By Syed Ilyas Basha
ISRAEL’S AGGRESSION ON GAZA: Israeli leaders’ aggression on besieged Gaza entered 108th day on Monday, January 22, 2024, with its killing of over 25,900 which include 11,000 children (missing 8,000) and 7,500 women reported Anadolu Agency. It killed 119 journalists and detained 10 too since October 7. Some 70,000 houses have been completely destroyed in Israeli carpet bombings, and 290,000 houses were made uninhabitable. On Israeli attacks on the health care sector, the statement said 337 health care workers and 45 civilian defense officials have so far been killed. Israeli forces detained 99 healthcare workers and 2 million people were displaced in the Gaza Strip. And with every passing day, the score keeps increasing. Pointing to the in-humane conditions in crowded shelters where Palestinian displaced seek refuge, the authorities said that 400,000 cases of infectious diseases and more than 8,000 cases of Hepatitis A have been detected as a result of Israel’s forced displacement. Some 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza face critical risks due to the inability to provide health care, while 350,000 individuals with chronic illnesses are facing critical risks due to the lack of medication. The Israeli army destroyed 140 government facilities as well as 99 schools and universities, while partially damaging 295 schools and universities. Outside Gaza, there are 11,000 injured people who need treatment, and 10,000 cancer patients are facing the risk of death due to inadequate health care. The statement said the Israeli army damaged 253 mosques and also caused the destruction of three churches. Israel targeted 150 health care institutions in Gaza, rendered 53 health centers and 30 hospitals inoperative and made 122 ambulances unusable. Israel also targeted Palestine’s cultural heritage, destroying 200 historical and cultural assets in Gaza.
The IDF continues bombardment of cities, towns and refugee camps across the tiny enclave and it has launched more than 65,000 tons of explosives which is more than the weight and power of three nuclear bombs like those dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima.” Its aircraft dropped over 45,000 missiles and giant bombs, some of them weighing two thousand pounds of explosives, during the comprehensive genocidal war on the Gaza Strip, deliberately targeting residential complexes. Reports also suggest that about “two-thirds of the bombs and missiles are unguided and imprecise, commonly known as dumb bombs.” It pointed out that the use of such bombs indicates “the deliberate targeting of indiscriminate and unjustified killing by the occupation, a clear and explicit violation of international law and various international conventions.” Reports also suggest that Israel used around nine internationally banned bombs and missiles against civilians, children and women. The densely populated strip has thus been made a testing ground for the efficacy or otherwise of the newly manufactured and introduced arsenal of some countries.
Israeli rulers have crossed all records of atrocities and barbarity in a tiny area in a short span of time the world has ever seen. Seeking revenge instead from the innocent civilians is totally against humanity. The have executed the civilians after taking in custody also. All types of supplies have been stopped and the blockade is total. Israel has been using starvation as a weapon. The strategy reminds us of the past where starvation and famine were deliberately employed as a tools of warfare. It is nothing else than collective punishment on innocent civilians for ineffective, failed policing by its own defense apparatus. There is none to challenge its irresponsible, inhuman actions. All international bodies, world leaders have submitted before Israeli bloodlust. Its only aim in Gaza is appears to be a forced displacement.
One Gaza resident Hossam Wail Abu Shammallah told Al Jazeera that he has lost 120 members of his family since the war began. Despite having lived through four wars with Israel already, he said, “Combined, they’re all nothing” compared with what the besieged strip is going through now. It has unleashed a unprecedented massacre, ethnic cleansing and displacing people multiple times. If we look at the statistics, we are already past the number of the Nakba,” he said, referring to the mass displacement of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, known as the “catastrophe”. We are at the point that it’s quite impossible to find someone that hasn’t lost anyone, whether from his family, friends, relatives, or someone from work or school.” Continuous intensity and severity of bombarding speaks that those who are ordering it have become mad. It ought to have taken revenge from the militants who inflicted huge humiliating wound to its pride. Its invincibility was crushed into the dust.
I was wondering as to why did Hamas took to assault on October 7, 2023, knowing well that a strong IDF will retaliate with full and unprecedented force. A close and deep study revealed that for years, Hamas was under immense pressure from the occupying forces with all types of massacres and atrocities unleashed on the villages, housing units, and fertile lands almost on daily basis for quite a long time. These incidents were totally neglected by the world and neighborly states. Historically, the Palestinians under the P.A. (Palestinian Authority) were shackled by Oslo-created Palestinian Accords in 1967 and were made helpless. In the name of solving the problem, the basic role of the accord was to provide security cover for Israel in the occupied territories.This vacuum created by the PA’s complicity with the occupier, was slowly taken over by the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement called ‘Hamas’. Israel believed, it can crush the population at will at its place of choice. On Jan. 25, 2006, Hamas won a majority of seats in a Palestinian legislative election and earned mandate. Israel and the US refused to recognize it. They cut off aid to Palestinians and declared Hamas as a “foreign terrorist organization”. On June 25, 2006, Hamas captured Israeli army conscript Gilad Shalit in a cross-border raid from Gaza, prompting Israeli air strikes and incursions. Shalit was freed more than five years later in a prisoner exchange. June 14, 2007 saw Hamas took over Gaza in brief clashes, ousting Fatah forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who is based in the occupied West Bank. On December 27, 2008 Israel launched a 22-day military offensive indiscriminately targeting Gaza after Palestinians fired rockets at the southern Israeli town of Sderot. About 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis including civilians were reported killed before a ceasefire is agreed. Again on November 14, 2012, Israel kills Hamas’s military chief of staff, Ahmad Jabari. Eight days of Palestinian militant rocket fire and Israeli air strikes follow. On July-August 2014, the kidnap and killing of three Israeli teenagers by Hamas lead to a seven-week war in which more than 2,100 Palestinians were reported killed in Gaza and 73 Israelis are reported dead, 67 of them being military personnel. March 2018 saw Palestinian protests began at Gaza’s fenced border with Israel. Israeli troops opened fire to control protestors back. More than 170 Palestinian protesters were reported killed in several months of protests, which also prompted fighting between Hamas and Israeli forces. Here is a list of some of the deadly and destructive airstrikes:
On 12 November 2018: An airstrike leveled seven buildings in Gaza City including the headquarters of the official Hamas-run Al Aqsa TV. Firing 10 missiles at the Al-Aqsa TV station, Israeli jets destroyed its headquarters.
On 11 November: Tel Aviv’s air strikes killed at least seven Palestinians in what appeared to be a targeted hit near the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza near the border with Israel on Sunday. Again on November 13, 2018, the violence began with a botched Israeli special forces operation inside Gaza that turned deadly and prompted Hamas to vow revenge. An Israeli colonel, one Hamas commander and six others were killed in the incident. The airstrikes are also believed to be carried out to provide cover for the Israeli soldiers to escape.
On October 27: Israel launched airstrikes early on several targets, including Gaza’s Indonesia Hospital, which was built with the assistance and funding of Indonesia. Israeli warplanes bombed this hospital in Gaza last night.
October 17: A where 25-year-old Naji al Zaanin was killed and three were also injured in the northern city of Beit Lahia, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.
August 8-9: Israeli airstrikes targeted the Said Mishal Foundation for Culture and Science in Gaza on August 9, wounding at least 20 people. And at least three Palestinians were killed and 12 others were wounded after Israel launched air strikes on Gaza a day earlier.
On July 14 two Palestinian teenagers were killed in an Israeli airstrike on Gaza City on, health officials said.
In May 2021, After weeks of tension during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, hundreds of Palestinians are wounded in clashes with Israel after Israeli security forces stormed the Al Aqsa compound in Jerusalem, Islam’s third holiest site. After demanding Israel withdrew security forces from the compound, Hamas unleashed a barrage of rockets from Gaza into Israel. Israel hits back with air strikes on Gaza. Fighting goes on for 11 days, killing at least 250 people in Gaza and 13 in Israel.
On August 2022, at least 44 people, including 15 children, are killed in three days of violence that began when Israeli air strikes hit a senior Islamic Jihad commander. Israel says the strikes were a pre-emptive operation against an imminent attack by the Iranian-backed movement, targeting commanders and arms depots. In response, Islamic Jihad fired more than 1,000 rockets towards Israel.
January 2023 saw Islamic Jihad in Gaza fire two rockets towards Israel after Israeli troops raided a refugee camp and killed seven Palestinian fighters and two civilians. Later on, the settlers’ Racist far-right groups such as Lehava and La Familia protected by the Israeli police attacked the local citizens, killing and wounding dozens periodically. Residents from numerous areas like Sheikh Jarrah neighbor-hood in East Jerusalem were forcefully displaced and their homes handed over to illegal Jewish settlers. The Israeli legal system is all too bias and happy to oblige these racist thugs.
It appears the Palestinians lost hope of living a peaceful life as the extremist settler-Zionists having entered Knesset. Israel had sworn in its most right-wing government in history. These ministers have openly been urging the illegal settlers for looting, killing and kicking out the Palestinians out of country’s borders. The far-right ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich arrived on the political scene with the declared objectives of annexing the West Bank, imposing military control over Al-Aqsa Mosque and other Palestinian Muslim and Christian holy sites. Their pledges were quickly translated into action under the leadership of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Ben-Gvir was keen on sending a message to his constituency that the seizure of Al-Aqsa Mosque by Israel had become imminent. On 14 July, 2023 that Israeli Knesset member Amit Halevi forwarded a plan to divide Al-Aqsa Mosque complex between Muslims and Jews. Under his proposal, roughly two-thirds of the area, including the Dome of the Rock, would be for Jews, while the remaining portion, including Al-Aqsa Mosque, would be for Muslims. Restrictions at Al-Aqsa Mosque are already in place, with Muslims entering for worship registered electronically by Israeli police. Although the historical status quo stipulates that only Muslims can pray at Al-Aqsa Mosque, Jewish settlers, accompanied by Israeli security forces, routinely storm the complex. Violations are documented by the Jordanian religious authorities who manage the site. And as recently as on 4th Oct 2023, the Israeli settlers stormed the Al Aqsa Complex in occupied East Jerusalem in groups and attempted to perform ‘Talmudic rituals’, according to a Islamic Waqf Department official. It was the fifth day of Sukkot. Thousands of settlers have been carrying out provocative tours of the mosque complex following calls by ultranationalist Jewish groups. Amidst all these strikes, Hamas was preparing for action to protect the Holy site, self-respect, and the population at an appropriate time. The occupying forces had imposed a very strict blockade of the area. Even the financial resources were fully under their control. Taxes were collected by the Israeli authorities and a small part of those funds were released to the local administrative body. The situation forced Hamas to opt for unconventional methods hence built a vast network of the tunnels under the densely-populated Gaza to conceal weapons, command facilities and fighters. Over the time, the passageways were developed, sophisticated with ventilation shafts and electricity provided inside. Some of these tunnels touched a depth of 35 meters and can even be equipped with railroad tracks and communication rooms. The entrance to them often lies in residential buildings or other public facilities. At first, the subterranean network was intended mainly to smuggle goods and weapons from Egypt into the narrow strip of land that Israel withdrew from in 2005.
TRIED TO AVOID BLOOD SHED: Before launching of any rockets at Israel on October 7,, Hamas called for the occupation state to stop its attacks on Palestinian worshippers at Al-Aqsa Mosque and refrain from expelling Palestinian families from their homes. Israel ignored the Hamas appeal, so the movement repeated the appeal to the international community, asking the world to intervene and stop the Israeli aggression. The international community as usual ignored the whole issue. And encouraged by the attitude of the world, the Israeli government continued its onslaughts. After the decisive action on October 7, 2023, Mr.Ismail Haniyeh, the Chief of Hamas political bureau in exile declared: “Today, the enemy has had a political, military, intelligence, security and moral defeat inflicted upon it, and we shall crown it, with the grace of God, with a crushing defeat that will expel it from our lands, our holy city of al Quds, our al Aqsa mosque, and the release of our prisoners from the jails of the Zionist occupation,”
HAMAS THEN DECIDED TO ACT: “Enough is enough” declared Mohammed Deif is the leader of the Hamas’ military wing, who reportedly planned the deadliest and most daring blitz against Israel in 50 years. The assault was in response to the 16-year blockade of Gaza, Israeli military raids inside the occupied West Bank cities over the past year which included military raids on Al Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam. Mr. Deif, who does not appear in public, in the recorded message called the blitz as “Operation Al-Aqsa Storm” and called “Today the people are regaining their revolution and urged the Palestinians living in occupied east Jerusalem and northern Israel to join the fight. Hamas said the incursion, a multi-pronged surprise attack that included a barrage of rocket launches and infiltrations into Israel by land, sea, and air. In the raid, it not only eliminated 1,400 people which included emigrant settlers, land grabbers but also grabbed 240 hostages. While the War in Gaza is going on, the Israeli settlers, under protection by Israeli police, stormed into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound on January 3, as per Wafa news agency. Again on Jan 18, 2024, Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, called for Israel’s occupation of the Gaza Strip and said that Palestinians should be “encouraged” to leave the territory in an interview with Israel’s Channel 13 news on Wednesday night.
IS IT A CRUSADE?
The intensity of wild, merciless and ruthless raining of bombs coupled with emotional religious rhetoric by Israeli leaders has been sending alarming message to the world. Their statements laced with biblical references are possibly aimed at wooing Christian Evangelicals in the US, UK and elsewhere. Here’s how British theologian Stephen Sizer unpacks this phenomenon. Christian Evangelicals in the US are buying Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s biblical references and siding with his war on Gaza. About 30 years ago, the late Lubavitcher Rebbe (considered one of the most influential Jewish leaders of the 20th century) told a young Netanyahu that “he, (Benjamin Netanyahu), will be Israel’s prime minister, who will pass the scepter (an ornamented staff) carried by the rulers on ceremonial occasions as a symbol of sovereignty to the Messiah.” The Lubavitcher Rebbe said this during the election campaign in the 1990s, before Netanyahu’s first term in office. Today, Israel is in a kind of apocalyptic mood, Bibi is prime minister and the scepter is in his hand. Will Netanyahu, the nation and the world soon welcome the Messiah?
But then his first government fell in 1999. The next year the Second Intifada broke out and in 2005 Israel evacuated the Jewish settlements in Gush Katif in the Gaza Strip and handed the coastal enclave over to the Palestinians. A year later, Hamas seized control of Hamas seized control of Gaza. In 2009, Benjamin Netanyahu became Israel’s prime minister for the second time and ruled until 2021. His voters, in part, saw in Bibi God’s anointed one, the Messiah and King David, a hero who has no competition among the people. Not only in the country but also abroad, Christians rave about God’s messengers on earth, especially in the USA. From their perspective, Bibi was not replaceable, and that was true for a while. This of course angers his opponents, who cannot handle the fact that Bibi is being glorified like a messianic figure and messenger of God despite his political shenanigans. In Israel, too, many people saw Benjamin Netanyahu as a savior. Bibi eventually slipped into opposition for about a year until he was elected for a third time in November 2022. And now there is war under Netanyahu’s government and this can expand into a multi-front war or even a regional and global war. This is not a crazy idea, but a political perception of current reality. Anyone who doesn’t want to see and believe that probably lives in a different world. Now people are talking about the old prophecy of the Lubavitcher Rebbe again and are seeing a possible situation in which everything will come to a head. Will Bibi really be Israel’s last prime minister before the Messiah comes? For concealing their criminal acts the Israeli government declared that that Al Shifa Hospital in the besieged Gaza is a base for “armed Palestinian groups” with Hamas’s Head Quarters concealed beneath. It was meant to legitimize its bombing. According to a report on the Israeli news site HaMedash, a group of Israeli doctors, who go by the name ‘Doctors for the Rights of Israeli Soldiers’, signed a statement advocating the bombing of Al Shifa Hospital, a site which has been under constant attacks. The statement, which was endorsed by doctors working within the healthcare system, claim that the Israeli military’s bombing of Al Shifa Hospital was a “legitimate right.” The former Israeli Prime Minister Mr.Yahud Barak later revealed that the tunnels and huge infrastructure was built by the Israeli Government itself beneath the said Hospital for the storage and accommodation purpose.
HOW U.S. TRAPPED ARAB & MUSLIM RULERS: A major evolution in approaches and policies in the Islamic world was steered into with the duo President Donald Trump and his Jew son-in-law Kushner (a Jew) with their hidden pure Jewish religious sentiments and ambitions. They resorted to the diplomacy of ‘Deal for Peace, Prosperity’ accompanied by ‘carrot or stick’ policy in the Arab and Islamic world. It was also called ‘DEAL OF THE CENTURY’. Not to mention, their main ambition was establishing Greater Israel in the name of exploring solution for the Palestine problem. U.S. openly pressurized a number of Arab states in October, 2020 to stop giving financial grants to Palestinians. With the able organizer in Kushner, President Trump tied down the Arab nations with the so called ‘Abraham Accord’, all the Islamic Countries were bundled into the attractive ‘Mecca Declaration’. They were thus forced and made duty bound not to raise any issue, new or old, which may spoil the peaceful atmosphere in the Middle East. Under pressure, the Arab support for Palestinian Authority fell by 82% during the first eight months of that year, Shehab news agency reported according to Middle East Monitor dated Oct. 19, 2020. It was $38.1 million compared to $198.33 million during the same period previous year. It was also reported that this was done on the instance of Israeli Prime Minister Mr. Binyamin Netanyahu, to bring them to terms and establish normal ties with Israel. In fact, the Secretary-General of Fatah’s Central Committee has revealed that the UAE has been boycotting Palestine since 2010, according to a report in Al-Khaleej Online according to Mr. Jibreel Al-Rajoub’s comments on Palestine TV. “Indeed, since then, the Ambassador has not been invited to any official event [in the UAE].” While the Arab Emirates openly accelerated its normalization process with the occupying forces, Saudi Arabia with a new assertive role roped in Sudanese government into the ‘friendship club’ by paying its foreign debts of U.S. $335 million in October, 2020. All these developments encouraged Netanyahu who flew to Saudi desert city to meet Crown Prince along with U.S. Secretary of State Mr. Pompeo on Nov 23, 2020.
MAJOR CHANGES IN AL-AQSA STATUS: On September 3, 2020, Middle East Monitor reported that for the first time in the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict, the United Arab Emirates agreed to establish a change of status for Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa Mosque as part of the agreement with Israel. It was agreed to limit the rights of Muslims in Al-Aqsa Mosque to the prayer building at the southern end of the Noble Sanctuary of Al-Aqsa (Al-Haram Al-Sharif), which the Israelis call “the Temple Mount” and covers 144 acres. The fact is Muslims and international resolutions have always regarded the whole sanctuary to be “Al-Aqsa Mosque”. The decision was taken without consultation with the holder of rightful owner of the land Jordan, any Palestinian group, Arab or Islamic authorities and without the involvement of the Arab League or the Organization of Islamic Cooperation. The Palestinians; the rightful owners of occupied Palestine too had no knowledge of what was being planned by the UAE. This change in status was a great achievement for the Zionists and an important purpose of the ‘deal of the century’ Conspiracy. The aftermath saw a great change in the behavior of occupiers and settlers. Israel wanted to have alternative Arabs on hand ready to oblige and validate what it imposes on the Palestinians. This is the essence of the “deal of the century” cobbled together by Donald Trump and his son-in-law and senior advisor Jared Kushner. The deal is based on bypassing the Palestinians and dealing with them as an ethnic minority within a state called Israel. The UAE-Israeli agreement also bypasses the Palestinians, ignoring both them and their existence. It promotes Israeli interests and efforts aimed at crushing any Palestinian presence in their own land, as well as any official representation. It goes as far as ignoring the existence of the Palestine Liberation Organization. The agreement resulted from secret negotiations in which the Palestinians were not involved. Its godfathers simply used the Palestinians as an excuse so that the UAE could claim that Israel had reversed the decision to annex occupied West Bank territory as a condition of the agreement. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later denied that, and revealed that the agreement did not address annexation in the first place; that the decision to annex territory has not been changed; and that the decision to postpone, not cancel, the annexation plan was taken before the normalization deal with the UAE.
Kushner’s project is based on the Arabization of the issue of Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa Mosque, which is in fact an Islamic issue. What Kushner wants is for its sponsorship to be handed over to Arab regimes allied with Israel, so that Tel Aviv finds an Arab counterpart willing to approve whatever the Israelis want in the Holy City. However, everything that the Israelis and the Americans want to impose cannot be approved by any Palestinian or Jordanian. It is a clear violation of all previous agreements that Israel has signed with any Arabs, including the Wadi Arab Peace Treaty with Jordan. This is why Israel has had to resort to partners in the Gulf who have previously put pressure on the Palestinian Authority and Jordan, which was resisted. Now these Gulf States have decided to jump over the PA, deal directly with Israel and hand over what is not theirs to give. (This article first appeared in Arabic in The New Khaleej on 1 September 2020.)
Rabbi Meir Kahane is considered something of a prophet by the Israeli right-wing. He openly advocated expelling all Palestinians from historic Palestine between the river and the sea – what he called “the Land of Israel”. “The Jews and Arabs of the Land of Israel ultimately cannot coexist,” he wrote in his 1981 manifesto, They Must Go. “There is only one path for us to take: the immediate transfer of Arabs from Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel.” Although liberal Israeli elites still view Kahane as, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu brokered a merger agreement between two far-right parties, the reality is that Kahanism has today gone mainstream in Israel. Kahanism is an extremist Jewish ideology based on the views of Rabbi Meir Kahane, founder of the Jewish Defense League and the Kach party in Israel. Kahane maintained the view that the majority of Arabs living in Israel are enemies of Jews and Israel. A Jewish theocratic state, governed by Halakha (Jewish SHARIAH) with no right whatsoever (including voting) to non-Jewish population which includes Israel, Palestine, areas of modern day Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq should be created. The Kach party earlier was banned by the Israeli government and the U.S and the State Department had labeled it a Foreign Terrorist Organization. Now everything has changed. The term Kahanism has come to denote the controversial positions espoused by Rabbi Meir Kahane. Kahane’s positions spanned a broad range of subjects. Its beliefs are as under. The central claim of Kahanism is the belief that the vast majority of the Arabs of Israel are now, and they will continue to be, enemies of Jews and Israel itself:
Aliyah: Kahane believed that every Jew should live in Israel.
Anti-Semitism: Kahane believed that anti-Semitism should be fought immediately and by all means necessary.
Democracy: Kahane wrote that democracy was the best form of government for those who lacked a divine truth and a standard of good and evil.
Hate and Violence: Kahane believed that hate and violence were terrible, but terribly necessary at the right time and place.
Holocaust: Kahane felt that the history of the Holocaust should be taught to youth with all of the lessons that it implied, including the need to fight spiritual assimilation, the need to physically defend the Jewish people and the importance of leaving what he termed “the Exile”.
Israel: Kahane proposed that the State of Israel should enforce Jewish law, as codified by Maimonides, under which non-Jews who wish to dwell in Israel would have three options: remain as “resident strangers” with all rights but national ones, which would require non-Jews to accept resident-stranger status with all rights but political ones. Those who are unwilling to accept such a status will be required to leave the country with full compensation and, those who refuse to do even that, will be forcefully removed.
KAHANISM NOW PROPELLED INTO ACTION:
1) Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir declared Israel “in charge” of the area visited the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, also known as Al-Haram al-Sharif by Muslims and the Temple Mount by Jews in Jerusalem’s Old City on May21, 2023 after months of escalating tension and violence. He also entered the Al-Aqsa Mosque which is in violation of their religious norms and declared that “I’m happy to ascend the Temple Mount, the most important place for the people of Israel,”
2) While the War on Gaza is going on, again Itamar Ben-Gvir on December 19, 2023 called for the execution of imprisoned members of the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, for each day Israeli prisoners of war are held by the movement in the besieged Gaza Strip. He also urged his government to “immediately stop” any talks aimed at concluding prisoner exchange deals with Hamas and instead, the death penalty be applied against them.
3) Israeli settlers have been storming the al-Aqsa Mosque complex very frequently, disturbing the Muslims and attempting to perform “Talmudic rituals” against rules, according to a Waqf official. Israeli forces had been even detaining Muslim worshipers trying to enter Al-Aqsa Mosque.
4) A French lawmaker, Mr. Thomas Portes alleged that French soldiers are fighting along with IDF in Gaza Strip. He reportedly said that over 4,000 French and Franco-Israeli soldiers are fighting in Gaza and sought a probe. He also demanded Macron their prosecution if found involved in war crimes in the Gaza Strip.
5) The Jerusalem Post reported on November 30, 2023, that “Israeli soldiers established a synagogue in the heart of the Gaza Strip during the ground invasion.” The building displays photos of the entrance, which features a large sign that reads “Abraham Temple.”
6) Israeli writer and politician Avi Lipkin said that Israel’s borders will extend ‘from Lebanon to Saudi Arabia reported Middle East Monitor on January 11, 2024. A video clip is circulating on social media shows Israeli writer Avi Lipkin predicting that Israel’s borders will extend “from Lebanon to Saudi Arabia,” which he described as the “Great Desert,” and “from the Mediterranean to the Euphrates.” The clip setting out the territory envisaged by Zionists for “Greater Israel” has sparked widespread anger. “And who’s on the other side of the Euphrates?” asked Lipkin. “The Kurds, and the Kurds are friends. So, we have the Mediterranean behind us and the Kurds in front of us… Lebanon, which really needs the umbrella of protection of Israel, and then we’re going to take, I believe we’re going to take Makkah, Madinah and Mount Sinai, and purify [sic] those places.”
This has been the aim of political Zionism since the beginning. Moreover, said one commentator on X. “After Gaza and Hezbollah,” said another, “It will not be difficult for Israel. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan will not pose a difficulty because Israel can overthrow the regimes in these countries easily, and controlling their lands will be easy after spreading the culture of normalization and acceptance of Israel. No one will resist Israel like Gaza and Hezbollah resist it.” The term “Greater Israel” refers to the expansion of Israel’s territory and sovereignty to encompass what many Israelis describe as their historic Biblical land. For them, this includes the occupied Palestinian territories and the occupied Golan Heights, as well as the territory described by Lipkin. The Zionist plan for the Middle East, said Israeli journalist Oded Yinon, is based on the vision of the atheist founder of Zionism, Theodor Herzl, which is that Israel will annex large parts of Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and will establish a number of proxy states to ensure its dominance in the region. And the fact is both Biden and Nathenyahu are in fact worshippers of Anti-Christ and they have openly declared to be Zionists. Hence this huge and unprecedented massacre of local population in thousands to continue and these stories of differences, are simply hypocrisy.
UNABLE TO HIDE THEIR EXTREME HATRED:
The following statements by very responsible Israeli leaders are any indication of their intentions, the oft proposed two-nation formula certainly looks to be a pipe dream by peace-seekers.
(1) The National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has called for the execution of imprisoned members of the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, for each day Israeli prisoners of war are held by the movement in the besieged Gaza Strip. He also called to “immediately stop” any talks aimed at concluding prisoner exchange deals with Hamas, posted on X, according to a report dated December 19, 2023. He also demanded humanitarian aid be banned from entering Gaza.
(2) Israeli minister says she doesn’t care about Gaza: Israel’s Women’s Advancement Minister, May Golan, says she wants to see dead bodies around Gaza. ‘I don’t care about Gaza,’ she says, ‘for all I care, they can go out and swim in the sea. She further Israeli minister says she doesn’t care about Gaza. May Golan, Israel’s Women’s Advancement Minister says; ‘I don’t care about Gaza,’ she says, ‘for all I care, they can go out and swim in the sea. (Middle East Monitor.: December 19, 2023).
3) The Israel’s Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu when asked whether an atomic bomb should be dropped on the Gaza Strip dropping an atomic bomb on Gaza Strip, he declared that was “this is one of the possibilities”.. (The Hindustan Times, Nov 05, 2023)
4) While the UN Secretary General Guterres denounced attack on Al Shifa, saying after seeing “The images of bodies strewn on the street outside the hospital. On the other hand, a group of Israeli doctors released a statement claiming that Al Shifa Hospital in the besieged Gaza is a base for “armed Palestinian groups” and called for its bombing. (published in TRT World/ 06 Nov 2023).
THE WRITING ON THE WALL:
Note that whatever the Palestinians are now resorting to is to fulfill their prime duty of protecting Islam’s third and most important Mosque ‘al-Aqsa’, and to protect their right to life with dignity. While Zionists are continuing with their agenda of ethnic cleansing, the helpless population is left totally neglected by fellow Arab and Muslim nations except passing of resolutions, making appeals and participating in dinners. Some serious threat of economic boycott by Arab and Muslim fraternity the world had long expected to challenge and contain the cruelty.
Numerous world bodies of nations like UNO, UNSC, WHO, Arab League, Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC), Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) too could not do much to stop the bloodshed. Even the International Court of Justice has failed to deliver justice to the most oppressed. Unfortunately, the neighboring Arab leaders have preferred to play the role of a spectator. Let these neighbors note that once these warriors in the outfit of three ‘H’s (HAMAS, HEZBOLLAH AND HUTHI) are defeated and eliminated from the scene, Israel with its shrewdness and strong backing will easily overpower their forces.
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The writer can be reached at Email:
sdilyashyd@yahoo.com