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Israeli Attack on Gaza: Bombs Fall as Children Go to School
Firedoglake —
... admits that they have been planning and preparing for months. In fact, Ha'aretz is now reporting on the months of "deception", the "long-term preparation, careful gathering of information, secret discussions, operational deception and the misleading of the public " used to plan this attack. After ...
SURPRISE COUNTER-STRIKE ON HAMAS: OVER 50 KEY HAMAS TARGETS HIT MULTIPLE TIMES IN UNDER 4 MINUTES
THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS —
THAT'S WHAT I JUST HEARD ON FOX. HERE'S HOW THEY PLANNED IT: Disinformation, secrecy, deception: How the Gaza offensive came about Long-term preparation, careful gathering of information, secret discussions, operational deception and the misleading of the public - all these stood behind the Israel Defense Forces "Cast Lead" operation against Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip, which began Saturday morning. The disinformation effort, according to defense officials, took Hamas by surprise and served to significantly ...
Cease-fire As Misdirection Play: Israel Decided To Hit Gaza Six Months Ago
TPMCafe —
This explains alot, maybe it explains it all.
The only thing it doesn't explain is the stupidity of Hamas for falling into Barak's trap.
"Disinformation, secrecy and lies: How the Gaza offensive came about
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent"
How Israel maintained the element of surprise
Israel Matzav —
How Israel maintained the element of surprise It's pretty clear from this article that one of the reasons that Israel was able to surprise Hamas in Gaza on Saturday morning was that no one knew when the operation would take place - and until Wednesday no one knew whether it would take place at all (Hat Tip: ...
It’s Already Sunday in Gaza: “IAF strikes mosque, TV station”
Firedoglake —
... Israel’s plans to not simply stage a quick, narrow strike but to “change the rules” follows what Ha’aretz today reported was a six month preparation period: ...
Calling Hamas, part 2
Power Line —
... Haaretz carries an informative account of the planning that went into Israel's current offensive (Operation Cast Lead) in Gaza. Haaretz's account emphasizes the intelligence-gathering underlying the operation: ...
Hamas attacks, Israel counter-attacks
QandO —
... to defense officials, took Hamas by surprise and served to significantly increase the number of its casualties in the strike. Sources in the defense establishment said Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the Israel Defense Forces to prepare for the operation over six months ago, even as Israel was beginning to negotiate a ceasefire agreement with Hamas.So much for good faith negotiations.Of course, conveniently left out of the FDL quote from the same source is this: The plan of action that was implemented in ...
How Israeli Planned To Kick Hamas’ Butts
Pirate's Cove —
... to their typical unhingedness (not to mention the claims of a mosque and jihadi TV station being hit. Poor babies). Let’s look. Disinformation, secrecy and lies: How the Gaza offensive came about ...
How Israeli Planned To Kick Hamas’ Butts
Stop The ACLU —
... to their typical unhingedness (not to mention the claims of a mosque and jihadi TV station being hit. Poor babies). Let’s look. Disinformation, secrecy and lies: How the Gaza offensive came about Long-term preparation, careful gathering of information, secret discussions, operational deception and the misleading of the public - all these stood behind the Israel Defense Forces “Cast Lead” operation against Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip, which began Saturday morning. The disinformation effort, according to defense officials, took Hamas by surprise and served to ...
Gotcha
Jules Crittenden —
... Fooling Hamas … how hard could it possibly be? Ha ha, that was “Beat the stuff out of Hamas,” not “eat lots of stuff with hummus.” Ha’aretz on the serious business of planning and careful deception that reportedly preceded the current operation, with the desired effect of catching them right where they wanted them. No “How many Palestinian terrorists does it take to get blown up by the IDF” jokes please: Long-term preparation, careful gathering of information, secret discussions, operational deception and the misleading of the public - all these stood behind the Israel ...
How Israel's operation against Hamas was carried out through disinformation, secrecy and deceptions
Hyscience —
It was through long-term preparation, careful gathering of information, secret discussions, operational deception and the misleading of the public, that the IDF's "Cast Lead" Saturday morning operation successfully targeted Hamas in the Gaza Strip ... According to defense officials, the disinformation effort took Iran-supported and influenced Hamas Hamas by surprise and served to significantly increase the number of its casualties in the strike. ...
How Israel's operation against Hamas was carried out through disinformation, secrecy and lies
Hyscience —
It was through long-term preparation, careful gathering of information, secret discussions, operational deception and the misleading of the public, that the IDF's "Cast Lead" Saturday morning operation successfully targeted Hamas in the Gaza Strip ... According to defense officials, the disinformation effort took Iran-supported and influenced Hamas Hamas by surprise and served to significantly increase the number of its casualties in the strike. ...
Did Egypt sell out Hamas?
Israel Matzav —
... Israel not to attack the Gaza Strip ," he said. "Abbas also wanted to reassure Hamas by talking about his intention to renew the reconciliation talks with us." Taher a-Nunu, spokesman for the Hamas government, accused "third parties" of involvement in the Israeli effort to overthrow Hamas. However, he refused to name the third parties. A Hamas minister later said that the spokesman was referring to Egypt and the PA. For once, there might actually be something to the accusation. Consider this . While Barak was working out the final details with the officers responsible for ...
Disinformation, secrecy and lies: How the Gaza offensive came about
Democratic Underground Latest Breaking News —
... effort brought back information about permanent bases, weapon silos, training camps, the homes of senior officials and coordinates for other facilities. The plan of action that was implemented in Operation Cast Lead remained only a blueprint until a month ago, when tensions soared after the IDF carried out an incursion into Gaza during the ceasefire to take out a tunnel which the army said was intended to facilitate an attack by Palestinian militants on IDF troops. Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1050426.html Israeli warplanes fly low over south Lebanon ...
Covering for Iran
Yourish.com —
There is no kind way to describe today’s Washington Post editorial Israel Strikes with a subtitle:
Hamas suffers a serious blow — but the real winner may be Iran.
ISRAEL’S AIR offensive against the Gaza Strip yesterday should not have been a surprise for anyone who has been following the mounting hostilities in the region — least of all the Hamas movement, which invited the conflict by ending a six-month-old ceasefire and launching scores of rockets and mortar shells at Israel during the past 10 days. The initial Israeli strikes appeared to deal a punishing blow to the Islamic ...
Hamas and its boosters
Yourish.com —
Ethan Bronner of the NYT reports opines at the end of his recent report (via memeorandum):
There is palpable satisfaction at the moment in the Israeli government and the military because the operation so far is seen as a success. Few have focused on the fact that at this stage in the 2006 Lebanon war, there was the same satisfaction — before things turned disastrous.
True, it could backfire, but let’s go over a couple of things. For one, the current war against Hamas is being run by an actual general not a self-important political appointee. And Israel ...
Gaza Attacks: Murder with Impunity
Antiwar.com Original —
... Hamas' inability to renew a ceasefire with Israel for this most recent assault. But Israel must shoulder the lion's share of culpability for the carnage presently unfolding in the occupied territories. It is becoming increasingly clear that Israel's latest attack on Gaza was a pre-meditated attempt to destabilize the Hamas regime. The Israeli Ha'aretz newspaper recently revealed that even while it was negotiating a ceasefire, the Israeli government drew up a detailed plan to destroy Hamas in Gaza six months ago. No member of the international community is more complicit in ...
Gaza Ground Invasion Beginning? Goal Ethnic Cleansing?
Firedoglake —
... at that time (h/t markfromireland). We know, from reporting in Ha'aretz, that the Israeli leadership began planning for the current attacks before entering the Egyptian negotiated cease-fire which expired on December 19th and used the cease-fire as an opportunity to prepare. Add in two months of forced starvation for the people of Gaza which seems now to have been designed to weaken their resistance and it seems all too likely that what we are watching today is the culmination of those plans made back in March right after consultations with Condi Rice. ...
Gaza Ground Invasion Beginning
Firedoglake —
... at that time (h/t markfromireland). We know, from reporting in Ha'aretz, that the Israeli leadership began planning for the current attacks before entering the Egyptian negotiated cease-fire which expired on December 19th and used the cease-fire as an opportunity to prepare. Add in two months of forced starvation for the people of Gaza which seems now to have been designed to weaken their resistance and it seems all too likely that what we are watching today is the culmination of those plans made back in March right after consultations with Condi Rice. ...
Who Broke The Ceasefire?
The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan —
In my attempt to understand the Gaza blockade and assault, I wrote that Hamas broke the ceasefire first. While this is true in some respects, it is misleading in others on close inspection. Wikipedia's summary of the various competing accounts is here. The best full account I have found is in Ha'aretz. It shows how a reduction of the issue can obscure important nuances:
Sources in the defense establishment said Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the Israel Defense Forces to prepare for the operation over six months ago, even as Israel was ...
War of Choice: How Israel Manufactured the Gaza Escalation
Antiwar.com Original —
... Lebanon; and between 2001-2004, when Prime Minister Ariel Sharon repeatedly ordered assassinations of high-level Palestinian militants during declared ceasefires, provoking violent attacks that enabled Israel's virtual reoccupation of the West Bank. Israel's current assault on Gaza bears many trademark elements of Israel's long history of employing "strategic escalation" to manufacture a major crisis, if not a war. Making War 'Inevitable' T he countdown to a war began, according to a detailed report by Barak Raviv in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz , when Israel's Defense ...
Israel Learns from Experience in ‘Operation Cast Lead’
Pajamas Media —
... which it had withdrawn on the understanding that withdrawal would lead to peace; in both instances, withdrawal, in fact, was seen as a sign of weakness and actually precipitated further rocket attacks upon Israeli cities, in the north in the case of Hezbollah in Lebanon, and in the southwest, especially the town of Sderot, in the case of Hamas in Gaza. There are of course significant differences. Gaza is a small, dense, and urban area about which Israel has an intimate knowledge and good intelligence , while Lebanon is geographically larger and less dense in population, and ...
Gaza Update: Everywhere I Look There is Rubble
Firedoglake —
... on Gaza. By their own admission, Israel signed onto the June 19 cease-fire in order to buy time for preparing for that war – and while Hamas honored the cease-fire, Israel used the world’s focus on the Obama election on November 4 to ...
