Gaza

Israeli raids claim lives in Gaza

Al Jazeera.

Two Palestinians have been killed in Israeli air raids in the Gaza Strip, medics and security sources say. Another person has been critically injured.

The Israeli army launched three raids in the south of Gaza on Saturday after Palestinian fighters fired a rocket over the border.

The flare-up of violence on the Israel-Gaza border came just two days after the relaunch of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in the US.

Israeli aircraft reportedly struck targets including smuggling tunnels running under the border with Egypt at Rafah.

The two Palestinians were killed when one of the tunnels collapsed. Three others were wounded.

A raid also struck a former base of the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas.

An Israeli military spokesman confirmed the three raids, saying one was aimed at “a tunnel dug in the direction of Israeli territory” for attacks across the border.

Early on Saturday, Palestinian fighters fired a rocket from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel, causing no injuries, the Israeli military said.

Gaza is under the control of Hamas, the Palestinian faction which is strongly opposed to negotiations with Israel.

Hamas pledge

Hamas has vowed to carry out attacks against Israeli targets in the coming weeks.

Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades carried out two shooting attacks against Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank last week, killing four people in one incident, and wounding two in the other. More >

Why Iran’s Jews Are Better Off Than Gaza’s Palestinians

MPACUK.

25,000 Jews live in Iran. It’s the largest Jewish population in the Middle East outside of Israel. Iranian Jews are not persecuted or abused by the state, in fact, they are protected under Iran’s constitution. They are free to practice their religion and to vote in elections. They are not stopped and searched at checkpoints, they are not brutalized by an occupying army, and they are not herded into a densely-populated penal colony (Gaza) where they are deprived of the basic means of survival. Iranian Jews live in dignity and enjoy the benefits of citizenship. More >

Vice Premier slams Barak over his testimony on Gaza flotilla raid

Haaretz. Labor party secretary threatens to lead Labor out of government coalition if Vice Premier Moshe Ya’alon is not removed from his position due to comments.

Strategic Affairs Minister and Vice Premier Moshe Ya’alon set off a political storm when he attacked Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Friday for the testimony that he gave to the Turkel commission investigating the Gaza flotilla raid. More >

Hamas creates volunteer program for Gaza’s idle youth

EI.

Israel’s siege has had a disproportionate effect on Gaza’s youth. Over half of the Gaza Strip’s 1.5 million residents are under the age of 18, and thousands of young Gazans are unemployed. Hamas authorities in Gaza recently announced a voluntary employment program for Palestinian youth to get involved in their communities. More >

Army chief defends flotilla raid

Al Jazeera.

Gabi Ashkenazi, the Israeli armed forces chief, has defended his troops’ use of lethal fire when they stormed a Gaza-bound aid flotilla in May, killing nine pro-Palestinian activists.

During a sworn testimony to a five-member Israeli commission of inquiry, Ashkenazi said the naval commandoes who descended onto the deck of the ship only opened fire after a soldier was shot by one of the activists.

“Today it is clear to us that as soon as the first soldier had descended to the ship, the second soldier was shot,” he told the panel in a public session of the hearing on Wednesday. More >

Chief Rabbi questions Prime Minister’s Gaza comments

Telegraph.
The Chief Rabbi has expressed concern over comments made by David Cameron in which he described Gaza as a “prison camp”.

Lord Sacks said many in the Jewish community felt “dismay” about the Prime Minister’s remarks and urged him to show more “balance” when discussing the Middle East.

He made the comments during a sermon at St John’s Wood synagogue last Saturday. More >

viva5

Break the siege – Register for Viva Palestina 5: Convoy to Gaza

Since the beginning of Israel’s illegal siege on Gaza, individuals across the world have come together — participating in journeys to Gaza themselves, donating and raising awareness at home, and working to persuade the government to end the siege — as an act of solidarity with the besieged Palestinians in Gaza.

With our government’s failure to end the blockade, people have been inspired to take action themselves to end the crisis, seen by the Gaza flotilla and previous land convoys. The overwhelming response to Israel’s attack on the Freedom Flotilla has forced governments to highlight this issue and call for an end to the siege. But we are committed to pushing further to ensure that words become action, and the siege is actually ended, allowing 1.5 million Palestinians to take advantage of what we in Britain take for granted — the right to work, to decent food and clean water, to education, to health, to visit to see family and friends, and to travel. More >

Gaza aid flotilla to set sail from Lebanon with all-women crew

Guardian.
Arabic singer joins crew of nuns, doctors, lawyers and journalists for humanitarian mission despite Israeli warning.

A ship bearing aid for Gaza is preparing to leave Tripoli in Lebanon this weekend in the latest attempt to defy the Israeli blockade – with only women on board.

The Saint Mariam, or Virgin Mary, has a multi-faith international passenger list, including the Lebanese singer May Hariri and a group of nuns from the US. “They are nuns, doctors, lawyers, journalists, Christians and Muslims,” said Mona, one of the participants who, along with the other women, has adopted the ship’s name, Mariam. More >

Case studies: Child workers in Gaza

BBC. With Gaza’s economy devastated by years of sanctions and decades of conflict, many families send their children to work in the city’s rubbish dumps, streets and workshops. More >

Israel air raid on southern Gaza

Al Jazeera.

At least one Palestinian has been killed and another wounded in an Israeli air attack on southern Gaza Strip, Palestinian medical officials have said.

The Israeli military said troops had targeted a group of Palestinians who had approached the Gaza border fence, where army patrols sometimes face ambushes with guns or bombs.

The air attack, near the town of Khan Younis, comes after a spate of violence along Israel’s border with Gaza in the past week.

Many Palestinians were injured in an Israeli air raid on a Hamas commander’s house last Friday after a rocket fired from Gaza struck the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon causing no casualties but damaging property.

There has been growing tension in the region, with Israeli troops exchanging rocket and gunfire with Lebanese soldiers along their border on Tuesday.

The skirmish left two Lebanese soldiers and an Israeli soldier dead, and heightened fears of a war.

Hamas fighter killed in Israel air strikes on Gaza

BBC.
Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip have killed a Hamas fighter and wounded several other people.

Missiles struck central Gaza and Gaza City late on Friday; tunnels on the strip’s southern border were also hit.

The strikes came after a rocket fired from the coastal enclave by militants earlier on Friday hit the Israeli city of Ashkelon on the Mediterranean coast. More >

Israel hits Gaza after rocket fire

Al Jazeera.

Israel has launched air strikes against targets in the Gaza Strip, injuring eight Palestinians, Palestinian sources say.

Sami Zyara, a Palestinian journalist in the Gaza Strip, told Al Jazeera that at least two rockets launched late on Friday targeted a police training centre run by Hamas.

The Israeli military said its air force struck “a Hamas-linked terror activity site in the northern Gaza Strip, a weapons-manufacturing warehouse in the central Gaza Strip and a weapons-smuggling tunnel in the southern Gaza Strip” overnight. More >

Graduation Day in Gaza

MEM. The Islamic University of Gaza (IUG) has held a special graduation ceremony for its male and female students. The Chairman of the Board of Trustees, Jamal Al-Khodary, MP, said that the university’s vision is to stimulate students towards excellence and innovation, especially at a time when the education sector is facing the most difficult of circumstances with the ongoing siege and the aftermath of the recent Israeli invasion of Gaza. More >

Israel to lodge complaint with UN about Gaza rocket attack on Ashkelon

Haaretz Grad-type rocket explodes near apartment building in coastal city just after 8:30 A.M., causing no casualties but some damage to structure and parked cars; two mortar shells hit western Negev hours later.

The Foreign Ministry on Friday said that Israel would lodge a protest with the United Nations for a Grad rocket attack on Ashkelon earlier in the day. More >

White phosphorus burns

MEM.

(The Lancet) In January, 2009, an 18-year-old man presented to the emergency department after suffering an attack with an incendiary shell. He had many painful patches of full-thickness burns, which were surrounded by sloughed tissue. His wounds covered 30% of his body surface area, and were distributed on both upper and lower limbs, and his right shoulder.

There were no signs of inhalation burns. After a clinical diagnosis of white phosphorus burns was made, the airway was secured, resuscitation fluid was initiated, and wounds were irrigated with diluted sodium bicarbonate solution before wet dressing.

1day after admission to the burns unit, white smoke was noticed emanating from the wounds, which now contained extensive necrotic tissue and had extended into the underlying tissue. More >