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"Israel will consider releasing the 64 Hamas activists it rounded up early Thursday morning if IDF soldier Cpl. Gilad Shalit is freed, OC Central Command Maj.-Gen. Yair Naveh said Thursday.
"'The possibility exists,' Naveh said. "The diplomatic echelon can decide to release the Hamas officials if the soldier is returned to us." Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said the primary goal of the operation "is to bring about Shalit's release. If he is released, this would dramatically deescalate the situation.'"
Carl at Israelmatzav rips that idea a "new one:"
"But one thing I feel, despite all this… is that in the wake of disagreements between our brethren, with our different worldviews and different relationships to the land of Israel that creates a lot of conflict, a lot of anger, a lot of argument - many times, I've asked G-d that he should first of all grant me love for everyone in my heart, and… that He should show me the special quality of the nation of Israel, and that I should succeed - that we should all succeed in loving each other… truly from the heart."
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“The abduction was easy to carry out, and the hostage was alive for two days," said Palestinian Resistance Committee spokesman Abu Abir said on Thursday.
"Before we issued the announcement of his kidnap and after, the Israeli security system couldn’t decide who the kidnapped person was. Of course this only encourages us to continue the blessed Jihad and we promise more abductions in the near future.
“Operation ‘Cavaliers’ Wrath’ will turn Israelis’ lives into hell. Soldiers and settlers will find us everywhere; we will come out at them from under the ground and above it. We will to attack from every direction. The Salah a-Din Brigades are completing preparations for the next big operation. We will kidnap and murder more Zionists,” he said.
A moving, mutual Israeli-Jewish Diaspora shoutout over at Jblogosphere on this difficult morning:
“Those of us, who live in Israel are not isolated from the rest of the Jewish world. We in Diaspora, do care, and do think of Israel, and Israelis, as a nation (not just the Land, but the nation!) all the time. And for those of us, who live in Israel, we should not fall victims to illusion that once you become an Israeli, you forget about being a Jew. Wherever we are, we are one nation.
We have been separated through history, and wound up living in different parts of the world - but all those factors have not succeeded in breaking us, nor taking away our common identity. Israel, the symbol of our nationhood, stands strong, and whether you're religious or not, left-wing, right-wing, or somewhere in the middle, whether you're from Europe or the Middle East or the United States, you're all welcome there. And at the same time, whatever difficulties Israel experience, she is not alone. We're all here, ready to put aside our differences, the moment she needs our help.”
(In related news, later today I'll be posting a powerful, different take on this issue, and a disturbing cry of despair over Israel by an editor at a major New York Jewish newspaper, in an exclusive Israel At Level Ground Podcast with noted immigrant author, columnist and speaker Judy Lash Balint. Stop back here throughout the day and listen in. Meanwhile, Judy's latest: "Former Mossad Head: "Hamas Could Implode")
IDF soldiers in "Operation Summer Rain" in Gaza Strip. (Photo: Baubau Photowire)
From Haaretz:
"Has Israel decided (YNET) that like the Taliban & like Saddam's regime of brutality, that the Hamas Terrorist Government's day has come?"
From Ynetnews:
"Among those arrested during the operation, which began shortly after midnight in Ramallah, Nablus, Qalqilya, Jenin and Jerusalem, are Palestinian Deputy Prime Minister Nasser al-Shaer, Hamas government Labor Minister Muhammad Barghouti, Minister of Jerusalem Affairs Khaled Abu Arfa and many other top officials. Senior Hamas members Mahmoud Abu Tir and Mahmoud Atuan were apprehended in Jerusalem; most of the Palestinian Legislative Council members on Hamas’ behalf were also detained in various West Bank cities."
From The Jerusalem Post:
"The IDF confirmed early Thursday a report the Popular Resistance Committees issued from Gaza that it had executed Eliyahu Asheri, 18, of Itamar, who was kidnapped earlier this week in the West Bank.
"For a Jerusalem Online video of events click here.
"IDF combat engineers and Shin Bet agents, acting on intelligence, found Asheri's body Wednesday night in an abandoned car in an open field outside of Ramallah. The youth appeared to have been shot to death, and initial findings indicated that he may have been killed as early as Sunday.
"Asheri's family has been notified."
Israeli Air Force jets overflew Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's palace near Latakiya while he was in the building, Channel TV 10 News reported at the start of the Wednesday evening 20:00 news.
Israeli censors released the news only this evening of the quartet of F-16i "Sufa" (Storm) jets that buzzed the northern Syrian palace yesterday. Hamas "external" politburo chief Khaled Maashal directs terror operations from Damascus, and is believed to have been behind the attack on the IDF post and the abduction of IDF Cpl. Gilad Shalit.
Maashal is reportedly leaving the Syrian capital for Egypt, according to a 20:45 update, likely fearing an Israeli assault or abduction, or at Assad's behest. He is due to hold talks with Egyptialn officials.
"Earlier, Justice Minister Haim Ramon said that Mashaal, was a target for assassination due to his ordering of the kidnapping of Shalit.
"He is definitely in our sights... he is a target," Ramon told Army Radio. "Khaled Mashaal, as some who is overseeing, actually commanding the terror acts, is definitely a target."
The last time Israel warned Syria in this manner about sponsoring terrorism was four years ago, in the wake of a suicide bombing masterminded by Islamic Jihad, based in Damascus.
It is unclear if the Syrian military attempted to fire recently purchased Russian-made SA-18 ground-to air missiles at the aircraft as passed - reportedly at transonc speeds -causing sonic booms.
The Israeli army is on high alert along the northern border, for any possible Hizbullah response to the flyover.
Syrian television did not report the event, although al-Jazeerra did run a scroller shortly after the Israeli announcement, according to reporter Shai Yeheskeli.
An official Syrian response close to 20:30 denied that the flyover took place, and said the Syrians would "continue their current policies."
Former IDF southern command chief Doron Almog said, in an on-air discussion with the anchorman that he believed the theater of conflict was widening.
More on this at The Jerusalem Post.
The hackers were protesting the IDF's early mornnig incursion into Gaza. When clicking on one of the pages a message appears, saying:
"Hacked by Team-Evil Arab hackers u KILL palestin people we KILL Israel servers"
Sites affected include Bank Hapoalim, the Rambam Medical center, Bank Otsar Ha-Hayal, BMW Israel, Subaru Israel and Citroen Israel. The real estate company Tarbut-Hadiur and the Jump fashion website have also been targeted.
(Perhaps the hackers should remember, as they say in the language of the Prophets: Ha' Olam Egol - that what goes around, comes around...)
Preparing for Gaza: Uncertainty reigns
(This "reporter's notebook," covers the IDF preparations for an incursion into northern Gaza in 2002, in the wake of a particularly gruesome string of suicide bombings. The army decided to abort the foray to hunt down terror cells shortly before the unit was to deploy. This journal and audio are a personal report of that incident)
The call came at 1:30 a.m. Thursday morning.
I shuffle out of bed, and groggily answer the ringing cellphone.
“Is this David Bender?" the young female voice on the other end of the line asks brusquely. “Yes,” I reply, amid growing awareness that I recognize the voice and the background sounds as those of my army reserve unit’s liaison office.
My concern rises to the surface like a half-forgotten bad dream tailing me out of my slumber.
"This is a 'tzav-8' call-up. You need to arrive at the base by 9:00 am," she says, asking if I understand the instructions and other pertinent details. I mumble my assent, hanging up the phone as I fall back into a chair.
Stunned, I told my now-awake wife that no, this wasn't a drill and that no, they weren't kidding. Suddenly taken aback in a rush of confusion and inchoate fear, I drag down the dusty, readied backpack from the crawlspace over the bathroom, mentally going over the list of needed last minute supplies.
Later, deep in the heart of the night, we finish packing the bag, both finally comprehending that I was Gaza bound, and though uncertain, likely en route to harms way.
I arrived at the sprawling Negev-area base later that morning. Hundreds of friends and acquaintances - all brothers in arms - were already there, milling in and out of ragged lines, signing in and signing out on rifles, gear and webbing. Guys in the unit I hadn't seen appear for duty in years, aged and way past enlistment age were there, trying on wrinkled fatigues and lacing up stiff boots. Reports said we were at well over a 100 percent show rate. Fairly amazed, proud, and somewhat abashed at the plain show of patriotism, I went from group to group, catching up on news since our last term of service together.
The knowing looks between us as we backslapped and traded stories of times gone by wordlessly said it all. Our unit, together with many others, was preparing to go into operation against the Palestinian terror infrastructure in the Gaza Strip. Targets chosen in the wake of a lethal suicide bombing in Rishon Letzion earlier in the week.
Our unit's officers and noncoms, harried by a welter of conflicting orders and directives, quickly assign us tents and times to be at the firing range for infantry refresher drills as we lug the duffel bags, oily semi-automatic rifles, and personal gear across the covered staging area.
As we unfold rusty, creaky beds and unpack, Wexler from Eilat – both of us 15-year unit veterans - shows off his latest toy: a minidisc player and a collection of trance music discs to pass the time.
Presumably to be listened to sometime between assault and ambush.
I ask if he has any music from the previous century.
He grins at me over his 700 shekel sunglasses, thinks for a moment, and slides out Pink Floyd's art-rock classic, "Dark Side of the Moon," tossing it over to me. I insert the disc, hearing the multiple ringing alarm clocks and clinking cash registers, wryly smiling as I consider the album’s name in light of where we were headed and what I was doing when I first heard the album in a Houston, TX. high school so long ago and a world away.
Rumors are rife as we trade theories about the upcoming mission. For once the know-it-alls don’t. I can’t help but think about the 13 reservists blown apart in a dank booby-trapped alley in the Jenin refugee camp weeks earlier, the details palpable via grisly news reports.
I leave my cellphone turned off, partly to save batteries but mostly not have to answer inevitable questions by concerned friends and colleagues about my whereabouts. Palestinian intelligence - not to mention IDF field security - both likely tap the lines.
That night, while in classrooms studying bed sheet-sized aerial area photographs, we receive initial mission assignments.
Our battalion commander stands beneath a street lamp just before lights out, the assembled battalion sitting on the ground before him, and addresses us.
He prides us on our show-rate, speed of arrival and organization, and our willingness to take up arms for the nation’s defense.
“No one slaps around handcuffed and blindfolded prisoners,” he warns us.
No big words about glory and battlefield valor. Instead, he talks about purity of arms and the Israeli army’s code of battlefield ethics.
He then asks if any soldier is uncertain of his willingness to carry out the mission and go into combat.
“Is there any man who has married and not yet consecrated his home?” “Is there any among you who is fearful, let his leave.”
A chill runs through me as his words evoke the Biblical call to the warriors of Israel.
“On the battlefield, uncertainty reigns,” he reminds us, adding that events at ground level could change from minute to minute. We would soon discover the accuracy of those words.
Long after midnight, exhausted from the tension and unaccustomed efforts, we fall into fitful sleep in worn sleeping bags.
Awakened early the next morning, we gamely try to heed the tight schedule.
More infantry assault drills and shooting range practice. We expect to be on base sharpening our military skills throughout the Sabbath. The observant soldiers generally accepting of the order, assuming the nature of the planned operation comes under the heading of lifesaving acts, which defer Sabbath proscriptions.
The unit’s rabbi, however, himself uncertain of the minutia of Halachic Law on the issue, queries senior IDF rabbis over the absolute necessity of the Sabbath dry runs. He receives the go-ahead.
Late Friday afternoon, our battery commander addresses us, asking us if we fully understand what we are preparing for.
“Is there anyone here who is not ‘shalem’ (confident) about taking part in the mission?” He questions, echoing the senior commanders words the previous night. I sense the concern in his voice; see the worried look in his face as he speaks. He’s plainly apprehensive about the welfare of the soldiers under his command.
A few soldiers speculate aloud why the army chose middle-age reservists to carry our operations suited to infantry conscripts.
Mid-lecture late Friday afternoon, the battalion commander enters the classroom, smiles, saying there was a “change of plan;” we are going home for the Sabbath. Uncertainty reigns.
We quickly adjourn to prepare personal gear, racing the clock and highway traffic to be home before sunset.
I arrive home moments before the Sabbath begins, quickly showering and dressing intro festive clothes. The 24-hour respite goes by all too quickly, as my family and I share the shelter the Sabbath affords us before the gathering storm.
Refreshed and more psychically prepared for duty, I leave my wife and family behind as my ride back to base arrives late Saturday night.
We drive south in the dark, sharing few words, wondering what sunup would bring.
Rising early, we are back on the firing range before breakfast. We take turns going through the steps; shooting, running and diving, as the officer at our heels spurs us on.
Senior commanders tell us that we are likely to enter the Gaza Strip sometime that afternoon. The information comes as a surprise as we had planned to enter Gaza in forays a day or two later. Again, uncertainty reigns.
Helmet strap cinched tight and wearing full webbing, I slap an ammo clip in my M-16 rifle and ready myself for the solo assault tactic.
Go! The officer standing behind me shouts.
I raise my gun, aim and fire. Run several feet, slow - and dragging one foot for stability - fire again. Run, drag, shoot. Run, drag, shoot. I throw myself on the stony ground, take cover, aim and fire again. Picking off the targets in several brief volleys, I rise again to repeat the maneuver, a second and yet a third time.
Heart pounding, breathless, and sweating, I complete the maneuver. My officer slaps me on the back, congratulating me on a successful run: The target was peppered with bullet holes.
I take off my helmet, musing over the sterility of the maneuver compared to real battle, with bullets flying both ways. Another brush with the kingdom of uncertainty.
Someone’s cell phone rings; the caller saying the battery commander is urgently needed for aparley with senior officers. Rumors about the operation run riot through the unit.
He returns a few minutes later to tell us: The operation has been called off; we can pack and return home. Uncertainty reigns.
Click on map for close-up. (Map: University of Texas)"A fellow student at Neveh Tzuf told police that he had spotted Asheri trying to hitch a ride at the French Hill hitchhiking post in Jerusalem on Sunday night."
"If one goes to the BBC News page, they have two different settings: a "UK version" and an "International version." And each version has slightly different content, even at the same time.
When checking out the two different versions a few minutes ago, I found two different headlines -- saying the EXACT OPPOSITE thing! About Hamas recognizing Israel! So I kept two windows open, each with the contradicting headline, and overlapped them, them took a screenshot getting both simultaneously. Here it is:
BBC: Hamas does and does not recognize Israel.
So, for the UK version, it says "Hamas 'implicitly accepts Israel." And the International version says "No recognition of Israel - Hamas."
Both these pages were online at the same moment! Unfortunately, BBC has already changed the pages, but at least I got a screenshot of the crazy contradiction!
Go figure...
I had a terrifying moment of deja vu this evening over events that took place on the eve of the 1967 Six Day War, while watching Channel 10's 17:00 news show on Tuesday.
Folks, the grave concern on the face of Channel 10's chief military affairs reporter, Alon Ben-David, was clear to see, as he aired several clips of Defense Minister Amir Peretz during recent press conferences on the fast-unfolding events in Gaza, repeatedly stumbling, stuttering, and pausing, glassy-eyed in mid-sentence, as he tried to address the gathered reporters.
Dismayed, I had to get up from the desk, walk away from the tv screen, as the hairs on my arms stood up, and I had this awful, bottom-dropping-out-of-the-elevator-car sense of, “oh no, we've been in this movie before...”
I hurriedly called Carl over at Israel Matzav, to get his take on it, (thanks, Carl) and then, checked two other reputable historial sources to make sure that I wasn't exaggerating to myself about the startling parallels:
Two (of many) pivotal scenes traumatically engraved in Israel's collective memory are of Prime Minister Levi Eshkol stumbling and stuttering on-camera during a press conference on the eve of the 1967 Six Day War, and of IDF Chief of Staff Yitzhak suffering a brief, but incapacitating nervous breakdown during the same period.
As noted author Michael B. Oren writes in his highly regarded "Six Days of War June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East:"
"Israel's military command was alarmed. Waiting while Egypt's strike force was become stronger and stronger and letting Egypt strike first was militarily unsound. It was the Israeli government, under Prime Minister Levi Eshkol, that had the power to decide when to strike, and Eshkol, who was also defense minister, held back, hoping war could be avoided by talking to the Russians and to the Johnson administration in Washington. The pressure was unbearable for Yitzhak Rabin, the Israeli army's chief of staff, who had not been able to sleep. And, around the 25th, Rabin had a nervous breakdown - not unlike Moshe Dayan in the approach of war in 1973. Responsibility for Israel's survival was a heavy weight to bear."
L-R: Ariel Sharon, Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres (Photo: Newsday)
And this from “Six Days Remembered” by Anne Lieberman, noted at Boker tov, Boulder!:
“May 28: Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol delivers a speech on Israel Radio that can only be described as disastrous. Oren would describe it as "a stuttering, rambling, barely intelligible reading that listeners interpreted as a sign of exhaustion and panic... Soldiers huddled around transistors in the Negev were said to have burst into tears."
Back to the here and now:
Although I can't readily agree with Carl's conclusions - certainly under the present acute circumstances - he does bring forward a powerful take on the issue:
“At the Israeli ministry of defense, the buck stops with Defense Minister Comrade Peretz. When Peretz, whose highest rank in the army was Captain, was appointed Defense Minister there were fears that he would not be able to handle the position. There was talk about adding another Labor party MK who had been a general (Ephraim Sneh or Fuad Ben Eliezer) as his 'assistant' to actually run the Defense Ministry. But politics won out and no 'assistant' was appointed. And because Ehud Olmert wanted Labor in the cabinet and could not give Peretz the Finance Ministry (which Peretz really wanted, but which would have destroyed the economy), Peretz became defense minister. Regardless, that means the defense buck stops with Peretz. And if what the media are reporting is true, it is time for Peretz to resign.”
"IDF Deputy Chief of Staff Maj.-Gen. Moshe Kaplinsky told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee today that there was a warning over the past 10 days on the general location between Sufa and the Kerem Shalom crossings, but no specific warnings.
"As a result of the warning, both crossings were closed down.
"Senior Shin Bet sources confirmed late Sunday that they had passed specific intelligence regarding the attack to relevant officials inside the IDF.
"The information had included the precise location of the attack and the fact that a tunnel would be involved, but did not specify a time frame.
"Defense Minister Comrade Amir Peretz, however, told reporters that the IDF had only received a general warning."
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No matter what the political and media spin docs spew, whether it is a matter of mere lack of sleep, or worse, I am deeply worried about the next few days here.
Ok, first things first: I do not usually get involved in internal American politics, including voting for recent presidents. I did, however, interview and take part in a program on a radio station to in the States about the influence of American - Israeli voters living in Israel on the 2004 elections). Having said that, and reminding you that I don't really care for columnist Ann Coulter's waaaay over the edge political rants, uber-columnist Mark Steyn rarely fails to deftly skewer the political bonfires of the inanities, especially in the US, UK and Europe. In this column, he outdoes himself, handily filleting Coulter's critics:
"Ann Coulter's new book Godless: The Church of Liberalism is a rollicking read very tightly reasoned and hard to argue with. After all, the progressive mind regards it as backward and primitive to let religion determine every aspect of your life, but takes it as advanced and enlightened to have the state determine every aspect of your life.
"In 2004, in the gym of Newton High School in Iowa, Senator John Edwards skipped the dreary Kerry-as-foreign-policy-genius pitch and cut straight to the Second Coming. "We will stop juvenile diabetes, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and other debilitating diseases... When John Kerry is president, people like Christopher Reeve are going to get up out of that wheelchair and walk again." Mr. Reeve had died the previous weekend, but he wouldn't have had Kerry and Edwards been in the White House. Read his lips: no new crutches. The healing balm of the Massachusetts Messiah will bring the crippled and stricken to their feet, which is more than Kerry's speeches ever do for the able-bodied. As the author remarks, "If one wanted to cure the lame, one could reasonably start with John Edwards."
"The Israel Defense Forces said it was aware of the announcement but could not yet confirm that an Israeli citizen had been kidnapped, adding that they had received no report on a kidnapping from settlers. Settler leaders also said they are unaware of a kidnapping attack.
IDF armor units deploy near Gaza for possible incursion (Photos: AP)"National Security Council, has been appointed to head an investigation committee which will look into the attack and submit its conclusions to the defense minister and chief of staff.
"IDF forces blew up the tunnel used by terrorists to penetrate Israeli territory, but also found that the tunnel branched out – pointing to possible plans to carry out a more complex attack."
So here we are again, back to somber music on the radio. Tunes usually reserved for Israel Memorial and Holocaust Day. Watching stressed-out TV and radio reporters doing their hastily-organized stand-ups and stake-outs from assorted locations throughout Israel. Listening as they read off flimsily jotted notes, and grasping for clarity in the censorship blackout as to what they can say and what they can't, alluding and hinting to the rest, using a shared language every Israeli knows by heart, by din of overuse, but can't precisely define in terms clear to those beyond the shared group, despite professed heartfelt support for Israel's security predicament. Listening to breaking news of how Hamas may now launch Kassams from Gaza into Israel with chemical payloads.
The personal intestinal fortitude and national gumption required of Israelis dealing with ongoing terrorism on a daily – if not hourly basis, redlines the needle.
Bloggers, here and abroad are no less susceptible to that language of the heart, of a shared fate an Israel experience that binds Jew and gentile, hassid and secular, Muslim and Christian, sometimes far too painfully across seas and continents. Sometimes, just across town.
A hurried early morning call to a flustered representative at the IDF Spokesman's Office in Tel Aviv for a breaking news podcast, I implore the young-sounding, English-speaking soldier to let me know exactly what I can and cannot say on-air to the blogosphere, to family, friends, strangers - and enemies, only a mouse click away.
I worry about saying something that might be easily read and communicated to a family member, frozen in grief, frozen, waiting for the IDF to tell them that it was their turn to give a child to a needless death, to to a hospital or psychiatric ward, into terrifying captivity for the sake of “protecting the Israeli people and nation.”
Israel has one of the world's highest levels of broadband Internet connectivity per capita, and, in comparison to the worldwide assumption of “six degrees of separation” between any two people in this spinning, clattering, beeping global village, in Israel, it's only one, maybe two degrees on a slow day.
Israel have become used to the sense that the Israel Defense Forces, if not able to stop the lethal steel Kassam rain into Israel for the last several years, were at least capable of thwarting almost any infiltration into Israel from the heavily-guarded, state-of-the-art electronically monitored security fence.
Until today.
Until 20-year-old 1st-Lieutenant Hanan Barak of Arad, 20-year-old St.-Sgt. Pavel Slotzker of Dimona, the latest names and passport pictures flashed across our shared Israel reality; of 19-year-old Gilad Shalit of the Galilee community of Mitzpe Hila near Carmiel, one of three siblings, and now “shavui,” in the ancient Hebrew term, a wounded captive fallen into enemy hands.
A term redolent of Biblical antecedents, of fervent prayers of Jewish communities across the ages, across the world for members taken into captivity, in Babylon and other locations inscribed into antiquity, and hearts.
A particularly ghoulish aspect of the current incident is a Palestinian claim that the captors are holding body parts of the slain Israelis, to increase the pressure on the Israel government to accede to their demands, among them, the release of Palestinian security prisoners held in Israel jails.
IDF Special forces searching for Shalit also discovered the entrance of the nearly kilometer-long Gaza tunnel, which extended some 300 meters into Israel territory. IDF spotters said that that they'd had intel warnings for over a month of a tunnel in the vicinity, although massive army backhoes criss-crossing the football field-sized sandy field were unable to find it in time.
Israel Channel 2 News reports shortly after 20:00 this evening that the Israel security cabinet, headed by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has decided upon a large-scale, graduated operation against Palestinian targets in southern Gaza. However, the extent and aims of the IDF operation were not revealed.
Local bloggers in Israel may know, but, so far at least, can keep this military secret – a secret. Such a people, such a country. Blogging, recording, uploading again and again for nearly 15 hours I feel I stumble through the words, as the night wears on.
Hoping overseas correspondents will somehow, this time, "get it" about how it's all so close to home: Gilo, Jerusalem Tel Aviv, Mitzpe Hila, Gaza, all in an area smaller than New Jersey. Bringing up painful memories of IDF soldier Nachson Waxman, abducted and slain by Palestinian captors near Ramallah in December, 1994.
I interviewed his mother not long after the IDF killed the man behind his abduction and death. So harrowing. So close to home. Please God, let it not be that way again.
(Cross-posted, in part, at Israel News Agency, and Little Green Footballs)
