posted
Israeli troops move into Gaza to retrieve kidnapped soldier
JERUSALEM (CNN) -- Israeli troops crossed the border into southern Gaza early Wednesday in a campaign meant to secure the return of a soldier kidnapped by Palestinian militants over the weekend, the Israeli military said.
Jets hit a power plant in Gaza City and knocked out a bridge connecting the northern and southern parts of town in predawn airstrikes, witnesses said.
Video from the Palestinian Ramattan news agency showed fires burning at the site of the power station. (Watch scenes of Gaza damage as tanks roll -- 2:07)
Israeli troops and tanks had gathered along the Gaza border as tensions mounted over the abduction of 19-year-old Cpl. Gilad Shalit.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Tuesday threatened an "extended campaign" against Palestinian leaders unless the soldier was released.
"All targets" would be considered for possible action, Olmert told Israel's parliament, the day after ruling out any deals with militants for Shalit's release.
"We would not make compromises with terror. We would not hold negotiation with [terror]," Olmert told the Knesset amid the escalating crisis.
"No terrorist would be immune."
In the first round of strikes soon after midnight, Israeli aircraft hit two bridges in central Gaza to limit the ability of Shalit's captors to move him, said Capt. Jacob Dallal, a spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces.
Dallal said Israel will go to "whatever lengths necessary" to bring Shalit back.
"We are trying to make it clear to the Palestinian Authority and to the terror organizations that we will take the necessary steps to secure his safe return," he said.
Israel has slapped a land and sea blockade on Gaza, cutting off people's movements and shipments of fuel and food, nine months after returning control of the territory to the Palestinians.
Inside Gaza, Palestinians have dumped piles of sand on major roads, intended to slow any advance of Israeli tanks and armor and provide cover for gunmen. (Watch Palestinians express defiance as tensions rise -- 2:34)
Israel says it is holding the Palestinian Authority responsible for the safety of Shalit, who was captured Sunday by Palestinian militants at a guard post inside Israel.
Olmert said he did not want to hurt innocents, but the Israeli defense minister said the potential offensive would be deadly.
"There is no doubt we will have to carry out an operation which could cost many lives, but the Palestinian groups have to understand there is a price to pay for any attacks against Israel," said Defense Minister Amir Peretz.
Israeli leaders said Hamas officials, including political leader Khaled Meshaal, who is in exile in Syria, could be targets of Israeli military action.
Aides said Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya were directly involved in negotiations to free Shalit.
The Palestinian factions Fatah, headed by Abbas, and Haniya's Hamas, have pleaded with Israel to hold off on military action, saying an offensive would only complicate efforts to end the crisis.
Palestinian leaders have also said they fear Israel will not stop at freeing Shalit but will also go after Palestinian militants who have fired hundreds of crude Qassam rockets into Israel in recent months.
Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shimon Peres recognized a split between the politicians and the militants, saying Meshaal was behind the kidnapping and "wants to destroy any chance for peace." (Watch Peres' take on the escalating border tensions -- 6:27)
"All this was done against, maybe, the better judgment of the Palestinian leaders on the ground. The orders came from Syria. They came from a gentleman who wants to destroy any chance for peace," Peres said.
Meshaal, the head of the Hamas political office, lives in exile in Damascus.
"A small group of terrible people sitting in Damascus," Peres said, was mobilizing "the whole world against the Palestinians," who he said were the real victims of the kidnapping.
Peres said Israel believes that Shalit, who holds dual Israeli-French citizenship, is "alive and healthy." Another teenager reported missing
In another development, the Popular Resistance Committees, one of the Palestinian militant groups that says it is holding Shalit, said it also was holding an Israeli settler in the West Bank.
Israeli police said a family in the settlement of Itamar near Nablus had filed a missing persons report. The missing settler was identified as Eliyahu Asheri, 18.
He was last seen Sunday night at the French Hill hitchhiking post in Jerusalem, on the road leading north to the West Bank. His parents reported him missing at noon Monday.
CNN's Elise Labott and John Vause contributed to this report.
-------------------- Spend word for word with me and I shall make your wit bankrupt Posts: 977 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
The Palestinians are fools, indeed. They know all too well what happens when they mess with the Hebrews. The IDF is incredibly advanced and skilled. The Palestinians are no match for Israel. Only a nuke nation is a match for the Hebrews. Besides, the Palestinians are hated and despised amongst many Arab nations. They have been called "dogs," which is strong language in the Muslim culture.
Posts: 222 | From: Earth | Registered: May 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
ahhh.. but an excuse to take out Israel they are for the muslim world.. as is this an excuse for Russia and China to get rid of us.. atleast it will be before the end.
-------------------- Spend word for word with me and I shall make your wit bankrupt Posts: 977 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Having you been watching those "Left Behind" movies with Kirk Cameron again?
-------------------- I came here to teach you about the enchanting rhythms of the universe... Posts: 222 | From: Earth | Registered: May 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
GAZA (Reuters) - A spokesman for gunmen in the Gaza Strip said they had fired a rocket tipped with a chemical warhead at Israel early on Thursday.
The Israeli army had no immediate comment on the claim by the spokesman from the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, an armed wing of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement.
The group had recently claimed to possess about 20 biological warheads for the makeshift rockets commonly fired from Gaza at Israeli towns. This was the first time the group had claimed firing such a rocket.
"The al-Aqsa Brigades have fired one rocket with a chemical warhead" at southern Israel, Abu Qusai, a spokesman for the group, said in Gaza.
An Israeli military spokeswoman said the army had not detected that any such rocket was fired, nor was there any report of such a weapon hitting Israel.
posted
And here I thought we would start the next war.
Sigh...get used to this. It isn't going to stop anytime soon.
-------------------- No longer eligible for government service due to lack of tax issues. Posts: 5178 | From: Up North | Registered: Dec 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Palestinians wouldnt know what to do with peace. To them its boring and it might force them to go out and get jobs.
As for the Israeli's im growing a little tired of them is well. Its no secret that they were flying the American flag for years during alot of their skirmishes and the seizing of land. And the comments Netenyaho made right after 9/11 says it all(Its a good thing)
-------------------- "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" Posts: 4005 | From: Shaolin | Registered: Oct 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
still not over.. Hamas says they will negotiate for the soldier's life.. they want all prisoners freed.. namely all women and all the hamas officials detained yesterday by Israel.. Israel has stated that is not an option...
-------------------- Spend word for word with me and I shall make your wit bankrupt Posts: 977 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
CAIRO, Egypt (AP) -- Anger flared across the Middle East on Thursday over Israel's assault on the Gaza Strip, and Arab governments were assailed for not aiding Palestinians. The Egyptian government's top rival, the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, urged Egyptians to gather at pro-Palestinian demonstrations Friday, the day of weekly Islamic prayers.
The Israeli offensive put the governments of U.S.-allied Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia in a bind.
They have been cold to the new Hamas government, having done little to help amid the West's financial boycott to pressure Palestinians into moderating their positions on Israel. That has resulted in many Arabs feeling their governments are leaving the Palestinians in the lurch.
The leader of the Muslim Brotherhood accused Arab leaders of being impotent.
"We haven't heard even a whisper from you," Mohammed Mahdi Akef said. "You can't provide medicine and milk and the necessities of life to our besieged people in Palestine .... You take a hesitant stance toward their freely elected government, fearing the spread of the virus of freedom to your own fertile pastures."
Akef called on Arabs and other Muslims to "express your anger over what is happening, make the thunder of your voices heard ... using the peaceful means that are at your disposal."
The Brotherhood called for protests in Cairo and other Egyptian cities after Friday prayers. Past protests organized by the group have erupted into clashes with security forces.
In Jordan's capital, Amman, some 50 people held a sit-in protest, holding banners reading: "Wake up Arab nation! Save the babies, the old men, the land and our honor." Jordanian columnist Taher Adwan accused the Israelis of being "criminals and killers."
"What is frustrating is that the world, under U.S. pressures and bribes, has put them above the law," he wrote in the independent newspaper Al-Arab Al-Yawm.
The head of an alliance of Persian Gulf countries - some of which have taken quiet steps toward economic ties with Israel - called the Israeli offensive "barbaric."
"This dangerous escalation against the Palestinian people is a war against innocent civilians, women, children and the elderly that has left Gaza without water and electricity," Abdel Rahman Attiye, secretary-general of the Gulf Cooperation Council, said in a statement issued on behalf of the group's six member countries.
An emergency session of the 22-member Arab League in Cairo urged Arab nations to provide "urgent support" for the Palestinians.
But Abdul Khaleq Abdulla, a political scientist at United Arab Emirates University, said, "There's absolutely nothing the Arab world can do. The Palestinians are left alone to go through all this by themselves."
Egyptian officials urged the Syrian-based political leader of the Palestinian militant group Hamas, Khaled Mashaal, to obtain the release of an Israeli soldier whose abduction set off the confrontation.
An aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said both Abbas and Egyptian officials called Syrian President Bashar Assad to ask him to persuade Mashaal to order the soldier's release. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak spoke with Abbas on Thursday, Egypt's state news agency said.
Mashaal, meanwhile, sought help from Arab leaders to stop Israel's incursion, a statement from his office said.
"This situation demands that Arab officials and the international community take a tough stance," Mashaal's top aide, Moussa Abu Marzouk, told Al-Jazeera television. "They should pressure Israel to withdraw from the middle of cities and stop shelling civilians."
posted
Newspaper: Arab hackers shut down Israeli Web sites after Israel invades Gaza
June 30, 2006 - 8:20AM
Pro-Palestinian hackers shut down Israeli Internet Web sites as Israeli troops invaded southern Gaza after the abduction of an Israeli soldier, an Israeli newspaper reported Thursday.
The Jerusalem Post reported that about 700 Web sites were shut down in the campaign. Their home pages were replaced by the message, "Hacked by Team-Evil Arab hackers u KILL palestin people we KILL Israeli servers. By early Friday, all the Web sites mentioned in the newspaper article were back in service. The report could not be independently confirmed.
Among the sites mentioned in the newspaper report were Israel's largest bank, Bank Hapoalim, as well as a hospital in Haifa, BMW Israel, Subaru Israel and Citroen Israel.
quote:Originally posted by glassman: it's funny how the Israelis are supposed to overlook constant rocket attacks and ambushes isn't it?
I'm actually kind of shocked they were rather unimpressed about Hamas launching a missle at them tipped with chemical weapons.. I'm sure the chemical was primitive.. surely not sarin or anything like that.. might not even have been mustard gas.. maybe just mustard.. But still..
-------------------- Spend word for word with me and I shall make your wit bankrupt Posts: 977 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
The whole spreading democracy thing is a game we are playing.. realistically what we are doing is setting up the chess board for the fight which is coming. When this thing does blow up... and it is going to happen... we want to be everywhere at once.
-------------------- Spend word for word with me and I shall make your wit bankrupt Posts: 977 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
It will be peacefull once the radiation dissipates... That reminds me,glass, I've been meaning to ask you about global wind patterns with respect to.. ohhh.. say a nuclear war.. any idea?
-------------------- Spend word for word with me and I shall make your wit bankrupt Posts: 977 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Beats me.. euro-something I would guess. I don't believe in the prophecies about this whole thing.. I do believe this is a self fullfilling prophecy though.
-------------------- Spend word for word with me and I shall make your wit bankrupt Posts: 977 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I do believe this is a self fullfilling prophecy though.
whew, you had me worried there again DQ...
i agree that the prophecies get fulfilled because people want them to...
why would we need nukes? they don't solve any of our problems other than eliminating the whole region... that just creates another set of problems like the mess, and loss of oil...
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
We'll need nukes once this all expands into surrounding countries.... Iran gets involved.. Syria... the list goes on and on as soon as they go crazy over the evil zionists persecuting their brethren... Iran signed or is about to sign a war pact with China and Russia.. there's your nuclear war right there.
-------------------- Spend word for word with me and I shall make your wit bankrupt Posts: 977 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Used to kid my friend about standing on the corner with the proverbial "The End is Near" sign. But... self-fulfilling or not, its does appear to be headed in that direction.
OT: not only you're and your but loose and lose. lol
Posts: 184 | Registered: Sep 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by glassman: quite frankly? this is just another example of how stupid the idea is that "spreading democracy" will fix our problems in the mideast....
I agree...maybe we should just try spreading radicalism thats all its doing anyway. Except skew it a little with some Mr.Rogers like Clerks
People gotta take a step back and realize what we're trying to do. Us trying to force-feed democracy to the mid east is the same as them coming in here (with their military) and trying to install Islam. Plain and simple. We're trying to make them go agaisnt what has become their religion.
As for the Israeli soldier the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas "kidnapped". Well lets change the wording to how the Palestinians see it. "The Palestinian "ARMY" Hamas has captured an Israeli soldier and is holding him as a POW.
What people are failing to realize is these "terrorists" (as we call them) are there soldiers. Does a uniform make a differance? If an Israeli soldier got fed up one day and took a granade and ran into a crowd of Palestians would the papers say an "Iraeli terrorist"? I dont think so.... This is a war of words as well dont be fooled by labels used to justify certain actions!
-------------------- "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" Posts: 4005 | From: Shaolin | Registered: Oct 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
you haven't read the background on the attack..
The raid, which used a secret tunnel bored from inside Gaza to 300m (980ft) beyond the Israeli fence that seals off the Palestinian strip, also left two Palestinian fighters dead. It triggered a brief Israeli incursion into the strip.
this was a big operation...
your point about changing some wording is a good point... there have been a lot of cultural mistakes made...
unfortunateley? Bush only seems to be at his ease at a Texas BBQ... his notion of foreign policy is how to deal with hiring all the illegal immigrants he can recruit...
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Whether people realize it or not the Palestians are still at war and have been since 1947. The Palestians are just to embarassed to admit this is all thery're capable of as far as "Bringing it"
whats the differance? OOOHHHHH they didnt declare war! Which would lead to hundreds of thousands of them getting slaughtered......LEGALLY!! according to the Geneva convention........i have to laugh LOL! sick place we live in...i forget who said this but it went something like "the human beings natural state is to be at war at all times"
sound accurate? look around!
WE'RE FRIGGEN ARMY ANTS!!!!
-------------------- "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" Posts: 4005 | From: Shaolin | Registered: Oct 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
"his notion of foreign policy is how to deal with hiring all the illeagl immigrants he can recruit..."
For god's sake, don't stop at foreign policy.
dubya's notion of dealing with anything is to threaten and accuse people (or newspapers).
Diplomacy was one or two steps up the spelling bee like progression beyond what his born rich and left ignorant New England privileged upbringing could muster.
Cheer leaders don't have to "hold the line", they get to yell it at the real players with no chance of injury to either their physical or egotistical being.
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
UBBFriend: Email this page to someone!
Printer-friendly view of this topic
