An Israeli military operation in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about
oppressionand
disproportionate response...
’s southernmost city of Rafah could be "delayed somewhat" if a deal for a weekslong truce between Israel and Hamas
...a regional Iranian catspaw,...is reached, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday, but claimed that total victory in Gaza is "weeks away" once the incursion begins.
Speaking to Margaret Brennan on CBS News’s "Face the Nation," Netanyahu confirmed that a deal is in the works but did not provide details. Israeli media reported that mediators were making progress on an agreement for a temporary ceasefire and the release of dozens of hostages held captive in Gaza as well as Paleostinian security prisoners held by Israel. Several Israeli media outlets, citing unnamed officials, said the war cabinet tacitly approved it.
Talks resumed on Sunday in Qatar
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...
at the specialist level, Egypt’s state-run Al Qahera TV reported, citing an Egyptian official as saying further discussions would follow in Cairo with the aim of achieving the temporary ceasefire and release.
Multiple reports have indicated that the outline includes the release in the first phase of some 40 hostages held in Gaza, including women, children, female soldiers and elderly and ill abductees, amid a pause in fighting of some six weeks.
It also includes the release by Israel of hundreds of Paleostinian terror convicts, and a "redeployment" of Israeli troops within Gaza — but not a complete withdrawal as Hamas had previously demanded. The outline would also reportedly see Israel enable the return of Paleostinian women and kiddies to northern Gaza, from where hundreds of thousands evacuated during the fighting, and which Israel has kept cut off from the rest of the enclave.
We’ll see 1) if that’s what the thing looks like when approved, and 2) if Hamas actually agrees to it this time, and if so, whether they manage to stick to the conditions for the entire six weeks. Also, what is the ratio of Hamas captives to imprisoned terrorists this time?
Sami Abu Zuhri...a senior spokesman for Hamas. Zuhri gained notoriety in 2006 when he dropped his money belt containing somewhere between 640,000 and 900,000 euros, which was confiscated by Paleostinian security and customs officials at a routine border crossing from Egypt to Gaza. The news brought competing Hamas and Fatah forces to the crossing checkpoint for an epic face-making and hollering contest...
, a senior Hamas official, responded to Netanyahu’s comments, saying that they cast doubt over Israel’s willingness to secure a hostage deal.
"Netanyahu’s comments show he is not concerned about reaching an agreement," Abu Zuhri told Rooters, accusing the Israeli leader of wanting "to pursue negotiation under bombardment and the bloodshed" of Paleostinians in Gaza.
Meanwhile,
...back at the dirigible, the gondola was dangling by a single thread of rope.
Jack!Cynthia cried.
I just realized I'm afraid of heights! I don't even like high heels!...
Israel is developing plans for expanding its offensive against the Hamas terror group to Rafah on the Gaza-Egypt border, where more than half the territory’s population of 2.3 million have sought refuge. Humanitarian groups warn of a catastrophe, with Rafah the main entry point for aid, and the US and other allies have said Israel must avoid harming civilians. Israel’s political and military leaders have said the operation will not begin until the safety of non-combatants has been ensured.
Netanyahu has said he will convene the cabinet this week to approve operational plans for action in Rafah, including the evacuation of civilians.
"Once we begin the Rafah operation, the intense phase of the fighting is weeks away from completion. Not months," Netanyahu told CBS. "If we don’t have a deal, we’ll do it anyway. It has to be done because total victory is our goal and total victory is within reach."
He said that four of the six remaining Hamas battalions are concentrated in Rafah.
US CONFIRMS PARIS TALKS FORMULATED ’BASIC CONTOURS’ OF HOSTAGE DEAL
US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told NBC Sunday morning that President Joe
The Big GuyBiden
...46th president of the U.S.
I'm not working for you. Don't be such a horse's ass....
hadn’t been briefed on the Rafah plan and said, "We believe that this operation should not go forward until or unless we see [a plan to protect civilians]."
Sullivan also confirmed to CNN
...formerly the
Cable News Network, now who know what it might stand for...
on Sunday that representatives from Israel, the US, Egypt and Qatar who met in Gay Paree late last week "came to an understanding among the four of them about what the basic contours of a hostage deal for a temporary ceasefire would look like."
Sullivan said that any such deal "is still under negotiation in terms of hammering out the details of it. There will have to be indirect discussions by Qatar and Egypt with Hamas because ultimately they will have to agree to release the hostages," he added. "That work is underway. And we hope that in the coming days, we can drive to a point where there is actually a firm and final agreement on this issue."
Speaking to CBS, Netanyahu was asked about "growing distrust of you personally" by Congress and the Biden White House. "When you’re closest ally is telling you things like this and telling you you need to reconsider a strategy, isn’t it worth considering?" Brennan queried the prime minister.
Netanyahu eventually responded to the remark: "Well, first of all, you say there’s no confidence in me, well the Israeli public has confidence in me." The prime minister’s approval ratings, however, have plummeted since October 7 and almost all polls show that he would not be able to form a coalition were early elections to be held.
On the differences over strategy between the US and Israel, the prime minister said that he thinks "the US agrees with us on the goal of destroying Hamas and the goal of releasing the hostages. The decisions on how to do that are left with us, and with me, and with the elected cabinet of Israel.
"A lot of things that we were told by the best of friends initially turned out to not be true," Netanyahu continued. "They said ’you can’t enter the ground war without having enormous complications,’ they said ’you can’t enter Gaza City, you can’t go into the tunnels, it will be a terrible bloodbath.’ All that turned out to be not true," he said.
"Our soldiers are in the tunnel network. We don’t have to take apart hundreds of kilometers of tunnels. We are taking apart the missile production factories that are underground, the command and control headquarters, the computers that are there, the money that is there, the weapons that are there, and the ammo that is there. We’re doing that methodically," he continued.
Good to know. Carry on.
"You can’t substitute for the Israeli military command, and we’re doing it very responsibly. John Spencer, who’s the head of urban warfare [at the Modern War Institute], says that no other army has gone to the lengths that Israel’s army has gone to clear civilians out of harm’s way even though Hamas is doing everything to keep them in harm’s way," Netanyahu added.Related:
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Modern War Institute: 2023-07-05 Getting AI procurement right: The Cautionary Tale of the DoD Counter-IED FIGHT
Modern War Institute: 2023-05-09 Are we prepared if Ukraine's counteroffensive is way too successful?
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