This attack occurred for domestic political reasons, not to stop the missile attacks, unless the Israeli political class is completely delusional.

I suspect a little from column A and a little from column B.

Digg is open.

…unless the Israeli political class is completely delusional.

Seems to be endemic to becoming a member of a ruling political class. Delusions R Us if you will.

Either they don’t want peace, or they are criminally incompetent, or they are driven entirely by craven personal political motives.

How about, all of the above?

How surprising…

U.S. blames Hamas for cease-fire break
CRAWFORD, Texas (Reuters) – The United States on Saturday blamed the Islamist group Hamas for breaking a ceasefire and urged Israel to avoid civilian casualties after it launched air strikes that killed more than 200 people in Gaza.

Of course, Israel’s response is entirely commensurate with the provocation… as usual.

The Israelis, with this one airstrike, have now killed more people than all of the Hamas missile attacks from Gaza combined. This is nothing short of barbaric, indiscriminate violence, no different from that of Hamas except in degree. The Israelis created this situation by their barbaric total blockade. Since Hamas gained nothing by the ceasefire (and arguably lost internal support as a result), they abandoned it. Likud and other Israeli conservatives do not negotiate in good faith. They have no intention of allowing the creation of a viable Palestinian state, as they intend to annex all of Palestine.

Thanks for this great coverage, Ian. Over the years folks have harassed Jane about not covering this issue. Glad to see it happening. By the way: Your title reminded me of an excellent piece here:

http://www.peacockchronicle.co…..irani.html
(Disclaimer: shameless website promotion)

PS: There are some helpful links at the bottom of the article.

Either they don’t want peace, or they are criminally incompetent, or they are driven entirely by craven personal political motives.

i’m going with d) all of the above.

i believe i owe you a drink?

btw, if this news wasn’t bad enough i’m listening to kizner on cspan-2’s booktv talk about the genocide in rwanda.

Either they don’t want peace, or they are criminally incompetent, or they are driven entirely by craven personal political motives.

Or any combination of the above. This also seems to stake out the common ground they seem to share with our more dimwitted Republican brethren. I wonder just what information the average Israeli is fed every day. Personally, even though I know that a good portion of what’s offered up to me everyday is outright crap, it’s awfully hard to separate that from anything that might be halfway true.

Ian,dont forget,her American Counterpart….Wicked Witch of the WEST,MISS RICE……NEWLY BEJEWLED

http://oxdown.firedoglake.com/diary/

Don’t you just love that part in the Reuters article about how the U.S. asked Israel to avoid civilian casualties AFTER the attack? As IF our government had been caught totally by surprise.

Attacking Hamas. Because the tactic of regime change has worked out so very well in the ME.

So, what would change we can believe in look like with respect to Israel’s latest actions? What kind of statement from the Obama transition team could signal that we’re not entering another four to eight years of the kind of flaccid deference to Israeli war crimes characterized by the Clinton administration under Albright, Indyk, and Ross?

Here’s my dream statement from Obama:

As I said repeatedly during the past year, Israel’s right to security is absolute. But that does not mean that an Obama administration will apply absolute credulity to every claim Israel makes regarding every action it takes in the name of security. In particular, we will apply close scrutiny, according to no one’s best judgment but our own, to all applications of force by Israel, whether in the form of blockades or overt military strikes.

I would remind both the current and aspiring leaders of Israel that excessive force and collective punishment not only violate international law, they have proven profoundly and tragically counterproductive. One does not bomb terrorists out of existence; one bombs them into existence. The United States has learned this lesson dearly over the past seven years, and we look forward to working with an Israeli leadership that can demonstrate that it has learned it as well. And we have great concern over whether Israel’s current actions in Gaza indicate evidence of such learning.

Anyway, I can dream, can’t I? Of course, the reason we won’t see such a message, apart from concerns over interference with what’s left of the Bush administration’s authority, is the havoc it would wreak in confirmation hearings. In the US Congress, even the progressives are Israel hawks, and one can only imagine what would happen to Hillary if compelled under oath to declare concordance with such a statement.

I have little doubt that such considerations of US domestic politics contributed to the decision to bomb Gaza, in addition to Israeli internal politics.

In simple physical dimensions Gaza’a width and lenght make the idea of using high pressured aerial attacks by American provided Israeli F-16 warjets on a largely civilian,unarmed population of children,women and elderly barbaric and heartlessly cruel.

Clearly the Bush/Cheney regime and Princess Condi Rice had a hand in this attack being unleashed on Gazans.

Perhaps Israel should just cut to the chase and barricade three sides of Gaza and then on fourth side introduce massive grinding ground IDF and with high repeat IDF air attacks just keep killing Gazans until there are no more alive Gazans.

This will end the rocket attacks surely then.

By reducing Gazan civil infrastructure or offices of governance to rubble and dead bodies who does Israel propose is going to provide any civil framework for policing so called rocket attackers?

Israeil logic seems to orbit around this ludicrous premise of destroying and killing off Arab Palestinian civil governance ability and then accusing Arab Palestinians of not having effective civil governance.

Other predictable outcome is further radicalization and incensed humiliation revenge drives of remaining Arab Palestinians in positions of leadership.

Israel deserves full condemnation from the planet in whole for the stupidity and evil it is practicing in full measure in West Bank and Gaza.

One can only hope Bush/Cheney regime and Princess Condi Rice reap in this life or the life to come what they have sown. They will richly deserve it.

Saw your comments on earlier thread.

Peacock Chronicle
Peacock Throne

Nice name combo.

Everybody familiar with the War Resisters League?

And our headline said: Troops moving nearer India. That would be Pakistan, you understand. Yep, and Happy New Year.

This map says it all

http://firedoglake.com/2008/12…..k-on-gaza/

The Isrealis want the land and the water. And they are ruthless in taking it.

Tried to respond earlier but it wouldn’t go through. Had to reboot so I made another pot of coffee and eschewed hot cocoa. Both were part of my drink request. So now, you can make mine a brandy if you’ve got it. Thanks. :)

LOL! Had to Google to get your meaning! Thanks. I live in Peacock Texas. Hence the name.

HTH
Audrey

Ian, you’re points are well-taken, but to say:

Who is it that Hamas uses to make sure rockets only get launched when Hamas wants them to? That would be… the police and the security forces.

I think that implies that Hamas has absolute control over Islamic Jihad and other militant groups, which i think is debatable.

Imagine if Iraq had told the U.S. that it was responsible for all the attacks on its territory and that it had to stop them all before any talks.

…don’t cast your pearls before swine seems appropriate here…