A wee dram of Ernie or Le Retour de Nom de Guerre

The dram has been too wee this past couple of years but now Ernie Halfdram (nom de guerre of Harry Feldman) is back to blogging with a vengeance at his Bureau of Counterpropaganda.  See his penultimate post from earlier today:

Holding my breath

When Israel entered into the 'Agreement of Understanding For a Ceasefire in the Gaza Strip' at 2100 local time on 21 November, just about 30 hours ago, it undertook 'Opening the crossings and facilitating the movements of people and transfer of goods and refraining from restricting residents' free movements and targeting residents in border areas and procedures of implementation shall be dealt with after 24 hours from the start of the ceasefire'. [see Ernie blog for the terms]

Searching high and low has revealed no mention in the media of any progress towards this objective so far. Maybe the media are just a bit sluggish. Maybe they're waiting for some announcement to report. Maybe the parties have decided to wait until morning, their time, to commence 'dealing with' implementing these crucial undertakings.

What's certain is that there can be no peace while Israel persists in caging Gaza's 1 644 293 people in their 365 sq km concentration camp and enforcing thesiege. We can only hope that in the coming hours and days, we will see free movement of Gaza Strip residents to the West Bank and the rest of the world; unrestrained passage of imports and exports; the end of the naval blockade that prevents access to Gaza's Mediterranean gas reserves and fisheries; dismantling of the remote-controlled, watchtower-mounted machine guns; free access to the agricultural and other land in Israel's 'buffer zone', which extends up to 1500 metres into the narrow enclave, 12km across at its widest point; and opening of Gaza's airport and sea port.

I'm not holding my breath.

See those links? Packed with information. And questioning Israel's commitment to a ceasefire?  Perfect timing.

Is this a record? Israel kills Palestinian within two days of signing ceasefire

According to the BBC:

A Palestinian man has been shot dead by Israeli soldiers close to the Gaza border, say Palestinian officials.

It is the first reported killing since the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel came into force on Wednesday evening.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it fired warning shots at a group walking towards the border fence, then fired at their legs when they did not respond.

Towards the end of the BBC report we have this:

The BBC's Jon Donnison [he's the chap who ignored tweeted questions about the killing of his colleague's 11 month old baby] in Gaza says shootings near the border happen fairly often and do not always lead to an escalation of violence.

So what? Israel's always killing Palestinians so it doesn't really mean they've broken a ceasefire but see this:

Israel has unilaterally declared a 300m-wide exclusion zone around the fence which it says is needed for security

Ah, so the "withdrawal from Gaza" is even less of a withdrawal than we're usually told it was. And how does Israel secure the "secure" bit?

Anyway, I asked "is this a record". Israel has killed a Palestinian within two days of signing a ceasefire which most people must have thought meant they would stop killing people in Gaza. They have now killed a Gazan who strayed from Gaza into, er, Gaza. They managed to go more than a day without breaking their word and without killing a Palestinian. That, indeed, might be a record.