U.S. Pastor Saeed Abedini in this undated AP photo
Imprisoned U.S. Pastor Saeed Abedini has managed to get out a letter to his hundreds of thousands of supporters around the world through his wife, Naghmeh, in which he praised the unity Christians in various denominations have shown in praying for his release.
“I heard that the persecution, my arrest and imprisonment has united churches from different denominations, from different cities and countries, that would never come together because of their differences. That the churches have united together in prayer to put one request (my freedom) on one day (Pentecost) before God,” the pastor said in a letter.
“You don’t know how happy I was in the Lord and rejoiced knowing that in my chains the body of Christ has chained together and is brought to action and prayer.”
There has been some positive news in the past couples of weeks concerning the 33-year-old pastor, first with his release from solitary confinement in Evin Prison in Tehran earlier in May, and then with reports from fellow prisoners who said that Abedini seemed to be “glowing” and “filled with more joy and peace after solitary,” which his wife said is proof that prayers around the world are making a difference.
Abedini was sentenced to 8 years in prison back in January, supposedly for endangering national security, though the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), which represents his family in the U.S., has said that the conviction has more to do with his Christian faith. At the time of his arrest in September 2012, Abedini was building an orphanage for children in Iran.
Over 590,000 people around the world have signed a petition calling for the pastor’s release, and earlier this week he was able to meet with family in Iran during a prison visit, sharing with them how encouraged he is by all the support he has been receiving.
U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel held out hope this week for a nonmilitary way to ending the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran, but he also emphasized Washington’s willingness to let Israel decide whether and when it might strike Tehran in self-defense.
Hagel, on his first visit to Israel as Pentagon chief, seemed intent on burying the image that Republican critics painted of him as insufficiently supportive of the Jewish state. That portrayal was central to a failed campaign to derail Hagel’s Senate confirmation in February.
In an interview with reporters on his flight from Washington, Hagel said the United States and Israel see “exactly the same” threat from Iran, which he described as a toxic combination of nuclear ambition and support for terrorism.
But he acknowledged differences on when it may reach the point of requiring U.S. or Israeli military action.
Hagel stressed repeatedly that Israel has a sovereign right to decide for itself whether it must attack Iran. He made no mention of the possibility that an Israeli attack would draw the U.S. into the conflict and lead to a wider regional war.
“Israel will make the decision that Israel must make to protect itself, to defend itself,” Hagel said as he began a weeklong tour of the Middle East.
Also Sunday, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was in Istanbul, where he urged Turkey to speed up and cement an American-brokered rapprochement with Israel. On a trip to Israel last month, President Barack Obama secured a pledge from Turkish and Israeli leaders to normalize ties that broke down after a 2010 Israeli raid on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla.
Hagel said international penalties are taking a heavy toll on Iran, though he said no one can be sure that economic coercion will compel Iran to change course.
Referring to sanctions and diplomacy, Hagel said, “these other tracks do have some time to continue to try to influence the outcome in Iran.”
Hagel acknowledged that while Israel and the U.S. share a commitment to ensuring that Iran does not acquire a nuclear weapon, there “may well be some differences” between the two allies on the question of when Iran’s leaders might decide to go for a bomb.
“When you back down into the specifics of the timing of when and if Iran decides to pursue a nuclear weapon, there may well be some differences,”
he said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tends to see more urgency, reflecting in part the fact that certain Iranian technological advances toward a nuclear weapon could put the program beyond the ability of the Israeli military to destroy it with airstrikes. U.S. forces have greater reach.
Hagel’s first order of business upon arrival in Jerusalem was a guided tour of the Yad Vashem Holocaust history museum. He participated in a ceremony at the Hall of Remembrance and wrote an inscription in the guest book at a memorial for the 1.5 million Jewish children who perished in the Holocaust.
“There is no more poignant, more touching, more effective way to tell the story than this reality, as painful as it is, but it is a reality,”
he said after completing his visit. “It did happen, and we must prepare our future generations … for a clear understanding that we must never allow this to happen again.”
In his remarks while en route to Israel, Hagel repeatedly emphasized Israel’s right of self-defense and stressed that military force — by implication, Israeli or American — remains an option of last resort.
“In dealing with Iran, every option must be on the table,” he said.
During his two-day visit to Israel, Hagel was expected to further discuss a U.S. arms deal that would provide Israel with missiles for its fighter aircraft, plus KC-135 refueling planes that could be used in a long-range strike on a country such as Iran, as well as V-22 Osprey transport planes. He called the proposed sale a “very clear signal” to Iran.
“The bottom line is, Iran is a threat — a real threat,” he said.
Iran asserts that its nuclear program is designed entirely for nonmilitary purposes.
Yiftah Shapir, a military analyst at the Institute for National Security Studies think tank in Tel Aviv, said Hagel appeared eager to present a steady-as-she-goes attitude following his Senate confirmation battle.
“He’s here to say, ‘Folks, nothing has changed. We are still with you,’” Shapir said. “The goal is to deliver a relaxing message and to project business as usual.”
Hagel suggested he holds hope that Iran’s presidential election in June might change the trajectory of its nuclear drive.
After his talks in Israel, Hagel planned stops in Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates. Each is an important American ally in the Middle East, and each is worried by Syria’s civil war.
Saudi Arabia and the UAE are part of a $10 billion proposed U.S. arms sale that includes Israel. The UAE would get about 26 F-16 fighters and it and Saudi Arabia would get advanced air-launched missiles.
Boston bombings ‘a message’ to West, Muslim cleric says.Egyptian Salafi Sheik Murgan Salem warns France that it could be next if it continues to fight its campaign in Mali
By Aaron Kalman / TimesOfIsrael.com
While they weren’t up to the standard set by al-Qaeda, the Boston bombings were nevertheless a warning to the U.S. and West — especially France — for waging war against Islam, a Muslim cleric said.
Two bombs were detonated during the Boston Marathon on Monday, killing three and injuring more than 150 people.
In a video from Egyptian TV translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Egyptian Salafi cleric Sheik Murgan Salem said he didn’t know who was behind the attack, but “if it was done by the mujahideen” — Islamist fighters — “it serves as a message to America and the West: We are still alive… We have not died.”
“This was not up to the standard of al-Qaeda. It was extremely amateurish,” said the cleric, who boasted of a close relationship with the killed former al-Qaeda head Osama bin Laden. “The standards and techniques of al-Qaeda are much higher.”
But regardless of who did it, he said, the message that “we can reach you whenever and wherever we want” was conveyed, Salem said, praising the advances made in “the war with America” over the past 30 years, especially the relocation of the war from Arab countries to U.S. soil.
It was likely that “people resentful of the policy and arrogance of America and Europe” carried out the attack, he said, noting that they might have been U.S.-born.
France led the first crusade and was now spearheading the war against Islam in Mali, he charged, warning that if things don’t change “they must taste the bitter retribution for their deeds.”
Emergency medicine doctor says grisly scene of marathon explosions reminiscent of terrorist bombings in the Middle East
TimesOfIsrael.com
A top emergency medicine doctor at a Boston hospital where many of the wounded from Monday’s bombing attack were being treated credited Israel with training the hospital’s first-response team and readying it to deal with mass-casualty incidents.
While briefing media hours after the devastating attack that killed three people and wounded over 100 others near the finish line of the Boston Marathon (see video above), Dr. Alasdair Conn said that the scene of the carnage and the horrific injuries sustained by the victims were reminiscent of “a bomb explosion that we hear about in the news in Baghdad or Israel, or some other tragic place in the world.”
Afterward he added, “About two years ago, in actual fact, we asked the Israelis to come across, and they helped us set up our disaster team so that we could respond in this kind of manner.”
Conn, who is the chief of emergency services at Massachusetts General Hospital, reported that six of the victims taken to his hospital were in critical condition, requiring resuscitation, and five others were in serious condition.
He said that all of the patients he had seen from the attack were spectators rather than runners.
Nine female polio vaccinators have been killed in two shootings at health centres in northern Nigeria, police have told the BBC.
Nigeria is one of only three countries where polio is still endemic.
In the first attack in Kano, the polio vaccinators were shot dead by gunmen who drove up on a motor tricycle.
Thirty minutes later, gunmen targeted a clinic outside Kano city as the vaccinators prepared to start work.
Some Nigerian Muslim leaders have previously opposed polio vaccinations, claiming they could cause infertility.
On Thursday, February 7, a controversial Islamic cleric spoke out against the polio vaccination campaign, telling people that new cases of polio were caused by contaminated medicine.
Such opposition is a major reason why Nigeria is one of just three countries where polio is still endemic.
But this is believed to be the first time polio vaccinators have been attacked in the country.
Some Kano residents told the BBC’s Yusuf Yakasai in the city that other people injured in the first attack had been taken to hospital.
A health official confirmed to the BBC that those killed in the second attack in Hotoro were female health workers – there were earlier reports that people waiting at the clinic may have been among those shot.
Witnesses in Hotoro told the BBC that gunmen also approached the health centre using a motor tricycle.
Kano banned motorbikes from carrying passengers after a recent attack on the prominent Muslim leader, the emir of Kano.
Analysts believe that the attacks may have been the work of the militant Islamist group Boko Haram but it has not yet commented and no group has said that it carried out the attack.
The group — whose name translates as “Western education is forbidden” — says it is fighting to overthrow the government and impose sharia [Islamic law].
The group has been blamed for the deaths of some 1,400 people in central and northern Nigeria since 2010.
According to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, there were 121 cases of polio in Nigeria last year, compared to 58 in Pakistan and 37 in Afghanistan.
In the past month, polio workers have also been targeted and killed in Pakistan, where the Taliban have threatened anti-polio efforts — accusing health workers of working as U.S. spies, and alleging that the vaccine makes children sterile.
Clashes in Egypt kill dozens: Violence continued Monday, a day after Egypt’s president declared a state of emergency and nighttime curfews across three major cities to curb a wave of unrest that had left more than 45 dead and hundreds injured. Jan. 29, 2013 Egypt’s military chief warned that the political crisis sweeping the country could lead to the collapse of the state, as thousands defied curfews and the death toll from days of rioting rose to 52. Mohammed Abed / AFP/Getty Images
PORT SAID, Egypt — The residents of this Mediterranean coastal city say their conflict with Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi started with a harsh court verdict. (On Saturday, a court convicted and sentenced 21 defendants to death for their roles in a soccer riot in a Port Said stadium on Feb. 1, 2012, that left 74 people dead.)
Three days and 43 bodies later, the air around Port Said’s main cemetery still tinged by the stench of death, the conflict has spiraled into something much larger.
Many of the men and women who chanted for Morsi’s execution in the tense and battle-scarred streets of Port Said on Monday (Jan. 28) said that in last summer’s presidential election, they actually voted for the man.
That the city turned so vehemently against him with a single court verdict underscores Morsi’s increasing vulnerability, and suggests that others could just as easily shift their favor — potentially altering the nature of Egypt’s political divide and bringing new threats to the country’s already tenuous stability and rapidly sinking economy.
In all, at least 54 people were killed and hundreds injured across the country in four days of fighting between opposition protesters and government security forces. The clashes were set off by marches on Friday to mark the two-year anniversary of Hosni Mubarak’s ouster, when crowds of youth — rallied by Morsi’s predominantly liberal and secularist opposition — squared off against police in battles of rocks, molotov cocktails, and tear gas in Cairo, Suez, and other major cities.
In Port Said, the serious clashes broke out the following day, after a judge issued death sentences for 21 locals for their involvement in a soccer riot last year. But as Port Said’s death toll rapidly climbed, Egypt’s political opposition, which until last week cut predominantly along religious and class lines, began to broaden.
On Monday the National Salvation Front, a loose coalition of opposition leaders, rejected Morsi’s call to a national dialogue. Leftist leader Hamdeen Sabbahi said the alliance would agree to meet only if Morsi forms a national unity government and begins to amend Egypt’s contentious new constitution, which was approved in a national referendum last month. The front called for more nationwide protests on Friday.
The stakes are high. Egyptian Army Chief Abdel Fatah al-Sissi warned Tuesday of the “collapse of the state” if the crisis continues.
“The continuation of this struggle between the different political forces and their disagreements around the administration of the country could lead to the collapse of the state, and threatens the future of coming generations,” al-Sissi told military academy cadets, according to remarks posted on the armed forces’ Facebook page.
A grim cycle
Morsi’s government and his backers in the Muslim Brotherhood have struggled to control the security crisis. Morsi declared a 30-day state of emergency and a nighttime curfew for Port Said, Suez, and Ismailia on Sunday, a day after deploying troops to Port Said and Suez.
But many Egyptians in the emergency zone, spread along Egypt’s most crucial holding, the Suez Canal, said the moves only made them angrier. Thousands took to the streets of Port Said on Monday, beneath the whipping noise of circling helicopters, to bury their dead and defy the curfew.
A prominent Phoenix-based analyst–Mike Harris of VeteransToday.com–tells Iran’s Press TV that the Israelis and their media, like Hollywood, are behind most of the violent incidents happening within the United States including the recent deadly Newtown, Connecticut school shooting.
In a time of national grieving unmatched since the 9/11 attacks, the Iranian government’s English-language news outlet provided an outlet for vile anti-Semitic conspiracies so extreme that not even the most strident Islamists have offered anything close to them.
The claim came from Michael Harris, one of three panelists in a discussion about the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. While the other panelists focused on a culture of violence in America, or the issue of gun laws, Harris unleashed a torrent of Jew hatred.
“Hollywood is Jewish owned and Jewish controlled and they spew filth and they spew violence out,” he said. Jews are the ones pushing for gun control. Jews control Congress.
“And now here we go, here’s a revenge killing in the U.S., sponsored by Israel, that killed all these innocent children,” Harris said. “And that is something that Israelis do very, very well. They target the innocent, they target children, they target women and they avoid the issue. Because they’re angry they didn’t get their way and now Palestine has standing in the U.N. and Israel is going to be subject to the International Criminal Court and their leadership is going to be taken to task. So let’s connect the dots here about what’s going on globally, geo-politically with Israel involved.”
The other two guests dismissed Harris’s theories, saying Israel had nothing to do with Newtown and tried to steer the conversation back to the brutal killing, as did even the hijab-clad moderator.
Press TV followed up the Newtown panel discussion by publishing a story on Harris’ theory on its website. “Israeli death squads involved in Sandy Hook bloodbath: Intelligence analyst,” the headline blares. It describes Harris as “a former Republican candidate for governor of Arizona and GOP campaign finance chairman.”
The Press TV article asserts Israel staged the attack “to teach America a lesson, knowing that America would take the punishment, keep ‘quiet,’ and let a ‘fall guy’ take the blame.”
If the publishing of cartoons and Internet videos depicting the Muslim prophet Muhammad can spark riots and killings throughout the world, what does a blood libel like the Sandy Hook conspiracy theory do to Muslim attitudes toward Jews?
Blaming Zionists and blaming Jews for problems large and small is a reflex action in parts of the Middle East, including claims Jews were behind the 9/11 attacks. Hamas instills it in young children. Islamists in Egypt blamed Jews for a New Year’s Eve 2011 bombing at a Coptic church that killed 21 people, a message echoed by Press TV.
The article on the Newtown shooting was written by Gordon Duff, identified as “a Marine Vietnam veteran, a combat infantryman, and Senior Editor at Veterans Today.” Harris also writes for Veterans Today, including articles defending David Duke as “a shining example of western freedom and democracy.”
Another article details his suspicions that Jews, what he calls “organized jewery” was behind Jared Loughner’s shooting attack in Tucson that wounded U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and killed six people, including U.S. District Judge John Roll.
“My point here is: will organized jewery, the Neo-Pharisees that comprise the unelected criminal shadow government sacrifice an asset like Congresswoman Giffords to advance their bigger agenda?? You bet they will. The criminals who took down the WTC and the Murrah Building in Oklahoma, will eagerly sacrifice a pawn to pass stricter gun control measures and dis-arm the US population. The armed US population is the biggest obstacle that still exists for the shadow government of the Neo-Pharisees to fully implement a totalitarian state here in the USA, just like they destroyed Czarist Russia and created the Soviet Union, they work day and night to impose that same hell on the citizens of the USA.”
Press TV officials should have been aware of Harris’ views before they invited him on the air and let him unleash his empty conspiracy theories and hate rhetoric.
Duff’s Press TV article says Harris points to “the flood of inconsistencies in the ‘cover story.’” But those amount to a series of unanswered questions about alleged accomplices and unsourced claims that police gunned down the shooter, Adam Lanza, after he tried to surrender.
“After Harris’ broadcast, key members of the military and law enforcement community contacted Veterans Today in full support of Harris’ analysis,” Duff writes.
“One three star general is quoted as saying, ‘Harris hit the nail right on the head and it is about time someone spoke up.’”
What other proof is needed? In the broadcast interview, Harris predicted a grand cover-up by Congress, which he said is owned by Zionists. The absence of proof, therefore, is his proof.
“So any truth of this, if there’s going to be, is going to be hidden because Israel wants it hidden because they are once again the guilty party,” Harris said. “You have to realize, Israel has been operating death squads in the United States now since Gabby Giffords and Judge Roll were shot in Tucson. There’s been other incidences. The Aurora, Colorado shooting that was, again, Israeli death squads operating in the U.S.”
Fellow panelist Raynard Jackson, a Washington-based political consultant, called Harris’ comments “irresponsible.” A third panelist, Don Debar, said that the United States is the “pre-eminent imperial power in the history of the planet.” As such, it controls Israel “although there is some backwash in the Congress and other places.”
Given the last word, Harris went off on another rant, condemning American drone strikes abroad, which, “again,” he said, “it goes back to Israeli influence in U.S. foreign policy.” If he had not done so in the previous 20 minutes, he made it clear that he and Iran are on the same page.
“And I am very much anti Israel. I want Israel off the face of the earth. They are the source of all problems in the Middle East. They are the original terrorists. And do not forget that this killing in Newton (sic) was a revenge killing because Israel lost the vote about Palestine being recognized in the U.N. That’s all it’s about. It happens every time. It’s Israelis acting out, throwing a fit in extracting revenge upon the United States.
“That’s exactly what it is. And I’m tired of the kid gloves with Israel. It’s time to go bare knuckles with them. Let’s go.”
The Newtown massacre united the country in grief. Under the guise of discussing gun control, Press TV allowed Harris to use the tragedy to sow hatred and nonsense.
VIENNA – Diplomats say proposed high-level talks between Israel and its Muslim neighbors on a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction have been called off.
The diplomats said the U.S., one of the organizers, would likely make a formal announcement soon, stating that with tensions in the region high, “the time was not opportune” for such a gathering.
The meeting, to be held in Helsinki by year’s end, was on shaky ground since it was agreed to in 2010 by the 189 member nations of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
The decision to scrap it cast doubt on the significance of the NPT conference and its attempts every five years to advance nonproliferation.
The diplomats demanded anonymity Saturday because they were not authorized to divulge the cancellation ahead of the formal announcement.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel didn’t need support from Washington to attack the Iranian nuclear program. photo: Baz Ratner/Reuters
JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the day before the American presidential election reiterated his willingness to attack the Iranian nuclear program without support from Washington or the world, returning to an aggressive posture that he had largely abandoned since his United Nations speech in September.
“When David Ben-Gurion declared the foundation of the State of Israel, was it done with American approval?” Mr. Netanyahu asked in an interview broadcast on Israel’s Channel 2 on Monday night. “When Levi Eshkol was forced to act in order to loosen the siege before 1967, was it done with the Americans’ support?
“If someone sits here as the prime minister of Israel and he can’t take action on matters that are cardinal to the existence of this country — its future and its security — and he is totally dependent on receiving approval from others, then he is not worthy of leading,” Mr. Netanyahu added. “I can make these decisions.”
Though American officials, including President Obama, have always acknowledged that Israel ultimately has the right to decide how to defend itself, Mr. Netanyahu’s tough tone and timing — on the eve of the American presidential election — are sure to reignite rifts with Washington over how best to prevent Tehran from developing a nuclear bomb.
As has been the case over the past two years, however, it is impossible to know whether his hawkish words are harbingers of deeds or part of a strategic campaign to scare nations into increasing economic and diplomatic pressure on Iran.
“I am not eager to go to war,” Mr. Netanyahu said in the seven-minute interview. “I have been creating very heavy pressure, and part of this pressure comes from the knowledge some of the most powerful nations in the world have that we are serious. This isn’t a show, this is not false.”
Besides the creation of diplomatic tensions if Israel were to act alone against Washington’s wishes, there is a more practical concern: the Israeli military lacks the capacity to penetrate all of Iran’s underground nuclear facilities, and thus could most likely only delay the potential development of a nuclear weapon by a few years. The United States has bunker-busting bombs that could do far more damage.
The interview was broadcast on “Fact,” a program often compared to “60 Minutes,” at the end of an hourlong documentary on Israeli decision making regarding Iran over the past decade. The program highlighted the opposition of Israel’s own security establishment to a unilateral strike, saying that Mr. Netanyahu and his defense minister, Ehud Barak, ordered the Israel Defense Forces to prepare for an imminent operation in 2010 but were rebuffed by the chiefs of their military and international intelligence service.
Among those interviewed was Ehud Olmert, the former prime minister currently contemplating a political comeback. He accused Mr. Netanyahu of “spitting in the face” of Mr. Obama and “doing anything possible to stop him from being elected president of the United States,” a harsh critique in a country that regards safeguarding its special relationship with Washington as a sacred priority.
“What’s all this talk, that we will decide alone on our fate and that we won’t take anybody else into consideration?” said Mr. Olmert, who is expected to make Mr. Netanyahu’s relationship with Mr. Obama a mainstay of his campaign if he runs. “Can someone please explain to me with which airplanes we will attack if we decide to attack alone, against the opinion of others — airplanes that we built here in Israel? With which bombs will we bomb, bombs that we made by ourselves? With which special technologies will we do it, those that we made by ourselves or those that we received from other sources?”
But when shown a video of Mr. Olmert’s retort, Mr. Netanyahu was not cowed. “If what I just heard is that on this matter which threatens our very existence, we should just say, we should just hand the keys over to the Americans and tell them, ‘You decide whether or not to destroy this project, which threatens our very existence,’ well, that’s one possible approach, but it’s not my approach,” he said. “My approach is that if we can have others take care of it, or if we can get to a point where no one has to, that’s fine; but if we have no choice and we find ourselves with our backs against the wall, then we will do what we have to do in order to defend ourselves.”
After years in which Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Barak pursued the Iranian threat in close partnership, the prime minister now seems virtually alone in his defiant stance, as other leaders attempt to distinguish their positions ahead of Israeli elections on Jan. 22. While Mr. Netanyahu said in his Sept. 27 speech at the United Nations that the critical moment for preventing Iran from developing a weapon would most likely come next spring, Mr. Barak last week pushed the timetable back farther, and offered a new explanation of Israel’s reduced sense of urgency.
The crux of Mr. Barak’s argument, made in an interview with Britain’s Daily Telegraph, was based on reports by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the most recent in August, showing that Iran had 189 kilograms, about 416 pounds, of uranium enriched to the 20 percent level — from which it could relatively easily be further enriched to weapons grade. Roughly half of that was diverted to civilian use in a form that could not be easily turned into bomb fuel. But Iran has continued production and by most estimates, at current rates, would have roughly a bomb’s worth by next summer.
That “allows contemplating delaying the moment of truth by 8 to 10 months,” Mr. Barak said.
But several high-ranking Israeli officials and analysts said that Mr. Barak’s explanation was overly simplistic. While the diversion was clearly a factor, they said, it was not a new development: the nuclear agency had reported a similar transfer of enriched uranium in May, and that had hardly cooled the rhetoric of either Mr. Barak or Mr. Netanyahu through the summer. And both men have long warned of secret centrifuges that could be spinning without outside knowledge, enabling rapid replenishment of the enriched stockpile.
“Netanyahu backed away because he was getting the message that he was going too far and this could do damage, this was not helpful either to Israel or to stopping Iran,” said Emily Landau, an Iran expert at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University. “It might be easier for Barak to now say that it’s because of the technical issue, but it’s not a real issue. Relations with the United States is a much more substantial, real issue, but it’s more difficult to give that as your explanation.”
Graham Allison, a Harvard professor of government who specializes in international security, called Mr. Barak’s statement “kind of a convenient excuse,” adding that “the reason they really blinked” was that the prime minister was unable to convince a majority of his cabinet of the wisdom of acting alone.
“The big phenomenon here is what I’ve called the revolt of the Israeli security barons,” Mr. Allison said. “I can’t think of a prior Israeli government or an analogous case anywhere where there’s such a clear gap between a prime minister on one hand and his security establishment on the other.”
Trails of smoke are seen after the launch of rockets from the northern Gaza strip towards Israel October 24, 2012. Palestinians fired dozens of rockets into Israel from Gaza on Wednesday and an Israeli air strike killed a militant in a surge of violence after the Emir of Qatar embraced the enclave’s Hamas leadership with a visit. REUTERS/Amir Cohen
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Palestinians fired dozens of rockets into Israel from Gaza on Wednesday and an Israeli air strike killed a militant, a day after the Emir of Qatar made a rare visit to the enclave’s Hamas leadership.
Hamas claimed responsibility for some of the rocket and mortar bomb attacks, prompting some Israelis to wonder whether it had been emboldened by the Qatari visit on Tuesday that broke the Islamist group’s diplomatic isolation.
In recent months, Hamas has largely held its fire when other militant factions have launched cross-border rocket attacks, but the sudden upsurge in violence stoked fears that the hostilities could escalate further.
Hamas accused Israel of stepping up air strikes in the Gaza Strip, a move it said was meant to convey Israeli anger over Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani’s visit, and pledged to “continue to hold a gun … until Palestine is liberated”.
Israel said it was “astounding” that Qatar, a U.S.-allied Gulf state, would take sides in the Palestinian dispute and endorse Hamas, branded by the West as a terrorist group. Hamas seized the Gaza Strip in 2007 from fighters loyal to the Fatah faction of Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Some analysts saw the Qatari ruler’s trip, the first by any national leader to Gaza since Hamas took over, as an attempt to build bridges between the group and the West and coax it into the peace camp amid Arab turmoil across the Middle East.
A Palestinian official said Egypt was trying to mediate a truce.
“The contacts Cairo made resulted in a verbal promise by Hamas to calm the situation down and Israel said it was monitoring calm on the ground and would refrain from attacks unless it was subject to rocket fire from Gaza,” said the official, who is close to the talks.
Israeli officials had no immediate comment. Previous rounds of cross-border attacks have usually fizzled out in days, with both Israel and Hamas seemingly aware of the risks of ramping up the low-intensity conflict.
Israel’s three-week-long invasion of the Gaza Strip, launched in 2008 with the declared aim of curbing rocket launches, drew international criticism over a heavy Palestinian casualty toll.
Though hostile to Israel, Hamas has mostly sought to avoid direct clashes as it shores up its rule in the face of more radical challengers and seeks potential allies abroad.
NETANYAHU VISITS ANTI-MISSILE SITE
In a second day of violence, a Hamas militant was killed on Wednesday in an air strike, which Israel said was intended to stop rocket launches. On Tuesday, Israel killed three Hamas men, saying they had either launched attacks or were about to do so.
In southern Israel, three agricultural workers were wounded when a Palestinian rocket exploded near them.
An Israeli military spokeswoman, said 79 projectiles had been fired at Israel and that the Iron Dome system had intercepted eight of them. She said several homes had been damaged by Palestinian rockets.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is seeking a renewed mandate in Israel’s January 22 election, visited an Iron Dome anti-missile battery near the southern city of Ashkelon on Wednesday and threatened stronger Israeli military action in Gaza.
“We did not choose this escalation, nor did we initiate it, but if it continues, we are prepared for a much wider and deeper operation,” he said, pledging to press on with “targeted attacks” against militants preparing to fire rockets.
Israel kept schools shut in communities near the fenced Gaza boundary and residents were urged to remain indoors.
Hamas has refused to renounce violence or recognize Israel’s right to exist, and is ostracized by the Quartet of Middle East mediators comprising the United States, United Nations, European Union, and Russia.
However, Hamas has said it would accept a truce with Israel in return for a state in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
(Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi and Douglas Hamilton; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Andrew Osborn)
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