How Not to Get Shot by a Soldier

Daniel Greenfield
Sultan Knish
09 June '10

The following is intended to serve as a useful guide to various activists, protesters, migrants and other completely non-violent folk who happen to be packing knives, guns, rocks and crowbars. You will encounter soldiers, border patrol officers and various law enforcement and military personnel-- this is how not to get shot by them.

First of all it's important to remember that if you attack an armed man in a uniform, he will very probably shoot you. Even given the most restrictive Rules of Engagement in the world which forbid him from opening fire unless he is outnumbered 600 to 1, there is a nuclear war in progress and only when he has been given specific authorization by the UN to use deadly force-- there will still come a time when he will open fire on you. This will occur when he feels that he or his comrades are in danger. At this point there will be bullets headed your way, and no matter what you learned at your Madrassa or in Protest Studies at Evergreen State High University, you are not bulletproof. Really, you're not.

The good news is that there is a very easy way not to get shot. It starts with you not attacking the nice men in uniform. That means not trying to disembowel them with your peaceful knife and not throwing rocks at their head. Because while you might think that legal activism includes attempted murder, the nice men in uniform think that attempted murder should result in sudden death. And when that happens you will realize that fanatical passion for your poorly thought out cause and a medieval weapon are no match for trained law enforcement officers who have guns and know how to use them.

(Read full article)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.

Hey Peter, There’s a Reason Why “Free Gaza” Doesn’t Help Shalit

Jonathan Tobin
Contentions/Commentary
04 June '10

Peter Beinart weighed in today with another column at the Daily Beast designed to bolster his standing as a “liberal Zionist” rather than as merely another member of the pack of jackals attacking Israel for trying to enforce the blockade against the Hamas regime in Gaza.

Of course, Beinart has not changed his mind about the attempts to isolate the Islamist terrorists who seized power in a bloody coup and who pose the biggest obstacle to the two-state solution to the conflict, which he says he wants. He still buys into the Palestinian myths about the situation in Gaza. And he is equally resolute in his determination to ignore everything that has happened in the Middle East since 1993, when Israel began a series of attempts to buy peace with the Palestinians by trading land for the hope of peace. Because it is only by pretending that 17 years of Israeli concessions never happened that can he hold on to the falsehood that the lack of peace is due to Israeli intransigence aided and abetted by American supporters.

But, at least to his partial credit, Beinart hasn’t forgotten the kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who has been held captive by Hamas for four years. Beinart thinks the “Free Gaza” movement of foreign cheerleaders for Hamas ought to embrace Shalit’s cause and draw a moral equivalence between his plight and that of Palestinians trapped inside Gaza. He urges “Free Gaza” activists and others who are trying to aid Hamas by breaking the blockade to think of Shalit “as a Gazan — a caged, brutalized, Gazan Jew.” In doing so, he theorizes that they could gain the sympathy of Israelis who support the blockade in part because of Hamas’s refusal to free Shalit or even to allow the Red Cross to visit the prisoner. Beinart endorses Israeli journalist Eitan Haber’s proposal that the next ship that heads for Gaza be allowed through by the Israelis on the condition that it bring food to Shalit. That would, Beinart agrees, put the pro-Palestinian crowd to a test that would prove whether they are genuine humanitarians or merely Israel-haters.

Yet unfortunately for Beinart — and Shalit — the “Free Gaza” crowd has already been put to such a test. As I wrote last week, before the flotilla that Israel intercepted was launched in Turkey, the family of Gilad Shalit begged the organizers to take a package of letters and food to the Israeli being held in Gaza. In return, they promised to lend their voices to a call for lifting the blockade. Accepting this offer would have cost “Free Gaza” nothing and would only have given them good publicity and probably would have caused the Israeli government to seriously consider letting them through the blockade. But, in a decision that Beinart and other critics of Israel seemed to ignore, they refused the Shalit family.

(Read full post)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.

Analysis: Gaza aid deaths: how could it happen?

Anshel Pfeffer
The Jewish Chronicle
31 May '10

Flotilla 13, the IDF's naval commandos, were the toast of Israel's military - until yesterday. The recipients of a rare citation for the entire unit from Chief of Staff, Lieutenant General Gabi Ashkenazi, only last month, the "Shayetet" are credited with numerous secret missions far away from the country's shores. According to the non-Israeli press, these missions included interdiction of ships bearing arms from Iran to Israel's enemies in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.

So how were they humiliated by a bunch of club-wielding Turks and literally forced to use live-fire, causing nine deaths and an international crisis of unforeseeable dimensions?

The simple answer was that they were unprepared for the level of violence used by a small group in a contingent that claimed to be peace-seeking. They went into battle holding paintball guns designed for situations of minimal confrontation, harmless stun-grenades and their hand-guns holstered. After 40 minutes of hand-to-hand combat, their commander felt that after one officer had been stabbed, two more knocked and kicked senseless and a third thrown off the deck by a crazed mob, his men's lives were at risk if they didn't use firepower. Only then did he give the order to shoot.

But that is an insufficient excuse. The reality is that despite its much-vaunted intelligence capabilities and the most advanced aerial drones and surveillance systems in the world, the IDF failed to detect the fact that the group standing on the Turkish ferry's top-deck were equipped with an arsenal of metal clubs, catapults, flick-knives and Molotov cocktails and what's more, they were prepared to used them to kill.

(Read full story)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.

Why Gaza aid flotilla is a media success

Anav Silverman
Sderot Media Center
31 May '10

It was exactly the kind of coverage that pro-Palestinian activists behind the Gaza aid flotilla were aiming for: "Deaths as Israeli forces storm Gaza aid ship." Associated Press, BBC, Fox News, CNN and countless other media outlets across the world and even in Israel, carried such headlines, reporting the ensuing diplomatic crisis and worldwide condemnation that quickly followed.

Not surprisingly, this typical knee-jerk reaction by the media and international community to such Mideast confrontations, failed to report the outside circumstances that lead to the unfolding events at sea.

First, allowing the illegal flotilla to reach Hamas would have opened another corridor of weapons smuggling into Gaza, a strategy already in full operation thanks to the tunnel infrastructure between Gaza and Egypt where arms, many originating from Iran, are smuggled through intensively. Under international law, Israel has taken measures to defend its civilians from Hamas terrorism by placing a maritime blockade off the coast of Gaza to prevent such arms smuggling to Palestinian terror groups by sea route.

Indeed, the term 'peace-activists' which was used to describe those on board the Gaza aid flotilla fleet, was a strategic guise for those planning to employ violence against the Israeli soldiers once the fleet was stopped. Similar to Hamas's mode of human shield tactics, where terrorists will fire against Israeli troops while hiding among women, children, and civilian populated areas, the pro-Palestinian protesters also brought along small children on the boats.

(Read full article)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.

10 Deaths Aboard Gaza Flotilla--Is It Because Of Their Terrorist Connections?

Daled Amos
31 May '10

One of the organisers of the flotilla, which includes three vessels from Turkey, is IHH, a humanitarian aid group supported by Ankara.
The Guardian
-----
During the boarding of the ships, the demonstrators onboard attacked the IDF Naval personnel with live fire and light weaponry including knives and clubs. Additionally one of the weapons used was grabbed from an IDF soldier. The demonstrators had clearly prepared their weapons in advance for this specific purpose.

As a result of this life-threatening and violent activity, naval forces employed riot dispersal means, including live fire.

According to initial reports, these events resulted in over ten deaths among the demonstrators and numerous injured, in addition, more than four naval personnel were injured, some from gunfire and some from various other weapons. Two of the soldiers are moderately wounded and the remainder sustained light injuries. All of the injured, Israelis and foreigners are currently being evacuated by helicopter to hospitals in Israel.

Israel Defense Force Spokesperson

The IHH is a humanitarian group? Not by a long shot.

(Read full post)

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.