Operation Iron Swords - Day 14 - 20 October 2023
Palestinian armed group Hamas launched thousands of missiles at Israel and deployed its militants to infiltrate Jewish settlements near the country’s border with Gaza on 07 October 2023. The 1,200 Israelis killed on the first day would be the equivalent of 36,000 Americans killed in an attack, as a proportion to Israel’s population of 9.3 million people (compared to 332 million in the USA). Israeli President Isaac Herzog stated: “Not since the Holocaust have so many Jews been killed in one day". PM Netanyahu stated "On October 7th, Hamas murdered 1,400 Israelis. Maybe more. This is in a country of fewer than 10 million people. This would be equivalent to over 50,000 Americans murdered in a single day. That’s twenty 9/11s. That is why October 7th is another day that will live in infamy."
Israel bombarded Gaza relentlessly, killing at least 4,137 people and destroying entire neighbourhoods, according to Palestinian officials, The Gaza health ministry said over 13,000 were wounded in Israeli air raids. About 1,300 people across Gaza are believed to be buried under the rubble, alive or dead, according to health authorities, including 600 children. The Occupied West Bank saw 81 killed and 1,400 wounded, while Israel numbered 1,403 killed and 4,932 wounded. At least 306 Israeli soldiers had been killed since war started. The IDF military spokesman added that the army had confirmed information about 203 persons detained in Gaza and about 100 missing person.
A fresh report from Türkiye's Center for Countering Disinformation offers further insights into a recent video shared by Israel's official state account on social media, regarding the bombing of Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza, showing that the Israeli narrative of the attack is false and misleading. The report said the footage shared on the official Israeli state social media account with the headline "We have evidence for those still questioning what happened to the hospital in Gaza", contains manipulation. The Center has reached the conclusion that the missiles launched from Gaza were aimed at Israel, and the hospital that suffered the devastating strike was not situated in the path of those missiles.
Desmond Travers, who spent 40 years in the Irish military, was part of the famous three-member [Goldstone] United Nations Fact-Finding Mission, which investigated war crimes during the Israeli incursion into Gaza in 2008-09.
"I have investigated rockets that were fired from Gaza that failed to exit Gaza during past conflicts and I do not consider that they were very lethal when they impacted. In the two or three cases, I examined the damage they did and it was negligible. For that reason whatever occurred in the hospital in Gaza, I do not think was caused by a Palestinian Jihad rocket.
"An expert whose opinion I respect in the West has come up with an opinion based upon the impact size of the detonation and the sound of the detonation and their opinion is that this was an impact from a missile or a guided bomb and that the missile or bomb would be 100 to 250 kilogrammes. There are many Western bombs and missiles that fall into such a category and those bombs and missiles are available to NATO in the West. And indeed with the Israeli defense forces....
"I do not think the Palestinian groups have a munition of 100 kg to 250 kg payload. They haven't arrived at that level of competence yet.... But that does not redeem them because we know from the terrorism in Ireland that people can place quantities of explosive material in a particular site and detonate it, of course, but I do not agree with the Israeli estimation that it was a Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket. ...
"[The fact that there’s not a deep enough crater] could suggest the use of an improvised explosive device whose energy went upwards rather than downwards. In other words, it was in place before it exploded rather than dropped from an altitude. The other explanation is that a missile of some sophistication can have a proximity fuse, which prevents it from creating a crater because a crater is a waste of energy. A crater means a lot of the explosive energy does not do what is intended for it to do, which is to destroy the surrounding area. Missiles with proximity fuses are designed to explode at a certain distance above ground. And that technology is very definitely with one side (Israel) and not with the other."
If Israel enters the Gaza Strip with a ground operation, then another 10,000-15,000 Palestinians will die, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh said. Blind support for Israel "provides a license to kill," so Palestine hopes that the US will not go in this direction, as Israel is not under threat of existence, Shtayyeh told CNN, adding that the White House should urge the parties to work out a peaceful solution together. The Palestinian prime minister added that the current US leadership lacks the political will to end the conflict between Palestine and Israel.
Bloomberg reported that while early into the conflict, Israel promised “coordinated strikes from the air, sea and land” on Hamas; its military later indicated that the ground operation “might be something different from what you think.” Bloomberg noted this change in tone came after an unprecedented string of visits to Israel by high-ranking US officials, including President Joe Biden himself. According to three unnamed senior Israeli officials interviewed by the news agency, the role and influence of the US in the Israel-Hamas conflict are “deeper and more intense than any exerted by Washington in the past.”
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant met with his country’s service members stationed near Gaza, telling them to “get organized, be ready” for the offensive. “Whoever sees Gaza from afar now, will see it from the inside,” he said.
Defense Minister Gallant briefed parliament’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, said The first stage was the current military operation meant to destroy Hamas’s infrastructure, Gallant said, adding that the intermediate phase would include “operations at lower intensity” eliminating “pockets of resistance.” The minister said “The third phase will require the removal of Israel’s responsibility for life in the Gaza Strip, and the establishment of a new security reality for the citizens of Israel.”
Due to the narrowness of the Strip, most Israeli bombers will be able to launch their deadly payloads from outside Gazan airspace – above Israeli territory on the eastern side and above the Mediterranean Sea on the western side. Smart bombs can glide for distances sufficient to keep the aircraft out of reach of very few, limited-capability, anti-aircraft launchers that defenders are believed to have.
Coordinated land and sea attacks will follow, coming from multiple directions all at the same time, likely around midnight. This will give attackers six hours of night-vision advantage at a time when most of the Arab world and Europe is asleep and the American continent prepares to wrap up the day.
Land forces will go through the separation wall Israel built around Gaza with ubiquitous armoured bulldozers breaching the barriers, digging up and shoving aside anti-tank and anti-personnel mines that the Palestinian fighters probably laid. They will be flanked by Merkava tanks and dismounted infantry, and followed by infantry companies in armoured personnel carriers. The initial objective will be reaching built-up areas before dawn as the Israelis will want to see daylight from fortified defendable positions when the expected first Hamas counterattacks happen.
An article by the writer in the Israeli newspaper “Maariv” stated that on the morning of the “Black Saturday” operation, the Israeli army coordinator in the region, Colonel Ghassan Alyan, said to Hamas, “You have opened the gates of hell upon yourselves,” and the words were to the movement and through it the entire Arab world.
As many as 80% of Israelis believe Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should take responsibility for the security failures exposed by the deadly October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel. Even among voters who support Netanyahu's ruling Likud party, 69% said he should accept responsibility. Netanyahu was polling far behind former Defence Minister Benny Gantz, the head of an opposition centrist party who joined a unity government last week. Some 48% of respondents thought Gantz would be a better prime minister, compared with only 28% for Netanyahu.
The Israeli army's chief of staff, the head of military intelligence and the head of the Shin Bet domestic intelligence service all admitted their services failed.
For the second Friday in a row, the occupation imposed strict measures on Palestinians entering the Old City of Jerusalem and arriving at Al-Aqsa Mosque to perform Friday prayers. The occupation deployed its forces at various doors, and set up physical barriers to enable it to check the identities of passers-by, while dozens of Palestinians performed prayers in front of the doors leading to the mosque. The Islamic Endowments Department in Jerusalem estimated the number of people who were able to reach Al-Aqsa Mosque and perform prayers at about 5,000 only, at a time when the number of worshipers was estimated at tens of thousands before the recent restrictions.
The IDF struck over a hundred operational targets belonging to Hamas terrorist organization overnight and killed a Hamas operative who took part in the murderous massacres in southern Israel. Overnight, IDF fighter jets struck over a hundred terror targets belonging to the Hamas terrorist organization, including an underground tunnel, weapon warehouses, and dozens of operational command centers.
During the strikes, Amjad Majed Muhammad Abu 'Odeh, a Hamas naval operative was who took part in the massacre of Israeli civilians in southern Israel, was neutralized. In addition, a terror squad belonging to the Hamas aerial array was neutralized in a targeted strike in Gaza City, after they attempted to fire rockets at a jet. In addition, terror assets and weapons located in a mosque in the Jabaliya neighborhood were destroyed, which was used as observation posts and staging ground by Hamas terrorists.
In response to Hezbollah fire of anti-tank missiles across the border throughout the day, the IDF conducted a number of strikes against Hezbollah terrorist organization infrastructure, including observation posts. In addition, IDF fighter jets struck three terrorists who attempted to launch anti-tank missiles toward Israel.
US President Joe Biden gave the second primetime speech to the nation of his presidency from behind the historic Resolute Desk. Presidents traditionally reserve speeches from the solemn setting of the Oval Office for moments of key national significance. Biden's only previous address from there was in June 2023 when he hailed a deal with Congress to avert what would have been a catastrophic US debt default.
Biden said he would make an "urgent" request to Congress for funding to help Ukraine and Israel, arguing that this was an investment for the United States' future on the world stage for decades to come. "American leadership is what holds the world together," Biden said . Hamas and Russian President Vladimir Putin "represent different threats, but they share this in common: They both want to completely annihilate a neighboring democracy," he added. "We cannot and will not let terrorists like Hamas and tyrants like Putin win. I refuse to let that happen."
Fresh from a whirlwind trip to Israel this week, the Democratic president wants to win over war-weary voters and hardline Republicans as he ramps up his 2024 reelection bid. His 15-minute speech was a call to Americans to overcome deep political divisions and unite behind support for two conflicts that he said posed a critical threat to the US despite being an ocean away.
"We can't let petty partisan angry politics get in the way of our responsibility as a great nation," said Biden said, with the Stars and Stripes and a flag of the US presidential seal behind him. "America is a beacon to the world. Still. Still," he said. Biden also called for an end to a surge in both anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim prejudice in the United States, especially after the killing of a six-year-old Palestinian-American boy in an alleged hate crime linked to the Israel-Hamas conflict. "To all of you hurting, I want you to know, I see you," he said. "You're all American."
The White House was teeing up a huge request to Congress for a package of more than $100 billion. The package includes $60 billion for weapons for Ukraine and $14 billion for Israel. It also includes $7 billion in security assistance for Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific region to counter threats from China, $14 billion for security on the southern US border with Mexico and $10 billion in humanitarian aid for conflict zones, it said. Biden said the money was a "smart investment that's going to pay dividends for American security for generations."
Biden asked Congress for nearly $106 billion in extra funding to provide further support to Ukraine, Israel, the Indo-Pacific region, as well as to fund operations on the US southern border, the White House Office of Management and Budget said. The supplemental package includes $61.4 billion for Ukraine, half of which is to provide Kiev with weapons and replenish US military stocks, White House said. Moreover, $14.3 billion is for Israel, which includes $10.6 billion for security assistance such as air and missile defense support, industrial base investments and replenishment of US weapons stocks, according to the document.
As a presidential address, Joe Biden’s speech tailored to garner support for supplementary funding of Israel and Ukraine was a “failure,” “illogical,” and “a sort of muddled vision of what he thought he was doing,” Professor Joe Siracusa, political scientist and dean of Global Futures, Curtin University, Perth, Australia, told Sputnik. “What he did in it was he conflated what's going on in Gaza with what's going on between Ukraine and Russia. They're not comparable. So he conflated these two things, and then he asked for money to cover both of these in the House of Representatives, saying that both Hamas and Russia pose ‘existential threats’ to their neighbors. That's not true. Russia's relationship with its neighbor is a long, complicated one, going back to czarist Russia, Soviet Russia, in the modern times, not the same kind of thing,” the pundit clarified.
Furthermore, the speech by the 80-year-old POTUS “infantilizes the American public,” the former Professor of Human Security & International Diplomacy (RMIT University) believed. “The American public doesn't know that much about foreign policy... Biden speaks for the foreign policy elite. These are the people who got us [United States] bogged down in Vietnam, who lost Iran, they lost Iraq… lost Afghanistan, and so on and so on. The foreign policy public in America is very small. But the elites or the neocons kind of run the show for Biden in the background,” Professor Joe Siracusa underscored.
Asking Congress for supplementary funding for Tel Aviv, along additional aid to the Kiev regime amid waning resolve among lawmakers, as well as the American public, to further bankroll NATO’s proxy war against Russia in Ukraine is a “tough sell” for Biden, Joe Siracusa assured. "I think Americans are just a little weary of this," he pointed out.
"I reckon that the Russian-Ukraine conflict has come to about an end. Most Americans are done with it because they understand there's an adjustment there. But in terms of bankrolling Israel, the United States is looking over its shoulder at increasing confrontation in the region or beyond. Those two aircraft carriers there are not to deter violence, because Joe Biden hasn't deterred violence anywhere. I mean, it happens anyway. They are there to tell Israel's enemies that an attack on Israel right now from either Iran or Hezbollah or other places will be met with American counteraction. And that's the one thing you do not want to fool around with," he said.
As many as 56% of US citizens are critical of the way President Joe Biden is handling the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestinian group Hamas, while 44% are of the opposite view, according to a poll released 20 October 2023. The survey split heavily along party lines, with 66% of Democrats happy about the president's policy in the conflict, whereas 72% of Republicans disapprove of it. Opinions also divided on whether the United States should provide military aid to Israel, with 57% of Republicans supporting this idea and 53% of Democrats against. Meanwhile, 70% of Democrats threw support behind sending humanitarian aid for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip versus just 41% of Republicans. The survey was conducted among 1,878 US adults residents from October 16-19. The margin of error does not exceed 2.9 percentage points.
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
