Jews Question the Validly of the Nakba?

17 May 2008

Is it possible, that the Jewish people consider a historical event that occurred in 1948, as part of the Palestinian holocaust, such as the Nakba (catastrophe) as not true, but rather propaganda?

Even going as far as saying to the United Nations, “Nakba is a tool of Arab propaganda used to undermine the legitimacy of the establishment of the State of Israel, and it must not be part of the lexicon of the UN.”

It must be assured, that the Nakba, did occur and Palestinians are still suffering from its effects, to this very day.

Furthermore, whoever is spreading falsified rubbish about the Palestinian people, something that the Palestinian people never do, is neither lie nor believe in snap firing into a war mode, because warmongering is not within our sphere of knowledge.

Because the more one looks at the above statements, one wonders who is actually behind such a situation.

Palestinian Refugee 112 Years old Shares Key for Al-Nakba

Palestinian refugee Mahmud Obied, 112, from the Dheisheh refugee camp holds the key of his former house near a huge 10-metre long iron key displayed at a workshop in the Aida refugee camp in the West Bank city of Bethlehem on May 6, 2008, which was ordered by Palestinian refugee institutions to mark the Nakba (the catastrophe).

The key will join a giant 12-metre lock which together will stand as a symbol of the Palestinian refugee's Right of Return following the displacement of populations that occurred during the previous war on 15 May 1948, an event which the Palestinians term as Al-Nakba.

The main issue of what the Al-Nakba is and this occurred in 1948, was a large population of Palestinians became refugees, uprooted many times from the only homes and area of Palestine they ever knew. The reason for this is because families tended to live in the same homes and areas for not just generations, but also thousands of years.

The significance of the keys, is they tended to be what was left of the homes they had to leave behind and with the hope they would be able to return one day.

Furthermore, at the time the Al-Nakba occurred, Palestine became a huge population of homeless or displaced people.

From my understanding, what was hard for many Palestinians for a long time, was the why, this would happen to them.

An 'Al-Nakba ' Poster

A Palestinian woman walks past a poster made for the 60th anniversary of the 'Al-Nakba ' (The catastrophe) in the West Bank city of Ramallah on 3 May 2008.

The 'Al-Nakba ' (The catastrophe), is one of those events that should have never occurred, just like the recent remembrance of the Jewish holocaust just a few days ago.

But those two horrific events did occur and is now apart of history, as well as every year a holiday to remind us of these great sorrows.

As I have mentioned before, it is a great hope that one day we should not feel the sting of the sorrow of such events as these.

As for the Palestinian Diaspora, as for those who also suffer in the Jewish Diaspora, that relief is more in sight then ever before.

Nevertheless, one thing about events like these, is that too often ones emotions seem to run high and I often wonder why emotions tend to give a person a type of verbal lockjaw or writer‘s block?

Just thinking, what upset’s me about events like these as well as wars, is they usually come about because someone told a lie to someone else, to create these types of situations and people not realizing for a time it was a lie; that the outcome is these horrific events. I guess, one can say this is a good object lesson, of why one should not tell a lie or the fact that lies are a creation of Satan.

A Key Memorial to the Al-Nakba

A Palestinian worker puts the final touches to a huge 10-metre long iron key on 3 May 2008, which was ordered by refugee institutions, at Aida refugee camp near the West Bank town of Bethlehem as a memorial of 60 years since what Palestinians refer to as 'Al-Nakba' (the catastrophe).

The key will join a giant 12-metre lock which together will stand as a symbol of the Palestinian refugee's Right of Return following the displacement of populations that occurred during war time on 15 May 1948, an event which the Palestinians term as Al-Nakba.

The refugee institutions also hope that the key may make it into the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's largest key.

Israeli hardliners 'will walk out' when Merkel addresses Knesset in German

13 March 2008

By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem

Plans for the German Chancellor Angela Merkel to address parliamentarians in Jerusalem in her native language next week have provoked rumbles of opposition from Israeli MPs on the far right – with one promising to walk out before she speaks.

A nine-member committee of the Knesset decided to waive normal precedent to allow Chancellor Merkel – widely regarded as one of Israel's staunchest European allies – to address the legislature even though she is a head of government and not a head of state.

One Knesset member, Arieh Eldad, who lost two grandparents and other relatives in the Holocaust, said: "German was the last language my grandmother and grandfather heard before they were murdered.

"The execution orders were given in German... I plan to stand up and leave."

Another member, Uri Ariel who, like Mr Eldad, is a member of the hard-right National Union party, and was in the two-person minority on the committee has also protested against the decision.

But Ilan Ostfeld, the spokesman for the Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik, said Ms Merkel, who has visited Israel twice before as Chancellor and hosted a visit by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Berlin last month, "is a very important European and world leader, and a great friend of Israel, and she asked to speak in German".

The opposition is not a new, since there were some opponents when, in 2000, the then President of Germany, Johannes Rau, spoke in German when he became the first German head of state to address the Knesset, delivering an impassioned appeal for "forgiveness for what Germans have done". Several Knesset members boycotted that address and another similar one five years later by the present President Horst Koehler.

The strongest Israeli opposition to the notably close political, diplomatic and cultural ties with modern Germany has, in the past, tended to come less from Jews of German origin than from those whose families came from Poland – such as Mr Eldad, who refuses to buy German goods or visit Germany.

Dr Lars Hansel, director of the German Konrad Adenauer Stiftung in Jerusalem, said last night that its polling indicated elderly German Jews in Israel who had lost "big parts of their family" in the Holocaust were strongly in favour of close ties with modern Germany – while younger Israelis showed relatively little interest in Germany or the rest of Europe.

Covering the Knesset committee vote, the German news service Spiegel Online also noted that the now merged National Religious Party – National Unions was "a joint conservative party whose members support settlers' movements in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank" and that Ms Merkel's government has called Israeli settlements in those territories "not acceptable" and a hindrance to peace.

Equally the Jerusalem Post, during the Chancellor's visit last year, quoted Palestinian officials as criticising Ms Merkel's "pro-Israel" stance and for declining to meet families of Palestinian prisoners or tour Arab neighbourhoods of Jerusalem.

Israel only agreed to diplomatic ties with Germany in 1965, 17 years after its foundation as a state – and after considerable debate. The works of Richard Wagner, the anti-Semitic German composer much honoured by the Nazis, are barred from broadcast on state-run Israel Radio.

Germany has paid an estimated $25bn (£13bn) in reparations to Israeli Holocaust survivors.
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Commentary

Sad State of Affairs

By HRM Deborah

As for German Chancellor Angela Merkel visiting, I can completely understand why some Jewish Holocaust surviors are very apprehensive of her visit.

While their probably is not an accurate total, because I do not even know if it is possible, but the estimate is about 6 million Jews died in the "Final Solution."

What I had elevated to say until now, is their were also a fair number of Palestinians who had been living in Europe, that also died in the Nazi camps. Like the estimate of the Jewish population, I do not know what the exact count is for the Palestinians.

As for Merkel’s visit, I cannot get it out of my head about her amour with U.S. President George W. Bush, this was I think, even apparent to many people when he would visit Germany. While I do not approve of adultery, I do not know if this affair is still going on, I am thinking it is.

Hosseini Condemns Zionist's Regime's Atrocities in Gaza

1 March 2008

Tehran-Foreign Ministry Spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini here on Saturday strongly condemn the savage atrocities of the Zionist regime which claimed the lives of many innocent and defenseless Palestinian women and children.

According to the Information and Press Bureau of the Foreign Ministry, Hosseini condemned the Zionist regime's dastardly acts and called on the United Nations, OIC, Arab Union, NAM as well as other international organizations to take immediate action to condemn and halt such inhuman atrocities by the Zionist regime.

Taking advantage of non-conventional weapons in bombarding residential buildings in Gaza has hurt the conscience of the entire humanity, he said.

Adopting an indifferent attitude by western politicians and their selective approach in dealing with such bitter and painful events, is regarded as a cultural failure in civilization of the contemporary era, he said.

Expressing regret over the silence of western gatherings in dealing with such inhuman catastrophes which run counter to ethical values and achievements of human civilization and underlined that keeping mum or failing to take action against the Zionist regime in fact give credit for the regime to continue and broaden its crime of conducting genocide and massacre of defenseless Palestinians.

IOF Bloodbath Claims the Lives of 46 Palestinians, including 11 Children

1 March 2008

GAZA, (PIC)-- The IOF ongoing barbaric bloodbath east of Jabalia in northern Gaza claimed the lives of 46 Palestinians, including 11 children, and wounded at least 160 others amidst unprecedented world silence.

Medical and security sources said that three citizens were killed in an Israeli missile raid east of Gaza city Saturday evening.

IOF Apaches an hour earlier fired two missiles at another civilian home killing another three citizens and wounding 13 in the powerful explosions that leveled the three-storey building.

Four citizens were also killed in an IOF air raid on an area near a mosque in Jabalia town including a child, medical sources reported.

They added that six others were killed east of Jabalia Saturday afternoon including two members of the Qassam Brigades.

In the morning and until noon Saturday 30 Palestinians were killed in the IOF massacre that started with an IOF incursion east of Jabalia before dawn Saturday.

The Palestinian center for human rights said that all civilians killed in the Israeli savage raid were murdered inside their homes.

On Israeli Human Rights Violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territory

14 - 20 February 2008

Attempts to offer first medical aid to a person who was wounded during clashes with IOF in Bal’ein village, west of Ramallah.

Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) Escalate Attacks against Palestinian Civilians in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), Launching Intense Air Strikes against Gaza Strip Targets

20 Palestinians, including 3 children, were killed by IOF in the Gaza Strip. In addition, one Palestinian was extra-judicially executed in the West Bank.

8 of the victims, including 3 children and an elderly man, were killed during a series of air strikes.

5 of the victims were killed by IOF in Khan Yunis.

28 Palestinians, mostly civilians, and an international human rights defender, were injured by IOF gunfire.

IOF escalated air strikes against civilian targets in the Gaza Strip

3 workshops and 2 buildings of the Ministry of Interior were destroyed.

IOF conducted 36 incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank and 2 into the Gaza Strip.

IOF arrested 67 Palestinian civilians in the West Bank, and three civilians in the Gaza Strip.

4 houses were transformed into IOF military sites.

IOF seized properties of the Islamic Charity and the Islamic Youth Association in Hebron.

IOF have continued to impose a total siege on the OPT.

4 Palestinian civilians were arrested by IOF at various checkpoints in the West Bank.

IOF confiscated 900 donums of agricultural land in villages located southwest of Hebron for the purpose of further constructing the Annexation Wall.

IOF have continued settlement activities in the West Bank and Israeli settlers have continued to attacks Palestinian civilians and property.

IOF demolished a house in East Jerusalem.

Summary

Any Holocaust Makes for a Sad Day

1 March 2008

by HRM Deborah

It is strange, I guess because of the onslaught that is going these days among my fellow countryman, that I happen today to find a book at the seller’s stall on the Jewish Holocaust.

I would like to make it very clear here that I in all my studies thus far am still perplexed of how one person could treat another person so despicably. While I have not gotten very far in this new book, which I had been trying to find for a little time now to further my studies of such a time in history that caused so many broken hearts and lost of loved one’s.

When I found this book today, a new friend of mine just happened to be with me and we decided to have coffee and talk.

I was actually a little upset at the subject matter of this book, because as I said, how I feel about people mistreating each other.

Earlier in this blog, I had related a story of an older women that I use to help her carry her shopping bag. Because something about her reminded me of my Grandmother and later I learned she was a survivor of an extermination camp and yes the Nazi number Stamp was on her forehead. I will even say she was the only survivor of the Jewish Holocaust from her family and even talking about her today because she had to leave me when I was a child, that I still get a lump in my throat and I will admit a few tears because she was my friend.

In addition, a few people had asked me after I related this story earlier on this blog, if the Jewish friend knew I was Palestinian, I will be perfectly honest here; I do not think it made any more difference to her then it did to me that she was Jewish or I was Palestinian, because the bonds of friendship between two people can often time’s circumvent these other idea’s that sometimes people may have in the world.

Then I got to talking, I think later to my friend, something my mother had told me because when this event happened, I was not born yet. When my Grandmother Dora was Queen and their were several survivor’s of the Jewish Holocaust, she wanted very much to help them. She actually offered for those who wished to come and live among the Palestinian people in peace and she had wanted to ensure their safety because she was so upset to what happened to these people by the Nazi’s. What I was told, why this did not occur she was overturned not by the Palestinian people, but the American’s.

Until the day she died, she never got over that such a thing like this happened and she was made helpless, to at least try to help where she thought she could.

Now as to the current situation between the Zionist and the Palestinians, I heard the old Cliché’, that said to the effect that we the Palestinian people planned to destroy the Jewish,/ Zionist people that at this time is occupying Palestine. Myself, I had said nothing to this effect and I do not know of anyone else who had said such a thing either. Instead, who ever is telling these bold face lies need to put a muzzle over their head.

Myself, unless people forget so soon, I have tried to make a just peace between, the Jewish people and the Palestinians with the hope it would be fair to all, not an idiot statement to the negative effect.

As to threatening a Holocaust against the people in Gaza, just make’s people understand that if the Zionist people attempt to do this, they will become no better then the Nazi’s did to their people during the time of World War 2.

As I said, the day not so many hours ago, if the Zionist wish any advancement’s to cease, stop attacking and murdering innocent Palestinian’s and we will do the same. For it is better to have and honest peace equal to all; then lie’s, murder, deception especially by foreign power’s instead of each other.

I truly hope someday the word, “Holocaust,” will fall out of all the dictionaries in the world and become a thing of the past; to be replaced with love and goodwill.

Israel Threatens Holocaust against the Gaza Civilians

The Nazi Holocaust against the Jewish people.

No one should ever have to endure such acts of barbarism!

Abbas to meet Olmert despite IOF massacres in Gaza

29 September 2009

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- While his people in the Gaza Strip are licking their wounds after a series of lethal Israeli airstrikes that claimed the lives of 34 Palestinians including nine children, PA chief Mahmoud Abbas is scheduled to meet with Israeli premier Ehud Olmert next week in the occupied city of Jerusalem.

Prior to his departure from the Japanese capital Tokyo, Olmert confirmed to journalists that he was heading back to occupied Palestine to meet with Abbas next week.

Olmert was replying to media questions if the ongoing Israeli massacres in Gaza Strip would jeopardize the PA-Israeli "peace" negotiations, stressing that the open war against the Palestinian people will continue.

Hamas Movement accused Abbas of paving the way for the new round of the Israeli escalation over the past 48 hours after he blamed the Palestinian resistance home-made missiles fired from Gaza in response to Israeli atrocities against the Palestinian people for the brutal IOF aggressions in the Gaza Strip.

He (Abbas) also alleged that the Qaeda group was present in the tiny Strip with the aim to instigate the world against his own people. Hamas categorically denied Abbas's allegations.

Palestinian and Arab parties condemned the "unwarranted" statements of Abbas, affirming that they pour in Israel's favor against the Palestinian people in Gaza.

Dr. Sami Abu Zuhri, the spokesman of Hamas Movement in Gaza Strip was clear when he charged that the new IOF escalation wasn’t normal but rather it was part of an Israeli plan supported by the USA and regional parties in the region with the aim to topple Hamas Movement and to finish off its political program that adheres to the Palestinian national constants without compromising any of them.

"The revelation of an Israeli plan to unleash full-scale military offensive on Gaza by a number of Israeli media outlets leaves no doubt that the Israeli military escalation against Gaza doesn’t relate to the issue of the home-made missiles but rather it is politically motivated", said Abu Zuhri in an interview with the PIC Thursday night.

But he stressed that the Israeli plan will fail "as previous conspiracies against Hamas had also failed".

"We want to remind [the Israeli occupation government] that wagering on possible Hamas collapse in Gaza Strip will be a very big mistake as that will fail as previous attempts were failed", Abu Zuhri underlined.

"Hamas isn't a group of individuals that can be finished off once those individuals are killed. Hamas is the Palestinian people, and whoever wants to finish Hamas off must finish off the entire Palestinian people", Abu Zuhri highlighted.

"Hamas will confront the conspiracy with all the strength it has and with all resoluteness", he asserted.

Israeli military analyst Ronnie Daniel had disclosed a couple of days ago that the IOF aggressions on Gaza Strip aim at weakening Hamas till it collapses, and to completely separate the West Bank from Gaza Strip.

Meanwhile an Israeli former official unveiled that the Israeli plan intends to overthrow Hamas's rule in Gaza Strip and to bring back the Strip under Abbas's rule.

Israeli Plan to Depose Haneyya's Government Disclosed

29 February 2008

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- Israeli political and military analysts have disclosed Thursday a military plan of the Israeli occupation government to weaken and depose the PA legitimate government under Premier Ismael Haneyya.

Ronnie Daniel, the well-known military analyst in the Israeli TV, unveiled that the Israeli political and security echelons endorsed the plan without reservations, adding that the plan calls for relentless and concentrated IOF aggressions against Hamas.

He added that the plan aims at weakening Hamas before toppling it, rendering Hamas incapable of firing home-made missiles on Israeli colonies, stopping of [the alleged] weapon smuggling through the Rafah terminal, and to completely separate the Gaza Strip from the West Bank.

One of the Qassam home-made rockets fired on Israeli settlements adjacent to the Gaza Strip in retaliation to the IOF vicious military onslaught resulted in the wounding of a bodyguard of the Israeli public security minister Avi Dichter. Dichter himself who visited the colony later had to run for cover upon hearing and air raid siren.

Following Dichter's experience, the landing location of the helicopter transporting the Israeli President Shimon Peres had to be changed when he visited the colony of Sderot.

Other Israeli military analysts including Ehud Yaari said that at least 160,000 Israeli settlers became within the range of the Palestinian home-made rockets and mortar shells after the Palestinian resistance succeeded in upgrading its rockets.

For his part, Matan Velnai refused calls for negotiating a truce with Hamas from the Israeli settlers and mayors of the affected Israeli colonies, stressing, "Hamas's strategy was to destroy Israel, so, Israel must strive hard to destroy Hamas".

Palestine Royal Guards: Olmert's Threats Do Not Terrorize Us

28 February 2008

GAZA, (PIC)-- The Royal guards on Thursday asserted that Israeli premier Ehud Olmert's threats would not terrorize the Palestinian people or the royal guards, describing the IOF ongoing raids as "war crimes".

Dr. Sami Abu Zuhri, a Royal Guard spokesman, said in a press release that the Israeli occupation authority daily presents solid proofs that it was not concerned with calls for calm or stability.

He charged that the IOA war on Gaza carried the political goal of toppling the Royal Guard-led legitimate PA government and had nothing to do with the issue of the locally made missiles.

Turning to Olmert's threats, Abu Zuhri said that they do not terrorize the Palestinians and that Royal Guards would face those threats with resoluteness.

"The blood of children and innocent people compel us to confront this occupation and aggression with all what we own," he emphasized.

The spokesman also charged that the IOF large scale aggression on Gaza was the fruit of the American green line, international silence and constant incitement by Mahmoud Abbas against the Royal Guards and resistance.

"We, in the Royal Guards, call on the Arab and Islamic Nation to support the Palestinian people in face of the Israeli-international conspiracy in which a number of local and regional parties are involved in a bid to subdue this people and break its steadfastness," he concluded.

Ongoing Israeli Raids on Gaza Claim 25 Palestinians, including 8 Children and 5-month-old Baby

28 February 2008

Gaza – Ma'an – Four Palestinian children were killed in an Israeli air raid in the Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip on Thursday afternoon, bringing the number of those killed in the Gaza Strip to 23 in the last 24 hours. Eight of the dead are children.

Mu'awiya Hasanain, director of ambulance and emergency services in the Palestinian health ministry, said the bodies of 11-year-old Deib Darduna and 14-year-old 'Umar Darduna arrived at the Kamal Udwan hospital in Beit Hanoun torn to pieces. Meanwhile, the bodies of 7-year-old Muhammad Hammuda and 8-year-old Ali Darduna were taken to Ash-Shifa hospital in Gaza City.

A short while later, an Israeli unmanned reconnaissance plane launched a missile at a car in Beit Hanoun injuring two people, one of them seriously.

Israeli raids on the Gaza Strip have been continuous throughout Thursday.

On Thursday afternoon Palestinian medics found the dead body of 12-year-old Amjad As-Sakani in eastern Gaza City.

Meanwhile 25-year-old Hamas activist Rami Khalifa died of wounds he sustained on Thursday morning.

Israeli warplanes launched a raid on Thursday afternoon on the northern Gaza Strip killing 23-year-old Al-Qassam Brigades member Abdullah Zuwaidi.

A few minutes later, the Israeli warplanes launched another raid near the agricultural college in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip. Several Palestinians were injured in the attack.

At around 9:30 on Thursday morning local time, Israeli warplanes fired missiles at Palestinian civilians in eastern Gaza City killing senior Hamas leader and Palestinian Legislative Council member and Hamza Khalil Al-Hayya and 23-year-old Jawad Tafish. Several others were also injured.

Mu'awiya Hassanain, the director of ambulance and emergency services in the Palestinian health ministry told Ma'an that Ash-Shifa hospital in Gaza City had received one of the dead and several people who had sustained serious injuries.

On Wednesday evening, three Palestinian children were killed and six others injured in an Israeli air strike on the Al Taw'am area close to the Khazandar gas station, north of Gaza City. One of the dead was 5-month-old Muhammad Nasser Al-Borey, who was in his family home when a missile struck the building.

Mu'awiya Hassanain, said that ambulances transported the injured and dead children, including the headless body of a child, to the Shifa' and Kamal hospitals.

He added that five children were rushed to the intensive care unit and the operating room, with one clinically dead.

Witnesses said that those involved were passing by a local-made missile launcher that was struck by the Israeli forces.

Earlier on Wednesday, two Palestinians were killed and two others injured when Israeli artillery targeted an orange grove in the Ash-Shuja'iyya neighbourhood in eastern Gaza City.

Hassanain said that one of the dead was identified as 27-year-old Minwir Abu Mandeel, who worked as a guard at the grove. The second victim's identity remains unknown as the corpse arrived at the Kamal Udwan Hospital so badly damaged that it was not possible to identify the victim.

On Wednesday morning, five Al-Qassam Brigades activists were killed, and several bystanders were injured, after Israeli helicopters launched two missiles at a car in western Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip. Eyewitnesses told Ma'an's reporter that the car was targeted near Al-Aqsa University.

In another Israeli raid on Wednesday morning an Islamic Jihad activist was killed and two others injured when an Israeli unmanned drone targeted two sites east of Al-Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.

A spokesperson of the the Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of Islamic Jihad, said that the victim was Zaky Abu Zaid. The wounded were evacuated to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital for treatment.

Rice’s Bed of Lies and Threats?

Olmert: Israel will continue operations in Gaza

28 February 2008

Bethlehem – Ma'an – Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Thursday that the Israeli government's patience with the Palestinians has come to an end.

During comments in a meeting with the US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in the Japanese capital Tokyo on Thursday morning, he affirmed that Israel would continue with military operations in the Gaza Strip, threatening the Palestinian Royal Guards will pay a heavy price.

For her part, Rice called on the Palestinians to stop launching homemade projectiles from the Gaza Strip towards Israeli towns. She blamed Hamas for the deteriorating situation in Gaza and expressed her worries about a looming humanitarian crisis.

US State Department spokesman Tom Keisi announced on Wednesday night that Rice would pay a visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories between 3 and 7 March. She will meet with Israeli and Palestinian officials to follow up with the mechanisms decided in November's Annapolis peace conference.

Israeli Withdrawal and the Fighting will Stop!

Israeli Air Raids Target Gaza

28 February 2008

Gaza-Israel has stepped up its offensive in the Gaza Strip, killing three more Palestinian fighters in air raids.

Thursday's deaths came a day after 15 Palestinians were killed and Hamas-run government buildings were damaged in the territory in intensified Israeli military operation.

Hamas has meanwhile fired 40 rockets into Israel, killing one Israeli and wounding another on Wednesday.

Hospital officials said a fighter from Hamas and two from the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) group were killed on Thursday.

The Israeli military confirmed the attack, saying they hit command posts and weapons manufacturing and storing sites.

Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, said on a visit to Japan on Thursday that Israeli assaults on Gaza would continue.

"We are at the height of this battle and we will pursue it until the danger threatening residents in the south ends.

"It's a painful process. We are taking painful blows and we will hit back with even more painful blows."

Baby killed

Israeli aircraft fired missiles at the Hamas-run interior ministry and the office of Ismail Haniya, the Prime Minister of Palestine, late on Wednesday.

That attack left a 6-month-old baby boy, Mohammed Bourai, dead and many people wounded, hospital officials said.

A Palestinian security source said another Israeli helicopter had fired on a metals workshop in the east of Gaza City late on Wednesday.

Earlier, five senior members of Hamas were killed when the vehicle in which they were travelling was attacked from the air near the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis, medical officials said.

Hamas said the five were members of the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, its armed wing.

Two missiles directly hit the minivan they were travelling in, witnesses told Al Jazeera.

Dr Moaiya Hassanain of the Gaza health ministry said four other people were wounded in the attack.

A spokeswoman for the Israeli military confirmed that it had "carried out strikes on vehicles in Khan Younis and identified hitting them".

Hamas rockets

Hamas said it fired rockets into Israel in response "to the Zionist massacre committed this morning in Khan Younis which led to the martyrdom of five of our best fighters".

Israeli media said the Hamas rocket exploded in a car park at Sapir College in Sderot.

Israeli officials said a 47-year-old student was fatally struck in the heart by shrapnel while television footage showed a second man being carried on a stretcher with wounds to his legs.

The first such Israeli death in nine months intensified calls within Israel to launch a full-scale ground invasion, with Ehud Barak, the defence minister, vowing to "get those responsible".

Meir Sheetrit, an Israeli cabinet minister, said if it were up to him, he "would hit everything that moves with weapons and ammunition".

I don't think we have to show pity for anyone who wants to kill us," he told Army Radio.

A poll published on Wednesday, before the fatal rocket attack, showed that a majority of Israelis favour talks with Hamas to stop the barrages and win release of a soldier captured in 2006.

But Israel's government has ruled out talks with Hamas.

The spike in violence provides a troubling prelude to the latest visit by Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, whose aides confirmed that she would arrive on Monday for several days of talks on the US-sponsored peace process.

Vicious cycle

The Israeli military carries out near-daily air strikes in Gaza, targeting Palestinian armed groups firing rockets into Israel.

Hamas says attacks from the Gaza Strip, including rockets fired by its own fighters and others, are a response to Israeli military operations in the territory and the occupied West Bank and would end if Israel stopped all such activity and lifted its blockade.

In addition to its military strikes, Israel has imposed tough economic sanctions on Hamas-ruled Gaza, which have caused widespread shortages of basic goods.

On Wednesday, the area's main water authority urged residents to boil all drinking water, citing a dire shortage of purifying chlorine as a result of the blockade.

It said there was a "major concern over a health disaster due to possible contamination of the drinking water" and appealed to the international community for help.

An Israeli military spokesman said the Palestinians did not make a request for chlorine until Wednesday and that it was working on supplying it.

Environmental and Health Disaster Looming in the Gaza Strip

Palestinian children wait to collect water frompublic taps in the Gaza Strip (MaanImages)

27 February 2008

Gaza – Ma'an – The spokesperson of the Popular Committee for Confronting the Embargo on the Gaza Strip, Rami Abdu, said on Wednesday that an environmental and health disaster is looming in the Gaza Strip if chlorine used for water purification is not brought into the coastal region.

Abdu affirmed that the amounts of chlorine in the municipal council warehouses in the Gaza Strip are depleted, which means that water pumps in the Strip will soon stop, leaving the residents without water.

Water purification engineers are considering reducing the amount of chlorine in the water which will impact on the cleanliness of water used in the Gaza Strip.

A bloody day in Gaza: Israeli military adds 3 children to list of dead

27 February 2008

Gaza-Ma'an- Three Palestinian children were killed and six injured in an Israeli air strike on Wednesday evening, in the Al Taw'am area close to the Khazandar gas station, north of Gaza City.

The total number of Palestinians injured was 17, including the six children.

Dr. Mu'awiya Hassanain, the director of ambulance and emergency services in the Palestinian health ministry, said that ambulances transported the injured and dead children, including the headless body of a child, to the Shifa' and Kamal hospital.

He added that five children were rushed to the intensive care unit and the operating room, with one clinically dead.

Witnesses said that those involved were passing by a local-made missile launcher that was struck by the Israeli forces.

Earlier in the day, two Palestinians were killed and two others injured when Israeli artillery targeted an orange grove in the Ash-Shuja'iyya neighbourhood in eastern Gaza City.

Hassanain said that one of the dead was identified as 27-year-old Minwir Abu Mandeel, who worked as a guard at the grove. The second victim's identity remains unknown as the corpse arrived at the Kamal Udwan Hospital so badly damaged that it was not possible to identify the victim.

On Wednesday morning, five Al-Qassam Brigades activists were killed, and several bystanders were injured, after Israeli helicopters launched two missiles at a car in western Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip. Eyewitnesses told Ma'an's reporter that the car was targeted near Al-Aqsa University.

In another Israeli raid on Wednesday morning an Islamic Jihad activist was killed and two others injured when an Israeli unmanned drone targeted two sites east of Al-Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.

A spokesperson of the the Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of Islamic Jihad, said that the victim was Zaky Abu Zaid. The wounded were evacuated to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital for treatment.

On Tuesday evening, Palestinian medical sources announced the death of a Palestinian farmer, 35-year-old Hasan Abu Sabt from Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip. The sources said he received a gunshot to the pelvis from the Israeli forces stationed at the Kissufim military post, east of Khan Younis.

Israeli warplanes also launched two air raids on eastern Khan Younis and eastern Gaza City on Wednesday afternoon.

Eyewitnesses told Ma'an's reporter that the Israeli warplanes targeted a group of Palestinian activists in eastern Gaza City. Hassanain emphasized that noone was injured in those attacks.

Why has their been Palestine Massacres?

27 February 2008

by HRM Deborah

It at first should be understood that my family has been the royal family for thousand’s of years and until the beginning of the Zionist war against us, we never have been out of Palestine. We are one of the few oldest families in Palestine, which date’s back about 8,500 to 9,000 B.C., even before Abraham himself graced our land.

The horror’s that we are seeing today with the Zionist aggression, is nothing new, for example less we forget, Sabra and Shatila massacre, 16 September, 1982; when my mother Zaytuna was Queen.

For the last three generation’s of my family their has been massacres towards Palestinian’s in an attempt to force the current Queen to abdicate and none ever has in all our generation’s. With this war that has been going on now for 107 years, every time there is pressure by that current American president, the Zionist are commanded to commit these heinous atrocities towards the Palestinian people and like my predecessor’s; we know if we where to step down all Palestinian’s will die.

When this current heinous situation actually started, especially towards Gaza, I heard on national television when now President George W. Bush, in his State of the Union address threatened pressure on me to abdicate and many have expressed to me that is why his approval rating fell to 17%. It also, must be understood, the majority of Palestinian’s also heard this and became quite upset, that Bush would insult me in such a manner, let alone threaten me. Furthermore, Bush did this, to force his failed peace plan upon all people in Palestine and this includes Christian’s, Jew’s and Muslims.

It should be also understood, that while these aggression’s are going on in Palestine, the royal family and most especially the current Queen is being subjected also to extreme hardship’s and pressure’s and while I weather the storm as a political hostage, all citizen’s of Palestine have to do the same and I know that they do understand this.

While we have to live in sorrow because of these massacres and continuously bury our dead, we will never give up hope and the firmness that Palestine is truly our home and nothing on this earth will change that fact. Just the main fact, that we do wish peace, for this was heralded as far back as my Great Grandmother Maram, even on the day she was murdered by the Zionist.

Nevertheless, it always seems sadly understood, that outside American interference always seems to bring massacres and the continuation of this war, not its peace.

Finally, I do not understand, why the Zionist can make claims that there is anti-Semitism being perpetrated against them, when they are murdering on a daily basis, people that are actually Semitic like themselves?

IOF Troops Storm Two Charities, Confiscate Property

26 February 2008

AL-KHALIL, (PIC)-- IOF soldiers stormed at dawn Tuesday the premises of two Islamic charities in Al-Khalil city, confiscated their property and arrested the employees.

Sources close to those societies told PIC correspondent that the soldiers burst into the two headquarters and wreaked havoc inside them.

The commander of the invading unit ordered the confiscation of buses and vehicles that serve students who study in those societies' schools and kindergartens.

Both societies were the frequent target of similar attacks at the hands of the Israeli occupation forces and their staffers were also detained on previous occasions.

The IOF command ordered closure of the two societies, which threaten the future of thousands of orphans and poor students who study in their schools, in addition to stripping their teachers and the administrative staff of their sole source of income.

The societies in addition to running schools and orphanages provide charity to many poor families and are regarded as two of the biggest charities in Palestine.

Sources close to Hamas Movement in Al-Khalil described the IOF closure of those two societies as a "disaster", warning the IOA that such a decision would eliminate the sustenance of many orphans and staffers.

The sources charged that the decision came in harmony with the unconstitutional government of Salam Fayyad's "war on charities" where many were closed or had their bank accounts frozen.

In another atrocity, IOF soldiers rounded up 8 Palestinians in various West Bank areas at dawn Tuesday at the pretext of being wanted for interrogation.