From Childhood, I was always hearing news stories of ‘Suicide Bombers’ in Israel. Israel, the nation created by UN mandate in 1947. The land once ruled by the Ottoman Empire (Turkey), later conquered by the British, and then partitioned or sold off into separate lands to be controlled by the Zionist and Palestinians. Let’s understand, there has always been a small Jewish presence in the area. This is clear from the maps I have included in this post. However, after WWII, after the defeat of Hitler and the NAZI regime, 1O0’s of thousands of Jews immigrated from Europe and other Arab nations to land supported by the Zionist Movement. The Zionists were given the military armory to protect and support themselves from Western powers (Britain, the US, and others) and financial support from wealthy Jews in other countries.
While the Zionists accepted the land that the British and the UN parceled out, surrounding Arab nations rejected the proposal. This resulted in war and the Palestinian people were forced off of their land in the areas affected by the UN mandate. This was the beginning of decades of hardships suffered by the Palestinian people.
All this time the Palestinian people have been at the mercy of recalcitrant Arab nations that did not want a Jewish state in the region. They also did not want Palestinian Refugees in their lands. The people of Palestine were pushed out by the Zionists and other Arab nations pushed them back because they didn’t want the threat of future uprisings from refugees.
We were taught that Egyptian President Gamal Nasser, Jordanian King Hussein bin Talal, and Syrian Head of State, Salah Jadid launched an attack on Israel in June of 1967. While it is true that Nasser did take some provocative actions like closing down the Suez canal to Israeli ships, the reality was Israel that launched a aerial strike against Egypt, destroying its air force, that culminated in the infamous 6-Day War. Israel was fighting on three fronts during this period. Egypt, Syria, and Jordan.
On 5 June 1967, as the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) was in the process of leaving the Middle East, Israel launched a series of preemptive airstrikes against Egyptian airfields and other facilities, launching its war effort. Egyptian forces were caught by surprise, and nearly all of Egypt’s military aerial assets were destroyed, giving Israel air supremacy. Simultaneously, the Israeli military launched a ground offensive into Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula as well as the Egyptian-occupied Gaza Strip. After some initial resistance, Nasser ordered an evacuation of the Sinai Peninsula; by the sixth day of the conflict, Israel had occupied the entire Sinai Peninsula. Jordan, which had entered into a defense pact with Egypt just a week before the war began, did not take on an all-out offensive role against Israel. However, the Jordanians did launch attacks against Israeli forces to slow Israel’s advance. On the fifth day, Syria joined the war by shelling Israeli positions in the north.
Egypt and Jordan agreed to a ceasefire on 8 June, and Syria on 9 June, and it was signed with Israel on 11 June. The Six-Day War resulted in more than 20,000 fatal Arab casualties, while Israel suffered fewer than 1,000 fatal casualties. Alongside the combatant casualties were the deaths of 20 Israeli civilians killed in Arab forces air strikes on Jerusalem, 15 UN peacekeepers killed by Israeli strikes in the Sinai at the outset of the war, and 34 US personnel killed in the USS Liberty incident in which Israeli air forces struck a United States Navy technical research ship.
At the time of the cessation of hostilities, Israel had seized Syria’s Golan Heights, the Jordanian-annexed West Bank (including East Jerusalem), and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula as well as the Egyptian-occupied Gaza Strip. The displacement of civilian populations as a result of the Six-Day War would have long-term consequences, as around 280,000 to 325,000 Palestinians and 100,000 Syrians fled or were expelled from the West Bank and the Golan Heights, respectively. Nasser resigned in shame following Israel’s victory, but was later reinstated following a series of protests across Egypt. In the aftermath of the conflict, Egypt closed the Suez Canal until 1975, eventually leading to the 1970s energy crisis and 1973 oil crisis due to the impact on oil deliveries coming to Europe from the Middle East through the Suez Canal. (Source: Wikipedia).
One of the things most of us don’t know about or recall is that Soviet Union refused to allow Jews to emigrate to Israel. Eventually the emigration of Jews was permitted and that opened up another avenue of Palestinian expulsion. Israel allowed newly arriving Jews to open up settlements in land controlled by Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), forcibly expelling Palestinians and protecting the settlements with brutally harsh policies.
This crack down was implemented mostly in the West Bank territory. This is land that is governed under apartheid-like policies. Palestinians have little protection from the abuse of settlers, where IDF generally only step in for the benefit of Israeli citizens. Most West Bank Arabs do not have citizenship protections.
I give you this background to provide some context. The last piece, is that, like Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has been indicted for corruption. To save himself, he aligned his government with the extreme right wing of the country.
His governing and military partners had been so engrossed in tamping down unrest in the West Bank, that they ignored the threat of Hamas in Gaza. It is now being reported that Israeli Intelligence had the plans for the November 7th attack a full year before the operation was implemented. The military leaders who reviewed the plans were so arrogant that they decided it was merely aspirational and could not be carried out.
Netanyahu, was so focused on stripping the Israeli Supreme Court from having the power to hold him accountable for his crimes, that no one in the intelligence agency thought to bring the potential treat to him. Now Netanyahu has only one choice; wage war in Gaza on a genocidal level. The mantra is Hamas must be eliminated. He is willing to do that while killing all the innocent citizens it takes to accomplish the goal.
The problem for Netanyahu is that Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hamas Leadership view all the citizens of Gaza as martyrs. They are willing to sacrifice as many innocents as needed because they understand that the extreme right-wing policies of the current Israeli government will damage their standing in the world community as it did to the cruelty of the White regime in South Africa.
The more we know about the suffering of the Palestinian people, since 1947, we learn that Israelis missed the lessons not to mirror Nazi policies that displaced and dehumanized Jews. There is a flip side of history. Arab policies to discriminate against Jews all across North Africa and the Middle East also helped Hitler carry out his plans.
I write this post in response to reporting of people all over the US, especially Palestinians in the US, who express issues with President Biden for standing with Israel in the face of the November 7th attack. I have not heard one word of reporting condemning Yahya Sinwar and the Palestinian leadership who willingly martyr their citizens in Gaza. They know the level of retaliation their attacks would garner.
They blame President Biden for providing weapons currently being used in the war. However, here is the stickler. U.S. aid to Israel in this case has not yet been approved. The MAGA forces in Congress are currently holding up arms shipments to both Israel and Ukraine partisan politics. It has been Biden, behind the scenes using diplomacy, to focus on getting the hostages released on both sides. Many Palestinian women and children being held in Israeli prisons are also, in a sense, hostages.
Few, if any, of those complaining about Biden have applauded the number of Palestinian women and children being released from Israeli prisons in the hostage exchanges. Why is it that Israel has so many women and children being detained in their military prisons? By the way, as they release prisoners in these exchanges, they continue to arrest and imprison others.
In other words, as I always say, we cannot trust the ‘Mainstream/Legacy Media’ to keep us accurately informed. We can not trust that American news media will honestly frame what is happening. You cannot go by social media without fact checking . Most of all, become a blank slate, then do your research. After you look at the information you acquire ask yourself how the information stacks up against what you thought you knew. How does it stack up against what you were taught?
Israel is not the only side that is suffering here. Be objective and compassionate. That doesn’t mean you cannot condemn Hamas. You can also condemn the extreme right governing policies of Israel. Innocents on both sides are suffering needless pain and destruction.
Please take a look at the graphics, articles, and video below. If you are aware of most of this, count yourself well informed. If you are just learning most of this info, keep researching now. Learn what you can so we don’t turn a blind eye to the suffering of innocent people be they Palestinian or Israeli.
A top official with Hamas has vowed the terror group will “sacrifice martyrs” and will conduct terror attacks against Israeli citizens until the country has been annihilated.
Ghazi Hamad, who belongs to Hamas’ political bureau made the statements during a recent interview with a Lebanese TV station.
Hamad then said Islamist militants will carry out Oct. 7-style attacks until it brings Israel to its knees and eventually to total destruction.
“We must teach Israel a lesson, and we will do this again and again,” he said.
While referring to the surprise attacks last month, Hamad added, “[The attacks are] just the first time … Will we have to pay a price? Yes, and we are ready to pay it. We are called a nation of martyrs, and we are proud to sacrifice martyrs.”
He said Hamas would be justified in its actions and accused the state of Israel of occupying Palestinian land.
“We are the victims of the occupation,” he stated. “Period. Therefore, nobody should blame us for the things we do. On Oct. 7, Oct. 10, October one-million, everything we do is justified.”
Hamad also claimed Islamist militants did not set out on Oct. 7 to target civilians and that the group faced what he called “complications.”
Hamad made it clear that Hamas does not simply want Gaza, but all of Israel.
“The existence of Israel is illogical,” he said. “The existence of Israel is what causes all that pain, blood and tears.”
The Israeli Defense Forces are currently rooting out Hamas terrorists and their leaders through a historic ground incursion into the territory.”
https://www.npr.org/2023/12/03/1216138367/hamas-gaza-leader-yahya-sinwar
“Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, is widely believed to have helped mastermind the unprecedented Hamas attack that changed the course of Israeli-Palestinian history.
He spent more than two decades behind bars in Israel, before being freed 12 years ago in a hostage ransom deal his brother helped negotiate. In early October, Sinwar outsmarted Israel with the same hostage-taking tactic — resulting in Israel’s deadliest day on record.
Now Israel seeks to eradicate the Islamist militant group Sinwar leads in Gaza. Israel, the United States, Europe and others designate Hamas as a terrorist organization, but its surprise attack earned it widespread support among Palestinians, many of whom regard it as resisting decades of Israeli subjugation.
Israel also vows to kill Sinwar, a short, wiry man with cropped white hair. Israeli leaders have deemed him a psychopath.
Sinwar assembled a small team of confidants who would smuggle cellphones into prison, interrogate new prisoners about how they had been caught preparing an attack against Israel, and catch Palestinian inmates serving as informants for Israel.
“So many spies,” Mansour says, speaking to NPR in the Palestinian city of Ramallah.
In 2006, Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was captured by Hamas and held hostage in Gaza for five years. The man who guarded the captive soldier was none other than Sinwar’s own brother, Mohammed.
In 2011, Hamas freed the captive soldier in exchange for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners. Sinwar’s brother made sure Sinwar was among them.
“All the prisoners [looked] at him as a man who can decide about their life,” Mansour says.
His VIP status in prison, and return to Gaza with the released prisoners, helped Sinwar rise in the ranks to lead Hamas in Gaza.
A Reasonable Point of View 