Liveblogging the War: Saturday July 22nd – Sunday July 23rd

As I am typing this, I hear the roar of airplanes flying past my house. I cannot even imagine what it must be like for my fellow Israelis who are having to grow accustomed to the sound of warning sirens, Katushas landing, and ambulances wailing.

Regarding the news during my time away from the computer..

Today, IDF ground troops moved into the large Lebanese village of Maroun al-Ras in several waves and took control. They carried out operations to detect rocket launchers and underground bunkers (like these) in which terrorists are hiding, and uncovered anti-tank missiles, several surface-to-surface missiles, a machine gun, a Kalashnikov assault rifle, and ammunition. The IAF continued to strike targets in Lebanon, including  TV transmission towers (broadcasting Hizbullah radio and television programs and telephone frequencies used by Hizbullah), Hizbullah headquarters, six missile launchers, missile storage facilities, weapon storage facilities, communication lines, and over 40 rocket launch sites. This evening, the IDF urged residents of 10 villages to leave by 7:00PM ahead of IAF air strikes against Hizbullah targets.

Hizbullah continued to fire rockets in northern Israel today, with approximately 160 Katushas landing in our northern communities, including Carmiel, Nahariya, Safed, Western Galilee, Haifa, Rosh Pina, and Kiryat Shmona. Thankfully, there have so far been no casualties from these latest attacks, but at least 17 people have been wounded.

Meanwhile, Tel Aviv police apprehended 3 people last night, who were suspected of planning to carry out a terrorist attack in the city. Great.

Elsewhere in the world, the US are reaffirming their stance that Israel has the right to defend herself, and that Hizbullah and the nations that support it (Iran and Syria) need to be confronted. And according to the New York Times, they are rushing a delivery of precision-guided bombs to Israel.

Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)

8:35PM: Did I ever mention that religious leaders who don’t know what they’re talking about really get my goat?

Greek Orthodox Church says Israel should fear `wrath of God` for Lebanon deaths (AP)Actually, I am entirely convinced that everyone opposing Israel right now should be the ones fearing the “wrath of G-d.”

“The massive, brutal and murderous viciousness of Hezbollah is unfortunately not represented in its full intensity on television screens outside of Israel..A twisted image is presented, where the victim is presented as an aggressor.”- Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert

Opposition and Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu condemned comments by a British minister in Beirut that Israel’s response is disproportionate.

Speaking to international TV channels, Netanyahu said that Britain’s response to rocket attacks during WWII was tougher than that of Israel against Hizbullah.

For the past 11 days, we have seen Israel bomb all sorts of targets and i am sure most of us were wondering why would Israel bomb a certain factory or a truck or a construction yard or a truck ..

 

If we can for a moment turn off all those local and international channels who have nothing to do but show little children killed and bodies and touch the viewer to a certain degree that ll blind him, and think about the reasons behind those hits.

 

From a military point of view, you have a full equiped army, ranked in the top 5 armies in the world against a guerrilla with absolutly no info on its fighters, weapons , locations.

 

Even though the Israeli army is way superior in terms of weapons and technology and numbers than Hizbullah, its war must be a very cautious and tactical one since its fighting a guerilla.

 

We ve seen Israel for example hitting a factory for tissues in a small village in the South. It appeared that Hizbullah guys operate using trucks, meaning they move around with a missile in a truck, park nearby a factory for ex and shoot the rocket and flee. The origin of the rocket being the factory, Israelies respond by hitting it.

 

A witness for a similar action urged on TV the Hizbullah fighters to stop coming into his village to shoot rockets and then run away since the village is being destroyed.

 

Same for the truck that was carrying civilians and that became very suspicious when it was not allowed to enter the UN offices.

 

Fighting a guerrilla is very hard and knowing that they could shoot from anywhere, we should expect hits on unusual places.

 

Innocent people r dying, this is true but i believe the way Hizbullah is operating and its filthy methods in infilitrating villages and using them as launch positions is causing all those casualties.

 

Of course Israelies have hit bridges recklessly during the day killing innocent civilians passing on the bridge, but its war and you always have victims.

 

On the other hand, the one hitting civilians randomly and threatening innocent lifes r the Hizbullah launching rockets with no direction whatsoever. I ve seen rockets land on balconies, small cafes, walls … anything but military targets.

 

Finally, i heard that Hizbullah has accepted that the government negociates on the prisoners fate today, therefore i hope that they realized they havent achieved anything but destroy themselves politically and militarily and most of all destroy Lebanon and ruin its economy for the next 5 years.

Home Front Commander Yitzhak Jerry Gershon told government ministers: “The city of Nazareth asked to be disconnected from the system of air raid sirens because it interfered with them on remembrance days for IDF martyrs and on Holocaust Day.”

Some 44 years ago, when Soviet missiles in neighboring Cuba threatened American cities, John F. Kennedy set one goal and ultimately prevailed in achieving it: Remove the missiles. Today, when Israel’s cities are pummeled by Hezbollah missiles launched from neighboring Lebanon, our goal should be the same: Remove the missiles. Or destroy them.

 

It is not enough to push Hezbollah 30 kilometers north of the border. Hezbollah rockets have a range of up to 200 kilometers, and could easily be fired from Beirut. Nor is it enough to achieve a cease fire. With its missile arsenal intact, Hezbollah could re-emerge triumphant a year or two from now and again menace Israel’s population.

 

The objective of the military campaign currently being waged on Israel’s northern border, as well as any diplomatic effort to bring that campaign to an end, must therefore be to disarm Hezbollah, first and foremost from its missile arsenal. A failure to do so would be a great victory for that terror organization and for its sponsors in Tehran and facilitators in Damascus. It would enable Hezbollah to rebuild its lethal capacity for waging war, continue to threaten the people of Israel and hold hostage the people of Lebanon, and sow the seeds for an even greater conflict in the future. In contrast, disarming Hezbollah would help restore Israel’s deterrence and security, give hope to a peaceful, prosperous and democratic future for Lebanon, and deal a heavy blow to the forces of international terrorism.

 

Since Israel’s unilateral withdrawal in 2000 to an internationally recognized border, Hezbollah has established in Lebanon a terror state-within-a-state, and, working on behalf of Iran and Syria, it has sought to undermine the emergence of a free and democratic Lebanon. In crossing an international border, murdering and kidnapping Israeli soldiers and firing rockets at Israeli cities, Hezbollah has also committed blatant acts of war. Like any nation exercising its right of self-defense, Israel is responding not only to the specific incidents that occurred but is also working to eliminate the threat posed by this clear and present danger.

 

In direct violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1559–which specifically calls for the disarming of all militias in Lebanon–Hezbollah has used its de facto territorial control over southern Lebanon to amass a deadly arsenal of over 12,000 rockets. Some of these missiles are Iranian-made and bring over one-half of Israel’s population within range of the terrorist proxies of a fanatic Iranian regime that denies the Holocaust and is planning a new one with its promise to “wipe Israel off the map.”

 

Imagine what the U.S. would do if, on its northern border, a terror state-within-a-state pledged to its destruction was established from which flurries of missiles were fired at Chicago, its third-largest city. With that in mind, to suggest, as some have, that Israel is not acting with restraint is preposterous. Unlike Hezbollah, which is indiscriminately launching hundreds of missiles at Israeli cities and towns to kill as many civilians as possible, Israel is using only a fraction of its firepower and is in fact acting with great care to minimize harm to civilians. But because Hezbollah not only targets civilians but also uses them as human shields by hiding its missile launchers in population centers, Hezbollah has deliberately placed innocent Lebanese civilians in harm’s way.

 

At stake in the current operation is not only Israel’s security, Lebanon’s democratic future, and stability in the region, but a central principle in the war on terror. Soon after Sept. 11, President Bush made clear that America would no longer make a distinction between the terrorists and the regimes that harbor them. This policy is essential because international terrorism cannot survive without the support of sovereign states.

 

In order for the global terror network to be dismantled, its support by sovereign states must end–whether that supports comes in the form of actively perpetrating terror attacks (as in the case of Iran and the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority), providing safe havens for terror groups (as in the case of Syria) or not acting against terror groups within their borders (as is the case in Lebanon). A world in which the international community does not hold states accountable for the terrorism that emanates from within their borders is a world in which the war on terror cannot be won.

 

That is why any cease-fire or diplomatic effort that does not have as its objective the disarming of Hezbollah will only strengthen the forces of terror. And that is also why the world should fully support Israel in disarming Hezbollah–for Israel’s sake, for Lebanon’s sake and for the sake of our common future.

There have been attempts to smuggle weaponry from Syria into Lebanon in order to aid Hizbullah, said IDF Deputy Chief of the General Staff Maj. -Gen. Moshe Kaplinsky, Sunday, at a cabinet meeting.

Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, declared Sunday that Israel had “pushed the button of its own destruction” by launching its military campaign against the Iranian-backed Hizbullah militia in Lebanon.

The British Broadcasting Corp. (BBC) has admitted that many of the victims of Israeli retaliation in Lebanon are terrorists and not innocent civilians. A BBC reporter said he saw Hizbullah terrorists using a private home and added, “It is difficult to quantify who is a terrorist and who is a civilian.”

LMAO!! While we DO love to joke about ourselves This unfortuantly caused outcry by the shiites in Lebanon… They seem to think they are protected from jokes… WE HATE HIZBOLLA AND ITS TIME THEY LEFT WITH THEIR MATES SYRIA

PETA Calls On U.S. Commander, South African Embassy Official to Facilitate Evacuation of Animals

PETA has sent an urgent letter to Brig. Gen. Carl Jensen—the military commander in charge of U.S. evacuation operations in Lebanon—begging him to instruct his officers to help evacuees take their animals with them to safety and bringing international attention to the government’s failure to serve all Americans trapped in Lebanon.

PETA also dashed off a letter to Siyabonga Ponco, charg?© d‚Äôaffaires of the South African Embassy in Cairo, urging him to permit South African nationals who are being evacuated to take their companion animals with them rather than forcing them to abandon their animals in the rubble to starve. The plea stemmed from an e-mail message that Ponco sent to PETA in which he suggested that evacuees with animals should ‚Äúnot demand more than they could be given‚Äù‚Äîimplying that a request to help South African citizens take their beloved cats, dogs, and birds with them would be asking too much.