Israel's Onslaught: One of Its Bloodiest Attacks on Palestinians in 60 Years

By Amy Goodman, Democracy Now!. Posted December 30, 2008.

Every now and then, we hear a rocket attack or two. So, there are warplanes in the sky flying all over the time. As I speak to you now, I can hear them up in the sky, the pilotless jets and the warplanes, F-16s and God knows what. The warships in the sea are also attacking from the sea. And attacking who? Hamas? They are not attacking Hamas; they are attacking the people, the civilians. The civilians -- I mean, I'm looking at the street right now, the main street of Gaza, Omar al-Mukhtar, and hardly you can see anyone walking there, because every single person is afraid.

As you mentioned, last night, a family, five people, a woman and her four children, were killed when they were in their house. Three and -- I don't know -- three or four mosques were demolished. These are praying areas. These are mosques. So I don't know -- nobody is safe. No place is safe. All the buildings that were attacked, they are not military buildings. Even in the initial day, on Saturday, the first 150 people, they were civil servants. They were not striking attackers. They were civil servants, civilians. I don't know. I --

JG: I'd like to ask you also about the -- there have been reports that the Israelis were trying to block television signals. What's the situation with the electricity, the ability of the people to at least get some information and communicate with each other?

MH: Well, as I speak to you now, I have no electricity in my house. I have a generator that I can open or let work for like two or three hours every now and then to let the Internet work and watch TV. We have electricity like three or four hours a day. We have no cooking gas. I mean, I'm talking about the people. Maybe I have a little left in my house. But people don't have electricity about 75 percent of the time, no cooking gas, no gas for the cars. So fuel is also lacking. And the only source of, like, food and fuel lately was through Egypt, through those tunnels, and these were attacked last night. At least 40 tunnels were demolished last night.

I don't know. This is -- can you tell me if any of this is against Hamas? There's nothing against Hamas. This is a clear-cut genocide and holocaust against civilians, civilians who are helpless. They don't have warplanes. They don't have warships. They don't -- even the rockets that they talk about are homemade. And I just -- I cannot -- and I really lost the words, because the situation is so bad. And we are in the 21st century. We are not in 10th or 15th century. Everybody in the world can see and hear. But who acts? Who is doing anything? Now, they say the killer and the killed are the same. They are putting Israel, with all its military power, [inaudible] level like Hamas and people of Gaza.

AG: We're also joined by Fida Qishta, who is a freelance journalist living in Rafah and the Gaza Strip coordinator for the International Solidarity Movement. Welcome to Democracy Now. Describe what is happening in Rafah.

FIDA QISHTA: Well, at this moment, everything is calm, but yesterday was a massive attack to Rafah's border. They attacked the border area with more than 11 rockets by the F-16, and it was the only source for the Gazans to stay survivors, by the food and the medicines, anything that they could bring through the tunnels. But now, the only way for the Gazans to stay survive is destroyed.

And yesterday morning, they attacked a pharmacy in Rafah near my house. It's just 50 meters away from my house. And they [inaudible] other normal buildings in Rafah, too, which just include families and civilians. I don't know what is the reason for doing that. As Dr. Moussa said, they're attacking civilians. And it's true that the Israelis say that they attack -- their attack is really, really massive, and it's really unbelievable that we can see in our eyes what's happening. It's too much. The hospitals -- and even in Rafah, the biggest hospital, Abu Yusuf Al-Najjar, cannot afford to have more than 20 injured. And they moved the injured to Gaza City. And most of the people stay at home. Everything is closed. It's like a war. Nobody goes out.

JG: I'd like to ask you about the role of Egypt. There have been reports that the Egyptians along the border have prevented Palestinians from trying to escape the violence. Could you talk about that or what you have -- the reports you have heard there?

FQ: Well, when we heard the attack to the border, me and some friends from the ISM went there to observe in our eyes what's going on. And when we went there, we saw the Palestinians. Palestinians didn't try to escape. The Palestinians tried to show their anger to the Egyptian soldiers, why they didn't open just part of these borders or the crossings to let the injured go out of Gaza to have treatment in Egypt. This is what the Palestinians tried to do. They didn't try to escape to Egypt. This is a false information. People went to the border with Egypt after the attacks by the F-16s happened, and they tried to show their anger for the Egyptian soldiers to let them -- just let the injured go to Egypt for treatment. They didn't try to escape.

AG: We're speaking with guests in Rafah, in Gaza City. Now we go to Tel Aviv with the Ha'aretz journalist Gideon Levy. He's on the phone with us. His latest piece is called "The Neighborhood Bully Strikes Again."

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Amy Goodman is the host of the nationally syndicated radio news program Democracy Now!

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