Israel Reduces Jabalia to Debris Mounts

Jabalia is a pile of ruins and destruction, thanks to the Israeli army. Pictures, images and videos show the Jabalia Camp in the north of Gaza has been reduced to a series of gorges and tumbled down buildings, concrete and wreckage.

This is after its mass bombing and missiles that pulverized blocs of flats and residential buildings.

One videoclip shows people running amidst their destroyed buildings and houses being shot at and bombed by Israeli quadcopters and tanks that thud and boom.

The voices of individuals can be heard shouting telling others to run and take care.

Nowhere to run to

But, here, there is nowhere to run to. Its naked Israeli aggression. Sounds of Israeli machine gunfire and snipers as people scurry from one place to another are rife.

This is war in its ugliest form waged against ordinary civilians that don’t even have kitchen utensils.  

Al Jazeera journalist Anas Al Sharif is in a state of shock. “I swear to God that I can’t even begin to describe what is happening in the Jabalia camp.

Eyewitnesses told the Turkish news agency Anadolu bodies of Palestinians were recovered from the streets of the Jabalia camp and the Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip after the withdrawal of Israeli forces.

Israeli soldiers started withdrawing, Thursday, to the east of Jabalia after 20 days of total bombardment and destruction as covered by websites on the social media. Homes and infrastructure were blown up into smithereen, the burning of residential buildings torched to the delight of Israelis.

It was supposed to be a pull back from Jabalia camp, the arounding areas, Biet Lahia and Biet Hanoon.

But there was an element of double-dealing. Israeli snipers were heard frequently shooting at civilians who were returning to their destroyed homes as they heard of the atrocious pull out. Men, women, children were moving in between debris trying to identify the houses they once lived in.

In their destroyed state neigborhoods and residential areas looked so different.

The scale of destruction in Jabalia is unbelievable in its magnification and ruinous state as documented by another journalist who was in the camp during the three-week onslaught.

Mohammad Shaheen walks through the massive destruction of the camp built after 1948 when thousands of displaced Palestinians were forced to come here after the Israeli state was created.

One woman resident said the scale of destruction is mind-boggling. “The Israelis have destroyed us. They are testing their missiles on us,” she told the reporter.   

Another resident says the vast destruction is the result of weapons being “tested on us with Jabalia and the rest of the Gaza Strip used as a testing ground for different armoury provided by the Americans.

The Israeli war machine unleashed on Jabalia included people, old, children and women. Of the infrastructure, the Israeli targetted the UNRWA headquarters that housed thousands of displaced persons. In a recent bombing of the al Nazla school outside Jablia 10 people were killed and 17 injured.

But it had been a tough fight for the Israeli army who faced missiles by the Palestinian resistance movement who shot, killed, maimed and injured Israeli soldiers and their tanks and other armoury destroyed.

In this battle, Israeli soldiers were killed and injured almost daily as reported by the the Izz Al Din Al Qassam fighters as well with 120 anti-tank missiles fired at Israel forces in the first few day of the start of the military slaughter of Jabalia.

In the first six days when Israeli soldiers started to enter Jabalia and the areas of northern Gaza that included Biet Lahia, Biet Hanoon and Al Zaitoun in Gaza City, the Israeli army reported it lost 95 soldiers between those killed and injured and with tanks, armed carriers and few bulldozers put out of action. The cost of one bulldozer is earmarked at $1 million.

Not Beaten

Despite the extent of destruction many say Jabalia will not be beaten for this is the home of the Palestinian resistance. It is here, in Jabalia, were the first Intifada in 1987 against Israeli occupation was first struck. The Intifada, a people’s uprising continued for five years until the beaguered 1991 peace conference in Madrid.  

After more than eight months of war against Gaza, the number of Palestinians civilians killed stands at over 36,000 with over 81,000 injured.

Vast swathes of Gaza lies in ruin amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water, and medicine with Israeli border guards refusing the entry of aid trucks into the enclave. The north of Gaza has long passed into the famine stage as a result and mass starvation is also creeping into south Gaza because of the Israeli control of the different crossing points in Rafah and elsewhere.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, which in its latest ruling ordered it to immediately halt its operation in Rafah, where over a 1.4 million Palestinians sought refuge from the war before it was invaded on May 6.

Major-General Fayez Al Dwairi comments the Israeli army has no morals or ethics because it destroyed everything in its path during its occopation of the camp. He added, it left tens of people dead in the streets of the camp and/or under the wreckage of buildings, destroying what was left of the camp and all the basics of life.

Al Dwairi pointed out the Israelis destroyed all of the UNRWA Schools, bulldozed the roads in the camp and dug up its cemetaries. He said they deserve to be called a bunch of gangs but nevertheless suffered great material and manpower losses and were not able to hold on to the land or stay there, and wherever they go they will suffer the same fate and will be defeated by the Palestinian resistance.

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Analysis: Tactics on The Gaza Battlefields

Maj-Gen Wasef Erekat from Ramallah talks about the military details and tactics used by the Palestinian fighters to confront the Israeli army in Gaza.

The killing of Israeli soldiers and the destruction of tanks in Gaza after eight months of war on the enclave means the Palestinian resistance is strong, dynamic and holds the initiative with professional ability says military and security analyst Maj-Gen Wasef Erekat.

He described the Palestinian fighter in Gaza as one having courage, is valiant and who is fighting in battles using his quick thinking and swiftly moving in the field according to the dictates of the environment. 

As Israeli soldiers try to carry out their military plans and tactics in the different battlefields of Gaza, Palestinian resistance fighters lie in wait for them, forming boobytraps, drawing the soldiers forward and forcing them to enter the houses which they have wired by explosives and which are subsequently blown up as was the recent case in a refugee camp in Rafah, the retired Major-General recently told Al Jazeera from Ramallah.

There, the house was wired with explosives and eight Israeli soldiers who entered were struck, leading to the immediate deaths of three of them and the injury of others according to the Israeli army.

Today and after eight months and as the Israeli army promises to enter Rafah on a wide scale, the Palestinian resistance is involved in more than  one battle on the field of offense and that is the battle of the picture, the image and the videos of Palestinian rockets and missiles as seen on television and the social media.

Erakat emphasizes such images have great influence on Israeli soldiers, the Jewish public and the Israeli decision-maker, saying when these videoclips of missiles on tanks and towards Tel Aviv and are seen by Israelis it slams their spirits down and sends more negative messages to their soldiers.

‘Day After’

These missiles’ messages speaking of ill-forebodding for the soldiers that Gaza is indeed becoming a quagmire and a graveyard for them. This is why the Israel Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi and the Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant are imploring Benjamin Netanyahu to start planning for the so-called “day after”, the retired Palestinian military general maintains.

But Erakat said Netanyahu can’t do that because he “has nothing in his bag” because when we talk about 7 October Israel was defeated on three basic levels by the Aqsa flood:

First, the army – military might, intelligence, rules of engagement and fighting doctrine – was defeated by the Palestinian resistance; and even today after 236 days, it did not achieve anything. Second, today there are 500,000 settlers in occupied Palestine who left their homes and will not return back unless the Palestinians return back to their homes in Gaza. Thirdly, there is now a new trend today of people emigrating out of Israel. Hebrew newspapers have recently reported 5000 Israelis have applied to the German Embassy to enter that country, he added.

Because of this Netanyahu can’t talk about the day after. “The ‘day after’ will be dictated by the Palestinian fighters who remain steadfast in the battlefield and the great Palestinians people who are bearing the pain and tears and whose young children appear from beneath the tunnels and send messages to the whole world that whoever wants to see pride and dignity should come to Palestine and Gaza.” 

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Gaza: Israel’s War Insanity to Last For 7 More Months

The Israeli National Security Advisor Tzachi Hanegbi says he expects the war on Gaza to last for seven more months.

“We are expecting another seven months of fighting in the Gaza Strip,” he says.

One blogger called this on the X platform as Israel’s “unchecked insanity…” adding “this will only further isolate Israel and costs Biden” the coming US presidential elections in November. But besides, he points out, Biden has “already lost.”

This piece of news has set many on the social media talking despite the fact that Israeli army military officers have already said this war on Gaza could go on till 2026 or even 2027 because of the tough fighting of Hamas and the other Palestinian groups that include Islamic Jihad.

Kenneth Roth, a past Human Rights Watch Executive Director and is now a visiting professor at Prinston University says the reason fot Hanegbi’s comment is he wants Donald Trump to get back into the White House and for Netanyahu to be kept out of prison because of the corruption charges he faces.

But that might be jumping the gun especially on the Trump front who may not be interested in forking out billions of dollars to keep this genocidal war on Gaza going as the Israelis would claim and which is what the Biden administration is doing through its air and sea bridge of mass bombs and military hardware to Israel.

Hanegbi, described as a “Netanyahu yes man” and like his prime minister may be in a state of illusion, saying Israel wants “another seven months of fighting so as to deepen our achievement and achieve what we define” as the destruction of Hamas.

His illusion is stemming from the fact that Hamas and the Palestinian resistance in Gaza remains strong and the fact they are putting up a hard fight with Israeli soldiers getting killed by the day.

This is not to say anything about the fact that Hamas missiles and batteries are targeting Israeli tanks and troop carriers by the day with estimations so far, that the Islamist movement has destroyed and/or partially destroyed up to 1500 tanks and other vehicles on the streets of Gaza.

These numbers keep going up daily despite the Israeli sensors to control what goes out to the media.

Gadi Eisenkot also of the Isreali war cabinet says the idea that Hamas could be beaten, a view put forward by Netanyahu is sowing false illusions. Rather than attempting to end the existence of Hamas, Eisenkot says Netanyahu should be finding ways of bringing the hostages back home which are down to 125 killed through Israeli bombings on different residential areas in the Gaza Strip.

Hanegbi’s comment however continues to trend on the social media platforms. One says the Israeli war on Gaza like the war in Ukraine are part of prolonged conflicts that are likely to last for years and will generate new conflicts.

Dr Asmar is an Amman-based writer covering Middle East Affairs.

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Ireland, Spain, Norway Recognize Palestine

It maybe a new dawn for Palestinian statehood as Ireland, Norway, and Spain formally recognize Palestine as an independent state.

This decision comes at a time when Israel is waging a bloody war on Gaza since 7 October, 2023 when over 36,000 civilians have been killed.

Irish Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said on X: “Today’s Government decision authorizes the establishment of full diplomatic relations with the State of Palestine,” as carried by the Anadolu Turkish news agency.

“Recognition of Palestine is not the end of a process; it is the beginning,” Martin emphasized, highlighting “our long-standing development cooperation programme.

The three European countries decided to recongnize Palestine as an independent official state for impact and ueging other countries in the world to follow suit.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said: “This is a historic decision that has a single goal — to contribute to achieving peace between Israelis and Palestinians,” Anadolu reported.

“We recognized Palestine because it’s the time to do so. We can’t wait any longer,” said Spain’s Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares, commenting on the government’s decision.

When asked how he would respond to Israel’s recent diplomatic attacks against Spain, Albares told journalists on Tuesday that Madrid will deliver a “coordinated, serene and firm response,” alongside Norway and Ireland.

On Tuesday, Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz compared Spain’s Deputy Prime Minister Yolanda Diaz to the leaders of Hamas and Iran, posting on X that she is calling for the “elimination of Israel,” even though she has insisted that she believes in a two-state solution.

On the other hand, Norway’s recognition was announced by Foreign Minister Espen Eide in a statement.

“Today, when Norway officially recognizes Palestine as a state, is a milestone in the relationship between Norway and Palestine,” he said.

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Hamas Rockets Jolt Israelis Back to Reality

Its almost a reminder of the old days! The volley of missiles on Tel Aviv from Rafah, the first in four months, is sending shivers down the spines of Israelis who fear the worse is yet to come from Hamas and the Palestinian resistance.

The launch of 12 rockets on 26 May, 2023 by the Izz Al Din Al Qassam Brigade fighters and which landed on different parts of greater Tel Aviv comes at a time when the Israeli army is immersed in east Rafah and about to wage a full military camaign on the city under the pipedream slogan of eradicating Hamas.

https://twitter.com/timesofindia/status/1794732722411249937/video/1

But the timing of the firing of the rockets  – a reach and distance of 140 kilometers from Rafah, the longest so far – is designed to send a strong message to the Israeli political and military establishments that the Palestinian resistance movement remains in top fighting form despite the bunk busters, dumbs bombs and missiles hurling down Gaza’s housing estates for the past eight months.

A mad number of 75,000 tons of explosives have so far been dropped on the 364-kilometer enclave. This is the equivalent of 37 atom bombs. But in spite of this, the Palestinian resistance are still strong with thousands of fighters, rockets, guns, machine guns and ammunition in their depositories across Gaza. As Hamas officials keep warning there is still more of that to be unleashed on Israel.

The fired rockets are a message that such weapons, bombs, and sniper rifles will continue to be used against the Israeli army, its soldiers, tanks and troop carriers for the forseeble future and if they insist on staying in Gaza.

The fired rockets show Hamas will continue to use them when the need be and as the battle requires. Now, the fight is against Israeli soldiers in Gaza but are fired into the Israeli depth now and then as a warning.

The rockets – unleashed after a tense calm – and all the way to the north of Tel Aviv, the major political, financial, economic, industrial and knowledge capital of Israel is devastating, jolting the Israelis back into sobering reality. Politicians, military officers, economic leaders and the ordinary are asking what more can be done by the way of the devastation the Israeli armed forces have carried out on Gaza since 7 October.

Videoclips on the social media show the timing when the missiles were heard in Kfar Saba, Herzliya, and Raanana, north of Tel Aviv were sirens blasted off to the panic of ordinary Israelis, quickly trying to move out of harms way whilst senseing fear and instability back into their lives. 

The surprised rockets are expected to rattle the psychology of Israelis especially since they were fired 100s of meters away from Israeli troops in  Rafah which means Palestinian fighters are actually amongst them incognito.

This should of deep concern to the Israeli Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi who worries about the state of his soldiers in Gaza, having been in daily battle for the last eign months, in turrain that is alien to them and aginst fighters who know only too well the nooks and cranies of the towns, cities, alleways, and roads of Gaza and where soldiers are being killed and maimed by the day to ghost Palestinian fighters. 

Indeed, although a full scale invasion is yet to materialize in Rafah, the Israeli army is already bombing different parts of the city and has been doing so for the last 18 days. So the war there has already started.

The missiles into Israel, over Tel Aviv, cities in the center and in settlements around 

Gaza are an addition and pressure to the real fight inside the enclave being helped by Hezbollah missiles penetrating into Israel, the Houthis from Yemen firing most at Eilat and the occasional firing, from islamists groups from deep inside Iraq.

Finally, the rockets are a warning by Hamas to Netanyahu not invade Rafah for the cost of doing so will be greater than you think, for the city will be the final graveyard of Israel soldiers and the over 100 hostages who are still held in captivity there. 

But Netanyahu may not be thinking at all about that since he wants the war to continue to lengthen his time out of prison and play into the hands of the extreme right wing while claiming to want to eradicate Hamas. What he wants are unattainble objectives explained by the bad Israeli army situation in Gaza.

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