Tags: 7 Min Read; 3 Mins of Video
Correction: The email yesterday mistakenly identified Mansour Abbas as the chief of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. This is incorrect. He is an Arab Israeli Member of Knesset. This was corrected on the web site just after the email went out. Sorry.
It is drizzling in Tel Aviv.
Read
Op Ed by a Palestinian Israeli
Loui Haj, a commercial property manager in Acre, writes in Haaretz (PDF here):
Dear Progressive 'Freedom Fighters,' I'm a Palestinian Israeli. I Don't Need your 'Liberation' Both the Jewish and Palestinian peoples have an unshakable right to a nation-state. So why are you chanting 'From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,' an annihilationist slogan, and not 'Palestine and Israel, side by side'?
Thoughts of Abu Ali
I watch Arabic language social and media sources via an internet persona named Abu Ali. He is thought to be a retired Israeli intelligence officer who is fluent in Arabic. It appears he has a small team. He posted:
The evacuation of the population from Khan Yunis - another significant breaking point for the Gazans.
I have written to you more than once here about the complete disconnection between the aggressive statements of senior Hamas officials who are abroad in their speeches and the situation of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip.
In the last day, after the end of the hudna [cease fire] and with the beginning of the ground operation in the south of the Gaza Strip, a different, much more desperate sentiment can be noticed among the Gazans on social networks. A new bottom. The end of the hudna was a severe mental blow for them, as well as the reports of the many dead since then. The concentration of attacks in the Khan Yunis area alongside the IDF spokesman's calls to evacuate to the south created a total breakdown for many.
It should be understood that there are hundreds of thousands of Gazans from the north of the Gaza Strip who evacuated to the Khan Yunis district, leaving behind everything. After they managed to partially establish themselves in Khan Yunis, they are once again sent to migrate south in destitution, to a crowded area with no housing solution. Alongside this, the lack of food, water and basic services stands out despite the arrival of aid trucks. The burden on the areas to which residents are evacuating has increased and the struggle for daily survival has become a reality for many of them. They are willing to do almost anything to get food and shelter for themselves and their families. This causes a change and escalation in the discourse on social networks. Things that used to be taboo are now allowed. Sacred cows are slaughtered. Including the "resistance" and its goals. It is not uncommon to find sentences on Facebook like: "Give them back their prisoners already and end the war." "Let them eliminate Sinwar and be done with it."
The Gazans are in real trouble. And even looking ahead to the foreseeable future, even after the war, many of them will not have a home even in many months.
I am not telling you all this to evoke pity for the Gazans, but mainly to explain the situation in the Gaza Strip and hence also to get insights regarding the continuation of the conduct with them.
I think this is the hour when Israel should increase the dialogue with the Gazan population and explain to them every day that the war will continue until all the abductees are released and until the leaders of Hamas are eliminated and the Gaza Strip is demilitarized.
The Gazan population needs to hear every day who is to blame for their situation, and no less important is the way to end this situation.
The motivation of so many people must not be underestimated, this Gazan motivation can be harnessed for the sake of the current Israeli interest in Gaza. They can be part of the move against Hamas. And they can apply pressure and give aid that can only help Israel. And the price from Israel's point of view - zero: just continue to present every day in a focused, short and clear way what is the way to end the war:
The release of the abductees.
The elimination of Hamas leaders.
Demilitarization of the Gaza Strip.
I think Israel will be pleasantly surprised. the risk? Does not exist!
Watched
At Kibbutz Be'eri
That was decimated on October 7
זכור את אשר עשה לך עמלק
This is a quote from Deuteronomy 25:17
Remember what Amalek did to you
IDF dropping flyers in the Khan Yunis area
Typically three kinds of information is dropped like this:
What areas to leave (because they will be bombed in a day or two)
Evacuation routes that are monitored by the Israeli Army (where Hamas is prevented from shooting evacuees, which, from my observation, has killed hundreds of Gazans by now)
Times and places of the humanitarian pauses
Relief Area
Alef: Bill Cosby
Bet: Map
Here is a map of the world from 1815 if anyone tells you "Israel is a fake country found on stolen land".
Gimmel: Arabization
Dalet: Word of the day: Simp
Simp is an internet slang term describing someone who shows excessive sympathy and attention toward another person, typically someone who does not reciprocate the same feelings, in pursuit of affection or a sexual relationship.
I need to get dressed and go out. It is dark. House music by a pair of female DJs. We'll see how it looks!
Thinking of everyone out there in the drizzle.
Stay well,
Raf
(Thank you A.K.)