Soccer Dad

Gaza tidbits

The Muqata and Israelly Cool are liveblogging. So is the IDF Spokesman.

A tidbit from the former:

4:19 PM Critically wounded soldier medivacked by IAF helicopter from Gaza frontline to Israeli hospital. His family has been notified.

Zvi Yehezkeli (Channel 10 TV) reports that the machine gun weaponry firing at IDF troops now in Gaza City were given to the PA and Fatah by Israel as a "sign of goodwill, confidence-building measure."

from the latter:

9:10PM: Interesting poll results reported by the Palestinian Ma'an News: Near East Consulting surveyed Palestinian residents of the Gaza Strip in late December, where results found that a full 60 percent of Palestinians there believe Hamas made a mistake by not seeking to renew the ceasefire with Israel.

Which means 40% do support Hamas' decision. Hardly a small minority. But read on.

Just a slim majority of Palestinians in Gaza support rocket fire against Israeli targets, with about 54 percent in favor of the continuing bombardment. A nearly identical percentage of Israelis support the ongoing airstrikes on the Gaza Strip, incidentally.

You just have to love that last sentence. Professional and objective reporting at its finest.

The next best thing to liveblogging is doing roundups, which is what Jack's doing. His latest are 6.5, 7, 7.5 and 8. In the latest he comments:

Why does it irk me? Well because there are so very many examples of barbaric behavior by Hamas yet so many useful idiots choose to chastise Israel for disproportionate force, a term they don't really seem to understand.

During the Israel-Hezbollah war of 2006, I did something like this. It was a lot of effort, but I didn't do anything as ambitious as what Jack's doing. If you don't want to go all over the place looking for sources, Jack's roundups are an excellent starting point! You can also check out memeorandum.

Barry Rubin sent a link to Everything you wanted to know about Hamas but was afraid to ask (pdf, 55 pages long). I found this observation of particular interest. I'm guessing that (responding to and adjusting to) this is guiding Israel's battle plans.

6. With that in mind Hamas developed a defensive concept according to which it would refrain from using its full military potential during the first stages of the fighting, reduce engaging the IDF in open areas and channel the fighting into denselypopulated built-up areas. Its objective would be to exhaust the IDF forces and cause its soldiers as much bloodshed as possible while continuing its attacks on the Israeli home front with rocket fire (according to the Hezbollah model in the second Lebanon war). At the same time it would preserve the survival capabilities of its operatives and military infrastructure. All of the above would enable Hamas to represent itself as having "defeated" the IDF when it withdrew from the Gaza Strip, again, according to Hezbollah's model after the second Lebanon war.

Also, this is great.

One radio program was interrupted with a man's voice saying, "Hamas leaders are lying to you and they are hiding in hospitals." Launching rockets puts civilians in danger."

A television program was interrupted with a voice stating, "Hamas leaders are hiding and they are leaving you on the front line."

I hope they keep this up and name Hamas leaders in these broadcasts.

(h/t Barry Rubin again)