CrossFireArabia
Hajj Ziad Abu Hulyel, an elderly Palestinian man, was killed Sunday night in a brutal assault by Israeli occupation soldiers who raided his home in the town of Dura, west of Hebron.
CrossFireArabia
Look Bibi, you are not going to win the war so stop acting as if you are going on! The sooner Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu realizes that the better it would be for everyone.
But will he? Netanyahu is on a rollercoaster. Unable to finish off Gaza and Hamas, he turns his army to Lebanon and Hezbollah but he is soon stuck in the ‘mud’ despite the mass bombing, the destruction and the murder of innocent civilians.
The Israeli army has tried to cross the border at least seven times but has failed. It tried to enter a few hundred yards into southern Lebanon but soon pushed back every time by Hezbollah fighters. The Israeli army is finding out this party is no pushover despite the early pagers and the walkie talkie deathly-traps disasters.
Despite its air superiority and massive bombings that killed much of its top cadres including the dramatic killing of Secretary-General Hassan Nasarallah, Hezbollah fighters soon picked up and regained their strength and armor.
On the ground, the Israeli soldiers were not going to cross into Lebanon and that was a promise kept up by the skirmishes, heavy fighting, engagement and combat. Israeli soldiers were being stopped at the door so to speak, they were being killed and injured as reported by Hezbollah and admitted to by the Israeli army.
In addition to that, Hezbollah has been launching missiles and rockets on northern and central Israel all week, reaching all the way to Haifa and Tel Aviv, Acca, Tiberias, Safad with settlements, military basis, Mossad headquarters, the Galilee and all way to the occupied West Bank.
What this meant is that sirens were going off all the time and people were going in and out of underground shelters because of the extent of the missiles that were mostly coming from southern Lebanon but occasionally from Yemen and from Islamic resistance groups in Iraq and even Syria.
Psychology Strain
So the psychology has been a strain on its people, military and even politicians for on average between 100 and 150 missiles were being launched on the Israeli interior and on a daily basis. The majority of these are falling on these areas all the time and wreaking havoc and nervousness. Their deflection by the Israeli Iron Dome has failed badly in this war with Israelis feeling the heat as 23 percent of the population polled are already thinking of leaving the country.
Hezbollah is launching the different missiles despite the constant bombing being made by Israeli warplanes on the southern district of Beirut which is considered as the main Hezbollah stronghold. The Israelis are bombing intensely the Lebanese district, almost on the same level that was being practiced on the Gaza Strip, especially in the early months of the period following 7 October.
However, Hezbollah is stronger than Hamas and continuing its battering of the north of Israel – as can be seen – and will be maintained for a long time. Observers are saying Hezbollah seeks to send a clear message to Israel that ‘if you bomb our south district we will continue to strike places like Tel Aviv and Haifa’ which are the major economic and technological hubs and conurbations in Israel.
It is not an east ride for Israel after it killed Nasrallah which was seen as a brief moment of success and jubilation not least most of all from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who wanted to celebrate this act on the first anniversary of 7 October. But this wasn’t to be for soon, Israel was hit by 200 ballistic missiles launched all the way from Iran and increasing the psychology of fear among the Jewish population.
Israel has already tried to play down that affair by saying these missiles were not effective but they later admitted at least two of their military bases were hit. On the point of conjecture, everyone is expecting Israel to strike Iran and expand the regional war. But the Americans, whose generals and politicians are presently in Israel, they maybe trying to persuade the Israeli government not to because of the deadly consequences and slippery-slope scenarios.
Meanwhile, and feeling the pain again, Israel is going back to pound poor old Gaza in a most intense and obscene way and manner while seeking once again to drive the population of northern Gaza further down south and create a military zone and fill it with Jewish settlements through its so-called ‘Generals’ Plan’.
This was the idea put forward at the start of this war on the enclave last year. It failed then – despite talk of driving the Palestinians into the Sinai Peninsula – and no doubt it will fail now.
This is because after a whole year of destruction Hamas and its fighters continue to be a force to be reckoned with. They have not been destroyed despite the mass bombs dropped on Gaza but they are regrouping throughout the enclave and dealing painful blows to the Israeli army.
CrossFireArabia
Two military experts said the military operation launched by the Israeli occupation army in the northern Gaza Strip is different from previous onslaughts and is aimed at implementing the so-called “Generals’ Plan” that has been adopted at the political level in Israel.
Military expert Maj-Gen Fayez Al-Duwairi, explained that the latest military operation is different from previous invasions, which were within a time frame that sought to gather information about fighters and leaders of the political and military resistance and searching for tunnels and detained prisoners.
He explained the new military operation is related to the “Generals’ Plan” that aims to gain absolute control over the northern Gaza Strip and empty it of its population up to the Netzarim axis, where the numbers range between 350,000 and 700,000.
He added the operation also comes within the framework of what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke regarding his aim to redraw the Middle East and with the ongoing Israeli reports about re-establishing settlements in the northern Gaza Strip.
Late last month, Israeli Army Radio reported that Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Galant approved a study of possible operations in Gaza based on the “Generals’ Plan,” which calls for blockading the northern Gaza Strip, halting humanitarian aid and evacuating its residents.
CNN quoted a former Israeli military official as saying the plan aims to turn the northern Gaza Strip into a closed military zone, besiege Hamas fighters and “force them to surrender or starve.”
Al-Duwairi said that implementing the “Generals’ Plan” requires military action on the ground to evacuate civilians who are concentrated in the Jabalia, Shujaiya, Zeitoun, and Sheikh Radwan neighborhoods according to Al Jazeera.
CrossFireArabia
A bedrock principle of the laws of war is that all warring parties, whether national armed forces or armed groups, must do everything they can to minimize harm to civilians. Deliberate attacks on civilians, but also attacks that don’t distinguish between civilians and combatants, are prohibited. International law seeks to limit civilian suffering and destruction.
Yet in Israel and Palestine, the last year has been defined by unlawful attacks on civilians, causing suffering on a horrifying scale.
Achiad Milba, 29, was on Zikim Beach when Palestinian fighters, including from Hamas’ armed wing, landed in boats and killed at least 19 people there, among 815 civilians killed in southern Israel on October 7, 2023. “When people run for their lives, they fall, and they are screaming. And it’s an awful feeling I can’t describe.” About 251 people were taken hostage that day.
Mu’min al-Khalidi, 21, was sheltering with his family in northern Gaza City on December 21, when Israeli soldiers threw grenades and fired into the room, killing seven people. He regained consciousness under their bodies. “There are no words to describe what I felt. All I want to know is why? Why did I have to live through such a massacre? Why did I lose all these people? What did we do to deserve all this?”
https://twitter.com/QudsNen/status/1842991017332765148
Hostages in Gaza have been shot dead by their captors and subjected to inhumane treatment. Palestinians in Israeli detention facilities have been tortured, abused, held in incommunicado detention, and subjected to sexual violence.
The International Court of Justice in the Hague has ordered Israel three times to prevent genocide against Palestinians and let necessary aid enter Gaza. Yet the Israeli military has maintained its unlawful siege and repeatedly attacked hospitals and humanitarian workers.
As of September 2024, nearly 42,000 Palestinians had been killed in Gaza according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, the majority women and children. The number of those under the rubble and others who have died from starvation, illness, infection, and disease may be higher.
Almost all civilians in Gaza are displaced, with most crammed into an area that consists of just 3 percent of Gaza’s territory. Nearly all suffer from hunger. Children have no schools and face trauma. The majority of buildings are damaged or destroyed. Entire neighborhoods have been razed to the ground.
Ghazal, a 15-year-old girl with cerebral palsy, said she lost her assistive devices in an attack on her home in Gaza City on October 11 and begged her parents to leave her behind when they had to evacuate two days later following the Israeli military’s evacuation order: “I was a burden on them [my family], an extra load alongside their belongings. I couldn’t find any means of transportation. I gave up and sat on the ground in the middle of the road, crying. I told them to go on without me.”
Victims of rights abuses in Israel and Palestine have faced a wall of impunity for decades. Israel’s policies of apartheid and persecution against Palestinians are worsening, including land grabs and deadly violence in the West Bank.
The International Criminal Court is now considering arrest warrants for several Israeli and Hamas leaders.
Some foreign governments say they are trying to end the abuses yet pour fuel on the fire, sending arms to warring parties that are committing widespread abuses. Foreign officials, including in the United States, who knowingly send weapons to an abusive force risk complicity in international crimes.
The recent escalation of hostilities across the Middle East is putting more civilians at risk. All civilians—in Israel, Palestine, and Lebanon—are entitled to protection, dignity, and justice.
Bill Van Esveld Associate Director, MENA, Children’s Rights Division at Human Rights Watch
CrossFireArabia
Lebanon’s National News Agency says the people of in the southern district of Beirut experienced their most horrific night since the start of the Israeli occupation’s aggression on the country, as the Israeli army pounded several places with more than 30 airstrikes.
