Mauritania, one of the few Arab countries that has full diplomatic ties with Tel Aviv, has withdrawn its ambassador from Israel.

Israel deliberately targeted Hamas-run media installations in its bombing campaign on Gaza and is practising media censorship, a journalist rights group said Monday.

The press group, which fights for better protection of journalists in conflict zones, also condemned the recent deaths of two journalists as a result of Israeli attacks.

Mads Gilbert, a Norwegian doctor in Gaza, tells CBS News that the number of civilians injured and killed in Gaza proves that Israel is deliberately attacking the population.

Strong circumstantial evidence is slowly emerging into the mainstream media that confirms that, far from Hamas provoking Israel, it has been Israel that has been deliberately provoking Hamas into rocketing and mortaring southern Israel specifically in order to provide a casus belli for Israel to attack the Gaza. In doing so, this makes Israel guilty of using its own people as ‘victims’ for political purposes.

The Israeli military is reportedly using napalm-like white phosphorus shells in its all-out attack on Gaza, according to the conservative Times of London. The phosphorus in the smoke-emitting shells causes agonizing, unquenchable burns, sometimes searing flesh right down to the bone.

These savage tools of terror are "legal" when used as smokescreens to mask military operations, although their use as an offensive weapon is war crime. This is a rather ludicrous distinction when the shells are fired into heavily populated civilian areas, exploding and spraying phosphorus in all directions. Anyone who orders their use on cities and refugee camps knows with iron certainty that civilians will be burned, maimed and killed by this chemical weapon. That is to say, they know they will be murdering and mutilating innocent people in the most gruesome manner -- and they give the order anyway.

They create robots to justify mass murder! Qassamcount is a Facebook and Twitter robot that will update your status with the latest numbers on Hamas rocket firings. Megaphone is a desktop application Zionists can install to be notified of opportunities to comment on news articles and vote in opinion polls on major international news websites.

They weren't kidding about that propaganda war!

Why is it that every government in the world is fair game for critical comment – except one? Call China ruthless; describe Zimbabwe as a madhouse governed by a lunatic; ridicule the intellectual shortcomings of George W. Bush – and that’s a legitimate exercise of free speech.

But criticize Israel, and it’s racism.

AS ISRAELI forces attacked Gaza by land, sea and air, residents living in the congested coastal strip faced a fateful question: should they flee the shelling and shooting, or hole up inside their homes and hope for the best?

The five-member al-Jarou family decided to make a break for it around midday on Sunday. They abandoned their home in the Shaaf neighbourhood east of Gaza City and dashed by car to a relative's house about two kilometres away, thinking it would be safer.

For a while, it was.

INTERNATIONAL efforts to impose a ceasefire in Gaza were underway last night as Israeli forces advanced deeper into Gaza City and the Palestinian death toll from the offensive soared towards 550.

Hopes for a ceasefire rose after Hamas, which governs the Gaza Strip, announced it had accepted an invitation from Egypt to send a delegation to Cairo for negotiations.

Thousands of Palestinian supporters took to the streets of Canadian cities Saturday to protest Israel's attack on Gaza and to urge the Canadian government to speak up against the increasing violence in the region.

In Toronto, about 2,000 people gathered in the city's downtown center and marched on the Israeli and the U.S. consulates.

"We're calling on the Canadian government to ask for an immediate ceasefire and resume humanitarian aid," Diana Ralph, one of the organizers from the Independent Jewish Voices, told reporters.

This is "a war-crime attack on sovereign people," she said.

Israeli troops engaged in heavy gunbattles late Monday with Hamas militants in Gaza City for the first time since the start of the army's ground offensive, military sources and witnesses said.

Large explosions and heavy exchanges of fire rocked Shejaiya neighbourhood of eastern Gaza City.

Ambulances and medical workers in Gaza are facing increasing difficulty in reaching the wounded, some are being killed in doing so, and a “humanitarian breathing space” is vital to ensure that food and medical supplies reach those in need as Israel’s offensive entered its 10th day, the top United Nations relief official in the area said today.

Now the Israeli army is trying the same doomed tactic again. Ban the press. Keep the cameras out. By yesterday morning, only hours after the Israeli army went clanking into Gaza to kill more Hamas members – and, of course, more civilians – Hamas was reporting the capture of two Israeli soldiers. Reporters on the ground could have sorted out the truth or the lie about that. But without a single Western journalist in Gaza, the Israelis were left to tell the world that they didn't know if the story was true.

The state of Israel has descended – plummeted – to one of the lowest levels of conscious barbarity that is currently evident in this horrible world.

Any nation that has behaved towards a subject people, as Israel has to Palestinians, is worthy only of utter contempt. On Sunday January 4 I heard a rabbi on the BBC's morning religious program saying that he supported Israel's air strikes on Gaza. A man of God actually endorsed the killing of hundreds of people. To say that I was – and am – aghast at the sentiment expressed is to put it very mildly. This religious leader, a person supposed to spread and preach tolerance, patience, charity and peace, was supporting war crimes of immense gravity. His approval of the killing of Arabs was blood-chilling.

Does it get more racist than this? "Pity for people of Gaza may be a natural emotional reaction, yet it is unethical and immoral." - Published in Israel's Number one newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth

Early 2006, Palestinians in the West Bank and especially in the Gaza Strip voted overwhelmingly for Hamas in a transparent and a fair election that was monitored by the former US President Carter. In response, all Western Powers (European Union and the United States), the “Moderate” Arab Regimes, and the Israelis conspired to topple the newly elected government (see related articles section for details). As a first response, the Israeli government jailed all the elected Hamas’ representatives in the West Bank and Western Powers started all sorts of blockade against the freely elected government. I’m not a fan of Hamas or its agenda, however, I believe it’s critical to understand why these Arab leader joined the Western Powers & Israel in a conspiracy to oust the freely elected Palestinian Government. To simply say they are puppets in hands of Israel and Western powers is not good enough, there must be more to it than that.

Twenty hours later, the wounded were still bleeding in a shed in the courtyard of the house. There was no electricity, no heat, no water. Their relatives were with them, but every time they tried to leave the courtyard to fetch water, the army shot at them.

I arrived in Israel 40 years ago. It took me many years to understand that the very existence of my country, as it is today, is based on an ongoing ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. The project started many years ago. Its seed can be traced to the basic fallacy of the Zionist movement, which set out to establish a Jewish-national state in a location already inhabited by another nation. Under these conditions, one has, at most, a moral right to strive for a bi-national state; establishing a national state implies, more or less by definition, ethnic cleansing of the previous inhabitants.

Speculation: Israel has been accused of using phosphorous which is banned under the Geneva Treaty of 1980 during its strikes on Hamas

Five civilians die when shells hit a market, while most residents stay indoors to avoid Israeli shelling. 'Anyone who survives this wave, it will be like they were born again,' said one man.

...

Reporting from Gaza City and Jerusalem -- As Israeli forces closed in on Gaza City, Mohammed Barbari joined the scramble by its most intrepid residents Sunday for dwindling supplies of food they would need while hunkering down at home.

The first explosion tore through the central Firas Market at 11:30 a.m. as he approached from adjacent Palestine Square. Unable to turn his yellow Volkswagen Golf around in traffic, he kept driving toward the hail of shrapnel and the screams of scattering shoppers.

Israel is believed to be using controversial white phosphorus shells to screen its assault on the heavily populated Gaza Strip yesterday. The weapon, used by British and US forces in Iraq, can cause horrific burns but is not illegal if used as a smokescreen.

Haaretz reports that, as Israeli ground forces entered Gaza yesterday, “hundreds of shells were fired, including cluster bombs aimed at open areas.” FireDogLake’s Siun writes, “The use of cluster bombs — which have a large footprint when initially dropped and then remain a threat for decades — in a location like the Gaza Strip which is so packed with people is horrifying.” (FDL notes that video footage seems to confirm the use of cluster bombs.) Last summer, a former Israeli defense official said that “the Israeli military used cluster bombs for two weeks during the 2006 Lebanon war without telling the Israeli government.” At the time, the UN decried the use of the bombs as “completely immoral.”

The following list of massacres is by no means exclusive, but they reflect the nature of the Zionist occupation of Palestine and Lebanon and show that massacres and expulsions were not aberrations that happen in any war, but organized atrocities with only one aim, that is to have a Zionist state which is 'goyim rein'.

The thermal imaging footage shot from an Israeli drone hovering over Gaza shows eight Palestinian militants loading rockets on to a lorry. Within seconds, the drone’s sights are locked on to the vehicle and it and the ghostlike figures nearby are incinerated in a missile blast.

Or so tens of thousands of visitors to the popular video-posting internet site YouTube have been led to believe. The clip was one of several dramatic scenes uploaded to the site by the Israeli army last week, the first time a national army has created its own YouTube channel.

A subsequent investigation by the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem attracted less attention. It suggests the rockets were in fact gas canisters and that the supposed militants were civilians moving welding equipment after their workshop had been damaged in one of the hundreds of Israeli air strikes on Gaza over the past week.

At least 13,000 Palestinians have been forced to flee their homes in Gaza as the bombardment continues into its seventh day, Save the Children said today.

More than half of those displaced people are children.

The aerial bombings and the ongoing ground invasion of Gaza by Israeli ground forces must be analysed in a historical context. Operation "Cast Lead" is a carefully planned undertaking, which is part of a broader military-intelligence agenda first formulated by the government of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in 2001:

"Sources in the defense establishment said Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the Israel Defense Forces to prepare for the operation over six months ago, even as Israel was beginning to negotiate a ceasefire agreement with Hamas."(Barak Ravid, Operation "Cast Lead": Israeli Air Force strike followed months of planning, Haaretz, December 27, 2008)

It was Israel which broke the truce on the day of the US presidential elections, November 4:

No one expected the internet. Across the world today, people who want the actual news, instead of clever propaganda, are getting it. People know about Israel’s false flag adventures. People know about her culpability for 9/11. They know who PNAC and Larry Silverstein are. They know about Odigo, Comverse and Megaphone. They know about things like this. They know that Israel started both of her major wars and wasn’t attacked by anyone. They know what Israel did in Lebanon and they know what is happening in Gaza. All over the world people are waking up to the fact that Israel is an enemy of the rest of the human race.

Pacifici explains that the Italian Jewish community agreed with the Israeli ambassador on keeping a "low profile"at this time. "I can assure you - writes Pacifici - that the decision to send medicine to Palestinian and Israeli children was taken only for media purposes, and was only used for our struggle which will start on Monday in the media to support Israel". Pacifici announces that on January 10th there will be a "mega-event" with 1,500 personalities chosen together with the Israeli ambassador in order to "explain Israel's reasons and its right to make this war".

Pacifici explains that the Roman Jewish community did not spend "even one Euro" for the medicine, which was donated by "an international Jewish organization" and guarantees that "in any case not one piece of medicine will get to Gaza unless it has been authorized by the Government of Israel".

Some of the thousands of extra reservists called up by the Israeli military are to be held ready in case of conflict on Israel's northern border with Lebanon, the scene of a long and costly battle two years ago.

Bill Kristol thinks that President-elect Barack Obama should be thankful for Israel's attack on Gaza.

"If you care about the peace process you should want Israel to embarrass and humiliate Hamas. That's the only chance -- there would be no peace process if Hamas were governing Gaza. That would be the worst thing for Obama. This is a favor for Obama if it de legitimizes and weakens Hamas," Kristol said.

Israel was reported to be using white phosphorous shells to cover the advance of its troops: the munitions are not illegal, but their use has been heavily criticised for causing terrible burns.

Israel consolidated its hold on parts of the Gaza Strip on Monday, seizing high-rise buildings on the outskirts of the territory's biggest city as a stream of world leaders headed for the region to press for a truce.

At least seven Palestinian children were killed, adding to the growing toll of civilian deaths that has caused international outrage.

let's revisit – and reverse – the Israeli argument, putting all the known facts in their proper context. If Mexico – in an attempt to regain its lost territory, the promised land of California – invaded California, drove the residents of San Diego from their city, cooped them up in, say, Death Valley, and wouldn't let anything but a basic minimum of consumer goods and medical supplies either in or out, well, we all know what would happen.

We call on the EU to suspend the EU-Israel Association Agreement until Israel respects human rights and International Law.

Above is a picture of a Catholic child from Gaza, 14 year old Christine Turok, lying in a coffin after being killed in Israel's latest fit of Talmudic hatred - one of many innocent children, women and men, Christian and Muslim, slaughtered by the drive to consolidate Eretz Yisrael.

I know that in the United States, from where we attract many readers, there are white, European Christians and Catholics who wholly support Israel in the belief that they are God's "Chosen People" - a theological fallacy which has crept even into the Catholic Church after the Second Vatican Council.

Theology and the Crucifixion aside, let's reason for one second: would "God's Chosen People" perpetrate, or collectively support the perpetration of, such an orgy of genocide and destruction as we are witnessing in Gaza? Would "God's Chosen People" hinder a Catholic Archbishop from celebrating pre-Christmas Masses in Gaza, before murdering members of his congregation from the air with impunity?

MORE than 100 Australian Jews, including two award-winning novelists and a former federal cabinet minister, have signed a statement condemning Israel's siege of Gaza, heightening tensions within the local Jewish community over the violence.

The Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, meanwhile called yesterday for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza but refused to criticise the Israeli offensive.

The first attempt at trying to end the war came a few days into the conflict, when Israeli and American sources floated the idea, with French backing, that Israel was considering suspending its attacks for 48-hours. However, the truth behind that proposal was that Israel was concerned that the Gaza Strip was scheduled to be under heavy cloud cover for those 48 hours, restricting Israeli warplanes' visibility while simultaneously providing Hamas rocket teams with cover.

Israel had hoped that Hamas would fall for the bait, keeping Israel safe from Hamas rockets for 48 hours, after which Israel (perhaps with help from the Fatah group) would “engineer” a few rockets designed to ‘break the truce’, allowing them to re-launch its offensive in clearer weather.

Nonetheless, Hamas refused to take the bait, and Israeli officials distanced themselves from the proposal.