US Secretary of State John Kerry's attempt to broker a long term truce ended in failure as neither Israel nor Hamas was interested.Israel's security committee unanimously rejected Kerry's proposition, especially when they saw he had changed the original Egyptian formula to favor some of Hamas' inane demands.
Kerry is now attempting to bypass the Egyptians and use Hamas funder Qatar and Islamist Turkey as his intermediaries. Good luck with that where the Israelis are concerned.
The 'humanitarian' ceasefire is ostensibly supposed to be about removing Hamas casualties and allowing humanitarian aid to be brought in. As the Israelis and any other honest person knows, any aid that comes in will go to the Hamas leaders and the fighters rather to the general Gaza population, but they still agreed to go through with it, starting at 8 Am Saturday local time.
You will notice that no one is proposing any humanitarian aid for the Israeli civilian population, some of whom are injured and homeless.Apparently, they don't count for much in the eyes of the 'international community.'
The Israelis insisted on the following conditions. Their forces will stay in position in Gaza, and that they they will continue to locate Hamas' tunnels, although they will not destroy them until the ceasefire is over, or unless Hamas violates this ceasefire as they have all the others.
What Kerry and the odious UN Secretary General Ban ki-Moon wanted was a 7 day truce to carry out what amounts to talks about talks, while Hamas regroups. I doubt the Israelis will agree to that, but we'll see.
One sign that they won't came from Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon, who along with other Israeli military leaders is briefing the troops to be ready for what he called a significantly expanded ground assault in Gaza,
The next step,of course is Shifa Hospital in central Gaza, home of the main Hamas command post and it's weapons depots, and the terminus of the huge network of tunnels.The head of the IDF’s Southern Command, Maj. Gen. Sami Torjeman said in an interview Friday that, in a week, the army had managed to destroy half of the tunnel network which took Hamas 4-5 years to build, a major accomplishment but without cutting the head off the snake, it will just be a temporary respite.
Hamas is particularly vulnerable right now. Much to their surprise, the advanced Russian Kornet-E, and 9M113 Konkurs guided anti-tank missiles Hamas received from Iran have so far proven to be worthless against Israel's new Merkava Chariot-4 battle tanks equipped with the Israel's Windbreaker armor. The 401st armored brigade equipped with these tanks has been virtually unstoppable. Like the IronDome, the Windbreaker armor missile defense system is made by Israeli defense company Rafael. If the assault on Shifa happens, it may very well be spearheaded the 401st and its Chariot-4s.
Stay tuned..
does any of the terms of the cease fire include language regarding samantha power's f_______ head exploding?
ReplyDeletei'd pay to see that.
no.
no i wouldn't.
"Much to their surprise..." Actually it should come as no surprise at all. If I'd been advising Hamas which I NEVER would do as they are an enemy of America, I would have explained this to the early on.
ReplyDeleteThese Russian made weapons were designed to deal with American tanks, not Israeli tanks. Had these been American tanks these weapons would have split them open killing the occupants in most cases before the occupants even knew what hit them and in all cases before the occupants were able to maneuver the tanks into firing position. In other words, these weapons would completely eliminate the entire American tank arsenal before it could even get off a shot, yet another reason why an American military option against Iran is an impossibility right now. That and the Air Force and Naval assets would be completely eliminated as well before anyone in Iran even felt anything but I digress and am getting off topic.
America's best bet would be to completely GET OUT OF THE WAY. Unfortunately our leaders do not seem to be smart enough to figure this one out which is hardly surprising.
Fortunately Israel seems to be doing okay in spite of our stupidity. As long as the Israeli keep their military assets in place during the now 24 hour cease fire and quickly resume operations forthwith perhaps they will finish off their and our enemy once and for all.
While I have some issues with your solution to the problem, I do think it is a step in the right direction and would like to see American leadership endorse it but don't think that is going to happen as American leadership is a.)to stupid, and b.)to beholden to Arab and Western European influence to be capable of figuring this out.
Please continue your excellent coverage of this. The main stream media certainly isn't going to do it!! Even if they did, you do a much better job!!
Louie,
ReplyDeleteWasn't S. Power one of the people who came up with the R2P doctrine or whatever she called it? This doctrine is ridiculous on so many levels that I do not even know where to begin. I certainly could not discuss it in the limited space that Rob allows for posts on this site.
My first thought is I would pay for the privilege of seeing the head of this b!tch explode!! Perhaps I would not, as she is a human being, however misguided she is, the best approach would be to pray for her and our country.