[Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News] 07/14 Links Pt1: Bibi: We use missiles to protect civilians, Hamas use civilians to protect their missiles. ~ EoZ

From Ian:

Bibi On Fighting "The Rocketeers" & On "The Preeminent Terrorist Empire Of Our Time" (video)

"[H]ere's the difference between us. We are using missile defense to protect our civilians, and they're using their civilians to protect their missiles. That's basically the difference. They're embedding these rockets that they're firing wholesale into our cities, terrorist rocketing, trying to kill as many as they can.
They're not succeeding because of two reasons. One is because we've developed this incredible missile defense system, which I think is a historic development in the history of defensive warfare ...
But the other reason we're succeeding, you have to understand some of the rockets do pierce through this shield. The reason we're succeeding is also because we're targeting the rocketeers. The rocketeers are firing from homes, these homes are actually command posts of the Hamas and Islamic jihad army. So, that's where they have their secure communications, weapon caches, rockets hidden, map rooms, so on. These are the command posts.

Benjamin Netanyahu Fox News Sunday We Use Missiles to Defend Civilians Hamas Uses Civilians..

Netanyahu: Imagine 80% of Americans in Bomb Shelters

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appeared on CBS's Face the Nation Sunday from Tel Aviv just as another round of sirens sounded, sending the city under yet another red alert. The prime minister asked viewers to imagine this scenario happening in every city in America:
Well, the sirens went off because Hamas have fired rockets on Israel's major city. They're firing rockets at all our cities. I want your audience to imagine what it would be like if all the cities of the United States -- I'm not just talking about New York and Washington, I'm talking about all the cities of the United States from the East Coast to Colorado. 80% of your population would be in bomb shelters, with a minute to a minute and a half red alert warning time to get into those shelters. That's what we're experiencing right now as we speak. So this is an unconscionable terrorist attack on civilian populations and of course we have to act to defend ourselves.

Dermer: Hamas Deliberately Targets Civilians, Israel Does Not

Israeli ambassador to the U.S. and Face the Nation guest Ron Dermer said Sunday while Hamas was deliberately targeting civilians during its fighting, Israel would continue to make all efforts to avoid killing or hurting civilians on its end.
Host Bob Schieffer played a video during the interview from the Israel Defense Forces of a pilot being told that a target set to be attacked in Gaza had children inside, and thus he backed off.
“When our pilots are targeting a particular site, they try to make sure that it’s clear of civilians,” Dermer said. “There are many, many military operations that are called off, because we see that there are civilians that are going to come into harm’s way. That’s the difference between us and Hamas. Hamas is deliberately targeting our civilians. They want to kill as many civilians in Israel as possible.”

Danny Ayalon: Lessons learned

The relatively low number of casualties in Gaza during the operation so far, despite the IDF’s’ intensive attacks, which are even stronger than the IDF attacks during “Cast Lead”, result from the precise and optimized use of advanced warning such as “Knock on the Roof”, and avoiding direct hits on schools, hospitals and mosques, even when it is a known thing that rockets and other weaponry are being hidden there.
In light of the IDF’s responsible conduct, Hamas is finally seen, not only in Western media, but in the Arab media as well, as a cynical, cruel, and irresponsible terror organization. An organization that uses a civilian population as human shields, and even calls for them to use their bodies to protect Hamas leaders and their rockets, while the Hamas terrorists and leaders themselves stay well-hidden and protected in underground tunnels and warehouses set in the midst of a civilian populace.

Statement NOT issued by the UN Security Council (satire)

Hamas war on Israel. Members of the United Nations Security Council commend Israel on the innovative technology behind the Iron Dome missile defense system, which is proving so mercifully successful in intercepting relentless rocket salvoes fired indiscriminately at Israel’s citizens from the Gaza Strip.
The Council recognizes with profound dismay that the approximately 1,000 rockets launched at Israel by Hamas and other terrorist groups in the Strip over the past seven days were designed to kill and maim the people of Israel, and to terrorize the entire nation, in pursuit of Hamas’s hideous stated goal of destroying Israel. Members of the Council shudder at the thought of the widespread loss of life and devastation these hundreds of rockets were intended to cause, and would have caused, in the absence of the Israeli missile defense system. The Council cautions that terrorist organizations in Gaza and elsewhere can be relied upon to seek new means to wreak such devastation upon Israel and its people, including by evading Iron Dome and other defenses, and offers any assistance Israel may need in continuing to thwart such pernicious efforts.

UNRWA tells reporters to interview Norwegian supporter of 9/11 terror attacks

UN Watch today called on UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to reprimand a top official in Gaza who is telling reporters to interview a Norwegian doctor and radical Maoist politician who in September 2001 openly supported the “moral right” of Al Qaeda to perpetrate the 9/11 terrorist attacks against thousands of American civilians.
Earlier today, UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness reached out to journalists with the following Twitter post: “Great interviewee @ Shifa Hosp Gaza right now Prof Mads Gilbert +4790878740 call him 4 fatality & cas figs and atoms RT”
“It’s an outrage that a supposed UN relief organization — which receives tens of millions of dollars from U.S. and European taxpayers — is promoting a radical politician who has openly supported the murder of American civilians,” said Hillel Neuer, Executive Director of the Geneva-based human rights group UN Watch.

CNN's Michael Holmes Praises UNRWA Man's Gaza Lies

In a July 9 interview, UNRWA spokesman Adnan Abu Hasna blatantly lied about conditions in Gaza -- claiming there is no water or electricity, and that no one may leave -- and CNN's Michael Holmes' praises him: "you raise incredibly important points."
UNRWA's Abu Hasna has created a completely false picture in which Gazans completely lack of water, electricity, construction materials, and exit passage, leaving them with nothing to lose, as he puts it. Rather than correct and clarify, according to his journalistic responsibility, Holmes effuses: "Give the Gazans something to lose, I mean, that's a really powerful point."
Clearly delighted with his guest's performance, Holmes closes with a big thank you: "Adnan Abu Hasna of UNWRA, you raise incredibly important points in all of this about the ordinary civilians there, uninvolved in the politics of all of this. Thank you so much for joining us on the line from Gaza."

JPost Editorial: In praise of Iron Dome

Israel has devoted its best minds to devising a technology that protects the lives of Israeli citizens. In contrast, not only has the Palestinian political leadership failed to develop anything remotely similar to Iron Dome, they have not even bothered to provide bomb shelters for their citizens. What is one to infer from this? No father, no mother wants to see his or her child die.
No son or daughter wants to bury a parent prematurely.
But central to the strategy of terrorist organizations such as Hamas is the use of civilian casualties on the Palestinian side as a means of delegimitizing the Israeli war effort. There are no bomb shelters in Gaza, because building them would save civilian lives and this would be counter to the Palestinian cause as conceived by Hamas.
Finally, Iron Dome provides our decision makers – Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon, and other members of the security cabinet – with important breathing space. Large numbers of Israeli casualties would force Israeli leaders to quickly escalate the military effort in an attempt to stop the rockets and missiles fired by Hamas. That would inevitably lead to more Palestinian casualties, particularly since Hamas purposely endangers its civilians to maximize the number of “martyrs.” Discourse on the possibility of a ground invasion, therefore, is presently taking place in a level-headed atmosphere based on pros versus cons.
If not for Iron Dome’s tremendous success, Israel might have found itself dragged into an even more violent confrontation, which would have led to more casualties on both the Israel and Palestinian sides. Iron Dome is a blessing.

Iron Dome will keep on getting better, developer says

Iron Dome was already very accurate during the 2012 Operation Pillar of Defense, he said, “but the system is progressing all the time.”
Unlike other missile defense systems, which require a long time to adapt to new situations, Iron Dome can do so very rapidly, Gold told reporters during an English-language briefing organized by the Israel Project. “It’s not quite like an iPhone application, which can be changed in one minute, but the changes to the [Iron Dome] system can be made very fast, and then the system can progress very fast,” he said. “We tried to design a system that will cope with all bad things that can happen, and cope with uncertainty.”

15 things you didn’t know about the Iron Dome

Israel’s anti-missile defense system has a 90 percent success rate. Betcha didn’t know there are toy car parts behind its features.
The Iron Dome anti-missile defense system is without a doubt the champion of Israel’s current conflict with Gaza. Without it, the hundreds of missiles fired by Hamas into Israel day after day would have likely caused many deaths, and severe damage.
Regular people and security experts alike all want to know more about this box-like contraption that is helping keep the Israeli population safe from the barrage of rockets

Behind Israel’s rocket warnings, an alarmingly complex system

Every one of the 896 rockets launched at Israel during Operation Protective Edge (at time of writing) has been spotted by an air force soldier, and they’ve nearly all resulted in a warning siren, sending Israelis scrambling for shelter.
A mix of radars and electro-optic devices detect the launch, classify its size and the threat it represents, and pinpoint, in a splotch on a map, the areas that are in danger.
This process takes seconds. But for the soldiers who receive the air force’s warning, serving under the command of Lt. Col. Levi Itach, the head of the army’s early warning branch, the procedure is filled with operational dilemmas.

Red Alert with 2 pairs of Google Glass

Shin Bet: We Didn't Send Out Shelter Warning Message

In an unusual move, the Shin Bet (Israel Security Service) announced that text messages sent out Sunday evening in the organization's name were fake and should be ignored. The text message is one of a series that “hostile groups” have been sending out since last week in order to rattle Israeli civilians, the organization said.
Sunday's text message, supposedly from the Shin Bet, said that “a suicide bomber has sneaked into Tel Aviv and central Israel, and is targeting shelters. Beware of strangers in shelters.” The organization denied sending out the message, adding that all official communications come from the Homefront Security Ministry.

Tired of Gaza- Hamas’s nightmare comes true

Hamas has done more harm to the Palestinian movement in the past two decades, than any opponent of the Palestinians could have done. It has sabotaged relations with a sympathetic media through muddled press conferences and moronic bombastic statements about “opening the gates of hell.” It has driven out international supporters, managed to decrease the support it did have among various “free Gaza” committees and “shot its bolt” in its various ill-conceived wars with Israel.
How did Hamas engineer such a defeat? As a religious Islamist movement it was never very palatable, yet it rode a wave of democratization in the Middle East whereby Islamist movements exploited democracy to weasel their way into government. In the 1990s it seemed to gain “street credibility” fighting against the Oslo Accords and speaking out against corruption. Sweeping student elections, it later won 41 percent of the Palestinian legislative elections in 2006. A civil war between it and Fatah in Gaza, in the wake of Israel’s disengagement, brought it to power but left it isolated. It withered, as PA President Mahmoud Abbas built up his security forces in the West Bank, with the aid of US security assistance.

Report: In Call to Netanyahu Kerry Declared U.S. Opposition to Gaza Ground Operation

A senior U.S. official on Sunday revealed that U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry, said America strongly opposes an Israeli ground operation to put an end to years of rocket fire into civilian areas across Israel, in a phone call with Israel’s Prime Minister Netanayhu on Thursday, according to Israel’s Channel 2.
Kerry said America is willing to broker a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, in a bid to end six days of intensive rocket fire into Israel from Gaza, which on Sunday reached areas close to 170 kilometers away, and furious Israeli counter strikes.

Israeli Truck Driver Blocks Several-Kilometer-Long Gaza-Bound Aid Convoy

An Israeli truck driver, fed up at near-incessant Hamas rocket fire into Israel, took matters into his own hands on Sunday and used his truck to block an aid convoy from entering the coastal enclave, Israel’s Channel 2 reported.
Israel’s Civil Authority (COGAT) has continued to allow hundreds of tons of humanitarian aid in, in order to alleviate daily conditions for the strip’s 1.6 million residents inhabiting the 139 square mile area.
But on Sunday, Kerem Shalom resident and married dad, Daniel Meteri, 27, snapped.

Mortar fired from Syria hits Golan Heights

A mortar shell landed on the Israeli side of the Golan Heights on Sunday evening, causing no injuries but starting a brush fire.
Firefighters scrambled to the scene to deal with the blaze, the IDF said.

Rockets from Lebanon Explode in Galilee

Three rockets exploded in the western Galilee region on Sunday night.
The rockets hit open areas, causing no physical injuries or damages. Sirens were heard in the city of Nahariya and throughout the region before the explosion.
The IDF responded with artillery fire towards the area of Lebanon from which the rockets were fired.

West Bank Palestinian killed in clash with IDF soldiers

A Palestinian was killed by Israeli military personnel near the southern West Bank city of Hebron early Monday morning.
Munir Ahmed Badarin, 22, was throwing rocks at an reservist IDF patrol near Al-Samua, and was shot by the patrol in its attempt to arrest him, Channel 2 reported.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Abbas turns to UN for protection

Abbas made the request in a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. The letter was handed to UN envoy Robert Serry during a meeting in Abbas’s office in Ramallah.
“We have decided to officially ask the UN to provide protection to the Palestinian people and the land of Palestine,” Abbas told reporters.
“The Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip is continuing, and last night there were many people killed and wounded. There was also much destruction [in the Gaza Strip].”

Gazan rocket knocks out power for 70,000 Gazans

The outage was caused by shrapnel from the rocketfire that hit the high voltage line that feeds electricity into Gaza, the Israel Electric Corporation said.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and National Infrastructure, Energy and Water Minister Silvan Shalom instructed IEC chairman Yiftah Ron-Tal to refrain from endangering the lives of IEC workers, according to the company.
"For this reason, the IEC intends to fix the problem," a company spokeswoman said. "However, in light of the security situation, and the great danger that we foresee for the lives of the IEC workers in the event if they perform the repair under fire, the problem will be fixed as soon as possible in terms of security."

‘Slightest doubt’ cancels mission, says IAF officer

Amid a rising chorus of condemnation of the steep civilian death toll in Gaza – there were 172 fatalities in total by Palestinian accounts as of Monday – a senior Israeli air force commander who has flown combat sorties all throughout the past week asserted that the fact-checking of possible targets and in-air awareness of his pilots to the possibility of harming civilians is unrivaled.
“I don’t think there’s an equivalent anywhere in the world,” said Lt. Col. T, the commander of a squadron of F-16Is, the air force’s most advanced model of that aircraft. “And I am familiar with many other air forces.”
The officer rejected the notion that the operational protocol of “roof knocking” – dropping a flare first on the roof of a structure as a warning to civilians – has limited the army’s success in its operation in Gaza. “I see it as a source of strength,” he said.

IDF Releases Recording of Phone Call Warning to Gaza Resident Prior to Striking Terror Target (VIDEO)

The Israel Defense Forces on Sunday released a recording of a phone call made to a Gaza resident on Saturday warning of an impending strike on a terror target in his vicinity.
“Hi, do you speak Hebrew,” an IDF operator asks in the call. “How are you? Is everything okay?”
The IDF needs to target the building that is located close to you,” he continues.”We are doing everything in our power to not hit buildings nearby. We are trying to make sure before we strike the target, that there are no civilians in the vicinity.”
“Make sure and tell everyone. Because in 5 minutes we will strike the target,” he concludes.

Algemeiner Video: Recording of IDF Conversation With Gaza Resident About an Upcoming Airstrike

Raw Footage of Hamas Firing Barrage of Rockets at Israel

IDF Airstrike on Weapons Cache Causes Huge Secondary Explosion

IDF Aircraft Calls Off Strikes to Protect Gazan Civilians

IDF Strikes Launching Site After Rocket Fire

IDF Observes Rocket Launching in Progress & Strikes Back

An Israeli pilot speaks

Hamas Spokesman: “We Are Leading Palestinians to Death”

The Hamas Spokesman has been very vocal during Operation Protective Edge, which Israel launched to bring about a cessation of rocket fire from Gaza. His words reveal the sinister way in which Hamas abuses its citizens by intentionally putting them in harm’s way.
The spokesperson for Hamas in Gaza, Sami Abu Zuhri, said yesterday [07/13] in an interview on Al Aqsa TV (Hamas’ TV network), “We aren’t leading our people today to destruction. We are leading them to death.” (h/t Jewess)

Paris Synagogue Attack: 'We Could Have Had a Kristallnacht'

Serge Ben Haim, one of the leaders of the Jewish community in Paris, told IDF Radio Monday morning about the attack on a Paris synagogue by a pro-Palestinian mob on Sunday.
Ben Haim told his interviewer that the event was a watershed occurrence. “What existed in the past can no longer continue. We could have had something like Kristallnacht,” he said, referring to the infamous “night of broken glass” in 1938, when Nazis swept through Jewish towns and neighborhoods throughout Germany and Austria, murdering some 500 Jews, burning homes and synagogues, and destroying shops.
The Paris riot began with a demonstration by pro-Palestinian activists not far from a synagogue in which many Jews had gathered Sunday.
“They decided to advance in large numbers toward the synagogue, and that was where they met our youths who volunteer to protect Jewish places, and then the police.”

The Jewish communities of the ‘Old Continent’ in crisis

Over the past six years, at least six factors have contributed to the alarming deterioration of the situation of France’s Jews, this against the background of a growing crisis for European Jewry in general.
1) The emergence, now completely “normalized,” of openly anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist speech (which comes to the same thing) in the media, in public debates and in certain intellectual circles.
2) The junction of these anti-Jewish circles with the French “lumpen-proletariat” and the dissatisfied: unemployed persons, holders of insecure and temporary jobs, disenfranchised and frustrated people; the typical profile of the admirers of the comic Dieudonné M’bala M’bala and the pseudo- intellectual Alain Soral.

Pro-Palestinians Continue to Use Old and Nazi Images Against Israel

Breitbart News proved numerous images used by pro-Palestinians on Twitter are from Syria or years ago in Gaza. There are people who are still using the pictures, but others moved on with other pictures to use in order to smear Israel. On top of these falsehoods, pro-Palestinians tweet out pictures and say Hitler was correct when he tried to rid the world of Jews.

‘Vile stuff out there’: Jake Tapper notes pathetic #HitlerWasRight trend

CNN’s Jake Tapper has taken notice of two disturbing hashtags that have recently surfaced, apparently in response to Israel’s Operation Protective Edge: #HitlerWasRight and #HitlerDidNothingWrong. And as he notes, Adolf Hitler was no friend to the Arabs. That hasn’t stopped the hashtags from spreading, though. (h/t jewess)

Antisemitism flying high at Sydney rally

The rally in support of Gaza was held outside Sydney’s Town Hall, in the plaza. On the majestic steps and podium, and in the crowd, dozens of the black jihadist Shehada flags and Hezbollah flags were flying high. Speakers were dwarfed by a huge Palestinian flag behind them.
Antisemitism was also flying high. It was open, unashamed and palpable. The images through posters and flags were not just anti-Israel, but antisemitic to its core.
A particularly odious poster was of a Star of David with a swastika embedded within it and the words “Holy Cost” playing on the word ‘Holocaust’. The implication was a mocking of the Holocaust against the Jews, while accusing the Jews of committing a holocaust against the Palestinians.
Other posters were emblazoned with themes denigrating Jews and Judaism, and equating Israel with Nazi Germany. These posters included the words: “Khazar Jews out of Palestine”, “God chosen who?”, “Gaza is the Warsaw ghetto”, “God is not your real estate agent”, “First it was Hitler….. Now it is Israel!” and “You cannot continue to victimize someone else just because you yourself were a victim once. Zionist do not do onto Palestine what Nazis did to you!

Large pro-Israel rally in LA marred by violence

Some 1,200 Israel supporters flocked to a community solidarity rally outside the Los Angeles Federal building in West Los Angeles Sunday afternoon. Though largely peaceful, the demonstration’s conclusion was marred by violence when four Palestinian activists allegedly beat pro-Israel demonstrators with sticks, according to the Los Angeles Jewish Journal.
At the demonstration’s start, pro-Israel demonstrators wrapped in American and Israeli flags and holding banners aloft cheered and chanted as cars drove by honking their horns in support of Israel’s right to defend itself against the ongoing Hamas rocket launches into the country. As the day wore on, the numbers swelled until three corners of the busy intersection were flanked with a sea of blue and white.
Initially only a small contingent of around 25 Palestinian supporters waving a Palestinian flag passed through the Israeli phalanx to the opposite side of the street, where their numbers eventually swelled to some 200. This first confrontation between the two groups was brief but uneventful, with hundreds of Israel supporters chanting “Am Yisrael Chai” (“The People of Israel Live”) while uniformed Los Angeles police kept them a safe distance apart.

German cops enable anti-Israel rant

Police let the protester use the megaphone during a Free Gaza demonstration Saturday because he had offered to calm down a protest that had turned violent, spokeswoman Virginie Wegner told The Associated Press.
“We as police had come up spontaneously with this unusual method and he abused it — we didn’t expect that,” Wegner said, adding that police were investigating the incident. “Police are neutral during protests.”
Instead of calming things down, the protester — whose identity was not revealed — shouted anti-Israel slogans in German and Arabic in downtown Frankfurt. A video that went viral shows a crowd following the police car, cheering and repeating the chants.

PFLP terror group raises their flag in San Francisco

Yesterday, in our beautiful city by the bay, a PFLP flag was raised at an anti-Israel rally. Not one of the rally endorsers have condemned or distanced themselves from this blatant gesture of support for terror.

Shocking anti-Semitic hatefest in downtown Seattle

As Hamas Rockets continued to rain down on Israeli population centers, a large anti-Israel rally took place in Seattle’s Westlake Center this Saturday, July 12. Protesters screamed anti-Israel slogans calling for the destruction of the Jewish state while waving signs and marching through the downtown sidewalks. But this was more than a rally in opposition to Israel or her defensive operations. The signs being waved and the chants hollered constituted a shocking public display of shameless Jew hatred right in the heart of Seattle.
While you may have thought that blood libel accusations are a relic of the past, in fact the slander was alive and well in downtown Seattle this past Saturday. The below poster depicts a Jew eating a gentile child along with a cup of blood to wash it all down.

Nuts to Your Moral Equivalency on Gaza

We hear you, Ben. Jews are not being killed enough. So what’s the use?
Turn now to CNN’s Anchorman Ron Burgundy – I mean Wolf Blitzer.
He began interviewing the mayor of Jerusalem, as six rockets just landed on Jerusalem, but never mind. Wolf switched the conversation to “extreme elements” within Israel, referring to a single alleged revenge murder. Mayor Nir Barkat proved that such “extremist” crimes happen maybe once every 10 years from less than one percent of the Jewish population.
No matter. Wolf persisted and he had his moral equivalency.

A letter from the bottom of my heart

I would have written a letter to Khaled Mashaal, but he already has enough problems to deal with. He’s in Qatar, moving from one place to another, with no home.
He probably misses the glory days when he was back in Cairo, when he was known as a mover and a shaker in Hamas and everyone hung on his every word.
And now he’s gone.
Mashaal gave a speech this week and explained that Israel will continue to suffer from devastation again and again. But the truth is, the speech sounded like a scene from a Monty Python movie.

Palestinian Delusions Fuel Conflict

To an objective observer this makes no sense. Hamas set events in motion last month when some of its operatives kidnapped and murdered three Israeli teenagers and then escalated the conflict by shooting several hundred rockets into the Jewish state from its Gaza stronghold. The result of these actions would all seem to undermine Hamas’s credibility vis-à-vis its Fatah rivals.
The rocket offensive has clearly failed on a military level. To shoot hundreds of rockets at cities for a week and to fail to score one hit or kill a single person—and killing civilians is exactly the goal of Hamas’s effort—can’t be represented as anything but a flop. At the same time, Hamas has not demonstrated any ability to deter or defend against Israeli precision attacks on Hamas targets.

The Shocking ‘Iron Dome Is Bad’ Argument

One of the more peculiar twists in “gee, let me try to find something interesting to say about the war with Hamas” punditry is the argument that suggests Israel’s use of anti-missile technology is bad for Israel, bad for Gaza, and bad for the world. This argument has two facets, both examples of the downside of the Internet: How it allows people with half-baked, half-considered ideas access to the court of world opinion to make a case any rational editor would have thrown out in the old days.

Third Lesson of the Gaza War: Abbas Sides With Hamas

When the Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestinians were signed in 1993, the U.S. State Department removed Fatah from its list of terrorist groups. Removing it was not just a statement of how the U.S. views Fatah; it also made it legally possible for the U.S. to start sending $500 million to the Palestinian Authority and the PLO, of which Fatah is the largest faction. Now that Fatah has openly boasted that it is carrying out rocket terrorism against Israel, it’s time to put Fatah back on the U.S. list of terrorist groups.
Fatah and Hamas both belong on that list because, in the end, they are birds of a feather. Certainly there have been moments of tension between the two movements. But those clashes reflected either internal disputes unrelated to Israel, or differences in tactics regarding Israel – not differences in their overall goals.
The third lesson from the Gaza war: The “moderate” Palestinian leadership has shown its true colors. It sides with the terrorists, not with Israel.

This Time Around, Surprising Support for Israel – Not Hamas
The current Hamas assault on Israel has lured the predictable coven of Palestinian nationalists, Islamists, Leftists, and antisemites from the woodwork to bash the Jewish state. But, more surprisingly, Israel is getting support, or at least restraint and fairness, from unexpected sources:
Daniel Pipes: Statement not issued by the UN Security Council

The current Hamas assault on Israel has lured the predictable coven of Palestinian nationalists, Islamists, Leftists, and antisemites from the woodwork to bash the Jewish state. But, more surprisingly, Israel is getting support, or at least restraint and fairness, from unexpected sources:

Celebrities Speaking Out For Israel During Operation Protective Edge

Following Roger Water’s disgusting, but predictable, rant against Israel, we were “greeted” today with the news that ~~Toe~~ Pearl Jam’s ~~Darth~~ Eddie Vedder – an apparent friend of Waters – had also revealed his true, Israel-hating colors.
And I am sure we will hear from the usual wretched hive of celebrity scum and villainy over the course of this war. But instead of focusing on them, I would like to point out those celebrities who have spoken out for Israel during this difficult time.

Israeli Arab Sheikh Offers to Host Rocket-Battered Residents of the South

Sheikh Ahmed Ju’ame’, 32, of the Muslim Arab village of Sulam, near Afula, in Israel’s agricultural heartland, in recent days has publicly invited Israelis from the south and center of the country to drop by and try to unstress.
“I’m helping foster co-existence between us and the Jews, because, in he end, we’re all Israelis,” he told Channel 2 television on Sunday.
Ju’ame’ is inviting anyone over to his two guest rooms in his pastoral village.
“Whoever turns to us, will be most welcome,” he said, stressing that his village is not hostile to Jews, and that that he has no concerns of opposition by anyone in his community.

Canadian Prime Minister Harper Praised for Statement in Support of Israel’s Gaza Campaign

In response, one activist wrote on Facebook, “Dear world leaders, please take note this is how a statement in support of Israel should read.”
“It’s so refreshing to see a world leader with unambiguous moral clarity,” said prominent California rabbi Yeruchem Eilfort.
While U.S. President Obama voiced support for Israel’s right to self defense, he called for both sides of the conflict to show restraint.

Italian Foreign Minister Tries to Mediate over Gaza

Italy's foreign minister, Federica Mogherini, will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in the coming days as part of European efforts to stem an escalating conflict in Gaza that has killed 166 people.
Italy currently holds the presidency of the European Union and Mogherini is seen as a possible candidate to replace Catherine Ashton as the next European Union foreign policy chief.

Hamas claims rocket attacks are successful, Israel is covering up deaths

Hamas is presenting Palestinians with a false picture of success in its ongoing attacks against Israel. On Hamas TV News, the host explained to viewers that the Israeli media "imposes blackouts on every place rockets fall, on every loss of human life and all damage to property." He charged that "the Zionist media" is only telling part of the truth:

Hamas propaganda: Iron Dome is a "failed project," Israel is concealing death toll

Coordinated cyber attacks on Hamas websites

A major hacking attack was carried out on Monday morning against some of Hamas's leading websites. For more than five hours various sites were disabled and others displayed content against Hamas and its leaders.
The leading Hamas site Shehab.ps displayed anti-Hamas headlines that when clicked played a video from Egyptian Television that was unfavorable to Hamas. In the video, from the Egyptian anti-Hamas website El-Balad, Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal is seen living a life of luxury. The anchor on the video says: "If Mashaal is man enough , why doesn't he take a plane from Qatar to Egypt . We would gladly open our border and let him enter the Gaza Strip, and then he can hide together with Hamas leader [Ismail] Haniyeh in a bunker underground."

Don’t believe the hype: Hamas isn’t desperate for a truce

True, Gaza’s Hamas rulers are frustrated to a certain extent. They aren’t happy that the almost 1,000 rockets they’ve fired at Israel so far have caused few injuries and haven’t even significantly disrupted life in Israel. Hamas also had far-reaching plans for terrorist attacks inside Israeli territory, but so far they’ve all been thwarted. Even attacks on communities and army bases by way of tunnels that were dug over years did not bear fruit, thanks to Israeli intelligence efforts.
However – and this is a major reservation – the damage to Hamas from Israel’s air campaign, at least so far, has been minimal. Not one senior member of the movement’s political or military echelons has been as much as scratched by Israeli fire.

Kerry to Demand that Iran “Cease and Desist” From Sending Missiles to Hamas

"Iran has a longstanding record of supplying weapons, rockets, to various terror groups in Gaza, including Hamas,” one senior Obama administration official said from Vienna. “Those rockets are being used to fire at civilian areas, and Iran has a responsibility to cease and desist from continuing to supply weapons in this conflict.”
Israel launched Operation Protective Edge five days ago to eliminate those stockpiles and their facilitators, members of Hamas and other Islamist groups that wish to destroy the Jewish state.
“Any opportunity that we get to communicate that message to them, we will take,” the administration official added.

Hamas calls on evacuated Gazans to 'return immediately'

Hamas called on Palestinian residents of the northern Gaza Strip to "immediately return" to their homes, after the IDF warned locals to evacuate the area at noon to avoid being harmed in any military operation.
A spokesperson for UNRWA in Gaza claimed that some 4,000 Palestinians had evacuated their homes and headed for UN facilities and shelters in the Gaza Strip.
The Hamas Interior Ministry released a statement titled "Urgent call to the residents of the Gaza Strip" in which locals were told to ignore the calls and warnings made by Israel and the IDF. "To all of our people who have evacuated their homes – return to them immediately and do not leave the house."

The U.S. should relocate its Israel embassy to a safer place – Jerusalem

Last week, the U.S. backed down to the terrorist group, Hamas, when it decided to partially close its embassy in Tel Aviv due to incessant rocket fire on Israel.
While kowtowing to terror is consistent with the White House’s strategic military objective – that of ending wars at all costs – abandoning a critical intelligence-sharing outpost in an allied country during a time of war against a mutual threat is unlikely to achieve that intended outcome.
Instead, President Obama should immediately announce the relocating of the U.S. embassy to somewhere safer – Jerusalem.

‘Children are children. They are not our enemies’

Along with the other 210,000 residents of coastal Ashdod, over the past couple of weeks Irena Nosel and her family must scramble for shelter when the wailing siren warns of incoming missiles from Gaza.
Her teenage son is in the army and her five-year-old son is confined to home because of the danger. Yet Nosel hasn’t missed a day of work as head nurse of the pediatric intensive care unit at Wolfson Medical Center in Holon.
She cares daily for critically ill children from Israel as well as from Gaza, the Palestinian Authority-administered territories, Syria, Africa and other places where the medical system is much less advanced than in Israel.
“Children are children. They are not our enemies,” she tells ISRAEL21c. “It doesn’t matter where they are from. If these children will not come to Wolfson and receive treatment, they will have no chance to live.”

Don’t Feel Helpless—Help the South

One thing’s for sure—NO American would tolerate this for a single day. If people in New York City were running from rockets, do you think America would show any restraint? When I think about it, it’s easy to feel helpless. Hopeless.
But there is something we can do. The residents of the south desperately need financial help. Many of them cannot work in these circumstances, and don’t have enough money to buy food for their families. They live off credit at the grocery store, racking up large debts. My friends and I started a campaign called “Straight to the South,” where we are raising money to pay off the grocery store debts of needy families, and buy food vouchers for needy soldiers. Please like our Facebook page, where you can see pictures and stories about the families we are helping. We are making a difference, however small, and hope to help as many people as possible. Please donate to this crucial cause and help us spread the word—time is of the essence.

International Day of Solidarity with Israel

Globally we have witnessed increased attacks against Israel. From the Iranian threat to the boycott Israel movement. Israel faces many attacks against its legitimacy and it is time for us all to stand up.
On July 17th you will be asked to come together from the four corners of the world and express your support for Israel.