Hamas admits kidnapping 3 young Israeli men, setting off Gaza war
Source: CBC
A top Hamas official said members of his militant group kidnapped three Israeli teenagers whose deaths in June provoked a spiral of violence that led to the war in Gaza, the first acknowledgement of the movement's involvement.
Hamas, which controls Gaza, has up till now refused to confirm or deny Israeli accusations that it masterminded the abduction and killing of the three young men, one of them a joint U.S.-Israeli citizen, in Hebron.
"There was much speculation about this operation, some said it was a conspiracy," Saleh al-Arouri told delegates at the International Union of Islamic Scholars in Istanbul on Wednesday, according to a recording of the meeting posted online by organizers.
"The popular will was exercised throughout our occupied land, and culminated in the heroic operation by the Qassam Brigades in imprisoning the three settlers in Hebron," he said, referring to Hamas's armed wing. This was an operation from your brothers in Qassam undertaken to aid their brothers on hunger strike in (Israeli) prisons," he added.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/hamas-admits-kidnapping-3-young-israeli-men-setting-off-gaza-war-1.2742649
This may not be earth-shattering news. I'm not sure what it changes but it is something I had not seen before.
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leftynyc
(26,060 posts)using Haaretz as a source:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/113477809
MrNJ
(200 posts)The Israel-haters will find another conspiracy theory to blame Israel for the conflict.
840high
(17,196 posts)won't like the source, etc.
Orrex
(63,208 posts)Last edited Thu Aug 21, 2014, 03:21 PM - Edit history (1)
I've been in a number of these discussions, and I haven't seen too many people (anyone?) defending Hamas, not even "the Israel-haters." Instead, they've condemned Israel for its murderous retaliatory campaign resulting in so many civilian deaths.
I don't see how the kidnapping or murder justifies the killing of hundreds and hundreds of Palestinians, but Hamas needs to be held accountable regardless.
MrBig
(640 posts)There was some debate about whether Hamas actually did kidnap and kill the three Israeli teenagers. Quite a few people on this board, citing poor sources, claimed Israel was actually responsible for the kidnapping and killing of the teenagers and used that as a pretext to attack Gaza.
Therefore, I think the point of this thread is to close the chapter on the question of who was actually responsible for the kidnappings and deaths of the three children.
That being said, while I consider myself Pro-Israeli, I am vehemently anti-Netanyahu and I agree that these murders do not justify the reckless manner in which Israel has responded, causing the deaths of hundreds and hundreds of innocent Palestinians.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)I will quote someone else... mine regarding hamas..
I want to just blow the fuck out of these subhuman thugs
(http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014874797#post10)
Talk about inappropriate. The vengeance dogs of DU are barking quite loudly these days. Dick Cheney would be proud.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)when it comes to terrorism, I don't see so much gray area.
philosslayer
(3,076 posts)No gray areas. Everything is black or white in your world. Kill them all! Let God sort them out! Doesn't matter how many women and children you kill in the process of course. They're all terrorists too! Or at least terrorists in the making!
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)but I don't really have a desire to.
Feel free to have the last word.
NealK
(1,867 posts)funny.
FrodosPet
(5,169 posts)Deranged little suckers!
When are you enlisting, Mr. Rambo?
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)But I suppose it's appropriate for the two people who took the most exception to my statement to bat it around a couple of days later. You guys enjoy yourselves.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)I was just "wow-ed" that someone had the guts to say it.
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)I believe that in that post, I prefaced by saying that I knew I was speaking in the heat of the moment, and that I would get to some calmer place. Well, I've sort of gotten to that place. I don't want a quagmire. I don't want tens of thousands of troops back in Iraq for years. But I have absolutely no qualms about using air and ground resources to kill these people. I'd go so far as to say that those members of ISIS who aren't near civilians should be killed without hesitation, irrespective of whether they're in Iraq or Syria. If I could convey a thought to ISIS, it would be this: my country is not without problems, is not without guilt, but you went beyond the pale, and now you're going to die.
Again, I'm sorry for misunderstanding your earlier post.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)
leftynyc
(26,060 posts)There IS such a thing as righteous anger and I honestly can't think of any place it was more appropriate. IMHO - the ones who took exception sounded like cartoon cut outs of liberals who seem to honestly believe you can sit around a campfire and work out all the world's problems and completely ignore the fact that if isis got a hold of them, their heads and bodies would be in different rooms.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)(http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=876557)
same thing I'd like to do to hamas.... which is basically the same as ISIS.
Archae
(46,326 posts)"The popular will was exercised throughout our occupied land, and culminated in the heroic operation by the Qassam Brigades in imprisoning the three settlers in Hebron," he said, referring to Hamas's armed wing. This was an operation from your brothers in Qassam undertaken to aid their brothers on hunger strike in (Israeli) prisons," he added.
Yeah. Kidnap three unarmed BOYS and shoot them.
REALLY heroic actions there! 
No wonder no other Arab country trusts Hamas.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts) VanGoghRocks
(621 posts)at a West Bank checkpoint in May, i.e., a month before these three teens' kidnapping and murder?
Oh, you were nowhere to be found?
See, because only Israeli teens' lives count.
seveneyes
(4,631 posts)Attrition rate for their members must be high. Dying ain't making much of a living.
sabbat hunter
(6,829 posts)is led by people who are morons and cowards.
kelliekat44
(7,759 posts)tabasco
(22,974 posts)Rationalizing the murder of three innocent children.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)why you're shocked.
tabasco
(22,974 posts)You got a problem with that?
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)So am I.
Iamthetruth
(487 posts)many on here said Israel lied about that. This can't be true, Israel must be guilty.
MrBig
(640 posts)You'll see that lie continue to be repeated on this website, as once something is used to support one's argument, it becomes gospel. Despite Hamas openly admitting to these murders, you'll see plenty of people still say Israel was responsible "and it was proven1!!!11!"
leftynyc
(26,060 posts)the confession is a mistranslation. That's an excuse that seems to never get old.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)
Behind the Aegis
(53,955 posts)leftynyc
(26,060 posts)they're twisting themselves into.
Behind the Aegis
(53,955 posts)If I hit you in the face...I didn't do it, you need to be specific and say "my hand" did it.
Uncle Joe
(58,355 posts)The al-Qassam Brigades and Hamas have a similar makeup to that of Sinn Fein and the IRA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Qassam_Brigades
The Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades are an integral part of Hamas. While they are subordinate to Hamas's broad political goals and its ideological objectives, they have a significant level of independence in decision making. In 1997, political scientists Ilana Kass and Bard O'Neill described Hamas's relationship with the Brigades as reminiscent of Sinn Féin's relationship to the military arm of the Irish Republican Army and quoted a senior Hamas official: "The Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigade is a separate armed military wing, which has its own leaders who do not take their orders and do not tell us of their plans in advance." Carrying the IRA analogy further, Kass & O'Neill stated that the separation of the political and military wings shielded Hamas' political leaders from responsibility for terrorism while the plausible deniability this provided made Hamas an eligible representative for peace negotiations as had happened with Sinn Féin's Gerry Adams.
The fighters' identities and positions in the group often remain secret until their death; even when they fight against Israeli incursions, all the militants wear a characteristic black hood on which the group's green headband is attached. The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades operate on a model of independent cells and even high-ranking members are often unaware of the activities of other cells. This allows the group to consistently regenerate after member deaths. During the al-Aqsa intifada, the leaders of the group were targeted by numerous airstrikes that killed many members, including Salah Shahade and Adnan al-Ghoul. The current leader of the brigades, Mohammed Deif, remains at large and is said to have survived at least five assassination attempts.
There seems to be spoilers on both sides, they feed off each other.
http://blogs.forward.com/jj-goldberg/201172/unruly-hebron-clan-pushes-hamas-and-israel-to/?
The debate erupted into angry verbal confrontations at security cabinet meetings on Monday and Tuesday, reaching a climax at one point when IDF chief of staff Benny Gantz praised the cabinet for adopting a temperate set of counter-measures that avoid escalation into full-scale war. In reply Gantz received a tongue-lashing from economics minister Naftali Bennett of the Jewish Home Party, the cabinet’s strongest advocate of harsh measures. Bennett angrily told Gantz he had no authority to “critique” the ministers’ actions.
(snip)
The third and perhaps most significant line of confrontation is the growing tension between Hamas leaders in Gaza and Damascus and the local Hamas organization in Hebron. The Hebron organization, dominated by one of the city’s oldest and largest clans, the Qawasmehs, has effectively operated for more than a decade as an independent franchise within the fundamentalist movement, and frequently as a radical opposition force and spoiler. The Shin Bet has identified Marwan Qawasmeh, 29, and a family hanger-on, Amer Abu-Eisha, 33, as the kidnappers of the yeshiva students.
Several detailed accounts of the Qawasmeh family’s alleged spoiler role in Israeli-Palestinian cease-fire efforts have appeared in several Israeli and international publications in the last day, claiming, based on Palestinian and Israeli intelligence sources, that the clan staged the kidnapping in order to sabotage the Fatah-Hamas unity pact and reignite armed conflict.
(snip)
Both Eldar and Gibor describe a series of incidents in 2003 and 2004 when the Qawasmehs repeatedly sabotaged cease-fires between Israel and Hamas by staging spectacular terror attacks, each time provoking Israeli retaliation and on several occasions getting senior Gaza Hamas leaders killed. The Gush Etzion kidnap-murder appears to be a the latest in the pattern, coming two weeks after the Fatah-Hamas unity pact that was supposed to include a Hamas cessation of terror attacks.
Read more: http://blogs.forward.com/jj-goldberg/201172/unruly-hebron-clan-pushes-hamas-and-israel-to/?#ixzz3B8cs8TU9
So I imagine the Qawasmehs are heavy backers of the al-Qassam Brigades, as they have a history of sabotaging cease fires and potential peace negotiations?
The Qawasmehs fertilize the grass, Israel "mows the lawn" and the people of Gaza are caught in the middle.
I wonder why did Israel deport democratically elected Mayor Fahd Qawasmeh in 1980 and who killed him in 1984?
No doubt those incidents radicalized at least some powerful members of that formerly moderate clan.
Another member, Fahd Qawasmeh, was mayor of Hebron from 1976 to 1980, and together with several other mayors was an early advocate of a two-state Israeli-Palestinian peace plan. He was exiled to Lebanon in 1980 following a terrorist murder in Hebron and was quickly made a member of the PLO executive committee. He was assassinated in Amman in 1984. The perpetrators were never identified.
After the founding of Hamas in 1988, a different wing of the Qawasmeh clan rose to prominence. The first Israeli press reports on the Qawasmeh terror organization began to appear in 2003 and 2004, after a string of family members became head of Hamas in Hebron and died, one after another, in armed confrontations with Israeli security forces.
Read more: http://blogs.forward.com/jj-goldberg/201172/unruly-hebron-clan-pushes-hamas-and-israel-to/?#ixzz3B8faQ9AE
Uncle Joe
(58,355 posts)asked for proof that Hamas did it, the evidence provided by you and the other poster states that
the al-Qassam Brigades; which is an independent branch of Hamas claimed responsibility.
I cited evidence that Hamas and the al-Qassam Brigades are similar in structure as Sinn Féin's relationship to the military arm of the Irish Republican Army, they operate independently.
There is no evidence that the political wing of Hamas claimed responsibility, despite the headlines of your and the other poster's links.
I cited evidence that a major, formerly moderate Palestinian clan was suspected by Israeli Police as being behind the kidnappings and murders of the three Israeli teenagers.
I cited evidence that the head of this clan, a democratically elected Mayor which at one time advocated for a two state solution was deported by Israel and assassinated four years later, no one knows who killed him.
I cited evidence that four years after he was assassinated, the clan or at least major elements of it became radicalized, logic would dictate those elements back the al-Qassam Brigades' hard-line approach and the deportation/assassination of that clan's leader had a major negative effect.
I cited evidence that this clan has done its best to spoil or ruin previous attempts of the estranged parties reaching a cease fire and/or peace agreement and every time Israel gets sucked in.
I cited evidence that within the Israeli government there was major disagreement between the Israeli Defense Force Chief of Staff promoting a moderate response and a Minister of Economics in taking a hard-line, heavy fist-ed approach, logic would dictate the same dynamic occurs between the Hamas political wing wanting a unity government, allowing elections and the para-military wing of the al-Qassam Brigades.
Logic and history dictates that every time Israel retaliates in a punitive in mass way, the hard-line al-Qassam Brigades are strengthened in the long run even when many of them die, because many innocents are killed as well. Meanwhile more moderate factions in the Hamas political wing are weakened as Israel becomes more hated by the civilian populace.
If you don't wish to connect the dots or answer my questions, that's your prerogative but Hamas hasn't claimed responsibility, one senior member of the al-Qassam Brigades has.
Uncle Joe
(58,355 posts)I addressed your proof with a substantial post outlining my rebuttal,
all you could say was "splitting hairs" and nothing more than that because you're intent on using a broad brush despite the evidence to the contrary.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/21/hamas-kidnapping-three-israeli-teenagers-saleh-al-arouri-qassam-brigades
Claim by Saleh al-Arouri, a founder of Hamas's military wing, is doubted by experts and not supported by other Hamas sources
(snip)
His claim has not been supported by any other member of Hamas.
Hugh Lovatt, Israel and Palestine coordinator at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said that while al-Arouri was a significant Hamas figure – serving as the group's most prominent representative in Turkey – the former militant could have an ulterior motive for making his claim.
"Given the timing I would be very suspicious about his claim. I still don't believe Hamas as an organization and its upper echelons sanctioned the kidnappings – something that Israeli intelligence also believes," he said.
Lovatt said that al-Arouri may be trying to claim credit for the actions of others in an attempt to demonstrate his own continued sway in the West Bank and Hamas's ability to hit Israel after failing to secure significant concessions after six weeks of violence in Gaza.
"A second, more remote possibility, is that al-Arouri is telling the truth and that he has operated on his own initiative – a development with very worrying repercussions as it would imply a serious power struggle and splintering within Hamas," he said.
Netanyahu's government is of the same mind as you, so they killed more than 2000 Palestinians many of them innocent men, women and children.
MFM008
(19,808 posts)of the 3 killed in Gaza 2 days ago? Kinda strange timing....
leftynyc
(26,060 posts)so your timing is several months off.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts).
cpwm17
(3,829 posts)It's likely not accurate. Supporters of Israel's atrocities will have to find another excuse for mass-murder:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/21/hamas-kidnapping-three-israeli-teenagers-saleh-al-arouri-qassam-brigades
His claim has not been supported by any other member of Hamas.
Hugh Lovatt, Israel and Palestine coordinator at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said that while al-Arouri was a significant Hamas figure – serving as the group's most prominent representative in Turkey – the former militant could have an ulterior motive for making his claim.
"Given the timing I would be very suspicious about his claim. I still don't believe Hamas as an organization and its upper echelons sanctioned the kidnappings – something that Israeli intelligence also believes," he said.
None of this really matters, unless one believes the Palestinians have a right to level Israeli towns whenever illegal settlers murder Palestinians. The settlers are forced on the Palestinians by the Israeli government, which would make Israeli cities fair game for leveling, by the same logic.
Rhinodawg
(2,219 posts)Hamas executes 18 suspected informers
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2014/08/hamas-kills-11-suspected-informers-israel-201482285624490268.html
?pubId=665003303001
A Gaza security official said the first batch involved 11 people who were killed early on Friday at the Gaza City police headquarters.
Six more were killed later in the day in a public execution in a central Gaza square, according to a Hamas website and witnesses cited by Reuters news agency.
Three suspected collaborators were also killed on Thursday.
The victims, their heads covered and hands tied, were shot dead by masked gunmen dressed in black in front of a crowd of worshippers outside a mosque after prayers, witnesses and al-Majd, a pro-Hamas website, said.
