ISRAELI OCCUPATION FORCES LAUNCH BRUTAL ASSAULT ON PALESTINIANS IN GAZA

Food, water, electricity cut off to more than 1 million people

Israel threatens regional war, sending war planes over Syria

EMERGENCY PROTEST IN LA

Stop the attacks! Cut off U.S. aid to Israel!

Thursday, June 29, 4-6 pm

Israeli Consulate: 6380 Wilshire Blvd, LA (near Wilshire & San Vicente)

Sponsored by A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition-LA, including member groups Free Palestine Alliance and Palestinian American Women's Association, and the National Council of Arab Americans-LA.

For more info call 323-464-1636 or email answerla@answerla.org.

http://www.answerla.org

Using the capture of one of its soldiers as the pretext, the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) launched a brutal assault on the entire population of Gaza in the early morning hours of June 28. U.S.-supplied F-16 fighter-bombers destroyed the main power station in Gaza and destroyed bridges on the only major roads linking the northern and southern sections of the region. The people of Gaza are now without water and electricity -- and many will die. The use of U.S. planes and other military goods against illegally occupied territories is a violation of both international and U.S. law.

Israel is also threatening to widen the war, sending war planes over Syria to “buzz” the home of Syrian President Bashir al-Assad, whose government the U.S. has been actively working to bring down for more than two years. The Palestinian population of Gaza, one of the poorest and most densely populated areas of the world, was already suffering severe shortages of food, medicine and other necessities due to Israel’s blockade of Gaza and the cut-off of international aid to the West Bank and Gaza, in effect since January 2006. The new Israeli assault has resulted in the cut-off of power, water and food supplies to most of the people in Gaza. The situation constitutes a deliberately created humanitarian disaster.

Deliberately attacking the civilian population, with the intent of causing maximum suffering, is clearly a crime against humanity. What we are witnessing today in Gaza is collective punishment against the Palestinian population as a whole. It is just one part of Israel’s colonial policy toward the Palestinians. In historic Palestine, whether the West Bank, Gaza or inside the 1948 borders of Israel, an apartheid system is in place, where many rights reserved for Jewish Israelis are denied to Palestinians. More than six million dispossessed Palestinians are denied the right to return to their homeland.

Israeli apartheid and the latest assault on Gaza is supported by the Bush regime, Congress and the corporate media because of Israel’s vital role in Washington’s project of Middle East domination. That is why Israel receives more military and economic aid from the U.S. -- over billion annually -- than any other country in the world.

While a great hue and cry is heard in the mass media about one captured Israeli soldier, the same media pays no attention whatsoever to the 9,800 Palestinian political prisoners being held illegally (it is illegal for an occupying power to transfer prisoners from occupied territory) under terrible conditions in Israeli prisons. At least 335 of these prisoners are children. Palestinian prisoners are systematically tortured after arrest. Just two days ago, the Israeli parliament gave the Shin Bet (the secret police) the right to double the time for secret “interrogation” of Palestinian prisoners -- a green light for even greater torture.

The A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition (http://www.answerla.org), which has organized the largest anti-war protests in Washington, DC, Los Angeles, San Francisco and in other U.S. cities over the past five years, including the historic demonstration of over 100,000 people supporting Palestinian rights in Washington on April 20, 2002, is calling for and supporting protests at Israeli embassies, consulates and U.S. federal buildings, to demand:The immediate end to the U.S.-supplied Israeli assault on Gaza.

* The release of all Palestinian political prisoners from Israeli jails

* An end to all U.S. aid to Israel

* An end to colonial occupation, support for self-determination for the Palestinian people including the right of return.

* No new U.S.-Israeli war against Syria.

In Los Angeles, A.N.S.W.E.R., its member groups the Free Palestine Alliance and Palestinian American Women's Association, and the National Council of Arab Americans-LA are calling for an Emergency Protest outside of the Israeli Consulate tomorrow - Thursday, June 29, from 4-6 pm. The Consulate is located at 6380 Wilshire Blvd in Los Angeles. Bring signs, banners, flags and more to support the Palestinian people.

A.N.S.W.E.R is also calling on justice-minded individuals and organizations to contact Congress and the White House demanding an immediate end to U.S. aid to Israel. Click here to send your message. For more information go to http://www.answerla.org.

-------------------------------

A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition

Act Now to Stop War and End Racism

323-464-1636

http://www.answerla.org

answerla@answerla.org

1800 Argyle Ave, #410

Los Angeles, CA 90028

Join us each Tues at 7 pm for A.N.S.W.E.R. Activists Meetings.

A.N.S.W.E.R. WRITES: "Using the capture of one of its soldiers as the pretext, the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) launched a brutal assault on the entire population of Gaza in the early morning hours of June 28. "

BECKY: Pretext??? Hamas military wing ---that is the current sitting govt. in the PA---tunneled under the Israeli border and killed 2 IDF soldiers and kidnapped another. Hamas leaders have already praised the units for doing so. Also, qassam rocket attacks have been launched continuously over the Israeli border into CIVILIAN areas in PRE-1967 Israel.

The continued claim that the IDF is an "occupational force" is a misnomer---since Israel withdrew in Sept. 2005.

This was a military attack on both the civilians and the IDF military purposely accomplished by the Palestinian govt.

It is the equivalent of declaring war---which Hamas has done a long time ago and never forsaken. Using the word "pretext" in this communication implies that Israel does not have a good reason for the incursion into Gaza.

A.N.S.W.E.R. WRITES: "The people of Gaza are now without water and electricity -- and many will die. The use of U.S. planes and other military goods against illegally occupied territories is a violation of both international and U.S. law."

BECKY: Humanitarian claims of Palestinian civilian populations suffering from thirst, starvation, or at risk to death are greatly exaggerated. They have been without electricity for A WHOLE DAY!! Nor does the Israeli govt. have any policy of allowing the population to starve or die of thirst.

This kind of claim is made by those at A.N.S.W.E.R. in the hopes that naive Americans will be duped into believing the conflict is about the Israelis trying to starve the Palestinians.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

As for the buzzing of the Syrian capital---why hasn't the A.N.S.W.E.R. coalition revealed that the head of Hamas lives in Syria and they have been directing Hamas units in the PA to attack Israeli citizens?

Oh!! I know why!! Then people would think the Israelis are JUSTIFIED in their actions!! A.N.S.W.E.R. doesn't want their members TOO educated on the issues.

Does ANSWER still have members?

@%

Much like the communist party during the 50's and 60's, A.N.S.W.E.R is kept alive (more like on life- support) by the dues of the FBI infiltrators.

I am please to note that our local chapter has nothing planned. They are losing stream, since the energetic responses to their anemic protests just make them look even more laughable.

The Devil (George Warmonger Bush): "Sorry to Oil the Arming of the Irgun Zvai Leumi / Likud Extremist in IsraOil and the Invasion of the Gaza Strip but Oil comes First. Fill her Up ?????"

Why would a real Progressive be Pro-Hamas? Thats whats driving people away.

or for that matter, pro-democracy. Hamas was, after all, democratically elected.

But here's a better question:

Why would a real Progressive be pro-Israel. Israel is a racist, apartheid, aggressor, colonialist, rogue state that preys on its neighbors.

Now that Israel has attacked Gaza and the West Bank and kidnapped members of the democratically elected government there, it will be interesting to see if the United Nations condemns these criminal acts and moves to pass another worthless resolution.

Israel’s "Operation Summer Rain" is not specifically intended to win the release of prisoner of war corporal Gilad Shalit so much as continue the nearly sixty year aggression against the Palestinian people. "According to some Western analysts, the military action, rather than being aimed at rescuing the captured Israeli soldier, is aimed at preempting the consequences of a recent agreement [to recognize Israel] reached by the Fatah block and Hamas," notes the Arab Monitor.

Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades and the Popular Resistance Committees, responsible for taking Shalit, want to use him as a "bargaining chip" to gain the release of women and children held in Israel’s dungeons in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

It should be noted, although this will not be mentioned in the corporate media, that Israel’s Supreme Court ruled in 1997 that abducting Arabs and holding them hostage is entirely legal according to the laws of the tiny outlaw state. As well, the Israeli government has attempted to codify GSS (General Security Services) torture during "interrogation." According to Amnesty International official, "Israel is the only country in the world known to have effectively legalized torture by officially allowing such methods," namely beatings, electric shock, sleep deprivation, forcing prisoners to remain in painful positions, violent shaking, hooding, confinement in tiny spaces, exposure to temperature extremes, prolonged toilet and hygiene deprivation, degrading treatment, and other methods, which have in cases led to the death of the detainees.

Osama Hamdan, a Hamas official, put the capture of Gilad Shalit into perspective. "He’s an Israeli soldier, a prisoner of war, taken in a battle and falls under a legal category," Hamdan told the Associated Press. "What happened yesterday [the abduction of elected Palestinians] were hostage-takings and acts of terrorism." Israel, however, has nothing but contempt for such legal categories, as the systematic murder and maiming of more than 24,500 Palestinians since the beginning of the al-Aqsa Intifada reveals.

"On Wednesday, the crisis seemed to be tipping toward escalation as Israeli tanks hunkered down inside southern Gaza at the airport after warplanes had knocked out half of Gaza’s electricity and pounded sonic booms over houses," reports the New York Times. "Also on Wednesday, Israel battered northern Gazan towns with artillery and sent warplanes over the house of the Syrian president, who is influential with the Palestinian leader believed to have ordered the kidnapping."

In other words, the Israelis violated Syrian airspace and terrorized Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, basically an act of war. "In a predawn operation Wednesday morning, Israel Air Force warplanes carried out a low-altitude flight over Assad’s palace in the Mediterranean port city of Latakia in northwestern Syria," explains Haaretz. [Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin] said it was 'absolutely unacceptable’ to breach the border or air space of any country," a fact lost on the neocon, pro-Jabotinsky, AIPAC seduced government of the United States.

Ehud Olmert, who got his start in the Arab-hating revisionist Zionist youth movement Betar (founded by Ze’ev Jabotinsky), declares Israel has "no interest to harm the Palestinian people, and in the operation we carried out tonight, civilians were not harmed. The Hamas Government and its sources in Syria are directly responsible for the reality we’ve fallen into," according to a translation provided by the World Today.

Granted, according to news reports, the IOF has yet to slaughter Palestinians outright, although it is disingenuous for Olmert to claim "civilians were not harmed," considering the IOF has bombed electrical facilities and "destroyed the main water pipe feeding Nuseirat and El-Bureij refugee camps," according to an by Electronic Intifada press release posted last night.

The Palestinian Center for Human Rights "strongly condemns IOF retaliatory measures targeting Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip, including the destruction of properties that are not classified as a legitimate military targets. The Center calls upon the international community, particularly the High Contracting Parties of the Fourth Geneva Convention, to force IOF to respect the convention, which prohibits reprisals against protected persons, as stipulated in article 33. In addition, the convention prohibits the destruction of private properties belonging to individuals, groups, organizations or official bodies. The Center calls upon the High Contracting Parties to enforce article 3 regarding adherence to the convention and respect of its stipulations, and to take appropriate sanctions against the serious violations currently being perpetrated."

Of course, this will be ignored, both in Israel and the United States, where the dutiful corporate media portrays the invasion of the Gaza Strip and West Bank as a defensive move against terrorists.

In effect, Israel is attempting to break any agreement between Fatah and Hamas in regard to recognizing Israel’s "right" to exist, a "right" predicated on more than sixty years of violence and ethnic cleansing.

Olmert and the Jabotinsky Likudites are engaged in a long-term plan to deny not only Palestinian statehood, but the most basic of human rights. "Zionism is a colonizing adventure and, therefore, it stands or falls on the question of armed forces," Ze’ev Jabotinsky wrote.

As well, it stands or falls on the ability to use such armed forces to terrorize Palestinians, run them off the land, bomb their civilian infrastructure, abduct their elected representatives, throw their women and children in torture dungeons, dynamite their homes, plow under their olive groves, shoot peace activists in the head (or run them over with military bulldozers), and engage in other crimes, illegal and shameful in more civilized places in the world.

A real Progressive would be pro-Israel precisely because Israel is pretty non-racist, progressive in its attitude toward gays and minorities, compromising in regards to historical land it should have annexed long ago in the 1970s or 1980s, on the defense from murderous genocidal terrorists, non-colonialist, and semi-pariah due to evil reactionary progressive wannabes like the person who penned the question above who lies that Israel preys on its neighbors.

"IOF Abducts Palestine’s Democratically Elected Leaders"

Some of these democratically elected leaders didn't lift a finger to prevent the abduction and murder of teenager Eliyahu Be'eri and the intrusion into Israel from Gaza in which Gilad Shalit was kidnapped.



"Now that Israel has attacked Gaza and the West Bank... it will be interesting to see if the United Nations condemns these criminal acts and moves to pass another worthless resolution."

Hopefully it won't.

Naturally this neo-Nazi paints a totally one-sided picture, as if the Palestinians haven't done any wrong and Israel is wrong to try to get back its kidnapped soldier and bring about the cessation of the unprovoked daily barrages of the Qassams and mortars. I see no readon to read further from this point.

And this justifies the abduction of Palestine’s democratically eected leaders, how?

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20060627.LETTERS27-6/TPStory/?query=lavie

Toronto Globe and Mail

POSTED ON 27/06/06

Letter to The Editor



Two raids

NAFTALI LAVIE

Toronto -- As someone who has served in an Israeli tank

unit near Kibbutz Kerem Shalom, I have nothing but sympathy

for the families of Lieutenant Hanan Barak and Sergeant

Pavel Slutzker, killed on Sunday in a daring Palestinian

commando raid in which Corporal Gilad Shalit was taken

captive (Israel, Hamas In Turmoil After Raid On Outpost --

front page, June 26). But some perspective and some context

are necessary.

This tank base is one of the locations from which Israel

has been relentlessly shelling the Gaza Strip for several

weeks. Moreover, just one day earlier, on Saturday, Israeli

commandos had raided Rafah in the Gaza Strip and captured

two brothers, Mustafa and Osama Muamar, who, according to

the army, were in the "final stages of planning a

large-scale terror attack." All of this is well known but

did not make it to the front page. Can it be that

Palestinian lives are nothing, Israeli lives everything?

That Palestinian captives are nothing, Israeli captives

everything?

Only by Zionists.

Justice Ministry: More arrests of Hamas figures are expected

By Avi Issacharoff and Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondents and News Agencies

Israel intends to arrest more senior Hamas figures in addition to the dozens of Palestinian lawmakers and ministers arrested in a predawn raid Thursday, the Justice Ministry said Thursday.

The detention of Hamas parliamentarians in the early hours of Thursday morning had been planned several weeks ago and received approval from Attorney General Menachem Mazuz on Wednesday. The same day, Shin Bet Director Yuval Diskin presented Prime Minister Ehud Olmert with the list of Hamas officials slated for detention.

The Group of Eight industrialized countries said Thursday that the Hamas arrests raised "particular concerns."

A Justice Ministry spokesperson said that the change in policy towards ministers and parliamentarians who are members of Hamas was carried out with the approval of and in coordination with the judiciary, and that Israel intends on arresting more Hamas officials.

"We are talking about people suspected of criminal violations such as membership in terror organizations, affiliation with terrorist leadership, and other violations," the spokesperson said.

"The criminal proceedings will follow accepted legal standards. The suspects will be entitled to legal defense, and the arrest and investigation will be subject to judicial oversight. If a charge against a suspect is found to be baseless, he will be released," the spokesperson added.

Israel Defense Forces troops launched a major arrest operation overnight, detaining 64 members of the Hamas political wing, including cabinet members and parliamentarians, as well as 23 militants.

The move is part of Israel's expanded military operation against the Hamas-led government in the Palestinian Authority.

The arrests took place in Ramallah, Qalqilyah, Hebron, Jenin and East Jerusalem, according to Palestinian reports. Soldiers carried arrest warrants signed by judges that were issued following cooperative preparatory work by the state prosecution and police.

"The detention of elected members of the Palestinian government and legislature raises particular concerns," said a joint statement by the G8, which also called on Israel to exercise "utmost restraint."

"[This]... is a pre-planned plot to destroy the [Palestinian] Authority, the government and the parliament and to bring the Palestinian people to their knees," Hamas lawmaker Mushir al-Masri said Thursday.

There appeared to be some confusion Thursday as to whether Palestinian Deputy Prime Minister Nasser a-Shaer, had been one of those detainees or whether he had evaded capture and gone into hiding in the West Bank.

The Hamas ministers had apparently expected the arrests. A-Shaer's wife said Thursday that he had avoided the military arrest operation as he had not been sleeping at home when the sweep took place.

He reportedly had disconnected all his cellular telephones for fear Israeli security services would again attempt to track him down and arrest him.

A-Shaer's wife said she had been in contact with him, and that he was not arrested. Employees at the Ministry of Education offices in Ramallah reported seeing him in the building in the late morning.

But GOC Southern Command Major General Yair Navbeh confirmed at a news conference Thursday that a-Shaer was among those who had been detained.

Warning to Haniyeh

On Thursday morning, National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer hinted that Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh is not exempt from arrest or harm.

"No one is immune... This is not a government. It is a murderous organization," Ben-Eliezer said.

A Hamas official called the arrests an "open war against the Palestinian government and people," and said that Israel must be prepared to pay their consequences.

"We have no government, we have nothing. They have all been taken," Saeb Erekat, an ally of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, said of the arrests. "This is absolutely unacceptable and we demand their release immediately."

Israel Radio quoted Shin Bet security chief Yuval Diskin as having told Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on the day of the kidnapping: "If the soldier is not returned in 24 hours, Israel will not allow the Palestinian government to survive."

The Foreign Ministry released a statement Thursday saying the recent security-related events, particularly the Qassam rocket fire and the kidnapping of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, were realizations of the Palestinian government's policies of terror.

The acceptance of responsibility for the kidnapping and the Hamas-led government's demand to exchange prisoners prove that Hamas' primary objective is not concern for the Palestinian people but determination to implement its policies of terror, the statement said.

"As a result of this, and out of a basic obligation to its citizens, Israel decided to implement orders to prevent terrorism," it went on.

Included among the detainees were Finance Minister Omar Abdel Razek; Minister Samir Abu Aysha; Khaled Abu Arfeh; and Jerusalem Affairs Ministers Naef Rajoub, the brother of senior Fatah official Jibril Rajoub.

Five of the cabinet ministers were arrested at the same Ramallah hotel.

Ahmed al-Najjar, a receptionist at the hotel, said he was asleep when troops arrived after midnight, demanded a list of guests, and took the men from their rooms at gunpoint.

Palestinian attorneys representing security detainees at the IDF military court in Salem said Thursday morning they refuse to represent the Hamas members arrested overnight because they maintain the arrests themselves are illegitimate.

In Ramallah, troops arrested at least two cabinet ministers and four lawmakers, all from Hamas, in a raid on a complex of buildings, Palestinian security officials said.

Labor Minister Mohammed Barghouti was stopped on his way to his village, Kabur, just north of Ramallah. Military jeeps stopped his car, ordered him out of the vehicle and took him away, the officials said.

In East Jerusalem, lawmakers Mohammed Abu Tir, Wael al-Husseini and Ahmed a-Tun were arrested.

Also, the Hamas mayor of the West Bank town of Qalqilyah and his deputy were detained, security officials said.

An IDF spokeswoman said the arrests were part of an operation against suspected terrorists, and were not "bargaining chips" for the release of abducted IDF soldier Corporal Gilad Shalit.

"They are not bargaining chips for the return of the soldier. It was simply an operation against a terrorist organization," she said. "They will be investigated, brought before a judge to extend their detention and charge sheets will be prepared."

The arrests are part of several moves designed to increase pressure on the militant group to free a captive soldier. Israel blames Hamas for the abduction of Shalit, kidnapped Sunday by militants who attacked an IDF post near the border with Gaza.

Army Radio speculated that the lawmakers might be used to trade for the captured soldier, but the IDF refused to comment on the matter.

The operation Thursday night came amidst IDF operations in the southern Gaza Strip aimed at securing Shalit's release.