Israel's Ground Invasion of Gaza Continues

Posted by Siun , Firedoglake at 9:00 AM on January 4, 2009.

Updates will appear on this page as more information becomes available. These updates will be clearly marked.

Update #4 -- Cluster Bombs:

There’s more evidence today of Israeli use of cluster bombs, originally noted by Laura Doty at Oxdown. The Times of London features a photo in it’s coverage (see Gaza Conflict slide show) with the following description:

An artillery round sends out bomblets above Gaza City, which continues to be attacked by Israeli forces

(h/t Brandon of VoteVets who points in email to this description of the weapons seen).

The use of cluster bombs - which have a large footprint when initially dropped and then remain a threat for decades - in a location like the Gaza Strip which is so packed with people is horrifying.

Conditions in Gaza continue to worsen:

Since the beginning of the Israeli invasion, 500 people in Gaza were killed, of which approximately 70 children and 27 women. By now, a total of 2,650 Gazans are injured of which more than 270 children and 650 women. Despite the Israeli recurrent discourse, facts are clear and Israel’s war has mainly been conducted against civilians.

The medical and health situation in Gaza is on the edge of collapse, facing a severe lack of vital medical supplies. Surgeries are now made without anaesthesias or sterile equipment, as anaesthetics, sterile medical gloves or needles are sometimes no longer available.

The heath sector in Gaza was already qualified as ‘in crisis’ before the beginning of the Israeli attacks and is now overloaded with severe injured and traumas resulting from the air strikes and ground operation. Before the beginning of the recent crisis, 105 medicines for severe and chronic diseases were reported lacking. All basic medical supplies are lacking, and the situation has worsened since the main warehouse stocking medicines in Gaza was bombed last week.

The 13 governmental hospitals from Gaza provide 1,500 beds and chronic patients such as suffering from hearth problems or cancers were sent home. Half of the 60 ambulances available in the Strip are out of order, struck by Israeli strikes.

And as the International Middle East Media Center notes:

It is worth mentioning that the official number of casualties could be much higher than reported, as dozens of wounded residents who suffered mild or even moderate injuries were release without registration due to the overcrowded hospitals as the Israeli offensive continues.

It’s also important to remember that while sources identify a large number of the dead and wounded as men, by no means are all men Hamas fighters. Many are just like Laila Al-Arian’s grandfather and Laila El-Haddad’s father:

I see the number on my caller ID; my heart races. I answer my cell phone.

"We ...are under..heavy bombardment. Heavy bombardment" says my father in terrified, articulated syllables.

"They are bombing the Legislative Council building next to our house. They are bombing just down our street."

"Baba...are you safe, are you both safe??" I ask, not knowing what else to say.

"I have to go now..I have to go...i just wanted to tell you that..but I have to go..." he stammers. And the line goes dead.

And today, both are looking for safety under a rain of cluster bombs, dropped by Israel, bought and sold by us. Last night, the US blocked – once again – a call for a cease-fire at the UN Security Council, today Senate “leaders” Harry Reid, Dick Durbin and Mitch McConnell were “standing solidly behind Israel's ground operation against Hamas.”

Let’s make sure they hear where we stand.

A very big H/T to Michael Braymen who made the map above - it is the best I've seen for understanding just how small Gaza is - and so how vulnerable the 1.5 million people who live there are.

Update #3 -- Nowhere to Hide:

The invasion according to Defense Minister Ehud Barak "..won't be easy and it won't be short," and the amount of Israeli firepower - continued air strikes, tank fire and intensive artillery shelling - is massive.

Human Rights Watch has already warned of the extreme danger of the use of artillery in such a densely populated area:

Israel's renewed use of artillery in Gaza poses an increased risk to civilians if the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) adopts the same reduced "safety zones" that resulted in many civilian casualties there in 2006, Human Rights Watch said today. The IDF had put a moratorium on the use of artillery in Gaza after an artillery attack on Beit Hanoun on November 8, 2006, killed 23 Palestinians and wounded 40, all of them civilians.

Laura Doty over at Oxdown asks Are Cluster Bombs Falling on Gaza Today? and quotes Sameh Habeeb of Gaza Today.

In reviewing the footage starting to come out (CNN's shows the same but is not yet online in embed format, this is from Italian tv, the same is seen in a Ha'retz tv video), we do see explosions in the air with multiple projectiles - you can see this in the video. I asked markfromireland, who is quite familiar with such weapons, if these are cluster bombs and he replied:

"Hard to tell exactly what shell they're using but yes thats what they look like. If you're asking is that what a cluster looks like then the answer is yes."

Each report we see and hear repeats, as I just did, the words “densely populated” and that repitition too easily jades us to the meaning behind those words. Gaza is packed with people – the majority under the age of 17.

It is hard to realize how very small the Gaza Strip is, "about 41 kilometers (25 mi) long, and between 6 and 12 kilometers (4–7.5 mi) wide, with a total area of 360 square kilometers (139 sq mi)."

To get a better sense of that density, look at this map.

In such a small area, there is no place to run when air strikes, tanks and artillery hit at the level we are now seeing in the footage from CNN.

As a Gulf News story recounts:

One man from the Al Shata refugee camp received a phone call from an Israeli soldier urging him to leave the area because his home would shortly be shelled. He left for his brother's home.

Three hours after the first phone call the man's brother got a similar message - they both left for a new location.

Thousands of others left their homes after the start of the strikes and the psychological warfare, but many have now returned since all their "safe places" became targets.

From Ha’aretz we already see the cost of this invasion:

A family in Beit Lahiya said that an Israeli artillery shell had hit a house there, wounding many people. Ambulances could not immediately reach them because of the resulting fire, they said.

Meanwhile, Israel Air Force warplanes stepped up airstrikes on Gaza, bombing the main road that runs throughout the strip in three different spots, making travel from one side of the Strip to the other close to impossible.

Maan News reports that airstrikes have destroyed the American International School in Gaza City:

The American International School in Gaza (AISG) in Beit Lahiya was founded by Americans in 2001. An elite private institution, AISG stressed teaching English as a second language and instilling progressive, enlightened values in its students using an American curriculum.

“I have no idea what will happen to us,” said Rawan Al-Masri a first grade teacher at the K-12 school. “Where will the students study? Now there is nothing.”

The school, according to its website, has a mission to teach such ideals as “An understanding and appreciation of global interrelationships to face the opportunities and challenges of a constantly changing world,” and “Engage social consciousness,” is culturally distant from Hamas’ political Islam.

Explosions cracking in the background, Al-Masri expressed despair for the children at the school who have known only war. “They didn’t live their childhood,” she says.

“But they do know the difference between an F16 and an Apache,” explaining that Gazans of all ages have learned to differentiate between the sounds of the American-made jets and helicopters that have rained fire down on them. She says they have come to prefer the thump of helicopter blades, knowing that the supersonic jets will be less accurate with their missiles.

“It’s a disaster,” she adds, “Their target is now the civilians. They won’t finish until they kill all of us.”

AFP reports that the air strikes continue:

Thousands of Israeli troops and tanks had encircled Gaza as Howitzers lobbed shells across the border hours earlier. F-16 jets roared over the enclave where at least 460 people have been killed in eight days of attacks.

Gaza militants fired more rockets into Israel on Saturday, slightly wounding three people, and the exiled Hamas leader threatened a "black destiny" for Israel if it launched a ground invasion.

In one of the deadliest single strikes of the campaign so far, an Israeli jet fired at a mosque in the northern town of Jabaliya, killing at least 16 people among more than 200 people at prayer, medics and witnesses said.

Four children -- two brothers aged 10 and 12 and two cousins under 16 -- were among the dead at the Ibrahim al-Maqadna mosque, medics said.

Dozens of wounded were dragged from the rubble.

Sameh Habeeb from Gaza Today reports:

Breaking News: 4palestinians killed in Rafah City in Israeli bombings.
Breaking News: Israel bombing Al Uma University and hundreds of shell rain on all Gaza areas now.
Breaking News:heavy strikes across Rafah and many houses damaged.
Breaking News:Israeli tanks advanced some meters from Eretz crossing in the north.
Breaking News: Shells landed between civilians' houses east of Gaza City, Toffah, shijaya and sha'f areas.

Update #2: From Ha'aretz

Israel launches ground operation in Gaza Strip

Large numbers of forces are taking part in this stage of the operation including infantry, tanks, engineering forces, artillery and intelligence with the support of the Israel Air Force, Israel navy, the Shin Bet security service and other security agencies.

Meanwhile, the cabinet has authorized an emergency call up of tens of thousands of IDF reservists.

The invasion was preceded by the firing of artillery shells into the strip from military preparation sites dotted along the Gaza-Israel border.

The artillery fire aimed to detonate Hamas explosive devices and mines planted along the border area before troops marched in.

Palestinian witnesses said the artillery barrage caused a large explosion in Gaza City as well as a series of blasts stitching the nearby frontier with Israel.

Channel 10 television quoted a witness as saying that Israel was shelling targets along the entire length of the shared border.

Update #1: Jerusalem Post:

The IDF said that a large amount of Armored Corps, Engineering Corps and Infantry troops entered the territory with the purpose of destroying Hamas infrastructure and preventing rocket fire by taking control of launching pads in northern Gaza.

The IDF warned that terrorists using civilians as human shields would bear full responsibility for their fate.

Original post:

Israeli forces have begun the ground invasion of the Gaza Strip. AFP and more are reporting that Israel has begun heavy shelling of the northern sections of Gaza and there are unconfirmed reports that the tanks are rolling. CNN reported an hour ago that Israel was warning Gazans to leave their homes and the northern sectors of the Strip:

Leaflets signed by the commander of the Israeli military were dropped over northern Gaza on Saturday morning, warning residents to "leave the area immediately" to ensure their safety.

Amidst appeals from the UN and protests around the world calling for a cease fire, the White House signalled its ok for a ground invasion.

The Israeli press has reported that the mission was approved as a short but major operation. Some idea of the actual Israeli plans may be seen in this translation from Missing Links of an Israeli Channel Two report from March 2008 following a visit from Condi Rice:

...Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak has gotten the green light from the Security and Political Council of Ministers, which met yesterday to decide how to end the problem of the Qassam rockets, to initiate implementation of the new plan aimed an ending the problem of the Palestinian Qassam rockets aimed at southern Israel.

The televised report cited high-level security sources as saying Barak intends to plan for the removal of tens of thousands of Palestinians from the northern Gaza Strip, namely from the region that the resistance uses for the launch of these rockets, and to move them toward Gaza City and to confine them there. The Israeli reporter added that Barak is turning to legal advisers in the Defence Ministry, in order to obtain legal authorization for the removal of the Palestinian civilians...

The reporter said that once [or if] the plan becomes operational, it would start immediately: In the first stage there would be a drop of leaflets advising residents to leave their homes, in addition to special radio announcements in Arabic directed to the residents, and in the event residents didn't obey the warnings, the occupation army would begin bombing the inhabited areas, in order to compel them to leave their homes and go to Gaza City.

The Council [of Ministers], which met yesterday after the departure of the American Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, stressed that they did not agree with previous army planning for [only] a partial end to the Qassam rockets. And the Council decided to target the leaders of Hamas, political and military alike, and to destroy every symbol of Hamas authority in the Gaza Strip.

This report was confirmed by the Jerusalem Post at that time (h/t markfromireland). We know, from reporting in Ha'aretz, that the Israeli leadership began planning for the current attacks before entering the Egyptian negotiated cease-fire which expired on December 19th and used the cease-fire as an opportunity to prepare. Add in two months of forced starvation for the people of Gaza which seems now to have been designed to weaken their resistance and it seems all too likely that what we are watching today is the culmination of those plans made back in March right after consultations with Condi Rice.

Such a plan would be a violation of the Geneva Convention (pdf) that "Parties to a conflict shall at all times distinguish between the civilian population and combatants in order to spare civilian population and property. Neither the civilian population as such nor civilian persons shall be the object of attack. Attacks shall be directed solely against military objectives."

Such a plan of forced evacuation would in fact be the very definition of ethnic cleansing:

The United Nations Commission of Experts, in a January 1993 report to the Security Council, defined “ethnic cleansing” as “rendering an area ethnically homogenous by using force or intimidation to remove persons of given groups from the area.”

Col. Pat Lang at Sic Semper Tyrannis (a must read in these times) points our that the Israel (and US?) plans may not go so smoothly however:

Muslim militiamen of the Hizbullah, Hamas, Jeish al-Mahdi, etc. varieties have a major advantage in fighting the Israelis. These Muslim fighters all believe in an afterlife in which they will be rewarded for their shihada, their testimony, their martyrdom in what they believe to be the path of God. If you do not think that they believe that, then you are truly clueless. There are not many Israeli Jewish soldiers who think the same thing. Some, but not many. This makes for a wildly disparate attitude towards casualties. In Lebanon the Hizbullahis wore body armor and dug in well. They did that because these men were valuable assets, not because they were not willing to "be all they could be."

"More difficult than many people anticipated." Really? Were Feith and Wolfowitz involved in the planning?

Meanwhile the casualty count in Gaza is already 425, possibly more. How many more before this ends?

Siun is a regular blogger for FireDogLake.