i cant believe a lot more people blame Hamas for the loss of life in Gaza than Israel!
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It's a very loaded question. Of course, it is Israel who is directly responsible as they are dropping the bombs and firing the missiles. Nevertheless Hamas must also be held responsible; it was inevitable that the pointless and idiotic firing of rockets into Israel would provoke a response. It is a totally disproportionate one, but that was also totally predictable - Hamas wanted this.
It's a very loaded question. Of course, it is Israel who is directly responsible as they are dropping the bombs and firing the missiles. Nevertheless Hamas must also be held responsible; it was inevitable that the pointless and idiotic firing of rockets into Israel would provoke a response. It is a totally disproportionate one, but that was also totally predictable - Hamas wanted this.
Please read the article below, and tell just who it is that broke the Gaza truce.
Gaza truce broken as Israeli raid kills six Hamas gunmen
* Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem
* guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 5 November 2008 14.32 GMT
* Article history
Gaza strike Israel
A man sifts throught rubble after Israel's overnight operation Photograph: Marco Longari/AFP
A four-month ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian militants in Gaza was in jeopardy today after Israeli troops killed six Hamas gunmen in a raid into the territory.
Hamas responded by firing a wave of rockets into southern Israel, although no one was injured. The violence represented the most serious break in a ceasefire agreed in mid-June, yet both sides suggested they wanted to return to atmosphere of calm.
Israeli troops crossed into the Gaza Strip late last night near the town of Deir al-Balah. The Israeli military said the target of the raid was a tunnel that they said Hamas was planning to use to capture Israeli soldiers positioned on the border fence 250m away. Four Israeli soldiers were injured in the operation, two moderately and two lightly, the military said.
One Hamas gunman was killed and Palestinians launched a volley of mortars at the Israeli military. An Israeli air strike then killed five more Hamas fighters. In response, Hamas launched 35 rockets into southern Israel, one reaching the city of Ashkelon.
"This was a pinpoint operation intended to prevent an immediate threat," the Israeli military said in a statement. "There is no intention to disrupt the ceasefire, rather the purpose of the operation was to remove an immediate and dangerous threat posted by the Hamas terror organisation."
In Gaza, a Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhoum, said the group had fired rockets out of Gaza as a "response to Israel's massive breach of the truce".
"The Israelis began this tension and they must pay an expensive price. They cannot leave us drowning in blood while they sleep soundly in their beds," he said.
The attack comes shortly before a key meeting this Sunday in Cairo when Hamas and its political rival Fatah will hold talks on reconciling their differences and creating a single, unified government. It will be the first time the two sides have met at this level since fighting a near civil war more than a year ago.
Until now it had appeared both Israel and Hamas, which seized full control of Gaza last summer, had an interest in maintaining the ceasefire. For Israel it has meant an end to the daily barrage of rockets landing in southern towns, particularly Sderot. For Gazans it has meant an end to the regular Israeli military raids that have caused hundreds of casualties, many of them civilian, in the past year. Israel, however, has maintained its economic blockade on the strip, severely limiting imports and preventing all exports from Gaza.
Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister, had personally approved the Gaza raid, the Associated Press said. The Israeli military concluded that Hamas was likely to want to continue the ceasefire despite the raid, it said. The ceasefire was due to run for six months and it is still unclear whether it will stretch beyond that limit.
It's a very loaded question. Of course, it is Israel who is directly responsible as they are dropping the bombs and firing the missiles. Nevertheless Hamas must also be held responsible; it was inevitable that the pointless and idiotic firing of rockets into Israel would provoke a response. It is a totally disproportionate one, but that was also totally predictable - Hamas wanted this.
That's just propaganda. What benefit is it for Hamas to have Israel invade and destroy everything they have built? There is no logic in that.
It doesn't matter who may or may not have 'broken' the truce. Hamas are in no position to conduct a conventional war; firing the rockets was either idiotic or calculated to produce just the response it did. Take your pick.
format_quote Originally Posted by Zarmina
That's just propaganda. What benefit is it for Hamas to have Israel invade and destroy everything they have built? There is no logic in that.
It's not 'propaganda', it is my considered opinion (which may or may not be right!) I think you are being niave. From the Hamas perspective it is perfectly 'logical'. The death and destruction is a price they are prepared to pay to provoke the reaction they wanted. In the short term they wish to increase their own prestige - it will be a huge propaganda victory for them if rockets are still being fired after the Israelis withdraw. They saw how Hezbollah came out of the Lebanon war. In the long term their objective is the destruction of the State of Israel, and their only means to potentially achieve that (as they cannot hope to do so themselves) is to provoke all out war between Arab (and maybe Iranian) and Israeli. A negotiated peace is an anathema to them.
Other is many things, one of them being both, Hamas and Israel. There's also the US, Iran etc and last but not least, Germany, a country guilty of committing the holocaust, without which Israel would probably not have been formed.
Please read the article below, and tell just who it is that broke the Gaza truce.
Gaza truce broken as Israeli raid kills six Hamas gunmen
Let's play this game (even though both sides are to blame)...
Rockets Ambush IDF Patrol On Gaza Border: Incidents Were First Truce Violations
November 3, 2008
By David Bedein, Middle East Correspondent
Published: Sunday, November 02, 2008
Two serious incidents of truce violation occurred over the weekend on Israel's Gaza border.
Early Friday morning, Palestinian terrorists fired two anti-tank rockets at Israeli troops patrolling the security fence near the Gaza border, near Kibbutz Nir Oz, opposite the Gaza town of Khan Yunis.
No Israeli soldiers were injured.
The incident occurred when the troops, combat soldiers from the Israeli Paratroopers Brigade, spotted a group of armed terrorists attempting to plant a bomb near the security fence and began to approach it. At that moment, the rockets were fired. In response, the troops opened fire on the terrorists, driving them from the area.
Additional troops combed the area, searching for more bombs. Palestinian sources told the MAAN Palestinian news agency that following the gunfire, Apache helicopters and unmanned aerial vehicles flew over the city of Khan Yunis. They also reported that IDF troops fired into Gaza, but it resulted in no casualties.
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