Israel strikes Gaza. Here we go again.

[Puck Nutty]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/11/14/israel-hamas-airstrike-.html

Israel killed the commander of the Hamas military wing in one of some 20 airstrikes on the Gaza Strip Wednesday, the heaviest barrage on the Palestinian territory in four years in retaliation for renewed rocket fire on southern Israel. Gaza's health minister said 10 people were killed — two of them young children — while the Israeli military said its attack was just the beginning of a major offensive and warned it could escalate with a ground attack.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel could not tolerate continued rocket attacks against its citizens and said the military was prepared to broaden its operation against Hamas targets in Gaza. Hamas is the Palestinian offshoot of the region-wide Muslim Brotherhood

"If there will be a need, the military is prepared to expand the operation. We will continue to do everything to protect our citizens," he said.

"From last Saturday on until today, 120 rockets were shot towards Israeli citizens in the southern part of Israel," she said.

"They have been targeting endlessly, daily … Israeli citizens, Israeli villages and cities and towns through all these months. And the last few days were really unbearable for the citizens in Israel."

Israel had also gathered intelligence that Hamas has amassed a "huge number" of missiles, some with a range of 75 kilometres.

I don't know how to feel at this point. I wish we could turn the whole place into some kind of holy amusement park. No one would live there, but you can visit to see the sacred sites. I know it's a stupid, unlikely notion, but I'm beginning to think the only solution is something completely bizarre.

I don't think this will cause a chain reaction leading to military action against Iran, but I guess stranger things have happened.

 

[Borachio]

Who knows?

Yesterday, I think, the Israelis returned fire into Syria. But it was probably just some stray mortar fire from the Syrian side, they say.

Escalation can happen very quickly.

 

[Phrossack]

Business as usual. What else can I say? This crap happens all the time, and there's no end in sight.

 

[Borachio]

No, you're right. I think the Israelis have just accepted that this is how things will be for the foreseeable future.

 

[Oruc]

Can someone who uses twitter check if this is legit? Are they responding to each other?

 

[Skwink]

Can someone who uses twitter check if this is legit? Are they responding to each other?

Oh hell, we got a twitter fight!

 

[Mr. Dictator]

If that twitter fight is legit, then both sides really deserve to lose.

 

[Puck Nutty]

Can someone who uses twitter check if this is legit? Are they responding to each other?

This is simultaneously awesome and disturbing.

Can you imagine if Twitter existed during WW2?

 

[ace99]

Yes, it's legit I just checked. Scroll down https://twitter.com/AlqassamBrigade

 

[Oruc]

Yes, it's legit I just checked. Scroll down https://twitter.com/AlqassamBrigade

Huh I thought twitter was like facebook, in that you have to be a member to look. Shows what I know

 

[Borachio]

What's a Grad 2 projectile?

Other than that Katyushas aren't much (them old WW2 stuff - need thousands of them). Nor mortars really.


Link to video.

 

[~Corsair#01~]

The sad reality is that Israel will get away with it. The Palestinians have no means of defending themselves and the USA will ensure that any international condemnation is reduced to a muffled grunt of disapproval.

 

[Formaldehyde]

Israel even just targeted Syrian troops after a mortar shell fell harmlessly inside their border.

JERUSALEM — Israeli tanks made a direct hit on Syrian artillery units on Monday, the army said, responding to mortar fire that fell near an army post in the Israeli-held Golan Heights.

It was the second consecutive day that Israel confronted fire along its border with Syria. On Sunday, a mortar shell crashed in from Syria, prompting Israel to respond with what its military described as “a warning shot” at a Syrian position across the frontier for the first time in 39 years.

On Monday, a military spokesman said that a mortar shell hit an open area in the vicinity of an Israeli army post in the central Golan Heights but caused no damage or casualties. In response, Israeli soldiers fired tank shells toward the source of the fire, hitting Syrian mobile artillery units, the spokesman said.

“The difference is that we confirmed a direct hit this time,” the spokesman said, comparing Monday’s exchange to the events on Sunday, when a stray Syrian mortar shell hit an Israeli military post in the Golan Heights. “Yesterday it was a warning shot. Today we fired toward the source of the fire.”

 

[Mr. Dictator]

Suddenly, Israel cares about collateral damage now that it affects them?

Not surprising.

 

[Skwink]

The sad reality is that Israel will get away with it. The Palestinians have no means of defending themselves and the USA will ensure that any international condemnation is reduced to a muffled grunt of disapproval.

Perhaps the Palestinians could defend themselves with Mortars and Rockets?

 

[Quackers]

Careful, you're going a bit off topic, thread-police Hobbs might come and tell you off!

 

[Tahuti]

Perhaps the Palestinians could defend themselves with Mortars and Rockets?

Agreed: Attack is the best defense!

Spoiler :

Really, I really hate those kinds of threads where people who think of themselves as civilized engage into flamewars where they moan how evil the wrong side is. Like if it will ever help, other than depressing unfortunate readers that is.

 

[~Corsair#01~]

Perhaps the Palestinians could defend themselves with Mortars and Rockets?

Mortars and rockets are irrelevant against modern armies. The Palestinians are firing rockets because it's the only means of political expression they have, not because they think they'll actually gain anything from it.

Israel created Gaza as a dumping ground for people they don't want in the racially-pure theocratic state they've carved out for themselves. It's a concentration camp, or a Bantustan, not a place for people to live in. Every kind of economic activity is throttled by the Israeli military.

So you have a generation of young men with no job, no home, no food, no future, that might as well immolate themselves via the Israeli airforce because they have nothing to live for.

Israel created this situation and they intend to maintain it until Palestine agrees to hand over the last shreds of territory it has left to Israeli settlers. That's what this whole conflict is about: forcing Palestinians to accept a two-state solution with borders dictated by Israel. Creating a single failed-state that Israel can wall off while they occupy everything of value in Palestine they want.

 

[Skwink]

Mortars and rockets are irrelevant against modern armies.

Perhaps somebody could start a not-for-profit where they raise money to buy Palestinians better mortars and rockets.

 

[Joecoolyo]

Mortars and rockets are irrelevant against modern armies. The Palestinians are firing rockets because it's the only means of political expression they have, not because they think they'll actually gain anything from it.

They did have political expression.

They wasted it on guys who's goal was to destroy Israel, and when they got backlash for it, invaded Gaza and took control for themselves.

Its a shame the Palestinians are in this situation, if only people like Hamas couldn't hold them hostage like they do.