Why didn’t the One and Only-Jewish State accept Hamas’s Surrender?

 The formation of a Palestinian Unity Government.

A number of commentators have presented a common outline of the events that led to one and only-jewish state’s massive military attack on gaza and have apportioned blame for the devastation according to this sequence.[i] There is no reason to dispute the facts they have presented but their analysis fails to bring out the full implications of these events leading them to a less critical condemnation of those responsible for the massacre in gaza.

After the saudi-funded, military coup in egypt, president sisi set about destroying the tunnels between egypt and gaza that had enabled hamas, and thus the palestinians in gaza, to escape the most crippling effects of the jews-only state’s old testamentary siege of the territory. For the first time since their democratic rise to power through palestinian national elections in 2006, hamas were facing a complete cessation of their smuggling activities. This would lead inexorably to economic collapse, increasing levels of starvation and political turmoil that would almost certainly result in their being swept from power. Hamas might have considered hanging on to power as gaza sank into misery and desperation, perhaps leading gazans in a mass hunger strike in the hope of forcing the international community to end the inhuman and illegal jewish blockade. But, instead of engaging in such a high risk, suicidal option they acted quickly before living conditions collapsed and sought a peace agreement with their rivals, and former enemies, the palestinian authority to produce a palestinian unity government. This shows that hamas is not a group of militant fanatics who couldn’t care less about the people they are supposed to represent and protect. On the contrary, they were willing to sacrifice their political power by surrendering to the palestinian authority because they didn’t want gazans to suffer the consequences of an economic collapse.

For many years mahmoud abbas had worked closely with zionist leaders to police the west bank to ensure that no palestinians posed a security threat to the jews-only state. Many regarded him as a collaborator because his security forces ruthlessly suppressed palestinian political activism in the west bank.[ii] Nevertheless he responded positively to hamas’s call for the creation of a unity government. But for abbas this new government wasn’t going to be a merger of two equal sides in which both compromised their opposing principles and tactics in order to meet in the middle. Abbas had no intention of adopting hamas’s tactic of military resistance. He agreed to the formation of a unity government on his terms and hamas had no other choice than to accept those terms. This wasn’t an alliance of equals but rather hamas’s political and military capitulation to the palestinian authority.

The process of hamas’s absorption within the palestinian authority was overseen by members of the obama regime, “a process worked out with input from the American government which included terms that would not automatically trigger a US ban.” (William James Martin ‘The War between Gaza and the Zionists’ http://www.palestinechronicle.com/the-war-between-gaza-and-the-zionists/#.U-1BAyhy_8s August 01, 2014). Kerry would not have given his blessing to a unity government in which hamas predominated, “Faced with growing Israeli condemnations, Secretary of State John Kerry defended the US decision to work with the Palestinian unity government, saying the US would “closely monitor” them. Kerry cited assurances from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that none of the ministers were actually members of Hamas. The unity government, between Fatah and Hamas, is made up of bureaucrats holding the positions pending a new election. Though the administration is desperate to avoid the appearance of public ties with Hamas, recent reports have confirmed months of secret US-Hamas talks in the lead up to the unity agreement.” (Jason Ditz ‘Kerry Defends US Decision to Work With Palestinian Unity Govt’ http://news.antiwar.com/2014/06/04/kerry-defends-us-decision-to-work-with-palestinian-unity-govt/ June 04, 2014).[iii]

Kerry had worked for nine months trying to pressure the netanyahu government into forging a peace agreement with the palestinian authority but, in march 2014, netti found the opportunity to wriggle out of the peace process when he refused to carry out his side of the agreement and release the last batch of palestinian political prisoners. Netti then terminated the peace process altogether the day after hamas and the palestinian authority announced the formation of a unity government. It seems as if kerry must have known, like everyone else, that he was never going to succeed in pressuring netanyahu into concluding a peace agreement with the palestinian authority so he’d been working secretly on a back up plan involving the formation of a unitary palestinian authority.

The conditions for palestinian unification revealed the scale of hamas’s sacrifice to the palestinian authority. “It offered Hamas’s political adversaries a foothold in Gaza; it was formed without a single Hamas member; it retained the same Ramallah-based prime minister, deputy prime ministers, finance minister and foreign minister; and, most important, it pledged to comply with the three conditions for Western aid long demanded by America and its European allies: nonviolence, adherence to past agreements and recognition of Israel.” (Nathan Thrall ‘How the West Chose War in Gaza’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/opinion/gaza-and-israel-the-road-to-war-paved-by-the-west.html?_r=1 July 17, 2014); “Hamas endorsed the new government even though it was given no cabinet posts and the government’s composition and political programme were virtually indistinguishable from its predecessor’s. With barely a protest from the Islamists, Abbas repeatedly and loudly proclaimed that the government accepted the Middle East Quartet’s demands: that it recognise Israel, renounce violence and adhere to past agreements. He also announced that Palestinian security forces in the West Bank would continue their security collaboration with Israel.” (Mouin Rabbani ‘Israel mows the lawn’ http://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n15/mouin-rabbani/israel-mows-the-lawn July 18, 2014).[iv]

Hamas knew the return of the palestinian authority to gaza would lead to their political demise and to the disarming of their military wing thereby ending the firing of rockets at the pariah state. Hamas’s political surrender to the quisling palestinian authority was a prelude to their militarily surrender. Hamas politicians had chosen to surrender to the palestinian authority because they couldn’t countenance doing so to the racist state but, given the quisling nature of the abbas government, this was in effect what they were doing. Hamas’s role in the unity government was so negligible it verged on the non-existent.

Nathan thrall is the only commentator who has mentioned what the implication of this unity agreement was for hamas – capitulation. “Thus far, the downside to this strategy has been borne entirely by Hamas. In the days following the agreement, Fatah was quick to take credit, and most Palestinians saw the deal as an act of capitulation by a greatly weakened, financially depleted, and politically isolated Hamas. Two weeks ago, Fatah could claim Hamas’s resistance project was all but finished.” (Nathan Thrall ‘Whose Palestine?’ http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2014/jun/19/whose-palestine/?insrc=rel June 19, 2014).

Netanyahu terrorized by the prospect of a Unity Government.

Netti denounced the idea of a new palestinian authority with volcanic fury and insisted that the international community should follow his churchillian lead and reject it too.[v] Such an implacable rejection seemed strange for a number of reasons. Firstly, the unified palestinian authority would gradually disarm hamas in gaza as it had disarmed the organization in the west bank. This meant the demilitarization of gaza and the end of rocket fire into the apartheid state. In essence gaza would be as pacified as the west bank. This could open the way to peace between palestinians and the jews-only state. Secondly, netanyahu would not have been politically compromised by having to negotiate with hamas members in the unity government because hamas had no members in that government.[vi] Thirdly, the new palestinian authority had the political backing of america and the international community. And finally, the formation of a unified palestinian authority was tantamount to hamas’s surrender.[vii]

Despite these huge political benefits, netti could find no reason for joy in this new enlarged palestinian authority and the dramatic improvement in the prospects of peace. On the contrary, he denounced abbas as a terrorist for negotiating with hamas. Whilst abbas believed the agreement would enable the palestinian authority to replace hamas in gaza, netanyahu insisted it would only allow hamas into the west bank. Netanyahu’s biggest fear seemed to be his oldest - that once the palestinians were united under a single authority it would be much more difficult for him to block their demands for a palestinian state.[viii] So, despite the fact that he had continually bullied abbas, insulted and humiliated him for years, and had forced the palestinian authority into becoming little more than a corrupt quisling organization that protected the interests of the jewish state instead of the palestinian people, netanyahu feared abbas would be in a stronger position to press for a palestinian state.[ix] According to many commentators, netti “is absolutely obsessed with keeping the Palestinians divided, and his stated refusal to even consider a two-state solution means he is obsessed with good reason.” (Mitchell Plitnick ‘Is Hamas Winning?’ http://www.lobelog.com/is-hamas-winning/ July 24, 2014).

Netanyahu’s vehement rejection of the proposed palestinian unity government should not have been surprising. Given that he’d evaded kerry’s efforts to bring about a peace agreement with the quisling palestinian authority it was absurd to believe he was going to negotiate with it after it had absorbed hamas, controlled both the west bank and gaza, and unified the palestinian people. Netti doesn’t want to negotiate with the palestinians because he doesn’t want palestinians living on jewish land.[x] He’ll only negotiate under political pressure and only does so until he can find a way of evading the political pressure without causing an international outcry. And he’ll only negotiate as long as he is allowed to continue stealing palestinian land. What he, his racist cabinet, and his racist society, want is a palestinian free palestine. Like all the jewish leaders before him, two of them former terrorists, netti was intent on avoiding peace at all costs for the sake of jewish expansionism.

On this occasion, however, there was one additional factor that netti may have found irresistible when considering his response to a unity government - hamas’s weakness. Hamas seemed on the point of collapse. Firstly, it had lost most of its regional backers from egypt, iran, syria and even hezbollah.[xi] Secondly, after president sisi of egypt destroyed the tunnels between egypt and gaza, hamas was in a crippled state. The gazan economy began to collapse; hamas could no longer replenish its armaments; and it was losing authority over gaza because it no longer received any taxes on the smuggling trade through the tunnels and thus had no money to pay its workforce. Thirdly, the racist state knew hamas must be in terminal decline because of its capitulation to the palestinian authority.

Netti may have concluded that since hamas was on the verge of collapse then it could be made to capitulate to the squatter state and not merely its quisling representative. This would enable him to stay in control of political developments keeping the palestinians in abject submission rather than having to respond to palestinian initiatives that might necessitate him making compromises. “When Israeli began its bombardment campaign of Gaza on July 6, and a day later with the official launch of the so-called Operation Protective Edge, followed by a ground invasion, it may have seemed that Gaza was ready to surrender. Political analysts have been advising that Hamas has been at its weakest following the downturn of the Arab Spring, the loss of its Egyptian allies, and the dramatic shift of its fortunes in Syria and, naturally Iran. The “Hamas is ready to fold” theory was advanced by the logic surrounding the unity agreement between Hamas and Fatah; and unity was seen largely as a concession by Hamas to Abbas’ Fatah movement, which continued to enjoy western political backing and monetary support.” (Ramzy Baroud ‘Why Gaza Fought Back’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/13/why-gaza-fought-back/ August 13, 2014).

Netti had little reason to fear hamas militarily given its lack of resistance to earlier invasions. “If we compare what happened in previous military operations in Gaza, it seemed that Hamas – and others – back then was barely able to fight back,” said Itamar Radai, a visiting research fellow at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies.” (Hugh Naylor ‘Gaza war illustrates Hamas’s military advances’ http://www.thenational.ae/world/palestinian-territories/gaza-war-illustrates-hamass-military-advances#full August 16, 2014); “Furthermore, (during the jewish military’s operation cast lead in 2008-2009) the internal Palestinian front was not in the best shape in terms of its cohesion. The occupation sought to infiltrate the Resistance and thwart its plans, especially at the level of ground operations. Israeli forces thus went deep into the west of Beit Lahia and Jabalia (north), and Tel al-Hawa in southern Gaza, without a strong response from the resistance. The Israelis also dissected Gaza into three parts, and the movement of medical services between the cities was prevented.” (Orouba Othman ‘A look at the tactics of the Palestinian Resistance after two intifadas and three wars’ http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/look-tactics-palestinian-resistance-after-two-intifadas-and-three-wars August 30, 2014).

Netti may have sensed this was a critical opportunity for launching a lethal blow against hamas and destroying any lingering prospects for peace. If hamas had agreed to be demilitarized by the palestinian authority then why couldn’t the zionist military do the job more efficiently, more thoroughly and more quickly than the palestinian authority whilst throwing the palestinians into turmoil thereby further undermining political efforts to create a palestinian state? Hamas’s dire predicament seemed to trigger in netti some pre-programmed attack mechanism.

Abbas, the palestinian authority, hamas, the obama regime and the international community had quietly fostered a golden opportunity for peace which could have culminated in the creation of a palestinian state that posed no threat to the racist state. Hamas’s capitulation would bring an end to the rocket fire that the squatter state has continually claimed is its worst nightmare. But netti would have none of it. He looked in horror at this prospect for peace that would undermine his efforts to create what he called “the one and only-jewish state” i.e. a racist ‘jews-only state’. Why would he want to stop hamas’s ineffectual rocket fire when it provided him with the political momentum he needed, both domestically and internationally, to promote jewish expansionism, a military solution to the palestinian problem? What to the international community was a perfect opportunity for peace was to netti a terrifying prospect that could only be counteracted by war.

The Militant Terrorist State in Action.

After the announcement of a unified palestinian government, the jewish military state waited for an opportunity to provoke a war that would once again abolish peace prospects for the foreseeable future. This excuse came when three young settlers went missing. Netti blamed hamas for capturing them even though hamas’s leadership was not involved.[xii] Far worse, however, was that although there was overwhelming evidence that the settlers were killed soon after their capture, netti pretended hamas was keeping them prisoner in order to whip up jewish hysteria for a war against hamas. “What's more, as Max Blumenthal reported, the Israeli government knew the teenagers had been murdered almost immediately, and who the likely culprits were; but the Netanyahu regime chose to wage a worldwide campaign of mendacity -- and torment the boys' parents -- by claiming they might still be alive, and launching "search" missions for them.” (Chris Floyd ‘Blockading the Truth: Obama's Big Lie About Gaza’ http://chris-floyd.com/component/content/article/1-latest-news/2413-blockading-the-truth-obamas-big-lie-about-gaza.html July 25, 2014). Shlomi eldar provides a shocking description of the lies that the netti government told for nearly three weeks to maintain the conspiracy that the settlers were still alive in order to continually build the hysteria against hamas into a crescendo thereby making war inevitable – and encouraging the jewish public to not merely condone but celebrate the massive slaughter of innocent palestinians that would ensue.[xiii]

Soon after the capture of the settlers, netti launched a military rampage, operation brothers’ keeper, against hamas members in the west bank supposedly to rescue the settlers and capture/kill the kidnappers. “Thus a ‘search and destroy’ operation was initiated consisting of 18 days of Israeli army rampages which targeted anything affiliated with Hamas on the West Bank. Hundreds were arrested, about 500 total, and about a dozen Palestinians killed, Hamas offices and clinics were ransacked and destroyed, with computers confiscated, hundreds of Palestinian homes were invaded, usually in the middle of the night with the homes ransacked and contents destroyed or damaged, guns were pointed at women and children and people terrorized, and many arrested. Homes of so-called suspected persons were blown up and destroyed.” (William James Martin ‘The War between Gaza and the Zionists’ http://www.palestinechronicle.com/the-war-between-gaza-and-the-zionists/#.U-1BAyhy_8s August 01, 2014).[xiv] A one commentator put it, The facts show that Israeli forces had to work quite hard to get Hamas to end its cease-fire.”[xv]

The intense military rampage of operation brothers’ keeper was intended either to force hamas’s capitulation to the zionist state or to provoke it into firing off rockets that the terrorist state could then use as its excuse for a full scale military assault on gaza. Much to netti’s surprise hamas’s resistance did not crumble. It would capitulate to abbas but not to netti.

On July 7, netti launched operation protective edge’ in the belief that a direct attack on hamas in gaza would finally crush hamas’s resistance. But, despite all the signs of its weakness, hamas put up a formidable, hezbollah-like, resistance to the jewish bombardment and invasion of gaza. “If we compare what happened in previous military operations in Gaza, it seemed that Hamas – and others – back then was barely able to fight back,” said Itamar Radai, a visiting research fellow at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies. “This time, however, there was fierce fighting and there were ambushes and booby traps, and it seems they did their homework well. They were much better prepared to confront the Israeli army.”” (Hugh Naylor ‘Gaza war illustrates Hamas’s military advances’ http://www.thenational.ae/world/palestinian-territories/gaza-war-illustrates-hamass-military-advances#full August 16, 2014).[xvi]

Netti’s sole consolation over hamas’s ferocious resistance was that it gave him the opportunity to renounce his support for the idea of a palestinian state that he had been pressured by the obama regime into supporting for the previous couple of years. “Then, on July 11, Mr. Netanyahu definitively rejected any possibility of establishing an independent Palestinian state. The Gaza conflict meant, he said, that “there cannot be a situation, under any agreement, in which we relinquish security control of the territory west of the River Jordan” (meaning the West Bank).” (Antony Lerman ‘The End of Liberal Zionism’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/23/opinion/sunday/israels-move-to-the-right-challenges-diaspora-jews.html?ref=opinion&_r=0 August 22, 2014).

Many zionist commentators complained that netti’s war objectives constantly changed over time, which made it seem as if he wasn’t pursuing a rational war strategy, but such complaints only show their fail to understand their own military’s war doctrine. The jewish wehrmacht pursues what it calls the “dahiya doctrine” which is basically the grossly disproportionate use of violence against both military and civilian targets. “The Goldstone Report on Operation Cast Lead concluded that, “The tactics used by Israeli military armed forces in the Gaza offensive [of 2008-2009] are consistent with previous practices, most recently during the Lebanon war in 2006. A concept known as the Dahiya doctrine emerged then, involving the application of disproportionate force and the causing of great damage and destruction to civilian property and infrastructure, and suffering to civilian populations.”” (Jeff Halper ‘Globalizing Gaza’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/18/globalizing-gaza/ August 18, 2014). This means destroying not merely rocket launching sites and terror tunnels (sic) but schools, mosques, united nations compounds, hospitals, water treatment systems, power stations, businesses, etc.[xvii] The intention of such attacks is to try and force civilians to rise up against their rulers, “the "dahiya doctrine" promoting targeting of civilian infrastructure to create widespread suffering amongst the population with a view to foment opposition to Israel's opponents.” (Nafeez Ahmed ‘IDF's Gaza assault is to control Palestinian gas, avert Israeli energy crisis’ http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jul/09/israel-war-gaza-palestine-natural-gas-energy-crisis July 09, 2014). Netti’s ‘dahiya’ war strategy was to make as much of gaza uninhabitable as possible before global public condemnations compelled governments around the world, but especially in the western world, to withdraw their support for such outright barbarism. 

Netti had dismissed a golden opportunity for peace in the hope of smashing hamas and inflicting more misery and hopelessness on the palestinians. In other words, it was the peace plan that had been put forward by kerry and the rest of the western world that had provoked netti into military action in order to destroy any further momentum towards peace. “This last goal (bringing the Gaza Strip back under the control of the Palestinian Authority) implies actualizing the unity government that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saw as a casus belli. The actions he has taken—especially in June with the so-called “Operation Brother’s Keeper,” a massive sweep through the West Bank—were intended to destroy the agreement the PA and Hamas had struck earlier in the year.” (Mitchell Plitnick ‘A Proposed UNSC Ceasefire Plan For Gaza’ http://www.lobelog.com/a-proposed-unsc-ceasefire-plan-for-gaza/ August 22, 2014). It is true that netti had grossly miscalculated hamas’s weaknesses and its powers of survival but he had made huge strides in his genocidal plan towards making gaza uninhabitable.[xviii]

After the Massacre, a Unity Government is back on the Agenda.

After the ceasefire, the net result of the war was that, on the one hand, netti’s popularity plummeted because a majority of jews wanted the carnage to continue until hamas had been militarily defeated.

On the other hand, in spite of the devastation inflicted on gaza, palestinians started turning away politically from the palestinian authority towards hamas which had done so much to defend the people of gaza who knew that without hamas’s resistance the jewish nazis would have punished them even more brutally. “While the anger has been directed against Israel and in solidarity with Gaza, there is growing anger against the Fatah-run Palestinian Authority, which governs the West Bank. That view has come alongside increasing support for Hamas, who are seen as the only Palestinian party willing to fight Israel.” (Orlando Crowcroft ‘Palestinian Authority’s popularity a casualty of Gaza’s war’ http://www.thenational.ae/world/middle-east/palestinian-authoritys-popularity-a-casualty-of-gazas-war#full August 14, 2014). Despite the carnage that had been unleashed on gaza and its people, the palestinian authority had continued to carry out its judenrate role as servants of the racist state. “But things have changed a great deal since the unity agreement was signed. The PA, under Mahmoud Abbas, continued its close cooperation with Israel in maintaining security in the West Bank throughout Israel’s massive West Bank operation in June and the bombardment and invasion of Gaza later in the summer. Abbas’ public standing was reduced to almost zero, and Hamas accordingly has reason to distrust his leadership.” (Mitchell Plitnick ‘A Proposed UNSC Ceasefire Plan For Gaza’ http://www.lobelog.com/a-proposed-unsc-ceasefire-plan-for-gaza/ August 22, 2014).

Jewish public opinion is now more racist, more militaristic, and far less willing to engage in peace negotiations than ever before. And gazans are more determined than ever to lift the illegal and barbaric siege against them. The renewed popularity of hamas, and the even greater scale of contempt for the palestinian authority, means that it is now psychologically impossible for hamas leaders to capitulate, at least in the near future, as they had been willing to do only a few months earlier.

The irony of the ferocious jewish assault on gaza is that more zionist politicians have started looking favourably on the idea of a unified palestinian authority! “Udi Dekel, a former lead Israeli negotiator with the Palestinians who is now a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, said that most of the Israeli government supported this idea of “turning the reconciliation inside out.” “The direction, without saying it loud and clear, is that Israel is reconciling itself to the reconciliation and trying to reap some benefits,” Mr. Dekel said.” (Isabel Kershner ‘Role in Gaza Talks Signals a Comeback for Abbas’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/13/world/middleeast/role-in-gaza-talks-signals-a-comeback-for-abbas.html?_r=0 August 12, 2014).[xix]

Some zionists believe they are confounded by a dilemma. Support the creation of a unified palestinian authority to demilitarize hamas in return for a lifting of the siege of gaza but face the prospect of renewed pressure for a palestinian state. Or allow hamas to stay in power in gaza to prevent the creation of a unified palestinian authority, thereby diminishing demands for a palestinian state, but continue the siege of gaza that will lead inevitably to further conflict. “Israel cannot "destroy" Hamas, as our semi-fascist politicians (in the government, too) loudly demand. Nor do they really want to. If Hamas is "destroyed", Gaza would have to be turned over to the Palestinian Authority (viz. Fatah). That would mean the reunification of the West Bank and Gaza, after all the long-lasting and successful Israeli efforts to divide them. No good. If Hamas remains, Israel cannot allow the "terror-organization" to prosper.” (Uri Avnery ‘Eyeless in Gaza’ http://original.antiwar.com/avnery/2014/08/15/eyeless-in-gaza/ August 16, 2014).

For netti, however, there is no such dilemma. If the right political circumstances existed he would expel or exterminate all palestinians from palestine just as, in 1982, ariel sharon had pushed the palestine liberation organization out of lebanon. But he knows that whilst many western political leaders would allow him to get away with this, global public opinion would not so under these circumstances he’ll continue to pursue the zionist objective of incremental genocide against palestinians by way of making gaza uninhabitable. “Moshe Feiglin, deputy speaker of the Knesset and chief of Bibi’s Likud party leadership group, has a plan that implements the Gordon-Blank genocide policy in chillingly detailed terms. "This is our country – our country exclusively," he says on his Facebook page, "including Gaza."” (Justin Raimondo ‘Israel, Genocide, and the ‘Logic’ of Zionism’ http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2014/08/03/israel-genocide-and-the-logic-of-zionism/ August 04, 2014).

There are many incidents that could be chosen as the cause of the war on gaza but by far and away the most important is netti’s incendiary, systematic, lies against hamas for supposedly capturing, and holding for 18 days, three jewish youths when he knew this was not the case. This was a conspiracy perpetuated by the entire jewish government and media to whip up hysteria against hamas and all palestinians in order firstly, to convince the jewish public of the need for another military onslaught on gaza and, secondly, to ensure that the jewish public was not as emotionally outraged by the scale of the slaughter as the rest of the world so that it could not bring any pressure on the government to bring the war to a premature end.

Netanyahu had managed to park the kerry peace process into a cul de sac before renouncing it completely so he wanted another military onslaught on gaza to ensure there would be no further efforts at restarting the peace process. The killing of the three young men gave him exactly this opportunity. In any decent, law abiding, society the killing of these youths would have warranted the arrest and trial of those believed to have carried out the murders. But for netti this was just an opportunity for a massive military assault and invasion of gaza. He knew the jewish wehrmacht’s diahiya doctrine would lead to the grossly disproportionate slaughter of palestinians which would not only cause outrage around the world but also within jewish public opinion. So, the only way to avoid opposition to the slaughter within the jewish state was to provoke such hatred of palestinians that most jews would welcome the slaughter. All the zionists’ complaints about netti’s multiple war aims or pretence that it had been events that had pushed netti into expanding a war he didn’t want[xx], were nonsense because netti had deliberately prepared jewish public opinion to welcome the jewish wehrmacht when it once again used grossly disproportionate military force to render as much of gaza as uninhabitable as possible.

The American Context.

John kerry proffered his help in establishing a ceasefire with the help of turkey and qatar but netti dismissed his offer. “From Israel's perspective, Mr. Kerry's cease-fire draft reflected an approach "completely out of sync with Israel, not just on a governmental level but on a societal level," said Michael Oren, a former Israeli ambassador to the U.S. under Mr. Netanyahu. "The best thing that Kerry can do is stay out... We need time to do the job, we need to inflict a painful and unequivocal blow on Hamas. Anything less would be a Hamas victory," Mr. Oren said.” (Adam Entous ‘Gaza Crisis: Israel Outflanks the White House on Strategy’ http://online.wsj.com/articles/u-s-sway-over-israel-on-gaza-at-a-low-1407979365 August 14, 2014).

President obama has stated he wanted an end to the siege of gaza. “Speaking at a press conference, Obama said that the United States was supportive of ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas but that “long-term, there has to be a recognition that Gaza cannot sustain itself permanently closed off from the world.”” (Obama: No sympathy for Hamas, but Gaza cannot remain closed off’ http://www.timesofisrael.com/obama-no-sympathy-for-hamas-but-gaza-cannot-remain-closed-off/ August 7, 2014).

Netti’s response to these overtures was to bluntly tell the obama regime not to second guess him about his treatment of hamas. He seems to have decided to wait for a new, more compliant, american president. “While Israeli officials have privately told their U.S. counterparts the poor state of relations isn't in Israel's interest long term, they also said they believed Mr. Netanyahu wasn't too worried about the tensions. The reason is that he can rely on the firmness of Israeli support in Congress, even if he doesn't have the White House's full approval for his policies. The prime minister thinks he can simply wait out the current administration, they say.” (Adam Entous ‘Gaza Crisis: Israel Outflanks the White House on Strategy’ http://online.wsj.com/articles/u-s-sway-over-israel-on-gaza-at-a-low-1407979365 August 14, 2014).

Netti thus succeeded in sidelining and humiliating the world’s sole military superpower whilst benefitting from its massive, ever-growing, tribute payments and its almost endless supply of munitions. It would not be possible for the jewish military to implement its “dahiya doctrine’ without america’s abundant supply of armaments even though it is supposedly illegal for american armaments to be used for offensive purposes.

The racist state will never willing agree to peace with the palestinians. It will only accept a peace agreement if forced to do so by the international community. But the western world does not have the political power to force it to do so. Western politicians cannot take any action because they are beholden to their countries’ zionist lobby and zionist dominated media.

The jewish racists, who form a majority of netanyahu’s government, the knesset and jewish society, do not want peace. They will go to war to prevent peace. They support incremental genocide by way of making gaza uninhabitable. They will drive the palestinians out of gaza and eventually the west bank. For them peace is possible only when there are no longer any palestinians in palestine.

But even this is not enough. The zionist state has pushed the western world into wars against iraq, syria and libya in order to boost the racist state’s military dominance over the greater middle east. It has been trying for over two decades to provoke a war with iran. The global economy has reeling for the last six years or so because these neocon wars have burdened western governments with colossal debts. These wars, and a prospective war against iran, are thereby against the national interests of the western world and the global economy. Do western countries want to be pushed against their national interests and their economic well being into yet another war in the middle east solely for the benefit of a diabolically barbaric racist state?

Addenda.

Hamas’s Weakness leads to formation of a Unity Government.

“By early 2014, Hamas’s motivation for forging a unity pact had grown stronger. War and political change in the region meant it could no longer rely on financial or military support from Iran, Syria, or especially Egypt, whose new military rulers had realigned policy in a way that put them closer to Israel than Hamas. As a result, in April, Hamas and Fatah signed a unity agreement.  Hamas was again sending a clear message of its willingness to engage in political compromise, this time agreeing to turn over unprecedented power in the reconciliation government.” (Sandy Tolan ‘Blown Chances in Gaza: Israel and the U.S. Miss Many Chances to Avoid War’ http://www.commondreams.org/views/2014/08/12/blown-chances-gaza-israel-and-us-miss-many-chances-avoid-war August 12, 2014).

Likudniks’ Provocative Military Operation Brother’s Keeper to get Hamas to resume Rocket Attacks.

The views of James Marc Leas and Chris Floyd - July 25, 2014.

“James Marc Leas lays out the timeline leading up to the operation in this succinct marshaling of the facts in CounterPunch. You should read the whole thing, but here are a few excerpts: The July 8 ITIC report also divulged why Hamas launched its first rocket fire at Israel in more than 19 months on July 7: On that night Israeli forces had bombed and killed 6 Hamas members in Gaza. The ITIC report includes a picture of the six Hamas members. Thus, a report from an authoritative Israeli source described the provocation for the resumption of rocket fire: Hamas rocket fire began only after Israeli forces had engaged in nearly a month of military operations in violation of the ceasefire agreement and had killed 6 Hamas members in Gaza. ... The facts show that Israeli forces had to work quite hard to get Hamas to end its cease-fire. The killing of the six Hamas members was not an isolated event. Israeli forces and settlers had gone wild on the West Bank starting on June 12 after the kidnapping of three Israeli teens. Israeli forces had also attacked 60 targets in Gaza during those three weeks of June. Then, on the night of July 7, 2014, the Israeli Air Force had attacked approximately 50 more “terrorist targets” in the Gaza Strip, as described in the ITIC report.” (quoted in Chris Floyd ‘Blockading the Truth: Obama's Big Lie About Gaza’ http://chris-floyd.com/component/content/article/1-latest-news/2413-blockading-the-truth-obamas-big-lie-about-gaza.html July 25, 2014).

The views of Mitchell Plitnick - July 26, 2014.

“Saying something over and over again doesn’t make it true, but it does make a whole lot of people believe it. For instance, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu willfully and repeatedly lied to the Israeli public and the world about Hamas’ complicity in the kidnap and murder of the three young Israeli settlers, which sparked this latest round. He kept saying he had proof that he never produced, and now the Israeli police are admitting what everyone who was actually paying attention at the time knew: this was an independent act of violence.” (Mitchell Plitnick ‘Israel-Palestine: Correcting Some Faulty Ideas on Both Sides’ http://www.lobelog.com/israel-palestine-correcting-some-faulty-ideas/ July 26, 2014).

The views of William James Martin - August 01, 2014.

“The abduction and murder of three Israeli youths was met by Mr Netanyahu’s .response: “Hamas is responsible, and Hamas will pay.” This was his chance to wreck the unity government. “Thus a ‘search and destroy’ operation was initiated consisting of 18 days of Israeli army rampages which targeted anything affiliated with Hamas on the West Bank. Hundreds were arrested, about 500 total, and about a dozen Palestinians killed, Hamas offices and clinics were ransacked and destroyed, with computers confiscated, hundreds of Palestinian homes were invaded, usually in the middle of the night with the homes ransacked and contents destroyed or damaged, guns were pointed at women and children and people terrorized, and many arrested. Homes of so-called suspected persons were blown up and destroyed. In addition, Mr Netanyahu’s rhetoric contributed to an atmosphere of anger and vengeance which resulted in the abduction and burning alive of a Palestinian teenager by several Israelis. As of almost three weeks later, there has been no evidence what so ever that the Hamas leadership was involved or even knew in advance about the kidnapping. Furthermore Max Blumenthal has reported, based on his sources inside Israeli intelligence, Shin Bet, that they knew, with high probability, within hours of the kidnapping that the three abducted youths had been killed. This news was not released to the public thus permitting the ‘search and destroy’ operation to continue. The rampage of Israeli soldiers in the west Bank was quickly followed by aerial attacks by Israel into Gaza which killed seven Hamas members. Thus the charge, by Mr Netanyahu, of Hamas responsibility in the abduction and killing of the three Israelis, and the suppression of information to the effect that the Israeli government knew the three Israeli youths had been killed were disingenuous techniques of Mr Netanyahu to destroy or seriously degrade Hamas and destroy the unity government which Mr Netanyahu so despised.” (William James Martin ‘The War between Gaza and the Zionists’ http://www.palestinechronicle.com/the-war-between-gaza-and-the-zionists/#.U-1BAyhy_8s August 01, 2014).

The views of Sandy Tolan - August 12, 2014.

A few weeks later, after three Israeli teenagers were abducted and murdered on the West Bank, Israel blamed Hamas and launched Operation Brother’s Keeper.  The Israeli military searched 2,200 West Bank Palestinian homes and arrested more than 400 Palestinians, mostly Hamas members, holding at least 150 people without charges.  Yet reports indicated that less than 10% of those taken in were even questioned about the kidnapping.” (Sandy Tolan ‘Blown Chances in Gaza: Israel and the U.S. Miss Many Chances to Avoid War’ http://www.commondreams.org/views/2014/08/12/blown-chances-gaza-israel-and-us-miss-many-chances-avoid-war August 12, 2014).

The views of Dan Glazebrook - August 15-17, 2014.

“The following day, however, the apparent kidnapping of three Israeli settlers in the West Bank provided the opportunity for a provocation on an altogether larger scale. Having blamed the kidnapping on Hamas (without ever producing a scrap of evidence), Netanyahu used it as an excuse for an attack on the entire Hamas leadership in the West Bank, while his economy minister Naftali Bennett announced that “We’re turning the membership card for Hamas into a ticket to hell”. Operation Brother’s Keeper did precisely that, with 335 Hamas leaders arrested (including over 50 who had only just been released under a prisoner exchange scheme), and well over 1000 house raids (which left them looking “like an earthquake had taken place” according to one Palestinian activist). Noam Chomsky notes: “The 18-day rampage….did succeed in undermining the feared unity government, and sharply increasing Israeli repression. According to Israeli military sources, Israeli soldiers arrested 419 Palestinians, including 335 affiliated with Hamas, and killed six Palestinians, also searching thousands of locations and confiscating $350,000. Israel also conducted dozens of attacks in Gaza, killing 5 Hamas members on July 7. Hamas finally reacted with its first rockets in 19 months, Israeli officials reported, providing Israel with the pretext for Operation Protective Edge on July 8.” Thus having killed eleven Palestinians in under a month, Israel then used retaliatory rocket attacks which killed no one as an excuse to launch the biggest slaughter of Palestinians in decades.” (Dan Glazebrook ‘Israel’s Real Target is Not Hamas’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/15/israels-real-target-is-not-hamas/ August 15-17, 2014).

Netanyahu triggered the war to prevent a merger between Hamas and the PA and thus block peace talks to create a Palestinian State - not Hamas’s Rockets.

The views of Ramzy Baroud - July 16, 2014.

“Even if Hamas succeeded in establishing a new brand based on the resistance/political model, Israel was determined to deactivate any potential for Palestinian unity. Destroying that unity became almost an obsession for Netanyahu.” (Ramzy Baroud Ravaging Gaza: The War Netanyahu Cannot Possibly Win’ http://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/07/16-6 July 16, 2014).

The views of Nathan Thrall - July 17, 2014.

“As Hamas fires rockets at Israeli cities and Israel follows up its extensive airstrikes with a ground operation in the Gaza Strip, the most immediate cause of this latest war has been ignored: Israel and much of the international community placed a prohibitive set of obstacles in the way of the Palestinian “national consensus” government that was formed in early June. Israel immediately sought to undermine the reconciliation agreement by preventing Hamas leaders and Gaza residents from obtaining the two most essential benefits of the deal: the payment of salaries to 43,000 civil servants who worked for the Hamas government and continue to administer Gaza under the new one, and the easing of the suffocating border closures imposed by Israel and Egypt that bar most Gazans’ passage to the outside world. Yet, in many ways, the reconciliation government could have served Israel’s interests. It offered Hamas’s political adversaries a foothold in Gaza; it was formed without a single Hamas member; it retained the same Ramallah-based prime minister, deputy prime ministers, finance minister and foreign minister; and, most important, it pledged to comply with the three conditions for Western aid long demanded by America and its European allies: nonviolence, adherence to past agreements and recognition of Israel. Instead, after Hamas transferred authority to a government of pro-Western technocrats, life in Gaza became worse. Hamas is now seeking through violence what it couldn’t obtain through a peaceful handover of responsibilities. Israel is pursuing a return to the status quo ante, when Gaza had electricity for barely eight hours a day, water was undrinkable, sewage was dumped in the sea, fuel shortages caused sanitation plants to shut down and waste sometimes floated in the streets. Patients needing medical care couldn’t reach Egyptian hospitals, and Gazans paid $3,000 bribes for a chance to exit when Egypt chose to open the border crossing.” (Nathan Thrall ‘How the West Chose War in Gaza’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/opinion/gaza-and-israel-the-road-to-war-paved-by-the-west.html?_r=1 July 17, 2014).

The views of Henry Siegman - July 22, 2014.

“Israel’s assault on Gaza, as pointed out by analyst Nathan Thrall in the New York Times, was not triggered by Hamas’ rockets directed at Israel but by Israel’s determination to bring down the Palestinian unity government that was formed in early June, even though that government was committed to honoring all of the conditions imposed by the international community for recognition of its legitimacy.” (Henry Siegman ‘Israel Provoked This War’ http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/07/israel-provoked-this-war-109229.html#.U9I4pihy_8s July 22, 2014).

The views of Stephen M. Walt - July 22, 2014.

“And why did Netanyahu decide to go on another rampage in Gaza? As Nathan Thrall of the International Crisis Group points out, the real motive is neither vengeance nor a desire to protect Israel from Hamas' rocket fire, which has been virtually non-existent over the past two years and is largely ineffectual anyway. Netanyahu's real purpose was to undermine the recent agreement between Hamas and Fatah for a unity government. Given Netanyahu's personal commitment to keeping the West Bank and creating a "greater Israel," the last thing he wants is a unified Palestinian leadership that might press him to get serious about a two-state solution. Ergo, he sought to isolate and severely damage Hamas and drive a new wedge between the two Palestinian factions.” (Stephen M. Walt ‘AIPAC Is the Only Explanation for America's Morally Bankrupt Israel Policy’ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stephen-m-walt/aipac-americas-israel-policy_b_5607883.html?utm_hp_ref=tw July 22, 2014).

The views of Jonathan Cook - July 24, 2014.

“It is no surprise that Netanyahu has been acting in bad faith, and that his military campaigns in the West Bank and Gaza are designed to disrupt the recent reconciliation between Hamas and Abbas’ Fatah.” (Jonathan Cook ‘US Plays Decisive Role in Israel’s Attack on Gaza’ http://original.antiwar.com/cook/2014/07/23/us-plays-decisive-role-in-israels-attack-on-gaza/ July 24, 2014).

The views of Mitchell Plitnick - July 24, 2014.

“Israel’s goal in starting this round of fighting was to destroy the unity deal between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas.” (Mitchell Plitnick ‘Is Hamas Winning?’ http://www.lobelog.com/is-hamas-winning/ July 24, 2014).

The views of Fouad al-Ibrahim - July 25, 2014.

“Abbas felt that the Saudi proposal represents political suicide for him and the Palestinian people and that it is intended, ultimately, to undermine national reconciliation and ignite a Palestinian civil war, especially after sensing the efficacy of the Resistance even in negotiations with Israel. Abbas cancelled his trip from Amman to Jeddah after receiving information about the Saudi offer and returned to Ramallah having decided to address his people directly. He said the main reason behind the Israeli aggression is to “abort the national reconciliation process.” He spoke of the need to “take the Palestinian cause out of the political crossfire,” and stressed “the Palestinian leadership’s insistence on national unity and ending internal divisions.” He also embraced the conditions of the Resistance even though he did say the priority is to end the Israeli assault on Gaza.” (Fouad al-Ibrahim ‘Saudi Arabia behind effort to disarm the Palestinian Resistance’ http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/saudi-arabia-behind-effort-disarm-palestinian-resistance July 25, 2014).

The views of Adam Horowitz and Phil Weiss - July 26, 2014.

“This version of events is so important, because what the Weapons of Mass Destruction were to the Iraq war — a dubious pretext — the three teens are to the Gaza onslaught. Let’s review. The three teens were abducted on June 12. That same day Israeli authorities received a desperate phone call from one of the boys that contained gunfire at its conclusion. The supposition that the boys were dead was advanced when Israeli authorities found the car in which the abduction had taken place, with evidence they’d been shot. The information about the gunshots on that desperate last phone call was widely known in the media, but as we reported, the Israeli government issued a gag order against these facts being published. And over the last two-and-a-half weeks of June, the Israelis launched extensive raids across the West Bank, locking down Hebron, supposedly to find the boys. But the major focus of the raids was rooting out Hamas affiliates and arresting them. In fact, the purpose of the raids seemed to be to break up the recent unity government between Hamas and Fatah, which Israel has vigorously opposed.” (Adam Horowitz and Phil Weiss ‘Claim that Hamas killed 3 teens is turning out to be the WMD of Gaza onslaught’ http://mondoweiss.net/2014/07/killed-turning-onslaught.html July 26, 2014).

The views of Mouin Rabbani - July 18, 2014.

“Israel received another blow on 2 June, when a new Palestinian Authority government was inaugurated, following the April reconciliation agreement between Hamas and Fatah. Hamas endorsed the new government even though it was given no cabinet posts and the government’s composition and political programme were virtually indistinguishable from its predecessor’s. With barely a protest from the Islamists, Abbas repeatedly and loudly proclaimed that the government accepted the Middle East Quartet’s demands: that it recognise Israel, renounce violence and adhere to past agreements. He also announced that Palestinian security forces in the West Bank would continue their security collaboration with Israel. When both Washington and Brussels signalled their intention to co-operate with the new government, alarm bells went off in Israel. Its usual assertions that Palestinian negotiators spoke only for themselves – and would therefore prove incapable of implementing any agreement – had begun to look shaky: the Palestinian leadership could now claim not only to represent both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip but also to have co-opted Hamas into supporting a negotiated two-state settlement, if not the Oslo framework as a whole. There might soon be increased international pressure on Israel to negotiate seriously with Abbas. The formaldehyde was beginning to evaporate.” (Mouin Rabbani ‘Israel mows the lawn’ http://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n15/mouin-rabbani/israel-mows-the-lawn July 18, 2014).

The views of Ran HaCohen - August 02, 2014.

“This period of planned national hysteria was used, first, to incite the masses against “the kidnappers” of “our children”. Whipped up by the hysteria and taking the law into their own hands, Jews burnt a teenage Arab boy alive. Second, the drama enabled Netanyahu to blame Hamas for the kidnapping – an outright lie, since the names of the kidnappers were known to Israel all along. Clearly they were not Hamas activists. Third, the run-up period was used to drag Hamas into the fighting: Hamas (in Gaza) denied responsibility for the kidnapping (which took place in the West Bank) and refrained from firing at Israel (it was the Islamic Jihad who fired), yet Israel still attacked Hamas targets, in an obvious effort to drag them into the war.” (Ran HaCohen ‘Yet Another War of Deceit’ http://original.antiwar.com/hacohen/2014/08/01/yet-another-war-of-deceit/ August 02, 2014).

The views of Jonathan Cook - August 04, 2014.

“It seems Netanyahu wanted to end a strategic threat: not Hamas rockets or tunnels, but the establishment of a unity government between Hamas and its long-time rivals Fatah. Palestinian unity risked reviving pressure on him to negotiate, or face a renewed and more credible Palestinian campaign for statehood at the United Nations.” (Jonathan Cook ‘Eyeless in Gaza’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/04/eyeless-in-gaza/ August 04, 2014).

The views of Mitchell Plitnick - August 13, 2014.

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was concerned that a unified Palestinian government would be in a better position to restart the peace process to which he is so opposed, and possibly even wrangle international pressure toward some small concessions from Israel. He needed an opportunity to shatter that unity government without incurring the wrath such open defiance could bring, especially from Europe. The second event was the spark that gave Netanyahu just what he wanted. The kidnapping and murder of three youths from an Israeli settlement presented him with a political opportunity and he seized it. By the morning after the event, the Israeli government knew the youths were dead. Israelis are somewhat accustomed to people being killed, but when they are held captive, the country becomes incensed. So, Netanyahu maintained a charade about the young men being alive to whip the country into a frenzy. As the anger in Israel built up, Netanyahu stoked the Palestinian fire with a massive operation in the West Bank, targeting Hamas operatives. The Israelis did this knowing that the kidnapping was not a Hamas operation, but one perpetrated by the Qawasmeh clan, which is affiliated with Hamas but is notorious for acting on its own. Recently, Israel has tried to cover up this aspect with claims about the perpetrators having received “funding” from Hamas. But that is a thin tale; this act didn’t require any funding. So Israeli forces swept through the West Bank, sometimes encountering resistance that resulted in several Palestinian deaths, and brought the day-to-day lives of tens of thousands of Palestinians to a halt. They arrested hundreds without charge, including many who had been released in 2011 as part of the swap for the captured Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit. That was a breach of the exchange agreement and a very sore point for Palestinians across the board.” (Mitchell Plitnick ‘Framing the Gaza Narrative’ http://www.lobelog.com/framing-the-gaza-narrative/ August 13, 2014).

“The escalation to this conflict was caused by Israel’s attempt to shatter the Palestinian unity government.” (Mitchell Plitnick Framing the Gaza Narrative’ http://www.lobelog.com/framing-the-gaza-narrative/ August 13, 2014).

Abbas condemns Hamas ….

The views of Matthew Kalman - August 04, 2014.

“The tacit approval for the destruction of Hamas extends to the Palestinian Authority, where President Mahmoud Abbas has insisted that the unity agreement signed earlier this year must involve the dismantling of Iz al-Din al-Qassam, the armed wing of Hamas. Abbas’s frustration with the Hamas militia boiled over in public as the Israeli air attacks began, when he blamed Hamas, not Israel, for the rising tensions. “What are you trying to achieve by sending rockets?” Abbas asked in remarks broadcast by Palestine TV in early July. “We prefer to fight with wisdom and politics. It’s not important who wins or loses,” he said. “What’s important is to end this bloodshed.”” (Matthew Kalman ‘Can Netanyahu pluck peace from the rubble of Gaza?’ http://normanfinkelstein.com/2014/israels-endgame/ August 04, 2014).

… but the Jos sees Abbas as an Extremist.

The views of Matthew Kalman - August 04, 2014.

 “As Barak Ravid pointed out in these pages Sunday, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni has long been pushing her Israeli cabinet colleagues to stop branding Abbas as an extremist and start to see him as a potential partner, not a problem.” (Matthew Kalman ‘Can Netanyahu pluck peace from the rubble of Gaza?’ http://normanfinkelstein.com/2014/israels-endgame/ August 04, 2014).

The views of Uri Avnery - August 1-3, 2014.

“For example: what do we want from Mahmoud Abbas? For many years the Israeli leadership has openly disparaged him. Ariel Sharon famously called him a “plucked chicken”. Israeli rightists believe that he is “more dangerous than Hamas”, since the naïve Americans are more likely to listen to him. Binyamin Netanyahu did everything possible to destroy his standing and sabotaged all peace negotiations with him. They vilified him for seeking reconciliation with Hamas. As Netanyahu put it, with his usual talent for sound bites, “peace with us or peace with Hamas’. But this week, our leaders were feverishly reaching out to Abbas, crowning him as the only real leader of the Palestinian people, demanding that he play a leading role in the ceasefire negotiations. All Israeli commentators declared that one of the great achievements of the war was the creation of a political bloc consisting of Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf Emirates and Abbas. Yesterday’s “no-partner” is now a staunch ally. The trouble is that many Palestinians now despise Abbas, while looking with admiration upon Hamas, the shining symbol of Arab honor. In Arab culture, honor plays a far larger role than in Europe.” (Uri Avnery Meeting in a Tunnel’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/01/meeting-in-a-tunnel/ August 1-3, 2014).

The views of Uri Avnery - August 8-10, 2014.

“Two months ago, Abbas was the punch bag of Netanyahu. Now he is the pet of Netanyahu and Israeli public opinion. At the same time, paradoxically, Abbas and Hamas have also been drawn closer together.” (Uri Avnery ‘Hamas and Israeli Paranoia’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/08/hamas-and-israeli-paranoia/ August 8-10, 2014).

Ceasefire to enable PA to take over from Hamas in Gaza.

The views of Mitchell Plitnick - July 24, 2014.

“Israel’s goal in starting this round of fighting was to destroy the unity deal between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. Thus far, the opposite seems to have materialized. Abbas is in agreement with Hamas’ goals, and is apparently fully representing them. That represents a major failure for Netanyahu. But that outcome is far from assured. Israel is reportedly considering a ceasefire deal that would be modeled after the 2006 accord achieved in Lebanon. If that were followed, the PA would assume control over Gaza. Hamas might have a tough time arguing with that, given their defense of the unity government. The PA would have, presumably, the same armament it has in the West Bank, but all other factions would be forced to disarm, surrender rockets and dismantle tunnels under international inspection. And in exchange, Israel would end its blockade of Gaza’s coastline and ease restrictions at the border crossings. That sort of agreement would absolutely represent a Palestinian victory, but it would also mean Hamas would no longer exercise control over Gaza. They would sacrifice their ability to re-launch an armed resistance until they could find a way to re-arm clandestinely. That might prove very difficult — they haven’t been very successful at it in the West Bank, largely due to PA efforts. For the group itself, it would mean a major loss. But the objectives of the current fighting would have been achieved — ending the siege and preserving the unity government.” (Mitchell Plitnick ‘Is Hamas Winning?’ http://www.lobelog.com/is-hamas-winning/ July 24, 2014).

The views of Matthew Kalman - August 04, 2014.

Many commentators believe that it was the unification of palestinians that led netti to attack gaza and yet kalman is suggesting that after a ceasefire the palestinian authority should unify the palestinians with netti’s support. “The election will pave the way for the return of PA control to Gaza and political reunification with the West Bank without the threat of Hamas and other radicals undermining the calm.” (Matthew Kalman ‘Can Netanyahu pluck peace from the rubble of Gaza?’ http://normanfinkelstein.com/2014/israels-endgame/ August 04, 2014).

The views of Yair Lapid, Jos Finance Minister - August 11, 2014.

“Finance Minister Yair Lapid on Monday called on the international community to pull together a massive aid package for Gaza conditioned on the Palestinian Authority returning to power in place of the Islamic militant group Hamas. Lapid said that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is the legitimate authority in Gaza, which was been blockaded since Hamas seized control there in 2007. If Hamas were removed, the blockade would end, achieving Hamas' own stated purpose in its firing of rockets on Israel, Lapid said. In a phone interview with the Associated Press, the finance minister argued that Israeli-Palestinian negotiations currently being mediated by Egypt should lead to a reopening of the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza, with the Gaza side controlled by the Palestinian Authority instead of Hamas. As a next step, he said, Abbas should be in charge of any aid the world community donates to the rehabilitation of Gaza, he said. "I think this is possible," Lapid said. "We have to remember that the PA was in charge of Gaza and is still the legal ruler of Gaza, and should be there instead of Hamas, which is a terror organization." The involvement of the international community and the Arab world was needed to put pressure on the militants, so "we think we should involve the Arab world into the process, and we should involve the entire international community."” (Associated Press ‘Lapid: Gaza aid should be tied to restored PA rule’ http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4557707,00.html August 11, 2014).

The views of Yair Lapid, Jos Finance Minister - August 12, 2014.

“Things have changed, don’t you agree?” Yair Lapid, Israel’s finance minister and the leader of the government’s second-largest party, Yesh Atid, said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “One of the problems we had with what they called the technocratic government was that everyone felt Hamas was too strong and might take over,” Mr. Lapid said. “Hamas has weakened since then, both militarily and policywise.” If Israel had worried before that the Palestinian reconciliation government supported by Hamas was “a tool for Hamas to go to the West Bank, now it can be a tool for bringing the West Bank to Gaza,” he added.” (Isabel Kershner ‘Role in Gaza Talks Signals a Comeback for Abbas’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/13/world/middleeast/role-in-gaza-talks-signals-a-comeback-for-abbas.html?_r=0 August 12, 2014).

The views of Isabel Kershner - August 12, 2014.

“Udi Dekel, a former lead Israeli negotiator with the Palestinians who is now a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, said that most of the Israeli government supported this idea of “turning the reconciliation inside out.” “The direction, without saying it loud and clear, is that Israel is reconciling itself to the reconciliation and trying to reap some benefits,” Mr. Dekel said. Evidence of a change in Israeli policy came with the arrival of Ziad Abu Amr, the deputy prime minister of the Palestinian Authority, in Gaza on Tuesday. Mr. Abu Amr said that the Israelis had repeatedly denied him a travel permit from the West Bank during the fighting, but that word came around 10 a.m. that he could enter Gaza through Israel’s Erez crossing. “I hope the Israelis are changing their mind and lifting the ban on the national reconciliation government,” he said in an interview. “I think Cairo is having a sobering effect. It’s going to bring everyone back to see reality and to be realistic.” Mr. Lapid and other centrist ministers have put forward their own plans in recent days for an ambitious new order, including the restoration of Palestinian Authority control in Gaza. That ended in 2007, when Hamas routed Mr. Abbas’s forces, leading to a bitter seven-year schism between the Palestinian factions.” (Isabel Kershner ‘Role in Gaza Talks Signals a Comeback for Abbas’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/13/world/middleeast/role-in-gaza-talks-signals-a-comeback-for-abbas.html?_r=0 August 12, 2014).

The Human Devastation of Gaza.

After 50 days, the war is over. Hallelujah. On the Israeli side: 71 dead, among them 66 soldiers, 1 child. On the Palestinian side: 2,143 dead, 577 of them children, 263 women, 102 elderly. 11,230 injured. 10,800 buildings destroyed. 8,000 partially destroyed. About 40,000 damaged homes. Among the damaged buildings: 277 schools, 10 hospitals, 70 mosques, 2 churches. Also, 12 West Bank demonstrators, mostly children, who were shot.” (Uri Avnery ‘The War for Nothing’ http://original.antiwar.com/avnery/2014/08/29/the-war-for-nothing/ August 30, 2014).

The Economic Devastation of Gaza.

The views of Dr. Mona El-Farra - August 14, 2014.

“I drove down Salaheddin Road and passed rubble from mosques, houses, and factories. Some buildings were destroyed completely and some partially. Later on in my drive, I saw dozens of big trees uprooted and smashed, fruit trees destroyed and farms and gardens decimated and ruined. The Israeli bombs were aimed to destroy the infrastructure, to destroy Gaza’s economy. Even the main cookie factory was targeted and destroyed.” (Dr. Mona El-Farra ‘Gaza: Whole Villages Have Been Wiped Off the Map’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/14/gaza-whole-villages-have-been-wiped-off-the-map/ August 14, 2014).

The views of Dan Glazebrook - August 15-17, 2014.

Third, the onslaught was an opportunity to destroy as much as possible of the infrastructure that would provide the basis for a Palestinian state. Of course, as the Israelis openly stated, this includes the military defence infrastructure, primitive as it is, but also all the economic infrastructure necessary for a functioning society. Thus, Israeli shelling destroyed Gaza’s only power plant, cutting off electricity for 80% of Gaza’s 1.6 million inhabitants, as well as dozens of wells, reservoirs and water pipelines, according to a recent report by Oxfam. A summary by Middle East Monitor notes that Oxfam “estimate that 15,000 tons of solid waste is rotting on the streets, wastewater pumping stations are on the verge of running out of fuel and many neighbourhoods have been without power for days, due to Israel’s bombing of the only power plant in Gaza. Oxfam said it was working in an environment that has a completely destroyed water infrastructure that prevents people in Gaza from cooking, flushing toilets, or washing hands, emphasising that the huge risk to public health. “Gaza’s infrastructure will take months or years to fully recover,” the head of Oxfam in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel reported.” The head of UNICEF’s field office in Gaza, Pernille Ironside, added that “There is a very limited amount of water available and it is used for drinking which means that there is no enough water for sanitary purposes. We see children who come from shelters infected with scabies, lice and all kinds of infectious diseases. The worst thing is that most people outside the shelters did not receive water for several weeks now. It is horrible that they have not been able to receive any clean drinking water that is not contaminated by sewage which can lead to diarrhoea and increases child mortality, especially among those under five years old”.

In addition to attacks on water and electricity infrastructure, the private economy has also come under attack. The biggest factory in Gaza, a biscuit factory that had just won the contract to supply the UN in Gaza, was completely obliterated by Israeli shellfire, and even conservative British daily the Telegraph notes that “anecdotal evidence of the systematic destruction of Gaza’s civilian economy and infrastructure is compelling”. The report continues: “Outside central Gaza City, a string of businesses with no obvious links to militant activities lie in ruins after being demolished by missiles or shells. They include a plastics factory, a sponge-making plant and even the headquarters of the territory’s main fruit distribution near the northern town of Beit Hanoun, much of which has been levelled in the Israeli land invasion.

"A few miles north of the Alawada plant, the headquarters of the El Majd Industrial and Trading Corporation – producing cardboard boxes, cartons and plastic bags – was reduced to a heap of concrete and twisted metal. It had taken two direct hits from missiles fired by an Israeli war plane in the early hours of Monday morning, according to Hassan Jihad, 25, the factory caretaker, who survived fortuitously because he had moved to the company’s administrative headquarters outside the main factory for the duration of the conflict. He too had little doubt about the reason behind the strike. “The Israelis are trying to destroy the economy and paralyse Gaza,” he said. “This is the only factory in the Gaza Strip producing cardboard containers. We don’t have any rockets in the place.” Roward International, Gaza’s biggest dairy importer and distribution company, met a similar fate on Thursday afternoon. Its plant in the al-Karama neighbourhood was totally flattened by a missile after an Israeli army operator phoned in a warning in time for its 60 workers to be evacuated. Majdi Abu Hamra, 35, accounts manager in the family-run business, said the firm bought milk from producers in the West Bank, before importing it into Gaza via Israel. The territory’s main power plant – also on Salaheddin Road, not far from the Alawada factory – went up in flames last Tuesday after being struck by Israeli shells. Israel denied targeting the plant but experts say it is now out of commission for the next year, leaving Gaza virtually without any electricity other than that supplied by generators. The resulting shortage has already affected the water supply, with power now insufficient to pump water to homes located above ground level. In addition, a public health crisis may be looming after two sewage pumping stations – one in the crowded Zeitoun area, the other near Gaza’s coastal road – were damaged in strikes on neighbouring targets, prompting UN officials to warn that raw sewage could flow onto the streets in the coming days. Trond Husby, head of the UN’s development programme in Gaza, was non-committal when asked if he believed Israeli forces were deliberately targeting private businesses in Gaza. But about the effects of the damage, he was unequivocal. “This is a humanitarian disaster,” he said. “I was in Somalia for two years, Sierra Leone for five, and also South Sudan and Uganda, and this beats them all for the level of destruction.””” (Dan Glazebrook ‘Israel’s Real Target is Not Hamas’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/15/israels-real-target-is-not-hamas/ August 15-17, 2014).

The views of The Food and Agriculture Organization - August 15, 2014.

The Food and Agriculture Organization on Thursday warned that the Israeli assault on Gaza had caused extensive damage to the coastal enclave's agricultural sector and would have long-term consequences. The FAO said in a statement that the five-week assault had "forced farmers and herders to abandon their lands and has paralyzed fishing activities, bringing local food production to a halt and severely affecting livelihoods." "The recent fighting has resulted in substantial direct damage to Gaza's 17,000 hectares of croplands as well as much of its agricultural infrastructure, including greenhouses, irrigation systems, animal farms, fodder stocks and fishing boats," the statement continued.” (FAO: Damage to Gaza agriculture will have long-lasting effects’ http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=720808 August 15, 2014).

The views of Martin Lejeune - August 18, 2014.

But it was not only factories, hospitals, schools, farms, agricultural land, and the famous orange groves of Beit Hanoun that were bombed during the worst of the Israeli assault between July 6 and Aug. 3. Gaza’s sole power station, its largest mosques, and the building of the popular TV station Al-Quds were also hit, while tens of thousands of private homes were destroyed or severely damaged. He also said that Israeli army completely destroyed 220 factories in the campaign, while hundreds more suffered partial damage.” (Martin Lejeune ‘Is Israel De-Industrializing Gaza?’ http://www.juancole.com/2014/08/israel-industrializing-gaza.html August 18, 2014).

The views of Jodi Rudoren and Fares Akram - August 06, 2014.

“During Israel’s month long air-and-ground assault on the Gaza Strip, the world’s attention has focused on the more than 1,800 Palestinians killed and the more than 30,000 homes destroyed or damaged. But as a temporary truce held and talks toward a longer-term cease-fire began Wednesday, business leaders said that 175 of Gaza’s most successful industrial plants had also taken devastating hits, plunging an already despairing economy into a deeper abyss.” (Jodi Rudoren and Fares Akram ‘Conflict Leaves Industry in Ashes and Gaza Reeling From Economic Toll’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/07/world/middleeast/after-conflict-gaza-industry-lies-in-ashes.html?_r=1 August 06, 2014).

The views of Harriet Sherwood - August 22, 2014.

“Gaza's economy will take years to recover from the devastating impact of the war, in which more than 360 factories have been destroyed or badly damaged and thousands of acres of farmland ruined by tanks, shelling and air strikes, according to analysts. Almost 10% of Gaza's factories have been put out of action, said the Palestinian Federation of Industries. Most other industrial plants have halted production during the conflict, causing losses estimated at more than $70m (£42m), said the union of Palestinian industries. The UN's food and agriculture organisation (FAO) said about 42,000 acres of croplands had sustained substantial direct damage and half of Gaza's poultry stock has been lost due to direct hits or lack of care as access to farmlands along the border with Israel became impossible.” (Harriet Sherwood ‘Gaza counts cost of war as more than 360 factories destroyed or damaged’ http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/22/gaza-economic-cost-war-factories-destroyed August 22, 2014).

Notes

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[i] They include

Nathan Thrall ‘How the West Chose War in Gaza’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/opinion/gaza-and-israel-the-road-to-war-paved-by-the-west.html?_r=1 July 17, 2014.

Mouin Rabbani ‘Israel mows the lawn’ http://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n15/mouin-rabbani/israel-mows-the-lawn July 18, 2014.  

William James Martin ‘The War between Gaza and the Zionists’ http://www.palestinechronicle.com/the-war-between-gaza-and-the-zionists/#.U-1BAyhy_8s August 01, 2014.

[ii] The palestinian authority always complied with the demands placed upon it by the racist state because this was the only way it could survive. “The PA has gone even further cooperating with Israel to ensure the demise of the Palestinian "radicals", as in those who insist on resisting the occupation. Thanks to the PA, the price for the Israeli occupation has never been so cheap. Despite repeated attempts at re-activating the so-called peace process, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has always found a way to torpedo such efforts, even those promoted by his closest allies in Washington. Abbas had done a great deal to ensure that Israel feels no pressure to negotiate. Every attempt at resistance, even by standing peacefully with placards and banners in Ramallah's al-Manara Square was crushed; often brutally.” (Ramzy Baroud ‘Uphill task for Israel's apologists’ http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-01-180814.html August 18, 2014).

It plays an identical role to that of the judenrate established by the nazis during the second world war to ensure the co-operation of jewish communities throughout Europe.

[iii] See also, “On June 2 of this year, Fatah, ostensibly in control in the West Bank, and Hamas, voted in democratically to govern the Gaza Strip, united, following a years- long estrangement. That estrangement had been seen as an impediment to any peace agreement with Israel, and the reconciliation was accepted by much of the world. Incredibly, even the United States, Israel’s open-ended checkbook and reliable ‘yes-man’, said it would work with the new government.” (Robert Fantina ‘Israel’s Goal is Not Peace’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/07/25/israels-goal-is-not-peace/ July 25-27, 2014).

[iv] See also, “Although the US did not change its policy toward Hamas after June 2, it did give formal recognition to the new government. The reason for this recognition was not because Hamas was no longer perceived to be a terrorist organization; it was because, with the Islamist movement’s own acquiescence, the new government excluded Hamas, was stacked with ministers committed to opposing Hamas’s program, and offered Fatah a foothold in Gaza for the first time in seven years. In Gaza and the West Bank, the new government is understood by all factions to belong to Ramallah. That is no less true today than before the kidnapping. The new government contains not a single Hamas-affiliated minister and strongly resembles the previous Fatah-led government in Ramallah, retaining the same prime minister, deputy prime ministers, finance minister, and foreign minister. It also pledged to pursue the political program of Fatah leader, PLO Chairman, and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, and, most importantly, to meet the three above mentioned conditions for Western aid.” (Nathan Thrall ‘Whose Palestine?’ http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2014/jun/19/whose-palestine/?insrc=rel June 19, 2014); “Let us recall: On June 2, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas announced the completion of an agreement unifying the two governments and to be led by the moderate Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah and with ministries run mostly by technocrats ...” (William James Martin ‘The War between Gaza and the Zionists’ http://www.palestinechronicle.com/the-war-between-gaza-and-the-zionists/#.U-1BAyhy_8s August 01, 2014); “So matters continued until April 2014, when an important event took place.  The two major Palestinian groupings, Gaza-based Hamas and the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority in the West Bank signed a unity agreement.  Hamas made major concessions. The unity government contained none of its members or allies. In substantial measure, as Nathan Thrall observes, Hamas turned over governance of Gaza to the PA. Several thousand PA security forces were sent there and the PA placed its guards at borders and crossings, with no reciprocal positions for Hamas in the West Bank security apparatus. Finally, the unity government accepted the three conditions that Washington and the European Union had long demanded: non-violence, adherence to past agreements, and the recognition of Israel.” (Noam Chomsky ‘Ceasefires in Which Violations Never Cease’ http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175892/ September 09, 2014); “The action by Egypt was so effective that, by the start of this year, Hamas was almost bankrupt. Worse still, it had lost the support of its long-time allies Syria, Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon because Hamas chose to back the rebels fighting to unseat Assad. So weakened was Hamas that it was forced into a deal with its oldest rival, the more moderate Palestinian Authority, led by Mahmoud Abbas, in the West Bank. Three months ago it even agreed to back a Palestinian unity government of technocrats – in which Hamas was allowed no members – which recognised Israel and renounced violence. In the past, the Israelis complained that the Palestinians were so fragmented that no faction could deliver on any peace deal. Now Abbas had a controlling position. Washington and Brussels backed him. Everything was in place for a package to bring Gaza back under the control of Abbas, to disarm Hamas, to reopen crossing points to Egypt and Israel, monitored by EU observers, and to pour millions of dollars into Gaza's reconstruction as a precursor to a viable Palestinian state.” (Paul Vallely ‘Israel-Gaza conflict: Israel's mowing of Gaza's lawn is an unjust war’ http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/israelgaza-conflict-israels-mowing-of-gazas-lawn-is-an-unjust-war-9659364.html August 10, 2014); “Before the current operation began, Hamas was at one of the lowest points in its history. Its alliance with Syria and Iran, its two main sources of support, had grown weak. Hamas’s ideological and political affinity with the Muslim Brotherhood turned from an asset into a burden, with the downfall of the Brotherhood in Egypt and the rise of its fierce opponent, General Abdel Fatah el-Sisi. Egypt’s closure of the Rafah crossing and the tunnels on its border with Gaza undermined Hamas’s economic infrastructure. In these circumstances, Hamas agreed last April to reconciliation with its political rival Fatah, based on Fatah’s terms. For example, the agreement called for a government of technocrats largely under the control of the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas.” (Assaf Sharon ‘Failure in Gaza’ http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2014/sep/25/failure-gaza/ September 09, 2014 Published September 25, 2014).

[v] See also, “But instead of welcoming this sign of growing moderation, the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, resorted to his old tactic of divide and rule.” (Paul Vallely ‘Israel-Gaza conflict: Israel's mowing of Gaza's lawn is an unjust war’ http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/israelgaza-conflict-israels-mowing-of-gazas-lawn-is-an-unjust-war-9659364.html August 10, 2014).

[vi] “Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, however vowed never to work with a government that included Hamas which he described, as is normal for him, as a ‘terrorist’ organization and also admonished western governments including the US not to conduct discussions with them, a call that went mostly unheeded, to Mr Netanyahu’s great frustration.” (William James Martin ‘The War between Gaza and the Zionists’ http://www.palestinechronicle.com/the-war-between-gaza-and-the-zionists/#.U-1BAyhy_8s August 01, 2014).

[vii] See, “Yet, in many ways, the reconciliation government could have served Israel’s interests. It offered Hamas’s political adversaries a foothold in Gaza; it was formed without a single Hamas member; it retained the same Ramallah-based prime minister, deputy prime ministers, finance minister and foreign minister; and, most important, it pledged to comply with the three conditions for Western aid long demanded by America and its European allies: nonviolence, adherence to past agreements and recognition of Israel.” (Nathan Thrall ‘How the West Chose War in Gaza’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/opinion/gaza-and-israel-the-road-to-war-paved-by-the-west.html?_r=1 July 17, 2014).

[viii] And once a palestinian state has been created it would gain ownership over the natural gas deposits found off the shores of gaza which would lead to a huge economic improvement in palestinian lives.

[ix] Netanyahu may also have feared that palestinian national elections to a new unified palestinian authority would undermine the zionists’ claim to being the only democracy in the middle east.

[x] “I spent many hours talking to thoughtful Israelis, who voiced their fears about the perils, the threatened corruption of their own society, which they perceived in the 1967 conquests. I also became dismayed by the naked imperialism displayed by Israel's rightwing zealots. One night at a dinner party in Jerusalem in 1977, I heard a young Israeli talking about the Arabs in terms which chilled my blood. "In the next war," he said, "we've got to get the Palestinians out of the West Bank for good." To me, in my naivete, Israel's struggle had hitherto seemed that of a brilliant little people, who had suffered the most ghastly experience of the 20th century, struggling for survival amid a hostile Middle East still bent upon their destruction. Now, suddenly, I found myself meeting Israelis committed to the creation of a greater Israel embracing the West Bank, who were utterly heedless of the fate of its inhabitants. The Palestinians were perceived as losers, a mere incidental impediment to the fulfilment of Israel's historic territorial destiny. By a curious quirk, that young Israeli whom I heard enthuse about emptying the West Bank of Arabs was Binyamin Netanyahu, today his country's prime minister.” (Max Hastings ‘The paradox of Israel's pursuit of might’ http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/may/09/israel-middle-east-max-hastings May 09, 2009).

[xi] See for example, “Hamas, the main Palestinian party in the conflict, which is also declared by Egypt's government as 'terrorist,' ….” (Ramzy Baroud ‘Why Gaza was betrayed’ http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-02-270814.html August 27, 2014).

[xii] The hamas leadership was not involved in the kidnapping. “Meshaal acknowledged for the first time that Hamas members — but not the group's political leadership — were behind the slaying of three Israeli settlers on the West Bank in June. But he defended the murders as a legitimate action against Israeli "illegal" occupation. "We were not aware of this action taken by this group of Hamas members in advance," he said. "But we understand people are frustrated under the occupation and the oppression, and they take all kinds of action."” (Michael Isikoff ‘Hamas leader: Don't compare us to ISIL’ http://news.yahoo.com/hamas-leader--don-t-compare-us-to-isil-193125056.html August 23, 2014).

[xiii] Shlomi Eldar ‘Was Israeli public misled on abductions?’ http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/07/misleading-kidnapping-almoz-hamas-vengeance-hatred.html July 3, 2014

[xiv] Uri avnery has argued that the 2014 gaza massacre was just an accident. “So what was it all about? The honest answer is: About nothing. Neither side wanted it. Neither side started it. It just so happened.” (Uri Avnery ‘The War for Nothing’ http://original.antiwar.com/avnery/2014/08/29/the-war-for-nothing/ August 30, 2014). If netti had not wanted this war he would not have lied about hamas’s involvement in the deaths of these three settlers nor would he have tried to whip up a war fever against hamas. It was his lies and political manipulation that reveals that the one and only-jewish state was solely responsible for provoking this war.

[xv] James Marc Leas ‘Why Did Bernie Sanders Get Gaza So Wrong?’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/07/24/why-did-bernie-sanders-get-gaza-so-wrong/ July 24, 2014.

[xvi] See also, “From the very first days of the war it became clear the resistance could not be defeated, at least not as easily as Netanyahu had expected. The more troops he invested in the war on Gaza, the more Israeli army casualties increased. Netanyahu’s response was to increase the price of Palestinian resistance by inflicting as much harm on Palestinian civilians as possible: He killed over 1,900, wounded nearly 10,000, a vast majority of whom were civilians, and destroyed numerous schools, mosques, hospitals, and thousands of homes, thus sending hundreds of thousands of people on the run. But where does one run when there is nowhere to go?” (Ramzy Baroud ‘Why Gaza Fought Back’ http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/08/13/why-gaza-fought-back/ August 13, 2014); “But what he expected was a relatively easy battle. Netanyahu's war was the Israeli leadership's attempt at capitalizing on Hamas's purported decline. But the war was a disaster and it failed miserably. Netanyahu's war-turned-genocide backfired beyond anyone's expectations. He helped resurrect the very movement he tried to crush.” (Ramzy Baroud ‘Netanyahu loses plot to new Gaza reality’ http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-01-100914.html September 10, 2014).

[xvii] American military officials allegedly expressed their surprise about the scale of the jewish wehrmacht’s attack on gaza and the use of the munitions that america had provided supposedly for its self-defence. “According to this senior U.S. officer, who had access to the July 21 Pentagon summary of the previous 24 hours of Israeli operations, the internal report showed that 11 Israeli artillery battalions — a minimum of 258 artillery pieces, according to the officer’s estimate — pumped at least 7,000 high explosive shells into the Gaza neighborhood, which included a barrage of some 4,800 shells during a seven-hour period at the height of the operation. Senior U.S. officers were stunned by the report.” (Mark Perry ‘Why Israel’s bombardment of Gaza neighborhood left US officers ‘stunned’’ http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/8/26/israel-bombing-stunsusofficers.html August 27, 2014).

Over the last few days of the massacre in gaza, the jewish wehrmacht suddenly launched into a last minute campaign to destroy as many high rise apartment buildings in gaza as possible. “Thousand of homes (sic) were destroyed in order to break their spirit, some with some slim pretext, others without any. In the last days, the Air Force systematically brought down the luxurious high-rise buildings in the center of Gaza.” (Uri Avnery ‘The War for Nothing’ http://original.antiwar.com/avnery/2014/08/29/the-war-for-nothing/ August 30, 2014). It is simply not feasible to believe that these buildings were being hit because hamas freedom fighters had suddenly decided to make use of them for firing rockets at the racist state. There was no military objective to the leveling of these buildings. What this destruction reveals is that the racist state was carrying out its genocidal policy of making gaza as uninhabitable as possible in order to force as many palestinians as possible to leave gaza.

[xviii] Even seasoned palestinian commentators were surprised by the success of hamas’s resistance, “The renewed success of Hamas, which arguably had been fading away into oblivion after the overthrow of Egypt's brotherhood, and the severing of ties with Damascus and Tehran, was puzzling, and immensely frustrating to these governments.” (Ramzy Baroud ‘Why Gaza was betrayed’ http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-02-270814.html August 27, 2014).

[xix] See also, “Hamas had, in fact, been on the ropes earlier this year, unable to pay salaries in Gaza following the regionwide counterrevolution that overthrew its Muslim Brotherhood allies in Egypt. The resulting desperation prompted Hamas to sign onto a unity agreement with Fatah on politically unfavorable terms that were questioned by many of the movement’s activists on the ground, effectively accepting a restoration of Palestinian Authority control over the territory from which Hamas had ejected its security forces in 2007. Israel and the U.S. had worked to prevent that agreement — which involved the creation of a unity government of technocrats — from being implemented. As a result of Operation Protective Edge, however, the Israelis have been forced to reconsider. Restoring control over Gaza by the Palestinian Authority, unity government notwithstanding, has now become part of Israel’s own thinking about a cease-fire — and the focus of diplomatic pressure by Israel’s allies. Even if such a scenario reduces Hamas control, if it results in an easing of the siege, Hamas will claim victory. “ (Tony Karon ‘As Gaza war winds down, who won the strategic contest?’ http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/8/6/as-gaza-war-windsdownwhowonthestrategiccontest.html August 06, 2014). A member of netti’s cabinet publicly called for a palestinian unity government that the war had been designed to prevent. ”If Israel had worried before that the Palestinian reconciliation government supported by Hamas was “a tool for Hamas to go to the West Bank, now it can be a tool for bringing the West Bank to Gaza,” he added.” (Yair lapid, the jews-only state’s finance minister and the leader of the government’s second-largest party, quoted in Isabel Kershner ‘Role in Gaza Talks Signals a Comeback for Abbas’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/13/world/middleeast/role-in-gaza-talks-signals-a-comeback-for-abbas.html?_r=0 August 12, 2014); “Assaf Sharon of Tel Aviv University, the academic director of a liberal think tank in Jerusalem, has a powerful piece in The New York Review of Books. It makes the important point that Hamas was beleaguered before the violence, isolated by the fall of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the rise of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. This weakness lay behind the reconciliation with Abbas. Netanyahu might have used this development to extend Abbas’s authority into a more open Gaza at the expense of Hamas, the very objective now apparently sought after so much needless loss of life.” (Roger Cohen ‘A War of Choice in Gaza’ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/09/opinion/roger-cohen-a-war-of-choice-in-gaza.html?_r=0 September 08, 2014); “A case in point was when Hamas and Fatah suddenly agreed to reconcile and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas established a unity government, which faced harsh criticism from the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. With the encouragement of Netanyahu himself and his Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon, the unity government became Israel’s “Great Satan.” Then the Operation Protective Edge war erupted in Gaza. When it ended, everyone begged Abbas and his government of technocrats to come and save the day, deploy at the Rafah crossing and give everyone a ladder to get off their high horse.” (Ben Caspit ‘US-Iran cooperation on IS makes Israel uneasy’ http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/09/israel-iran-us-islamic-state-cooperation-nuclear-hamas.html# September 09, 2014).

[xx] “So what was it all about? The honest answer is: About nothing. Neither side wanted it. Neither side started it. It just so happened.” (Uri Avnery ‘The War for Nothing’ http://original.antiwar.com/avnery/2014/08/29/the-war-for-nothing/ August 30, 2014).