Free Republic

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told Fusion TV´s Jorge Ramos that part of the reason Hamas hides rockets in schools and civilian areas is "Gaza is small." "I´m not a military planner but Hamas puts it´s missiles, it´s rockets in civilian areas, part of it is Gaza is pretty small and its densely populated," she said as neglecting the question of whether or not Hamas should have rockets in area to begin with.

Hamas have signed an arms deal with North Korea in order to replenish its deplete rocket arsenal, after thousands were either fired at Israeli civilians or destroyed in IDF strikes in recent weeks, according to The Telegraph. […] North Korea’s authoritarian regime has well-established ties with a variety of Islamist terrorist groups and militias in the Middle East, as it seeks alliances with anti-western forces in the region. Its relationship with Hamas in particular was exposed in 2009, when a massive shipment of arms—including heavy weaponry—was seized at Bangkok airport, after the plane transporting the deadly cargo was forced to...

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.” 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. Hamas has prepared a...

During United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s visit to Israel on Tuesday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu presented him with the rockets and operating methods of Hamas terrorists. Netanyahu showed Ban, among other things, some of the long-range rockets that Hamas has used to target central Israel. Netanyahu also showed the UN chief some proof that Hamas has been using civilians as human shields.

Support for Operation Protective Edge among the Israeli Jewish public remains strong, and a majority say that Israel has racked up more successes than Hamas since the beginning of the campaign, which entered its ground phase last week, a poll conducted by Israel Hayom and the New Wave Research firm shows. When asked if they supported or opposed Israel's ground incursion into Gaza, 80 percent of respondents replied that they supported it, 12 percent said they opposed it and 8 percent said they didn't know. When asked if Israel should expand its current ground operation, 71 percent of respondents said...

Delta Air Lines is canceling all flights to Israel until further notice, citing reports that a rocket landed near Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion Airport. A Delta Boeing 747 from New York was flying over the Mediterranean headed for Tel Aviv on Tuesday when it turned around and flew to Paris instead. Flight 468 had 273 passengers and 17 crew on board. US Airways, which has one daily flight from Philadelphia, canceled that flight Tuesday and the return trip from Tel Aviv. United Airlines, which has two flights daily to Israel out of Newark, N.J., did comment immediately on the status...

Hamas and Egypt are at odds over an unconfirmed cease-fire deal with Israel, Walla! News reports Tuesday—after Cairo refused to add to the terms of its mediation unprecedented “conditions” tempering the move. Hamas, which has rejected not one, but three separate ceasefire attempts, called on Israel over the past week to submit to a number of “conditions”—or demands—in return for an end to the violence against Israelis. The calls were accompanied by threats against the Israeli people, made through a series of weakly-worded text messages. These “conditions” include, among other things, greater access to international waters, reopening of border crossings,...

In a notably critical interview, Michael Oren emphasizes that Israel would prefer Egyptian, not American, mediation Michael Oren, who until recently served as Israel’s ambassador in Washington, said US envoy John Kerry was coming to the region “to our chagrin.” US Secretary of State John Kerry is expected in Cairo Monday for discussions surrounding a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. The White House said Kerry would seek “an immediate cessation of hostilities based on a return to the November 2012 ceasefire agreement,” and stressed the need to protect civilian life both “in Gaza and in Israel.” In strikingly outspoken comments...

The UN agency for Palestinian Arab “refugees,” UNRWA, has caused outrage by apparently giving rockets to Hamas. On Thursday, UNRWA confirmed that 20 rockets had been found in one of its vacant schools in Gaza. UNRWA staff said last week that they had “informed the relevant parties and successfully took all necessary measures for the removal of the objects.” However, Channel 2 reports Sunday that—rather than destroying the rockets—UNRWA workers called Hamas to come remove them. …

Things that shouldn’t be there have a way of turning up at the omnipresent installations of the world’s largest bureaucracy known as the United Nations. Back in the days when Kofi Annan was UN Secretary General, it was black boxes from crashed planes unearthed from filing cabinets at UN Manhattan headquarters.

A special delegation of firefighters from across the US arrived in Israel with one goal: To help firefighters from Israel's rocket battered south deal with ongoing rocket fire. Fire fighters in the south have been working ceaselessly to since fighting began ten days ago, and their mission include searching for the rockets as well as extinguishing the resulting blazes. Between the rockets attack from Gaza and rumors of ceasefire, little attention has been paid to the plight of Israel's firefighting forces in Sderot and other southern communities, however a group called Emergency Volunteer Project aims change that and work with...

Hamas agreed on Wednesday night to a temporary humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, but not before firing another salvo of rockets towards Israel. "The group agrees to a ceasefire for five hours," starting from 10:00 a.m. local time Thursday, Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said in a statement quoted by the AFP news agency. "The Palestinian factions agreed to accept the offer from the United Nations for a cooling-down on the ground for five hours starting from 10 in the morning," he told the news agency. Shortly before 2:00 a.m. Thursday morning, however, sirens were heard in the Eshkol region, Hof...

10% of Qassams fired never even make it out of the  dinky Gaza Strip- some see this as intentional Ironic it is -given the non-stop trumpeting of civilian woes seen in Hamas' (and liberal Western) media- that many of the Palestinian civilian casualties are the result of crude, home-made Qassam missiles gone haywire and roaring into neighborhoods... not exactly the respect for life you see with the IDF's intelligent targeting/notification systems, and killing their own to boot.  But they've always treated Gaza's cramped populace as chaff to be expended whenever deemed useful (or just steam to be blown-off) and the more cynical among us...

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon ordered the Israeli Air Force to resume strikes over Gaza Tuesday afternoon, six hours after a ceasefire proposed by Egypt, accepted by Israel and rejected by Hamas, was due to go into effect. During those hours, dozens of Hamas rockets raked town after town and village after village. DEBKAfile: The White House called off US Secretary of State John Kerry’s Cairo visit upon finding Tehran’s hand behind the rockets. Netanyahu goes on the air at 8 p.m. to explain what went wrong. Straight after the ceasefire was due to go into...

Sirens are sounding again at 10:36 am throughout the Eshkol region, after a volley of rockets fired less than one hour after Israel’s Security Cabinet agreed to a cease-fire mediated by Egypt landed in open areas. Two rockets have hit in open areas. No injuries or damage were reported. Sirens sounded at roughly 10:00 am in Ashkelon, throughout the Eshkol region, and in communities near Gaza. Two rockets fell in open areas in the Eshkol region; no injuries or damage have been reported. Israel accepted the truce in a surprise move Tuesday morning, after Hamas categorically rejected the notion of...

The UN's special refugee agency for Palestinians, UNRWA, reported Sunday that about 4,000 residents of northern Gaza have fled their homes after the IDF told them to do so, starting last night. In addition, about 850 Palestinians with foreign nationalities are leaving Gaza through the Erez checkpoint. Three hundred of these had already done so by the early afternoon. Israeli aircraft dropped leaflets on border areas in northern Gaza, calling on the citizens to evacuate their homes before noon Sunday as it prepared to bomb the area. The IDF warned that those who do not obey their instructions will be...

I was watching a segment on Fox about the current Hamas rocket attack on Israel. Evidently, hundreds of rockets have been launched in the past few days. Three questions occured to me. One, where did all these rockets come from (who manufactured them)? Two, who paid for these rockets? Three, how did these rockets get into Gaza? Were they smuggled in from Egypt?

Sirens sounded Saturday evening in northern Israel as rockets were apparently fired from Lebanon into the Jewish state. The sirens sounded in Nahariya, Rosh Hanikra, Shlomi, Kabri and Hanita, along the border with Lebanon. Initial analysis said that the rockets were apparently fired from Lebanon by a Palestinian Lebanese terror group. "Two rockets fired from Lebanon hit uninhabited areas in the Nahariya region," a coastal town around 12 kilometers (seven miles) from the border with Lebanon, an army spokeswoman told AFP. Israel responded with artillery fire targeting the firing points. A Lebanese security source told AFP at least one rocket...

In a reminder of the Middle East’s intertwined nature, the latest violence between Israel and Hamas has U.S. and Israeli officials lamenting the role of a key actor hundreds of miles east of Gaza: Iran. “Who is the enabler for Hamas? Where do they get those rockets?” asked House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce Friday morning. “It’s Iran.” […] “Iran continues to do everything it can to push rockets into Gaza,” says Israel’s ambassador to Washington, Ron Dermer. “Iran obviously is a supporter of Hamas. And Islamic Jihad is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Iran.” (Islamic Jihad is militant group...

Edited by Joel Leyden Israel News Agency Jerusalem --- July 11, 2014 ... The following was communicated by the Israel Prime Minister's Media Adviser to the Israel News Agency. Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, today at the Israel Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv, issued the following statement: "This is the fourth day of Operation Protective Edge. The Israel Defense Forces, the Israel Security Agency and the security forces are fighting Hamas with increasing intensity. As of now, we have hit over 1,000 Hamas', Islamic Jihad and other terrorist organizations' targets, and we are still busy. The pace of attacks in...