Israel accepts truce ‘principles’

Israel has agreed “on the principles” of a ceasefire proposal, raising hopes of an end to its conflict with Palestinian militants in Gaza.

“The challenge now is to get the details to match the principles,” Israeli spokesman Mark Regev said.

The Palestinian militant group Hamas said there were “positive signs but no agreement yet”.

The UN Security Council in New York has resumed discussions on the proposal, put forward by France and Egypt.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the US supported the Franco-Egyptian initiative and that she had spoken to Arab ministers and the Israelis about moving forward on it.

She added that the US did not want a ceasefire that would return Israel and the Palestinians to the “status quo” preceding the conflict.

Israel wants to stop rocket attacks on southern Israel and to stop Hamas smuggling weapons into Gaza via Egypt, while Hamas says any ceasefire deal must include an end to Israel’s blockade of Gaza.

Israel said it was not sure how long the diplomatic process would take and that a working arms embargo on Hamas was needed.

In a statement released on Wednesday, France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy welcomed “the acceptance by Israel and the Palestinian Authority” of the French-Egyptian ceasefire plan. The statement did not mention Hamas.

Tony Blair, Middle East envoy for the Quartet of the UN, US, Russia and EU, told the BBC he was hopeful that the ceasefire proposal would succeed.

The building blocks of a plan had been agreed but the details had still to be worked out, he said, which would take hard work over the coming days.

Source: BBC News

Filed under: MidEast, Breaking News, France, Hamas, IDF, India, Iraq, Israel, News, Operation Cast Lead, Pakistan, Politics, Russia, Terror, Terrorism, The Terror Journal, U.N, U.S.A, UK, War, World News

Targeting terrorist financial networks

Despite being under geographic siege and financial sanction, Hamas was still able to smuggle some 80 tons of explosives, roadside bombs and longer-range rockets into Gaza over the course of the past cease-fire.

Were it not for that success, Hamas would not have been able to continue firing rockets at the South, let alone effectively control Gaza. Denied access to regular trade routes and international banking, Hamas developed alternative mechanisms such as an extensive network of smuggling tunnels, taxes and custom fees, and increased reliance on charitable front organizations.

It is ironic, then, that one of the most effective counterterrorism tools since 9/11 has been targeting terrorists’ finances. Disrupting terrorists’ means of financial support frustrates their ability to operate, while following the money trail up and down the financial pipeline can reveal to investigators otherwise covert terrorist networks.

As the current conflict illustrates, these tools face multiple challenges, the most pressing being the ability to be flexible enough to keep up with a constantly moving target. And therein lies the fundamental catch-22: In response to each successful disruption of illicit financing, be it of a terrorist, proliferation or other illegal nature, our adversaries change the way they raise, move and store.

For example, crackdowns on terrorist organizations’ use of banks have led groups to turn to far less sophisticated methods of moving money. This includes the growing use of cash couriers, bulk cash smuggling and informal remittance brokers such as hawala dealers.

Source: By Matthew Levitt and Michael Jacobson Jerusalem Post

Filed under: Analysis, Afghanistan, Hamas, Hezbollah, IDF, India, Iraq, Israel, Operation Cast Lead, Pakistan, Russia, Terror, Terrorism, The Terror Journal, U.S.A, UK

Extremists drawing up a “hit list” of U.K’s leading Jews

Frears grew last night that hate-filled Islamic extremists are drawing up a “hit list” of Britain’s leading Jews — bringing the Middle East conflict terrifyingly close to home.

TV’s The Apprentice boss Sir Alan Sugar and Amy Winehouse record producer Mark Ronson are among prominent names discussed on a fanatics’ website.

Labour Peer and pal of Tony Blair Lord Levy, Foreign Secretary David Miliband and Princess Diana’s divorce lawyer Anthony Julius are also understood to be potential targets.

British anti-terror expert Glen Jenvey is convinced online forum Ummah is being used to prepare a deadly backlash against UK Jews.

On the Ummah site, “Saladin1970” asks for help compiling “a list of those who support Israel”.

“Abuislam” asks: “Have we got a list of top Jews we can target? Can someone post names and addresses?”

Saladin1970 gives a link to the Power 100 list of top British Jews.

Mr Jenvey, 43, said: “The Ummah website has been used by extremists.

“Those listed should treat it very seriously. Expect a hate campaign and intimidation by 20 or 30 thugs.”

Al-Qaeda’s second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri called on Muslims yesterday to strike Western and Israeli targets “wherever you can”.

And Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar urged the murder of Jewish children, saying Israel “legitimised the killing of their people all over the world”.

The Community Security Trust, which advises Britain’s Jewish community on safety, said: “We are advising prominent Jewish individuals to be conscious of potential threats.”

The group has recorded 24 anti-Jewish incidents since December 29, including an arson raid on a London synagogue.

There have also been synagogue attacks in France and Sweden.

Sir Alan was understood to be reviewing security.

The Foreign Office refused to discuss Mr Miliband’s security.

Source: The Sun

Filed under: Europe, Gaza strip, Hamas, Hit list, IAF, IDF, Israel, Kassam Rockets, Operation Cast Lead, Palestine, Palestinian Authority, Qassam Rockets, Terror, Terrorism, The Terror Journal, U.N, UK

Israel conditionally welcomes cease-fire proposal

Israel tentatively welcomed a proposal Wednesday for a Gaza cease-fire and ordered regular suspensions of its offensive to allow aid to reach Palestinian civilians, but also instructed the military to press ahead with its assault on Hamas.

Despite the reservations, the proposal offered by France and Egypt could mark the first sign of a possible exit from 12 days of bloodshed in Gaza, accompanied by continued Hamas rocket fire on southern Israel.

Israel ordered a three-hour pause in its Gaza offensive Wednesday to allow food and fuel to reach besieged Palestinians, and allowed in 80 trucks of supplies as well as industrial fuel for Gaza’s power plant.

Medics tried to retrieve bodies in areas that had previously been too dangerous to approach. Ambulance sirens wailed as drivers rushed to the border crossing with Egypt to evacuate the wounded during the relative lull.

Several Israeli airstrikes were reported immediately after the 1 to 4 p.m. halt ended, and Hamas resumed rocket fire.

Col. Moshe Levi, a Gaza liaison officer, told reporters the plan is to open the corridor daily. Peter Lerner, a military spokesman, said the corridor would more likely be open every other day, depending on security.

The precise details of the Egyptian-French proposal remain unclear, but it comes as international outrage grows over civilian deaths in Gaza.

About 300 of the more than 670 Palestinians killed so far were civilians, according to Palestinian and U.N. figures. Of those killed, at least 130 are children 16 and younger, says the Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights, which tracks casualties.

Israel has lost six soldiers since launching a ground offensive on Saturday — four of them to “friendly fire” — and four other Israelis have been killed by rocket fire, three of them civilians, since fighting began on Dec. 27.

Source: Associated Press

Filed under: MidEast, Ceasefire, Gaza strip, Hamas, IAF, IDF, Israel, Kassam Rockets, Operation Cast Lead, Palestine, Palestinian Authority, Qassam Rockets, Terror, Terrorism, The Terror Journal, U.N

Will Gaza deal succeed?

Israel wants Operation Cast Lead to end in a political agreement based on a new monitoring system and the prevention of smuggling along the Egypt-Gaza border. The system would rely on an existing security committee comprising representatives from Israel, Egypt, the Palestinian Authority and the United States. Hamas would not be represented, nor would it be a party to understandings or agreements, though it is expected to continue to control the Gaza Strip.

That is the political process being advanced by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, in conjunction with the ground incursion in Gaza. The idea was discussed at the meeting during which Olmert, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni approved the ground operation, and is being handled by the Prime Minister’s Bureau, together with officials from the defense and foreign ministries. The Bush administration is maintaining contact with Israel through phone calls and e-mails, and for the moment is holding off on sending even low-level envoys to the region.

The deal in the works is reminiscent of the Grapes of Wrath understanding that governed the cease-fire between Israel and Lebanon after an Israel Defense Forces operation in the spring of 1996.

At the time, a monitoring group consisting of Israel, Lebanon, Syria, France and the United States was established to deal with violations of the agreement, which banned firing on civilians. Hezbollah was not party to the agreement, but the assumption was that Syria would be able to influence it.

In the present situation in Gaza, Israel opposes a UN Security Council decision that would force a cease-fire – as did Resolution 1701, which put an end to the Second Lebanon War. Israel doesn’t want to grant Hamas legitimacy by allowing it to be a signatory to a deal, and wants the Palestinian Authority to play the role of the Lebanese government in 1996 and represent the Palestinians.

Source: By Aluf Benn Haaretz

Filed under: Analysis, Ceasefire, Gaza strip, Hamas, IAF, IDF, Israel, Kassam Rockets, Operation Cast Lead, Palestine, Palestinian Authority, Qassam Rockets, Terror, Terrorism, The Terror Journal, U.N

No war with India – Pakistani spy chief

The chief of Pakistan’s powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency has said there will not be a war with India over November’s militant attacks on the Indian city of Mumbai, Der Spiegel reported. Lieutenant-General Ahmed Shujaa Pasha told the German magazine in an interview terrorism, not India, was Pakistan’s enemy, and he said he took orders from the civilian president.

“There will not be a war,” Pasha said. “We are distancing ourselves from conflict with India, both now and in general.”

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stepped up a war of words Tuesday, saying for the first time the assault “must have had the support of some official agencies in Pakistan.”

Pasha said that soon after the Mumbai attack, Pakistan had anticipated an India military response.

“At first we thought there would be a military reaction. The Indians, after the attacks, were deeply offended and furious, but they are also clever,” he said.

“We may be crazy in Pakistan, but not completely out of our minds. We know full well that terror is our enemy, not India.”

The Pakistani government had initially offered to send Pasha to India to help with the investigation but withdrew the offer, apparently after objections from the top brass.

Pasha told Der Spiegel he had been willing to go to India.

“Many people here are simply not ready,” he said in the interview, published on Spiegel Onlne.

Source: Reuters

Filed under: Asia, India, ISI, Mumbai, Mumbai 26/11, Mumbai Terror Attacks, Pakistan, Terrorism, The Terror Journal

Rockets rock Israel as shells shatter Gaza

Israeli artillery Tuesday struck near a U.N. school sheltering civilians in Gaza, killing at least 40 people after, according to the Israeli military, Hamas militants fired mortars from the location.

“We face a very delicate situation where the Hamas is using the citizens of Gaza as a protective vest,” Israel Defense Forces spokesman Brig. General Avi Benayahu said after the incident.

The Israeli strike was one of three on U.N. school properties in Gaza since Monday. An Israeli artillery shell struck an empty boys school in Jabalya on Tuesday, and an Israeli airstrike killed three men at an elementary school being used as a shelter in Gaza City on Monday, a U.N. agency said. The United Nations called for an independent investigation into all three strikes.

A total of nine rockets and mortar shells hit Israel throughout Wednesday morning. One person was lightly wounded and a number of people suffered from shock when a Grad-type rocket hit the Be’er Tuvia region near Ashdod. A building on the premises was damaged. Impact sites were also reported in Sha’ar Hanegev region, Eshkol region, Kibbutz Sdot Negev, and Ashkelon.

Following the mortar shell attack on Kibbutz Sdot Negev, a fire erupted.

The Israel Defense Forces said a mortar-firing operation and a pair of prominent Hamas operatives — Imad Abu Askhar and Hassan Abu Askhar — were at the occupied school hit Tuesday. The two were among the Hamas militants killed in the strike, an IDF statement said.

“This is not the first time that Hamas terrorists have used Palestinian civilians as human shields and has exploited their deaths for the benefit of the international media,” an Israeli statement read. “Israel will continue to treat as valuable the lives of all Palestinian civilians and refuses to devalue the lives of Gaza residents in the manner of Hamas.”

Source: CNN/Jerusalem Post/Haaretz

Filed under: MidEast, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ban Ki moon, Beersheba, Ceasefire, Gaza strip, Hamas, IAF, IDF, Israel, Kassam Rockets, New York, Operation Cast Lead, Palestine, Palestinian Authority, Qassam Rockets, The Terror Journal, U.N

UN Secretary General call for ceasefire

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has called for an immediate end to fighting in the Gaza Strip during a meeting of the UN Security Council in New York.

“We need urgently to achieve Palestinian unity and the reunification of Gaza with the West Bank within the framework of the legitimate Palestinian Authority,” Mr Ban also urged Security Council members to act “swiftly and decisively to put this crisis to an end”.

Israeli attacks continued overnight and there were reports of further fighting around Gaza City and in Khan Younis in the south.

An Israeli attack on Tuesday on a school building, which Israel says was sheltering militants, left at least 30 people dead and 55 injured, UN officials say.

As Operation Cast Lead concluded its harshest 24 hours on Tuesday after the IDF lost five soldiers, senior defense officials revealed that the army was prepared to deploy in the entire Gaza Strip, if necessary.

At least 3 IDF soldiers killed by friendly fire

Defense Minister Ehud Barak will decide in the coming days whether Israel should expand the ground operation against the Hamas terrorist infrastructure, they said.

Since the ground operation was launched on Saturday, IDF troops from several infantry and armored brigades have, according to Palestinian reports, taken up positions throughout northern Gaza – near Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanun, Jabalya, Saja’iya and al-Atatra.

Source: BBC News/Jerusalem Post

Filed under: MidEast, Ban Ki moon, Ceasefire, Gaza strip, Hamas, IAF, IDF, Israel, New York, Operation Cast Lead, Palestine, Palestinian Authority, The Terror Journal, U.N

Egypt propose a truce plan

Israel and Hamas studied a proposal by Egypt for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday that won immediate backing from the United States and Europe, hours after Israeli shells killed 42 Palestinians at a U.N. school.

However, Israeli officials also said ministers would discuss a major escalation of their 12-day-old offensive that would push troops deep inside Gaza’s cities and refugee camps in their bid to end rocket fire into Israel by Islamist militant groups.

A Palestinian official said Hamas leaders, who want an end to Israel’s blockade of the coastal enclave, had been briefed in Egypt on the proposals by President Hosni Mubarak and were debating them internally.

Israeli officials have said they too are willing to look seriously at plans that would satisfy their demand that Egypt cut off Hamas’s supplies of smuggled weapons.

Mubarak made his ceasefire call at a joint news conference in Egypt with French President Nicolas Sarkozy. He gave little detail, but diplomats have described a process that would focus on bringing in foreign forces to seal the Egypt-Gaza border to Hamas arms smugglers while easing other trade routes.

Sarkozy, winding up a two-day tour of the Middle East, said: “I am confident the Israeli authorities’ reaction will make it possible to consider putting an end to the operation in Gaza.”

Source: Reuters/Associated Press

Filed under: MidEast, Ceasefire, Egypt, Gaza strip, Hamas, IAF, IDF, Israel, Operation Cast Lead, Palestine, Palestinian Authority, The Terror Journal

Obama Breaks Silence!

“We are going to engage effectively and consistently in trying to resolve the conflicts that exist in the Middle East,” he told reporters, adding that “the loss of civilian life in Gaza and Israel is a source of deep concern to me, and after January 20th, I am going to have plenty to say about the issue.”

After days of studied silence on the Gaza conflict, Obama promised yesterday “to hit the ground running” on achieving a broad Middle East peace deal

President-elect Barack Obama will inherit a perilous situation in the Middle East, with Israel under increasing pressure to halt its ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, key Arab leaders close to the United States greatly weakened and the Hamas militant group earning resurgent popularity in the region.

One of Obama’s biggest challenges will be to craft diplomatic solutions that do not have unintended consequences. Good intentions only go so far in the Middle East, and today’s battles often can be traced to choices made by the Israeli government or the Bush administration that ended up backfiring in unpredictable ways.

The Bush administration also did not effectively push Israel to negotiate its 2005 withdrawal from Gaza with Abbas, who had just been elected president after Arafat died. Abbas wanted to demonstrate that he could negotiate with the Israelis, but Jerusalem withdrew from Gaza unilaterally, as had been the plan when Arafat was still alive.

Source: Washington Post

Filed under: America, Barack Obama, Ceasefire, Gaza strip, Hamas, IAF, IDF, Israel, Mahmoud Abbas, Operation Cast Lead, Palestine, Palestinian Authority, The Terror Journal, U.S.A