 more children killed in a house to which Israeli troops had moved them for their own safety.

For all Israel's claims to have launched only targeted strikes on Hamas targets, it has shown scant concern for civilians caught in Gaza's crossfire in the past two weeks. Yet this is as nothing next to the contempt shown by Hamas.

Unlike the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), the paramilitary overlords of the Gaza Strip use civilians routinely for protection in the knowledge that many will be sacrificed to Israeli airstrikes.

Unlike the IDF, they deliberately target civilians with their own rockets. At least 70 such rockets were launched from Gaza into Israel in December.

This was the criminal act that triggered the current crisis. It was as simple and blatant as the history of the Holy Land is complex, and every time that bewildered Gazans are corralled by Hamas fighters into a human shield, it is compounded by rank cowardice.

Israel is an expression of outrage at the Holocaust and defiance of those who would turn a blind eye to history. It is also a country that in 60 years has justified its statehood by defending itself against those who deny its right to exist, preserving its democracy even when this has led it into diplomatic isolation, and building an economy that is the envy of the Middle East.

The same can scarcely be said of Hamas. Where Fatah at least speaks the language of negotiation, Hamas has explicitly rejected a two-state solution. It exists chiefly to promote a nihilistic doctrine of self-defence through terror, and to foster a delusional pan-Islamism with no tolerance for unbelievers, let alone a Jewish state.

Israel has a powerful ally in the United States. Its critics are wont to condemn this alliance as a Jewish axis blind to heart-rending realities in Gaza and to the sacrifices necessary for peace. No one can be unmoved by the suffering witnessed by the Norwegian surgeon who texted friends to tell them “we're wading in death, blood [and] amputees”.

But the way to end it is not to abandon Israel. It is to defeat Hamas. As Washington contemplates an opening to Iran, its reluctance to condemn Israel is not ideological but rational. The alternative would be to open talks with Tehran while its proxy in Gaza still threatened much of Israel with Iranian-built rockets.

The Vatican has failed unequivocally to disavow Cardinal Renato Martino's remarks likening Gaza to a concentration camp. It should know better. Those who join Annie Lennox and Ken Livingstone in Hyde Park tomorrow to condemn what they consider Israel's disproportionate response should, likewise, know that Israel is at war - but with a non-state organisation that depends on just such a response to bolster its flagging support among the Palestinian people.

Israel is better than its enemies. That is why the world expects better when children and civilians die under its ordnance. The past two weeks' fighting have damaged it internationally and will have radicalised some Palestinians. But it has also sent the essential message that Hamas is no partner for negotiations, much less for peace. The bitter lesson of this war is that Hamas cannot be allowed to win.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/leading_article/article5484881.ece

The Times gets it almost perfect. I just disagree with the bit about the Norwegian doctor. He is a fraud and has been involved in fake 'atrocity' photos.

The bold is mine.

Sick Gazans die in 'avoidable tragedies'

Israel has turned away more sick Palestinians from Gaza seeking treatment since Hamas seized control of the enclave and several have died each month unnecessarily, a United Nations agency said on Tuesday.

This is a no-brainer - Hamas are trying to destroy Israel

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said Israel denied entry permits to 18,5% of patients seeking to leave the Gaza Strip in 2007 versus 10% in 2006.

But allowed 81.5% in for treatment - remember these people want to destroy Israel.

In December 2007, 36% were denied permits compared with 8,5% in December 2006.

The WHO said the number of applicants and the percentage of those turned away surged after Hamas Islamists seized control of Gaza in June, the crossing to Egypt was closed and Israel tightened restrictions on the enclave.

Israel could not provide figures for how many sick Gazans were granted travel permits last year. A senior defence official denied the system caused unnecessary death, but said Israel was wary of would-be suicide bombers using illness as a cover.

Sound security measures by any standard.

Israel says its blockade on the enclave is a response to cross-border rocket fire by militants while international organisations have condemned it as collective punishment.

Well, they are harbouring the militants who are firing the rockets!

"Even under fire and under threat we still coordinate the health needs of Gaza's population," said Colonel Nir Press, head of Israel's Coordination and Liaison Administration for Gaza.

So, why are the idiots from WHO spending their time critisizing Israel instead of helping the hapless Palastinians?

Shortages of medicine, equipment and trained medics, which local officials blame on Israeli restrictions, mean advanced health care is virtually non-existent in the Gaza Strip.

They are worse than children!

Thousands of Gazans have been treated over the years in the Jewish state.

Those horrible Israelis. I wonder how much of a financial contribution either Hamas or the WHO have made.

The WHO said 32 Gazans died between October 1 and March 2 while waiting for travel permits.

Maybe they should speak out against the militants and their sworn aim to destroy Israel.

It could not provide comparative figures and said it was hard to measure whether faster treatment would have saved them, characterising many of the deaths as unnecessary.

"All these tragedies could have been easily avoided," WHO's head of office for the West Bank and Gaza, Ambrogio Manenti, told a news conference. Palestinian medical officials in Gaza say more than 100 Gaza patients have died since June after being denied permits.

Israel pulled troops and settlers out of the Gaza Strip in 2005 but effectively still controls its borders. As does any sovereign nation. Palestinians say that means Israel must observe Geneva Convention obligations as an occupying power to provide services for the territory.

But they are NOT occupying it!

Egypt has allowed some Gazans in for treatment, but has agreed with Israel to keep its border largely closed. - Reuters - What can you expect!

Israel seeks all clear for Iran air strike

Israel is negotiating with the United States for permission to fly over Iraq as part of a plan to attack Iran's nuclear facilities.
To conduct surgical air strikes against Iran's nuclear programme, Israeli war planes would need to fly across Iraq. But to do so the Israeli military authorities in Tel Aviv need permission from the Pentagon.

A senior Israeli defence official said negotiations were now underway between the two countries for the US-led coalition in Iraq to provide an "air corridor" in the event of the Israeli government deciding on unilateral military action to prevent Teheran developing nuclear weapons.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=UO5ZD2O42ZEZHQFIQMFCFFOAVCBQYIV0?xml=/news/2007/02/24/wiran124.xml

Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran

From Times On Line.

ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons.

Two Israeli air force squadrons are training to blow up an Iranian facility using low-yield nuclear “bunker-busters”, according to several Israeli military sources.

Under the plans, conventional laser-guided bombs would open “tunnels” into the targets. “Mini-nukes” would then immediately be fired into a plant at Natanz, exploding deep underground to reduce the risk of radioactive fallout.
“As soon as the green light is given, it will be one mission, one strike and the Iranian nuclear project will be demolished,” said one of the sources.

The plans have been prompted in part by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad’s assessment that Iran is on the verge of producing enough enriched uranium to make nuclear weapons within two years.
Israeli military commanders believe conventional strikes may no longer be enough to annihilate increasingly well-defended enrichment facilities. Several have been built beneath at least 70ft of concrete and rock. However, the nuclear-tipped bunker-busters would be used only if a conventional attack was ruled out and if the United States declined to intervene, senior sources said.

The Israeli government has warned repeatedly that it will never allow nuclear weapons to be made in Iran, whose president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has declared that “Israel must be wiped off the map”.

Sources close to the Pentagon said the United States was highly unlikely to give approval for tactical nuclear weapons to be used. One source said Israel would have to seek approval “after the event”, as it did when it crippled Iraq’s nuclear reactor at Osirak with airstrikes in 1981.

Some sources in Washington said they doubted if Israel would have the nerve to attack Iran. However, Dr Ephraim Sneh, the deputy Israeli defence minister, said last month: “The time is approaching when Israel and the international community will have to decide whether to take military action against Iran.”

I should hope that Israel has always had these plans to use their "non-existent" nukes on Iran to prevent madman Ahmadinejad loose with his fissile toys, and that they can stand upto America and their Democrat majority. Maybe if Iran saw that Israel was serious about their use if necessary, they would take a step back and stop production. Unfortunately they know that America is not going to let Israel use tactical nukes, and they are going to continue thumbing their collective nose at the West and the UN.
I'm glad that I don't live there.