The Israeli Invasion of Gaza: Updates (20 January)

See also: Chris Emery on Israeli Elections and the Gaza Crisis: What Has Changed?

12:30 a.m. That's all for today. No real diplomatic shifts, and the story of a possible full Israeli withdrawal to welcome President Obama was clearly spin.

Most dramatic development was UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon's speech when he discovered the extent of the destruction wrought by Israeli forces. Whether his emotive criticism of Tel Aviv has any effect, especially as he went straight from Gaza to a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, is another question.

Good night and peace to all.

11:55 p.m. Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni has moved to re-define any initiatives for a settlement with Hamas, announcing in a campaign speech that Israel will not end its blockade of Gaza until there is progress in talks on the release of Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier held in Gaza since June 2006.

Meanwhile, Israel has re-confirmed its strategy to get the Palestinian Authority back into Gaza, declaring that any aid to the area should go through the UN, non-governmental organisations, or the PA.

11:40 p.m. The International Atomic Energy Agency will investigate complaints, lodged by ambassadors of Arab countries, that Israel has used depleted uranium in its munitions during the Gaza conflict.

11:30 p.m. Ha'aretz is reporting skirmishes in violation of the Gaza cease-fire on Tuesday. After Palestinian militants (not necessarily from Hamas) fired eight mortars, the Israeli Defense Forces launched an airstrike on the positions. Gunmen also fired on Israeli troops in two separate incidents.



9:45 p.m. Repeating the- importanfiret news from earlier today: Arab countries at the Kuwait summit have been unable to agree on how to support reconstruction in Gaza, disagreeing on whether aid can be dispersed via Hamas.

Meanwhile, it appears that the Obama Administration will name former Senator George Mitchell, who was instrumental in the negotiations of an agreement on Northern Ireland, as his envoy to the Middle East.

9:30 p.m. Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah has phoned Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal to congratulate Hamas on the "victory achieved by confronting the Zionist aggression on Gaza".

9:20 p.m. We're back after a break to live-blog the Inaugural of President Barack Obama.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has been quick to offer thanks to former President George W. Bush and a welcome to Obama:

The values of democracy, brotherhood and freedom that constitute the building blocks of American society are also shared by Israeli society, together with the faith in man's power and ability to change and influence his surroundings. We wish the incoming President success in his office and are certain that we will be full partners in advancing peace and stability in the Middle East.

3:35 p.m. Al Jazeera's Mouin Rabbani on Ban's statement: "Those were very, very, very powerful words. We haven't seen a leader of this stature speak such language...condemning Israel but not the Palestinians, using the term 'Palestinian self-determination', calling for investigations and accountability....The Rubicon has been crossed here."

3:15 p.m. Ah, there he is: Ban Ki-Moon emerges, a bit shaken from his debriefing by UN staff. He is "not able to describe" how he feels about the damage and devastation, and he has "expressed his utter frustration, his utter anger" about the attack on the UN compound, asking for those responsible to be accountable.

Political questions remain: Ban continues to press the notion of "Palestinian unity", possibly without any consideration that this might imply the imposition of the Palestinian Authority upon Gaza.

2:45 p.m. UN Secretary Ban Ki-Moon is still in hiding in the UN Relief and Works Agency in Gaza. Al Jazeera has been featuring a shot of a bank of microphones on an empty podium for the last 90 minutes.

1:40 p.m. Arab leaders at Kuwait summit pledge $2 billion for Gaza reconstruction but divide sharply over how to distribute aid: Egypt and Saudi Arabia oppose direct provision to Hamas. On the symbolic front, there is some consensus with the call for Israeli political and military leaders to be tried for war crimes.

1:10 p.m. Donald Macintyre in The Independent of London has more details of the Zeitoun mass killing.

1:02 p.m. Oh, good, a fight over the military figures rather than the humanitarian toll: Israel claims more than 500 Hamas fighters killed (vs. Hamas claim of 48 and "Palestinian factions" claim of 112 plus 170 policemen), more than 12oo of Hamas' 2000 rockets destroyed, and 80 percent of tunnels shut down.

1 p.m. Robert Fisk sums up yesterday's Kuwait summit in nine words: "There was really no adequate comment for this charade."

12:50 p.m. The medical crisis continues: Nasser Medical Compound in Khan Younis has appealed to Arab nursing unions and international organizations to “urgently send nursing staff” to the Gaza Strip to fill a large void there.

12:40 p.m. I don't know if UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon is lost, or just too embarrassed to come out, but still no press conference from his visit to Gaza.

12:30 p.m. Interesting dichotomy in Gaza coverage in US and Britain: while broadcast networks have largely moved away from the news service, print journalists --- some belatedly getting access to sites and sources --- are continuing to highlight the legal and humanitarian issues. Sheera Frenkel of The Times has followed the articles in The Guardian with a human-interest story from Israeli attacks on Jabaliya, "Blind and burnt: Mahmoud, 14, young victim of banned white phosphorus shelling", and the revelation: "The Times has uncovered dozens of incidents in which doctors say that civilians have been wounded by white phosphorus."

12:15 p.m. So much for that Arab "Consensus"? Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari has apparently told news services that delegations at the Kuwait summit "are unable to agree on a unified statement about Gaza".

10:20 a.m. Al Jazeera's Ayman Moyheldin continues to warn of possible outbreak of disease, with bodies now weeks old and sewage flowing over in many areas.

9:55 a.m. Eyewitnesses are telling Al Jazeera that Israeli troops are destroying buildings and infrastructure as they pull back in Gaza.

9:45 a.m. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon will be in Gaza in just over an hour.

Morning Updates (8 a.m. Israel/Gaza time): The Central Bureau of Statistics in Palestine has confirmed more than 1300 Gazans have been killed and more than 5400 wounded in the conflict. More than 4,000 buildings were destroyed; another 18,000 were severely damaged. The total cost to Gaza of the invasion is more than $1.9 billion. A new and staggering figure: more than 80 percent of Gazan crops were destroyed.

Hamas has survived as the Gazan leadership, however, and it will offer a public demonstration today with a "victory rally".

Meanwhile, Barack Obama's team keep insisting that he will now enter the diplomatic arena, named a special envoy to the Middle East today. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon will maintained his even-handed intervention with a visit to Sderot in southern Israel; there are reports he will also visit the Gaza Strip.

Comments

[ernie yacub]

r u serious, bankimoon even-handed might visit gaza? he is a western imperialist stooge, giving legitimate cover for the continued oppression of the people of gaza - the u.n. is a corrupt organization owned in the service of empire.

[Jacob]

Great JOB!!! don't stop the war, keep going, Finally a country that knows how to fight a war. Think of all the American lives that would have been saved if BUSH (thank GOD he's been seen for who and what he truly is and has done to America) would have fought the Iraq war this way. All the world says stop, who gives a shit? Who cares let them fight, stop running there mouth and join in and fight or shut up. I am so tired of you people liberalist, join the Army fight for your freedom stop abusing it and taking it for granted. Just shut your mouth. and there was more than just aid in those trucks but that was NOT brought to the life because you dumb ass news people only report what you want and show the pictures you want to give us the story you want. YOU all don't fool me, and if you die reporting so be it. Part of the job. I won't shed a tear for any of the dead or change my mind. Keep bombing and destroy all the tunnels and kill all the enemy.........YEAH!!!!!!!

[chris]

I'm a hawkish type of guy, if someone hits me, i'll hit back
BUT
I'm looking forward to a war crimes tribunal.
That International Jewish groups openly and loudly distance themselves from the Israeli state that abuses the highly emotional memory of past wrongs against the Jewish people as a cover for their fascist actions.
All nations cancel and divert 'aid' that Israel normally receives and allocate it to rebuilding the Palestinian infrastructure... both physical and psychological, rather than for cluster bombs and dubious munitions for the Israeli Defense Force.
Everyone compromises... this region is the home of many religions and peoples, it cannot be dictated to like this by so few.
This is the worst PR disaster in the history of Israel, don't expect much sympathy from anyone with their head screwed on properly.

[Dave]

Everyone compromises… this region is the home of many religions and peoples, it cannot be dictated to like this by so few.

---------------

But those of minority faiths in the region are second class citizens. Minorities living in the Jewish state enjoy more rights and freedom than minorities in the Arab states and Iran...and even Malaysia and Morocco! Don't get me wrong - Arabs in Israel are forced to live with the embarrassing/humiliating security controls and other police/security apparatus. But my first point is still valid.

[Mike]

If another country was sending missiles into mine (no matter how crappy rockets they might be)... my country had better go in and take them out. If Gaza wants peace, then let them be peaceful and negotiate. Hamas wants to remove Israel from the face of the earth, how can there ever be peace? Israel should destroy them. Hamas is a true enemy in every sense of the word.

[Mae]

The Israeli government knows that their only chance to stop the rockets is to either end the occupation or to comprehensively destroy all Palestinians.

From 'Indiscriminate Fire. Palestinian Rocket Attacks on Israel and Israeli Artillery Shelling in the Gaza Strip', 30 June 2007

The Israelis:

'From September 2005, when the IDF withdrew from the Gaza Strip, through May 2007, Israel fired more than 14,600 artillery shells into the Gaza Strip, primarily in the north, killing 59 Palestinians and injuring 270.[136] Human Rights Watch's investigations, and analysis of reports from UNOCHA and non-governmental organizations monitoring the clashes, indicate that the fatalities were primarily if not exclusively civilians'

'The IDF's most common ammunition for these howitzers was a 155mm high-explosive artillery shell, usually the M107. Israel Military Industries, a state-owned arms producer and exporter, produces the M107 shell, although Israel has also imported 155mm shells from the United States. The M107 shell weighs about 44 kilograms and measures about 60.5 centimeters in length and 155 millimeters in diameter at its widest point. It has a range of up to 18 kilometers. If loaded with TNT, the shell spreads about 2,000 fragments in all directions. Some shells do not explode on impact and become potentially explosive duds.[141]

M107 shells are extremely deadly weapons. The expected lethal radius for a 155mm high explosive projectile is reportedly between 50 and 150 meters and the expected casualty radius is between 100 and 300 meters.[142] IDF officials have said that the error radius for a 155mm shell is usually 25 meters.[143] Therefore, if shells are lobbed as close as 100 meters to populated areas, as allowed under an IDF policy discussed below, or even closer, as sometimes happened, it greatly increases the likelihood of civilian casualties.'

The Palestinians:

'Palestinian armed groups fired about 2,700 Qassam-type rockets from September 2005 through May 2007.[72] The Palestinian groups characterize their rocket attacks as measures taken in response to Israeli abuses committed against Palestinians.'

'The rockets rarely cause extensive property damage because they are too inaccurate to be aimed at a specific target and on impact produce a small explosion with little shrapnel, but they can kill and injure people. From September 2005 through May 2007, Palestinian rockets injured 75 civilians and 9 soldiers. Over the same period, they killed four Israeli civilians.'

http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2007/06/30/indiscriminate-fire

Even though the Israeli Army fired five highly lethal bombs for every Quassam rocket this did not stop the attacks. It can not stop them as the Palestinians want to be free from Israeli oppression. While I deplore any attacks on civilians - no matter who perpetrates them, the Palestinians have already tried various forms of non-violent resistance (remember Rachel Corrie?) and negotiation and they are worse off now than ever before. This will end when Israel accepts that it must negotiate.

Just to balance the usual quote of the Hamas Charter - here is the Hamas election manifesto which does not call for the destruction of Israel, point 5:

'5- in case the occupation state recognizes our people and their national rights and honor them and in case it offers a serious proposal to implement them with assurances on comprehensive withdrawal from the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967, including Jerusalem then we can consider mechanism of negotiations.'

http://www.jmcc.org/new/06/mar/hamasprog.htm

and a statemnt by the Minister of Health and Information in the Hamas-led Palestinian administration in Gaza, Bassem Naeem:

'it should be made clear that neither Hamas nor the Palestinian government in Gaza denies the Nazi Holocaust. The Holocaust was not only a crime against humanity but one of the most abhorrent crimes in modern history. We condemn it as we condemn every abuse of humanity and all forms of discrimination on the basis of religion, race, gender or nationality.'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/may/12/hamascondemnstheholocaust

[Gazaholocaust.com]

(edited by moderator)

This Massacare in Gaza, and just like the other previous massacares in Jenin, Lebanon, Dear Yasin, Sabra & Shatilla ALL been commited at the hands of the...Israeli Jews who claim to have been victims of Holocausts. There is a pattern there; ALL BEEN STARTED BY ISRAEL as "SELF-DEFENSE." ...Well, the war on Iraq was also engineered by the Israelis who forced America to invade Iraq (WMD's my aas!!!) All for the security of Israel. The war on Iraq lead America to lose its leadership politically and financially and ethically in this world. bottom-line;... Gaza's holocaust proved it and the UN has evidence of it. ALL documented!!! They are not any more humain than the Nazi's of Germany.

[karina]

Firstly let me make it clear that I am against the brute force with which Israeli has gone into Gaza. What is happening to the Palestinian people and their children is wrong. I do not support Israel in this action or in its previous occupation of the West Bank.

However, what I do not support is Zionist conspiracies. In your piece you have contracted yourself in a mere number of lines. You write that Israeli Jews haved "claimed to have been victims of Holocausts". Yet you end with the statement "They are not any more humain than the Nazi's of Germany" So you do then admit that the Jewish people suffered terribly at the hands of the Nazis? Furthermore it is ludcrious to believe that the Holocaust is just a "claim". It is a well-documented, historical FACT of the systematic annihilation of a race of people. Hitler himself spoke of it and there is evidence to prove that he sanctioned the death of millions of Jewish people. Surely you do not believe that he secretly started the whole Zionist plot?

As for the Jewish people "engineering" the American invasion of Iraq? I'm not sure I really know where to begin with that one, except again look at the evidence. I very much doubt that America could be foced by anyone to invade anywhere. By the way, one of the few people to vote against the Invasion of Iraq in Congress was Diana Furnstein. And yes, you guessed it, she is Jewish.

Just a word of advice, the world will take your (and my own) plea for Israel to end its offensive and the economic blockades in Gaza more seriously if people like you stop spouting this Zionist conspiracy nonsense.

And no I am not Jewish. I am just looking at facts.