By Stuart Littlewood | At Sabbah Report | Nov 16, 2012
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Israel’s justification for latest assault on Gaza goes unchallenged

Recent scandals calling into question the news-handling skills of Britain’s national broadcaster don’t seem to have improved matters.
After being treated last night to footage of the slaying of Ahmed Jabari, the military leader of Hamas, by an Israeli assassin flying a drone from his armchair and violating Palestinian airspace, I woke this morning to the kind of crass reporting that has sadly become all too common at the BBC.
It’s flagship news programme ‘Today’ ran a particularly idiotic item about Israel’s unleashing of its latest offensive on Gaza and featured an ‘interview’ by John Humphrys with the Israeli ambassador to Britain, Daniel Taub. This latest escalation of violence, called Operation Pillar of Defence, had resulted in the killing of 12 Palestinians, including 5 civilians – 3 children, a pregnant woman and a 16 year old boy – and the wounding of dozens more, while 3 Israelis were killed.
Taub, the representative of a brutal occupying power, spoke of 800 missiles fired from Gaza since the beginning of the year but was not questioned about the number of rockets, bombs and tank shells delivered by Israel’s high-tech military into the packed humanity of Gaza in the same period.
Taub wanted Israeli citizens to live in peace and quiet but wasn’t asked why Palestinian citizens are not allowed to do the same.
Taub said over 1 million Israelis have to run for bomb shelters and their kids can’t go to school for fear of Gaza’s rockets, and any country in that situation would feel the need to respond. He wasn’t reminded that Gaza’s citizens also live in fear of daily Israeli air-strikes, have nowhere to run because the siege makes their tiny enclave a prison, and their schools are still so damaged from Israel’s infamous Operation Cast Lead nearly 4 years ago that they have to teach double shifts.
Taub declared that sitting and doing nothing was not an option for the Israelis. Its citizens, he said, were “exercising astonishing restraint”. He wasn’t asked how restrained Palestinians were expected to be after 64 years of cruel occupation and abuse and now under daily attack from air and sea and strangulated by a 6-year siege?
Taub claimed that 7 years ago Israel withdrew from every inch of Gaza to try to create a peaceful situation. Humphrys failed to point out that Israel still occupies Gaza’s airspace, territorial waters and airwaves and has maintained a vicious and illegal blockade since 2006 when democratically elected Hamas enforced their right to rule. Nor did he remind Taub that the West Bank remains illegally occupied and tightly sealed even though no rockets are fired from there. He could have suggested – but didn’t – that if rockets were such an issue and Israel was so concerned about the safety of its citizens, all Israel had to do was respect international and humanitarian law, end its illegal occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem and halt its illegal blockade of Gaza.
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The BBC gave Taub a free ride. After providing the Israeli ambassador with a comfy platform from which to broadcast his distorted views, why wasn’t the other side given a chance? Where was the Palestinian ambassador, Manuel Hassassian, to refute Israel’s propaganda lies? Was he indisposed, on holiday, in hiding or just “not available for comment”? Or does the BBC’s news agenda not permit even-handedness?
I imagine John Humphrys reads from a script and has little choice over what he says.
True, he landed a couple of good punches. But despite his reputation as a tough interviewer the programme succeeded in relaying and amplifying the Israeli propaganda narrative. For this I blame the researchers and editors and the Head of News who, it seems to me, need to go back to journalism school and brush up on the basics.
A press release from the Palestinian Mission, just arrived as I write, says that the execution of Jabari was followed by over 100 aerial, ground and sea attacks by Israel throughout the Gaza strip. In the last few days the Israeli Occupation Forces have targeted more than 100 sites in the Gaza Strip.
Hassassian urges the UK government to intervene immediately to stop Israel’s policy of collective punishment, including the killing and injury of innocent civilians, and the continued oppression of Palestinians living under Israeli military occupation and siege. “The UK government must back its support for the two state solution with actions”.
Hanan Ashrawi, a much-respected PLO executive member, issued a statement that Israel’s military campaign was a “blatant provocation in violation of international and humanitarian law” and called on the EU, the Quartet and the international community to adopt “serious measures”.
Not that these pleas will be heard. Israel’s devoted friend in the Foreign Office, William Hague, says it’s Hamas’s fault: “Hamas bears principal responsibility for the current crisis. I utterly condemn rocket attacks from Gaza into southern Israel by Hamas and other armed groups. This creates an intolerable situation for Israeli civilians in southern Israel, who have the right to live without fear of attack from Gaza.” As usual, he says nothing about Palestinians’ right to live in peace and freedom, or their right to self-defence, or the non-stop assaults by air and sea by Israel.
The conclusion I take away from this fiasco is that Palestinians must die in large numbers so that the psychopath Netanyuahu can win more votes in the coming Israeli election. And elements of the British establishment, including our national broadcaster, seem happy to smooth the way for him.
Article by Stuart Littlewood | © Sabbah Report: http://sabbah.biz/mt/?p=15143
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For who does not understand the need or concept of resistance of Palestine, recommended read: The History of Resistance | The Eagle of Palestine
- Special Topic | All Israeli Massacres on Palestinians
- iRemember… | Confirmed Names of Martyrs Occupation 2011 *
- Special Topic | Ethnic Cleansing
- Israeli escalation in Gaza | A “cover-up for settlement activity
- UN: Israel killed 2,300 & injured 7,700 people in Gaza in 5 years | Source
- The Palestinian Right of Self Defense
MYTHS & FACTS ABOUT THE ROCKETS FROM GAZA
- The “Rocket” from Gaza Myth – Photography
- More facts about the Rocket from Gaza Myths – Storify
- Half the story: What @IDFSpokesperson leaves out about #Gaza ~ by @yousefmunayyer
- Israel and #Gaza: Context Behind Projectile Fire ~ by @yousefmunayyer
- Truths and lies behind Israel’s attacks on Gaza and its whining about rockets ~ by @AliAbunimah
- Israel is not looking for peace. Nor talks. But: This
FEATURED
- March 23, 2012 | Gaza Siege Harshness Continues. Israel’s committing slow-motion genocide ~ by Stephen Lendman
- March 18, 2012 | A “Leaflet” to the World about it’s own “forgotten” Extermination Camp called Gaza
PHOTOGRAPHY
Click on the thumbnails to view the full albums
![]() Photos #GazaUnderAttack Nov 10, 2012 |
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ஜ۩۞۩ஜ
Martyred By Israeli Occupation Attacks
انّا للہ و انّا الیه راجعون
May Allah Subhana wa Ta’ ala grant the Shuhada Jannatul Firdaus, and ease it for their families, loved ones and anyone around them. Allahumma Ameen ya Rabbil Alameen. ‘ Inna Lillahi wa ‘ Inna ‘ Ilayhi Raji’un, Allahu Akbar
ஜ۩۞۩ஜ
* The list of shuhada does not display, the numerous victims of the zionist occupation which are undocumented by media. Nor it displays the victims of the “silent onslaught” due to restrictions of movement, ability to go to hospitals for treatment or life saving surgery, due to lack of medication because of the blockades and so on. For example: The Slow Motion Genocide by the Siege on Gaza only, killed 600 patients since Gaza got under Israeli Siege.
For an overview of All Israeli Massacres Palestinians go here
Neither does this list, display the avoidable mortality. A clear and statistical factual evidence, about the number of deaths due to indecent ruling by occupation forces. For even an occupier has obligations under International Laws, Geneva Convention and the Hague regulations, which it is neglecting. These circumstances, together with deliberate policies of the occupier to neglect and even deny every basic human right, severes avoidable mortality which is totally silenced by media or reporting organisations. While in the Holocaust, 1 on 6 Jewish people directly died of deliberate neglect, so if we believe the facts over 1 million due to avoidable mortality, neither should these same circumstances be ignores which are ongoing in Palestine. For this report displays a avoidable morality of at least 0,5 million Palestinians.
How many more dead corpses of Palestinians does the international community need to see in order to act? How many more cruelties and violations of Human Rights, Regulations and International Law will be needed to intervene so this ongoing warcrime is being stopped once and for all.

November 16, 2012 






























































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