Three Ninnies and a Jackass: This Last Week in Gaza

Three Ninnies and a Jackass: This Week in Gaza

By Clarice Feldman in American Thinker

 

This week we learned that former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, the elected choice of the wealthy denizens of San Francisco, believes that Hamas is a humanitarian organization. Qatar, Hamas’ principle supporter, told her so.

From former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton we learned that the reason Hamas’ weapons are found stored in civilian sites -- schools, mosques, hospitals, and UNWRA buildings -- is because the area is so small there’s nowhere else to hide them.

 

And from the UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, the viciously anti-Israeli Navi Pillay, we learned that the Israel may have committed war crimes because it refused to share its Iron Dome technology with Hamas.

Where would we be without smart leaders like these three ninnies to guide us through the tortuous, rocky shoals of a contentious world?

But the king of meddlesome, dimwitted fops is the biggest jackass of all: America’s present Secretary of State, former Massachusetts Senator and Democrat Presidential nominee John F. Kerry. He singlehandedly is responsible for more mayhem in Israel and disrespect for the U.S. abroad than even these three lightweights.

Repeatedly during the course of this conflict he has taken steps to strengthen Hamas and keep the fight going while claiming to be a peacemaker. This week, he “negotiated” a seventy-two-hour ceasefire, which was broken ninety minutes after it was announced when Hamas, using a civilian shield and a surprise assault, killed two IDF soldiers and kidnapped a third.

Algemeiner sets the record straight in a way our major media seems unable to:

The Israeli government believed the word of the Secretary of State of the United States that, via his Turkish and Qatari friends, he had obtained acceptable terms for a ceasefire with Hamas. Mr. Kerry’s flunkies even bragged about the success of his Turko-Qatari connections, chiding those who looked askance at his bromance with friends and sponsors of Hamas.

What happened next -- a surprise attack on Israeli troops in the southern Gaza Strip an hour and a half into the “ceasefire”, an abduction of a soldier -- shows that Kerry’s word -- America’s word! -- counts for absolutely nothing. Neither Turkey nor Qatar (and of course not Hamas) intended to keep their promises to the Secretary of State, their dearest friend. They counted on the ceasefire to give Hamas the advantage of surprise to score some “strategic” gains, in which the terrorists have probably and tragically succeeded. Neither Qatar nor Turkey are afraid of possible American retaliation for such a flagrant breach of trust.

Not surprisingly, the Israeli response was one of outrage and fury.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Secretary of State John F. Kerry in a telephone call Friday afternoon that the cease-fire was broken by Hamas and that the Islamist group and other Palestinian militant factions “will bear the consequences of their actions,” according to Netanyahu’s office.

“The cease-fire is over,” said Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, a senior spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces. Ground operations will continue, he said, “and our aircraft are in the sky as we speak.”

Let this sink in -- the Egyptians have done more to secure Israel’s borders from harm than the U.S. Secretary of State who either was gullible in taking the word of Turkish and Qatari representatives -- or a liar about their guaranties in order to come off as an heroic peacemaker.

This time even the White House, which till now seemed more interested in protecting the terrorist Hamas outfit and its survival, condemned the attack as a barbaric violation of the humanitarian ceasefire. Perhaps overwhelming voter support for Israel over Hamas played a part in the issuance of this strong statement. In any event, it must be noted, EGYPT has done more to protect Israel than the U.S has during the Gazan hostilities.

Even before Hamas broke the ceasefire, advancing any Qatari-Turkish proposal was  a stupid move by Kerry.

As Charles Krauthammer explains:

Kerry did not just trample an Egyptian initiative. It was backed by the entire Arab League and specifically praised by Saudi Arabia. With the exception of Qatar -- more a bank than a country -- the Arabs are unanimous in wanting to see Hamas weakened, if not overthrown. The cease-fire-in-place they backed would have denied Hamas any reward for starting this war, while what Kerry brought back from Paris granted practically all of its demands.

Which is what provoked the severe criticism Kerry received at home, including from (among others) the scrupulously independent columnist David Ignatius, who called Kerry’s intervention a blunder.

Kerry seems oblivious to the strategic reality that Hamas launched its rockets in the hope not of defeating Israel but ending its intra-Arab isolation (which it brilliantly achieves in the Qatar-Turkey peace proposal). Hamas’ radicalism has alienated nearly all of its Arab neighbors.

OmriCeren of the Israel Project has uncovered more of the backstory, a backstory so shameful that Kerry should resign or be removed before he can do even more damage to our national reputation.

Drawing our attention to a conference call with Israeli reserve Colonel Lior Lotan, he noted:

(1) A journalist asked Loton whether some group other than Hamas might have been responsible for the attack. The short answer is no, for reasons that have to do with how Gaza is controlled. But he also pointed out a very suspicious pattern of Hamas diplomatic behavior:

It's really inconsiderable, due to the fact that the region is so crowded with Hamas elements, fighters, and warriors -- that [are] engaging into contact with our IDF troops every day, every hour.[b] And also some indicator might be that Hamas neglect[ed] to send their negotiators to Cairo this morning. It was supposed to be a negotiation session over the condition of the ceasefire, arranged by the UN, and the USA, and of course the Egyptian authorities. And the Hamas did not even send their negotiators. So one can assess that they might know, in advance, that this ceasefire will not hold, due to an event that's going to happen. It happened at 9:30 am, while the ceasefire started at 8 o'clock in the morning, local time of course.[/b] One can also assess that since Hamas authorities, Hamas leadership, is sending their negotiators, and did not send them, they are part of this plan. Anyway, tactical wise, it's just infeasible that any other power -- unless Hamas will conduct such a planned operation in the region that Hamas is so rooted -- it might be some soldier, or some element from other organizations working as a proxy under the umbrella of the Hamas, no doubt planned by the Hamas.

(2) The attack and kidnapping made use of a civilian human shield who came in under the cover of the ceasefire

There are all indicators that the event is genuine, and really happened. Analysis of what we know about the event demonstrates it was well-planned. It was involved with, let's say, first of all, a decoy. A civilian starts to approach their home on their street and by that came to some kind of a contact with the IDF troops, under the umbrella of the ceasefire. Under this decoy, elements of the Hamas came out from the tunnel, start shooting, then launche[ed] a suicide attack that of course attract[ed] a lot of attention. And during this event, when some soldiers were wounded and the chaos -- the few seconds of chaos -- a different element, and what we think, kidnapped one of the junior officers in the field.

Israel’s noted peacenik Amos Oz has seen the light: One has no choice but to respond with force to neighbors who shoot at your children while holding their own children in their lap or who dig tunnels to kill your kids from a nursery school on their side of the border.

Finnish and Italian reporters have openly conceded that Hamas is using human shields to cover their aggression, though our own media, notably the New York Times, still prints only those pictures that Hamas wants it to, and that excludes shots of Hamas’ aggression and the significant casualties to their own people caused by Hamas’ tactics and mishaps. The United Nations' UNWRA looks even worse, for it is inconceivable that it was unaware of the fact that Hamas was using its facilities to hide weapons and to engage in aggressive warfare from them. They abetted real war crimes, not the lunatic fancied ones of Navi Pillay.

In any event, though the answer is clear to all who are not like Pillay, clearly for Israel’s destruction, or desperate like Kerry (and presumably President Obama, his boss) to curry favor with Qatar and the internationalists who despise Israel, there are those who cannot bear to face the truth -- that they have been wrong for so long, blinded by media-megaphoned propaganda, anti-Western bias, and dangerously fluffy thinking about peace in the face of naked, unremitting hatred and aggression.

This week we learned that former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, the elected choice of the wealthy denizens of San Francisco, believes that Hamas is a humanitarian organization. Qatar, Hamas’ principle supporter, told her so.

From former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton we learned that the reason Hamas’ weapons are found stored in civilian sites -- schools, mosques, hospitals, and UNWRA buildings -- is because the area is so small there’s nowhere else to hide them.

And from the UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, the viciously anti-Israeli Navi Pillay, we learned that the Israel may have committed war crimes because it refused to share its Iron Dome technology with Hamas.

Where would we be without smart leaders like these three ninnies to guide us through the tortuous, rocky shoals of a contentious world?

But the king of meddlesome, dimwitted fops is the biggest jackass of all: America’s present Secretary of State, former Massachusetts Senator and Democrat Presidential nominee John F. Kerry. He singlehandedly is responsible for more mayhem in Israel and disrespect for the U.S. abroad than even these three lightweights.

Repeatedly during the course of this conflict he has taken steps to strengthen Hamas and keep the fight going while claiming to be a peacemaker. This week, he “negotiated” a seventy-two-hour ceasefire, which was broken ninety minutes after it was announced when Hamas, using a civilian shield and a surprise assault, killed two IDF soldiers and kidnapped a third.

Algemeiner sets the record straight in a way our major media seems unable to:

The Israeli government believed the word of the Secretary of State of the United States that, via his Turkish and Qatari friends, he had obtained acceptable terms for a ceasefire with Hamas. Mr. Kerry’s flunkies even bragged about the success of his Turko-Qatari connections, chiding those who looked askance at his bromance with friends and sponsors of Hamas.

What happened next -- a surprise attack on Israeli troops in the southern Gaza Strip an hour and a half into the “ceasefire”, an abduction of a soldier -- shows that Kerry’s word -- America’s word! -- counts for absolutely nothing. Neither Turkey nor Qatar (and of course not Hamas) intended to keep their promises to the Secretary of State, their dearest friend. They counted on the ceasefire to give Hamas the advantage of surprise to score some “strategic” gains, in which the terrorists have probably and tragically succeeded. Neither Qatar nor Turkey are afraid of possible American retaliation for such a flagrant breach of trust.

Not surprisingly, the Israeli response was one of outrage and fury.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Secretary of State John F. Kerry in a telephone call Friday afternoon that the cease-fire was broken by Hamas and that the Islamist group and other Palestinian militant factions “will bear the consequences of their actions,” according to Netanyahu’s office.

“The cease-fire is over,” said Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, a senior spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces. Ground operations will continue, he said, “and our aircraft are in the sky as we speak.”

Let this sink in -- the Egyptians have done more to secure Israel’s borders from harm than the U.S. Secretary of State who either was gullible in taking the word of Turkish and Qatari representatives -- or a liar about their guaranties in order to come off as an heroic peacemaker.

This time even the White House, which till now seemed more interested in protecting the terrorist Hamas outfit and its survival, condemned the attack as a barbaric violation of the humanitarian ceasefire. Perhaps overwhelming voter support for Israel over Hamas played a part in the issuance of this strong statement. In any event, it must be noted, EGYPT has done more to protect Israel than the U.S has during the Gazan hostilities.

Even before Hamas broke the ceasefire, advancing any Qatari-Turkish proposal was  a stupid move by Kerry.

As Charles Krauthammer explains:

Kerry did not just trample an Egyptian initiative. It was backed by the entire Arab League and specifically praised by Saudi Arabia. With the exception of Qatar -- more a bank than a country -- the Arabs are unanimous in wanting to see Hamas weakened, if not overthrown. The cease-fire-in-place they backed would have denied Hamas any reward for starting this war, while what Kerry brought back from Paris granted practically all of its demands.

Which is what provoked the severe criticism Kerry received at home, including from (among others) the scrupulously independent columnist David Ignatius, who called Kerry’s intervention a blunder.

Kerry seems oblivious to the strategic reality that Hamas launched its rockets in the hope not of defeating Israel but ending its intra-Arab isolation (which it brilliantly achieves in the Qatar-Turkey peace proposal). Hamas’ radicalism has alienated nearly all of its Arab neighbors.

OmriCeren of the Israel Project has uncovered more of the backstory, a backstory so shameful that Kerry should resign or be removed before he can do even more damage to our national reputation.

Drawing our attention to a conference call with Israeli reserve Colonel Lior Lotan, he noted:

(1) A journalist asked Loton whether some group other than Hamas might have been responsible for the attack. The short answer is no, for reasons that have to do with how Gaza is controlled. But he also pointed out a very suspicious pattern of Hamas diplomatic behavior:

It's really inconsiderable, due to the fact that the region is so crowded with Hamas elements, fighters, and warriors -- that [are] engaging into contact with our IDF troops every day, every hour.[b] And also some indicator might be that Hamas neglect[ed] to send their negotiators to Cairo this morning. It was supposed to be a negotiation session over the condition of the ceasefire, arranged by the UN, and the USA, and of course the Egyptian authorities. And the Hamas did not even send their negotiators. So one can assess that they might know, in advance, that this ceasefire will not hold, due to an event that's going to happen. It happened at 9:30 am, while the ceasefire started at 8 o'clock in the morning, local time of course.[/b] One can also assess that since Hamas authorities, Hamas leadership, is sending their negotiators, and did not send them, they are part of this plan. Anyway, tactical wise, it's just infeasible that any other power -- unless Hamas will conduct such a planned operation in the region that Hamas is so rooted -- it might be some soldier, or some element from other organizations working as a proxy under the umbrella of the Hamas, no doubt planned by the Hamas.

(2) The attack and kidnapping made use of a civilian human shield who came in under the cover of the ceasefire

There are all indicators that the event is genuine, and really happened. Analysis of what we know about the event demonstrates it was well-planned. It was involved with, let's say, first of all, a decoy. A civilian starts to approach their home on their street and by that came to some kind of a contact with the IDF troops, under the umbrella of the ceasefire. Under this decoy, elements of the Hamas came out from the tunnel, start shooting, then launche[ed] a suicide attack that of course attract[ed] a lot of attention. And during this event, when some soldiers were wounded and the chaos -- the few seconds of chaos -- a different element, and what we think, kidnapped one of the junior officers in the field.

Israel’s noted peacenik Amos Oz has seen the light: One has no choice but to respond with force to neighbors who shoot at your children while holding their own children in their lap or who dig tunnels to kill your kids from a nursery school on their side of the border.

Finnish and Italian reporters have openly conceded that Hamas is using human shields to cover their aggression, though our own media, notably the New York Times, still prints only those pictures that Hamas wants it to, and that excludes shots of Hamas’ aggression and the significant casualties to their own people caused by Hamas’ tactics and mishaps. The United Nations' UNWRA looks even worse, for it is inconceivable that it was unaware of the fact that Hamas was using its facilities to hide weapons and to engage in aggressive warfare from them. They abetted real war crimes, not the lunatic fancied ones of Navi Pillay.

In any event, though the answer is clear to all who are not like Pillay, clearly for Israel’s destruction, or desperate like Kerry (and presumably President Obama, his boss) to curry favor with Qatar and the internationalists who despise Israel, there are those who cannot bear to face the truth -- that they have been wrong for so long, blinded by media-megaphoned propaganda, anti-Western bias, and dangerously fluffy thinking about peace in the face of naked, unremitting hatred and aggression.