Gaza Score Card - 3 August, 2014

Summing up at this point in time:

- Lieutenant Gordin is declared dead by the IDF.  The government faced a wave of public hysteria that would have tied their hands.  This declaration restores some of their freedom of action.

- Marc Regev, Bibi's spokesman told Blitzer today that Palestinian civilian casualties in Gaza have been "greatly exagerated" by "forces hostile to Israel."  Frank Luntz should be very proud of such disciples.

-  The IDF says it has "nearly finished the job" in destroying "teghor (terror) tunnels."  Why is it that they can find these infiltration routes into "Isghael" (Israel) now and could not before?  Simple.  The US started giving them Ground Penetrating Radar imagery a week or so ago.  Before that they were blind mice searching for holes in the ground.  they are understandably annoyed that they did not have their hands in this US cookie bowl before.

 

- In return for this gift Qbama wanted a cease fire.  What he got was an arrogant response that demanded a public endorsement of all Israeli action.  Obama read that to the world in his press conference.  Given the language of his recitation there seems little doubt that the text was dictated by Israel. 

- Did he receive a cease fire in return?  No, there was an incident, ambiguous in timing, that served as a pretext for a flamingly hubristic tirade on Israeli national TV in which Bibi declared his defiance and contempt for all those who frustrate his nationalist ambitions. 

-  The US administration's response to this is yet more submission to Tel Aviv. 

- Nevertheless, it can be seen at this point that while Isrel has triumphed politically and militarily at the tactical level, it is defeated at the strategic level.  Hamas yet lives and continues to resist the fire storm of air strikes, artillery bombardment and ground action.  That very steadfastness places Israel in the position of eventually having to make a choice with regard to the Palestinians between actual, serious, bargaining or extermination.  The Israili government and populous have chosen to believe that sufficient brutal force, if widely applied, would separate the resistance from the people .  That has failed no matter how much the Israilis would like to believe otherwise.  At the same time, political support ofr Israel is disintegrating across the world.  This is defeat.  pl

Comments

[samuelburke]

Col Lang, do you mean that the amazing "Isghaelis" could not have developed this ground penetrating radar on their own?

[turcopolier]

samuelburke

alas! even they screw up at times. pl

[zanzibar]

Pat

Brilliant! You can't get this cogent analysis on any MSM outlet.

Every chance I get to introduce people to SST, I do. I understand the mush brain those addicted to Fox or CNN become but I am surprised at the level of propaganda in the UK and the continent. There used to at least be a semblance of reality in their reporting.

Do you see political support for Israel disintegrating in the west? What about the patron who behaves like a poodle?

[Andrew]

"This is defeat." pl.

Sir, as much as I dislike contradicting you. When an entity kills children at this rate using F 16's, and still get the full support from the leaders of the western world, the pundits, global media, jewish communities, and the public at large-

"At least 10 people have been killed in a strike near a UN-run school housing Palestinians displaced by the Gaza conflict, medics say."
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28628682

-It is the triumph of evil.

[Jonathan House]

Another sort of score card: "Initial statistics of attacks on basic service facilities..."

.
http://www.pchrgaza.org/portal/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=10556:initial-statistics-of-attacks-on-basic-service-facilities-a-forcible-displacement-in-the-gaza-strip&catid=145:in-focus

[turcopolier]

rick

If they had a powerful military GPR capability mounted on aircraft they would have known the exact location of the infiltration tunnels before this war. they did not which indicates to me that their improved performance in this is the product of a grant of American imagery to them. There are several companies in Israel that make or sell such equipment at the size and wattage needed to do excavation work for construction. Evidently they never bothered to develop the capability on a military scale. pl

[turcopolier]

Andrew. Nah! Don't go squishy on me. Germany killed vast numbers of innocents but was ultimately defeated. pl

[jonst]

" The Col wrote: "That very steadfastness places Israel in the position of eventually having to make a choice with regard to the Palestinians between actual, serious, bargaining or extermination."

I disagree. I think THEY think, there is a third choice. Squeeze, and squeeze, and squeeze, (and there is a world of variables within that word 'squeeze) them out of the West Bank. Gaza? Gaza is Gaza, they will cross that bridge after the WB is digested. I think this is a 50-75 year plan. They think that the only way to do this, policy wise, given all the brutally it will take to accomplish it, is to keep the population in Israel enraged and fearful. I think they are nuts if they think this can work. However, I probably would have told them in 1900 that their Zionist Dream for a 'Greater Israel' was nuts. I know this...all this is not about tunnels. What is the worse that could have happened? One, maybe two, sucessful attacks before they would go in and take the entire place apart. Attacks that might have a engendered a fairly high level of sympathy for Israel? No, this is not about stopping attackers coming from the tunnels. This is about something far larger and far more insidious.

My take, anyway.

[oofda]

And ad to this that Der Spiegel is reporting now that Israel (and another nation's intel service) eavesdropped on Kerry's discussions with the Palestinians.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/03/israel-spied-kerry-peace-effort-report

http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/israel-hoerte-us-aussenminister-kerry-ab-a-984176.html

[b]

One wonders what Israel thinks will happen the next time it "mows the lawn".

Hamas then will then have guided missiles.

Everyone can now buy a Rasperry PI system for $25 and add a GPS and inertial navigation module off the shelf. Four actuators from model planes to move the fins, some programming and a bit of testing and today's unguided Qassam rockets will become fine GPS guided missiles.

The Iron Dome will be pretty useless against them. How does Israel plan to cope with that?
The current "strategy" will soon meet its technological end.

[b]

How could Egypt dismantle a hundred plus of Hamas tunnels without stepping on the ground of Gaza?
Why couldn't/can Israel do the like?

It can't be just the radar.

[John Minnerath]

Israel's actions have gone beyond the pale.
It's possible even the wienies who feed on the sop put out by Obama and crowd may begin to change their feelings about them.

[hans]

at a cost of $2 Trillion +/- every Palestinian could be given a $1 Million check and a plane ticket to anywhere. But where would that anywhere be?

[turcopolier]

b

Egypt worked for many years at locating supply tunnels into Gaza. in doing this they approached the problem with typical Egyptian methods. i.e., they employed very large numbers of people searching and digging constantly. Don't start thinking that the Israelis are somehow ten feet tall. they are amazingly short sighted and limited by their contempt for their enemies. pl

[Haralambos]

Off-topic, but perhaps of interest: http://www.naplesnews.com/lifestyle/neapolitan/surviving-odds-b-17-flying-fortress-pilot-recounts. My father father was a tail gunner on B-17s and a waist gunner on B-24s. He preferred the 17s I believe, since they had better armament. He never made it to 30 missions, since he spent a long time being rehabilitated in Australia after he was thrown from his Jeep and had both legs broken during a Japanese raid. Add to that six bouts of malaria. He never much liked to talk about his experience, the exception being the time he was separated from his unit on way to a new deployment. A cook unit picked him up and took very care of him. That experience hardened his resolve against any kind of racism.

[Fred]

Andrew,

A number people have objected to the use of the term “genocide” and chose instead the more ambiguous “ethnic cleansing”. I have always objected to the later because it sounds like a cheap brand of soap. Of course in Gaza they ain’t using Ivory, why that’s on 99 and 44/100% pure. This is the latest Zionist “Bibi” brand - 100% pure (Jewish). Palestinians (and Muslims and Christians in general) need not come to Israel. You sure won’t have any rights and may wind up dead (deservedly of course) if you do. Don’t forget, it’s approved by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, dozens of Hollywood artists and notables; and of course America’s own Nobel Laureate Barrack Obama and his wife Michelle. So Bibi, you keep on killing. Whoever heard of “birthright Palestine” anyway?

[Fred]

hans,

the land of their birthright - where their ancestors lived for centuries - Palestine.

[Andrew]

@b...
Respectfully, I think "mowing the lawn" is a demographic operation (despite any of the usual reasons), its aim being the periodic killing of children and women in order to affect the numbers of Palestinians. As well I think there must be an experiment in programming "learned helplessness" in the DNA of the Palestinians - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_helplessness

As if the Start-Up nation doesn't have any ground penetrating radar, or the IDF can't get their Druze to...

[Norbert M Salamon]

Without US cover this can not go on for 75 years, for it is unconceivable that the current hegemon nominee will be a top dog that far off.
Conversely, it is possible that another current nuclear powers will take preliminary defensive steps against Israel's Nuclear, Chemical and biological weapons [which endanger the world] and deliver some mushroom clouds.

[Augustin L]

@ b, seems the israeli suit monkeys have no idea what is about to hit them... Open source satellites will soon be up and running using low cost ground stations. I'm sure hackers of the world will be more than happy to help the palestinian resistance. After hubris comes nemesis.

[JohnH]

Obama's inability to get a quid pro quo is mind boggling. The man gives them the radar and gets nothing in return. The man is a fiasco as a politician.

But we already knew that when he gave the Republicans everything they wanted in the budget "negotiations" of December 2010 and then declared he was ready to negotiate the rest.

What animates such a man? How do you develop a positive legacy when you can't even negotiate from a position of strength?

[Peter Brownlee]

"Despise not your enemies" is pretty basic but perhaps some antique fantasies are unravelling at the moment.

http://projects.vassar.edu/punch/hires1.html

Though the Vassar analysis is pretty sloppy -- the "Zulu warrior, equipped with his weapons, writing `Despise not your enemy' on a blackboard" is not doing it "for the edification of the British gentlemen (sic) who watches from his stool" but clearly for John Bull. (Don't they even look at the stuff they post?)

For a better pic see

http://www.lookandlearn.com/history-images/XM10071781/Cartoon-Zulu-War-Punch

Zulu warrior is not teach o

[Jose]

BSHO, declared victory in those negotiations...

I voted for Romney, my conscious is clear.

[FB Ali]

All,

The Daily Beast has a report on what appears to be a mass execution of Palestinians in Gaza:

http://tinyurl.com/pj73h7s

[Cee]

Col,

Perhaps we didn't give it to them because we know they would STILL sell it to China,

http://defensetech.org/2013/12/24/report-israel-passes-u-s-military-technology-to-china/

Or Russia.

Off topic a bit...http://www.richardsilverstein.com/2014/08/03/both-israel-and-russia-shared-kerrys-intercepted-phone-calls/

Silverstein has asked to communicate with someone who has knowledge of encryption. Anyone?