The bad news is that Ismail Haniyeh is still alive. The good news is that it seems the casualty rate was about 94% terrorists.
Israeli warplanes rained more than 100 tons of bombs on security sites in Hamas-ruled Gaza Saturday and early Sunday, killing at least 230 people in one of the Mideast conflict’s bloodiest assaults in decades. The government said the open-ended campaign was aimed at stopping rocket attacks that have traumatized southern Israel.
Most of the casualties were security forces, but Palestinian officials said at least 15 civilians were among the dead. More than 400 people were also wounded.
Reuters has only a half-count so far, but with the same number of civilian casualties. The Hamas propaganda office has been busy today.
Hamas estimated that at least 100 members of its security forces had been killed, including police chief Tawfiq Jabber and the head of Hamas’s security and protection unit, along with at least 15 women and some children.
The cemeteries in Gaza City will be busy tomorrow. But they may have to wait a few days.
The IDF has also begun mobilizing tanks and reinforcement infantry troops to the Gaza region in the event a ground incursion is ordered. In an interview with the British SKY network, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said that ground forces would indeed enter the Strip if the move was deemed necessary by Jerusalem.
Barak did not declare outright that there would be a ground offensive, but said that he could not presume to guess what Hamas’ next move would be and therefore was preparing the military for any contingency.
I wouldn’t presume to guess Hamas’ next move, but I’m betting it includes more rockets into Israel, seeing as how they haven’t stopped yet.
Three senior terrorists bought the farm today. Unfortunately, we don’t know of any more. But still, the loss of two hundred Hamas terrorists is a good thing.
The 230 Palestinians killed in the Israeli air raid on Gaza Saturday included three senior officers: Tawfik Jabber, the commander of Hamas’ police force in Gaza; his adjutant, Ismail al-Ja’abri, commander of the defense and security directorate; and Abu-Ahmad Ashur, Hamas’ Gaza central district governor.
The UN Security Council will be discussing the Gaza operation. Here’s Bush’s chance for one last in-your-face veto.
And I would like to bring you back to Wednesday night, when Hamas promised that it would “open the gates of hell” if Israel fought back.
Israel “should know that any decision to attack the Gaza Strip will open the gates of hell and we will make you regret your stupidity with tears of blood,” the group’s armed wing, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, said in a statement.
I do believe the gates opened Saturday morning, Gaza time. And not in Israel’s direction.
The good news for Palestinian rock throwers is that the latest skirmish has given them thousands of new rocks of all different sizes
Why worry about “civilian” casualties? Muslims certainly don’t. Just about every single Islamist terrorist attack in the past decades, with only a couple of exceptions, have target civilians. Kill them all, let “allah” sort them out.
Brian, while inaccurate (Gazans throw rockets, not rocks, at Israel), that was pretty funny.
They can use the rocks to shore up their smuggling tunnels, though.
got to talk to my son before he went to his I.D.F. BASE
may Hashem protect him and improve his aim.
In an article I was reading, they said that Palestinians were throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers. I don’t know if that was the West Bank or Gaza.
I was reminded of an article in the “Onion” several years ago. It was a satire about the the “rubble industry” in the Palestinian territories. They described the “Rubble Minister’s” responsibilities. And how the rubble trade was big business there. And how many Palestinians remember the first time their house was destroyed and how they keep some of the rocks as a memento. Although not to make light of the situation currently, it was one of the funniest things I had ever read. The best line was from a construction person who said “today’s pile of rubble is tomorrow’s shopping center. Today’s shopping center is tomorrow’s pile of rubble.”
check this out…
“”The Israelis kill our people in Gaza and the West Bank. The Americans kill our people in Iraq. We’re refugees, kicked out of our home in Tulkarem in 1967 and we’re still displaced,” he said, bemoaning his family’s flight in the 1967 Mideast war.”
1967?!?!?!?!?!? kicked out?!?!? these people are seriously retarded..
also for years I have been wanting Israel to strike hamas recruitment bases.. also fly jets over EVERY hamas rally.. causing thousands of people flee will surely have the opposite effect…
Having been to israel and watched first hand from the defense command center I know first hand that most or all of you are misinformed.The IDF only targets terrorist and its bomb making facilities.The reason for the rubble is that it once (and no longer hides) the terrorist or his weapons. Israel, unlike the muslims, doen’t target civilians.
John, you are preaching to the choir, as we say around here. Nobody’s arguing that the IDF is doing a great job.
I think Meryl means that “Nobody is arguing that the IDF is not doing a great job.”
The quote from “The Onion” was a joke. All “The Onion’s” stories are jokes. It once did one, in 2000 IIRC, about G-d choosing the Chosen People for the next 2000 year stint. Once again He chooses the Jews. ‘”Oh s**t” say the Jews.” The story went on to quote Jews asking if it wasn’t someone else’s turn to be the target of the rest of the world’s resentment of the status of Chosen People.
John, we have often remarked here in comments, as Meryl and others have in posts, that Israel does its best to avoid civilian casualties. The job is doubly difficult because the terrorists so often hide behind civilians. I remember reading about an incident a couple of years ago when some IDF troops cornered two heros of the jihad in a mosque. Typically the Israelis did not storm the place, showing a respect for another religion’s meeting house that few Muslims show in war. The two heros in the mosque called for women to come and surround them as they made their getaway. Because the Israelis did not want to risk killing women the two heroic jihadists were able to slink away in women’s clothing and surrounded by Arab women dressed in their usual abayas.
Yes, we know that the IDF avoids civilian casualties as much as possible.
The onion story was a joke? You mean there really is no “Minister of Rubble”? Duh!!
I haven’t read the story in years, but here is the link.
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/30047
Continued Arafat: “Palestinians need a man of Mr. Al-Katif’s unequaled vision. In the coming years, he will oversee the construction of many wonderful new schools, courthouses, banks, and monuments. He will then truck away the remains of those buildings and monuments when they’re reduced to gravel and dust……….Al-Katif responded to a reporter who suggested that his plan focused more on rubble than on urban development. “These are two sides of the same coin,” Al-Katif said. “Today’s development is tomorrow’s pile of rubble, and today’s pile of rubble is tomorrow’s makeshift shelter for a displaced family. It is all part of the same cycle.”
Michael, the story about the Jews getting chosen again was Satire Wire, defunct for years, but that was way funnier than the Onion.
And, oops.
“Why worry about “civilian†casualties? Muslims certainly don’t. Just about every single Islamist terrorist attack in the past decades, with only a couple of exceptions, have target civilians. Kill them all, let “allah†sort them out.”
Robert, and I say this as a Jewish American, this type of thinking is part of the problem.
When has responding to violence with more violence helped Israel?
A hero of mine, general Petraeus, once said: “Adherence to our values is what differentiates us from our enemy.”
Show that we are humane, show that we are democratic and peace-loving, and that we have morals, and the world will support us again. Hell, apparently, if you ask the Palestinians (CITIZENS not HAMAS), all they want is their electricity, food, and water back.
Regardless, the time for ‘eye for an eye’ vindictiveness is behind us.