Barrage of rockets slams South in violent escalation
UPDATED: 11/10/2012 21:53
IDF says 19 rockets fired at Israel; Iron Dome intercepts Grad; Earlier, missile hit IDF jeep patrolling Gaza border, injuring four soldiers; IDF tank shelling, killing four Palestinians.
JPOST
A barrage of rockets fired from Gaza landed in a slew of southern Israeli cities on Saturday night, as violence continued to escalate along the Gaza Strip border following an anti-tank missile attack against an IDF jeep earlier on Saturday.
Nineteen rockets fell, according to the IDF, though Channel 10 reported a total of 25 rockets, including eight long-range rockets, landing at Ashkelon, Ashdod, Sderot, the Eshkol Regional Council area and the Be’er Tuviya area. No injuries or damage were reported.
At least one of the long-range Grad rockets was intercepted near Ashdod by the Iron Dome, according to the IDF.
Earlier on Saturday, Palestinian terrorists in Gaza fired an anti-tank missile at an IDF jeep carrying out an ordinary patrol on the Israeli side of the border, striking the vehicle directly and injuring four soldiers.
One soldier was in serious condition with a head injury, one is moderately wounded, and two are lightly injured. They were airlifted to the Soroka University Medical Center in Beersheba.
Immediately afterwards, tanks opened fire on the area from which the missile was fired. Tanks also fired on pre-selected targets in the Sa’ajiya area of Gaza near Nahal Oz. Palestinian sources said four people were killed in the return fire, and 25 others were injured.
Following the incident, the IDF asked Gaza envelope residents in the Eshkol region and in Sha’ar Hanegev to be within 15 seconds away from shelters, Army Radio reported.
Islamic Jihad is believed to be behind the latest attack. The IDF views the incident as a severe escalation, and as part of a wider, stepped-up terrorist initiative to target its forces along the border.
IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz is due to hold an evaluation in the coming hours. “This is the second serious incident in a few days along the border,” a senior army source said.
Defense Minister Ehud Barak, responding to the anti-tank missile attack, said, “The IDF responded severely to the incident, and additional responses will be examined in the coming days. We will not accept the escalating attacks on the border.”
Home Front Command Minister Avi Dichter said that Israel must restore its military deterrence against Gaza, saying that “this is an unbearable and unreasonable situation. Israel cannot accept a daily terrorist drizzle from Gaza.”
Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum blamed Israel for the incident, saying, “The occupation’s targeting of civilians was a grave escalation that must not pass in silence,” and adding that “resistance must be reinforced in order to block the aggression.”
In an separate incident at another location, four people were wounded in an Israeli air strike in the town of Khan Younis.
The incident came days after terrorists in Gaza blew up a massive tunnel they had dug from southern Gaza toward Israel. No one was injured in that incident. but a jeep that was in the area was blown sideways by the force of the explosion.
The blast may have been set off by remote control.
Earlier on Thursday, Brig.-Gen. Micky Edelstein, the new commander of the Gaza Division, led soldiers into Gaza to investigate the area, following a string of bomb attacks in recent days, including one on Tuesday that wounded three soldiers.
The soldiers uncovered several bombs after crossing the border, some of them very powerful, IDF Spokesman Brig.-Gen. Yoav Mordechai said.
“As soldiers worked to fix the fence in the area, the tunnel blew up under the [fence] route,” Mordechai said. “It was a very large explosion, leaving a four- to five-meter crater. We believe the blast is a result of the work carried out by the army west of the border, though this needs to be confirmed.”
The IDF does not yet know how the tunnel was intended to be used. “It was a very big tunnel, of the likes we haven’t seen in a long time,” Mordechai said.
On Tuesday morning, an explosion tore through the Gaza border, wounding three soldiers.
Reuters and JPost.com staff contributed to this report.
Yamit, I believe you once stated.Israel should turn off the utilities to Gaza.Turn them on when the residence rid themselves of Hamas.Israel allows goods to move into Gaza while Hamas is receiving rockets and ammo from tunnels from Egypt.Blow the tunnels and cut off supplies to Gaza.And above all don’t worry about what the rest of the world thinks, it’s not their ass.
rongrand says:
“Over 60 rockets from Gaza into Israel
since yesterday. No other nation would tolerate such behavior.Where is the Israeli leadership?? The rockets rain on Israel and the world remains
silent, the silence is deafening.; What the hell is wrong with this picture??? What a contrast, Israelis are out proving aid to nations in distress and the Arab world is firing rockets at Israel and the world is
looking the other way. G-d is watching and there will be a price to pay.””Where is the Israeli leadership??
_________________________________________________
Where is the Israeli leadership??
“What Leadership?
We ain’t got no Leadership. They are cowering in their own fear and excrement.; They need Dead Jews, in fact many dead Jews to justify to the ones they fear, any significant retaliation.
Rongrand
“The rockets rain on Israel and the world remains silent, the silence is deafening”.
In Greece, the Media woke up when Israel retaliated. As expected, Israel is portrayed as the aggressor in the headlines.
In my country, Palestinian lives are apparently worth more than Jewish ones.
Ron,
We have near family in the South and all cousins and my niece and family decided to pack it at least until some semblance of protection is made available.
Regretfully our warning that we do not have a military command worthy of trust and a political cadre of worth, did not elicit interest and we reap the tragic consequences.
Honestly I do not know if we have the time now to effect corrective action.
Today in the North also the idiot passing as leader went up to the Golan to look using binoculars over to the Syrian side to ascertain a “response” to days of over the border attacks from Syria.
He ordered one shell and one GG rocket launch to “MISS” the military that fired on our side.
MISS, ordered to MISS. That is the net worth of him and the military.
from moshe feiglin’s ‘manhigut yehudit’ site:
”
In the mid-90s (the Oslo era) Israel’s “This is our land” mentality switched to “This is their land”. A large swath of influential people in the arts, communications, politics, security, justice, media and politics are responsible for the transformation. They built their careers on it and cannot go back to the pre-Oslo days of “This is our Land.”
That is why there is no solution to the missiles screeching into southern Israel from Gaza.”
unless the core of the problem is clearly identified and properly addressed (read: ‘ruthlessly apply a VERY HEAVY BOOT to the muslim population’s neck wherever ye find them’…)we are all treading water here.
and more from the short article: “”Fighters,” Kovner sums up his words, “Smite the enemy!” (There is an enemy and it is not “terror”) “Smite him again and again!” (No “proportionality” here)
“The enemy will be destroyed by the sword of the division fighters” (No stopping in the middle).
“Forward to battle and to victory!”
i wish the comment tool bar were back and running…:(
Over 60 rockets from Gaza into Israel since yesterday. No other nation would tolerate such behavior.Where is the Israeli leadership??The rockets rain on Israel and the world remains silent, the silence is deafening. What the hell is wrong with this picture???What a contrast, Israelis are out proving aid to nations in distress and the Arab world is firing rockets at Israel and the world is looking the other way.G-d is watching and there will be a price to pay.
@ shmuel halevi,SELA !
I want to make a SECULAR philosophical argument for the right of Israelis to eradicate
Hamas (et al.) terrorists once and for all, EVEN IF THIS MEANS THAT A HUGE NUMBER
OF PALESTINIAN CIVILIANS WILL BE INADVERTENTLY KILLED IN THE PROCESS.
I am not arguing that Israel SHOULD do it. I am saying that SHE HAS THE MORAL RIGHT to
do it. In such a scenario, the (always anti-Semitic) international community will
certainly ethically demonize Israel. Is that an acceptable price? Also, will
Israel be able to stand the economic sanctions that might be imposed on her as
a result of her exercise of her right to defend the Israeli children? It is up
to the Israeli public to decide. But the moral right of Israel to act in such a
decisive manner cannot be philosophically disputed.
The usual argument against operations such as Cast Lead, which involve the death of Palestinian
non-combatants, is that the number of such deaths exceeds by far the number of
the Israeli civilians that will be saved by the resulting reduction of
Palestinian terrorism. It says, in effect, that killing, for example, 10
thousand Palestinians is morally unjustified given that terrorism by Hamas
would never inflict even remotely as many Israeli civilian casualties. This is
a version of the very nice-sounding dictum that all lives count the same.
Now, the above argument fails to take into account the other consequences of Palestinian
terrorism: Hamas rockets don’t just kill innocent Israelis, they also condemn
nearly 1 million Israelis to live a life of constant fear and stress. But let’s
skip that, for we can debunk the argument’s basic claim, the claim that all
lives should count equally.
Moral philosophers have a trick for elucidating their point, a trick that is called a
“thought experiment”. Such a thought experiment asks us to imagine a situation
and then to describe our reactions to that situation. The philosopher hopes
that our reaction will agree with the one she predicted, and that our reaction
will be the one that proves her point. So let’s engage in one such thought
experiment:
Imagine you are in the sea with a ship. One kilometer to your right, your daughter is
drowning. One kilometer to the left, one thousand people are drowning. There is
enough space in the ship for all one thousand and one drowners, but there is
simply not enough time to go to both directions. You have to go either right
for your daughter, or left for the other thousand. Which one do you let die?
Well, it is obvious that all of us would go save our kid, and it is clear that we do
consider ourselves morally justified in letting the others die. It is also
clear that no culture on planet earth (even the very uncivilized ones) would
suggest that we were morally wrong in choosing the life of our kid over the
life of the thousand drowners.
This shows that the idea that some lives are worth MORE than others (for example, the life
of our children versus the life of strangers) is A FACT ABOUT HUMAN PSYCHOLOGY.
In other words, humans feel like valuing the life of their kids more than the
life of strangers. And this should be enough proof that operations like Cast
Lead, which are meant as self defense for the protection of Israeli children, should
be deemed morally acceptable despite the number of Palestinian casualties
BECAUSE WE HAVE A MORAL DUTY TO OUR CHILDREN THAT WEIGHS MORE THAN OUR MORAL
DUTY TO STRANGERS.
Some diehards in the philosophy profession might insist that whatever our psychology is, it
cannot dictate what is morally right or wrong. And that, therefore, the moral
thing to do would be to save the thousand drowners, and not our kid, BECAUSE WHAT
FINALLY DECIDES THE MORALITY OF OUR ACTIONS ARE THE CONSEQUENCES OF THOSE
ACTIONS. And, the philosopher continues, 1000 deaths are worse than one death.
I wouldn’t want to be the son of such a philosopher, because he seems to be as bad a
parent as he is a philosopher. His argument can be easily refuted, even if we
accept his view that it is the consequences of actions that matter morally
(this view in the theory of “Ethics” is called “utilitarianism”, and I happen
to be a proponent of it, but our imaginary philosopher has misapplied it, as I
intend to show).
Imagine a world where parents must value the well being of their kids as much as the well
being of strangers. This means that they should be allotting their effort and
wealth equally among their kid and the strangers: no second pair of shoes for
their kid, but just one pair, so that the other pair can be donated to a poor
kid in Africa. And so on with all their possessions. Given that the parents
love their kids more than the strangers, they will be at a constant state of
distress in their attempt to act as the morality of our imaginary philosopher
dictates. Isn’t it obvious that such a morality, a morality that is so hostile
to our basic instinct of caring more for our child, will end up creating a
society of neurotic parents? This counts as a very bad consequence, and
therefore we may dismiss the imaginary philosopher’s argument by telling him
that the THE BEST SET OF CONSEQUENCES WILL OCCUR ONLY IF WE CONSIDER THAT OUR MORAL
DUTY TO OUR KIDS COMES BEFORE OUR MORAL DUTY TO STRANGERS.
In this way we save both the theory of utilitarianism from its misapplication, and the
Israeli moral right to protect their kids, even if tens of thousands of Palestinians
have to die.
My argument can be extended to any sort of decisive action against the terrorists which
might lead to big civilian Palestinian casualties. The only moral requirement for Israel is that
she performs the action that is the most EFFICIENT in achieving her goal of
exterminating Hamas: if there are two possible courses of action, both of which
will lead to the elimination of Hamas, but the first will inflict more
casualties in Palestinian civilians than the second, then the second one should
be chosen. Choosing the first would be gratuitous since Israel’s aim can be
fulfilled with less deaths.
Then again, Israel has always chosen the least drastic options so as to protect Palestinian
civilians, so my last point is moot.
But let it not be argued that Israel is in any way immoral if she wipes out lots of
Palestinians: as long as Palestinian civilians have been forewarned to evacuate
their houses, anything human that moves in the area of attack is fair game –
morally speaking.
Tried twice to leave a comment but it disappeared.
Here we go again…
The same garbage remains in control of the IDF and the government in general, (no pun intended), and that WILL NOT produce different results.
Barak is trash out of the Oslo barns, Netanyahu never had any position he could not twist around. He has had the longest time in office after Ben Gurion and FAILED to deal with any real security problem, be that Iran or Hamas or Hezbollah. STUNT meisters and red marker expert. The economy due in great part to Professor Fisher expert guidance is still viable, otherwise our condition is sorry disgrace.
IRAN will not be stopped by the unJews. Hamas will remain rocketing at will, Hezbollah will join once the Syrian condition moves on.
SOLUTIONS: THE PEOPLE must retake the direction of the State and remove the perpetuating flotsam in there. Easy? No, but… Otherwise Mr. Obama will complete at will his and his Islamic controllers plans.