Can Truce be a Rinse?
Hamas Rips Egypt’s Fence,
Much Israeli trouble ever Since,
Cause Hamas at fence shows Offence,
In great chaotic midst of so very little Sense,
But time shall arrive when truce doth come Hence!
Olmert political immorality stymies real Israeli Defense,
And public grows weary for military operation to Commence!
June 13, 2008
http://www.tribulationperiod.com/
HAMAS CHILDISH JIHAD MALE VANITY – THE ONE GETTING IN
THE LAST LICK WINS THE FIGHT!
I Corinthians 13:11 – When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
Ever since Hamas tore through the western border security with Egypt, which allowed thousands of Gaza residents to pour into Egypt, Israel has made daily pronouncements that it is about to unleash a major IDF Operation into Gaza, but no operation has occurred.
It appears Israel is determined to get some kind of a truce with Hamas, and Hamas is determined to get in “the last lick” before it happens.
However, they have been pushing the offensive to extremes in the last couple of days, and the Knesset patience is wearing razor thin. If Hamas continues this pattern they will leave Israel no choice other than to strike a prolonged blow into the Gaza Strip.
Begin DEBKAfile Article
Hamas pounds Israel with missiles, rockets, mortars, suicide bombers all day Thursday
June 12, 2008, 7:30 PM (GMT+02:00)
Under cover of a barrage of more than 50 missiles, mortars and rocket, Hamas made three attempts to breach the Gaza border fence for major suicide bombings, the last one late Thursday, June 12. They sent a bulldozer to ram Netiv Ha’asara, a bomb car to crash the border fence and gunmen on foot to blow up the Erez crossing. Israel ground and air units foiled them all.
Israeli locations from Ashkelon in the north down to Shear Hanegev, Kibbutz Nir Oz and Sderot were struck by 20 missiles, one Grad rocket and more than 35 mortar shells. A woman was injured at Kibbutz Yad Mordecai.
Sirens warned people under attack
to stay in indoors, as fires blazed and explosions erupted – one close to the Barzilai regional hospital in Ashkelon.
The first Hamas attempt to blow up Israeli military guard posts at the Erez crossing was mounted early Thursday as the Israeli defense ministry’s political coordinator Amos Gilead traveled to Cairo to hand over Israel’s acceptance of the Egyptian formula for a truce in Gaza.
They were intercepted and at least one was killed by Israeli ground and air fire.
Wednesday, Israel’s security cabinet approved the decision by prime minister Ehud Olmert and defense minister Ehud Barak to accept a ceasefire with Hamas (called “a lull”), instead of launching the large-scale military operation needed to finally relieve southwestern Israel of daily Palestinian missile, rocket and mortar attacks. Hamas greeted that decision with the heaviest Palestinian barrage in months.
Its spokesman replied to an Israeli demand with derision: The captive soldier Gilead Shalit will be released as part of truce accord only in Israel’s dreams. Hamas PM Ismail Haniya said: “Ariel Sharon is neither alive nor dead a fate all Israel’s leaders will share.”
The population is preparing further protest action, accusing the Olmert government of cowardice, sacrificing their security for self-serving political ends and risking the loss of the Negev, the southern half of Israel.
Begin Jerusalem Post Article
Israel still seeks truce after 50 projectiles pound Negev
Jun. 12, 2008
YAAKOV KATZ and HERB KEINON, THE JERUSALEM POST
As more than 50 mortar shells, Kassam and Katyusha rockets were fired into Israel from Gaza on Thursday, the Defense Ministry was still working to “exhaust” the dialogue with Egypt on a cease-fire with Hamas, sources in the Prime Minister’s Office said.
Amos Gilad, head of the Defense Ministry’s Diplomatic-Security Bureau, returned Thursday night from a meeting in Cairo with Egyptian Intelligence chief Omar Suleiman to try to finalize a deal.
Defense officials said Gilad asked the Egyptians for clarifications on the release of kidnapped soldier Gilad Schalit in conjunction with a truce deal, as well as on Cairo’s promise to step up efforts to curb the smuggling of weapons into Gaza under
the Philadelphi Corridor.
“The Egyptians are supposed to get back to us with answers in the coming days,” a senior defense official said. “It is likely that the cease-fire will go into effect by the middle of next week.”
The barrage of rockets on the western Negev on Thursday was interpreted by the defense establishment as an attempt by Hamas to flex its muscles before implementing a cease-fire. There are fears that Hamas will try to carry out a massive terrorist attack in the coming days.
“They want to have the last word before the cease-fire,” the senior defense official said. “But if they continue with their attacks we will not sit by idly and will respond harshly as well.”
The rockets began to fly in the afternoon, shortly after a powerful explosion flattened the home of a Hamas operative in the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya.
Seven people, including an infant girl, were killed by the blast, which the IDF said was not caused by an Israeli attack but was rather a “work accident,” most likely caused by terrorists’ faulty handling of explosives.
Earlier in the day, three Palestinian gunmen were killed by IDF soldiers after they were spotted placing a bomb along the Gaza border.
Under the cover of the ensuing mortar shells, IDF troops spotted a bulldozer approaching the security fence in northern Gaza near Kibbutz Netiv Ha’asara.
Soldiers fired at the vehicle, whose occupants escaped. IDF sources said the bulldozer was part of an elaborate Hamas plan to infiltrate Israel.
An Israeli woman was moderately wounded by shrapnel in Kibbutz Yad Mordechai shortly after noon, and evacuated to Barzilai Hospital in Ashkelon.
A number of fires broke out following the attack.
Several people were treated for shock after a Grad-type Katyusha rocket was fired at Ashkelon. A state of emergency was declared in the Hof Ashkelon Regional Council and residents were instructed to enter fortified rooms.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s spokesman, Mark Regev, said Thursday’s attacks “show the current situation is both unstable and not sustainable, and that there has to be a solution.”
Regev said that the fact Hamas fired dozens of mortars the day after Israel declared it wanted to give the Egyptian cease-fire track an additional chance “shows who we are up against. This shows who Hamas is. They are committed to violence, not dialogue.”
Still, he said, Israel would give the Egyptian-mediated talks a chance, while at the same time continuing to plan for military action “in the unfortunate event that they won’t be successful.
The situation in the South is expected to be one of the key items on the agenda of talks US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will hold in Jerusalem on Sunday and Monday.
Diplomatic officials say the US has been urging Jerusalem to let the Egyptians try to put together a cease-fire, concerned that an IDF invasion of the Gaza Strip could end the current diplomatic process with the Palestinians and badly damage Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s stature.
Rice, who is scheduled to arrive Saturday night and leave on Monday, is expected to hold two different sets of trilateral talks here to discuss the ongoing Israeli-PA negotiations.
One of those trilateral meetings will be with Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, the head of Israel’s negotiating team, and her PA counterpart, Ahmed Qurei, to discuss the status of those talks, and the second trilateral meeting will be with Defense Minister Ehud Barak and PA Prime Minister Salaam Fayad to discuss implementation of road-map obligations.
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