![\"\"](\"http:\/\/proutistuniversal.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/mideast-1123s.jpg\" "\\"mideast-1123s\\"")
<\/a>Gaza buildings destroyed. Photo from CNN WebSite.<\/p><\/div>\n
In The Politics of Genocide<\/strong>, Edward Herman and David Peterson wrote:\u00a0 \u2018The vulgar politicisation of the concept of genocide, and the \u201cemerging international norm\u201d of humanitarian intervention, appear to be products of the fading of the Cold War, which removed the standard pretexts for intervention while leaving intact the institutional and ideological framework for its regular practice during those years.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n We Must Blow Gaza Back To The Middle Ages<\/strong><\/p>\n With the above in mind, consider that, on November 16, on the third day of Israel\u2019s latest assault on Gaza, with at least 18 Palestinians already killed, the BBC reported<\/a>: \u2018Israel’s aerial bombardment of Gaza has intensified after it authorised the call-up of 30,000 army reservists, amid reports of a possible ground offensive.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n Israel’s cabinet quickly approved the activation<\/a> of 75,000 reservists, as well as hundreds of Merkava main battle tanks, armoured bulldozers and other assault vehicles, which were transported into position for attack.<\/p>\n Was a massacre looming?<\/strong> The Israeli deputy prime minister Eli Yishai appeared to promise<\/a> as much on November 18: \u2018We must blow Gaza back to the Middle Ages destroying all the infrastructure including roads and water.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n Gaza: school. From CNN WebSite<\/p><\/div>\n A prominent front-page article<\/a> in the Jerusalem Post by Gilad Sharon, son of the former Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, openly advocated\u00a0 mass killing:\u2018We need to flatten entire neighbourhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza.\u201d \u2018There should be no electricity in Gaza, no gasoline or moving vehicles, nothing. Then they\u2019d really call for a ceasefire.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n Was the call to ‘Flatten all of Gaza’ beyond the pale of respectable discourse? <\/strong>Apparently not for the BBC, which quoted<\/a> a less frenzied comment by Sharon three days later.\u00a0 Recall the human cost of Operation Cast Lead, Israel’s three-week offensive waged between December 2008 and January 2009. The Israeli human rights group B\u2019Tselm reported:<\/p>\n \u2018The magnitude of the harm to the population was unprecedented: 1,385 Palestinians were killed, 762 of whom did not take part in the hostilities. Of these, 318 were minors under age 18. More than 5,300 Palestinians were wounded, of them over 350 seriously so.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n Comparison Table of numbers killed on both sides since 2000<\/p><\/div>\n There is no question, then, that a \u2018Benghazi moment\u2019 had arrived for Gaza<\/strong> around November 16 or shortly thereafter. A Cast Lead-style\u00a0 massacre of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of civilians was a very real possibility.\u00a0 Did\u00a0 Hamas rockets had killed more civilians, for example in Tel Aviv?<\/p>\n Gaza is under decades of military occupation and years of siege<\/strong>, greatly strengthening the moral case for external intervention. Escape from a ground assault would have been completely impossible for Gaza’s 1.6 million people, about half of them children.\u00a0 Gaza has been targeted by the\u00a0 most advanced weaponry US taxpayers\u2019 money can buy<\/strong>.<\/p>\n By any reasonable accounting, then, the case for a no-fly zone<\/strong>, indeed a no-drive zone<\/strong> \u2013 some kind of humanitarian intervention<\/strong> \u2013 was far\u00a0 more compelling for Gaza than it had ever been for Libya. And yet our search of the Lexis media database found no mention in any UK newspaper of even the possibility of setting up a no-fly zone over Gaza. There was no reference to Gaza\u2019s \u2018Benghazi moment\u2019.<\/p>\n We saw no commentary suggesting that Western military action might have been justified to prevent a massacre of civilians in Gaza.<\/strong><\/p>\n We wrote<\/a> to Neely: \u2018Bill, are the attacks on Gaza \u201cterror attacks\u201d? Have you described them as such?\u2019 The November 21 bus bombing, injuring 28 Israelis (initially reported as ten injured), was a far bigger story for the media than the killing of 13 people in Gaza that day. The bias was reflected in the tone of coverage. The BBC reported<\/a> ‘Horror in Israel’<\/em> whereas they had earlier referred<\/a> to a ‘difficult night for people in Gaza’<\/em> after 450 targets had been struck with scores of people killed.<\/p>\n The final death toll<\/a> of the latest massacre is horrifying: 103 of the 158 people killed in Gaza were civilians. Of these, 30 were children \u2013 Twelve\u00a0 of them under ten-years-old. More than 1,000 Palestinians were injured. Six Israelis were killed,<\/a> two of them soldiers. This infographic<\/a> provides a shocking comparison of numbers killed on both sides since 2000. And this<\/a> excellent little animation asks: ‘Is this what they mean by the cycle of violence?’<\/p>\n Inevitably President Obama said<\/a><\/strong>: \u2018we will continue to support Israel’s right to defend itself\u2019.\u00a0Noam Chomsky has been a rare voice making the counter-argument<\/a>:<\/strong><\/p>\n Noam Chomsky<\/p><\/div>\n You can’t defend yourself when you’re militarily occupying someone else’s land. That’s not defence. Call it what you like, it’s not defence.\u2019\u00a0 Obama also said: \u2018There is no country on Earth that would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders.\u2019 A war was fought without an Israeli ground assault but with massive air and rocket attacks on both sides. Israel did\u00a0 not have the appetite and perhaps the power to crush Hamas. Hamas did not have the power to compel Israel to change its policies but wanted to achieve a symbolic victory against Israel. Both decided that continued fighting made little sense<\/strong>. And 23 rd Nov. they agreed on a cease fire brokered by the Americans and Egyptians to for a settlement. \u00a0Everyone from Iran to the\u00a0 Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood played a role, and then the curtain on this act went down for the time being to flare it again till Gaza cease to remain an open air prison. Freedom is the \u00a0birth right of every citizen.<\/strong><\/p>\n Source: Media Lense – David Edwards<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Edited by: Ac: Krtashivananda In The Politics of Genocide, Edward Herman and David Peterson wrote:\u00a0 \u2018The vulgar politicisation of the concept of genocide, and the \u201cemerging international norm\u201d of humanitarian intervention, appear to be products of the fading of the Cold War, which removed the standard pretexts for intervention while leaving intact the institutional and … <\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/proutistuniversal.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/mideast-1124s.jpg\" "\\"mideast-1124s\\"")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"http:\/\/proutistuniversal.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/vp-violence-timeline-2012-11-23_0-200x150.png\" "\\"vp-violence-timeline-2012-11-23_0\\"")
<\/a>Terror attack in Tel Aviv?<\/strong><\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/proutistuniversal.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/mideast-1121s.jpg\" "\\"mideast-1121s\\"")
<\/a>One week<\/strong> into Israel\u2019s Operation Pillar of Cloud<\/strong>, on a day when 13 Palestinians were killed \u2013 with more than 136 people in Gaza\u00a0 killed by that point in 1,500 attacks since the operation began on November 14 – 28 people were injured <\/a>in a Tel Aviv bomb attack. ITV News’s international editor Bill Neely commented<\/a>: \u2018Tel Aviv bus bomb is first terror attack there in 6 years.\u2019 And<\/a>: \u2018Israeli Police confirm terror attack.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n
\n<\/em>Neely wrote<\/a> again;\u2019A bomb on a bus, like a missile, is terror weapon.\u2019
\n<\/em>\u2018’Is This What They Mean By The Cycle Of Violence?’<\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/proutistuniversal.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/Noam-Chomsky.jpg\" "\\"Noam-Chomsky\\"")
<\/a>
\n<\/em>Try telling that to the many bereaved<\/a> in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Yemen. Irony is \u2018dead,\u2019 it seems \u2013 killed by drone-fire.<\/em><\/p>\n