The Israelis are starving the Palestinians in Gaza and destroying almost everything of economic value. They can't carve tiny Gaza up into Bantustan-like disconnected entities, so they're just going to waste the place. You won't learn this on CBSFOXNBCABC.
Gaza is dying. The Israeli siege of the Palestinian enclave is so tight that its people are on the edge of starvation.
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A whole society is being destroyed. There are 1.5 million Palestinians imprisoned in the most heavily populated area in the world. Israel has stopped all trade. It has even forbidden fishermen to go far from the shore so they wade into the surf to try vainly to catch fish with hand-thrown nets.
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This bloody conflict in Gaza has so far received only a fraction of the attention given by the international media to the war in Lebanon.
It was on 25 June that the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was taken captive and two other soldiers were killed by Palestinian militants who used a tunnel to get out of the Gaza Strip. In the aftermath of this, writes Gideon Levy in the daily Haaretz, the Israeli army "has been rampaging through Gaza - there's no other word to describe it - killing and demolishing, bombing and shelling, indiscriminately". Gaza has essentially been reoccupied since Israeli troops and tanks come and go at will. In the northern district of Shajhayeh they took over several houses last week and stayed five days. By the time they withdrew, 22 Palestinians had been killed, three houses were destroyed and groves of olive, citrus and almond trees had been bulldozed.
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Sometimes the Israeli army gives a warning before a house is destroyed. The sound that Palestinians most dread is an unknown voice on their cell phone saying they have half an hour to leave their home before it is hit by bombs or missiles. There is no appeal.
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The few ways that Gazans had of making money have disappeared. Dr Abu-Ramadan says the Israelis "have destroyed 70 per cent of our orange groves in order to create security zones." Carnations and strawberries, two of Gaza's main exports, were thrown away or left to rot. An Israeli air strike destroyed the electric power station so 55 per cent of power was lost. Electricity supply is now becoming almost as intermittent as in Baghdad.
The Israeli assault over the past two months struck a society already hit by the withdrawal of EU subsidies after the election of Hamas as the Palestinian government in March. Israel is withholding taxes owed on goods entering Gaza. Under US pressure, Arab banks abroad will not transfer funds to the government.
Two thirds of people are unemployed and the remaining third who mostly work for the state are not being paid. Gaza is now by far the poorest region on the Mediterranean. Per capita annual income is $700, compared with $20,000 in Israel. Conditions are much worse than in Lebanon where Hizbollah liberally compensates war victims for loss of their houses.
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The Israeli siege and the European boycott are a collective punishment of everybody in Gaza. The gunmen are unlikely to be deterred. In a bed in Shifa Hospital was a sturdy young man called Ala Hejairi with wounds to his neck, legs, chest and stomach. "I was laying an anti-tank mine last week in Shajhayeh when I was hit by fire from an Israeli drone," he said. "I will return to the resistance when I am better. Why should I worry? If I die I will die a martyr and go to paradise."
http://news.independent.co.uk/...
No wonder the kid wants to go back out. Wouldn't you?
What will it take to get the Israelis to at least provide the basic necessities? It's not like it'll cost them a dime, they'll surely bill us, just as we paid to to move the Gaza "settlers" (gotta love that word-- as if there was no one there until Israel moved those American and Russian malcontents in and took whatever they wanted).
Israel is doing the same thing in Gaza it did in Lebanon-- exacting revenge against all for the actions of a few, ensuring they will be hated for generations. And Israel is busy expanding, even today, its settlements in the West Bank, demonstrating bad faith and continued disregard of UN resolutions and international law, continuing her brutal and dehumanizing military occupation. Finally, Israel herself is becoming dehumanized, and is turning into the Golem of legend.