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Israel Courts Catastrophe in Gaza Protests April 2, 2018
Palestinians in Gaza are among the world’s most desperate people. For more than a decade, their 140-square-mile strip has been blockaded by Israel and Egypt, sharply restricting the flow of goods and people. Indeed, many Gazans have never left the enclave, a grim measure of their prolonged isolation.
[OCS: Let’s see, the “desperate people” elected a terrorist government that refuses to recognize the neighboring state as legitimate, uses their territory as a launching pad for terrorism and rockets, teaches their children hate, and is hated by all of their Arab neighbors to the point of restricting the entry to their respective countries to Palestinians. The blockade is one of necessity to assure the safety and security of the beleaguered nation of Israel.]
Unemployment is more than 40 percent for the general population and nearly 60 percent for Palestinian youths. Last month, the United Nations warned of an imminent humanitarian disaster if global donors did not contribute $539 million for fuel for critical water, sanitation and health facilities, most for Gaza and its two million people. The remainder of the money would go to Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
[OCS: let’s put aside for a moment the fact that a good portion of humanitarian aid is stolen by a kleptocratic administration and a large portion is used to subsidize terrorist activities. The Palestinians are not self-sufficient and have nothing to offer in trade to the international community. Its political and business model is based on terrorism, creating victims for their exploitive public relations value, and is doomed to failure. Already Israel contributes food and water – and it was found that much of the concrete provided went to reinforcing “terror tunnels” that traversed the border into Israel. And, yet the Palestinians do not appear to have a problem importing rockets from Iran.]
Under such conditions, it is no wonder that pent-up frustrations would erupt in protests, as they did last Friday. Responding to the demonstrations, Israeli forces killed 17 Palestinians at the border fence that separates Israel from Gaza. More than 1,000 Palestinians were injured. It was the worst violence since the Gaza war of 2014.
[OCS: These are not protests or demonstrations but government orchestrated attempts to create victims to be paraded on the world stage. Palestinian mothers have no qualms about allowing their children to be strapped with bombs and used as terrorist bombers. Every time the Palestinian state runs low on funding, they create trouble. The shame is that the dishonest mainstream media refuses to cover the story in a fair and balanced manner. Perhaps because there is no moral equivalence that can be drawn between good and evil.]
Israel has a right to defend itself and maintain civil order, but it also has an obligation to respect peaceful protests and not use live ammunition on unarmed demonstrators. Israel’s response appears to have been excessive, as human rights groups have asserted.
[OCS: This is pure bullpucky. These are not peaceful protests when people gather, march, and make speeches – these people use slingshots to propel rocks that can be lethal and other weapons in an attempt to provoke return fire. Without that return fire, the riot escalates until it becomes intolerable and the situation is addressed with legitimate force. Notice the contrast – the optics – of soldiers in full battle-rattle standing before people in tee-shirts and shorts. The perfect scenario to use in their fundraising efforts in a growing anti-Jew Europe.]
Amnesty International called on Israel to immediately end its “heavy handed, and often lethal, suppression of Palestinian demonstrations.” Peace Now said that the casualties are “an intolerable result of a trigger-happy policy.” Shlomo Brom, a retired brigadier general at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies, told The Times that while the military probably decided to use lethal force as a deterrent, “In my opinion they should have planned from the beginning to use minimal force and to prevent casualties.”
[OCS: The Israelis would use NO FORCE if Amnesty International would ensure a peaceful protest demonstration and not a riot that is a clear and present danger to the soldiers and others. It is not uncommon for shots to be fired at the Israelis from deep in the crowd if the riot is not producing victims.]
Israel said it acted judiciously to prevent a dangerous breach of its borders and sovereignty led by Hamas, the Islamic militant group that controls Gaza, and to protect nearby communities. No one actually crossed the fence on Friday.
[OCS: For all of the military might of Israel and the number of lethal Palestinian provocations, one wonders when the tipping point might be reached and the Palestinian people demonstrate they want peace by marching against their corrupt leadership who pockets humanitarian cash and send innocents out to be killed for a fundraising photo-op?]
Competing videos told competing stories. The Israeli version appeared to show a Hamas fighter shooting at Israeli forces while other Palestinians were seen hurling stones, tossing Molotov cocktails and rolling burning tires at the fence. Palestinian videos on social media appeared to show unarmed protesters being shot by Israelis.
[OCS: What did you expect? If you want the real story – ignore special pleaders for the Palestinians like the New York Times and look at the raw footage coming from the region on Twitter and Facebook. Especially the teenagers who are whooping and hollering as they attack Israeli troops. One Israeli soldier said his worst nightmare is being approached by a little girl light his daughter and not knowing if she was a terrorist bomber. Imagine having to shoot that child to protect yourself? Exactly the position imposed on Israel by the Palestinians.]
An independent and transparent investigation is an obvious way to get at the truth. But with President Trump backing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, the United States on Saturday blocked a move in the United Nations Security Council calling for such an inquiry. The European Union has also urged an independent investigation.
[OCS: What investigation? By people who see evil and excuse it? By people who note that the destruction of Israel is still in the Palestinian Charter and that young Palestinian children are taught that Jews are dogs to be killed in the name of Allah?]
Friday’s protests, which drew tens of thousands of Palestinians to the Gaza boundary, were the start of a six-week campaign called the Great Return March. The organizers said it was intended as a peaceful sit-in to raise awareness of the blockade of Gaza and to support Palestinians’ demand to return to homes lost in 1948 in what is now Israel. More than two-thirds of Gazans are refugees from villages that have since been destroyed and their descendants.
[OCS: This is a bogus issue – the people who abandoned their property did so before the war that they knew was coming and they hoped to return once the Jews were driven into the see. Whoops! Big Mistake. Now they want to return, get the right to vote, and simply vote the Jews out of their own land. Sorry – ever since the so-called Palestinians (actually a Russian labeling ploy given to terrorist/pedophile Yasser Arafat) were offered a second state by the United Nations when Israel was created – they did nothing by engage in terrorism when they weren’t fundraising.]
Such goals seem farther away than ever. Neither Mr. Netanyahu nor Mr. Trump has shown serious interest in a two-state solution that would give Palestinians their own country and resolve central questions about land, refugees, borders and security, even though Mr. Trump says a peace deal is a priority. Under Mr. Netanyahu, Israel has expanded its claims to land that Palestinians seek for their own state.
[OCS: There is plenty of land where these Arabs originally dwelled – in the Transjordan. However, due to their bad neighbor policies, Jordan exiled them to refugee camps where many remain to this day.]
Instead of easing tensions and resolving the political questions at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Mr. Trump has exacerbated the situation, most recently by unilaterally recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, in exchange for nothing, and declaring his intention to move the American embassy there from Tel Aviv. For decades, the international community, including the United States, has said Jerusalem’s fate should be decided in Israeli-Palestinians negotiations.
[OCS: This is pure bullpucky. The political question at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian feud is if the Palestinians will recognize the right of Israel to exist. And, since the tensions arise on the Palestinian side, when will they stop attacking Israel and promoting terrorism.]
Palestinian leaders have also failed their people. Hamas leaders who run Gaza have waged war against Israel, exploiting their people in the process. Their rival, the Palestinian Authority, has been feckless at pursuing peace with Israel and last year imposed its own punitive measures on Gaza, including cutting salaries, in a bid to end Hamas’s control.
[If the New York Times was intellectually honest, this would have been the lead paragraph as it accurately states the facts on the ground. But how many people will read this far to discover the truth?]
On May 15, Palestinians in Gaza plan to observe the 70th anniversary of what they call the “nakba,” or “catastrophe,” when 750,000 Palestinians fled or were driven from their homes in what is now Israel, by breaking through the border fence and marching toward their former villages. The demonstration will come the day after Israel celebrates the 70th anniversary of its independence and the United States formally opens its embassy in Jerusalem.
[OCS: Why not tell the whole truth? Nakba Day was inaugurated by Yasser Arafat in 1998 and is the day after Israeli Independence Day (Yom Ha'atzmaut). The rest of the story -- The Arab-Israeli War of 1948 broke out when five Arab nations invaded territory in the former Palestinian mandate immediately following the announcement of the independence of the state of Israel on May 14, 1948.
The catastrophe was the Palestinian miscalculation of their strength and Israeli resolve.]
Unless someone steps up to end Gaza’s humanitarian disaster, ensure Israel and the Palestinians act with restraint during the protests and set a credible peace process in motion, both sides could face a new catastrophe.’'
[Someone? How about the Palestinians themselves? Israel has tried over and over – and it never enough.
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