Gaza - As Israel and Hamas trade escalations , the West as well as the GCC Nations are largely silent as to the suffering in Gaza

Hamas missile chief dies in Israel air strike
DEBKAfile November 18, 2012, 5:36 PM (GMT+02:00)

Yihye a-Baya,  head of the Hamas missile system, who was large responsible for the Palestinian missile war on Israel, was killed Sunday by an Israeli air strike Sunday.  The Palestinians report that the air strike which hit the Gaza Shatti camp killed 13 members of one family including 5 children.

Rocket fire seriously injures 4 Israelis in Ofakim
DEBKAfile November 18, 2012, 4:52 PM (GMT+02:00)

Their car was hit in the continuous rocket assault on Ofakim Sunday afternoon. Two are in serious condition. Another rocket injured a woman in her home. Extensive damage was caused to buildings and vehicles in Beersheba, Ashdod and other locations by an unrelenting missile barrage from the Gaza Strip since 0700 hours Sunday. A fireman was seriously hurt in Shear Hanegev earlier Sunday. He was attending to a fire ignited by a Palestinian rocket in a residential district of Shear Hanegev Sunday when he was hit by a second rocket.  Iron Dome intercepted its first rocket over Sderot, the first time it proved effective as close as a 7 kilometer radius from Gaza.  Seven were caught in mid-air by the defense system over Ashkelon and Ashdod.

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http://www.juancole.com/2012/11/palestinians-say-israel-trying-to-silence-media-by-attacking-journalists.html

Palestinians say Israel trying to Silence Media, by Attacking Journalists

Posted on 11/18/2012 by Juan

The USG Open Source Center translates articles from the Arabic on the Israeli attack on newspapers and journalists in the Gaza Strip.

Palestinians Say Israel Trying To Silence Media Following Attack on Journalists
West Bank and Gaza Strip — OSC Summary
Sunday, November 18, 2012 …
Document Type: OSC Summary…

The Bethlehem-based independent Ma’an News Agency in Arabic reports at 0031 GMT on 18 November that “in the early hours of the morning, Israeli war planes shelled the Al-Shawwa and Al-Husari Tower in Gaza City. The tower, which accommodates several media offices, including the Ma’an office, was shelled with four rockets. The attack targeted the eleventh storey belonging to the Al-Quds satellite channel. Three journalists from the satellite channel sustained what was described as moderate wounds.

The tower accommodates satellite channels and local and foreign media outlets, including Ma’an. The Israeli war planes continued their intensive and violent attacks on the Gaza Strip during the night and the early morning.”

At 2359 GMT on 17 November, the HAMAS-run Beirut-based Al-Quds TV carries the following “urgent” screen caption: “Al-Quds correspondent: Media teams in the Al-Husari building call ambulances to evacuate wounded people after an Israeli attack on the building.”

At 0013 GMT on 18 November, Al-Quds TV carries the following “urgent” screen caption: “Our correspondent says that three employees from Al-Quds TV were wounded in the Israeli shelling of the Al-Quds TV offices in Al-Shawwa and Al-Husari Tower in central Gaza.” At 0031 GMT the station reports that the number of wounded people in the station has risen to four.

At 0045 GMT, the station identifies the four wounded media staff as Darwish Bulbul, Ibrahim Labad, Muhammad al-Akhras, and Hazim al-Da’ur.
At 0101 GMT, a correspondent reports that the number of casualties has risen to six and a screen caption says that journalists Khadr al-Zahhar sustained severe wounds.

At 0109 GMT, Al-Quds TV carries the following “urgent” screen caption: “Al-Quds TV views this attack as an ugly crime and a blatant violation of media freedom.”

At 0110 GMT, a correspondent standing outside a Hospital interviews one of the wounded correspondents, Hazim al-Da’ur, together with Imad al-Afranji, head of the Gaza office of Al-Quds TV. Al-Da’ur provides an account of the attack while being propped up by two people holding him.
At 0111 GMT, Al-Quds TV reports in a screen caption that “our colleague Khadr al-Zahhar had his leg amputated after the occupation crime in which the bureau was bombed. Another was wounded by shrapnel all over his entire body and he is in severe condition.”

Al-Afranji is then interviewed and says that “the occupation wants to show the world that it is the victim and that the Palestinian people are the ones who dispersed the Jews, but the opposite is true. They are the ones who came to Palestine and forced us out of our homes. The Palestinian people are a victim and we will convey this picture to the world through our profession. We will show the truth of what is happening on the ground, without exaggerating or using any media fabrications.”

He says that the image of “steadfast” Palestinians “angered” Israel. Afranji further notes that “this was a deliberate targeting of journalists and media staff. Last time they demolished the offices of the Al-Aqsa satellite station, attacked the offices of the Abu-Dhabi channel, and killed around seven journalists.” He adds that Al-Quds TV lost two of its journalists in the 2008-2009 military operation, adding that “now, they want to repeat this.” He says that “They will not succeed in silencing the media.”

and......


http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/11/2012111842933654975.html

Israel ready to 'expand' Gaza operation

Children killed and media centres hit in Palestinian territory as Israel keeps up bombardment for fifth straight day. Last Modified: 18 Nov 2012 16:07 inShare5 Email Print Share Feedback

Israel is ready to "significantly expand" its operation against Palestinian fighters in the Gaza Strip, Binyamin Netanyahu, Israeli prime minister, has said. His announcement came as at least five people in the Palestinian enclave were killed in Israeli bombardment for a fifth straight day from air and sea. On their part, fighters in Gaza have continued to fire rockets into Israel. Two of them, aimed at the commercial hub of Tel Aviv, were shot down by Israel's anti-missile system, police said. "The operation in the Gaza Strip is continuing, and we are preparing to expand it," Netanyahu said at the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday. "We are extracting a heavy price from Hamas and the terror organisations." Meanwhile, thousands of Israeli troops backed by armour massed along the Gaza border, fuelling fears that Israel is poised to expand its aerial bombing campaign into a ground operation. Gaza City targeted Medical sources in Gaza said at least three children and two women were among those killed in Sunday's attacks. One of the victims was an 18-month-old killed in a air raid east of Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza.   An air raid before dawn in Gaza City targeted a building housing the offices of local Arab media, wounding several journalists from al-Quds television, a station Israel sees as a mouthpiece of Hamas, the Palestinian group which rules the Gaza Strip. "At least six journalists were wounded, with minor and moderate injuries, when Israeli warplanes hit the Al-Quds TV office in the Showa and Housari building in the Rimal neighbourhood of Gaza City," Ashraf al-Qudra, health ministry spokesman, told AFP news agency. He said one journalist lost his leg. Witnesses reported extensive damage to the building, and said journalists had evacuated after an initial strike, which was followed by at least two more on the site. A second media centre was targeted later on Sunday morning. Sky News, Al-Arabiya and the official Hamas-run Al-Aqsa TV channel have offices in the building. Russian television station RT said its office was destroyed, adding that none of its staff were injured. The Israeli military said it had targeted "two Hamas operational communication sites" and had only targeted communication devices located on the roof to "minimise the damage to non-involved persons". Huge plumes of smoke were billowing in the sky after a security building in Gaza City was hit. Two other attacks on houses in the Jabalya refugee camp killed one child and wounded 12 other people, medical officials said. Hamas remained defiant, however, with Abu Ubaida, its military spokesman, insisting that despite Israel's blows the group "is still strong enough to destroy the enemy". "This round of confrontation will not be the last against the Zionist enemy and it is only the beginning," he said on TV. Gaza has been under attack since Wednesday, when Israel launched a military offensive with the declared goal of deterring fighters in Gaza  from launching rockets into its territory. Civilian death toll At least 67 Palestinians, about half of them civilians, including 14 children, have been killed in Israel's raids so far, Palestinian officials said on Sunday. During the same period, more than 500 rockets fired from Gaza have hit Israel, killing three people and injuring dozens. Al Jazeera's Nadim Baba, reporting from Gaza City, said some people who live near the northern and eastern borders with Israel had been leaving their homes to seek shelter with relatives elsewhere. In Gaza City, streets were relatively quiet on Sunday. "People still do think that the Israeli military might actually launch a ground incursion," he said. "They are of course also worried that they might be near targets of the Israeli military, and they might also be near to a place from where rockets are being launched." Our correspondent witnessed a rocket being launched from a waste ground in the city. "Then I saw civilians running away from that area," he said. Rocket fire from Gaza into Israel subsided during the night but resumed in the morning with at least 50 rockets fired, the Israeli army said. At least 17 of them were intercepted by the so-called Iron Dome, Israel's a missile-defence system meant to shoot down rockets and artillery shells fired at populated areas. Two people were lightly injured by a rocket hitting a house in the coastal city of Ashkelon, the Magen David Adom emergency services said. Israel shuts schools Israel said it would keep schools in its south shut on Sunday as a precaution to avoid casualties from rocket attacks. The military said Israeli aircraft had targeted dozens of underground rocket launchers overnight, "causing severe damage to the rocket launching capabilities of Hamas and other terror organisations". It also confirmed that its navy had shelled Gaza, hitting targets on the northern Gaza shore line. Follow the latest developments in the ongoing conflict  Netanyahu told the Sunday cabinet meeting tthat he was holding ongoing talks with world leaders, "and we appreciate their understanding of Israel's right to self-defence". Al Jazeera's Hoda Abdel-Hamid, reporting from Sderot in southern Israel, said the Israeli leader had a lot of support for a ground operation, especially in the southern parts of the country. However, a ground invasion would cost Israel much international sympathy and support, according to William Hague, UK foreign secretary. Hague told Sky News television it was much more difficult to limit civilian casualties in a ground assault and it would threaten to prolong the conflict. "A ground invasion is much more difficult for the international community to sympathise with or support - including the United Kingdom," he said. Hague said Britain would like to see an agreed ceasefire, with an end to the rocket attacks being an essential component of any peace deal. and..... http://www.debka.com/article/22539/Obama-backs-Israel%E2%80%99s-right-of-self-defense-vs-missiles-The-next-24-48-hours-crucial Obama backs Israel’s right of self defense vs missiles. The next 24-48 hours crucial DEBKAfile Exclusive Report November 18, 2012, 4:34 PM (GMT+02:00) Tags:  IDF   Hamas   ceasefire   Binyamin Netanyahu   Barack Obama   Mohamed Morsi   Erdogan   Gaza  Barack Obama in Bangkok  “We are fully supportive of Israel’s right to defend itself from missiles landing on people’s homes and workplaces and potentially killing civilians," said President Barack Obama Sunday, Nov. 18 in Bangkok.  "And we will continue to support Israel’s right to defend itself.” Speaking at a joint conference with Thai Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, the US president said, “there is no country on earth that would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders.” If that can be stopped “without a ramping up of military activity in Gaza, that’s preferable, not just for the people of Gaza. It’s preferable for the Israelis because if Israeli troops are in Gaza they are much more at risk of incurring fatalities or being wounded.” He went on to say after talking to would-mediators in Cairo, “if we’re serious about wanting to resolve this situation and create a genuine peace process, it starts with no more missiles being fired into Israel’s territory and that then gives us the space to try and deal with these long-standing conflicts that exist.” “We’re going to have to see what kind of progress we can make in the next 24, 36, 48 hours, but what I’ve said to [Egyptian] President Morsi and [Turkish] Prime Minister Erdogan is that those who champion the cause of the Palestinians should recognize that if we see a further escalation of the situation in Gaza than the likelihood of us getting back on any kind of peace track that leads to a two state solution is going to be pushed off way into the future.” The US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro joined Defense Minister Ehud Barak on a visit to an Iron Dome battery Sunday shortly before he flies out to brief the White House on the Gaza crisis. Barak thanked President Obama and all those Americans who past and present contributed to the financing and development of the Iron Dome missile interception system. This defensive weapon has intercepted a total of 300 incoming Palestinian missiles, nearly 90 percent of the rockets threatening Israeli towns, he said. Its performance “made it possible for us to prepare the next stages of Operation Pillar of Cloud which may be even tougher. There is no better symbol of the close US-Israeli military cooperation.    DEBKAfile reported earlier Sunday:   Israeli air and naval forces launched heavy assaults in Gaza before dawn Sunday, Nov. 18 – Day 5 of the IDF’s Gaza operation - after daylong bargaining Saturday among Washington, Jerusalem, Cairo and Gaza, failed to produce an Israel-Hamas truce accord.  When Egyptian and Turkish middlemen suggested a ceasefire was close, Israel accused them of pushing Hamas’s terms which were fashioned to present the Palestinian radicals as the victor in the contest. The trio leading the Israeli war, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, countered by intensifying the IDF’s Gaza offensive – though not as yet sending ground troops in. A Western source said it would take some days to determine if a ceasefire was feasible. Egyptian intelligence meanwhile smuggled Hamas Prime Minister Islmail Haniyeh out of Gaza and over to El Arish in northern Sinai in the convoy of visiting Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafiq Abdessalem when he departed Gaza Saturday, DEBKAfile reports. Friday night, Israel bombers struck government headquarters in Gaza City. Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi decided that Haniyeh must be continuously available at the end of a phone to lead the Hamas side in the ceasefire negotiations. This was not possible so long as the Hamas prime minister remained in Gaza. All of Hamas leaders have gone to ground for fear of targeted assassination by Israel. They have switched off their phones and electronic communications to avoid giving away their locations to Israeli surveillance. Haniyeh was even afraid to communicate with Cairo through the Egyptian military mission in Gaza. In these circumstances, Morsi and Erdogan’s were prevented from get their ceasefire mediation bid off the ground. Moving Haniyeh to El Arish put a Hamas negotiator in place to lead the give-and-take for a truce. Our sources have not discovered if he is still there or has moved back to Gaza. The Turkish prime minister brought a secret passenger in the plane bringing him to Cairo Saturday. He is Saleh Aruri, formerly of the Hamas military wing.  Aruri had spent 15 years in an Israeli prison for terrorism and murder until he was released on Oct. 18, 2011 in the prisoner exchange for the Israeli soldier Gilead Shalit on condition he went into exile. Turkey granted him asylum and its intelligence agency MIT gave him free rein to set up an operational command in Istanbul for Hamas terrorist networks on the West Bank. On arrival in Cairo, the Turkish prime minister put Aruri in charge of the contacts with Haniyeh. At a news conference in Cairo Saturday night, the Egyptian president and Turkish prime minister reported “some indications that there could be a ceasefire soon” although “there were still no guarantees.”The guarantees issue has become a pivotal bargaining point. Israel, backed by the United States, insists that a ceasefire be signed between the US, Egypt, Turkey and Israel, and exclude Hamas, which would be bound by a separate agreement with Cairo. Netanyahu, Barak and Lieberman are asking the United States to act as guarantor for a ceasefire. Erdogan has countered by inviting Russian President Vladimir Putin to join US President Barack Obama as victor. Hamas has rejected all of Israel's terms. During the night, Israel denied reports circulating in Cairo that an Israeli negotiator was heading for the Egyptian capital to get down to the specifics of an emerging truce deal. The three Israeli war leaders decided not to fall into the trap laid by Morsi and Erdogan. Instead, they told the IDF to press ahead with the operation until its objectives were attained – hence the launching of a fresh air and sea assault before daybreak Sunday. OC Southern Command, Maj. Gen. Tal Rousso defined those objectives to reporters Saturday night as “eliminating the war arsenals of Hamas and terrorist organizations and restoring peace and normality to the population of southern Israel.” The ground operation is meanwhile delayed, in accordance with Netanyahu’s promise to President Obama in their conversation early Saturday, that a full-scale ground invasion would not go forward so long as there was a chance of a ceasefire - unless there was escalation from Hamas or a strike that caused significant casualties. A western source in Cairo familiar with the truce negotiations reported that Obama has not yet decided whether he wants to be directly involved in any ceasefire deal, which in any case has not reached the concluding stage. “The cake dough is still being kneaded and not yet ready to for the oven,” he said.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-11-17/stratfor-update-gaza-israel-and-hezbollah

Stratfor Update On Gaza, Israel, And Hezbollah

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/17/2012 21:27 -0500

• Iran
 
• Israel

Via Stratfor Global Intelligence,

Update On The Israel-Gaza Conflict

New intelligence indicatesforces in Gaza may be manufacturing long-range rockets locally. If this is the case, a significant ground force offers the Israelis the best chance of finding and neutralizing the factories making these weapons. Meanwhile, Israel continues its airstrikes on Gaza, and Gaza continues its long-range rocket attacks on major Israeli population centers, though Israel claims its Iron Dome defense system has intercepted most of the rockets.

Analysis

Israel appears to be positioning itself for a ground operation,perhaps as early as the night of Nov. 17. The Israeli Cabinet on Nov. 16 approved Defense Minister Ehud Barak's request to call up 75,000 reservists, significantly more than duringOperation Cast Lead in 2008-2009. The Israeli army meanwhile has also sought to strengthen its presence on the borders with Gaza. Primary roads leading to Gaza and running parallel to Sinai have been declared closed military zones. Tanks, armored personnel carriers, self-propelled artillery and troops continue to stream to the border, and many units already appear to be in position.

During Operation Cast Lead, the Israelis transitioned to the ground phase around 8:00 p.m. on Jan. 3, 2009. Going in during dark hours allows the IDF to take advantage of its superior night-fighting equipment and training, including the use of night vision goggles and thermal optics.

The Israeli air force remained active throughout the night of Nov. 16-17, striking at targets across the Gaza Strip including key Hamas ministries, police stations and tunnels near the border crossing with Egypt. The IAF reportedly carried out strikes in Rafah's al-Sulan and al-Zahour neighborhoods, as well as east of the al-Maghazi refugee camp. According to IDF reports, the air force carried out a rapid and coordinated military strike, targeting approximately 70 underground medium-range rocket-launching sites in the less than an hour. The IDF claims direct hits were confirmed. The IAF will increasingly target Hamas militant defenses ahead of any ground invasion. Already the IAF has bombed militant defensive positions, particularly in the northern part of the Gaza Strip.

Meanwhile, Hamas and other militant factions in Gaza have been actively striking back at Israel. More than 80 rockets have been launched from Gaza over the past 24 hours. Of the rockets launched Nov. 17, approximately 57 landed in Israel. According to the IDF, a total of 640 rockets have been launched since Nov. 14, with 410 landing in Israel. A long-range rocket was fired from Gaza toward Tel Aviv at approximately 4:45 p.m. local time Nov. 17 but was successfully intercepted by the recently deployed Iron Dome anti-rocket defense system in the area. Hamas continues to target areas around Ashkelon, Ashdod and Beersheva, with the Iron Dome system intercepting five rockets over Ashkelon at 5:15 p.m. The majority of rockets launched from Gaza appear to be of shorter range than the Fajr-5. The IDF has stated its Iron Dome interceptors have so far successfully intercepted 90 percent of the rockets, though this may be an exaggeration.

One of the long-range rockets was intercepted by the newly installed Iron Dome battery in the Tel Aviv area. A Stratfor source has indicated that the rocket was not a Fajr-5, but was a locally manufactured long-range rocket in Hamas' arsenal.

If militants in Gaza are now able to locally manufacture their own long-range rockets that can target Tel Aviv and other major Israeli cities, it would be a worrisome development for Israel. Thus far, Israel has been able to focus its efforts on limiting the supply of these rockets to Gaza through interdiction efforts, such as the alleged Oct. 23 strike on the Yarmouk arms factory in Sudan. But if Palestinian militants can manufacture long-range rockets in Gaza, it will be much more difficult for Israel to restrict Gaza's inventory of these rockets. Beyond rocket launch sites and caches, which Israel is currently targeting with its airstrikes, it would need to target production sites and those who would be responsible for manufacturing the rockets.

Furthermore, it will be significantly harder for Israeli intelligence to form an accurate picture of the number of these rockets locally constructed in Gaza. We have already seen that Israeli intelligence likely did not anticipate how many long-range rockets had escaped its first wave of strikes, and the fact that Hamas may have been producing these weapons could explain Israel's lack of complete information.

Hamas recognizes that these long-range rocket attacks have only increased the likelihood and intensity of an Israeli ground incursion. A significant ground force offers the Israelis the best chance of finding and neutralizing the factories making these long-range rockets as well as the shorter-range Qassams. Hamas and the other militants therefore are actively preparing their defenses for the anticipated incursion and are likely laying improvised explosive devices, setting up road blocks and defensive emplacements and sorting out their ranks and tasks.

Hamas has already announced that its Al Murabiteen units, consisting of five brigades spread across Gaza, will beconcentrated in the border region to limit Israeli penetration into the Gaza Strip. Learning from Hezbollah's example in 2006, special units of Hamas are relying heavily on tunnels to maintain communications. Should Israel be drawn into more densely populated areas of Gaza in pursuit of weapons storage and manufacturing facilities, Hamas has also reportedly prepared its suicide bombers, known as Istishadiyeen, to raise the cost for Israel in an urban battle.

Hezbollah Remains Wary amid Israeli Operations in Gaza

While Hamas is preparing for an Israeli ground assault into Gaza, Hezbollah's movements on Israel's northern frontier bear close watching. Iranian Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi on Nov. 17 called on the Muslim world to retaliate against Israeli actions in Gaza. Naturally, many are looking in the direction of Lebanon, where Hezbollah, Iran's most capable militant proxy, could open a second front against Israel.

Though Iran would welcome the opportunity to demonstrate the spectrum of its militant proxy strength,especially after supplying Hamas with the long-range Fajr-5 rockets that have been targeting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem,Hezbollah will likely be extremely cautious in deciding whether to participate in this war.

The group's fate is linked to that of the embattled regime of Syrian President Bashar al Assad; should Syria fracture along sectarian lines, Lebanon is likely to descend into civil war, and Hezbollah will have to conserve its strength and resources for a battle at home against its sectarian rivals. Indeed, Hezbollah has already been preparing for such a scenario by seizing control of villages along the Orontes River Basin in order to maintain connectivity with Syria's Alawite community.

At the same time, if Hamas is able to bog down Israeli ground forces by drawing them into a war of attrition in densely populated Gaza City, Hezbollah may see a political opportunity to burnish its credentials as the region's leading "resistance" movement. In this case, Hezbollah would likely monitor the situation until it could be assured that Israeli forces are sufficiently constrained on the Gaza front before it begins attacks on the northern front. Hezbollah is not looking for a major confrontation with Israel, and the tens of thousands of additional Israeli reservists called up compared to Operation Cast Lead suggest that Israel is already preparing for a two-front contingency. If Hezbollah does decide to participate in the war, it would be carefully timed to drive an already embattled Israel toward a cease-fire so that Hezbollah could claim a largely symbolic victory at relatively little cost.

With Hezbollah uncertain how the Israeli-Hamas battle will play out, the group appears to be taking a cautious approach.Stratfor has received indication that Hezbollah has prevented radical Palestinian groups in southern Lebanese refugee camps from firing rockets into northern Israel. In addition to an increase in the number of patrols by the Lebanese army and the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, Hezbollah has been deploying numerous operatives in plainclothes along the border to monitor the situation. Hezbollah has also installed cameras around the Ain al Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp near Sidon to monitor traffic from the camp to its outside environs. WhereasHezbollah completely controls movement into and out of Palestinian refugee camps in the deep south, Ain al Hilweh lies completely within a Sunni neighborhood. For this reason, Hezbollah has rented a number of apartments around the camp, especially in al Ta'mir area, to keep a close watch there.

For now, Hezbollah appears intent on not allowing the battle in Gaza to spill into southern Lebanon. It remains to be seen whether that calculus would shift should Hamas succeed in wearing down Israeli ground forces.

and..... 

http://www.infowars.com/israel-vs-hamas-deadly-theater/

Israel vs Hamas: Deadly Theater

Tony Cartalucci
Infowars.com
Nov 16, 2012

The Western allied, funded, armed, and directed sectarian extremist organizations, namely Al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, and their subsidiaries of Hamas and the so-called “Free Syrian Army,” were created and to this day are backed specifically to counter real opposition to Western designs of hegemony across the Muslim World.

The West has also created and continues to perpetuate Israel as it exists in its current state, a purposefully provocative militant nation that serves as a beachhead for Western objectives throughout the region, as well as a perpetual impetus for filling the ranks of extremist groups who are then turned loose against the West’s enemies.

While Israel conducts combat operations against Hamas in Gaza, they are supporting their affiliates in Syria just across the border upon the Golan Heights, and across greater Syria in coordination with the US, France, England, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar.

While US representatives frequently meet in Doha, Qatar to support and continue propping up the political front serving as cover for Western, Saudi, and Qatari backed terrorists in Syria, Qatar’s unelected leader-for-life,Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, has slinked in and out of Gaza to pour 250 million dollars into Hamas just before the latest Israeli-Hamas violence broke out.

It is documented that since 2007 the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia have been colluding to arm and unleash sectarian extremists, both Al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood, against their collective enemies across the region. With the West using Qatar as a base of operations, not only to continuously prop up the so-called “Syrian National Council,” but to base the corporate-funded Brookings Institution think-tank’s Doha Center, are we to believe that Qatar is not-so-secretly trying to destroy Israel right under America’s nose? Without condemnation or protest from the US or any of its co-conspirators?

As difficult as it is to believe, the current government in Israel is purposefully placing the lives of its citizens and soldiers in harm’s way to execute an orchestrated geopolitical stunt – aimed at capturing the sort of popular support Hezbollah had gained in defending Lebanon in 2006. Unlike in 2006, where Hezbollah was backed by, according to Western sources, Syria and Iran, today, Hamas is, as it always has been, supported by Saudi Arabia and Qatar, with Israel and the US playing a more covert role of funding, infiltrating, directing and manipulating the organization.

Israel Created Hamas – West Uses Extremists as Plot Devices.

The Wall Street Journal reported in their article, “How Israel Helped to Spawn Hamas,” that:

“Hamas, to my great regret, is Israel’s creation,” says Mr. Cohen, a Tunisian-born Jew who worked in Gaza for more than two decades. Responsible for religious affairs in the region until 1994, Mr. Cohen watched the Islamist movement take shape, muscle aside secular Palestinian rivals and then morph into what is today Hamas, a militant group that is sworn to Israel’s destruction.

Instead of trying to curb Gaza’s Islamists from the outset, says Mr. Cohen, Israel for years tolerated and, in some cases, encouraged them as a counterweight to the secular nationalists of the Palestine Liberation Organization and its dominant faction, Yasser Arafat’s Fatah. Israel cooperated with a crippled, half-blind cleric named Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, even as he was laying the foundations for what would become Hamas. Sheikh Yassin continues to inspire militants today; during the recent war in Gaza, Hamas fighters confronted Israeli troops with “Yassins,” primitive rocket-propelled grenades named in honor of the cleric.

This is in fact exactly what Hamas is still being used today for – to counter real opposition movements by dividing against each other different factions of Muslims and secular organizations alike, in confusion and armed combat, preventing a greater, unified front against Western expansion and exploitation throughout the region. Extremist groups closely aligned to Hamas, including Al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood, would flood into Iraq during the US occupation to “serendipitously” disrupt united Sunni-Shia’a resistance, and create bloody infighting that broke the back of meaningful opposition against foreign occupation.

These same networks used to flood Iraq with terrorists from across the region, have since 2007, been used by the West, including Israel, to begin a wider confrontation with Hezbollah in Lebanon, as well as with Syria, and Iran. Exposed in Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh’s “The Redirection,” published that same year in the New Yorker, it was revealed that many of these sectarian extremists were in fact affiliated directly with Al Qaeda.

The article stated specifically (emphasis added):

To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda. -The Redirection, Seymour Hersh (2007)

Hersh’s report would continue by stating:

“the Saudi government, with Washington’s approval, would provide funds and logistical aid to weaken the government of President Bashir Assad, of Syria. The Israelis believe that putting such pressure on the Assad government will make it more conciliatory and open to negotiations.” -The Redirection, Seymour Hersh (2007)

Image: West Point’s second report on Al Qaeda’s networks used to funnel foreign fighters into Iraq titled, “Bombers, Bank Accounts and Bleedout: al-Qa’ida’s Road In and Out of Iraq,” goes deeper in depth into who was really behind the influx of terrorists, how it was accomplished, and a range of options that might be applied to prevent it from happening. The report gives great insight into just how NATO and the Persian Gulf states are using Al Qaeda to now destabilize Syria, and how these interests are most likely funding, arming, and manipulating Hamas.

….

The link between extremist groups and Saudi funding was also mentioned in the report, and reflects evidence presented by the West Point Combating Terrorism Center indicating that the majority of fighters and funding behind the sectarian violence in Iraq, came from Saudi Arabia. Hersh’s report specifically states:

“…[Saudi Arabia's] Bandar and other Saudis have assured the White House that “they will keep a very close eye on the religious fundamentalists. Their message to us was ‘We’ve created this movement, and we can control it.’ It’s not that we don’t want the Salafis to throw bombs; it’s whothey throw them at—Hezbollah, Moqtada al-Sadr, Iran, and at the Syrians, if they continue to work with Hezbollah and Iran.” -The Redirection, Seymour Hersh (2007)

And even as early as 2007, direct Western support for the Muslim Brotherhood was already reportedly underway:

“There is evidence that the Administration’s redirection strategy has already benefited the Brotherhood. The Syrian National Salvation Front is a coalition of opposition groups whose principal members are a faction led by Abdul Halim Khaddam, a former Syrian Vice-President who defected in 2005, and the Brotherhood. A former high-ranking C.I.A. officer told me, “The Americans have provided both political and financial support. The Saudis are taking the lead with financial support, but there is American involvement.” He said that Khaddam, who now lives in Paris, was getting money from Saudi Arabia, with the knowledge of the White House. (In 2005, a delegation of the Front’s members met with officials from the National Security Council, according to press reports.) A former White House official told me that the Saudis had provided members of the Front with travel documents.” -The Redirection, Seymour Hersh (2007)

If Al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Hamas are truly a threat to the West and its allies, clearly the West has only itself to blame. The West has been, and to this day still is propping these extremist groups up – so much so that their credibility across the Muslim World has begun to falter.

Could that be the reasoning behind this latest exchange between Israel and Hamas? An attempt to rebuild a tremendous loss of credibility after nearly two years of supporting US, Israeli, Saudi, and Qatari designs against Syria? Is it a much larger version of the US-engineered assaults on its own embassies recently, aimed at reasserting the “War on Terror” narrative after Russia openly accused the US of arming and funding directly Al Qaeda in Syria? Or could Israel simply be “weeding” Hamas of the inevitable “true believers” in their cause leaving only co-opted double agents in the wake of the violence? Perhaps both.

Image: (ABDALRAHEM KHATEB/ASSOCIATED PRESS) An airstrike in Gaza, 2009. Israel and Hamas’ last conflict had kept people divided and squabbling for years. Just as people began to follow the leash of Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the newly contrived “Free Syrian Army” back to Western hands, Israel and Hamas are once again locked in deadly combat – timing almost as impeccable as US-backed Qatar’s Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani’s visit and generous donation to Hamas just before hostilities began.

….

One thing that is certain – the threat Hamas poses to Israel is directly proportional to the support it itself gives the organization in the form of both covert financial and military aid, as well as perpetually fueling its rhetorical cause through blatant and continuous provocations aimed at the people of Palestine. It is clear that the only true existential threat Israel and its people face is the duplicity, deceit, and designs of their own ruling government.

As the conflict continues to unfold, it is absolutely imperative to understand and keep in mind the illegitimacy of Hamas and its affiliates across both Al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood – how each organization is currently propped up by the West everywhere from Egypt to Syria and Libya to Yemen. While inevitably people will die on both sides, tempting us to reinvigorate our old pro-Palestine, pro-Israeli prejudices, we must understand that this division is precisely what the West seeks as a medium through which it plans on continuing the pursuit of its regional objectives.

and....





http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-11-17/israel-releases-another-gaza-pinpoint-strike-video-anonymous-retaliates-taking-down-

( Just who is Anonymous ? The idea that this is a Mossad project seems drawn into doubt if they decided to take down the  IDF Blog ...  considering the skill required , might they be Russian or Chinese led hackers ?  Still offline as the time of this posting - I tried without success to access the IDF blog to just test whether the blocking was still ongoing. )

Israel Releases Another Gaza Pinpoint Strike Video, Anonymous Retaliates By Taking Down IDF Blog

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/17/2012 11:00 -0500

• Israel
 
• Reality
 
• Twitter

In what is becoming an increasingly more confusing conflict - is it truly an ideological war, or merely an extended attempt to generate empathy via social networking, together with a full-blown conflict on twitter- Israel continued its pinpoint strikes in Gaza overnight, taking out the house of a high-ranking Hamas operative, together with the release of commemorative video showing the explosion moments after the event. The clip is below. What is more curious is that the global hacker group Anonymous has already picked its side, and yesterday launched a massive attack named #OpIsrael, which has so far hacked 700 Israeli websites. From RT: "The hackers reportedly took down websites ranging from high-profile governmental structures such as the Foreign Ministry to local tourism companies’ pages. The biggest attack as of now has been the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s international development program, titled Mashav. Anonymous announced on Twitter they’ve hacked into the program’s database, with the website remaining inaccessible at the moment." And most notably, Anonymous also took down the primary nexus used by Israel's to boast about its military exploits: the blog of the Israel Defense Forces, which has been down for half a day now.

While Israel has demonstrated superiority in sheer physical military strength, the reality, as the StuxNet stories over the past 2 years have shown, that the real war will be fought on line and in various mainframes. The problem is that when dealing with a massive decentralized, cloud of hacker attacks originating from everywhere in the globe, just whom will Israel retaliate against in this 21st century equivalent of guerrilla warfare?

The latest explosion:

IDF's blog as of right now:

http://rt.com/news/anonymous-gaza-israel-website-938/

Anonymous hack hundreds of Israeli websites, delete Foreign Ministry database in support of Gaza

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Published: 17 November, 2012, 15:06
Edited: 17 November, 2012, 19:33

TAGS:
Conflict, Protest, Internet, Israel, War,Anonymous, Security, Hacking

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Israel-Gaza strikes

Anonymous has launched a massive attack named #OpIsrael on almost 700 Israeli websites

Hacker group Anonymous has launched a massive attack named #OpIsrael on almost 700 Israeli websites, protesting against Operation Pillar of Defense in Gaza. Israeli media confirmed the group’s move.

The hackers reportedly took down websites ranging from high-profile governmental structures such as the Foreign Ministry to local tourism companies’ pages.

The biggest attack as of now has been the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s international development program, titled Mashav. Anonymous announced on Twitter they’ve hacked into the program’s database, with the website remaining inaccessible at the moment.

“There is [sic] so many defaced Israeli websites right now, that we just made a list of them,” Anonymous tweeted. 

The hacktivists also took down the Israeli President's official website and the blog of the country's Defense Force, www.idfblog.com, posting the news on Twitter using their infamous #TANGO DOWN hashtag. 

The Jerusalem Post has confirmed the group’s assault, including the attack on the Foreign Ministry’s website, as well as those of Kadima party, Bank of Jerusalem, and Tel Aviv Municipality. The latter is online as of now. Among other functions, it provides residents with directions to bomb shelters. Meanwhile, the majority of the web pages that were taken down were blank, but some showed pro-Palestinian images and messages, Jerusalem Post reported.

It was mentioned, however, that most of the 663 pages on the list were subdomains of the same site, and many proved to be still online and functioning properly.

Most of the sites were simply unavailable, but others displayed pro-Palestinian images and messages. One site whose front page was replaced with an image of a man wearing a Palestinian kaffiye, displayed a message reading: "This attack is in response to the Injustice against the Palestinian people."

Overnight, the group claimed 9,000 websites were taken down, but the actual number proved to be fewer than that.

From the very beginning of the Israeli offensive, Anonymous has avidly supported the Palestinian people. OnWednesday, they said in a press statement, "For far too long, Anonymous has stood by with the rest of the world and watched in despair the barbaric, brutal and despicable treatment of the Palestinian people in the so called 'Occupied Territories' by the Israel Defense Force."

Amid the conflict, which has already claimed at least 33 lives, 30 of them Palestinians, Anonymous also pledged to help those who are at the heart of the conflict: many Palestinians were left without electricity, and consequently, without internet access. The hackers gave instructions on their Twitter account for residents to get reconnected: “If you have friends in Gaza who still have phone, but need internet, give them these dial-up numbers and instructions: http://pastebin.com/6dYQruHu.”
Anonymous put together a “Gaza Care Package,” which contains instructions in Arabic and English to assist Palestinians in the event that the Israeli government cuts their internet connection. Plus, the package includes information on evading IDF surveillance, along with first aid information. The collective encouraged Palestinians to download and share the package with others.

Anonymous members also contacted Israeli forces directly. A tweet from an Anonymous account to an IDF spokesperson warned, “It would be wise of you to expect us”, while a statement on their webpage said, “Stop bombing Gaza. Millions of Israelis and Palestinians are lying awake, exposed and terrified.”

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/11/2012111743731924984.html

Deaths as Israel expands air assaults on Gaza

Nine Palestinians are killed, as Israeli warplanes hit Hamas government compounds, tunnels and power transformers. Last Modified: 17 Nov 2012 13:31 inShare2 Email Print Share Feedback

Israeli air strikes have killed at least nine Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, medics said, with Palestinian security sources confirming that at least three of them were Hamas fighters. The Israeli army, meanwhile, said on Saturday that four soldiers were injured by a rocket fired from Gaza. Palestinian medics said 40 Palestinians have been killed and 345 wounded since Israel launched the aerial campaign on the Palestinian enclave on Wednesday. In the same period, three Israelis have been killed and 18 injured, including 10 soldiers. Israel on Saturday expanded its fierce air assault on rocket operations in the Gaza Strip, striking Hamas government and security compounds, tunnels and electricity transformers after an unprecedented rocket attack aimed at the holy city of Jerusalem raised the stakes in its violent confrontation with armed Palestinians. Israel said that its aircraft also kept pounding what it named weapons-storage facilities and underground rocket-launching sites. Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafik Abdesslem visited the Gaza Strip on Saturday and denounced Israeli attacks on the Palestinian enclave as unacceptable and against international law. "Israel should understand that many things have changed and that lots of water has run in the Arab river," Abdesslem said as he surveyed the office of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh reduced to rubble in an overnight air strike. "[Israel] should realise it no longer has a free hand. It does not have total immunity and is not above international law," he added. "What Israel is doing is not legitimate and is not acceptable at all." Ground troops The Israeli military called up thousands of reservists and massed troops, tanks and armoured vehicles along the border with Gaza, signaling a ground invasion of the densely populated seaside strip could be imminent. Since the start of its operation, Israel's army said it carried out some 700 airstrikes. It also said that fighters have fired more than 580 rockets over the border, 367 of which hit southern Israel, and 222 of which were intercepted by the Iron Dome anti-missile system. The Gaza Interior Ministry said a government compound was also hit as devout Muslims streamed to the area for early morning prayers. So, too, was a Cabinet building where the Hamas prime minister received the prime minister of Egypt on Friday. In southern Gaza, Israeli aircraft went after the hundreds of underground tunnels used to smuggle in weapons and other contraband from Egypt, people in the area reported. A huge explosion in the area sent buildings shuddering in the Egyptian city of El-Arish, 45 kilometres away, an Associate Press news agency correspondent there reported. New capabilities The tunnels have also been a lifeline for residents of the area during the recent fighting, providing a conduit for food, fuel and other goods after supplies stopped coming in from Israel days before the military operation began. Missiles also knocked out five electricity transformers, plunging more than 400,000 people into darkness, according to the Gaza electricity distribution company. The widened scope of targets brings the two sides closer to the kind of all-out war they waged four years ago. Hamas was badly bruised during that confrontation, but has since restocked its arsenal with more and better weapons, and has been under pressure to prove its commitment to armed struggle against Israel. The attack aimed at Jerusalem on Friday and strikes on the Tel Aviv area twice this week dramatically showcased the fighters' new capabilities, including a locally made rocket that appears to have taken Israeli defence officials by surprise. Both areas had remained outside the gunmen's reach in past rounds of fighting, and their use dramatically escalated the hostilities.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-11-16/israel-re-escalates-mobilizes-75000

Israel Re-escalates: Mobilizes 75,000

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/16/2012 12:40 -0500

• CDS
 
• Israel

Update: Israel CDS 162/170, +8 bps

Earlier today, air raid sirens went off in Tel Aviv, and even Jerusalem was supposedly in danger of a missile attack: hardly the deescalation Israel was hoping to see. Sure enough, the ball is in Bibi's court and he wastes not time:

• NETANYAHU CONVENING MINISTERS TO APPROVE RESERVES CALL-UP; TV
• ISRAEL PLANNING TO CALL UP 75,000 RESERVISTS, CHANNEL TWO SAYS

Next: flip flops and other various closed-toed shoes on the ground.

and...

Hamas Escalates - Air Raid Sirens Over Jerusalem

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/16/2012 - 10:00headlines Israel Twitter

Markets have come to their senses a little and are selling off as news breaks of a plethora of concerning headlines from Israel:

• *AIR RAID SIRENS HEARD OVER JERUSALEM
• *HAMAS CLAIMS FIRED ROCKET TOWARD JERUSALEM AREA, CHANNEL 2 SAYS
• *HAMAS CLAIMS IT HIT ISRAELI JET OVER GAZA STRIP
• *HAMAS SAYS FIRED AT ISRAELI PARLIAMENT IN JERUSALEM
• *FLASH: EXPLOSION HEARD IN JERUSALEM AREA: LOCAL MEDIA

Not good at all...

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-11-16/photos-gaza

( Contrast the cries in the past for the  suffering people in Egypt , Libya and now Syria with the vaste wasteland of silence for Gaza... ) 

Photos From Gaza

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/16/2012 18:27 -0500

Most have read about the events in Gaza over the past three days, for the most part insulated and buffered by a distance of several thousand miles and one or more oceans, from what is rapidly becoming ground zero of a new and most deadly escalation in the center of the Middle Eastern powder keg. Few, however, have witnessed and documented it quite as well as French photographer Anne Paq and her collection of photos below.

Pictures from Gaza via Chroniques de Palestine:

 

Guest Post: What's Next In The Middle East?

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/16/2012 20:44 -0500

• Cohen
 
• Guest Post
 
• Iran
 
• Israel
 
• Middle East
 
• SWIFT
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Submitted by John Aziz of Azizonomics

What's Next In The Middle East?

While the missiles, planes and rockets fly over Gaza and Israel, both Hamas and theIsraeli government have been engaged in a battle of social media.

Hamas:

And Israel:

 

It is a battle to shape the perceptions of the rest of the world.

The IDF appears so far to have the upper hand in terms of social media, having notched up 143,000 followers on Twitter, although Hamas’ al-Qassam Brigades are in swift pursuit having just climbed above 20,000 followers.

Yet to view this as a simple conflict between Hamas and Israel is too superficial. It ignores the history and the context. This is a much bigger and broader tapestry.

Glenn Greenwald writes:

Israel‘s escalating air attacks on Gaza follow the depressingly familiar pattern that shapes this conflict. Overwhelming Israeli force slaughters innocent Palestinians, including children, which is preceded (and followed) by far more limited rocket attacks into Israel which kill a much smaller number, rocket attacks which are triggered by various forms of Israeli provocations  — all of which, most crucially, takes place in the context of Israel’s 45-year-old brutal occupation of the Palestinians (and, despite a “withdrawal” of troops, that includes Gaza, over which Israel continues to exercise extensive dominion). The debates over these episodes then follow an equally familiar pattern, strictly adhering to a decades-old script that, by design at this point, goes nowhere.

And Michael Chussudovsky writes:

On November 14,  Hamas military commander Ahmed Jabari was murdered in a Israeli missile attack. In a bitter irony,  barely a few hours before the attack, Hamas received the draft proposal of a permanent truce agreement with Israel.

“Hours before Hamas strongman Ahmed Jabari was assassinated, he received the draft of a permanent truce agreement with Israel, which included mechanisms for maintaining the cease-fire in the case of a flare-up between Israel and the factions in the Gaza Strip.”(Haaretz, November 15, 2012)

F-16 fighter planes, Apache helicopters and unmanned drones were deployed. Israeli naval forces deployed along the Gaza shoreline were involved in extensive shelling of civilian targets.

While Israel continues to enforce extreme restrictions on the lives of Palestinians, it has been inevitable that organisations like Hamas who promise resistance against Israel and Zionism will thrive. And while Hamas has thrived, Israel has continued to impose sanctions and restrictions. Both sides have been locked into a cycle of brutal retaliation (and a particularly suicidal cycle for the Palestinians).

In the latest skirmishes, Hamas has inflicted three Israeli casualties in rocket strikes, the Israeli military has already assassinated two high level Hamas commanders, and carried out successful strikes on dozens of Gazan targets resulting in thirty deaths.

But Israel and Hamas share a deeply interwoven history. The WSJ notes:

“Hamas, to my great regret, is Israel’s creation,” says Avner Cohen, a Tunisian-born Jew who worked in Gaza for more than two decades. Responsible for religious affairs in the region until 1994, Mr. Cohen watched the Islamist movement take shape, muscle aside secular Palestinian rivals and then morph into what is today Hamas, a militant group that is sworn to Israel’s destruction.

Instead of trying to curb Gaza’s Islamists from the outset, says Mr. Cohen, Israel for years tolerated and, in some cases, encouraged them as a counterweight to the secular nationalists of the Palestine Liberation Organization and its dominant faction, Yasser Arafat’s Fatah. Israel cooperated with a crippled, half-blind cleric named Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, even as he was laying the foundations for what would become Hamas.

And co-operation has continued between Hamas and Israel, even while they throw rockets at each other, and even while Hamas continues to receive funds and weapons from Israel’s major rivals, including Iran.Upon Ahmed Jabari’s killing, Haaretz noted:

Israel killed its subcontractor in Gaza.

The political outcome of the operation will become clear on January 22, but the strategic ramifications are more complex: Israel will have to find a new subcontractor to replace Ahmed Jabari as its border guard in the south.

Co-operation between Hamas and Israel should not be surprising. The two factions of hardliners — on one side Hamas, and on the other side Netanyahu’s coalition — validate each other’s existence. Without a state of perpetual enmity, the hardliners would find themselves marginalised. Nothing strengthens Hamas in Palestine like an Israeli rocket attack, and nothing strengthens Likud and Yisrael Beitenu in Israel like a Palestinian rocket attack.

However, Israel’s co-operation with Hamas may now be at an end. The surprise strike on Jabari may well be a sign that Hamas is to be cast aside and driven out of Gaza. This seems like the beginning of a new era in the middle east.

Now that the American election is out of the way, Netanyahu may be stepping toward engaging with Iran.

John Glaser, writing for AntiWar.com lays out one theory:

Israel, lest we forget, instigated this resumption of missile exchanges last week when two Palestinian civilians were shot and killed and Israeli tanks intruded into Gaza, prompting Gaza militants to respond by targeting Israeli soldiers, which then gave Israel an excuse to unleash successive airstrikes. And Israel had numerous chances to pacify the situation, considering Hamas publicly offered to establish a total ceasefire and Egypt appeared about to broker a truce between the two. Israel has intentionally inched towards escalation from the beginning. Are we to believe this isn’t strategic?

A ground invasion, and a reoccupation of Gaza by the IDF could be the first step toward engaging Iran. It would allow for Israel to dislodge Hamas, and create a buffer between Israel and Egypt, and the forces of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Morsi government in Egypt has pledged to support the Palestinians — but is this a bluff? Does Egypt have the capability or the desire to really oppose Israel? Does Iran really have the capability or the desire to oppose Israel in a more active way? Ultimately, Iran may have no choice, as Netanyahu is certain that they are on the nuclear threshold.

The world is in motion. Israel is playing its cards. The intent? To create facts on the ground that cement Israel’s position as the dominant power in the middle east for the next century.

Now, Iran’s move.

and........

Netanyahu calls Obama's bluff
By M K Bhadrakumar

As tensions mount in the coming hours and days with the Israeli troops and tanks advancing toward Gaza menacingly, United States President Barack Obama begins to realize that he has a forked tongue.

Gaza becomes the litmus test of what he can claim to be as a statesman and what he cannot be in political reality.

For Obama, there is no running away from the reality that he has been hiding his head ostrich-like from the day he left Cairo in 2009 after making a magnificent speech there on the Palestinian problem.

The events of the past week in Gaza underscore that unless he musters the political courage - and integrity as a statesman - to address the Palestinian problem, all his talk of a transformativeagenda for the Middle East remains sheer baloney.

Furthermore, his lop-sided priorities in the Middle East are getting exposure. In essence, he ends up being seen as cooking up tales about Syria and Iran and shying away from the one issue that can make all the difference for America's discourse with the Muslim world.

The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has exposed Obama and is forcing a reset of their mutual equations even before the US president gets started on his second term in the White House.

Obama can always take shelter behind mellifluous rhetoric and has no adverse domestic public opinion to grapple with. Nor is he being called upon by his European allies to be accountable.

The spanner in the wheel 
The paradox is that the crisis in Gaza had to erupt just when things were looking up for a possible US-Egyptian reset, including a joint enterprise by the two countries to give a decisive push for "regime change" in Syria.

A technical team from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has been in Cairo for the past fortnight to negotiate a US$4.8 billion loan that Egypt has sought to shore up finances. Even as the Israeli jets kept pounding Gaza relentlessly and Hamas beseeched Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi for help, the IMF announced on Wednesday, "The mission will remain in Cairo for a few more days to continue work and build on the good progress already made."

The IMF usually expects that governments take actual measures as per an agreed economic reform plan before signing off on loans, but Morsi knows exceptions can always be made, and it is Washington who decides. Equally, from Obama's viewpoint, the flare-up in Gaza comes at a most awkward moment for his best-laid scheme for Syria in the coming months. After much effort spread over five agonizing days in Doha, the former US ambassador to Syria, Robert Ford, and the former Syrian parliamentarian Riad Self somehow managed to cobble together a Syrian National Coalition (SNC) over the weekend.

Many a time it seemed Ford would fail to pull the rabbit out of the hat, and the Qatari hosts had to literally step in and blackmail some of the key figures in the Syrian opposition groups before they'd fall in line with the script Ford brought from Washington.

The urgency was clearly there. The formation of the SNC was a prerequisite for the forthcoming meeting of "Friends of Syria" in Tokyo where the "international community" would accord recognition to the Syrian opposition.

Morsi has been mollified, as Syria's Brothers have been given the lead role within the SNC. Also, Qatar and Turkey each extended US$2 billion as aid for Morsi's government. The game plan is to have the SNC headquartered in Cairo. The Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu visited Cairo on Wednesday and talked things over with Morsi as to what is expected of him while Obama shifts gear on his transformative agenda on Syria.

Therefore, Netanyahu has literally thrown a spanner in the wheel and is all but acting as a spoilsport. The crisis over Gaza takes the focus away from the SNC and highlights all over again that the real battle line in the Muslim Middle East ought to be not on Syria at this juncture but instead on the Palestinian problem.

However, where Netanyahu would have intentionally hit Obama hardest is in terms of the latter's credibility to enter into one-on-one negotiations with the Iranian leadership. In his very first press conference on Wednesday after his magnificent election victory, Obama declared that he intended to "make a push in the coming months to see if we can open up a dialogue" with Tehran "to see if we can get this thing [nuclear issue] resolved." Obama was manifestly conciliatory and claimed he wouldn't stand on "diplomatic niceties or protocol" and "if Iran is serious about wanting to resolve this, they'll be in a position to resolve it."

Now, if the Israeli troops march into Gaza, Obama will be seen in the entire Arab world as someone who makes empty promises. It suits Netanyahu at this point to be seen as calling the shots in the Middle East, since his alliance with Yisrael Beiteinu (Avigdor Lieberman's party) stands to gain in January's parliamentary elections. The hardline grouping panders to the prevailing popular mood in Israel in its championing of "Greater Israel".

An engrossing duel
Clearly, Obama has been compelled to fall back on the one-sided US policy of putting all the blame on Hamas for triggering the present crisis and by justifying Israel's "right to defend".

More fundamentally, however, this also has the potential to become an Obama-Netanyahu duel, which will impact the uncertain alchemy of their relationship through the US president's second term.

Obama may not like it that Netanyahu has hustled him, but then, as a realist he also has to factor in that the Republican-controlled House of Representatives in the US Congress will not brook anything other than 100% support to Israel in the present crisis.

Obama might as well say goodbye to his hopes to forge a consensus in the United States Congress to advance a second-term agenda that would go into the making of his presidential legacy - fiscal cliff, tax reform, immigration, energy and climate change, disarmament, etc - if he fails to pass the litmus test on support to Israel.

But this is exactly where he is going to run into a serious problem with Tehran. The point is, the centrality of the Palestinian problem in the regional policies of the Islamic regime in Tehran is not often fully grasped when facile conclusions are drawn that what motivates that country would be solely its (legitimate) claim to be accommodated as a regional power. The regime in Tehran, like most of the Muslim world, has great sympathy for the Palestinians and finds the suppression in Gaza appalling and genuinely unacceptable.

Yet, all that Obama can do today is to urge Morsi to rein in Hamas. Suffice to say, Obama is making a grievous error by once again instinctively taking the pragmatic route of being seen walking shoulder-to-shoulder with Israel.

Influential sections within the Iranian establishment all along alleged that Obama is far too weak to negotiate meaningfully with Tehran on the nuclear issue. Besides, Tehran also harbors the suspicion that the real US agenda is to weaken Iran by imposing a Taif-model accord (as in Lebanon and Iraq) on Syria (which also enables Israel to regain its regional dominance.)

That is to say, Netanyahu may have smothered for the present whatever degree of optimism Obama generated regarding direct talks between the US and Iran. All in all, therefore, Obama finds himself on a spot even before his second term gets under way. Netanyahu has turned the tables on him for the slights administered by Washington in recent months.

There is no doubt that in one brilliant swipe Netanyahu has brought to the surface the profound contradictions in the US strategy on the Middle East question.