Israel's Transparent Bullshit Justification for Invading Palestinian Gaza

is contained in a report titled, Summary of rocket fire and mortar shelling in 2008, which was put out by the "Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at the Israel Intelligence Heritage & Commemoration Center (IICC)" dated: [January] 1 בינואר 2009

Overview:
1. The year 2008 saw the peak of rocket use by Hamas and the other terrorist organizations operating in the Gaza Strip. Last year, the terrorist organizations managed to significantly increase the scope of rocket attacks. They gradually put nearly one million Israeli civilians living in the south (about 15 percent of the entire population) within the range of the rockets, and posed a security challenge to Israel, prompting it to launch Operation Cast Lead.

2. Rocket fire and mortar shelling first started in 2001, gradually becoming the major threat posed by the Palestinian terrorist organizations, which consider it an asymmetrical, simple, cheap, and reliable solution to Israel’s military superiority. The rockets, while still having their share of problems and shortcomings, in the terrorists’ view, allow them to disrupt the lives of Israeli civilians within the range of fire, destabilize their social fabric, override the security fence built by Israel along the Gaza Strip, and create a kind of balance of terror that makes it difficult for Israel’s security forces to conduct counter-activities and reflects the terrorist policy
of Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip.

3. Following are three major characteristics of the use made by Hamas and the other terrorist organizations of rockets during 2008 (see chapter on statistical data for details):
a. A dramatic increase in the extent of rocket fire and mortar shelling despite the six months long lull in the fighting: in 2008, the peak year of rocket fire and mortar shelling, a total of 3,278 rockets and mortar shells landed in Israeli territory (1,750 rockets and 1,528 mortar shells). That is a significant increase compared to 2007 (the number of landings in 2008 more than doubled) and compared to the previous years of the Palestinian terrorist campaign.

b. A significant increase in the number of Israeli residents exposed to rocket fire within 40 km of the Gaza Strip: before 2008, the city of Sderot (about 20,000 residents) as well as villages around the Gaza Strip were the preferred target of rocket fire and mortar shelling. In 2008, other cities and hundreds of thousands of Israelis gradually entered the circle of fire: first the cities of Ashkelon and Netivot, and later, during Operation Cast Lead, Ashdod, Beersheba, and other cities within a range of 40 kilometers from the Gaza Strip. The rocket attacks created a new reality in which nearly one million Israeli residents (about 15 percent of the entire population) are exposed to rocket fire and mortar shelling in various levels of intensity.

c. A significant improvement in the effectiveness of rockets and mortar shells possessed by Hamas and an increase in their quantity: in 2008, Hamas put into use 122-mm Grad launchers (for ranges of 20.4 km and approximately 40 km) and standard 120-mm mortars, which were smuggled into the Gaza Strip (in our assessment, from Iran). Those standard rockets and mortars, significantly different from self-manufactured rockets and mortars, not only increased the range of fire but also increased its effectiveness. That is a result of increasing the rockets’
warhead size and their fragmentation. As for the mortars—the standard 120-mm mortars are more precise and their range is greater than that of the other mortars possessed by Hamas and the other terrorist organizations.

4. The quantity of rockets held by Hamas and the other terrorist organizations has also increased, currently reaching, in our assessment, a constant supply of several hundred self manufactured 90 and 115-mm rockets and an unknown quantity of self-manufactured long-range rockets capable of attaining greater ranges (up to 19 km). Also, we assess that Hamas has dozens of standard long-range Grad rockets (122-mm) with a range of 20.4 km and a range of approximately 40 km, smuggled into the Gaza Strip through the tunnels in the Rafah region, some during the lull in the fighting.

5. As a result of the rocket and mortar shell fire, eight people were killed in 2008, four of them during Operation Cast Lead.1 During that operation, 58 people were injured as a result of rocket and mortar fire, 10 of them moderately and severely (as at December 31, 2008). Also, several dozen civilians were injured as a result of the rocket fire in 2008 (prior to Operation Cast Lead), and several hundreds suffered stress-related traumas. The number of fatalities, injuries, and stress-related traumas in 2008 is added to the number of casualties in the previous years of the confrontation (2001-2007): 10 civilians were killed, 434 were wounded, and thousands of civilians suffered from anxiety, shock, and various traumas as a result of the fire. The continuing fire of rockets and mortar shells has a severe, cumulative psychological effect on the population, causing severe damage to its social structure and severe damage to its feeling of safety. The fire also disrupts the efforts to promote a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians (the Annapolis process) by creating a lasting 1 In 2008, 21 people were killed as a result of terrorist attacks originating in the Gaza Strip, out of 31 killed as a result of terrorist attacks during that year (Summary of 2008 by the Israel Security Agency). reality of rocket fire and counter-measures by Israel, which reached their peak in Operation Cast Lead.

The rest of the report consists of charts of statistical data based on "complimentary studies," for which links are not provided:

"To complete the data and analysis in this document, one can draw upon four fundamental papers written by the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center in 2008:

a. Rocket threat from the Gaza Strip, 2000-2007 (December 2007)
b. Hamas’s military buildup in the Gaza Strip (Updated April 2008)
c. Anti-Israeli Terrorism in 2007 and its Trends in 2008 (May 2008)
d. The Six Months of the Lull Arrangement (December 2008)"

This escalation of threat levels to new "large Israeli cities exposed to rocket fire," is totally and completely false. It is a made up lie by the powers-that-be to try and vilify the nearly inconsequential Palestinian opposition to Jewish occupation of their land by lobbing home-made mortars over the border. Suddenly, one million Israelis were under threat of rocket attack:

Ashdod 208,900
Beersheba 186,800
Ashkelon 110,000
Kiryat Gat 47,900
Rahat 43,300
Yavne 32,300
Netivot 26,100
Ofakim 24,700
Kiryat Malachi 19,700
Sderot 19,400

The truth is that under 50,000 settlers in cities like Sderot and surrounding areas have been under the shocking threat of un-aimed firecracker-explosive-like munitions. This is the response since 2001 from a powerless and exploited people to the theft of their homeland. Many of the people of Gaza came literally from the farms and villages now occupied by Zionist settlers whom they engage in this fashion. Ultimately, that engagement can be said to be effective since it has brought us to this day that God gave us.

Every one of these rocket attacks since December 27th, including the three supposed fatalities, is a false-flag, self-dealt blow, a public relations stunt, a self-terrorizing ploy by Israeli leaders to traumatize their own citizens. I can have nothing but compassion for the average Israeli who in the face of lies of this magnitude have responded like sheep as they were told too.

To attribute to Chinese manufacture these new rockets with a range up to 40-km, is a demonstrable and provable lie. The international arms community is organized and qualified enough to uphold the truth of this without accusations of "black market" smuggling or subterfuge. In fact, that the Sichuan Aerospace Industry Corporation, would even set out to make a new munition like the WS-1E rocket, saying it "is compatible with legacy 122mm rockets"---in other words, it is the same small, lightweight, hand-carried instrument, which is the most advanced weapon used by Hamas in Gaza, only with twice the range---is evidence of Israeli and United States involvement at the highest levels of the military-industrial complex. This is the manufacture of reality, not weaponry.


Israel states unequivocally within this report that a rocket which landed near Gan Yavne on December 28 was the Chinese made WS 1-E, but globalsecurity.org states just as unequivocally, that "The WS-1 series weapon system did not enter PLA service, and has not received any orders from foreign customers," stating,

"The WS-1E is compatible with legacy 122mm rockets. Each rocket is 2.94 meters in length, weighs 74 kg, carries a18 or 22 kg warhead, and is capable of engaging targets located at ranges between 20 and 40 kilometers. The WS-1E is the 122mm multiple rocket system developed by SCAIC as a successor to the PLA’s current Type 81 122mm rocket system. It is similar to the Type 90 122mm rocket system, but did not enter production."

This is clear proof that the whole story of new rockets with a range between 20-km and 40-km is an an elaborate hoax put out by Israeli psychological-warfare operators, and the scores of actual missiles which may, or may not, have landed in these advanced areas, were launched by Israel itself, in a false-flag bid for sympathy and justification for attacking Gaza.


This a psychological warfare conceit, for some reason didn't pan out.