This Bloody Week in Palestine July 5-11
By IMEMC News
HAVANA TIMES — Welcome to this Week in Palestine – Gaza Special Coverage, a service of the International Middle East Media Center, www.imemc.org, for July 5th, to the 11th, 2014.
More than 100 Palestinians have been killed so far due to the ongoing Israeli military offensive targeting the Gaza Strip. Meanwhile the Palestinian leadership has asked for international intervention to end the escalating Israeli aggression against Palestinians.
On Monday of this week Israel started a massive military attack against the Gaza Strip. On Friday 12 Palestinians were killed as Israeli bombardment continue to target the costal enclave, bringing the death toll since Monday to 100 people killed and more than 650 injured, among those killed there are 25 children, Palestinian medical sources reported.
Israeli war planes continued to targeted residents homes, hospitals and schools, local sources reported. More than 150 homes gave been leveled to the ground after being targeted by Israeli missiles.
From Gaza IMEMC’s Rami Al Meghari says Israel is targeting residents’ homes at random:
On their part, Palestinian resistance fighters in Gaza continued to fire rockets into different Israeli areas following the murder of Mohammad Abu Khdeir in Jerusalem by Israeli settlers. Armed groups vowed to continue the firing of shells in retaliation to the ongoing Israeli attacks targeting the Palestinian people.
On Thursday, the UN Security Council held an emergency meeting on the escalating violence. UN chief Ban Ki-moon has asked for an immediate ceasefire.
Japan, Egypt and Jordan have issued statements condemning the latest series of Israeli assaults on the Palestinian community. Member of the executive committee of the Palestinian liberation Organization (PLO) and chief Palestinian negotiator, Dr. Saeb Ereikat has described the ongoing Israeli offensive against Gaza as an “all-out, systematic war against the national project and national reconciliation.”
Egypt opened the Rafah crossing with Gaza to allow urgent aid to enter the region and facilitate the evacuation of injured Palestinians to nearby Egyptian hospitals.
Israeli authorities declared this week that its armed forces are ready to deploy 40,000 reserve soldiers for a possible ground offensive in Gaza. Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon said that the attacks on Gaza may take more than few days.
IMEMC spoke to Sergio Yanni, an Israeli political analyst from Jerusalem:
Also on Friday, weekly anti wall and settlements protests were organized in Bil’in, Ni’ilin and al Nabi Saleh in central West Bank in addition to the southern West Bank village of Al Ma’ssara. Protests this week were in solidarity with the Gaza strip and against the ongoing Israeli attacks.
IMEMC spoke to Salah Khawaja, a member of the popular struggle committee that organizes the weekly nonviolent protests.
“The main message is to show that the occupation government and the settlers are using the Nazi policies, and fascist practices in addition to mass killing and genocide. So the protestors today wore similar outfits the Nazis used to give to those they wanted to kill.”
Israeli troops attacked the anti-wall and settlements protests wit h tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets. Many civilians were treated for the effects of tear gas inhalation.
Earlier in the week at least 19 people were injured many others were treated for the effects of tear gas inhalation as Israeli soldiers invaded West Bank communities and clashed with local youth.
Clashes were reported in the central West Bank city of Ramallah as well as Hebron and Bethlehem city in southern west Bank.
Conclusion
And that’s all for today from This Week in Palestine – Gaza Special Coverage . This was the Weekly report for July 5th, to the 11th 2014 from the Occupied Palestinian Territories. For more news and updates please visit our website atwww.imemc.org. This week’s report has been brought to you by George Rishmawi, and Ghassan Bannoura.
UN refugee agency, UNRWA finds 20 rockets hidden in its school in Gaza.
http://www.unrwa.org/newsroom/press-releases/unrwa-strongly-condemns-placement-rockets-school
Hiding weapons in a school is another war crime by Hamas, which endangered the lives of Palestinian children.
On July 16th, Egyptian television host Osama Mounir tells Hamas leaders “you belong in a mental asylum.”
http://israelmatzav.blogspot.co.il/2014/07/you-belong-in-mental-asylum.html
Since July 8th, over 100 rockets launched by Hamas and PIJ have landed in Gaza, undoubtedly killing Palestinian civilians. They just don’t care who they kill.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-R50_7FeR_BY/U8a9z61lS9I/AAAAAAABmHA/Z7-EVHZS9C8/s1600/Hamas-hits-its-own-people-640×640.jpg
Hamas is committing war crimes in Gaza, intentionally endangering the lives of Palestinian civilians and hoping to get gory propaganda videos.
The spokesperson for Hamas in Gaza, Sami Abu Zuhri, spoke on Al Aqsa TV endorsing and advocating the use of civilians as a human shield.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXZEzbT0H1s
Hamas commits a war crime every time they use human shields to protect their leaders.
Hamas commits a war crime every time they fire a missile from a school yard.
Hamas commits a war crime every time they hide their missiles in mosques.
Hamas commits a war crime every time their leaders use bomb shelters built under hospitals as command centres.
A journalist on Egyptian television blasts Hamas and their leadership for starting a pointless war they cannot win, all from the comfort of their condos in Qatar, when it is the people of Gaza who must pay in blood for the stupidity of Hamas.
http://israelmatzav.blogspot.co.il/2014/07/egyptian-tv-hosts-slam-hamas-leaders-we.html
While most of the Gaza population tries to deal with the difficulties of daily life, it seems that one sector at least has had few worries about their livelihoods – Hamas leaders and their associates.
Former Hamas prime minister in Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh. In 2010, Egyptian magazine Rose al-Yusuf reported that Haniyeh paid for $4 million for a 2,500msq parcel of land area in Rimal, a tony beachfront neighborhood of Gaza City. The land was registered in the name of the husband of Haniyeh’s daughter. Since then, Haniyeh has purchased several homes in the Gaza Strip, registered in the names of his 13 children. His eldest son was arrested on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing with millions of dollars in cash in possession, which he intended to take into Gaza.
Haniyeh’s wealth, like others high up in Hamas, came primarily from the flourishing tunnel industry. Hamas levied a 20 percent taxation on all of the trade passing through the tunnels.
Ayman Taha, a Hamas founder once considered one of its key spokesmen. In 2011, Taha himself paid $700,000 for a luxury three-floor villa in the central Gaza Strip.
A Jordanian website reported that Khaled Mashal Mashal had control of a massive $2.6 billion, in large part deposited in Qatari and Egyptian banks. This is likely Hamas’ accumulated assets from years through donations, as well as its investments in various projects in the Arab and Muslim world. Hamas has invested in real estate projects in Saudi Arabia, Syria and Dubai. And, according to reports, Mashal did not always separate Hamas money and his own. When Hamas had a falling out with Syrian dictator Bashir el-Assad, Hamas fled to Qatar. He claimed he “lost” $11 million in a safe deposit box back in Syria, but some say he simply diverted the funds to his own accounts.