be just

Press TV - Israeli gunboat targets Gaza civilians : "A Palestinian medical official says an Israeli gunboat off the shores of Gaza City has opened fire on Gaza, wounding at least five people. Dr. Moaiya Hassanain said Thursday that a shell fired by the gunboat hit a house in a beachside refugee camp. He said the wounded were passersby in the street, AP reported. Gunboats off Gaza have been firing for several days despite a cease-fire, which ended a three-week Israeli offensive, being in place."

So Far, Obama's Missed The Point on Gaza... : Information Clearing House - ICH : "It would have helped if Obama had the courage to talk about what everyone in the Middle East was talking about. No, it wasn't the US withdrawal from Iraq. They knew about that. They expected the beginning of the end of Guantanamo and the probable appointment of George Mitchell as a Middle East envoy was the least that was expected. Of course, Obama did refer to 'slaughtered innocents', but these were not quite the 'slaughtered innocents' the Arabs had in mind. There was the phone call yesterday to Mahmoud Abbas. Maybe Obama thinks he's the leader of the Palestinians, but as every Arab knows, except perhaps Mr Abbas, he is the leader of a ghost government, a near-corpse only kept alive with the blood transfusion of international support and the 'full partnership' Obama has apparently offered him, whatever 'full' means. And it was no surprise to anyone ...

Gaza Father Finds Out Child Survived http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7843430.stm

Israel accused of executing parents in front of children in Gaza - Telegraph : "One nine-year-old boy said his father had been shot dead in front of him despite surrendering to Israeli soldiers with his hands in the air. Another youngster described witnessing the deaths of his mother, three brothers and uncle after the house they were in was shelled. He said his mother and one of his siblings had been killed instantly, while the others bled to death over a period of days. A psychiatrist treating children in the village of Zeitoun on the outskirts of Gaza City, where the alleged incidents took place, described the deaths as a 'massacre'. Rawya Borno, a Jordanian doctor, said civilians, including children, were rounded up and killed by Israeli troops."

American killing of civilians every time “was not deliberate” and there can’t be anything done about it is simply unacceptable. For so long millions of people from as long as one can remember, civilians were targets. Regardless of intent to kill civilian population, targeting fighters or suspected fighters around civilian quarters is a war crime indeed. The funny thing is, America always claim “the incident is under investigation” or “the terrorists are responsible” or “our troops are operating under difficult circumstances” so and so forth. At the end American bullies never take responsibilities or throw a couple of thousands of dollars for their victims (it is rare Americans pay for their victims) and everything is dandy. Americans also claim they investigate themselves. Would anyone believe a killer investigate himself and come to a conclusion of guilt?

Ben White: Targeting civilians was a deliberate part of Operation Cast Lead | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk : There is, however, no shortage of evidence available that points to rather different Israeli aims. Estimates for the proportion of civilian deaths among the 1,360 Palestinians killed range from more than half to two-thirds. Politicians, diplomats and journalists are by and large shying away from the obvious, namely that Israel has been deliberately targeting Palestinian civilians and the very infrastructure of normal life, in order to – in the best colonial style – teach the natives a lesson. Given the enormous scale of what Palestinians have described as a "war of extermination" – it appears that some 15% of all buildings in the Gaza Strip were completely destroyed or collapsed and there is an estimated $1.4bn worth of destruction to vital civil infrastructure – it is impossible to list every atrocity. Israel has repeatedly hit ambulances, medics , clinics , ...

Obama and the Muslims: An Inauguration of a New Era? - by Wajahat Ali - Antiwar.com : "As Jamal el-Shayyal, a Middle East expert and producer for al-Jazeera, told me, 'The Egyptian public, like the rest of the Arab world, is not too optimistic for a change in policy during the Obama administration…the majority of people do not regard US foreign policy with the slightest respect. Many view it as biased, oppressive and at times even inhumane.'"

How to Inflame the Entire Muslim World - by Gabriel Kolko : "How will history describe the Israeli war against the Palestinians in Gaza? Another Holocaust, this time perpetrated by the descendants of the victims? An election ploy by ambitious Israeli politicians to win votes in the February 10 elections? A test range for new American weapons? An effort to lock the new Obama Administration into an anti-Iranian position? An attempt to establish its military 'credibility' after its disastrous defeat in the war with Hezbollah in Lebanon in 2006? Perhaps all of these…and more."

Respite in Gaza - by Kathy Kelly Sitting around an ashcan fire, people who had maintained the tunnels tell us that they dream of freedom: freedom of movement and basic human rights. Every person can dream, but human beings in Palestine can't dream of anything else but freedom, to sleep without bombing and to live without suffering from extreme stress. Fida, who translates for us, tells me she has a terrible headache every day, from the stress. She feels worse at night. Her little sister is so terrified that she can't walk a step without help from her mother and sister. She says that if Israel opens the border there won't be any need to open the tunnels. If borders don't open, people will rebuild the tunnels.