Social Items

TPQ
Showing posts with label Hamas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hamas. Show all posts
Mousa Abu Marzouk ✏ writing for Media Review Network.


For years we have been vilified and criminalized from afar by various Western governments, political leaders and movements and their hired agents. Hamas is this… Hamas is that … Hamas did this … Hamas did that. For decades, we have been subject to non-stop verbal attacks, lies and disinformation which has sought to recraft us from a national liberation movement and the elected representative of the people of Gaza into “terrorists” who care not for Palestine and its needs and independence, but the chase of personal fame and benefit.

Once again in the recently concluded two-day hearing brought by South Africa before the International Court of Justice, not on our behalf, but that of international law and justice, Israel spent its entire defense relying on rampant hearsay, a fabric of lies and an obvious strategy of deflection. Before responding to this symphony of distortion let us make clear certain fundamental undeniable points:

Hamas was elected by Palestinians in Gaza more than fifteen years ago in a process described by then international monitor former President Jimmy Carter as the fullest and fairest he had ever observed. All these years later we still serve in that capacity not because we have refused or prevented our Palestinian families and community from holding new elections, but because Israel has done everything in its power to ensure that full and free elections will not happen, fearing that Hamas would not only once again win in Gaza, but throughout the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem. Our candidates have been detained, essentially indefinitely, without formal charge or trial in a military system; universities have been raided and closed and students arrested whenever they dared to hold political rallies or debates let alone elections to see who would speak on their behalf; and, finally, our political leaders, activists and candidates have often been executed by Israeli military and security forces, or by so-called settlers. So please, spare us the indictment that we are a despotic movement interested in maintaining power at all costs rather than one which seeks to participate in full, fair and free elections across all of Palestine and which will abide by those results whatever they may be.

Israel’s defense against the action brought before the ICJ by South Africa, is likewise filled with convenient distortion, deflection and, at times, outright lies. Moreover, our lawyers advise that its various defenses are not valid under the Genocide Convention but simply another in the lifetime Israeli scream that it is the eternal victim, all the while victimizing millions of Palestinians. As a civil proceeding, the ICJ arguments were not a trial with live in-person witnesses’ to events they observed or participated in and who could be subject to examination and cross examination for the Judges to decide their credibility and whether to credit their narrative. Israel spent most of its defense telling the Judges and the world what Hamas did or did not do on the basis of second, at times third hand reports very much like a novel for sale. None of the sources for these accusations or so-called observations appeared in court and many were not even identified. Israel simply said this is what happened and why … trust us.

Israel used the same dodge before the ICJ in defending what it claims to have done in Gaza these past three months, using second and third hand self-serving information, anonymous sources and manipulation of fact. There is a simple way to resolve this stream of hearsay claims and manipulation — it’s called a trial. Since 2015 Hamas has accepted the jurisdiction of and cooperated with the on-going investigation by the International Criminal Court into Israel and Palestinian resistance movements, including our own. Israel has not. Since 2015 Hamas has repeatedly expressed its interest in appearing before and being judged by the ICC not on the basis of unsubstantiated allegations and screams but evidence and facts. Israel has not.

This could be resolved quickly and easily. Hamas stands ready to appear before the ICC with witnesses and live testimony and bear the burden of any judicial finding against it or its members after a full and fair trial with rules of evidence; with examination and cross examination into we have done or not over the many years of our leadership as a national liberation movement. Is Israel?

Israel has gone to great pains these past three months of its unprecedented onslaught against our people to justify their rampant violation of international law on the basis of what they say happened and by whom on October 7th. In an ever-changing stream of allegations, it accuses the Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, of a host of crimes and violations of international law. Putting aside the fact that what Israel alleges on a given Monday changes on Tuesday and what is stated with forensic or scientific certainty by Israel on Wednesday changes on Thursday there is a simple way to establish what did or did not happen on October 7th. A trial. We categorically deny the allegations lodged in the media by Israel and its supporters against us with regard to the events of that day and stand ready to defend ourselves at such a trial. Is Israel willing to proceed from rhetoric to evidence and to pursue justice in such a proceeding and to bear the consequences, whatever they may be? We are.

Ultimately in the broadest sense given Israel’s unprecedented onslaught upon our communities in Gaza and the West Bank these past three months, that is the question of our time. And while Israel has tried before the ICJ to rebut overwhelming independent first-hand evidence of the crimes it has committed most recently against our community of two plus million in Gaza, it has once again proven to be little more than coverup. Quite simply, under international law what did or did not happen on October 7th bears no legal relationship to or defense against what Israel has done to our people in the months since, as little more than not just brazen revenge, but clear violation of the Convention against Genocide.

Fact. Over these months Israel has dropped more bombs on Gaza than the allied forces on Germany during a two-year period of WWII. It’s fired some 30,000 air-to-ground munitions, 50 per cent of them unguided and launched more than 15,000 tank shells into our residences, hospitals, schools, shelters, and refugee camps.

Fact. These months of incessant Israeli attacks have killed more than 25,000 civilians with almost 13,000 children slaughtered, and another 60,000 wounded. Some 10,000 Palestinians are missing buried under the rubble of their homes and offices.

Fact. Hundreds of medical staff and teachers have been killed along with more than a hundred journalists and a like number of UN workers, all identified as such. More than 80 % of Gaza has been leveled including most hospitals, mosques and churches, schools and essential infrastructure. Like an earlier Nakba, more than 90% of our people have been forcibly dispossessed from their homes.

Fact. Half a million Gazans are starving. Denied food, water, medicine and medical support, hundreds of thousands of our people are sick with the likelihood of out-of-control infectious diseases to claim countless numbers of other civilian lives in the days to come.

More than seventy-five years ago the world watched in horror as the Nuremberg Tribunals put Nazi war criminals on trial, holding them accountable for horrific crimes they carried out against millions of defenseless Jews. From that nightmare came the Convention against Genocide under which, in relevant part, it is defined as “any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”

We ask nothing now but that the Genocide Convention used against those that committed appalling crimes against Jews a lifetime ago be applied equally here and now for other no less fiendish crimes carried out by Israel against millions of defenseless Palestinians.

Law for one is law for all.

⏩Mousa Abu Marzouk, a senior member of Hamas is one of the original founders of Hamas, he was the first head of its political wing, imprisoned in the US for some two years because of it, and is now a leader of its international efforts.

Hamas Throws Down The Gauntlet

International Centre for Counter-Terrorism ✏
Written by Tricia Bacon. 
Recommended by Christy Walsh.

This deliberate and repeatedly targeting of civilian places, like mosques, schools, markets and hospitals, by the Zionists-American Coalition are manifestations of an extremely evil psyche that is overflowing with hatred and contempt… This false and immoral play was carried out by the cowardly Zionist army in Al-Shifa Hospital after killing pre-mature babies, the sick, the wounded, and the displaced, and after they and the Americans screamed and wailed that this hospital was the centre of the jihadis leadership in Gaza. Then it became clear after all this blatant quackery that there was no trace of a single gunman in it. Their real intention was to destroy magnetic imaging devices and the like, which are used to diagnose the life of a wounded person, and by which the life is preserved. The missiles that are burning our proud brothers in Gaza comes from the American and European bases that are sitting on our chests and sitting on out land…

This message did not come from Hamas, Hezbollah, or Iran. It came from al-Qaeda. Admittedly, the Sunni jihadist movement, including al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, and their affiliates, is unlikely to shape the trajectory of the conflict in Gaza. 

Continue reading @ ICCT.

The Jihadist Landscape Amidst Israel-Hamas War 🔨 Five Critical Factors

Chris Bambery ☭ writing in Counterfire argues that violent resistance is the result of violent oppression, so socialists do not blame the oppressed for situations created and sustained by the oppressor. Recommended by Packy Carty. 

What attitude should we take towards the violence of Hamas and other, similar groups? For those of us who defend Palestinian rights, we instantly face demands that we must join attacks on their hostage taking or their killing of civilians, in most cases from people who do not criticise Israeli bombings of civilians, hospitals, places of worship and so on.

These defenders of Israeli collective reprisals to Hamas attacks on southern Israel – including the Labour front bench – take a position of uncritical and unconditional support. Nothing Israel does merits criticism.

When it comes to Hamas, we, as revolutionary Marxists, share neither their ideology, strategy nor tactics. We seek a democratic, secular, single Palestine; we do not believe this can be achieved through killing innocent civilians; nor do we believe that the Palestinian population imprisoned in Gaza and the West Bank (where their guards include the American and Israeli-backed security apparatus of the Palestinian Authority) can defeat an Israeli state armed to the teeth with the most sophisticated weaponry, up to nuclear weapons.

Continue reading @ Counterfire.

How Should Socialists Respond To The Violence Of The Oppressed?

Fearghal Mac Bhloscaidh ☭💣writing in BLOSC, takes issue with an earlier TPQ piece by Brian Hanley. 



I posted this reply to Brian Hanley’s blog on Cedar Lounge Revolution, which was reposted on the Pensive Quill. I post it here with the original in the link for those not familiar with that blog.

Brian, a chara

While I keep an occasional eye on this site, I never comment as I don’t like getting sucked into the echo chamber. But your ‘no axe to grind’ article is problematic on several levels and I would like to respond.

Firstly, you need to quote these statements in detail (I saw one link to the Times of Israel) and explain the difference in supporting Palestinians’ right to armed resistance and condoning acts of terrorism.

You are correct that war crimes are war crimes even if committed by those resisting colonialism. But that does not negate Palestinians right to resist.

Secondly, you make a false comparison between the Provos and Palestinian resistance to criticise factions of the ‘Irish Left’. Firstly, this is a different historical period and it is likely that the positions of these groups, and certainly their membership, has changed.

More significantly, as an historian you know that Irish people haven’t faced anything like what Palestinians are facing since at least the famine or even as far back as the seventeenth century. There is nothing inconsistent with ‘critical support’ for the PIRA and full solidarity for Palestinians operating under far worse historical circumstances with no avenues for a peaceful solution. You’re correct to identify Hamas as an off shoot of the Muslim Brotherhood and Iran proxy, but that does not negate their right to oppose colonial occupation and apartheid. I back the Ukrainian people’s right to resist occupation even though they have thousands of Nazis in their army. I might also add, as you know, that the socialist and secular Palestinian left acknowledge Oslo was a trap and that the Israeli state have favoured Hamas over Fatah to subvert peace and achieve “Eretz Yisrael”. As a socialist and anti-imperialist, it is imperative to side with the colonised against the coloniser – period.

Also, at some point you have to move from a facile evocation of class to actually develop a general analysis of the situation. So white Rhodesians, or Afrikaners, or the KKK in the southern states or Ulster loyalists for that matter didn’t exhibit class divisions? Your argument that Israelis are being presented as an undifferentiated mass is unconvincing and you counter argument falls flat.

Similarly, your points about the USSR recognising Israel or the number of Red Army veterans who now live there add little or nothing to your argument. You know antisemitism operated as a bedrock of post-WWII Stalinism and the 1952 Slanksy show trial should tell you all you need to know about Czechoslovak antisemitism in the period. My criticism is that it is not sufficient to sprinkle your own criticism of others with decontextualised incidents from a general understanding of European history.

Even international law states that it is legitimate to resist occupation. Palestinians claim this goes back to 1948, the UN back to the 1967 6 Day War. You are correct that many Middle-Eastern Jews suffered persecution and fled to Israel, but this followed the formation of a Jewish state based on the ethnic cleansing of 750k – 1 million Palestinians and, while unjustifiable and grotesque, Iraqi Jews etc did not suffer the same systematic ethnic cleansing as Palestinians, outlined in Ilan Pappe’s comprehensive work.

As it stands, Israel is an apartheid state with a kleptocratic prime minister in coalition with Jewish fascists. Israel is also the ally of the imperial hegemon that since 1945 has turned the Middle East into an open wound to secure its strategic imperatives, destroying secular Arab nationalism in the process.

You fail to contextualise the onset of full unequivocal USA support for Israel (it always favoured them) to the successful attempts to smash secular Arab nationalism within the context of the wider Cold War.

An anti-imperialist analysis would support the Palestinian people’s right to resist and then urge people here to deploy every means available to mobilise support for Palestine and pressurise Israel. Ceasefire surely, but BDS, recognition of the Palestinian state and expelling the Ambassador are all valid and appropriate calls for Irish people, or anyone, to make. Your later point in the comments about Kristallnacht is ironic given Netanyahu’s reaction is quite similar to the manner in which the Nazis (aside from Goebbels also wanting to ingratiate himself with Hitler again) used an atrocity against a German diplomat to initiate a pogrom. Now the Israeli state is using the 7 October attacks as the basis for collective punishment and forced population transfer. We are watching a genocide unfold before our eyes.

In short, and not for the first time recently, you are selectively using decontextualised historical nuggets to hobble a wider anti-imperialist and socialist analysis. You will recall you recently told a CPI conference we both spoke at that (I am paraphrasing but there is a recording) painting post boxes green and getting the army out of the 26 counties were tangible victories “ask anyone living in the six counties?” was your refrain. Well I lived in the North and the Brits never left Ireland, they just left Free Staters alone to paint the post boxes and victimise the poor – as you well know.

Your call for nuance then, and I write this respectfully, speaks to a failure to distinguish the general from the particular and exhibits a failing of many historians who prune facts from the trees and hedges unconscious of the ideological forest.

⏩Fearghal Mac Bhloscaidh blogs @ BLOSC.

Hamas & The Irish Left

Brian Hanley - sharing his thoughts on the war on Gaza in Cedar Lounge Revolution.

I don’t have an axe to grind with the CPI and they’ve been good enough to publish an article of mine in the past, but I have to say I find the analysis of the war in Palestine deeply problematic.

I’ll take it as a given that everyone (bar the odd troll) opposes what Israel is doing. But the language in the statement essentially endorses every aspect of the attacks on October 7. Statements from People before Profit and the Workers Party that I’ve read also basically do this.

Now the CPI opposed the Provisional IRA’s armed struggle, partly on the basis that it was counter-productive and also because the killing of civilians undermined the possibility of popular support. The main organisation involved in PBP also opposed the IRA’s campaign and the Workers Party (as regulars will now doubt know) considered that the Provos were actually ‘fascist.’ (The Brighton bomb, probably the least offensive aspect of the IRA’s campaign, was described by the WP as an attack on democracy). Well if the Provos were ‘fascist’ (and I don’t believe they were) then what are the politics of Hamas? And if targeting civilians in Ireland was wrong, then why do all Israeli civilians (including children, old people, teenagers etc) no matter what their politics, ethnic background (including migrant workers from Asia) seem to be considered legitimate targets? I can hazard a guess; ‘settlers’, ‘oppressors’ etc.

Now, for a variety of reasons, Israel has the largest number of WW2 Red Army veterans outside the former USSR.

Are these people all settler-colonists as well? Would they have been legitimate targets on October 7? Perhaps. What about the 50% or so of Israel’s population whose families came originally from Yemen, Iraq, Iran and so on? Or those descended from the 400,000 Jews who lived there before Israel was established? Or the Jews who lived there in the 19th century? Do people think every Israeli is an arrogant New Yorker with a gun on a settlement on the West Bank? Because some certainly are, but as you could see from some of the testimonies of those who lived in the places attacked on October 7, some are not.

My impression is that people are reeling off slogans in response to Israeli brutality with very little idea of what they mean in actuality.

Are Israel and Palestine the only places in the world where class doesn’t seem to matter? Does Israel not have a myriad of class and ethnic divisions that make it more than just another Rhodesia? Does it matter that the politics of Hamas are expressly anti-left and anti-progressive? And that these politics inform their choice of civilian targets?

And for those from the communist tradition, how is it that the Soviet Union was the first state to give recognition to Israel and that it was Czech arms, sent with Soviet support, that guaranteed the Zionists victory in 1948? Were the Politburo just having a off-day when they sanctioned that? At the time the orthodox communist press presented the conflict as one between reactionary Arab regimes backed by British imperialism and a somewhat progressive Jewish homeland. The communist movement might regret that now but it doesn’t do any good to pretend it never happened. And while Israel today is propped up by vast support from the US, that was not always the case - until 1967 France was its main arms supplier and the US put a halt to its gallop at Suez in 1956.

All this is a long way of saying that I can understand a Palestinian living in the hell of Gaza not wanting or needing nuance and aiding those people is the most important issue at the present moment. The Irish left, on the other hand, is at a remove whereby it could discuss these issues (as some progressives, Jewish Currents for example, are still trying to do in the midst of taking part in protests against the siege); yet what I see is vicarious pleasure at someone else’s armed struggle, often from people who opposed armed struggle in many other contexts.

I think the only reasonable demand at the moment is for a ceasefire and massive humanitarian aid to Gaza, but I get the impression some people are looking forward to a war they can support from a distance with little thought for the actual consequences for actual people.

⏩Brian Hanley is a historian. 

The Irish Left And Hamas

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ On 7th October 2023 the Palestinian militant group, Hamas, crossed the border into Israel with relative ease. 

The Israeli authorities, including the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) were apparently caught asleep when the incursion took place. How could this have been? The Israelis have one of the highest technologically advanced defence systems in the world so how could a group like Hamas carry out such an audacious raid? One news bulletin, very, very briefly explained why this breach in Israel's security may have happened. It was only shown once and has not been seen again on TV. Apparently, many of the IDF troops assigned to defend the border had taken time out to go hunting ‘Palestinians with Israeli settlers’ -  Israeli settlers who are illegally occupying Palestinian land supposedly protected under so-called ‘international law’. These settlers are comfortably housed and living on land they have no right to be on. Not content with stealing this territory, every now and again these illegal squatters go looking for Palestinians - unarmed Palestinians - often accompanied by members of the IDF. This was the reason, according to this brief news bulletin, why the border was left with a skeletal protection, the troops were out on a ‘turkey shoot’ with the illegal settlers. Putting this on the news was an obvious mistake as the last thing the Western authorities want is their peoples to know the truth about what is happening in Israel/Palestine. The caption was not shown again.

My own view of Hamas, unlike some other Palestinian fighting groups, is they are a bunch of religious nutters, like their nemesis in Israel the Zionists. Like their paymasters in Iran who torture and kill women who do not conform to some barmy Muslim religious law, which perhaps does not exist outside their interpretation of the Koran, and such tortures and murders happen all too often in Iran. Hamas appear to share a similar set of beliefs. Hamas are anti-women’s rights, anti-LGBTQ and certainly will not bring freedom to the Palestinian people. The Zionist crowd in Tel Aviv who constitute the Israeli Government are no better in their fanatical beliefs in Judea and hatred of Arabs. Don’t get me wrong, it is everybody’s right to practice their religion, or to follow none, but not if that leads to fanaticism, murder and war.

When Hamas crossed into Israel, something which the Israelis have been doing to the Palestinians on the Gaza Strip for many decades all too often killing unarmed Palestinians, they had the chance to take the moral high ground, but did not take this opportunity. Had Hamas a military brain between them they would have taken a golden opportunity to score a military victory over the IDF and score points in the propaganda war. They did not do this. One option may have been, cross the border as they did, then double back on themselves and take the IDF border guards, reduced in number as they must have known, from the Israeli side. They could have stolen their uniforms and weapons and waited for those guards, out on a ‘turkey shoot’ with the settlers, to return and take them as well using the art of surprise. They could then return to Gaza better armed and with IDF uniforms and issue a statement along the lines of, perhaps:

acting on intelligence received from inside the IDF Hamas ASUs (Active Service Units) penetrated Israeli security attacking and killing a number of IDF border guards. We have the ability and expertise to hit when and how we please as this operation bears testament.

Such a statement would have caused panic and confusion inside the IDF and the Zionist Government in Tel Aviv. There were other equally legitimate alternatives for them to hit. They did not do this and instead took civilian hostages whose only crimes were listening to music or being Jewish. Hamas is not a military outfit, moreover it is a bunch of religious rabble!! The Israelis have for many, many, years been murdering Palestinian civilians and Hamas had the opportunity to rise above this barbarism of their foes. They should have confined their operations to attacking and destroying military, political and economic targets. Instead, they took civilians, women and children, concert goers as hostages and nobody, outside Hamas, knows what fate awaits them! 

Hamas could have gained much credibility in the eyes of normal people, among which I do not include western governments, by carrying out a well-planned military assault on Israel in their pursuit of a Palestinian nation-state. Hamas want to see the total destruction of Israel, something which will not happen and should not be allowed to happen. The destruction of the apartheid Zionist state yes, definitely, but the destruction of Israel as a country, no equally definitely not! After all, when the Third Reich was thankfully defeated in 1945 we witnessed the destruction of the evil Nazi state, but not the obliteration of Germany off the map, so where’s the difference? A smaller and reformed Israel and her population of 9.5 million, slightly larger than Greater London, living in peace alongside a Palestinian nation state is not an unreasonable starting point and aim. There would be no room for the Zionist fanatics or Hamas under such an arrangement.

The response by the Israelis to the Hamas attack has been devastating and murderous. They have turned Gaza, which has been an open-aired prison for the Palestinian inmates for years, into something between the Warsaw Ghetto, where Jewish people were forced to live by the Nazis and subsequently destroyed by them with the inhabitants still in their dwellings following an ‘uprising’ and the Sobibor Nazi Death Camp. If the Hamas attack was a war crime, which it was once they took hostages, then the reaction by Israel is ten war crimes! However, a war crime is a war crime be it one or a hundred. The death and destruction Israel is inflicting on the people of Gaza has been done under the aegis of ‘Israels right to defend herself’ which is stretching this right to say the least. Does this ‘right to defend herself’ stretch as far as cutting off electricity supplies to civilians? Does it go so far as to legitimise preventing hospitals from treating patients, some in critical conditions? Does it stretch to stopping emergency medical supplies to hospitals? The answer to these questions is categorically No. What the Israelis are doing constitutes war crimes of the first degree and the Zionist regime in Tel Aviv just like some of the Nazis nearly eighty years ago should be held to account. Oddly enough it was the USA who gave protection and immunity to some Nazis who were of use to them!!

Could the Israeli Intelligence Services have been behind the Hamas attack? Could Mossad have planned the attack on Israeli civilians? No, this is unlikely but what is possible is they allowed the attacks to go ahead. The reason for this, if it was the case and it’s only a remote possibility, could have been to create a situation which, under the guise of ‘Israel defending itself’ which allows them to bomb and bulldoze Gaza to pulp? Could this have happened? Unlikely but certainly not beyond the bounds of possibilities. In the eyes of the world Israel would be exercising her ‘right to defend herself’ which is what has happened as government after government repeatedly speak of this right of ‘Israel to defend itself’. From Washington to London to Dublin, in fact across the western world, we have repeatedly heard this bland, less than convincing rhetoric about Israels ‘right the defend herself’ and it is wearing very thin! In the Dail, 12th October 2023, Holly Cairns, the leader of the Social Democrats asked Tanaiste, Micheal Martin, “why had the European Union not shown the same condemnation of Israeli attacks on Gaza civilians as they have to Hamas for their attacks?” Martin replied with some half-baked answer, which was no answer at all really, about the EU continuing financial support for the people of Gaza. Also in the Dail, People Before Profit TD, Richard Boyd Barret, was almost foaming at the mouth in his condemnation of Israel. As the veins stuck out on his neck he, rightly, condemned the IDF and Netanyahu Government demanding the 26 county administration support the Palestinians. What a great pity he, and his parent party the Socialist Workers Party, did not show the same outrage against British atrocities in the six counties! 

In Britain at the Labour Party Conference leader Keir Starmer said “I am shocked and appalled by events in Israel and these attacks by Hamas must be condemned”. Not a word, notably, of condemnation for the disproportionate response from Tel Aviv! At a press conference in Tel Aviv while shaking hands with war criminal, Benjamin Netanyahu, US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, told the Israeli leader; “America will always be at Israel's side”. He went on to liken the Hamas attacks with “echoes of Nazi massacres”. If any side, without condoning Hamas for one second, is emulating the actions of the Third Reich against Jewish people, it is the Israelis actions against Palestinian civilians. So much for so-called ‘international law’ which, arguably, does not exist!! If a country is well in with the USA, as Israel is, they are free to break any law they wish with, it appears, US permission.

To have a law, any law, it must be enforced. This often quoted ‘international law’ is unenforceable as those unofficially charged with enforcing it, the USA, NATO, Russia, Britian and China regularly break such laws. I remember many years ago in West Belfast on the toilet door of a pub was written, ‘when the people who make the law, break the law, in the name of the law then there is no law’. A fitting piece of wall graffiti which also applies to this ‘international law’. Blinken by stating “America will always be at Israel's side” was giving approval to go out and commit war crimes to Netanyahu, of that there can be no doubt. According to Gabrielle Aumann, Medicines Sans Frontier, the war crimes committed include; “hospitals attacked by Israeli forces”. He continued; “We are running out of supplies and electricity. Babies in units will die if the electricity runs out. The Israelis are violating humanitarian law” he said.

The advice Hamas are giving to people, people in a position of hopelessness, is to ignore the Israeli warnings about leaving Gaza. As bombs explode all around them Hamas can offer nothing more concrete than this rubbish? How can a person ignore something which is happening before their very eyes? Are Hamas totally bereft of any form of reality? War crimes are going on in Palestine and have been for decades, people are being murdered by the thousand daily and all Hamas can say is, “ignore anything Israel say and stay where you are”. On this occasion Hamas, through their actions in the attack on Israel, have exposed the legitimate Palestinian struggle to the same allegations of war crimes as those levelled at the Israelis! Are they simply plain stupid, or just barbaric as are, it has appeared for many years, the Israeli Government? One thing Hamas and the Zionists share, they are both fucking evil, rotten to the core.

A war crime, according to the Geneva Convention 1949, is a violation “of the laws of war that give rise to individual criminal responsibility for action by combatants in action such as intentionally killing civilians”. War Crimes cover “murder, ill treatment or deportation to slave labour or any other of the civilian population in the occupied territory, killing of hostages, torture or inhuman treatment.” Both the Hamas and the Zionist regime in Tel Aviv are guilty of many of these offences and should be tried for such crimes. 

An addition in 1977 to the Geneva Convention of 1949 was an amendment which detailed ‘international humanitarian law’ which, notably Israel are not signatories to as neither, are the USA the country along with the British Government giving the most unequivocal support to the Zionist breach of international law! Clearly both Hamas and the Israeli Government are guilty of breaking ‘international law’ but it looks likely only Hamas will pay the penalty. The United States will continue to stand beside the Zionist regime in Tel Aviv as will, no doubt, the British Government and the European Union. Basically, what is happening is that a cloak of protection is being given to Netanyahu and his government misinterpreting ‘Israels right to defend itself’ with ‘Israels right to commit war crimes’.

The situation in the region is affecting many walks of life not least sport. In Britain on Monday 9th October Arab and Muslim sportsmen in Cricket, Football and Rugby held a meeting. At this meeting it was decided if the Wembley Arch was illuminated in Israeli flag colours before or during the friendly football match between England and Australia on Friday 13th October at Wembley these sports competitors stated “they would walk off the pitch if respect was not shown to the Palestinians lost in the conflict.” Earlier Jewish supporters of all three games had condemned the sporting authorities for “staying quiet” about what they described as; “the worst atrocity since the holocaust”. The Wembley authorities decided against lighting up the arch much to the annoyance of the British Government and the Israeli Football Association. The Irish Dailly Mirror on Saturday 14th October reported; “Rabbi quits in FA refusal”. This was in reference to “the Chair of the Faith in Football group” resigning over the FA's refusal to illuminate Wembley in the Israeli flag colours. “Rabbi Alex Goldberg has told the FA that Faith in Football will no longer be working with them”. This group appear to be a religious faction, which is their right, which refuse to see the crimes of both Hamas and the Israeli defence forces. The IDF have committed by far the most war crimes which ‘Faith in Football’ conveniently do not mention. Equally, “two wrongs do not make a right”, for once I have semi-agreement with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar.

All the warring factions which are murdering civilians in the area should be taken off the stage. Starting with the Netanyahu Government in Tel Aviv, Hamas and any other faction who are a barrier to peace should be taken out of the game. The demand Israel should be wiped off the map must be dropped. The Zionist state which exists at the moment should be forced out and a new, reformed and smaller and democratic Israel put in its place. The other idea, perhaps applicable in any other situation, but not this one due to historical factors, is a non-starter. That is, Israel goes and a unified Palestine be born where ‘Jews can live’. Given the historical experiences of the Jewish people dating back to the 12th century and before, why should these people have any faith or confidence in such an arrangement? Did they not consider themselves safe in Russia before the ‘Pale of Settlement’? Equally, did the Jewish community not feel safe in Germany until Hitler came to power? The answer to both these is yes they did feel safe and look what happened. Why then should they feel safe in the proposed new Palestine where ‘Jewish people can live’? I know I wouldn’t if I was Jewish, would you?

The victims in this almighty murderous mess, the Israeli hostages whose fate is unknown to all but Hamas, and the Palestinian people of Gaza who are being bombed out of existence are the real sufferers. The Palestinians are being pulled in a three way-no-win situation. On the one hand, Egypt is refusing, so far, to open the ‘Rafah Pass’ which is the border crossing between Gaza and Egypt. Therefore, the Palestinians cannot cross into Egypt. On the other, Israel is not allowing aide to cross their border into Gaza because if they do, the bombing and killing of Palestinians would have to stop for fear of bombing the aide convoys. In the centre Hamas are telling the Palestinian people of Gaza to “ignore the Israeli warnings to move south, and stay where they are”, three not very appetising choices. Cold blooded murder by all concerned with one side, the Zionists, backed all the way by the USA and the West. What fucking hope for the Palestinian refugees?

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

Hamas And Zionists Destroy Any Hope Of Peace In The Region

Gavin Casey ✍ I stood in solidarity with the Palestinian people at Belfast City Hall on Sunday at a protest chaired by a Jewish female. 

I consider Israel to be a genocidal, terrorist, apartheid, war criminal and rogue state with an active Biological WMD program (1 of only 10 rogue states which refuse to sign or ratify the convention) but I did not and do not stand with Hamas. The deliberate targeting of civilians and indiscriminate use of artillery / rockets are wrong in any circumstances; regardless the provocation.

The Hamas act of so-called ‘resistance’ came about because of an apparent ‘intelligence failure’ much-promoted by the media. At the very least there was a gross and criminal dereliction of duty within the Israeli administration. When one considers the decision to permit a music festival within 3 miles of the Gaza blockade in an area with woefully-inadequate defensive-readiness there can be no other conclusion.

The defensive-readiness failings included drone vulnerability, seemingly oblivious to the war in Ukraine; with intelligence-gathering assets left wide open to top attack. That they could conduct drone operations on top of an Israeli installation betrays a total lack of electronic warfare capability. There also appeared to be no Quick Reaction Force readiness in the areas attacked. The lack of readiness is apparently due to a religious festival, according to the media. How would Israeli intelligence and academia not be alert to the significance of the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War when they were attacked on the date of the same religious festival? Was this criminal lack of defensive readiness and public safety by default, as a consequence of corrupt negligence, or something more designed? The decision to permit a music festival three miles from the Gaza blockade in such a security-compromised blockade sector also containing senior officers and an apparent Holocaust survivor is questionable to say the least.

Hamas is a theocratic, patriarchal and socially-retrograde organisation; which suppresses dissent and apparently persecutes the LBGTQ+ community. They deliberately target civilians. They indoctrinate young workers into martyr mindsets and send them to their deaths. They use indiscriminate artillery (rockets) in the same manner as Russia in Ukraine. What Hamas did when they exploited the glaring vulnerabilities was no more 'resistance' than the Omagh or Enniskillen bombs. Deliberate targeting of civilians was wrong in Dresden, Derry and Dublin-Monaghan and it's equally wrong either side of the Palestine conflict. Hostagetaking was as wrong in Patsy Gillespie's house as it is in a Kibbutz. Inhumanity is inhumanity regardless the provocation. There is no moral or strategic capital to be gained from 'returning the serve'; only the perpetuation of trauma, demonisation and genocide.

If our own history teaches us anything Hamas has been significantly-penetrated and compromised by Mossad. Mossad is one of the most sophisticated global intelligence agencies and certainly the most ruthless. It is illogical to believe Mossad doesn't have coercively-controlled assets within Hamas and did not have forewarning. It is also illogical to believe an attack of this size with all its logistical and planning requirements could have gone off with complete operational security. The Egyptian Government has claimed to have passed on warnings. It is also reasonable to expect that Mossad has orchestration and misdirection potential within Hamas and with those with whom they collaborate internationally.

Ukrainian intelligence is apparently claiming Wagner trained Hamas in drone operations. No side will be remiss when it comes to propagandising carnage so such claims, while plausible, require further scrutiny complicated by the liquidation of the Wagner chain of command.

What is absolutely true is the nature of Hamas 'resistance' is unjustifiable violence which in turn results in grossly disproportionate response from Israel. War crime begets war crime and the Palestinian people continue to suffer. Imprisoned and under siege, how much more 'resistance' retribution can they withstand? The people of Palestine need freed from both Israel and Hamas; who appear to me to be little more than a genocide-facilitation vehicle.

Gavin Casey is an independent Republican from
County Tyrone who has also lived in the USA and Asia.

War Crime Begets War Crime

The Uri Avnery Column takes a look at Israeli government stupidity in its attitude to Hamas.


The March Of Folly

Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)