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Hamas surprise attack out of Gaza stuns Israel and leaves hundreds dead in fighting, retaliation
By JOSEF FEDERMAN and ISSAM ADWAN
25 mins ago
JERUSALEM (AP) — Backed by a barrage of rockets, Hamas militants stormed from the blockaded Gaza Strip into nearby Israeli towns, killing dozens and abducting others in an unprecedented surprise attack during a major Jewish holiday Saturday. A stunned Israel launched airstrikes in Gaza, with its prime minister saying the country is now at war with Hamas and vowing to inflict an “unprecedented price.”
In an assault of startling breadth, Hamas gunmen rolled into as many as 22 locations outside the Gaza Strip, including towns and other communities as far as 15 miles (24 kilometers) from the Gaza border. In some places they gunned down civilians and soldiers as Israel’s military scrambled to muster a response.
Gunbattles continued well after nightfall, and militants held hostages in standoffs in two towns. Militants occupied a police station in a third town, where Israeli forces struggled until Sunday morning to finally reclaim the building.
Israeli media, citing rescue service officials, said at least 250 people were killed and 1,500 wounded, making it the deadliest attack in Israel in decades. At least 232 people in the Gaza Strip were killed and 1,700 wounded in Israeli strikes, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. Hamas fighters took an unknown number of civilians and soldiers captive into Gaza.
The conflict threatened to escalate with Israel’s vows of retaliation. Previous conflicts between Israel and Gaza’s Hamas rulers brought widespread death and destruction in Gaza and days of rocket fire on Israeli towns. The situation is potentially more volatile now, with Israel’s far-right government stung by the security breach and with Palestinians in despair over a never-ending occupation in the West Bank and suffocating blockade of Gaza.
In a televised address Saturday night, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who earlier declared Israel to be at war, said the military will use all of its strength to destroy Hamas’ capabilities. But he warned, “This war will take time. It will be difficult."
“All the places that Hamas hides in, operates from, we will turn them into ruins," he added. “Get out of there now," he told Gaza residents, who have no way to leave the tiny, overcrowded Mediterranean territory of 2.3 million people.
Israeli airstrikes in Gaza intensified after nightfall, flattening residential buildings in giant explosions, including a 14-story tower that held dozens of apartments as well as Hamas offices in central Gaza City. Israeli forces fired a warning just before.
Around 3 a.m., a loudspeaker atop a mosque in Gaza City blared a stark warning to residents of nearby apartment buildings: Evacuate immediately. Just minutes later, an Israeli airstrike reduced one nearby five-story building to ashes.
After one Israeli strike, a Hamas rocket barrage hit four cities, including Tel Aviv and a nearby suburb. Throughout the day, Hamas fired more than 3,500 rockets, the Israeli military said.
The strength, sophistication and timing of the Saturday morning attack shocked Israelis. Hamas fighters used explosives to break through the border fence enclosing Gaza, then crossed with motorcycles, pickup trucks, paragliders and speed boats on the coast.
In some towns, civilians’ bodies lay where they had encountered advancing gunmen. At least nine people gunned down at a bus shelter in the town of Sderot were laid out on stretchers on the street, their bags still on the curb nearby. One woman, screaming, embraced the body of a family member sprawled under a sheet next to a toppled motorcycle.
In amateur video, hundreds of terrified young people who had been dancing at a rave fled for their lives after Hamas militants entered the area and began firing at them. Israeli media said dozens of people were killed.
Among the dead was Col. Jonathan Steinberg, a senior officer who commanded the Israeli military's Nahal Brigade, a prominent infantry unit.
The shadowy leader of Hamas’ military wing, Mohammed Deif, said the assault was in response to the 16-year blockade of Gaza, Israeli raids inside West Bank cities over the past year, violence at Al Aqsa — the disputed Jerusalem holy site sacred to Jews as the Temple Mount — increasing attacks by settlers on Palestinians and the growth of settlements.
“Enough is enough,” Deif, who does not appear in public, said in the recorded message. He said the attack was only the start of what he called “Operation Al-Aqsa Storm” and called on Palestinians from east Jerusalem to northern Israel to join the fight.
The Hamas incursion on Simchat Torah, a normally joyous day when Jews complete the annual cycle of reading the Torah scroll, revived painful memories of the 1973 Mideast war practically 50 years to the day, in which Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, aiming to take back Israeli-occupied territories.
Comparisons to one of the most traumatic moments in Israeli history sharpened criticism of Netanyahu and his far-right allies, who had campaigned on more aggressive action against threats from Gaza. Political commentators lambasted the government and military over its failure to anticipate what appeared to be a Hamas attack unseen in its level of planning and coordination.
Asked by reporters how Hamas had managed to catch the army off guard, Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli army spokesman, replied, “That’s a good question.”
The abduction of Israeli civilians and soldiers also raised a particularly thorny issue for Israel, which has a history of making heavily lopsided exchanges to bring captive Israelis home. Israel is holding thousands of Palestinians in its prisons. Hecht confirmed that “substantial” number of Israelis were abducted Saturday.
Associated Press photos showed an elderly Israeli woman being brought into Gaza on a golf cart by Hamas gunmen and another woman squeezed between two fighters on a motorcycle. AP journalists saw four people taken from the kibbutz of Kfar Azza, including two women.
In Gaza, a black jeep pulled to a stop and, when the rear door opened, a young Israeli woman stumbled out, bleeding from the head and with her hands tied behind her back. A man waving a gun in the air grabbed her by the hair and pushed her into the vehicle’s back seat. Israeli TV reported that workers from Thailand and the Philippines were also among the captives.
Netanyahu vowed that Hamas “will pay an unprecedented price.” A major question now was whether Israel will launch a ground assault into Gaza, a move that in the past has brought intensified casualties.
Israel’s military was bringing four divisions of troops as well as tanks to the Gaza border, joining 31 battalions already in the area, the spokesman Hagari said. And the Israeli military later released an Arabic-language video warning Gazans to leave their homes in targeted areas of the dense coastal enclave.
In Gaza, much of the population was thrown into darkness after nightfall as electrical supplies from Israel — which supplies almost all the territories’ power — were cut off. Netanyahu’s office said in a statement that Israel would stop supplying electricity, fuel and goods to Gaza.
Hamas said it had planned for a potentially long fight. “We are prepared for all options, including all-out war,” the deputy head of the Hamas political bureau, Saleh al-Arouri, told Al-Jazeera TV. “We are ready to do whatever is necessary for the dignity and freedom of our people.”
U.S. President Joe Biden said from the White House that he had spoken with Netanyahu to say the United States “stands with the people of Israel in the face of these terrorist assaults. Israel has the right to defend itself and its people, full stop."
Saudi Arabia, which has been in talks with the U.S. about normalizing relations with Israel, called on both sides to exercise restraint. The kingdom said it had repeatedly warned about the danger of “the situation exploding as a result of the continued occupation (and) the Palestinian people being deprived of their legitimate rights.”
Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group congratulated Hamas, praising the attack as a response to “Israeli crimes.” The group said its command in Lebanon was in contact with Hamas about the operation.
The attack comes at a time of historic division within Israel over Netanyahu’s proposal to overhaul the judiciary. Mass protests over the plan have sent hundreds of thousands of Israeli demonstrators into the streets and prompted hundreds of military reservists to avoid volunteer duty — turmoil that has raised fears over the military’s battlefield readiness.
It also comes at a time of mounting tensions between Israel and the Palestinians, with the peace process effectively dead for years. Over the past year, Israel’s far-right government has ramped up settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settler violence has displaced hundreds of Palestinians there and tensions have flared around a flashpoint Jerusalem holy site.
Palestinians demonstrated in towns and cities around the West Bank on Saturday night. Palestinian health officials said Israeli fire killed five there, but gave few details.
___
Adwan reported from Rafah, Gaza Strip. Associated Press writers Wafaa Shurafa in Gaza City and Isabel DeBre and Julia Frankel in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
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Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said: “We are at war and we will win it.”
Israelis have killed at least 232 people and wounded more than 1,700 in
retaliation for the attack. He promised the Israeli military will “take
revenge for this black day” but that it “will take time.” He warned that
Israel would turn “into ruins” the places where Hamas operates, and
told residents of Gaza to “get out of there now,” although they have no
way to leave.
Talk about terrorism. Shake my head.
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
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Lerxst I think the treatment of the Palestinians by the Israelis is terrorism and has been going on for far too long. I am not surprised that some people are getting fed up enough to mount more successful insurgencies. Is it great that this will lead to more and further bloodshed? No.
As far as comparing this to Natives or saying that all land is occupied, that is hogwash. We know better at this point, arguably we did back then as well. However, just because the US did it in the past doesn't make it right for Israel to do now.
Hey we are gonna force you out of your land, and when you inevitably fight back we are going to take more of your land with our superior fire power in the name of security, and when you fight back again we will call you terrorists etc... What a fucked up carousel.
Israel seized land because of constant invasion from every direction after the Nakba in 1948.
Really 1948? wow. I guess the land was never Israeli before 1948? Or Mick will come in soon and explain what happened four thousand years ago never really happened. Thats three thousand and eight hundred years before the US seized its land. But according to that comment, the US gets a free pass, Australia gets a free pass, Canada gets a free pass , everyone gets a free pass, except Israel. Wonder why. Wonder what makes Israel so different.
We’ve argued this before, except now, Iran has started a war. They are not interested in peace, and if the Dems start talking like this, it probably will get trump elected.
palestine has always been supportive of ethnic cleansing of israelis and never been interested in peace. Today is obviously Iran destroying the Saudi peace talks. Any attempt to deny that is a joke.
Before 1948 the land was Mandatory Palestine and part of the Great Britain's colonial empire. Now I'm unclear where the US and Australia or Canada for that matter get a free pass. I think we can all agree that what was done in the past should not ever be repeated, but we have been and are seeing it repeated in Palestine. Israel telling Palestinians to leave so they won't be targeted by the retaliation well where are they supposed to go?, certainly not to the homes of their ancestors, or even living dependents if they don't want to be slaughtered. People literally had homes and land taken from them for over 50 years and are expected to be docile.
As for your earlier myth about natives deciding to peacefully coexist with European conquerers, I'm pretty sure Custer and thousands of others that fell to native resistance would beg to differ. Or was Native American resistance just terrorism and a wish for ethic cleansing in your mind? Coexisting only happened once military superiority and the white mans boundless cruelty were well established.
How many unarmed Palestinians have been killed trying to return home? But sure it all must be anti-semitism as you are seemingly trying to infer. Anytime something like this happens it is wrong and no one gets a pass. The founding fathers gave themselves a pass, GB gave Australia a pass after starting a penal colony on aboriginal land, but that don't mean shit if the natives never co signed, just a bunch of legalese.
No one gets a pass. America has an original sin and it isn't slavery. If you can go through life and think this is A ok because the world is just one occupied territory, well that's sad for you. Seeing this continually unfold in real time over my whole life as long as it has is sad.
Israel just keeps penning in the Palestinians and striking with a harder and harder fist after nearly decimating an entire culture.
Wrong is wrong. But please tell me how America and Australia and Canada get a pass and why it's ok to just continue this type of shit in Israel or anywhere else for that matter because previous generations of wealthy white men got away with it.
I'm glad I don't view history through a one way street.
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I always wonder why the UN didn't just give Germany to the Israelis, it seems more fitting and like it would have been much easier to protect globally especially coming out of WWII
Lerxst I think the treatment of the Palestinians by the Israelis is terrorism and has been going on for far too long. I am not surprised that some people are getting fed up enough to mount more successful insurgencies. Is it great that this will lead to more and further bloodshed? No.
As far as comparing this to Natives or saying that all land is occupied, that is hogwash. We know better at this point, arguably we did back then as well. However, just because the US did it in the past doesn't make it right for Israel to do now.
Hey we are gonna force you out of your land, and when you inevitably fight back we are going to take more of your land with our superior fire power in the name of security, and when you fight back again we will call you terrorists etc... What a fucked up carousel.
Israel seized land because of constant invasion from every direction after the Nakba in 1948.
Really 1948? wow. I guess the land was never Israeli before 1948? Or Mick will come in soon and explain what happened four thousand years ago never really happened. Thats three thousand and eight hundred years before the US seized its land. But according to that comment, the US gets a free pass, Australia gets a free pass, Canada gets a free pass , everyone gets a free pass, except Israel. Wonder why. Wonder what makes Israel so different.
We’ve argued this before, except now, Iran has started a war. They are not interested in peace, and if the Dems start talking like this, it probably will get trump elected.
palestine has always been supportive of ethnic cleansing of israelis and never been interested in peace. Today is obviously Iran destroying the Saudi peace talks. Any attempt to deny that is a joke.
Before 1948 the land was Mandatory Palestine and part of the Great Britain's colonial empire. Now I'm unclear where the US and Australia or Canada for that matter get a free pass. I think we can all agree that what was done in the past should not ever be repeated, but we have been and are seeing it repeated in Palestine. Israel telling Palestinians to leave so they won't be targeted by the retaliation well where are they supposed to go?, certainly not to the homes of their ancestors, or even living dependents if they don't want to be slaughtered. People literally had homes and land taken from them for over 50 years and are expected to be docile.
As for your earlier myth about natives deciding to peacefully coexist with European conquerers, I'm pretty sure Custer and thousands of others that fell to native resistance would beg to differ. Or was Native American resistance just terrorism and a wish for ethic cleansing in your mind? Coexisting only happened once military superiority and the white mans boundless cruelty were well established.
How many unarmed Palestinians have been killed trying to return home? But sure it all must be anti-semitism as you are seemingly trying to infer. Anytime something like this happens it is wrong and no one gets a pass. The founding fathers gave themselves a pass, GB gave Australia a pass after starting a penal colony on aboriginal land, but that don't mean shit if the natives never co signed, just a bunch of legalese.
No one gets a pass. America has an original sin and it isn't slavery. If you can go through life and think this is A ok because the world is just one occupied territory, well that's sad for you. Seeing this continually unfold in real time over my whole life as long as it has is sad.
Israel just keeps penning in the Palestinians and striking with a harder and harder fist after nearly decimating an entire culture.
Wrong is wrong. But please tell me how America and Australia and Canada get a pass and why it's ok to just continue this type of shit in Israel or anywhere else for that matter because previous generations of wealthy white men got away with it.
I'm glad I don't view history through a one way street.
No culture has been decimated or cleaned more than that of the people of Israel. It’s the height of absurdity to suggest otherwise. Had hitter won, these people would have been wiped from the planet. And hitler followed thousands of years or Israelis being forcibly displaced from this very land. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrian_captivity. That’s one page of many. The links above are like starting a thousand chapter book on chapter 950.
WWII was the last straw of this four thousand year old story, that’s why the UN put together its Partition Plan, which was met immediately with violence from the Arab nations. No bargaining table no negotiations. That’s how the Arabs have handled this complex process since their “beginning” which is really chapter 950. The Arabs start wars, and don’t like how they end.
Look at what happened in WWII and how the arab states responded to these people cleansed by hitler. That violence is their legacy. They stand for hatred and violence, decade after decade, right from the ashes of Hitlers war.
Regarding Canada, we had a recent topic here, the phrase is literally First Nations, plural , and that doesn’t apply to the Canadian immigrants from Europe. There were other peoples living there who were violently displaced. Australia also has issues with its indigenous populations.
Israel occupies key strategic lands in the West Bank because these lands were used to attack Israeli civilians , including women and children, and were seized when Israel was attacked in the 1967 war. The US, Canada, Australia and many other countries get to keep land won after conflict to try to secure peace , yet Israel does not?
Israel occupies other lands in the West Bank that was theirs thousands of years ago. It’s Sunday, you are free to go to church now in multiple religions and read about this in the Bible.
Israel has a list of peace deals with Arab nations. Todays war is about Iran not liking the Saudi talks and destroying the peace process. Go ahead and support Iran.
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“There is today in the Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since
1967 a deeply discriminatory dual legal and political system that
privileges the 700,000 Israeli Jewish settlers living in the 300 illegal
Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank,” said Michael
Lynk, the UN Special Rapporteur for the situation of human rights in the
Palestinian territory occupied since 1967.
“Living in the same geographic space, but separated by walls,
checkpoints, roads and an entrenched military presence, are more than
three million Palestinians, who are without rights, living under an
oppressive rule of institutional discrimination and without a path to a
genuine Palestinian state that the world has long promised is their
right.
“Another two million Palestinians live in Gaza, described regularly
as an ‘open-air prison’, without adequate access to power, water or
health, with a collapsing economy and with no ability to freely travel
to the rest of Palestine or the outside world.”
The Special Rapporteur said that a political regime which so
intentionally and clearly prioritizes fundamental political, legal and
social rights to one group over another within the same geographic unit
on the basis of one’s racial-national-ethnic identity satisfies the
international legal definition of apartheid.
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
Interesting article, but what are your thoughts on it, Nick?
My own feeling is that any time one group of people attacks another and kills in large numbers is a bad time. I also believe that any time one group of people suppresses and restricts another, a violent reaction will eventually occur. Maybe too simply stated, but that pretty much sums up this situation to me.
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
Interesting article, but what are your thoughts on it, Nick?
My own feeling is that any time one group of people attacks another and kills in large numbers is a bad time. I also believe that any time one group of people suppresses and restricts another, a violent reaction will eventually occur. Maybe too simply stated, but that pretty much sums up this situation to me.
I’m not going to act like I know enough about the history to have an opinion but you pretty much summed up how I feel.
Interesting article, but what are your thoughts on it, Nick?
My own feeling is that any time one group of people attacks another and kills in large numbers is a bad time. I also believe that any time one group of people suppresses and restricts another, a violent reaction will eventually occur. Maybe too simply stated, but that pretty much sums up this situation to me.
I’m not going to act like I know enough about the history to have an opinion but you pretty much summed up how I feel.
Oh man, how many people do when it comes to Israel/Palestine and the Middle East in general? I find the history- particularly post WWII- to be hugely complex and convoluted. I'm certainly not one to claim to have a clear understanding of what's going on. One thing I can say almost for certain though, it must be hell for a lot of people in that region who just want to go on with day to day life. I can't even begin to imagine what hell it must be to live there.
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
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Comments
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
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Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
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memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
JERUSALEM (AP) — Backed by a barrage of rockets, Hamas militants stormed from the blockaded Gaza Strip into nearby Israeli towns, killing dozens and abducting others in an unprecedented surprise attack during a major Jewish holiday Saturday. A stunned Israel launched airstrikes in Gaza, with its prime minister saying the country is now at war with Hamas and vowing to inflict an “unprecedented price.”
In an assault of startling breadth, Hamas gunmen rolled into as many as 22 locations outside the Gaza Strip, including towns and other communities as far as 15 miles (24 kilometers) from the Gaza border. In some places they gunned down civilians and soldiers as Israel’s military scrambled to muster a response.
Gunbattles continued well after nightfall, and militants held hostages in standoffs in two towns. Militants occupied a police station in a third town, where Israeli forces struggled until Sunday morning to finally reclaim the building.
Israeli media, citing rescue service officials, said at least 250 people were killed and 1,500 wounded, making it the deadliest attack in Israel in decades. At least 232 people in the Gaza Strip were killed and 1,700 wounded in Israeli strikes, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. Hamas fighters took an unknown number of civilians and soldiers captive into Gaza.
The conflict threatened to escalate with Israel’s vows of retaliation. Previous conflicts between Israel and Gaza’s Hamas rulers brought widespread death and destruction in Gaza and days of rocket fire on Israeli towns. The situation is potentially more volatile now, with Israel’s far-right government stung by the security breach and with Palestinians in despair over a never-ending occupation in the West Bank and suffocating blockade of Gaza.
In a televised address Saturday night, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who earlier declared Israel to be at war, said the military will use all of its strength to destroy Hamas’ capabilities. But he warned, “This war will take time. It will be difficult."
“All the places that Hamas hides in, operates from, we will turn them into ruins," he added. “Get out of there now," he told Gaza residents, who have no way to leave the tiny, overcrowded Mediterranean territory of 2.3 million people.
Israeli airstrikes in Gaza intensified after nightfall, flattening residential buildings in giant explosions, including a 14-story tower that held dozens of apartments as well as Hamas offices in central Gaza City. Israeli forces fired a warning just before.
Around 3 a.m., a loudspeaker atop a mosque in Gaza City blared a stark warning to residents of nearby apartment buildings: Evacuate immediately. Just minutes later, an Israeli airstrike reduced one nearby five-story building to ashes.
After one Israeli strike, a Hamas rocket barrage hit four cities, including Tel Aviv and a nearby suburb. Throughout the day, Hamas fired more than 3,500 rockets, the Israeli military said.
The strength, sophistication and timing of the Saturday morning attack shocked Israelis. Hamas fighters used explosives to break through the border fence enclosing Gaza, then crossed with motorcycles, pickup trucks, paragliders and speed boats on the coast.
In some towns, civilians’ bodies lay where they had encountered advancing gunmen. At least nine people gunned down at a bus shelter in the town of Sderot were laid out on stretchers on the street, their bags still on the curb nearby. One woman, screaming, embraced the body of a family member sprawled under a sheet next to a toppled motorcycle.
In amateur video, hundreds of terrified young people who had been dancing at a rave fled for their lives after Hamas militants entered the area and began firing at them. Israeli media said dozens of people were killed.
Among the dead was Col. Jonathan Steinberg, a senior officer who commanded the Israeli military's Nahal Brigade, a prominent infantry unit.
The shadowy leader of Hamas’ military wing, Mohammed Deif, said the assault was in response to the 16-year blockade of Gaza, Israeli raids inside West Bank cities over the past year, violence at Al Aqsa — the disputed Jerusalem holy site sacred to Jews as the Temple Mount — increasing attacks by settlers on Palestinians and the growth of settlements.
“Enough is enough,” Deif, who does not appear in public, said in the recorded message. He said the attack was only the start of what he called “Operation Al-Aqsa Storm” and called on Palestinians from east Jerusalem to northern Israel to join the fight.
The Hamas incursion on Simchat Torah, a normally joyous day when Jews complete the annual cycle of reading the Torah scroll, revived painful memories of the 1973 Mideast war practically 50 years to the day, in which Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, aiming to take back Israeli-occupied territories.
Comparisons to one of the most traumatic moments in Israeli history sharpened criticism of Netanyahu and his far-right allies, who had campaigned on more aggressive action against threats from Gaza. Political commentators lambasted the government and military over its failure to anticipate what appeared to be a Hamas attack unseen in its level of planning and coordination.
Asked by reporters how Hamas had managed to catch the army off guard, Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli army spokesman, replied, “That’s a good question.”
The abduction of Israeli civilians and soldiers also raised a particularly thorny issue for Israel, which has a history of making heavily lopsided exchanges to bring captive Israelis home. Israel is holding thousands of Palestinians in its prisons. Hecht confirmed that “substantial” number of Israelis were abducted Saturday.
Associated Press photos showed an elderly Israeli woman being brought into Gaza on a golf cart by Hamas gunmen and another woman squeezed between two fighters on a motorcycle. AP journalists saw four people taken from the kibbutz of Kfar Azza, including two women.
In Gaza, a black jeep pulled to a stop and, when the rear door opened, a young Israeli woman stumbled out, bleeding from the head and with her hands tied behind her back. A man waving a gun in the air grabbed her by the hair and pushed her into the vehicle’s back seat. Israeli TV reported that workers from Thailand and the Philippines were also among the captives.
Netanyahu vowed that Hamas “will pay an unprecedented price.” A major question now was whether Israel will launch a ground assault into Gaza, a move that in the past has brought intensified casualties.
Israel’s military was bringing four divisions of troops as well as tanks to the Gaza border, joining 31 battalions already in the area, the spokesman Hagari said. And the Israeli military later released an Arabic-language video warning Gazans to leave their homes in targeted areas of the dense coastal enclave.
In Gaza, much of the population was thrown into darkness after nightfall as electrical supplies from Israel — which supplies almost all the territories’ power — were cut off. Netanyahu’s office said in a statement that Israel would stop supplying electricity, fuel and goods to Gaza.
Hamas said it had planned for a potentially long fight. “We are prepared for all options, including all-out war,” the deputy head of the Hamas political bureau, Saleh al-Arouri, told Al-Jazeera TV. “We are ready to do whatever is necessary for the dignity and freedom of our people.”
U.S. President Joe Biden said from the White House that he had spoken with Netanyahu to say the United States “stands with the people of Israel in the face of these terrorist assaults. Israel has the right to defend itself and its people, full stop."
Saudi Arabia, which has been in talks with the U.S. about normalizing relations with Israel, called on both sides to exercise restraint. The kingdom said it had repeatedly warned about the danger of “the situation exploding as a result of the continued occupation (and) the Palestinian people being deprived of their legitimate rights.”
Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group congratulated Hamas, praising the attack as a response to “Israeli crimes.” The group said its command in Lebanon was in contact with Hamas about the operation.
The attack comes at a time of historic division within Israel over Netanyahu’s proposal to overhaul the judiciary. Mass protests over the plan have sent hundreds of thousands of Israeli demonstrators into the streets and prompted hundreds of military reservists to avoid volunteer duty — turmoil that has raised fears over the military’s battlefield readiness.
It also comes at a time of mounting tensions between Israel and the Palestinians, with the peace process effectively dead for years. Over the past year, Israel’s far-right government has ramped up settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settler violence has displaced hundreds of Palestinians there and tensions have flared around a flashpoint Jerusalem holy site.
Palestinians demonstrated in towns and cities around the West Bank on Saturday night. Palestinian health officials said Israeli fire killed five there, but gave few details.
___
Adwan reported from Rafah, Gaza Strip. Associated Press writers Wafaa Shurafa in Gaza City and Isabel DeBre and Julia Frankel in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
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"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
As for your earlier myth about natives deciding to peacefully coexist with European conquerers, I'm pretty sure Custer and thousands of others that fell to native resistance would beg to differ. Or was Native American resistance just terrorism and a wish for ethic cleansing in your mind? Coexisting only happened once military superiority and the white mans boundless cruelty were well established.
The foundational events of the Nakba took place during and shortly after the 1948 Palestine war, including 78% of Mandatory Palestine being declared as Israel, the expulsion and flight of 700,000 Palestinians, the related depopulation and destruction of over 500 Palestinian villages by Zionist militias and subsequent geographical erasure, the denial of the Palestinian right of return, the creation of permanent Palestinian refugees and the "shattering of Palestinian society".[9][10][11][12] The expulsion of the Palestinians has since been described by some historians as ethnic cleansing.
How many unarmed Palestinians have been killed trying to return home? But sure it all must be anti-semitism as you are seemingly trying to infer. Anytime something like this happens it is wrong and no one gets a pass. The founding fathers gave themselves a pass, GB gave Australia a pass after starting a penal colony on aboriginal land, but that don't mean shit if the natives never co signed, just a bunch of legalese.
No one gets a pass. America has an original sin and it isn't slavery. If you can go through life and think this is A ok because the world is just one occupied territory, well that's sad for you. Seeing this continually unfold in real time over my whole life as long as it has is sad.
Israel just keeps penning in the Palestinians and striking with a harder and harder fist after nearly decimating an entire culture.
Wrong is wrong. But please tell me how America and Australia and Canada get a pass and why it's ok to just continue this type of shit in Israel or anywhere else for that matter because previous generations of wealthy white men got away with it.
I'm glad I don't view history through a one way street.
There are no kings inside the gates of eden
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
There are no kings inside the gates of eden
WWII was the last straw of this four thousand year old story, that’s why the UN put together its Partition Plan, which was met immediately with violence from the Arab nations. No bargaining table no negotiations. That’s how the Arabs have handled this complex process since their “beginning” which is really chapter 950. The Arabs start wars, and don’t like how they end.
Look at what happened in WWII and how the arab states responded to these people cleansed by hitler. That violence is their legacy. They stand for hatred and violence, decade after decade, right from the ashes of Hitlers war.
Israel occupies key strategic lands in the West Bank because these lands were used to attack Israeli civilians , including women and children, and were seized when Israel was attacked in the 1967 war. The US, Canada, Australia and many other countries get to keep land won after conflict to try to secure peace , yet Israel does not?
Israel occupies other lands in the West Bank that was theirs thousands of years ago. It’s Sunday, you are free to go to church now in multiple religions and read about this in the Bible.
Israel has a list of peace deals with Arab nations. Todays war is about Iran not liking the Saudi talks and destroying the peace process. Go ahead and support Iran.
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
“There is today in the Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967 a deeply discriminatory dual legal and political system that privileges the 700,000 Israeli Jewish settlers living in the 300 illegal Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank,” said Michael Lynk, the UN Special Rapporteur for the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967.
“Living in the same geographic space, but separated by walls, checkpoints, roads and an entrenched military presence, are more than three million Palestinians, who are without rights, living under an oppressive rule of institutional discrimination and without a path to a genuine Palestinian state that the world has long promised is their right.
“Another two million Palestinians live in Gaza, described regularly as an ‘open-air prison’, without adequate access to power, water or health, with a collapsing economy and with no ability to freely travel to the rest of Palestine or the outside world.”
The Special Rapporteur said that a political regime which so intentionally and clearly prioritizes fundamental political, legal and social rights to one group over another within the same geographic unit on the basis of one’s racial-national-ethnic identity satisfies the international legal definition of apartheid.
Oh man, how many people do when it comes to Israel/Palestine and the Middle East in general? I find the history- particularly post WWII- to be hugely complex and convoluted. I'm certainly not one to claim to have a clear understanding of what's going on. One thing I can say almost for certain though, it must be hell for a lot of people in that region who just want to go on with day to day life. I can't even begin to imagine what hell it must be to live there.
guessing its a picture from the festival before shit went iff.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
need to make this clear to Israel, so there isnt another "accidental" strike.....
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14