This morning (7/16/14), I receive the following message from Jewish Voice for Peace:
Israel announced this morning that it would accept a unilateral ceasefire, but the terms were actually a continuation of Israel’s ongoing war on civilians—a continued blockade of Gaza, continued extrajudicial assassinations, continued imprisonment of Palestinians without charge, and continued occupation. And with no guarantee Israel wouldn't violate the agreement as they have on numerous occasions in the past.
That expresses similar comments that I made on this site last night. Some of this diary is from a comment I made yesterday to "The Egyptian Initiative for a Cease Fire in Gaza" diary by InAnlya. AoT was perhaps the only one who wrote that the deal was "unlikely" since the "cease fire" only included Gaza and not the West Bank. A very good observation.
This unfair proposal, not accepted by Hamas, was put together by Sisi with input from Blair, Netanyahu, and perhaps Kerry, with zero consultation with the Palestinian Authority or Hamas. This creation was not from a group that had the welfare of Palestinians as a concern. The so-called "cease fire" would OK's Israeli attacks against the militants in all of Palestine. Israel only has to stop the targeting of civilians. But, since Israel never admits "hostilities" on civilians it changes nothing for them. This cease fire would have applied to all Palestinians, while it approved the continued violence from the Israelis who have from the beginning said that they never target civilians. --continue below.
Palestinians were asked to stop all "hostilities." Nothing was asked of the Israelis since they claim to never intentionally kill civilians--it's always the fault of Hamas and their human shield? It's easy to see why the Israelis, Americans, and the Egyptians would love this now rejected plan. Here is the key section as supplied by InAnlya:
Section 1a. Israel shall cease all hostilities against the Gaza Strip via land, sea, and air, and shall commit to refrain from conducting any ground raids against Gaza and targeting civilians.
Certainly the "Cease Fire" proposal was an extremely effective short term propaganda coup for the U.S. and Israel. I do think that the Palesinians should have waited a bit longer before the rejection. This is easily seen in the immediate commentary from all the talking heads in the pro-Israeli corporate media that uniformly condemned Hamas. I think that InAntalya, had correctly anticipated much of the response:
If the Israeli government maintains its acceptance of the initiative and the leadership of Hamas does not accept the initiative in the very near future, Hamas will have done something which I feel is both incredibly stupid and counterproductive.
However, If the past is any indication of the future, to match the IDF killings of operation Cast Lead, an additional 1,800 Palestinians will need to be killed--this number includes the many who will die from injuries and other causes of war after the official end date -- this is based on B'tselem research. With the "cease fire" propaganda trap,
the Israelis are given the green light to continue the killings of women and children, and targeted assassinations in all of Palestine for at least a couple more weeks, at which time the international community may get sufficiently outraged with the atrocity, and demand a stop.
True, Hamas does know that Israel can wipe them off the map with their vastly superior American supplied killing machines. But there comes a point in life for people who suffer decades of inhumane and degrading human rights violations, that death is not a big deal. The Palestinians feel that an OK now is worthless, since the trap includes nothing to stop a repeat performance. They are putting a bit of faith in the international community. Will the world respond, or are we all too filled with hate and racism?
Some in this community may have found it odd to see my name so often in I/P commentaries. I have been a one issue person ever since discovering the terrorism of war in 1951, while in North Korea in an infantry squad that was wiped out of existence. A review of my prior contributions to DKos will show that anti-war comments have always been my focus.
I try to express the thinking of all by buddies who died in a war that they hated and did not understand, away from home and their loved ones. We served in below zero weather without proper winter clothing, and I have forever felt especially badly for those who died of frosbite.There is nothing glorious or noble about dying in wars. The world needs to find better answers.
I may not answer to many comments. I'm a slow typist, and these issues are very upsetting for me. And I hope go be doing something else.