“The Peaceful Demonstration”
The world is in an uproar over the sixty Palestinians from Gaza who died on the border of Israel. Most of them, however, were Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists. The world protests the excessive use of force by Israel. “Hamas placed many women at the front in an effort to make it difficult for us to deal with terror targets. That’s the most significant level of violence we have seen since the start of the protests.” Said an Israeli army spokesman. Gaza’s terrorist rulers make no secret of their agenda. They are out to destroy Israel. Suicide bombers, rockets, and tunnels have failed. So now its mass marches on the border with their weapons of human shields.
One of their leaders said it very clearly: “We shall come and take down that (border) fence. With blood, with martyrs, with women, and with children. The Palestinian people shall liberate its land.”
”Hamas’ control of the events is evident in its blatant incitement to violence, its calls on Gazans to arrive at the border, it has control over events taking place near the security fence. These acts prove that Hamas has abandoned all of its restraints and it is openly acting to intensify riots and violence on the border,” the Israeli army Spokesperson’s Unit said in a statement.
”The IDF is prepared for a variety of scenarios and is determined to defend Israel’s sovereignty and the Israeli public. We will not allow security infrastructure to be compromised and we will neutralize anyone seeking to undermine Israel’s security,” the statement said.
Who is Hamas
Hamas is a violent Islamist anti-Semitic terror group that seeks to destroy Israel. 7 countries have classified Hamas as a terrorist organization. Israel and “The Quartet on the Middle East” (US, Russia, UN, EU) imposed economic sanctions on Hamas and Gaza, including the cessation of foreign aid to the Palestinian government, and restrictions on movement, imposed by Israel. In order to lift these economic sanctions and movement restrictions, Hamas must: renounce violence against Israel, recognize Israel, and honor all previous agreements between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Following the Battle of Gaza in June 2007 in which Hamas violently took control of Gaza from Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah (and even killed some of them, driving the rest out of Gaza), two years after Israel withdrew its military and civilian presence from the Strip, both Israel and Egypt heavily tightened their respective border crossings, creating a “blockade”, including a naval blockade. So far Hamas has not abided by the conditions, and the blockade is still in place. Hamas declared continually that the land of Palestine (not recognizing Israel’s right to the land) is their land, and they will not stop fighting until they take the land back from “the occupiers” (the Jews).
Humanitarian Crisis
Although Israel has tolerated many months of rocket attacks from Gaza on its cities, the international outcry from the United Nations as well as worldwide media has focused almost entirely on the Palestinian plight in Gaza, which they assume to be a result of Israel’s actions. The international media portrays the residents of the Gaza strip as poverty-stricken, malnourished and scared. They claim that there is a humanitarian crisis going on in Gaza. All of these things are true, but they are the result of the actions of the Hamas leadership.
Israel unilaterally withdrew from the Gaza Strip to the pre-1967 lines in 2005. It uprooted thousands of Israeli settlers from their homes. It dismantled all military infrastructure in the Strip. Israel has no physical presence there. It makes no territorial claims there.
Despite the terror onslaught, Israel continues to supply electricity and water to the Palestinian people, and these plants are sometimes hit by the rockets fired by Hamas from within the Gaza Strip, cutting power to thousands. Since the beginning of 2013, over 20,000 truckloads of supplies from Israel have crossed into Gaza for consumption and use by the citizens. These supplies include meat, vegetables, canned foods, milk products, medical supplies, fuel, water, medical equipment, livestock and pet food, school supplies, and cosmetic products. The Palestinian Authority accused Hamas of stealing thousands of liters of fuel from local Gazan companies and then telling the media that there is a fuel shortage. Fatah members also claim that Hamas is lying about the fuel shortage “crisis” for propagandistic reasons.
Israel says the blockade is vital to prevent Hamas from importing weaponry and other means of materials for attacking Israel. Even so, Hamas was able to smuggle weapons into Gaza through tunnels.
Weapons and Rockets and Blockade
Having attempted to terrorize Israel into capitulation with its strategic onslaught of suicide bombers in the Second Intifada, Hamas has, since grabbing hold of Gaza, continued its efforts to terrorize Israel by firing thousands upon thousands of rockets indiscriminately across the border. Hamas has cynically and relentlessly exploited Gazans — a large number of whom have supported it in elections — by storing its rockets near or even inside mosques and schools, firing rockets from residential areas, and digging tunnels from beneath homes and civilian institutions. It has subverted all materials that can be utilized for the manufacture of weaponry, necessitating a stringent Israeli security blockade whose main victims are ordinary Gazans.
Human Shields
With the Iron Dome Israel invented, and high-tech capability to detect and destroy tunnels Hamas dug in order to infiltrate Israel to kill and kidnap soldiers, Hamas has no other means to attack but to use their people as human shields, willing to “pay any price” necessary to carry out their plans of destruction.
Hamas has gone to great lengths to bring more people to the “fence protests.” Israeli Defense officials said Hamas was offering Palestinian families in the Gaza Strip $100 if all family members took part in the protests. The terror group also offered Gazans transportation to the fence area and to the different points of friction.
Organizing and encouraging mass demonstrations at the border in the so-called “March of Return” to face off against Israeli troops, while branding the campaign non-violent, is merely the latest iteration of Hamas’s cynical use of Gazans as the human shields for its aggression.
Demographic Warfare
Palestinians are the only refugees who kept their status as such for generations. Their demand of a “right of return” to Israel for tens of thousands of Palestinian refugees and their millions of descendants is nothing less than a call for the destruction of Israel by demographic means. No Israeli government could accept this demand since it would spell the end of Israel as a Jewish-majority state.
On April 6, the Hamas political leader, Yahya Sinwar, stated: ‘We will take down the border [with Israel] and we will tear their hearts from their bodies.’ On Facebook, Hamas posted maps for their operatives showing the quickest routes from the border with Israel to Israelis’ homes, schools, and day-care centers near the border. Israel Defense Forces had precise intelligence that the violent riots were masking a plan of mass infiltration into Israel in order to carry out a massacre against Israeli civilians. Hamas called it a ‘peaceful protest,’ and much of the world simply fell for it.
Hamas’s Gaza chief Yahya Sinwar setting out the ultimate goal to Gazans at the border on Friday, “The March of Return will continue… until we remove this transient border.” The protests “mark the beginning of a new phase in the Palestinian national struggle on the road to liberation and ‘return’… Our people can’t give up one inch of the land of Palestine.”
The US Embassy
Israel’s Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman posted on Twitter on Monday, June 14, “Few are the moments in a nation’s life like the one when the world’s greatest power recognizes our sovereignty on our capital, Jerusalem.
”We are ready to counter Hamas’ threats to disrupt our celebrations. I advise the residents of Gaza: Do not be fooled by [Hamas military leader Yahya] Sinwar, who sends your children to sacrifice their lives for nothing. We will defend the [Israeli] people with all the means at our disposal. We will not allow anyone to breach the border.”
Since the day before, the IDF has been dropping warning leaflets into Gaza, urging residents to stay away from the security fence and stressing that any attempt to breach the border will be met with force.
“The Israel Defense Forces had precise intelligence that the violent riots were masking a plan of mass infiltration into Israel in order to carry out a massacre against Israeli civilians. Hamas called it a ‘peaceful protest,’ and much of the world simply fell for it,” Several dozens to several hundred, depending on the week, tried to damage and break through the security fence. A few succeeded, but were quickly turned back by Israeli troops. Some weeks have also seen direct armed clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinians armed with guns or explosives.
In response, the Israeli military used tear gas, rubber bullets and live rounds, which the army says were fired in accordance with its rules of engagement and always with the approval of a commander. In the past eight weeks, thousands of Palestinians have been wounded by live ammunition and over 100 have been killed, according to the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry.
International Outrage
The deaths of over 60 Palestinians during last week’s violent protests were met with international outrage and calls for an independent investigation of events. The UN’s Human Rights Council on Friday ordered a probe, and a resolution prepared by Kuwait for the UN Security Council urges the deployment of an international force to protect Gazans. Hamas has subsequently admitted that 50 of the dead were members of the terror group. Three others were Islamic Jihad members.
Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani, former Grand Mufti of Lebanon, urged Muslims from the pulpit on May 16 to wage a jihad, to liberate Palestine from the foreign Israeli occupation. He decreed: “This is in accordance with the Islamic legal decree that Palestine and Jerusalem constitute Arab land throughout history, in the present, and in the future. The Al Aksa Mosque is the third holiest place, after Mecca and Medina. I reiterate therefore this religious legal law that Palestine is historical Islamic Arab land. It was occupied by the Zionist Jews of the Balfour Declaration, who immigrated to Israel from all countries of the world on May 14, 1948. The liberation of Palestine is an Islamic duty of the Palestinian people and the countries of the Arabs and the Muslims. They are forbidden to surrender, to reconcile, to make peace treaties, and to concede to a piece of Arab Palestinian land to the foreign Jewish occupation.
On May 13, Mahmoud Al-Zahar, a co-founder of Hamas, said in an interview with Al Jazeera: ‘When we talk about ‘peaceful resistance,’ we are deceiving the public”.
“A senior Hamas leader, Salah Bardawil, said in a May 16 interview with a Palestinian TV station: ‘In the last round of confrontations, if 62 people were martyred, 50 of them were Hamas,’” the general wrote.
There are daily attempts by Gaza to infiltrate to Israel, and shoot at Israeli border soldiers. IDF fighter jets and tanks attacked Hamas targets in a training camp in Jabalia, in the northern Gaza Strip, following earlier attempts to plant an explosive device on the fence and gunfire at soldiers. The IDF also killed the three terrorists who tried to plant the explosive in the Rafah area. Hamas placed many women at the front in an effort to make it difficult for us to deal with terror targets. That’s the most significant level of violence we have seen since the start of the protests.”
And that is what is happening on the ground in Gaza. …
As Bible believers, followers of Messiah Yeshua/Jesus, we understand that the battle is not against flesh and blood but against powers of darkness (Eph 6:12). We are called to pray and intercede according to God’s will and share the truth. Remembering that Israel can be looked at as the prophetic clock showing us the times we are living at according to the Bible.
