Showing posts with label Ryan Jones. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ryan Jones. Show all posts

Sunday, July 15, 2018

Israelis Angered by Gaza Ceasefire After 174 Mortars and Rockets Hit Negev - Ryan Jones Israel Today

Israelis Angered by Gaza Ceasefire After 174 Mortars and Rockets Hit Negev

Sunday, July 15, 2018 |  Ryan Jones  Israel Today
Many Israelis have characterized the government's response to ongoing "terror kite" attacks from Gaza as flaccid, at best.
So, when Hamas and its allies upped the ante by lobbing no fewer than 174 rockets and mortar shells into southern Israel at the weekend, there was some hope that the Israeli army would finally get a green light to take real action.
The Israel Air Force did bomb a number of Hamas and Islamic Jihad installations, but it's the kind of damage from which the terror groups quickly recover.
Israelis want the threat eliminated completely, and see the ceasefire agreed to by the government on Saturday evening as a bandaid on a festering wound.
The constant fear of having to run for bomb shelters at any moment "is ruining our lives," a resident of Kibbutz Kfar Aza told Israel's Mako news portal.
Others complained that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seemingly isn't making their ability to live in peace and security a top priority. "Another escalation, and [Netanyahu] is off traveling to the World Cup," said a resident of Netiv HaAsara, referencing the fact that the prime minister took the opportunity during last week's visit to Russia to enjoy the world's largest sporting event.
The government argued that the return of relative quiet to the area known as the "Gaza envelope" should silence the residents' grumbling.
In an interview with the Ynet news portal, Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz insisted that it was Israel's "strong response" to the rocket fire over the weekend that compelled Hamas to seek a ceasefire. "We will not accept any acts of terror against us," Steinitz said, stressing that additional attacks on southern Israel would be dealt with harshly.
But the mayor of Sderot, the Negev town most often hit by Gaza rockets, warned that the manner in which the weekend's violence was resolved had put Hamas, not Israel, in the driver's seat.
"We are not pleased with this ceasefire," Mayor Alon Davidi told Mako. "It is Hamas, not Israel, that's deciding when to escalate and when to back down. I call upon the prime minister and his cabinet to come down to the south and hear from the residents what life is like here."
Mayor Davidi's criticism was echoed by Education Minister Naftali Bennett.
"Allowing Hamas to dictate the terms of the ceasefire after two months of arson attacks and hundreds of rockets on the residents of Gaza border communities is a serious mistake," read a statement released by Bennett. "Showing restraint creates an escalation in violence."
Indeed, as Bennett concluded, the greatest fear of the residents of southern Israel is that their government's policies have committed them to a "long war of attrition."
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Friday, June 22, 2018

Report: Hamas Paid Family to Claim Baby Died From Israeli Teargas - Ryan Jones ISRAEL TODAY

Report: Hamas Paid Family to Claim Baby Died From Israeli Teargas

Thursday, June 21, 2018 |  Ryan Jones  ISRAEL TODAY
Remember that baby girl who died in Gaza last month allegedly after inhaling teargas fired by Israeli soldiers against Palestinian protestors?
Well–surprise, surprise–it turns out 9-month-old Layla Ghandour wasn't the victim of heartless Israeli brutality after all. At least not according to her cousin.
Twenty-year-old Mohammed Omar was captured by Israeli forces late last month while taking part in a three-man infiltration of southern Israel. The Fatah-affiliated activists managed to cut through the Gaza security fence and tried to set fire to an unmanned IDF post. Omar and one other cell member were nabbed, while the third managed to escape back into Gaza.
During his interrogation, Omar detailed the planned attack, and also volunteered that he was related to Layla Ghandour.
According to his indictment filed by the Southern District Attorney on Thursday, Omar told investigators that he was present at the mass Gaza border demonstration on May 14, the day Layla died.
Omar reported receiving a phone call from his mother informing him that his baby cousin had passed away. When he arrived home, Omar was told that Layla had succumbed to the same blood disease that had killed her brother less than a year earlier.
It was at that point, Omar recounted, that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar got in touch with the family and offered them NIS 8,000 ($2,200) to tell reporters that Layla had died from inhaling Israeli teargas.
This type of deception is not uncommon in the Palestinians' portrayal of Israeli defensive and counter-terrorism measures. Nor is the mainstream international media's willingness to publish each and every unsubstantiated Palestinian claim against Israel absent even the most rudimentary fact-checking.
As the above video notes, Hamas had already removed Layla from the official Gaza border death toll at the end of last month, but not until longer after the damage to Israel's reputation had been done.
Watch video here: Hamas lies
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Friday, April 27, 2018

Wonder Begets Tragedy as Israeli Students Swept Away in Mighty Flood - Ryan Jones ISRAEL TODAY

Wonder Begets Tragedy as Israeli Students Swept Away in Mighty Flood

Friday, April 27, 2018 |  Ryan Jones  ISRAEL TODAY
All of Israel marveled at the tremendous "latter" rains the country received over the past two days.
Heavy downpours, accompanied by spectacular lightning shows, turned streets in downtown Jerusalem and Tel Aviv into rivers and brought the dramatic desert flash floods for which Israel's southern Negev and Judean deserts are so famous.
But the wonder quickly turned to tragedy on Thursday when a group of high school students suddenly found themselves in the path of one of those mighty desert floods.
Following hours of dangerous rescue work, soldiers with the Israel Air Force’s elite 669 rescue unit managed to extract the surviving students, along with the bodies of 10 of their classmates that had been washed miles away.

One of the girls who perished heartbreakingly predicted her own death hours before in a WhatsApp group with fellow students. "I cannot believe I’m going on a trip in such weather," she wrote. "It doesn’t make sense for us to go to a place where everything is flooding. It’s tempting fate — we’re going to die, I’m serious."
Incredibly, one of the counselors responded that all precautions had been taken, and that the students had no reason to be worried.
A boy who survived the flood recounted the harrowing ordeal through his father for Hadashot News:
"I saw bodies floating in the water, I didn’t know if they were alive or if what I saw were dead bodies. At one point there was a wave that was 3 or 4 meters high. I was holding on to one of my friends really tight… but we couldn’t stand against the massive water current. She slipped away from me in front of my eyes."
Two directors at the Benny Tzion pre-military academy in Tel Aviv have been arrested and are being investigated for putting the students' lives in mortal danger.
Most Israelis are aware of the types of floods that accompany such heavy rains in this land. For those who weren't, there was ample warning on radio and television news to avoid inescapable valleys and ravines at risk of flooding.
The ravine, or wadi, where the students were hiking is known as Nahal Tzafit. It is one of the more popular hiking routes in the Judean Desert, and one of those most prone to flash-flooding.
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Tuesday, April 3, 2018

Why 16 Palestinians Were Killed in Gaza Last Friday - Ryan Jones ISRAEL TODAY

Why 16 Palestinians Were Killed in Gaza Last Friday

Tuesday, April 03, 2018 |  Ryan Jones  ISRAEL TODAY
Last Friday was the eve of Passover, a day on which nearly every Israeli Jewish family was busy marking one of the Bible's most foundational events - the Exodus from Egypt.
Last Friday also played host to a classic example of deadly Palestinian propaganda.
We say "deadly" not because of the terrible long-term effects it will have on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which it will. But our present concern is more immediate. The "deadly" in this case is the cynical exploitation of Palestinian Arab civilians to score points against Israel in the international media. Yes, there are a great many of us in Israel who take offense at the despicable exploitation of average Palestinian Arabs as pawns in the grand scheme to destroy the Jewish state.
A prime example of this was witnessed on Friday when Hamas activists sent a 7-year-old Palestinian girl to breach the Gaza security fence during massive riots in the terrorist-ruled coastal enclave.
With cameras trained on the frightened little girl, she slowly made her way toward the heavily-armed Israeli soldiers. There could be only one reason for doing this - Hamas hoped the Israelis would assume the child was carrying a bomb and gun her down, thus providing the Palestinian cause with a PR victory that would make headlines for years to come.
The Israelis didn't take the bait.
The girl was stopped by the soldiers and returned to her parents unharmed. It was a clear demonstration that Israel had no intention of harming Palestinians who were either innocent or could not be held accountable for their actions.
Toward those who were not innocent and who could be held accountable for their actions, Israel was far less forgiving.
Hamas leaders made clear that the goal of what they called the "March of Return" was to breach Israel's southern border, and then...who knows? Attack nearby Jewish towns?
Singling out Israel for protecting its border against such a breach and subsequent violence and mayhem is hypocritical in the extreme, considering that any other nation would have done the same.
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Sunday, April 1, 2018

Trump Tells Arabs to Pipe Down Over Gaza Border Deaths - Ryan Jones ISRAEL TODAY

Trump Tells Arabs to Pipe Down Over Gaza Border Deaths

Sunday, April 01, 2018 |  Ryan Jones  ISRAEL TODAY
US President Donald Trump at the weekend instructed his ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, to block a Security Council statement blaming Israel for Palestinian deaths during Friday's Hamas-led riots along the Gaza security fence.
Hamas reported that at least 16 Palestinians had been shot and killed by Israeli forces after the terror group sent some 30,000 Gazans to attempt to breach the barrier and enter southern Israel.
Israeli officials described the mass incident as extremely violent in nature, and video footage supported that claim.
But Palestinian and other Arab leaders attempted to paint the confrontation as a "peaceful demonstration" during which Israeli troops opened fire unprovoked, resulting in what they called "war crimes."
Acting on behalf of the Palestinians, Kuwait submitted a Security Council draft that contained a veiled condemnation of Israel and demanded an "independent and transparent investigation" into the Palestinian deaths.
Such investigations have in the past served only to whitewash Hamas and lay the bulk of the blame at Israel's feet. Trump was having none of it, and neither was the UK, which joined America in opposing the statement.
Palestinian leaders were livid.
Palestinian Authority spokesman Yusef al-Mahmoud said opposition to the Security Council statement by the US and UK had "turned them into accomplices in the horrific massacre committed by the Israeli occupation army against our defenseless people."
Al-Mahmoud was apparently unaware that numerous video clips circulating on the Internet show the Palestinian mobs violently provoking the Israeli soldiers with rocks, fire bombs and guns. Several Palestinians were caught planting bombs along the security fence.
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas said that America and Britain had demonstrated blatant "bias in favor of oppression and suppression."
Casual observers might wonder why protecting the Gaza security fence from mass infiltration constitutes oppression. After all, the Palestinians demand an independent state in the West Bank and Gaza, and independent states have protected borders separating them from neighboring states.
Hamas itself provided the explanation for the apparent discrepancy.
The mass demonstration was dubbed the "March of Return," and of it Gaza-based Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh stated: "We are here to declare today that our people will not agree to keep the ‘right of return’ only as a slogan."
To translate, Hamas was reiterating that it does not see a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza as the conclusion to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It remains dedicated to the destruction of the entire State of Israel. And the best way of achieving that at present is flooding the Jewish state with millions of Palestinian "refugees."
One of the few points on which Hamas and Abbas' Palestinian Authority agree is that as part of any "final status" peace agreement, Israel must agree to open its gates to these millions of new Arab inhabitants. It is a demand that no Israeli government, be it right- or left-wing, can ever accept, and the Palestinians know that.
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Wednesday, March 28, 2018

Palestinian Authority Touts Its Gender Equality For Letting Women Be Terrorists - Ryan Jones ISRAEL TODAY

Palestinian Authority Touts Its Gender Equality For Letting Women Be Terrorists

Wednesday, March 28, 2018 |  Ryan Jones  ISRAEL TODAY
Not wanting to miss out on the gender equality movement that's all the rage in most of the Western world these days, the Palestinian Authority has been talking up the prominent role of women in its society.
For instance, most Palestinian leaders have absolutely no problem with women joining men as equals in the merciless slaughter of Israeli Jews.
In fact, the most deadly Palestinian terrorist attack on Israelis ever was led by a women. In 1978, Dalal Mughrabi and her team of killers from current Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party, hijacked a passenger bus on Israel's coastal highway and executed 37 of the people aboard, including 12 children.
Mughrabi has ever since been held aloft as a role model for Palestinian girls.
On International Women's Day, which was marked earlier this month, the secretary-general of Abbas' "moderate" Fatah party, Tayeb Abd Al-Rahim, highlighted Mughrabi as evidence of the gender equality in Palestinian society.
"From the outbreak of our revolution in 1965, the outlook of the Palestinian National Liberation Movement - Fatah - has been clear in its social aspect; it saw no difference between women and men, and Dalal Mughrabi who led men is testimony to this," said Al-Rahim in remarks carried by the official Palestinian newspaper Al-Hayat Al-Jadida. [Translation by Palestinian Media Watch]
March 11 was the 40th anniversary of the Coastal Road Massacre, and the Palestinian Authority took that, too, as an opportunity to encourage young Arab girls to emulate the blood-soaked female terrorist.
At a local high school event, the Palestinian Authority's Al-Yasser Cultural Forum announced that its agenda is to "return the glory to the fighting Palestinian girls and women such as Dalal Mughrabi and others who sacrificed their lives for Palestine [sic], and also to provide information and knowledge to these female students during recesses."
The Palestinian Authority obligated itself in the various signed agreements with Israel to cease all incitement that could lead to violence against Israeli Jews. Ongoing violations of this stipulation are seen by Israel as the primary obstacle to peace.
PHOTO: Teenage Palestinian girls hold a picture of Dalal Mughrabi, a woman who is celebrated for having killed more Jews than any other Palestinian terrorist. (Issam Rimawi / Flash 90)
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