Qassam-2’s My ass!
An Israeli warplane killed a Hamas militant Thursday with a missile strike on a donkey cart he was riding in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian witnesses and medics said.
Donkey cart — nice visual... wait til they do the Paleo-swarm (hat tip to LGF) on the donkey’s carcass. Which pieces are which??? Oh, the humanity!
They identified the man as Hamdi Kabach, an operative in the Izz al-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic militant faction, and said three other Palestinians were wounded in the attack in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis. Israel radio said Kabach was responsible for rocket attacks on Israel. The Israeli army had no immediate comment.
"I can say no more™"
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Thursday he had ordered Israel’s army to take "all necessary steps" against Palestinian militants after they fired a rocket into a large Israeli city for the first time. "I have instructed the minister of defense to take all necessary steps to avoid such actions in the future," he told reporters in Jerusalem after the rocket strike into Ashkelon, which caused no damage or casualties.
Eight Israeli tanks and two armored bulldozers rumbled into the Beit Hanoun area and began felling trees about half a mile from a residential zone. An Israeli security source told Reuters, "We are leveling shrubbery, bushes and trees used as shelter for the (Hamas militant) cell that fired the Qassam rocket." Israel warned earlier that the attack may have crossed a "red line" threshold for serious military action inside Palestinian-administered Gaza after Islamist militant factions called off a seven-week-old truce.
| That was after the boomed a busload of people. We have to keep repeating that, lest we forget and history change right out from under us... |
The rocket strike into an industrial zone of Ashkelon, a coastal city of 116,000 people 6 miles north of the Gaza boundary, was the farthest a Qassam had been fired into Israel since a Palestinian uprising for statehood began in 2000. Palestinian officials said Palestinian security forces had rushed to Beit Hanoun shortly after the rocket was fired to rein in Hamas militants responsible, preventing further launchings.
yeah, riggghhttt
"Hi! We're the Paleostinian Security Forces. Did youse guyz fire off a rocket?"
"Nope. Wudn't us."
"Hokay." |
"There was a chase and a shootout," a Palestinian security official told Reuters shortly before Israel’s incursion. "Our forces are still searching the area in the northern Gaza Strip."
"See anybody, Mahmoud?"
"Nope. Don't see nobody. How 'bout you, Achmed?"
"Nary a soul... Oh! Wait! There's somebody!"
"That's a chicken."
"Sorry. My mistake." |
"We can’t see nothing with these blinders on, dammit!"
Islamic militants renounced their truce, crucial to a troubled U.S.-backed "road map" peace plan, after Israel assassinated a Hamas political leader in a missile strike following a suicide bomb attack in Jerusalem by a Hamas man based in the West Bank.
Dontcha just love that wording? Skim it, and you can tell what bad guyz those Zionists are. Perhaps if it was reworded: "Islamic militants renounced their truce, crucial to a troubled U.S. backed "road map" peace plan, by blowing a bus full of non-combatants. This was followed by Israel zapping a Hamas political leader in a missile strike." |
Israeli troops have been poised at the entrance to northern Gaza since Hamas and Islamic Jihad renounced the cease-fire. New volleys of Qassams have since hit Jewish settlements inside Gaza and communities in southern Israel, causing minor damage and few casualties. Israel fears Qassam strikes also from the West Bank against the nearby densely populated coastal heart of the country. Israeli officials said Thursday’s attack may have breached a "red line" necessitating a major military response.
| You said that before. What'd you do? Combine two stories again? I hate when they do that... |
"It’s crossing a red line ... This is an alarming reality for us," Foreign Ministry spokesman Jonathan Peled told Reuters.
| Cheeze Nips! They said it three times! I think they're just doing it to irritate me... |
The "road map" requires Palestinians to end violence and Israel to pull back forces from occupied territory to pave the way for a Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank by 2005.
| Hey! They could end violence. I think my hair's growing back, too... |
In an apparent clampdown on Hamas affecting thousands of needy Palestinians, the Palestinian Monetary Authority said it had frozen 39 bank accounts held by 12 Islamic charities, most of which are widely believed to be Hamas-sponsored. The move followed a U.S. decision to freeze assets of six top Hamas figures after a suicide bomber killed 21 people in Jerusalem in what Hamas called retaliation for army search-and-arrest raids that continued despite the truce. Hamas denied any official connection with the 12 charities, but many of their directors are former or current senior activists in the organization.
| Just a coincidence, I'm sure... "Well, yes, dear. Those are my secretary's underpants in my briefcase..." |
Several thousand charity recipients, some holding banners reading "Don’t make us beggars" and "We are not terrorists," took to the streets of Gaza City and Rafah in protest after banks refused to cash their monthly welfare checks.
| Golly. I wonder which account pay the actual terrorists? |
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