Israeli regime carries out new strikes on Gaza

The Israeli air force launched waves of strikes on Wednesday and Thursday against up to 150 purported “military targets” in the besieged Palestinian enclave of Gaza. The targets included manufacturing facilities, alleged weapons depots and a five-story cultural center in a densely-populated area.

The Palestinian Ministry of Health named three people who were martyred: Ali Ghandour, 34, Inas Khamash, 23, and her 18-month-old daughter, Bayan Khamash. At least 30 more people suffered injuries.

The strikes were carried out in purported retaliation for the firing of mortars and rockets into the occupied lands —most of which were reported being destroyed by Israeli military or fell in open fields.

The Palestinian strikes were themselves retaliation for an earlier incident on Tuesday, in which an Israeli tank fired on a Palestinian border post, martyring two Palestinian security personnel. The Israeli military later claimed it had “mistaken” a training exercise for a sniper attack.

By Thursday afternoon, a ceasefire was agreed between the Hamas-led authorities in Gaza and the usurper regime, but tensions remain high. On July 14, Israel launched the most intense air strikes on Gaza since the seven-week, one-sided “war” in 2014.

The latest Israeli assault follows weeks of repeated threats by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to launch yet another full-scale military intervention if Hamas does not agree to end ongoing popular protests along the border. Since late March, at least 160 people have been martyred and some 15,000 injured by Israeli forces during demonstrations to demand the right of Palestinians to return to the homes from which their families were driven in 1948.

Antagonisms in the Palestinian territories have been fueled by the passage within Israel of the “Nation-State Law,” which institutionalizes discrimination against non-Jewish citizens, sanctions state-supported segregation and the exclusion of Arabs from exclusively Jewish communities, and removes Arabic as an official state language.

The Israeli security cabinet met Thursday evening to plan further attacks on Gaza. Among the measures being considered is the targeted assassination of Hamas leaders. The Trump administration nevertheless immediately blamed the violence exclusively on Hamas. The US State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert declared the US “fully supports Israel’s right to defend itself, and to take actions to prevent provocations.”

Conditions for the two million people in Gaza are horrific and desperate. Since 2007, they have been subjected to an Israel economic blockade. Electricity is unavailable for up to 18 hours per day, while at least 56 percent of the workforce is unemployed. The health and education systems are dysfunctional. Access to many essential food items is restricted. Most of the water system is contaminated with untreated sewerage or salt.

Last month, Jamie McGoldrick, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, condemned additional measures imposed by Israel to prevent all goods passing through the Kerem Shalom border crossing, except medical and food supplies. On July 17, McGoldrick stated: “Should they continue, these additional restrictions risk triggering a dramatic deterioration in an already fragile situation and desperate humanitarian conditions, particularly for the health sector.”

The UN agency noted that humanitarian aid is only 23 percent funded and $4.5 million was urgently needed for emergency fuel, which would run out in early August. An aid worker told Israeli Haaretz: “They [the people of Gaza] currently have no purchasing power. They have no money to spend on anything except food, and there too it’s the most basic items.”

The impact of the Israeli siege is aggravated by sanctions imposed by the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank, headed by President Mahmoud Abbas. Abbas and his government are demanding that Hamas surrender control of Gaza. Last year, the PA slashed the salaries of Gaza-based state employees by 30 percent in a calculated attempt to worsen the poverty and deprivation in the tiny territory. It is an unfortunate attempt while the Gazans are languishing for life and welcomed union with other Palestinian brothers.

Talks about “reconciliation” between Abbas’s authority and Hamas, a ceasefire with Israel and some relaxation in the economic blockade of Gaza have taken place in Cairo, Egypt over the past two weeks, presided over by the UN Special Coordinator for Middle East Peace, Nickolay Mladenov. However, little progress had been made before this week.

In a statement, Mladenov warned earlier that if the tensions were not “contained immediately, the situation can rapidly deteriorate with devastating consequences for all people.”

The protracted 2008–2009 Israeli onslaught against Gaza martyred some 1,400 Palestinians and left much of the territory in ruin. The 50-day assault in 2014 claimed close to 2,200 Palestinian lives, overwhelmingly civilians. In yet another new low for the United Nations, the usurper and brutal regime of Israel has been elected to head a permanent committee at the upcoming General Assembly, despite intense efforts by Arab and Muslim states to stop the controversial nomination.

In a secret ballot Monday in New York, Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon was elected chairman of the General Assembly’s Sixth Committee, which deals with legal issues. Among the issues it is expected to deal with at this fall’s Assembly are “measures to eliminate international terrorism,” and “the rule of law at the national and international levels.”

The move is a mockery of international legal system. Rewarding Israel for its flagrant violations of International Law and acts of collective punishment and violence also defies logic:
Israel has been assassinating citizens of the world countries, including several Iranian nuclear scientists. It has even been assassinating individuals in third party states, including Hezbollah Commander Imad Mughniyeh in Syria, in complete violation of their sovereignty rights.

According to CIA and cyber-security agents involved in the operation, Israel and the US ran a joint cyberattack to sabotage Iran's infrastructures, including its nuclear facilities, with the Stuxnet virus.

The usurper regime continues to breach International Law and conventions, International Humanitarian Law and countless UN resolutions. Being nominated to head a legal committee that aims to promote international law and protect basic human rights and freedoms will only give a new lease of life to Israel’s apartheid policies and plans. It will only embolden the regime.

It just does not make sense for Israel to chair the General Assembly’s legal committee as the regime continues to violate the Palestinians’ basic rights, build illegal settlement units on the occupied lands, and impose a blockade on Gaza that has been going on for years. This nomination encourages the brutal regime of Israel to continue its terrorist policies against the Palestinian people as well.

Meantime, this is a huge blow to the UN and its anti-terrorism rules and bylaws. This is because Israel continues to aid and abet the terrorist groups of Daesh and Al-Qaeda in Syria. The usurper regime of Israel has long provided medical treatment to the Nusra Front and Al-Qaeda terrorists wounded in the ongoing war on Syria. The Al-Qaeda offshoot never bothered Israel all throughout the years that it was in control of some border areas along the Golan Heights until last month when it was defeated by the Syrian army. This should give the UN some basis to think who is really backing the death cults in the region.

The UN has already published numerous reports criticizing Israel for imposing an apartheid regime of racial discrimination on the Palestinian people. These reports have concluded that "Israel has established an apartheid regime that dominates the Palestinian people as a whole." These reports reflect the views of the international community and for this reason alone Israel shouldn’t be allowed to have the final say on legal matters discussed and ratified at the UN General Assembly. The Assembly should distance itself from Israel.

Considering the above facts, it should be clear by now that by electing Danon as chairman, the UN General Assembly’s Sixth Committee cannot and won’t be able to deal with legal issues, in particular, when it comes to measures to eliminate international terrorism and establish the rule of law at the national and international levels.

A regime that violates International Law and International Humanitarian Law, assassinates civilians of other states, backs terrorist groups, launches cyber terrorism against world countries, steals lands and attacks its neighbors cannot and won’t be able to bolster the ability of United Nations Member States to prevent terrorist acts both within their borders and across regions. On the contrary, the move is encouraging for that reason and no other, the UN must retract its move.

That was from an article by James Cogan who is an industry and policy analyst with expertise in EU climate, innovation and economic development policy. Of course, it was coupled with words on the latest move by certain elements, the US in particular, at the UN; a move which is a mockery of international legal system.

EA/MG