Love war, fear and hate.
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10:59 am, March 31st, 2018 - 28 comments
Categories: Abuse of power, International, israel, journalism, Media, Politics, Propaganda, the praiseworthy and the pitiful -
Tags: gaza, israel, protest
Ahmed Abu Artema used his facebook page (it does have good uses!) to call for a mass act of civil disobedience called “the Great Return March”. In response, some tens of thousands of Palestinians participated in a rally next to the Gaza Israeli border. Apparently, the idea was that “Palestinian refugees living in Gaza will set up tents near the border and move gradually — and peacefully — closer.” The encroachment was or is to play out over six weeks and climax on May 15 (the 70th anniversary of the state of Israel)
Before the day of protest, Greenblatt the US Envoy sent to negotiate an end to the Israeli Palestine conflict tweeted…
Hamas is encouraging a hostile march on the Israel-Gaza border. Hamas should focus on desperately needed improvements to the lives of Palestinians in Gaza instead of inciting violence against Israel that only increases hardship & undermines chances for peace.
Ahmed Abu Artema who initiated proceedings on his facebook page lives in Israel and is not a member of Hamas.
In the event, peaceful protesters were shot dead.
Some Israeli sources have been scathing, but it appears most western media is accommodating the official Israeli narrative and reporting on violent protests – not violence being visited upon peaceful civil disobedience. At the bottom of this post is a link to a video of the day that runs for over an hour. I’ve not watched it all, but what I have watched, shows children and adults gathering peacefully. And teargas and stretchers rushing wounded people away from the area.
All of the above comes from Robert Mackay’s piece at The Intercept. It’s worth taking the time to read thoroughly and chasing through the links provided.
Here are some western headlines and snippets. Stuff talks of “clashes” and has photos of youths deploying sling shots. The Guardian is definitely measured and probably merely guilty of bending over backwards to achieve some mythical “balance” in its report. The New York Times headlines talk of “confrontations” – as though there are two culpable sides and has video of a young lad in burning grass using a sling shot.
I think there will be a lot of negative fall-out for Israel over coming days and weeks. There comes a moment in all processes of oppression when something breaks and continuing with oppressive policy is no longer a viable option. This may be the breaking. Time will tell.
Here’s the linked one hour and fifteen minute video from Walid Mahmoud’s facebook page. I guess I’d suggest watching it and holding it up to news reports and deciding for yourself where the likely truth or accuracy lies. Media generally reflects the interests of the powerful, and when media can no longer spin their side of the story successfully, then power shifts its stance.
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Kua hinga te manawa kairākau o Te Rua Tekau Ma Waru Tiwhatiwha te po! Kakarauru i te po! Ka rapuhia kei hea koe kua riro! Haere e te Ika a Whiro ki o tini hoa kua ngaro atu ki te Pō ...2 weeks ago
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The Siege which is strangling the Palestinians in Gaza is nearing its genocidal end point. Going on present trends, United Nations experts on the ground have predicted this genocidal endpoint will be reached by 2020.
The inhumane, (and illegal under international law), medieval type siege of Gaza, imposed on the people of Gaza by the Israelis and their Egyptian Ally, has made life unliveable for 1.5 million people and which is causing the near total collapse of all infrastructure. The siege is soon projected to lead full total total collapse, leading to massive a death toll from disease and starvation of the captive population who cannot even escape their fate by leaving. All fences and walls are permanently closed, except for very limited aid and medical evacuations.
It is this approaching genocide and the people’s desperation which has led them to protest against the inhumane blockade that imprisons them.
Save the Children calls on Israel to lift the siege
The UN found in 2012 that if nothing were done to ease the blockade on Gaza, life there would become “unlivable” by 2020.
But following the release of a UN report in July that found that living conditions had worsened since the blockade began, the international body’s humanitarian coordinator for the occupied territories said that point “of unlivability [had] been passed quite a long time ago”.
‘Worse every day’
Save the Children’s Caroline Anning told Al Jazeera that the “situation in Gaza is a growing humanitarian crisis”.
She added that the situation “is getting worse every day”.
Save the Children called on Israel to “lift the Gaza blockade and for Palestinian and Israeli authorities to provide basic services”, adding that the lack of such services was contributing to growing mental health issues in the enclave.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/09/save-children-warns-unlivable-conditions-gaza-170905014336701.html
Thanks for this post Bill, as usual Israel seem to be able to act with international impunity in it’s all to familiar act’s of ultra violence against basically defenseless civilians…no talk of kicking out Israeli diplomats over this outrage…..in fact no official condemnation at all.
+111
Well said Adrian.
For all the anti Russian talk going on here, the silence is deafening in regards to the brutal Israeli actions.
I, for one, would like our leadership to show some courage and send home a diplomat or two in response to the goings on in Gaza.
Assuming we are allowed, as a nation, to have a view that differs from uncle Sam.
It astonishes me that a nation founded out of the holocaust then proceeds to commit genocide on other peoples
I am also astonished that the western world condones it
The holocaust has effectively given Israel a free pass in the western world for its atrocities over many decades.
Western politicians who voice complaint over the treatment of Palestinians are then quickly smeared with “anti-Semitism” allegations – the attacks on Corbyn are but the most recent example.
Zionism is very ugly but also very effectively managed by its promoters.
The Guardian, Fri 30 Mar 2018 12.14 BST
“Palestinians say over a dozen killed in Gaza border protest”
Israeli military dismisses demonstration as Hamas ploy to ‘carry out terror attacks’
The Palestinian Chronicle, Saturday, March 30, 2018
“Land Day Protest: 16 Palestinians Killed, Hundreds Wounded in Gaza (PHOTOS & VIDEO)”
Sickening Israeli atrocities.
“To be gassed, or not be gassed: that is the question”
Scoop.NZ March 30, 2018
This is a question that Palestinian protesters in Gaza may have to face.
By Julie Web-Pullman
“Israeli activists plan protest in solidarity with Gaza return march”
+972 Magazine, March 30, 2018
Will Israel’s apartheid army use tear gas dropping drones and live rounds against Israeli protesters?
Is a question that Israelis may have to face.
By Yael Marom
“UN Chief Calls for Independent Investigation Into Palestinian Deaths at Gaza Border”
UN security council convenes without Israel’s ambassador ■ Palestinian premier joins call to investigate Israel’s actions ■ Israeli Arab NGO blasts Israel for ‘unlwaful’ use of snipers
Haaretz, Mar 31, 2018
If this matter of holding an independent investigation into these killings is raised in the Security Council, which looks likely, will the US super power use their power of veto to prevent an investigation into these killings to shield their ally from international condemnation?
Jack Khoury
The building tragedy
An official Israeli spokesman announces the IDF will murder “everyone” who approaches the walls the Israelis use to imprison 1.5 million Palestinians.
For despairing Palestinians there is little choice. Die by being shot, or die by hunger and disease, as Israel, and Israel’s ally Egypt, tighten the siege to its final genocidal conclusion.
Palestinian protesters interviewed by Al Jazeera, say that by approaching the border is an attempt to get the world to notice their plight.
The question on everyone’s mind is:
Will the unarmed and desperate Palestinians try to rush the border? Will the Israelis carry out their threat and massacre “everyone”?
Or will the UN Security Council finally agree to act to relieve the siege.
Which is illegal under international law. And open up a guarded pathway to the outside world.
But even by this simple statement of threat, the Israeli Army Spokesman proves himself a liar. On Friday even before the protest had begun Israel fired a tank shell into farmland near the border, killing a Palestinian farmer gathering his crops.
Not an uncommon occurrence, for either farmers, or fishermen trying to eke out a living within sight of Israeli gunmen, racist crimes for which no Israeli soldier is ever punished or investigated.
Skripal and his daughter allegedly get poisoned in Salisbury .
No evidence is presented.
Russian diplomats are expelled from the US , the UK, and many European countries.
Israel kills peaceful Palestinian protesters.
Nothing happens.
Indeed, in good old clean green New Zealand, it barely makes the news.
We are owned.
no evidence is presented
Meanwhile, on Earth:
Mr. Justice Williams, Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
22/03/2018.
15 Palestinians shot dead by Israeli army on Gaza border.
Stuff, yesterday.
The evidence looks damning by the look of that… A nerve agent was used that looks like a novichok agent or something related to novichok or something, something…
Did I say it was damning? No, that was you, putting words in my mouth. I suggest you stop telling lies that way before you end up looking like your guru.
That is not evidence of Russian culpability
Still waiting for the oh so respectable “International Community ” to summons the Israeli ambassadors to explain themselves alongside immediate expulsions from embassies the world over .
Where are the comparisons to Hitler , and the verbose denunciations from the equally bloated Boris
After all, visual , recorded evidence of Israeli culpability is there for all to see..
And I would suggest we have much more history of Israeli spies .
I’m sure Jacinda could rustle around and find a few…
Indeed Ed. And even less is said, when Palestinian refugees are massacred in Yarmouk and Latakia.
Thank you Jenny.
Israel thanks to US protection has flouted the United Nations since 1948.
An exiled Russian friend of Sergey Skripal talks to the BBC, another opinion to throw in the mix
http://www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-43343805/russian-exile-skripal-targeted-by-criminal-gangs
An acquaintance of ex-Russian spy Sergei Skripal has told the BBC that he believes he may have been targeted by criminal gangs… to make Vladimir Putin look bad.
“He believes”, “he may”. So in other words, the interviewed him because he’s from Russia and reckons something 🙄
He may be “from Russia” but he’s currently an exile living in Britain
Maybe the BBC thought it was time to follow their charter and provide “balance” for once.
“Palestinians hold day of mourning after 773 ‘shot with live ammunition’ “
At least 15 killed when Israeli soldiers open fire during mass demonstrations in Gaza
The Guardian, Sat 31 Mar 2018 12.24 BST
By Hazem Balousha in Gaza, and Oliver Holmes in Jerusalem
773.
Appalling.
And barely a word from our base media.
Jenny.
Do you appreciate how cutting and pasting seven lengthy quoted pieces on a post like this one, and with little or no personal opinion attached, smothers the space provided for people to comment with their own thoughts/feeling/reactions to the post?
Nicely, I’m asking that you pause and reflect before doing it again on any other posts I submit.
Nicely, I’m asking that you use the comments section to air your own thoughts, and not simply as space to echo and/or amplify the thoughts of others you just happen to agree with.
Kia ora Bill. Thanks for pointing this out.
Point taken.
What I meant to personally add, (but omitted to), was that this is the only report that I have seen so far, that mentions that Israel, as well as shooting protesters, has also launched what can only be described as a punitive attack against the elected government of Gaza, (under the thin veil of an excuse, of an alleged, “attempted shooting attack” . ie not even an actual shooting attack which could be disproven)
To give this singular quote some context, I felt I had to include the whole of the paragraph.
However apart from that, I thought that this is a good report in its own right, from people on the ground in Gaza and Jerusalem. Which I thought worth bringing people’s attention to. This report has a lot more other background information, I would recommend that it be read in full.
I hope you can forgive this minor infraction.
In the meantime I have been trying to find further confirmation of these raids on the government of Gaza quoted on by The Guardian as being admitted to, by the (Israeli) “military”. In particular the amount of the destruction and if there were any casualties.
Cheers J.
Finally after much searching I seem to have found another mention of the Israeli use of punitive air strikes against the Hamas government of Gaza.
This mention is buried deep in a UN report.
That very fact of this near silence over this dangerous escalation by Israel, re-emphasises Ed‘s comment, above, on the slavish nature of the Western media.
If instead of Israeli jets landing bombs on Hamas, who are the elected representatives of the Palestinians on the Gaza strip, Hamas rockets had targeted Israeli elected officials in Israel, you can be sure that our media would be all over it.
The MSM total blackout of this dangerous escalation speaks volumes.
If Hamas responded to this provocation in kind, and launched its homemade rockets into Israeli held territory, can we expect our disgusting media toadies here, to continue their conspiracy of silence and report only that Hamas has launched a rocket attack on Israel, not mentioning a word of the previous causative attack on Hamas?
That Hamas has not responded in kind to the Israeli “air strikes” on them, speaks of their forebearance in the face of this dangerous Israeli escalation, and of Hamas desire to maintain the current decided tactic of backing the mass peaceful protest against the siege.
*My emphasis J.
PS. At Bill’s suggestion, I have posted all my other comments and links on this issue on Open Mike.
https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-01-04-2018/#comment-1468636
Nice bit of digging there Jenny. thanks.
Very sad to see so few comments on this outrage, infact there was more outrage expressed about the Australian cricket cheats….lot’s more.
In the past 24 hours…Palestinians-17 Killed, 1,416 wounded: 758 from live fire, 148 from rubber-tipped bullets, 422 from inhaling tear gas and 88 from other causes…..Israelis Dead or wounded-0
As you say if this where in reverse, and that horrific death and injury toll was visited upon Israeli civilians…
Terrible.
And the world washes its hands, turns a blind eye and allows the apartheid Zionist state to act at will.