Image Credit: Mohammed Omer, Rafah Today 2007-12-17.
Assault Upon Grief: Funeral Attacked and Rafah Again Besieged
BBSNews 2007-12-18 -- By Mohammed Omer. Four mourners were killed, and another forty were injured, due to an explosion which targeted mourners amid throngs of people at the funeral of a Fatah member killed by Israeli Forces in Gaza on Thursday. This was just some hours before Israeli's large-scale attack on southern Gaza Strip's Rafah refugee camp.
|
|
|
Palestinians inspect destroyed vehicle after an Israeli air strike hit a taxi targeting passengers in Gaza City.
Image Credit: Mohammed Omer, Rafah Today 2007-12-17. |
This has been bloody week in Gaza.
Dozens of Fatah supporters had come to pay their respects to Fatah member Nasser Khalil Al Masaara, killed on Thursday when an Israeli warplane fired a missile at the taxi in which he was traveling in the Al Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of northern Gaza City, also killing others traveling with him. One of the mourners attending the funeral reported that someone had fired a grenade into the crowd. Another recounted: "I was inside the loudspeaker car, a blue Volkswagen, with my right hand outside the window when suddenly an explosion rocked the car. I could see my fingers and flesh strewn all over the street."
Hamas' spokesman has denounced the incident and its Ministry of Interior is investigating it. Fatah, on the other hand, has accused Hamas of carrying out the bombing, while still others believe that the aim was to incite rioting in Palestinian streets and to consequently affect the plans for Hamas' 20th anniversary celebrations.
The spokesman of Palestinian Police in Gaza, Islam Sahwan, stated: "The only initial information that we have is that a grenade exploded in one of the mourner's hands."
Rafah Again:
On Tuesday, an estimated 35 Israeli tanks and numerous bulldozers, with helicopters and F16s supporting from above, attacked Rafah refugee camp in what is said to be the largest operation in Gaza since June, killing 7 and injuring tens of civilians. Many others were arrested, and vast tracts of olive and orange trees were razed. The Israeli forces attacked and destroyed key infrastructure, additionally cutting off electricity. Access was cut off to the main streets, as well as to the road linking the south and north. The bodies of many of the injured were ripped apart, unrecognizable pieces of flesh strewn all over. Israel is using new kinds of rockets which burn the flesh and mince human targets into unidentifiable chunks.
Hamas' Anniversary and the Right to Return:
|
|
Various estimates put the crowd celebrating Hamas's 20th anniversary at over 200,000. A poll taken during the week of the anniversary showed Hamas has held its popularity in both Gaza and the West Bank.
Image Credit: Mohammed Omer, Rafah Today 2007-12-17. |
Israel's decision to reduce fuel supplies to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip is driving Palestinians to use a more affordable means of transport - donkeys and horses. And this was the way tens of thousands of people have managed to make it to the 20th anniversary of Hamas.
At Gaza's bustling donkey market east of Gaza City, donkeys and mules were fetching record-high prices because ordinary Palestinians can no longer afford, let alone find, working cars and the fuel to power them. After Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip in June, Israel tightened its military and economic cordon around the coastal territory, largely limiting imports to humanitarian supplies.
At the anniversary Ismail Haniyeh, Palestinian prime Minster of the dismissed Hamas government, said: "The message from you today is that Hamas and these masses will not yield before the sanctions." Haniyeh spoke at the rally in Gaza City to a cheering audience who waved the green Islamic flags of Hamas. The crowd shouted in response: "We came to you, Haniyeh."
Haniyeh lambasted the renewal of peace talks between Israel and Abbas' administration at the Annapolis conference last month, warning they will not bring about a cessation of Israeli settlement construction on disputed land or yield any other Israeli concessions.
"As for the fruits of the other track, the track of negotiations, normalization and bargaining, all can see that the fruits are the consolidating of settlements, the continued injustice and oppression of the Palestinian people," Haniyeh said. "They are bitter fruits."
The Hamas leader warned Abbas against conceding on the Palestinian stance that refugees, and their descendants, who were forcibly made to flee during past wars and invasions by Israel be allowed to return to their homes. Their fate is a key sticking point in the talks that are meant to iron out a final peace agreement.
"There is no such thing as a just solution to the right of return," Haniyeh said to the crowds. "It is the right of every refugee ... to return to the land."
As Israel continues to ravage the Gaza Strip, destroying infrastructure, suffocating the economy, killing our citizens, and to partition the West Bank into numerous enclosed and cut-off enclaves, it is questionable what kind of land our refugees will return to.
Comments (0)