Latest update: Gaza: The Israeli Invasion
1:10 a.m. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon calls for immediate cease-fire. CNN prefers to repeat, without analysis, the statement of Israeli Minister of Defense Ehud Barak.
1 a.m. Watching Fox News to find out their angle --- They go to their man on the Israel-Gaza border, Mike Tobin, who quite clearly has no decent sources of information and is just making up "news", such as possibility that Hamas set fires to the gas tanks in Gaza --- The media-literate might find a Tobin/Fox News look-a-like in
The Day Today's Peter O'Hanra-hanrahan12:55 p.m. Al Jazeera: US State Department says cease-fire is needed as soon as possible and is concerned about humanitarian situation but says "Hamas is holding Gaza's people hostage"
12:42 p.m. CNN gives 10 minutes to military analyst Retired General David Grange, who says despite "extraordinary precautions" by Israel, Number One risk is civilian casualties --- He says Hamas wants to "induce casualties among its own people" as well as Israeli forces
Why not just identify Grange as "spokesperson for Israeli Defense Forces"?
12:25 a.m.
Hamas spokesman says battalion of Israeli commandos surrounded ---5 soldiers killed, 29 injured
12:10 a.m. Israel TV says Gaza gas terminal hit.
12 midnight. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband calls for immediate cease-fire. UN Security Council to meet at 7 p.m. New York time (2 hours from now).
Massive explosion in Rafah.
11:33 p.m. As Israeli troops invaded,
Israel jammed Al-Aqsa, Hamas' television station, and posted message, "Hamas --- Your Time is Over".
11:30 p.m. Al Jazeera reports that France has condemned the Israeli invasion. Israeli military says dozens of Gazans killed.
11:15 p.m. West Bank Palestinians on streets of Ramallah condemning invasion and calling on Arab states to respond.
11:10 p.m. UN has now set up shelters for refugees from Gaza fighting.
10:57 p.m. Al Jazeera correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin in Gaza City is very good, making excellent point that Israeli operation may have to attempt reoccupation of all Gaza. Rationale? Because Hamas has better rockets than in recent years, it can put them deeper in the territory. So if Israel wants to remove all the sites, they cannot go for a "limited" operation.
10:39 p.m. Israeli spokesman Mark Regev now talking to Al Jazeera. In response to Mahmoud Abbas's warning of "grave consequences" of Israeli invasion, he holds to the line of an operation responding to Hamas' "terrorism" of rockets. He does not rise to Al Jazeera's bait that Israel "wants to overthrow Hamas", arguing that this is "up to the Palestinian people themselves".
Regev is good: he gets in all the political hyperbole with Hamas as "a totalitarian, Taliban-type regime".
10:37 p.m. CNN's Ben Wedeman is officially hopeless. He passes on Tel Aviv's spin, "Our understanding from Israeli officials is that it's going to be, at least initially, the first stage, is going to be limited in scope," even as Al Jazeera correspondent in Gaza City reports a two-pronged Israeli attack, one from east and one into Gaza towns (Jabaliya, Beit Hanoun) in northeast.
10:28 p.m. Al Jazeera reports that airport, in southern Gaza, "destroyed" by Israeli artillery.
10:24 p.m. Israeli state TV says number of Hamas fighters killed.
10:20 p.m. Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman tells Al Jazeera that military operation is not "reoccupation" of Gaza, as it is only to destroy "Hamas infrastructure of terror". He then gives away the political aim, however, referring to a "legitimate Palestinian leadership" (Palestinian Authority) that could lead Gaza.
10:10 p.m. Palestinian Authority takes public position of criticising Israel:
chief negotiator Saeb Erakat says, "What this will do is undermine the peace process."
10:00 p.m. Brigadier Avi Benayahu on Israeli television: "This won't be a school outing. We are talking about many long days."
9:50 p.m. Israel/Gaza:
Ehud Barak, Israeli Defense Minister, is giving a press conference. The aim of the operation is "to force Hamas attacks and to stop its hostile activities....We are not war hungry but we should not allow a situation where our towns ... are constantly targeted by Hamas....It will not be easy or short, but we are determined."
The invading force is "columns" rather than a "column", coming in from four directions into northeastern Gaza.
9:45 p.m. Israel/Gaza:
There has been contact between the invading Israeli column and Hamas fighters, according to a witness.
Hamas is claiming on Al-Arabiya television that there have been Israeli casualties.
9:15 p.m. Israel/Gaza:
Reuters, citing Palestinian witnesses, and
Press TV are headlining that a "small Israeli ground force" has entered Gaza. (
CNN is headlining but has yet to post story.)
Al Jazeera is reporting that the force is an Israeli armoured column supported by attack helicopters. Apparent objective is to seize sites from where rockets have been fired. Point of entry is in northeastern Gaza, on open land (and site of former Israeli settlements) near Beit Hanoun.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman has told Al Jazeera that ground operation is to continue until "situation on the ground...transformed".
Monday, January 5, 2009 at 20:32