On August 3, Asmaa al-Ghoul’s family in Rafah was targeted in an Israeli missile strike: My father’s brother, Ismail al-Ghoul, 60, was not a member of Hamas. His wife, Khadra, 62, was not a militant of Hamas. Their sons, Wael, 35, and Mohammed, 32, were not combatants for Hamas. Their daughters, Hanadi, 28, and Asmaa, 22, were not operatives for Hamas, nor were my cousin Wael’s children, Ismail, 11, Malak, 5, and baby Mustafa, only 24 days old, members of Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine or Fatah. Yet, they all died in the Israeli shelling that targeted their home at 6:20 a.m. on Sunday morning.
Their house was located in the Yibna neighborhood of the Rafah refugee camp. It was one story with a roof made of thin asbestos that did not require two F-16 missiles to destroy. Would someone please inform Israel that refugee camp houses can be destroyed, and their occupants killed, with only a small bomb, and that it needn’t spend billions to blow them into oblivion?
If it is Hamas that you hate, let me tell you that the people you are killing have nothing to do with Hamas. They are women, children, men and senior citizens whose only concern was for the war to end, so they can return to their lives and daily routines. But let me assure you that you have now created thousands — no, millions — of Hamas loyalists, for we all become Hamas if Hamas, to you, is women, children and innocent families. If Hamas, in your eyes, is ordinary civilians and families, then I am Hamas, they are Hamas and we are all Hamas. [Continue reading…]
This year marks the 69th anniversary of the first atomic bomb, dropped at Hiroshima on 6 August 1945. After my mornings views of the news from my usual sources not one word about the 69th anniversary of this monumental tragedy -hmmm surely Paul at War in Context would have found some news source to post on this and if not he would have a comment himself. Yikes -(I guess not it seems)
I spent a good many of this anniversary in the past sending opinion comments to the local English Dailies about Hiroshima and Nagasaki and attending to the many angry responses that stubbornly proclaimed the many of ‘our boys ‘lives’ it saved by the decimation of those cities and the snuffing out of the hundreds of thousands of the civilian population that inhabited them.
The current news buzz is all about Israel and the decimation of Gaza and the massacre of the innocent civilians in their open air prison. Historians admit now that the U.S. did not need to use such a weapon to end the war in 1945. As a ‘cease fire’ for now barley hangs on between Israel and Gaza most of the outside world has taken to task Netanyaho backed by his Zionist Lukud party about that there was no need for the over the top military force in the systematic destruction of Gaza. Yes, August 6 and 9 did bring the war in 1945 to an end but the like military force of the IDF will not accomplish an Palestinian submission. Palestinian resistance has matured.
Best wishes to you Paul and War in Context
Bill – I guess you missed this, which I posted yesterday: How many minutes to midnight? Hiroshima Day 2014
Yes Paul I did miss it was but much more than I expected. None the less I knew you would recognize the anniversary in some way. Thanks. My brother was in the flotilla of B29’s in Siapan or Tinian on that occasion. As a 10 year old I only remember the news coverage. It was in the early 50’s ,while in college ,during for ever reason the bomb and nuclear hype became an issue, that caused me to peruse it and all the implications. That the bombings took place and the consequences of it with us today still move me.In my mind it was an act that even exceeds the holocaust and the Stalin purges. Thanks for hearing me out.