Gaza Updates: Deaths and Injuries | Diplomacy | Media

Gaza Update: Deaths and Injuries

Updated 7:00 pm

Martyrs – 69 (20 children, 8 women, and 9 elderly persons)
Injured – 660 (224 children, 113 women and 50 elderly persons)

November 18, 2012 |

Spot the Difference: Gaza Council of Ministers

Look at the video filmed yesterday outside the Council of Ministers.

Now look at the photograph taken from a few metres further back today. Can you spot the differences? (Clue: the stairs Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh descended in the video are the same as the ones in the photo.)

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Gaza Council of Ministers today

November 17, 2012 |

Gaza Update: Deaths and Injuries

Dr. Ashraf Al-Qedra, from Al-Shifa Hospital advised the following in a Press release:

“The latest death toll is 39 Deaths (5 are children under the age of 2 years) and 340 injuries, 80% of them are civilians.

Palestinian hospitals are now suffering from a lack of medicine and medical supplies.

Gazans are asked to donate blood, and to volunteer to help with nursing.

Israel is using chemical and perhaps biological weapons in Gaza, we saw shrapnel with toxic properties in the bodies of injured and dead children and there are strange smells in the air.”

November 17, 2012 |

Tunisian Foreign Minister arrives in Gaza, slams Israel

Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafik Abdesslem spoke at a Press Conference a Al Shifa Hospital today after his arrival in Gaza amidst ferocious aerial attacks, and slammed Israel’s breaches of international norms.

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Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafik Abdesslem in Gaza

“We who have come from Tunisia carry a strong and clear message from our Prime Minister and members of the government to express our strong solidarity with Gaza against Israeli aggression,” he said.

“What is happening to the citizens of Gaza is not justified, and is contrary to all international law and regulations. We have just seen the injured, the wounded and the martyrs and all of these manifestations are unacceptable.

This unjustified targeting of civilians and the targeting of schools and civic institutions, public and private property is unacceptable and illegal. We come charged with a message to express our solidarity and support of our brothers, the people of Gaza.”

He went on to say that Israel must recognise international norms and laws, and it should be aware that there are different variables now occurring in the Arab world.

He called on the Council of Arab States and the international community to take a united stance to address the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip, stressing the need to take positions similar to that of the Egyptian President, in order to strengthen and enhance it.

November 17, 2012 |

Israeli tactic to foment fear, even in the media

Nothing is off-limits to the Zionist war machine – babies, families, homes of anyone from Cabinet Ministers to farmers – not even journalists.

Roaming the skies like a pack of rabid dogs, US-funded drones, F-16s and Apaches strike fear into the hearts of Gazans, whether or not they are firing rockets – their mere presence signifies that possibility.

Percussion bombs, whose sole purpose is to terrify, are a constant companion.

Israel’s psy-war now extends to telephoning and texting individuals with death threats, particularly journalists.

Palestinian journalist Sameh Habeeb on Thursday received a phone call from an Israeli soldier threatening to bomb his family home, and kill him and his family.

I also received such a call. At around 09:15 am on Thursday while drones swarmed the skies and rockets pounded the city around me, I answered the phone to a person with an American accent, who asked if it was Julie. When I answered “yes” they proceeded to call me an “Islamic-Jihad-supporting piece of shit” and told me that an Israeli drone was on its way to kill me. They asked repeatedly if I could hear it (given the situation, there was little else to hear, apart from their psychotic rantings…), and continued their vitriolic abuse and threats. I hung up, and the phone immediately rang again, this time with no number displayed. Two more calls followed that day.

Such tactics show that despite their nuclear arsenal and US-funded military might, Israel’s hardware is no match for the power of the word, or the power of truth.

That it must stoop to intimidation of the media, especially with death threats under such conditions as currently prevail in Gaza, indicates both the paucity of its justifications for its criminal offensive, and also the depths of moral depravity to which it has sunk – and correspondingly, that even Israel itself realises that despite its big guns, it cannot win the war of hearts and minds.

Like its merciless attacks on and terrorising of the citizenry of Gaza, these attacks on the media will not succeed – they only make us stronger, and even more determined to ensure that truth and justice prevail.

And like every Palestinian with a true heart and an independent mind, I will not be deterred by Zionist threats, and will continue to resist.

Venceremos.

November 17, 2012 |

ENDS

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