Turns out a on the so-called humanitarian/peace activist on the Turkish Mavi Marmara of the Gaza Strip Flotilla just happened to served a prison term for hijacking a Black Sea Ferry. Jerusalem Post:
One of the men on the Mavi Marmara spent three years in a Turkish prison for hijacking a ferry in the Black Sea in 1996; this indicates just who the “activists” were on the boat that tried to break the Gaza blockade on May 31, Foreign Ministry officials said Monday.
The Turkish newspaper Hurrieyt reported over the weekend that Erdinc Tekir, who was hurt during the IDF raid on the boat, was among the nine member team that hijacked the Black Sea ferry to bring the 1996 war in Chechneya to the world’s attention. Tekir spent some three and a half years in prison for the incident.
Coincidence?!? I bet if the Canada Boat to Gaza people asked nicely; he’d crew for them too!
Hamastan needs a bigger armed forces. AP:
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — The top security official in Hamas-ruled Gaza said Tuesday he is considering setting up a bigger military force, first with volunteers and eventually with conscripts as well.
Such a step could further tighten Hamas’ control of Gaza and deepen the rift with the group’s Western-backed rivals in the West Bank. Hamas seized Gaza by force in 2007, wresting control from forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Currently, Hamas has a paid security force of about 18,000.
Interior Minister Fathi Hamad raised the idea of a broad-based force during the inauguration Tuesday of a new police building. He said his ministry is “open to the idea of voluntary recruitment and then going to conscription.” He gave no details.
Other Hamas officials deny a draft will be instituted…
Yes, those spunky humanitarians are at it again. The Jerusalem Post:
Hamas’s security forces on Monday and Tuesday raided the offices of several non-governmental organizations in the Gaza Strip and confiscated equipment and furniture, drawing sharp condemnations from human rights groups.
The sources said the raids were carried out by agents belonging to Hamas’s Internal Security apparatus without court permission. Hamas spokesmen in the Gaza Strip on Thursday refused to comment on the raids.
After conducting a thorough search of the offices of the organizations, the Hamas security agents confiscated files, documents, computers, fax machines and other equipment. The agents also informed the managers and workers of the organizations of the Hamas government’s decision to close them down indefinitely. The Gaza-based Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights expressed outrage over the raids and called on the Hamas government to open an investigation.
“Al-Mezan condemns these assaults against NGOs and views them with much concern,” the center said. “Al-Mezan calls on the Gaza government to initiate an investigation into these acts, ensure full respect of the law, and protect the right of NGOs to work freely.”
According to affidavits given to Al-Mezan by workers at the NGOs, on Monday morning Hamas security agents stormed the NGOs offices in the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah. The NGOs raid on Monday were: Sharik Youth Institution, Bonat Al-Mustaqbal (Future Builders) Society, the South Society for Women’s Health, and the Women and Children Society.
The security agents searched the offices and made a list of the equipment and other belongings. Later in the day, Hamas policemen returned to the offices of the same NGOs and called the directors by telephone. They confiscated most of the equipment and other items, including computers, faxes, cameras, documents and reports, in addition to the keys to their doors. The security agents informed the directors that their organizations were closed. They did not provide any reasons behind this decision.
The following day [Tuesday], Hamas security men stormed the offices of another two NGOs, the Palestinian Mini Parliament and the National Reconciliation Committee. They confiscated the keys to their doors and ordered them closed.
Despite busy bee quality of the humanitarians of the Gaza Strip; they still made time to express their love for their neighbours.
The ongoing captivity Gilad Shalit is turning into a virtual propaganda boon for Hamas and its supporters. Ynet News:
Hamas-owned “Falasteen” journal published a “rare and special” interview with captive Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, an interview, which, only at the end of the report, turned out to be fabricated.
The paper’s political analyst Mustafa al-Sawwaf, was allegedly given the opportunity to interview the soldier in captivity, but at the end of his article, the journalist writes, “All this was in a dream, which I woke up from, after recording this interview.”
And what does Shalit learn in al-Sawwaf’s dream interview?
“I would not be exaggerating if I said I didn’t expect the treatment to be so good. Especially after I learned in school and in the army that the Arabs are murderers and criminals and that they deserve to die,” Shalit “said” in the fabricated interview.
“But these years I have spent here have proved to me that what I learned is not true and that they are people with feelings and that they love life and give civil and humane treatment, the opposite of what is said. I would like to end my words with a cry to my people – help me live, from your son, Gilad Shalit.”
If Shalit learned all Arabs are murders and criminals I don’t expect he learned that in an IDF basic training course…although, he might think so given his present circumstances but good thing it’s all a ‘dream’. I suspect Shalit would not necessarily characterize his kidnapping which resulted in the death of two of his comrades and the injuring of three others as particularly ‘civil’ or ‘humane’. Of course, there is also the fact he is held in such isolation that the Red Cross is not allowed to visit contrary to umteen laws regarding the treatment of prisoners of war.
The United Nation’s Commission on Human Rights (for everyone except Jews) has passed another anti-Israeli which makes it the number xbillion to date. Arutz Sheva:
The UN Human Rights Commission on Thursday approved a resolution demanding that Israel compensate Gaza Arabs for damages that occurred to property during Operation Cast Lead. The vote passed 29-6. The U.S. voted against it.
I freely admitted I laughed hysterically when I first heard the news, but on a sober second thought, I think Israel should pay the bill in full.
In fact, Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu should call a press conference and announce he has the cheque in hand to cover every shekel of damage done by the IDF during Operation Cast Lead and the Jewish state will be happy to pay up in full the minute the Hamas government pays the Israeli bill in full – that’s five years worth of compensation for the over 8,000 kassam rocket attacks launched against Israeli civilians as well as the damage to civilian infrastructure. I’d also add in the cost of fortifying civilian infrastructure because of the kassam attacks as well as paying the families of the victims of kassam attacks suitable compensation. And because I am a vengeful bitch; I would demand compensation for all civilian aid poured into the cesspool of the Gaza Strip and paid for by the taxpayers of Israel.
This is too funny not to post. Apparently, a significant number of Viva Palestinia activists who converged on the Egyptian-Gaza Strip border in order to deliver ‘humanitarian aid’ to supplement the Hamas budget have run into another roadblock – this time financial. Ynet News:
A Cairo airport security official says heated arguments have erupted as authorities attempt to send home some 500 international activists who were part of an aid convoy to the blockaded Gaza Strip. The official said Saturday that many activists cannot pay for their plane tickets and the Foreign Ministry is asking their respective embassies to foot the bill. (AP)
Maybe, just maybe – Western governments should present the bill to Hamas who does seem rather flush.
From Elder of Ziyon we learn Hamas has passed its Gaza Strip Budget for 2010 and and when we throw in the amount the Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas claims to pays out to Hamas from their budget it comes into a cool $2 Billion. Not at all too shabby for a territory known primarily for its export of violence and not much else.
So what does this buy? Well running a television station with its own in-house productions cannot be cheap. Ynet News (has the video):
The video portrays a Palestinian officer carrying out orders of IDF troops while being humiliated by them, and assitsting settlers. The eight-minute video takes place near the security coordination HQ. Palestinian officer Bahlul (clown) is shown to be asked by his Israeli counterpart: “What is your mission?” to which he replies: “To defend the rule of law.” When the Israeli officer asks what that is, the Palestinian replies: “To defend settlers.”
He also notes that settler provocations will not be disturbed or responded to by the Palestinians when asked how he would react in such a case. The video portrays Bahlul as saying that should he get an order from his Israeli colleague to arrest his family members he would do it. He notes that he is willing to fight the resistance and even shine the shoes of the Israeli officer and as a bonus to kiss them as well. “I’ll divorce my wife if you tell me to,” he said.
The Palestinian officer is also seen trying to defend an Israeli settler who shot Palestinian children in Hebron. He shouts at the settler “you just killed my people, but I will respond with a commitment to peace.” At this point in the clip, Bahlul draws a dove and presents it to the settler who had went on a killing spree by his father’s orders. According to the setller’s father “the most delicious thing is to kill Palestinians and drink their blood.”
This was broadcast on January 1, 2001. Meanwhile, the Hamas leadership in Damacus claims a Fatah-Hamas reconciliation is imminent – and good luck with that!
You can be forgiven for missing this great milestone in the history of money launderers. Hamas has opened a bank in the Gaza Strip reports Ynet News and its first mandatory customers are Hamas government employees.
The first bank affiliated with the Hamas movement running Gaza opened on Tuesday in the coastal strip which lies outside the Palestinian Authority’s control. “We are opening the bank today and are beginning to offer our services to the public,” Alaa al-Rafati, head of the National Islamic Bank, told AFP. The National Islamic Bank has $20 million in start-up capital and will operate under Islamic finance rules, he said. With offices on four floors of a building in central Gaza City, the bank will hold the accounts of 6,000 Hamas employees whose salaries are to be deposited in the bank.
Rafati did not say how the Islamist movement acquired the start-up capital in a territory under Israeli embargo since Hamas, which is pledged to the destruction of the Jewish state, violently seized power in 2007. Because of the blockade, which has prevented all but essential humanitarian goods from entering the territory, Gaza’s banks have faced a virtually constant liquidity crisis. Rafati said no such problems would plague the new bank. “We have absolutely no crisis of liquidity, be it shekels or dollars. This will allow us to win the confidence of customers.”
Although the vast majority of the board of directors are members of Hamas, including Rafati, he said the bank was “a private enterprise aimed at making profit and is not associated to Hamas or to the government in Gaza.”
Egad, I hate to think of their customer account service charges. Anyhoo, the Palestinian Authority has refused to issue the bank a license and called for a boycott. How a boycott is suppose to work when the governing authority (and I use this term loosely) makes participation mandatory for all Hamas employees is beyond my ability to reason in Fatah style.
Ha’aretz carries an interesting twist on the black market tunnel networks of the Egyptian Gazan border.
When the calves were hauled out of the tunnel from Egypt Tuesday they could hardly stand up. After a terrifying, one-kilometer underground trip into the Israeli-blockaded Gaza Strip, what the young cattle wanted most was a long drink of cool water.
Underground livestock smuggling has increased dramatically ahead of Id Al-Adha, the feast of the sacrifice, due December 10, when Muslims the world over slaughter animals and feed the poor to seek God’s forgiveness.
“Even if we brought in animals every day we would not meet the demand for the Id,” said a tunnel operator who identified himself as Abu Luqaib. Hundreds of Gaza merchants throng around the border area of Rafah every day to pick up merchandise coming to Gaza from Egypt via subterranean passages that have created a flourishing trade zone. “It’s an industrial zone here,” said the 23-year-old tunnel operator as his crew pulled a bawling calf up the deep shaft by a simple rope around its middle. No livestock harness was used.
Gaza has suffered galloping unemployment since Israel tightened its blockade on the territory in 2007 to try to weaken its Palestinian rulers, Hamas, an Islamist group sworn to the destruction of the Jewish state. Goods are scarce in Gaza markets because of Israeli restrictions on what Gaza may and may not import. The tunnel network handles all sorts of readily portable merchandise including fuel, automobile parts, computers and clothes.
The number of tunnels has mushroomed in the past year to around 800, according to Abu Luqaib. They employ between 20,000 to 25,000 workers in a gray economy struggling for survival. A standard 500-meter tunnel costs from 60,000 euro to 90,000 euro to build, he says. A 1,000-meter tunnel built with extra safety features can cost up to 150,000 euro.
The tunnels can be dangerous. Palestinian officials say at least 45 Gazans have died in cave-ins this year, some of which were blamed by Hamas on the security forces in Egypt, who are under pressure from Israel and the United States to clamp down. But such risks are clearly outweighed by potential profits. The calves that came through Tuesday cost 350 euro each plus 250 euro for the transport, a total of 600 euro per head.
Read the rest here but I find this article more troubling than compelling. In fact, the article raises far more questions than it answered. If the Gaza Strip is in the midst of a ‘humanitarian’ crisis and as unemployment has now risen to above 50% while 80% of all Gazans relie on food aid as all the NGO’s routinely claim – just how on earth does anyone have any money or means of making money in order to buy the black market goods coming into the Gaza Strip from the tunnels?
And what of Egypt’s role in the black market? These goods have to come from somewhere before they are taken into the Rafah tunnel crossings into the Gaza Strip. The only entrance to the Rafah tunnel network lies through the Sinai – sovereign Egyptian territory. In fact, since the Sinai is not the bastion of industrialization or a cornucopia of agriculture and almost all goods would have to be brought in from Egypt proper and cross the Suez Canal before entering into the Sinai.
Suddenly the merchants of the Sinai are able to supply any need of the Palestinians of Gaza without arousing the slightest curiosity of the Egyptian police. One would think this should be a fairly easy and routine enforcement for the Egyptian authorities to crack down on, and yet, it seems to be far above the pay-grade of the Egyptian security forces. Methinks, the ink on the Camp David Accord is mighty cold, and the accord is nothing more than a pretense for peace rather than a lasting peace agreement.
Lauren Booth, sister in law of Tony Blair, was snapped by Agence France-Presse photographer shopping at the ‘concentration camp supermarket’ of the Gaza Strip in mid-September. Who knew the modern Auschwitz had such well stocked and computerized supermarkets?
No one does victim or refugee like the Palestinians but more importantly what motivation is there for the Palestinian leadership to seek a true peace with Israel when playing the victim pays has such obvious financial advantages? The general wisdom for Arafat turning down Ehud Barak’s offer of 97% of the West Bank in 2000 was that the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity but what if the sole motivation to turn down the deal was that the offer was not financially in their best interests to accept? If that is indeed the case, there will be no peace until such time as playing the refugee and card becomes a sum zero game for real.
In other news today, a kassam was launched into Israel from the Gaza Strip. This makes the 28th kassam violation since the truce began on June 19th.
