The things you never hear about

I understand that it's a big world, and it's impossible to keep up with everything happening everywhere.

But still, it's kind of creepy and shocking to discover that the Middle East's version of the Berlin Wall was (temporarily) knocked down a month ago, and nobody I know has heard anything about it. Described by one commentator as "the biggest prison break in the history of man", Joel Beinin, Professor of Middle East History at Stanford University, described it thusly:

About 3:00 am on Wednesday morning Jan. 23, well-coordinated explosions demolished the iron wall built by Israel to seal the southern border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt (the Philadelphi axis). Tens of thousands of Palestinians streamed across the border and entered the Egyptian side of the town of Rafah, which had been bisected by the wall, in search of food, gasoline, and other basic commodities which have been in short supply for many months in Gaza. The first wave of Palestinians to cross consisted of hundreds of women who were met with water canons and beatings by Egyptian security forces.

Read the rest of his op-ed here.

For that matter, most people I know didn't even know there is a Wall cutting off Palestinians from their own farms and jobs, or that it has already lead to the avoidable deaths of innocents.

Hamas in its own words

3quarksdaily quotes from a Hamas spokesman after they rescued kidnapped BBC journalist Alan Johnston:

We did not deliver up Alan Johnston as some obsequious boon to Western powers.

It was done as part of our effort to secure Gaza from the lawlessness of militias and violence, no matter what the source. Gaza will be calm and under the rule of law — a place where all journalists, foreigners and guests of the Palestinian people will be treated with dignity. Hamas has never supported attacks on Westerners, as even our harshest critics will concede; [...]

Yet our movement is continually linked by President Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to ideologies that they know full well we do not follow, such as the agenda of Al Qaeda and its adherents. But we are not part of a broader war. Our resistance struggle is no one's proxy, although we welcome the support of people everywhere for justice in Palestine.

Dominance rituals, the President and the Terrorist

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz has published a review of "Ariel Sharon: An Intimate Portrait" by Israeli journalist Uri Dan. Dan was the former adviser, close confidant and friend of the late Israeli Prime Minister Arial Sharon.

In the book, Uri Dan discusses a meeting between Sharon and US President Bush, and Bush's fantasy for what he would do to Osama bin Laden if he every got his hands on him. Because I'm trying to keep this blog nannyware-safe, I'll just point you here for the description of what Bush would do if he caught bin Laden. But here's a couple of hints:

The President used to be a frat boy.

There's some serious analysis as well, not just cheap gags. Dominance and sexuality are intimately linked in our species.

(An interesting aside: in the book, Dan also hints obliquely that Palestinian President Yassar Arafat may not have died of natural causes, and that Sharon may have been involved.)

Hamas recognises Israel's existence

Jonathan Zasloff from the Reality Based Community quotes from the Israeli newspaper Haaretz:

This is potentially huge: Hamas leader Khaled Meshal, generally considered a hard-liner within the group, has acknowledged the existence of Israel:

Israel is a "reality" and "there will remain a state called Israel, this is a matter of fact," Meshal said in an interview. The problem was not Israel's existence but the failure to establish a state for Palestinians, said Meshal, whose party leads the Palestinian government.

Unfortunately, the current crop of right-wingers in power in Israel aren't interested in coexistence with the rest of the Arab world, let alone the Palestinians. They have already knocked back serious offers from Saudi Arabia, the spiritual head of Islam, to recognise Israel's right to exist. I predict that this will go nowhere.

Timeline of lead up to the invasion

Remember the two "kidnapped" Israeli soldiers? Israel swore they would never negotiate for their release. Now that they've backed down and have agreed to negotiate for a prisoner exchange, it is worth revisiting the question of the "kidnapping".

Of course these two soldiers weren't kidnapped from their beds or snatched off the street. They were taken prisoner during a clash between Hezbollah fighters and IDF soldiers back in July. Israel insisted that Hezbollah had crossed the border into Israel -- but not at first. It took a few days before the "Hezbollah started it first" story hit the media. Originally, Israel stated that the soldiers had been captured in Lebanon.

Forbes quoted Israeli officials:

The militant group Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers during clashes Wednesday across the border in southern Lebanon, prompting a swift reaction from Israel, which sent ground forces into its neighbor to look for them.

The forces were trying to keep the soldiers' captors from moving them deeper into Lebanon, Israeli government officials said on condition of anonymity.

See also here.

And here which points out that the Israelis had not been able to recover the tank destroyed in the raid (at least as of the time of writing).

It's worth remembering the timeline of events:

• June (date unknown, but on or before the 13th):
  Israel apparently shells a Gaza beach, injuring at least one family of Palestinians.


• June 13: Israel launches another airstrike against Gaza, killing eleven.


• June 24: Israel raids Gaza, kidnapping/capturing two Palestinian civilians, one of whom is a doctor.


• June 27: Hamas apparently used a tunnel to raid Israel, capturing an Israeli soldier:
  
  

  "KIBBUTZ KEREM SHALOM - Israel (CBS/AP) June 25 -- The brazen pre-dawn attack was the first ground assault by Palestinian militants since Israel pulled out of Gaza last summer, and the first abduction of an Israeli soldier by Palestinians since 1994..."

  
  If you've been reading media reports here, one would be forgiven for thinking that Israelis soldiers were being kidnapped on a daily basis.


• June 27: The plot thickens. The Shin Bet claims that the IDF was given detailed warnings of where and when the tunnel raid was going to take place.
  
  Probe: IDF knew militants planned abduction via tunnel
  Link (apparently no longer on line) here.


• July 12th: Two Israeli soldiers were captured by Hezbollah. Immediately afterwards, Israel begins launching air strikes against not just the Hezbollah-controlled south, but Beirut and the Christian north, including Lebanese army bases in the north.


• Also on July 12: IDF Chief Lt. General Dan Halutz threatens to "turn the clock back on Lebanon 20 years", as reported in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz.
  Sorry no direct link, but it is referenced here.

After the Israeli invasion had started, SF Gate reveals that the attack on Lebanon has been planned for at least one year and possibly as many as three. Israel's claims of self-defence do not hold water.

Trish Schuh of Counterpunch has also discussed this shifting border crossing. Now that Israeli lawyers are suing the Lebanese government (talk about blaming the victim), the question of who cross the border first will take in greater importance. She quotes a report on the ABC News in Australia, quoting the IDF:

The sources say the Israeli soldiers had been seized at around 9am local time across the border from Aita al Shaab, some 15 kilometers from the Mediterranean coast. The Israeli army confirmed that two Israeli soldiers had been captured on the Lebanese frontier. Israeli ground forces crossed into Lebanon to hunt for the missing soldiers, Israeli Army Radio said.

and the Voice of America, reporting from Jerusalem on July 12:

Speaking to reporters outside the Israeli Foreign Ministry, spokesman Mark Regev says Hezbollah is responsible for the violence. "It appears we have an escalation in the North," he said. "It is very clear that the escalation started on the Lebanese side of the border, and Israel will respond appropriately."

"The escalation started on the Lebanese side of the border". What were Israeli troops doing on the Lebanese side of the border? Picking daisies? Sounds like "He started it by hitting me back" to me.

Although it is getting further away from the immediate cause of the war, it is worth remembering the Israeli provocations towards Hamas and Hezbollah (assassinations, both bungled and successful, bombings, shelling of civilians, etc.). In Down the Memory Hole we have some hard figures which show which group of people is at greater risk of death and injury and who it really is that needs defending:

...between September 2005 and June 2006, 144 Palestinians in Gaza were killed by Israeli forces, according to a list compiled by the Israeli human rights group B'tselem; 29 of those killed were children. During the same period, no Israelis were killed as a result of violence from Gaza.

Don't forget the Gaza Strip

While the world's attention is on Lebanon, we should remember also that Israel is also attacking the Gaza Strip.

Radio New Zealand reports that Israel fires about 150 artillery shells into the tiny occupied territory every day, and has killed about 140 people over the last month. Several times per week Israel sends attack helicopters over Gaza. Deliveries of essentials like food have been virtually halted, and the power station has been bombed, leaving people without clean water and electricity.

Life's little ironies

In one of life's little ironies, the Israelis used to take credit for "creating" Hezbollah and Hamas, as "safe" religious alternatives to Palestinian nationalism. As Tom Hayden writes:

In 1982, Israel said the same thing about eliminating PLO sanctuaries in Lebanon. It was after that 1982 Israeli invasion that Hezbollah was born. I remember Israeli national security experts even taking credit for fostering Hamas and Islamic fundamentalism as safe, reclusive alternatives to Palestinian secular nationalism. I remember watching Israeli soldiers blow up Palestinian houses and carry out collective punishment because, they told me matter-of-factly, punishment is the only language that Arabs understand. Israelis are inflicting collective punishment on Lebanese civilians for the same reason today.

From Tom Hayden's discussion here:
Part One
Part Two

No untermenschen here

Juan Cole discusses degrees of human-ness:

Israeli officials have already showed us how Arabs can be reclassified away from a full "human" category that they clearly, in the view of the Kadima government, do not deserve.

For instance, Israeli ambassador to the United Nations Dan Gillerman angrily denounced Kofi Annan for neglecting this key fact. The Guardian reports, 'Mr Gillerman said "something very important was missing" from Mr Annan's speech: any mention of terrorism. Hizbullah were "ruthless indiscriminate animals", he told reporters.'
[...]
Israeli Deputy Consul General for San Francisco, Omer Caspi, said of the Lebanese and Palestinian publics concerning Hamas and Hizbullah members, "We say to them please remove this cancer off your body and soul before it is too late."

Caspi did not specify whether members of Hamas are leukemia and those of Hizbullah melanoma, or the reverse.

I admire Cole's good taste in failing to mention der Untermensch. I, on the other hand, have no such restraint. With a good quarter of my recent family tree dying in the Hitler's concentration camps, I know what it is like to have a powerful enemy intent on treating you as a disease. I'd just like to reach out the hand of friendship to the Untermenschen of Lebanon and wish them peace and prosperity, and remind Israel that you reap what you sow.