Aysha’s raising money for Gaza

By: Aysha Mercs

As you are probably aware there is a war crime happening in Palestine, as we speak there are missiles being launched into Palestine and thousands of people have lost their home, schools, hospitals and local amenities. The death toll in Palestine has reached over a thousand and their are children without parents, childless mothers and families torn apart. The money I raise is just a small amount that with your help can go towards rebuilding what’s left of the lives of these innocent people. As we go to sleep tonight in out warm comfortable beds the are those that are unable to Close their eyes through fear of being attacked. Please donate as much or as little as you can afford. 100% of proceeds raised go directly to Human Appeal through just giving account so that they are able to provide aid during this terrible time.

Hamas’s conditions to accept ceasefire

Here are Hamas’s conditions to accept ceasefire.

1- Open land borders to enter and leave Gaza freely.
2- Establish maritime corridor & seaport.
3- Release prisoners (there are more than 7000 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli Jails).
4- Grant access to Jerusalem Holy Sites for Gazan People.
5- Lift the siege over Gaza and let foods and fuel enter without limitations.
6- Build new power plant.

Via Dr. Mohamad N. Ziara

Palestinian children in Gaza are exposed to more violence in their lifetime than any other people

Palestinian children in Gaza are exposed to more violence in their lifetime than any other people, any other children, anywhere in the world. If you look at a child right now who is 10 years old, they’ve been through Cast Lead in 2008-2009, the invasion in 2012, now the invasion and destruction in 2014, in addition to the siege. If you look at the statistics for example, even before Cast Lead, 80% of Palestinian children in Gaza had witnessed some sort of violence against themselves, a friend or a family member. And now you’re getting to the point where probably close to 99% of children in Gaza are being exposed to a level of violence where they have seen family members be killed, murdered, burned alive – there’s nothing like the levels of traumatic exposure that any child in the world has ever been exposed to on a chronic and daily basis.

Joe Scarborough Harshly Criticizes Israel’s Conduct In Gaza (Video)

 Joe Scarborough took aim at Israel’s bombardment of Gaza on Thursday, saying that, despite his history of support for the country, he could not condone the killing of so many Palestinian civilians. “This continued killing of women and children in a way that appears to be indiscriminate is asinine,” he said, adding, “The United States of America, we cannot be associated with this if this continues. This is so bad, not only for the Israeli people, but for us.“

Gaza conflict: Israel and Hamas begin 72-hour humanitarian ceasefire

Shelling continued in the Gaza Strip minutes before the ceasefire began at 8am local time and four Palestinians reported killed by Israeli tank fire

An Israeli tank advances in a staging area near the Israel-Gaza border on Thursday. Photograph: Tsafrir Abayov/AP

By: Harriet Sherwood, Jason Burke and Paul Lewis

Source: http://www.theguardian.com/

A tense ceasefire has officially come into effect in Gaza after Israel and Hamas agreed to a 72-hour pause in their three-week conflict. The United States and United Nations brokered the temporary truce to allow for humanitarian relief and bring both sides to the table for talks on a longer-term halt to hostilities.

After a night of heavy bombardment, shelling continued in the Gaza Strip and rocket fire from Hamas hit Israel minutes before the ceasefire began at 8am on Friday local time. An Israeli army spokesman said it was looking into reports four Palestinians were killed and 15 wounded by tank fire nearly two hours after the truce began.

Delegations from Israel and Palestine are due to convene in Cairo for negotiations to be mediated by the Egyptian government.

Gaza families bake Eid ‘cake of resistance’

Displaced Palestinians are baking traditional holiday cakes under Israeli bombardment, to bring joy to their children.

By: Mohammed Omer

Source: http://m.aljazeera.com/

Gaza City – When Elham Elzanin fled her home in Beit Hanoun, she only had time to grab her terrified children and evacuate. Now sheltering at a school in Gaza City, Elzanin’s nine-year-old daughter Nima cries over missing one of the sweetest parts of the Eid holiday: cake.

“I said to myself, ‘We ought to make the children feel the atmosphere of Eid, even if warplanes are bombing,'” Elzanin, 39, told Al Jazeera. She said that the idea quickly spread among the children seeking refuge with their families at al-Hud school, and soon, a group of mothers began baking.

“The Israelis should know they will not stop us [from] finding some joy in making Eid cake,” she said. The cake, she added, represents “resilience and resistance”.

Palestinian teenager tweets real-time bombing in Gaza: “I might die tonight”

Panic on the streets of Gaza

Source: http://www.news.com.au/

A Palestinian teenager is using social media to give a devastatingly frightening insight into the situation in Gaza.

16-year-old Farah Baker, who goes under the name Farah Gazan on Twitter, is amassing thousands of followers and re-tweets on Twitter after sharing a night of her private terror from her bedroom as rockets fell through Gaza overnight.

“I might die tonight,” she wrote.

The teenager tweets furiously between attacks; posting video footage and sound grabs of bombs and missiles as they fly through the air and hit unsuspecting targets.

Gaza vs Israel on Twitter (IMAGE)

Gaza: why Israel is losing the social media war

By: Paul Mason

Source: http://blogs.channel4.com/

When Shujaiya was attacked by the Israeli Defence Force, killing dozens of civilians, the first I heard about it was via Twitter, early Sunday morning.

An activist on the ground I follow tweeted: “people running out of Shujaiya, bodies lying on ground”.

Soon after, Mohammed Omer an award-winning Palestinian journalist who tweets as @Mogaza – reported:

“Israel refuse allowing ambulance crew to get into Shejaia now! scores of dead bodies in all streets now! #gaza”

Not long after that, numerous western TV journalists stationed alongside Palestinian ambulance crews, including my colleague, Jonathan Miller, reported the same things. There was immediacy, corroboration and – with pictures – evidence.

Now compare that to the Israeli Defence Force Twitter feed, @IDFSpokesperson, as news emerged of the massive bombardment and civilian deaths. These are the first three tweets:

Nothing in those three tweets constitutes either a defence of, or explanation for, the killing of tens of non-combatants. But in the space between them, anybody following the Gaza conflict from both sides would have seen tens of independently shot images and accounts of civilian death and the destruction of housing and civilian infrastructure.

The incident shows who is winning the social media war over Gaza. It is evidence of a massive change in the balance of power between social media and the old, hierarchical media channels we used to rely on to understand wars.

Specifically social media has the power to do three things: first, to show people reality or a version of it independent of what TV networks show. Second, and I think just as important, journalists on the ground are using social media to report, necessarily short-circuiting the normal editorial processes that used to filter what they said. Third, to get into your real life consciousness much more powerfully than the old media.

Let’s work through each of these new powers and understand their impact. In a society where the media is supposed to observe balance and impartiality, getting real-time access to corroborated facts independently of TV stations is not so revolutionary.

But modern-day America is not one of those countries. Its media is traditionally heavily skewed towards the pro-Israeli view. My colleague, Matt Frei, tweeted that CNN’s Wolf Blitzer interview with Netanyahu was less a grilling more “a warm bath and a back rub”. Others used more profane metaphors.

But now, for the first time in a major Arab-Israeli conflict, the American public has other sources of reality. All research says that young people everywhere regard Twitter as essentially a news service, and via your social network you can easily get served up words and pictures more impactful than anything on TV. By the time many Americans woke up on Sunday, these pictures were of dead Palestinian children.

Netanyahu complained the Hamas strategy was to provide “telegenically dead” people: but where Israel is losing the hearts and minds of the world is not via “tele” anything: it is in the JPEGs that stream into millions of people’s mobile phones every time they glance at the object in the palm of their hand.