If Israel is forced to ultimately undertake an expanded ground operation in which dozens of young Israelis and hundreds of Palestinian civilians could lose their lives, it would be appropriate to name the offensive after the person who caused it: John Kerry. But if the escalation does not happen, instead we should remember that those who prevented it are three people the Obama administration loathes: Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi, Benjamin Netanyahu and Moshe Ya’alon.There was an explosion at Shifa Hospital (used by Hamas as a safe haven) which immediately was blamed on Israel, but now appears likely to have been a Hamas rocket misfire. We will update as the day goes on.
Heavy clashes in Libya between army troops loyal to a renegade general and Islamist-led militias have killed 38 people—including civilians—in the country's restive east, health officials said Sunday. A security official said the fighting involved forces loyal to Gen. Khalifa Hifter and militias in the eastern city of Benghazi. The clashes started Saturday and continued through early Sunday morning. The official said commando forces regained control of four military camps captured by Islamist militias in the past few days. Health officials said rockets fired during the fighting hit civilian homes, causing casualties and wounding dozens of people.
BREAKING: 158 Americans evacuated from U.S. embassy in Libya amid spiraling militant violence http://t.co/QQPbDZdmIo
— NBC News (@NBCNews) July 26, 2014
Secretary of State John Kerry announced during an overseas trip on Saturday that the United States is temporarily suspending its diplomatic activities in Libya. Diplomats were quickly moved to locations in nearby Tunisia after the militias attacks had struck Tripoli's airport which is close to the U.S. embassy:
The draft Kerry passed to Israel on Friday shocked the cabinet ministers not only because it was the opposite of what Kerry told them less than 24 hours earlier, but mostly because it might as well have been penned by Khaled Meshal [the political head of Hamas who lives in Qatar]. It was everything Hamas could have hoped for. The document recognized Hamas' position in the Gaza Strip, promised the organization billions in donation funds and demanded no dismantling of rockets, tunnels or other heavy weaponry at Hamas' disposal. The document placed Israel and Hamas on the same level, as if the first is not a primary U.S. ally and as if the second isn't a terror group which overtook part of the Palestinian Authority in a military coup and fired thousands of rockets at Israel.It gets worse, as I suspected Kerry is seeking to make Hamas a post-war power, Ravid reports:
Israeli media reporting that Hamas is staring to break. Rocket fire down 50%. Gaza neighborhoods captured. Hamas members surrendering.
— Gidon Shaviv (@GidonShaviv) July 24, 2014
We will update when more is known, but you can follow the events in the live video and Twitter feeds at the bottom of the post.
A ceasefire that allows Hamas to rearm and reload likely will be unacceptable to Israel in light of the discovery that Hamas had planned a massive Rosh Hashonah attack through the tunnels that are being destroyed:
Israel’s Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu revealed on Thursday that Hamas was intending to attack Israel from dozens of tunnels in a coordinated simultaneous attack. At the beginning of Thursday’s special cabinet meeting the prime minister said, “These tunnels enable the enemy to open a multi-pronged offensive and carry out a massive terror attack inside Israel.” According to security officials cited by Israeli daily Ma’ariv, the political echelon needs to give the military more time to eliminate the tunnels since “we are now not even halfway through.” The attack Hamas was planning, the officials say, “would have made Israel drop to its knees.” They added that even the tunnels destroyed until now takes away from Hamas a strategic asset the terror group has been working on for years..IDF officers estimate that the job of destroying all the tunnel infrastructure will take another ten days to two weeks to complete:
The American effort will always be multiplied by the amount of trust between the two leaders. So if Kerry's pressure represents the number five, and then Obama's help brings the number to ten, it really doesn't matter. You're still multiplying it by zero. The final result will always be zero.The amount of trust---or distrust---between the two leaders reflects the amount of distrust between the two countries and their peoples. Peace plans sometimes have been entered into by these two groups (or Israel and other Palestinian groups) for temporary tactical reasons, but that's about it. The Palestinian government does not recognize Israel's right to exist and Hamas is a terrorist group dedicated to its destruction. But for various reasons both have become the darlings of Europe and the Left, and that helps tie Israel's hands to a certain extent. But "partners for peace" they ain't.
Driven by increased ground combat between insurgents and government forces, civilian casualties in Afghanistan surged 24 percent through the first half of the year, reaching their highest levels since 2009, according to the United Nations. The findings were released just as a Taliban attack unfolded in the densely populated center of Kandahar, the main city in southern Afghanistan. At least nine people were killed in the Kandahar assault and the ensuing gun battle, including four civilians, Afghan officials said, violently illustrating how ground fighting, as opposed to improvised explosive devices, has emerged as the deadliest facet of the war. The United Nations report said that the death toll this year was especially high for women and children.The Afghan runoff election results are highly questionable due to allegations of serious fraud committed by the outgoing Hamad Karzai regime and ballot stuffing by the apparent winner, Ashraf Ghani. Ghani's vice presidential candidate is former Afghan warlord General Abdul Rashid Dostum. Seen as more moderate than Ghani, Presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah claimed victory on Tuesday in Afghanistan's disputed election, blaming fraud for putting him behind in preliminary results as fears rise of instability, ethnic unrest and Taliban military successes:
The Australian government will not refer to East Jerusalem as “occupied, territory” the government said in a statement on Thursday, in what one legislator called a “massive shift” in foreign policy Attorney General George Brandis explained Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop’s position that using the word “occupied” was judgmental and does not contribute to the dialogue about the contested area, the Australian Associated Press reported.The move came, in part, as an Australian reaction to the verbal abuse Palestinians heap on anyone who supports Israel (been to a campus lately?):
Australia’s decision to stop referring to East Jerusalem as “occupied” territory and to adopt additional similar steps that will likely please Israel and anger the Palestinians came as a retaliatory measure against Palestinian officials who in recent months repeatedly and ferociously attacked Canberra’s Middle East policies in public, The Times of Israel has learned “The Australian government is irritated by how the Palestinians have chosen to pursue their disagreements with us in public,” a senior Australian source told The Times of Israel Thursday. “This is the kind of behavior you’d expect from the leaders of a student union but not from a government-in-waiting.”As expected, the Palestinians heaped even more abuse on the Australians:
The United States said on Monday it plans to work with and fund the new Palestinian unity government formed after an agreement by the Fatah and Hamas factions, and Israel immediately voiced its disappointment with the U.S. decision. he United States views Hamas as a "terrorist" organization and the U.S. Congress has imposed restrictions on U.S. funding for the Palestinian Authority, which typically runs at $500 million a year, in the event of a unity government. Senior U.S. lawmakers said on Monday Washington should suspend aid to the new unity government until it is sure of the Islamist group's commitment to pursuing peace with Israel. In its first comment since the Palestinian government was sworn in, however, the State Department stressed that it regarded the new Cabinet as made up of technocrats and that it was willing to do business with it.Following the U.S. lead, the EU and U.N. quickly announced acceptance of the coalition. We now have open conflict between the U.S. and Israel based on the U.S. backing out of understandings with regard to Israeli refusal to negotiate with the PA if Hamas were part of the coalition. Via The Times of Israel:
The select committee that will probe the attacks in Benghazi will have seven Republicans and five Democrats, according to sources familiar with the GOP leadership’s plans. A resolution to create the committee will come to the floor Thursday and is expected to pass by a wide margin. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) tapped South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy to chair the panel.And it's pretty obvious that Hillary will be a primary focus:
On May 7, 2013 during one of the many House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearings on Benghazi, Rep. Trey Gowdy, his voice slightly shaken with emotion, had the following ringing words to say – and for their sake, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama better have been listening: “so if anyone wants to know what difference does it make, if anyone wants to ask what difference does it make (in reference to the now infamous Hillary Clinton quote) – it always matters whether you can trust your government – and to the families of the victims – we are going to find out what happened in Benghazi and I dont give a damn who’s career is impacted – we are going to find out what happened.” Rep. Gowdy will now be able to completely fulfill that promise, and in the process, could destroy the political careers of one or both of the most powerful Democrats in America.Rand Paul is encouraging the focus on Hillary:
A possibly fictional demographic time bomb is no reason to expose Israelis to real bombs....
The two groups — the Palestine Liberation Organization, which runs the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, and Hamas, the militant Islamist group that dominates the Gaza Strip — have reached similar accords before that were never carried out. But the latest deal comes as the fragile American-brokered peace efforts between the Palestinians and Israel are approaching an April 29 deadline without a resolution in sight. People familiar with the discussions have said the Israeli and Palestinian sides were far apart even on how to extend the talks past the deadline.The Times article ends in typical understatement.
Analysts remained skeptical about whether the Palestinian reconciliation efforts would lead to a tangible change on the ground, because neither of the factions has shown interest in genuine power-sharing in the past, and they have deep differences over how to deal with Israel, which Hamas does not recognize. Even so, some experts said that the latest effort at reconciliation appeared more serious than past attempts, because both factions are under growing pressure. Gaza under Hamas has been severely weakened by an Egyptian crackdown on the smuggling tunnels along the Gaza-Egypt border and an Israeli blockade. And Mr. Abbas, for his part, has faced growing criticism from West Bank residents about the negotiations with Israel and his own legitimacy, with Palestinian elections long overdue. He has threatened to dissolve the Palestinian Authority, which exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank, if the talks with Israel end in failure.No Hamas does not recognize Israel. It is also a genocidal terrorist organization devoted to destroying Israel. Note terror is not mentioned.
The Obama administration has been waging a secret media war in capitals across two continents blaming Israel for the recent collapse of peace talks with the Palestinians, according to former Israeli diplomats and Washington, D.C. insiders familiar with the peace process. Multiple sources told the Washington Free Beacon that top Obama administration officials have worked for the past several days to manufacture a crisis over the reissuing of housing permits in a Jerusalem neighborhood widely acknowledged as Israeli territory. Senior State Department officials based in Israel have sought to lay the groundwork for Israel to take the blame for talks collapsing by peddling a narrative to the Israeli press claiming that the Palestinians were outraged over Israeli settlements, the Free Beacon has learned. These administration officials have planted several stories in Israeli and U.S. newspapers blaming Israel for the collapse of peace talks and have additionally provided reporters with anonymous quotes slamming the Israeli government. The primary source of these multiple reports has been identified as Middle East envoy Martin Indyk and his staff, according to these insiders, who said that the secret media campaign against Israel paved the way for Secretary of State John Kerry to go before Congress on Tuesday and publicly blame Israel for tanking the talks.It makes sense. The John Kerry clown show has so mangled things, talking out both sides of the clown car, that the end result of Israel taking the blame was a foregone conclusion. John Podhoretz writes, Contemptible John Kerry blames Israel for his own mess:
Kerry was for a Jewish State as part of a peace deal before he was against it....
Or is this story even true? Is it actually one of those "good-cop/bad-cop" tales instead? It's difficult to say, but I vote ever-so-slightly for "true." My opinion of John Kerry is very low, but I think more of him than I do of Obama. The following seems...
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