Israel / Palestine News Thread

[Raze]

https://www.972mag.com/tunnels-hamas-lethal-gas-bombs-gaza/

Quote

The Israeli army intensively bombarded residential areas in Gaza when it lacked intelligence on the exact location of Hamas commanders hiding underground, and intentionally weaponized toxic byproducts of bombs to suffocate militants in their tunnels, an investigation by +972 Magazine and Local Call can reveal.

The investigation, based on conversations with 15 Israeli Military Intelligence and Shin Bet officers who have been involved in tunnel-targeting operations since October 7, exposes how this strategy aimed to compensate for the army’s inability to pinpoint targets in Hamas’ subterranean tunnel network. When targeting senior commanders in the group, the Israeli military authorized the killing of “triple-digit numbers” of Palestinian civilians as “collateral damage,” and maintained close real-time coordination with U.S. officials regarding the expected casualty figures.

Some of these strikes, which were the deadliest in the war and often used American bombs, are known to have killed Israeli hostages despite concerns raised ahead of time by military officers. Moreover, the lack of precise intelligence meant that in at least three major strikes, the army dropped several 2,000-pound bunker-buster bombs that killed scores of civilians — part of a strategy known as “tiling” — without succeeding in killing the intended target.

 

Quote

“Pinpointing a target inside a tunnel is hard, so you attack a [wide] radius,” a Military Intelligence source told +972 and Local Call. Given that the army would have only a vague approximation of the target’s location, the source explained, this radius would be as large as “tens and sometimes hundreds of meters,” meaning these bombing operations collapsed multiple apartment buildings on their occupants without warning. “Suddenly you see how someone in the IDF really behaves when given the opportunity to wipe out an entire residential block — and they do it,” the source added.

The investigation also reveals how Israel has known for years that the use of bunker-buster bombs releases the lethal gas carbon monoxide as a byproduct, which can kill people inside a tunnel through asphyxiation even at a distance of hundreds of meters from the strike location. After discovering this by chance in 2017, the army first tested it as a strategy in Gaza in 2021, and employed it in its efforts to kill Hamas commanders after October 7. This way, the army could attack targets without knowing their precise location, and without having to rely on direct hits.

“The gas stays underground, and people suffocate,” Brig. Gen. (res.) Guy Hazoot, the only source willing to be named, told +972 and Local Call. “[We realized] we could effectively target anyone underground using the Air Force’s bunker-buster bombs, which, even if they don’t destroy the tunnel, release gases that kill anyone inside. The tunnel then becomes a death trap.”

Quote

Three Israeli hostages — Nik Beizer, Ron Sherman, and Elia Toledano — were definitively killed by asphyxiation as a result of a Nov. 10, 2023, bombing that targeted Ahmed Ghandour, a Hamas brigade commander in northern Gaza. The army told their families that, at the time of the bombing, it was unaware that hostages were being held near Ghandour. However, three sources with knowledge of the strike, which was led by the Shin Bet, told +972 and Local Call there was “ambiguous” intelligence indicating that hostages might be in the vicinity, yet the attack was still authorized.

According to six sources, this was not an isolated case but one of “dozens” of Israeli airstrikes that likely endangered or killed hostages. They described how the military command greenlighted attacks on the homes of suspected kidnappers and the tunnels from which senior Hamas figures were directing the fighting.

 

[PurpleTree]

 

[Nivsch]

[zazen]

@Nivsch I think Bibi gets scapegoated so a larger segment of Israeli society don’t get blamed. I may even add that Bibi is scapegoated so a segment of the US elites don’t get blamed.

Bibi is a symptom of the problem: occupation - which requires the dehumanizing of Palestinian people. That dehumanization stems from a superiority complex which is behind a lot of imperial / colonial behaviour. 

There are many Israelis who think just like Bibi - meaning that this is a societal issue not just a Bibi one. Obviously not all Israelis, but it’s a sizeable portion. If we even just go by the many polls - it’s usually at least half voting in favour of pretty nasty things.

There is a smaller portion of Westerners who think Israel’s actions are just. They suffer from the same sickness as Bibi himself. 

Edited February 11 by zazen

[Hatfort]

Hamas has paused the hostage exchange until Israel complies with the terms of the ceasefire agreed between them.

During the ceasefire, Israel has kept killing unarmed civilians in Gaza daily, in smaller numbers. They've also increased their military presence in the West Bank, killing civilians there too, like they've transferred part of their Gaza troops there, one could deduce. Remember there's no Hamas in the West Bank. These things directly violate the terms of the agreement. They are also not allowing in the aid they agreed to, basic things like tents. They don't want to comply with what they signed. Do they even know what making a deal means?

Israel’s communications minister, Shlomo Karhi, has backed Trump’s call to let hell break out in Gaza if all the remaining Israeli captives are not released by Saturday. They cannot even comply with what they signed up for in the first phase.  I thought it would take them a bit longer to back in their word, at least until they had all their hostages home.

It seems the ceasefire is going to collapse soon. Let hell break out, Trump says, so more genocide, I guess. It didn't last long.

Edited February 11 by Hatfort

[PurpleTree]

Comedy?

 

[PurpleTree]

^ the King of Jordan is blinking S.O.S.

”save me from this Orang Utan”

[Raze]

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/gaza-israeli-forces-used-80-year-old-palestinian-human-shield-killing-him
 

Quote

Israeli forces strapped explosives around the neck of an elderly Palestinian man in Gaza and forced him to act as a human shield before killing him and his wife, an investigation by the Israeli news website HaMakom has revealed.

The Palestinian man, who has not been named but is believed to have been well above the age of 80, was told that if he did not carry out the searches Israeli forces would detonate the explosives and "blow off his head."

 

Quote

An Israeli soldier told HaMakom that after explosives were placed around the Palestinian man's neck, he was told "that if he does something wrong or not the way we want, the person behind him will pull the rope and his head will detach from the body."

"That's how he walked around with us for eight hours, even though he's an 80-year-old man and even though he couldn't run away from us. And that's knowing that there's a soldier behind him who can pull the rope at any second – and he's done," the soldier added.

According to HaMakom, after the elderly Palestinian was forced to enter homes and tunnel allegedly used by Hamas, the soldiers ordered him and his wife to leave the area for al-Mawasi, a small area that at the time was just 1km wide and was being used to house hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.

However, HaMakom said that no other battalions were informed that the couple would be making their way south and within 100 metres of being allowed to leave they were both shot dead.

"They died like that, in the street," another soldier told HaMakom.

 

 

Edited February 16 by Raze