#Yasser Arafat International Airport

[workersolidarity]

[ 📹 Scenes from the random carpet bombing of Rafah's eastern neighborhoods, in the southern Gaza Strip, where more than 1.4 million Palestinians have been displaced into the city, living in tent cities as Israeli warplanes and drones fly overhead dropping munitions on civilian homes, infrastructure and humanitarian aid warehouses. 📸 The bodies of those killed in today's airstrikes across Rafah are piling up already, even before an Israeli ground operation begins. ]

🇮🇱⚔️🇵🇸 🚀🚀🚀🏘️💥🚑 🚨

ISRAELI OCCUPATION ARMY CARPET BOMBS EASTERN RAFAH AS GENOCIDAL OPERATION LOOMS OVER THE CIVILIAN POPULATION

The Israeli occupation forces (IOF) continued with their random carpet bombing of the eastern neighborhoods of the city of Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, today, among other axis of Gaza, killing and maiming dozens of civilians.

According to local media reports, Zionist occupation forces hammered the east of Rafah with intense waves of bombing and shelling, while IOF warplanes dropped banned White Phosphorus munitions, known to burn at temperatures in excess of 800°C, or 1'500°F, lighting up the sky and spreading the substance over the city, which is known to incinerate even bones.

The occupation army conducted strikes on various areas of Rafah through the day, including strikes targeting civilian roads and infrastructure, agricultural lands, residential homes and apartment buildings, and even animal farms, with airstrikes focusing mainly on the Al-Geneina, As-Salām and ash-Shawka neighborhoods, east of Rafah City.

In just one example of the bombing today, Israeli occupation warplanes targeted a residential home in the Tal al-Sultan neighborhood, west of Rafah, slaughtering 5 Palestinian civilians and wounding several others.

In another strike, Zionist fighter jets destroyed a house belonging to the Abu Amra family, killing three civilians, including a child.

IOF air forces also bombarded humanitarian aid warehouses on the Palestinian side of the border crossing, resulting in a fire and damaging several aid trucks.

In yet another strike, Israeli fighter jets bombed in the vicinity of the shuttered Gaza Yasser Arafat International airport.

Elsewhere in Gaza, IOF warplanes bombed a gathering of civilians near the Beit Hanoun crossing in the northern Gaza Strip, while also targeting the Al-Bureij Refugee Camp's southern neighborhoods with artillery shells.

At the same time, a Zionist drone fired a missile into the Al-Zaytoun neighborhood, southeast of Gaza City, assasinating the Palestinian journalist Mustafa Ayyed.

In addition to the bombings, Israeli artillery shelling targeted a multitude of civilian residences on Street 8, also in the Al-Zaytoun neighborhood of Gaza City.

In further attacks, Zionist tanks and armored vehicles opened fire on civilian homes in the Sheikh Ajlin neighborhood, southwest of Gaza City, while occupation artillery shelling killed two civilians in the Al-Bureij Camp in central Gaza.

For the second day in a row, the Israeli occupation closed the Kerem Shalom/Karm Abu Salem border crossing, blocking Humanitarian aid from entering the Palestinian enclave as civilian continue to be starved.

Meanwhile, the Hamas resistance movement sent a proposal for hostage negotiations to the Israeli occupation, who's leadership responded by announcing the unanimous decision to proceed with the occupation's Rafah operation regardless of Hamas's acceptance of the proposed basic parameters for a deal.

In statement, the Israeli occupation cabinet stated that “The War Cabinet unanimously decided that Israel would continue its operation in Rafah in order to exert military pressure on Hamas in order to promote the release of our hostages and achieve the other goals of the war.”

"Although Hamas's proposal is far from Israel's necessary requirements, Israel will send a delegation of mediators to exhaust the possibility of reaching an agreement under conditions acceptable to Israel," a truly convoluted way of saying no deal will be accepted by the Israeli entity's leadership.

Further reports stated that occupation forces were seen advancing towards Rafah's eastern border fence, while reconnaissance drones flew in the skies overhead.

With a pre-war population of just 171'000 people, more than 1.4 million Palestinians have been jam packed into tent cities in the Rafah area, Gaza's southernmost city, where the civilian population was directed towards at the start of the war and told it would be a "safe zone".

Rafah is also the Gaza-outdoor-prison's lifeline to the outside world, with the border crossing into Egypt serving as the last gateway for humanitarian aid brought into the enclave.

As a result of the Israeli occupation's special genocide operation in the Gaza Strip, the death toll now exceeds 34'683 Palestinian killed, including more than 14'500 children and 9'500 women, while another 78'018 others have been wounded since the start of the current round of Zionist aggression, beginning with the events of October 7th, 2023.

May 6th, 2024.

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@WorkerSolidarityNews

[azspot]

Israel has refused to fully open the crossings into Gaza at Beit Hanoun and Karem Abu Salem as well as refused to allow complete opening of the Rafah crossing the links Gaza to Egypt. Since these land crossings are closed, and since Israel destroyed the Yasser Arafat International Airport in 2001, there are no easy solutions to bring food aid into Gaza. Delivery of food and supplies through the air is not sufficient—indeed it is a drop in the ocean (which is where some of the aid packages landed). There is now talk of building maritime corridors, but since Israel has bombed the Port of Gaza this is not an easy option. That the US has said that it would build a temporary pier off the coast of Gaza’s southern half is ridiculous. It would be so much easier to open the Rafah crossing to allow at least 500 trucks a day into Gaza. But Israel will not permit this option.

Starvation Is a War Crime

[whatsgoingoninpalestine]

Palestinian Life under Israeli Occupation

Every year on May 15, Palestinians mark the Nakba - the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948 by Zionist militias.

In the 76 years since the Nakba, Israel’s control over the Palestinian people has affected every aspect of life, from services they can access and where they can travel, to what resources they can use and where on their own land they can build homes.

In this illustrated guide, Al Jazeera takes you through some of the daily struggles under Israeli occupation.

1. Control of land and natural resources

There is a physical separation between Palestinians living in Gaza and those in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Israel essentially bars any movement between these areas.

But Israel still controls it completely and has built more than 290 illegal Jewish settlements and outposts on it, where some 700,000 settlers now live.

2. Control of housing

What would you do if you knew you needed a permit to build a home, but it is nearly impossible to get one because you are Palestinian?

Many Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem are forced to build homes without permits because Israel refuses to grant them.

“All my memories were in that house,” Fakhri Abu Diab, 62, told Al Jazeera after Israeli authorities bulldozed his home in occupied East Jerusalem in February.

Israeli authorities typically require Palestinian residents to pay for the bulldozing of their own homes, leaving Abu Diab concerned that he may not be able to afford the demolition.

3. Control of human resources

Every morning, before dawn, tens of thousands of Palestinian workers squeeze into cage-like lanes to wait to pass Israeli military checkpoints on their way to work.

Israel, with its heavy restrictions on Palestinian movement and resources, has driven Palestinian unemployment rates to the third highest in the world.

The ILO predicts that if the war on Gaza continues until June, unemployment in Palestine will rise above 45 percent compared with 25 percent for the same period last year.

4. Control of financial resources

Israel has significant influence over Palestine's financial resources through mechanisms like the taxes it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA), which has overseen parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank since the mid-1990s.

Israel collects about $188m a month in taxes on behalf of the PA - 64 percent of the PA’s total revenue.

Israel has regularly suspended these payments, hampering the PA’s ability to pay salaries to its estimated 150,000 employees working in the occupied West Bank and Gaza.

5. Control of trade

Since 1967, when Israel occupied all of historic Palestine and expelled 300,000 Palestinians from their homes, Palestinian trade relations with the Arab world have been all but cut off.

Israel controls the movement of goods that Palestinians can import and export.

In 2001, Israeli forces destroyed Yasser Arafat International Airport in Rafah, southern Gaza, the territory’s only Palestinian-operated airport.

6. Control of technology

Palestine is digitally occupied too.

Israel restricts imports of information and communications technology (ICT) equipment, claiming it is “dual use”, or has both civilian and military applications.

Israeli networks can also monitor and censor online Palestinian content.

7. Control of infrastructure

Israel controls most water resources in the region, including the occupied West Bank's main underground aquifers.

Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank and Gaza often face restrictions on access and usage.

The World Health Organization recommends a minimum safe water consumption of 100 litres per capita per day.

In 2023, Israelis on average consumed 247 litres a day, while Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza got 82 litres.

8. Control of cultural heritage

Palestine’s rich cultural heritage is constantly in danger under Israeli occupation.

Since October 7, Israel’s bombardment of Gaza has destroyed more than 200 cultural heritage sites, including museums, libraries and mosques.

These are just some of the ways daily life in Palestine is restricted under Israeli occupation.

Israel’s control and domination violate international laws and deprive Palestinians of their right to self-determination. They have also diminished Palestine’s economy, making it dependent on Israel, according to a report by the UN’s Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia.

“We’re traumatised,” Abu Diab, who was forced to pay for the demolition of his own home earlier this year, said.

Palestinians say Israel’s continuing system of oppression has meant that the Nakba has never really ended.

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 12.13 (after 1970)

1972 – Apollo program: Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt begin the third and final extra-vehicular activity (EVA) or "Moonwalk" of Apollo 17. To date they are the last humans to set foot on the Moon. 1974 – Malta becomes a republic within the Commonwealth of Nations. 1974 – In the Vietnam War, the North Vietnamese forces launch their 1975 Spring Offensive (to 30 April 1975), which results in the final capitulation of South Vietnam. 1977 – Air Indiana Flight 216 crashes near Evansville Regional Airport, killing 29, including the University of Evansville basketball team, support staff, and boosters of the team. 1981 – General Wojciech Jaruzelski declares martial law in Poland, largely due to the actions by Solidarity. 1982 – The 6.0 Ms  North Yemen earthquake shakes southwestern Yemen with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe), killing 2,800, and injuring 1,500. 1988 – PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat gives a speech at a UN General Assembly meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, after United States authorities refused to grant him a visa to visit UN headquarters in New York. 1989 – The Troubles: Attack on Derryard checkpoint: The Provisional Irish Republican Army launches an attack on a British Army temporary vehicle checkpoint near Rosslea, Northern Ireland. Two British soldiers are killed and two others are wounded. 1994 – Flagship Airlines Flight 3379 crashes in Morrisville, North Carolina, near Raleigh–Durham International Airport, killing 15. 1995 – Banat Air Flight 166 crashes in Sommacampagna near Verona Villafranca Airport in Verona, Italy, killing 49. 2001 – Sansad Bhavan, the building housing the Indian Parliament, is attacked by terrorists. Twelve people are killed, including the terrorists. 2002 – European Union enlargement: The EU announces that Cyprus, Czechia, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia will become members on May 1, 2004. 2003 – Iraq War: Operation Red Dawn: Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein is captured near his home town of Tikrit. 2007 – The Treaty of Lisbon is signed by the EU member states to amend both the Treaty of Rome and the Maastricht Treaty which together form the constitutional basis of the EU. The Treaty of Lisbon is effective from 1 December 2009.

[drmaqazi]

JEWISH TERRORISM AND GENOCIDE

IN THE HOLY LAND SINCE 1948 …… 

October 14-15, 1953, Qibya. Ariel Sharon commands attack on Qibya, 42 homes destroyed, 60 civilians killed

Holy Week 1954, Haifa. Israelis desecrate  Christian cemeteries in Haifa

July 14, 1954, Egypt. Israeli Army intelligence, Modin, firebombs civilian post office in Egypt After 50 years, President Katsav presents three surviving members with certificates of appreciation for the false flag operation.

October 29, 1956, terrorist atrocity in Kafr Qasim, 47 cold-blooded murders

November 13, 1966, village of Sammu attacked, 18 dead, 100 wounded

In a false flag to blame Egypt, Israel attacked the USS Liberty, even machine-gunning drowning US sailors

June 8, 1967, USS Liberty attacked 34 sailors dead, 170 wounded -- not civilians, but non-participants.

Try watching this video on www.youtube.com, or enable JavaScript if it is

More on Jewish false flag attacks here.

June 5, 1967, “In danger of being attacked” Israel launches war, 759 Israelis and 15,000 Arabs dead

Netanyahu’s False Narrative of Self-Defense

Marjorie Cohn - CounterPunch

Historical Myth Justifies Israel’s Golan Heights Occupation

Institute for Historical Review

For decades Israel has cited vital security concerns to justify its seizure of the Golan Heights. Israelis have claimed that from 1948 to June 1967, Syrian military forces repeatedly used the Heights to shell Jewish settlements and installations below. These artillery bombardments, in the widely accepted Israeli and American view, justified Israel’s conquest of the Heights in 1967, and its occupation ever since. Actually, Israel’s seizure and occupation of this territory is based on a historical lie. 

This was frankly acknowledged by IDF General and Israeli cabinet minister Moshe Dayan in an interview given in 1976, but which was not made public until April 1997.

On March 3, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued an impassioned plea to Congress to protect Israel by opposing diplomacy with Iran ... He reiterated the claim that Israel acted in the 1967 Six-Day War “to defend itself.” ... Israel relies on that narrative to continue occupying those Palestinian lands ... But declassified high-level documents from Britain, France, Russia and the United States reveal that Egypt, Syria, and Jordan were not going to attack Israel and Israel knew it. In fact, they did not attack Israel. Instead, Israel mounted the first attack in order to decimate the Egyptian army and take the West Bank.

December 28, 1968, Beirut. Operation Gift, Israeli commandos attack Beirut International Airport, destroyed 12 passenger planes and a cargo aircraft

1969, Israeli bombing of school Bahdr al Baker, 75 children dead, 100 wounded

March 1, 1970, Israel invades Lebanon, civilian death toll unknown

Sept 8, 1972, Israeli bombing of Syrian and Lebanese civilians, “hundreds dead.”

1974, Israeli terrorists attack civilian aircraft; desecrate Christian shrines including Church of the Holy Sepulcher, stealing the diamond crown of the statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary

March 31, 1975, Revealed: how Israel offered to sell South Africa nuclear weapons by Chris McGreal, The Guardian, 5/24/2010

Declassified: Israeli Government Offered to Sell Nuclear Weapons to South Africa

Zionist nuclear hypocrites are seeking sanctions and war against Iran, a nation that complies with the nuclear regulation.

1975-1980, numerous Mossad assassinations of Palestinian scientists, journalists, and others

1978, Operation Litani, Israeli invasion of Lebanon, approximately 2,000 Lebanese civilians killed, approximately 250,000 displaced

June 1982, Israel invades Lebanon again on the pretext of an Israeli false flag claim that Yasser Arafat attempted assassination of Israeli UK Ambassador Shlomo Argov, Robert Fisk called the invasion resulting in the death of 18,000 Palestinians “one of the most shocking war crimes of the 20th century.”

August 1982, 20,000 civilians dead from Israeli bombing of Beirut on the orders of Ariel Sharon

September 1982, massacres of the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps, 800 women, children, and elderly killed, victims were axed, shot, and raped, many bodies were found mutilated

Some of the 800 innocents killed by the Israelis at Sabra & Shatila,

September 16-18, 1982

October 1982, Israeli terrorists bombed houses, cars, and offices of three elected mayors of the West Bank cities, Nablus, Ramallah, and Al Beireh

1984, kidnapping of Palestinians on the high seas off merchant vessels

1984, Mossad planted a radio transmitter in Gaddaffi’s compound in Tripoli, Libya which broadcast fake terrorist trasmissions recorded by Mossad, in order to frame Gaddaffi as a terrorist supporter. Ronald Reagan bombed Libya immediately thereafter.

1986, Palestinian cartoonist, Naj Al Ali, assassinated

April 1988, Israeli commandos invade the home of Khalil Al Wazir, a Palestinian leader, and shoot him in bed

February-March 1989, Israeli jets bomb Beka Valley, 15 children killed, more adults

April 14, 1989, Israeli police and armed Jewish settlers attack disarmed Palestinian village, Nahalin, 8 killed, 50 wounded

October 8, 1990, 17 Palestinians gunned down on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount by Israeli Border Police

February 25, 1994, Kach Party terrorist Baruch Goldstein uses assault rifle to murder 39 Palestinians worshipping at Cave of the Patriarchs mosque in Hebron.

“A pamphlet named Baruch Hagever was published in 1994 and a book called Baruch Hagever: Sefer Zikaron la-Kadosh Baruch Goldstein in 1995, in which various rabbis praised Goldstein’s action as a pre-emptive strike in response to Hamas threats of a pogrom, and wrote that it is possible to view his act as following five Halachic principles.”

Chief Rabbi of Hebron and Kiryat Arba in the southern West Bank DOv Lior celebrated the massacre as an act carried out “to sanctify the holy name of God.” He then extolled Goldstein as “a righteous man.”

… and then Prime Minister Yitshak Rabin gave permission for a memorial to honor Goldstein (photo at right)

Responding to the massacre, Rabbi Yitzhak Levinger stated, “I am sorry not only about dead Arabs but also about dead flies.”

The Hebrew inscription on Goldstein’s grave monument reads, in part:

“The revered Dr. Baruch Kapel Goldstein… Son of Israel.  He gave his soul for the sake of the people of Israel, The Torah, and the Land.  His hands are clean and his heart good… He was assassinated for the Sanctity of God”

On Feb. 27, 1994 Rabbi Yaacov Perrin eulogized Goldstein and stated,

”One million Arabs are not worth a Jewish fingernail.” [N.Y. Times, Feb. 28, 1994, p. 1]

Murderpedia’s entry on Dr. Goldstein: http://murderpedia.org/male.G//g/goldstein-baruch-photos.htm

Epitaph on the mass murderer’s government-approved monument: ”Here lies the saint, Dr. Baruch Kappel Goldstein, blessed be the memory of the righteous and holy man, may The Lord avenge his blood, who devoted his soul to The Jews, Jewish religion and Jewish land. His hands are innocent and his heart is pure. He was killed as a martyr of God on the 14th of Adar, Purim, in the year 5754.”

February 27, 1994, Israeli Mossad bombs Our Lady of Deliverance Maronite Catholic Church at Jounieh, Lebanon, 11 killed.

Aftermath of the 1994 Israeli bombing of Our Lady of Deliverance Church in Lebanon

April 18, 1996, Israeli massacre of civilians at Qana, Lebanon

April 14, 2000, homes of civilians bulldozed (actions admitted by Ha’aretz and praised by the canonized “Holocaust survivor” Elie Wiesel)

September 30, 2000, 12 year old Palestinian boy, Muhammad al-Durah, shot dead in front of his father.

October 3, 2000, Israeli army spokesperson admits that Israeli snipers killed him.

http://www.themodernreligion.com/jihad/sniper.html ,

November 2000, …then the Israeli investigation says the Israelis are not responsible.

Try watching this video on www.youtube.com, or enable JavaScript if it is

[xtruss]

Life Of Ex-Pakistani President Parvez Musharraf In Photos

Former Pakistani President Parvez Musharraf died on Sunday. He was 79. He was the Pakistani Army chief at the time of Kargil War. He overthrew the then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to assume power in 1999, which he held until 2008. He supported the US-led War on Terror and participated in failed peace talks with India. He visited India to hold talks with the Indian leadership. Under his presidency, Pakistan also hosted the Indian men's cricket team and Musharraf famously asked former Indian captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni to not cut his long hair.

— Outlook India | 05 February 2023

Pervez Musharraf Passes Away! Then Pakistan Gen. Pervez Musharraf gestures at a news conference, Thursday March 23, 2000, in Islamabad. Gen. Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup and later led a reluctant Pakistan into aiding the U.S. war in Afghanistan against the Taliban, has died, an official said. He was 79. | Photo: AP/B.K. Bangash, File

In this file photo, Pakistan's then President Pervez Musharraf with then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpyee in Agra. Musharraf passed away due to prolonged illness. | PTI Photo

Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf and his wife Sehba pose in front of the Taj Mahal in Agra. An official said Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan military ruler who backed U.S. war in Afghanistan after 9/11, has died. | Photo: AP/Sherwin Crasto, File

Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, center, and his wife Sehba Musharraf, 3rd right, pose with Pakistani children clad in traditional dresses during the 54th anniversary celebration of Pakistan's Independence Day at Presidential palace in Islamabad, Pakistan on Aug 14, 2001. Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup and later led a reluctant Pakistan into aiding the U.S. war in Afghanistan against the Taliban, has died, an official said. He was 79. | Photo: AP/B.K.Bangash, File

In this file photo, Pakistan's then President Pervez Musharraf with indian cricketer M.S. Dhoni during the ODI match played between India and Pakistan at Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore, Pakistan. Musharraf passed away due to prolonged illness. | Photo: PTI

Then U.S. President George W. Bush, right, shakes hands with then Pakistan President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, on Sept. 22, 2006, at the end of a joint press conference in the East Room at the White House in Washington. Gen. Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup and later led a reluctant Pakistan into aiding the U.S. war in Afghanistan against the Taliban, has died, an official said. He was 79. | Photo: AP/Gerald Herbert, File

Afghanistan interim Prime Minister Hamid Karzai, right, welcomes Pakistan President Gen. Pervez Musharraf on April 2, 2002, at Kabul International Airport in Afghanistan. That was Musharraf's first visit to Kabul. An official said Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan military ruler who backed U.S. war in Afghanistan after 9/11, has died. | Photo: AP/Suzanne Plunkett, File

Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, right, chats with U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan at Pakistan Human Development Forum on Jan 24, 2002 in Islamabad, Pakistan. An official said Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan military ruler who backed U.S. war in Afghanistan after 9/11, has died. | Photo: AP/B.K.Bangash, File

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, left, gives a news conference in Islamabad, Pakistan with Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf on Oct. 16, 2001. Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup and later led a reluctant Pakistan into aiding the U.S. war in Afghanistan against the Taliban, has died, an official said. He was 79. | Photo: AP/John McConnico, File

General Pervez Musharraf, President of Pakistan, left, talks to Palestinian Leader Yasser Arafat on Aug. 23, 2001, at the Presidential palace in Islamabad, Pakistan. Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup and later led a reluctant Pakistan into aiding the U.S. war in Afghanistan against the Taliban, has died, an official said. He was 79. | Photo: AP/Hussein Hussein, File

[political-affairs]

Rafah Border Crossing

  Rafah border crossing - British aid convoy entering Gaza Strip from Egypt 

Rafah (Arabic: رفح‎), also known as Rafiah, is a Palestinian city in the southern Gaza Strip. Located 30 kilometers (19 mi) south of Gaza, Rafah's population of 71,003[1] is overwhelmingly made up of Palestinian refugees. Rafah camp and Tall as-Sultan form separate localities. Rafah is the district capital of the Rafah Governorate. Yasser Arafat International Airport, Gaza's only airport, is located just south of the city; the airport operated from 1998 to 2001, when it was bombed and bulldozed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) after the killing of Israeli soldiers by members of Hamas. Rafah is the site of the Rafah Border Crossing, the only crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt.

 Etymology

Over the ages it has been known as "Robihwa" by the ancient Egyptians, "Rafihu" by the Assyrians, "Ῥαφία, Rhaphia"[2] by the Greeks, "Raphia" by Romans, "Raphiaḥ" [pronounced Rafiach] by the Israelites, "Rafh" by the Arab Caliphate.

  History

  Antiquity

Rafah has a history stretching back thousands of years. It was first recorded in an inscription of Egyptian Pharaoh Seti I, from 1303 BCE as Rph, and as the first stop on Pharaoh Shoshenq I's campaign to the Levant in 925 BC. In 720 BCE it was the site of the Assyrian king Sargon II's victory over the Egyptians, and in 217 BC the Battle of Raphia was fought between the victorious Ptolemy IV and Antiochus III.[3] (It is said to be one of the largest battles ever fought in the Levant, with over a hundred thousand soldiers and hundreds of elephants).

The town was conquered by Alexander Yannai and held by the Hasmoneans until it was rebuilt in the time of Pompey and Gabinius; the latter seems to have done the actual work of restoration for the era of the town dates from 57 BCE. Rafah is mentioned in Strabo (16, 2, 31), the Antonine Itinerary, and is depicted on the Map of Madaba.[3]

A Jewish community settled in the city in the 9th and 10th centuries and again in the 12th, although in the 11th century it suffered a decline and in 1080 they migrated to Ashkelon. A Samaritan community also lived there during this period. Like most cities of southern Palestine, ancient Rafah had a landing place on the coast (now Tell Rafah), while the main city was inland. During the Byzantine period, it was a diocese.[3]

  Arab and Mamluk rule

Rafah was an important trading city during the early Arab period, and one of the towns captured by the Rashidun army under general 'Amr ibn al-'As in 635 CE.[4] Under the Umayyads and Abbasids, Rafah was the southernmost border of Jund Filastin ("District of Palestine"). According to Arab geographer al‑Ya'qubi, it was the last town in the Province of Syria and on the road from Ramla to Egypt.[5]

In 1226, Arab geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi writes of Rafah's former importance in the early Arab period, saying it was "of old a flourishing town, with a market, and a mosque, and hostelries". However, he goes on to say that in its current state, Rafah was in ruins, but was an Ayyubid postal station on the road to Egypt after nearby Deir al‑Balah.[5]

  Ottoman and Egyptian period

Ottoman records in the 16th century show a small village of 16 taxpayers.

In 1799, the Revolutionary Army of France commanded by Napoleon Bonaparte passed through Rafah during the invasion of Egypt and Syria.[6]

Rafah was the boundary between the provinces of Egypt and Syria. In 1832, the area came under Egyptian occupation of Muhammad Ali, which lasted until 1840.

In 1881, Archduke Ludwig Salvator of Austria wrote

Fragments of gray granite pillars, still standing, are here to be met with about the road, the fields, and the sand, and we saw one lying on the ground half buried... The pillars are the remains of an ancient temple, Raphia, and are of special importance in the eyes of the Arabs, who call them Rafah, as they mark the boundary between Egypt and Syria.

—Ludwig Salvator, The Caravan Route between Egypt and Syria

Salvator 1881, pp. [1]

  Modern times

In 1917, the British army captured Rafah, and used it as a base for their attack on Gaza. The presence of the army bases was an economic draw that brought people back to the city, and in 1922 it had a population of 600. By 1948, the population had risen to 2,500.

After the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the refugee camps were established. In the 1956 war involving Israel, Britain, France, and Egypt, 111 people, including 103 refugees, were killed by the Israeli army in the Palestinian refugee camp of Rafah. The United Nations was unable to determine the circumstances surrounding the deaths.Demographics

In 1922, Rafah's population was 599, which increased to 2,220 in 1945. In 1982, the total population was approximately 10,800.[16]

In the 1997 Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) census, Rafah and its adjacent camp had a combined population of 91,181, Tall as-Sultan was listed with a further 17,141.[17] Refugees made up 80.3% of the entire population.[18] In the 1997 census, Rafah's (together with Rafah camp) gender distribution was 50.5% male and 49.5% female.[19]

In the 2006 PCBS estimate, Rafah city had a population of 71,003,[1] Rafah camp and Tall as-Sultan form separate localities for census purposes, having populations of 59,983 and 24,418, respectively.[1]

  Rafah Border Crossing

Rafah is the site of the Rafah Border Crossing, the only crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt. Formerly operated by Israeli military forces, control of the crossing was transferred to the Palestinian Authority in September 2005 as part of the larger Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. A European Union commission began monitoring the crossing in November 2005 amid Israeli security concerns, and in April 2006, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas's Presidential Guard assumed responsibility for the site on the Palestinian Authority side.[20] On the Egyptian side, the responsibility is assumed by the 750 Border Guards allowed by an agreement of Egypt with Israel. The agreement was signed in November 2005 forced by US pressure, and specifies that it is under security requirements demanded by Israel.

 On January 23, 2008, at 2 am, the border crossing was breached after gunmen set off an explosion nearby, destroying part of the Israeli Gaza Strip barrier. Over the next four days, approximately 700,000 Palestinians crossed into Egypt, most planning to buy supplies and return to Gaza. A smaller number of Egyptians crossed into Gaza.

On June 1, 2010, in the midst of international uproar following Israel's attack on a relief boat, Egypt announced it was opening the border crossing.

On May 28, 2011, Egypt opened the Gaza Strip Border Crossing, and thousands of Palestinian refugees entered into Egypt.

However in mid-June 2011 the crossing was closed for several days and after that only a few hundred were allowed to cross each day compared with 'thousands' who applied to cross each day. Egypt reportedly agreed to allow a minimum of 500 people to cross each day. [2][7][8]

[accradotalt]

PRESIDENT KAUNDA HOSTS MANDELA IN ZAMBIA 1990

Barely 16 days away from his release from prison, Nelson Mandela visited Zambia on 27th February 1990 where he was greeted with the ceremony normally reserved for heads of state.

Among the people that welcomed him included notable figures such as leaders of the Frontline states, Commonwealth representatives, Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman and the exiled ANC Executive Committee.

• Present at the then Lusaka International Airport were:

• Yasser Arafat - Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman

• Tunku Abdul Rahman – Malaysian Prime Minister

• Yoweri Museveni – President of Uganda

• Sam Nujoma - SWAPO Leader

• Herman Toivo ja Toivo - SWAPO Founder

• Robert Mugabe – President of Zimbabwe

• Quett Masire – President of Botswana

• Joaquim Chissano – President of Mozambique

• Obed Dlamini - Prime Minister of Swaziland

• Justin Metsing Lekhanya - Prime Minister of Lesotho

[architarki]

Yasser Arafat International Airport

Gaza. active for less than 2 years before the israelis bombed the building during a Palestinian uprising

[latestnewstable]

Gaza airport: The legacy of a Palestinian dream

Gaza airport: The legacy of a Palestinian dream

It was 7am on June 2, 1996, in Cairo when Captain Zeyad al-Bada received a surprising phone call from Palestine Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat. Arafat told al-Bada, then a 39-year-old Palestinian Airlines captain and Arafat’s personal pilot, that he would be the first to land at the newly-built Gaza International Airport. “There were no aerial maps, no radars, the Gaza airport…

[sweetsmellosuccess]

Sundance 2018: Day 5

Number of Films: 4 Best Movie of the Day: The Oslo Diaries

Search: Over the last couple of decades, we have adapted to computer tech in ways both overt and internal. It is more often than not the way we connect with other human beings, and the means by which we interact in society. This makes for an interesting branch of storytelling, conducted entirely via the screens, apps, and cameras so ubiquitous in our lives. Aneesh Chaganty‘s mystery thriller begins promisingly enough with an emotionally powerful 10 minute recap of one family’s progression told entirely through saved photos, videos, calendar entries, and emails. We meet the Kims, watching as their daughter goes from kindergartner to high school freshman, even as her mother gets sick, goes into remission, and then gets sick again. It plays like a high-tech Up, and brings us on board emotionally with the father, David (John Cho), such that when his daughter Margot (Michelle La) suddenly goes missing, we feel his increased panic at the thought of losing her. It’s a promising premise, that carries itself reasonably well up until its final act, when this carefully crafted thriller loses its sense of restraint entirely, and plays instead like a cheap airport paperback. There are moments when Chaganty captures the confusing mishmash of crowdsourced input (naturally, there are quickly concocted reddit threads declaring the father the culprit in her disappearance; and various trolls on different platforms who revel in the pain another family is experiencing), and a satisfying combination of on-screen activity and visual scenework (mostly via FaceTime calls), but unfortunately all the precision work of the first act gets lost in the shuffle of its completely far-fetched ending.

The Oslo Diaries: There was a heady time back in 1995, where it really seemed as if the ages-old Israeli/Palestinian conflict would finally be resolved. Mor Loushy and Daniel Silvan‘s Doc explores the top secret peace talks that began in 1992, between a pair of Israeli professors, and a trio of Palestinians sent by PLO head Yasser Arafat to gauge the interest in real, substantive compromise. Through the inevitable pitch-and-yaw of the two governments, Arafat and Israeli prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, met on the White House lawn to sign the basic accords -- wherein each country formally recognized the other’s right to exist -- and the long process of actually implementing the new plan began in earnest, a process that had seemed positively insurmountable just a few years before. The Doc captures the flood of optimism in both countries at the prospect of real peace, a belief cemented at a massive peace rally in Tel Aviv, but sadly the accords died the second a radical Israeli student fired three bullets into Rabin as he was leaving the rally. As the agony has continued unabated in the 23 years since, with some 16,000 deaths in the unresolved conflict, it’s particularly painful to see just how close the world came to the resolution of one of its most entrenched conflicts. It’s a fascinating if not deeply disheartening time capsule of a brief era of optimism.

Assassination Nation (pictured): Hopped up and too much of everything, including an incoherent political bent that wants to strike a blow for feminist empowerment, instead it just muddies the water with buckets of stage blood. Sam Levinson‘s film, about a town driven to Purge levels of violent madness after a series of hacks first exposes public figures, then goes on to reveal half the town’s dirty business. At first, the mobs are content to laugh and mock the victims, but then things get a good deal more vicious. Through it all, we watch the plight of Lily (Odessa Young), and her three besties (Hari Nef, Suki Waterhouse, Abra), as she gets accused of being the hack’s perpetrator, sending the masked mob into a frenzy to go after her. Far from a satire -- apart from everything else, it doesn’t have much of a sense of humor -- it positions itself as a modern feminist diatribe, only its message is garbled by Levinson’s chaotic narrative. It pays lip service to deeper meanings, but doesn’t really offer much other than feminists are handy with heavy caliber guns, the internet is messed up, and many horrible things happen in the name of lulz.

Beirut: Something you don’t very often see at Sundance is a decently budgeted international thriller, but Brad Anderson’s film, written by Tony Gilroy, features a Hollywood cast (John Hamm, Rosamund Pike), and some of the kind of dense political intrigue with which Gilroy is best known. Hamm plays Mason Skiles, a former U.S. diplomat in the Middle East who experienced a severe trauma in Beirut, leaving him a hard-drinking husk back in the States. When a complicated hostage situation arises there a decade later, he is quickly recruited by the CIA to return to the city in which he lost so much in order to broker a deal on behalf of an old friend. The film moves along smartly enough, depicting the political quagmire and competing interests of various factions, but at a too svelte 110 minutes, it actually doesn’t quite have the heft to do its story justice. It’s the rarest of films that actually needs to be a bit longer to properly flesh it out. Reportedly, Anderson made the film from a script that had been languishing on the shelf for more than 20 years, and it feels like an earnest effort by a writer who hadn’t yet quite worked out all the beats of his stories.

Tomorrow: Hard to believe, but we’re moving into the wind-down part of the fest already. First off, I will watch the highly anticipated new film from Lynn Ramsay (Ratcatcher), You Were Never Really Here; then jump to the environmentalist minded doc The Devil We Know; before taking in the buzz-worthy Madeline’s Madeline; and close out the evening with the female buddy pic, Never Goin’ Back.

Into the frigid climes and rarefied thin air of the spectacular Utah Mountains, I've arrived in order to document some of the sense and senselessness of the 2018 Sundance Film Festival. Over the next week, armed with little more than a heavy parka and a bevy of blank reporter's notebooks, I'll endeavor to watch as many movies as I can and report my findings.

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 11.11 (after 1980)

1981 – Antigua and Barbuda joins the United Nations. 1982 – Space Shuttle Columbia launches from the Kennedy Space Center on STS-5, the first operational mission of the Space Shuttle program. 1992 – The General Synod of the Church of England votes to allow women to become priests. 1993 – A sculpture honoring women who served in the Vietnam War is dedicated at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. 1999 – The House of Lords Act is given Royal Assent, restricting membership of the British House of Lords by virtue of a hereditary peerage. 2000 – Kaprun disaster: One hundred fifty-five skiers and snowboarders die when a cable car catches fire in an alpine tunnel in Kaprun, Austria. 2001 – Journalists Pierre Billaud, Johanne Sutton and Volker Handloik are killed in Afghanistan during an attack on the convoy they are traveling in. 2002 – A Fokker F27 Friendship operating as Laoag International Airlines Flight 585 crashes into Manila Bay shortly after takeoff from Ninoy Aquino International Airport, killing 19 people. 2004 – New Zealand Tomb of the Unknown Warrior is dedicated at the National War Memorial, Wellington. 2004 – The Palestine Liberation Organization confirms the death of Yasser Arafat from unidentified causes. Mahmoud Abbas is elected chairman of the PLO minutes later. 2006 – Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II unveils the New Zealand War Memorial in London, United Kingdom, commemorating the loss of soldiers from the New Zealand Army and the British Army. 2011 – A helicopter crash just outside Mexico City kills seven, including Francisco Blake Mora the Secretary of the Interior of Mexico. 2012 – A strong earthquake with the magnitude 6.8 hits northern Burma, killing at least 26 people. 2014 – Fifty-eight people are killed in a bus crash in the Sukkur District in southern Pakistan's Sindh province. 2020 – Typhoon Vamco makes landfall in Luzon and several offshore islands, killing 67 people. The storm causes the worst floods in the region since Typhoon Ketsana in 2009. 2022 – Russo-Ukrainian War: Ukrainian armed forces enter the city of Kherson following a successful two-month southern counteroffensive.

[publicsituation]

RT @MWC_Bradford: This video is heartbreaking. 💔 In 1998 the Yasser Arafat International Airport was built in Gaza. But by 2001 three years after it opened Israel BOMBED its radar stations and used BULLDOZERS to rip up the... https://t.co/vOYOVvng7b

[tendance-news]

No planes have taken off or landed at Yasser Arafat International for 17 years. from BBC News - Home https://ift.tt/2QsGOKX

[gnmagazine]

No planes have taken off or landed at Yasser Arafat International for 17 years. from BBC News - Home https://ift.tt/2QsGOKX

[skykhandare-blog]

Gaza's abandoned airport in ruins

Gaza’s abandoned airport in ruins

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In 1998 the Yasser Arafat International Airport was built in Gaza.

It was seen by many as a symbol of Palestinian sovereignty, soon after the Oslo Accords were signed by Israel and the Palestinians, in a move towards peace.

But by 2001, the airport was no longer operational.

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