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Resistance Report — 12 May 2024

Palestinian resistance clones, improves existing weapons, with Jon Elmer

Jon Elmer breaks down the resistance operation targeting the Israeli military build-up around Rafah.

Nora Barrows-Friedman, Asa Winstanley, Ali Abunimah and Jon Elmer of The Electronic Intifada were joined by Abubaker Abed, our contributor in the Gaza Strip; Dr. Adel Eksharkawy, a Canadian physician based in Calgary, Alberta who worked at Gaza’s only functioning neonatal unit; Shahd al-Hadid, a student activist at the University of Sheffield in the UK participating in a mass encampment in solidarity with the Palestinian people; Sabiya Ahamed, a staff attorney at the civil rights organization Palestine Legal, on the day 215 livestream. You can watch the entire broadcast here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCaU3MnTjmE

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Full transcript
the attack on Rafa um a limited attack on Rafa I don't think we're seeing the main invasion of Rafa but a limited attack on Rafa as you reported Nora in your uh news at the off the top of the show um a very violent and bloody begin beginning to these attacks on the Eastern edge of Rafa more than 100 air strikes um each 24-hour period in the last three days that this has been going on of course thousands of artillery shells as well um on a city that's five times over it population is now five times what it was before the start of the war um even with people leaving the evacuation of a 100,000 in the evacuation Zone um you still have a a wildly overcrowded area um and just really devastating um to think about an attack on Rafa that it is a large scale attack at this point right now we'll talk more about it in the discussion there's negotiations going on uh in Cairo and I don't believe that we're seeing the open War on Rafa right now the Israelis seem to indicate that this is a uh a limited operation to begin so um so we will look at the operations from the last week we'll start off the top here um we saw number one here tomorrow we saw the Cassandra Gades pull out um a multiple launch rocket system that we haven't seen in the field reports be used since December um here they have a sign that says the date May 1st and the isad AL cassam brigades um so we're seeing a multiple launch rocket system that was used throughout the first two months um two months of the war it's a 114 millimeter rocket artillery system you can see there it's five rows U of three tubes on each row so 15 launches um per uh per canister um so this is a type 63 multiple launch system that is a universal system this is a Chinese made system the uh cassam Bri Gades have cloned the system and built their own um but the Chinese system is one of the most common um artillery systems in the world and has been for the last 50 years and it's just another example of the cassam Bri Gades not Reinventing the wheel um but applying their research and development um and engine in skills to perfect a weapon that has already been proven in the field for decades to exist um and to operate uh effectively which is something we saw with the Yasin 105s that's a copy of uh a Soviet weapon we see it with the AL goul sniper rifle that's a copy of a Austrian uh 50 cal sniper rifle um so using existing weapons and cloning them existing weapons that have a record and a history of success um and then in the Gaza Strip under the most difficult circumstances Palestinians are building uh these systems themselves and so what we're seeing here is an attack on uh holit settlement the attacks this week were against the IDF buildup the mustering and staging for the Rafa Invasion and that's just across the border from Karam Shalom and holit the two settlements um on the other side the emptied settlements on the other side of the border of the Gaza fence um and we didn't we've been watching for this buildup um well let's let's go to number two here tomorrow um because let me just talk a little bit more about the reime so this system this it debuted on October the 7th um on the night of October 7th we saw this video released by The cassam Bri Gades um showing their multiple launch rocket unit systems here and you can see there's dozens of them um and the um on the side of the there you saw the the verse uh scrolled on the side of the launcher it's a konic verse that says when our Command came we turned the city upside down and rained down on it stones of baked clay um the reime the term reume is the term that they use in the West Bank for uh Palestinian kids who throw stones um so it's a rocket system with again Kasam always does this linking their names um to the struggle embedding them in the struggle um and so you can see these weapons being used they were used on October 7th and it's the way in which on October 7th the Palestinians were able to launch the unprecedented rocket attack that began the operation uh on October 7th it was an unprecedented barrage of 5,000 Rockets within minutes um on Israel and those Rockets were a key part of the October 7th operation because the rocket siren sounding forced the Israeli soldiers into their bomb shelters and in and bought time for the resistance to carry out the paraglider operation where their paragliders went over the fence um and the breaching the blowing the holes in the fence and the blinding operation those three operations that led the October 7th attack um and so on that morning of October 7th they were able to fire 5,000 Rockets more than the number of rockets Hezbollah fired in the 33-day war July war in 2006 and more Rockets than the Palestinians fired in the 52-day war in 2014 um and that rocket barrage was um was covering fire uh for the rest of the operation so we'll watch this launch one more time because you can see how the multiple launch here um are designed to defeat the Iron Dome to flood uh the Iron Dome missile defense system that Israel deploys uh in the envelope and in the north and you can see that these uh these Rockets come out in a number uh that floods essentially attempts to flood the Iron Dome uh system so if we go to number three tomorrow we'll see it on October 7th um I pulled some footage for you guys from October 7th so you can see there the reime being launched there and if you watch closely here you'll see the paraglider underneath Kasam has uh pointed it out there with red circles we're watching for people listening rocket fire going up through the clouds and paragliders flying underneath the rocket barrage um and so that gave covering fire for the paragliders um to get inside Israel and to land uh near the base um the military base at Rian which was the base for the Gaza division that the Palestinian resistance collapsed within 45 minutes on October 7th so you could see the paraglider uh flying through there if we just roll it maybe one more time tomorrow we'll show it again you can watch the rocket fire go up and then you can watch it traveling and underneath literally underneath the rocket fire if you look 2third of the way across the screen you can see the paragliders literally flying under the rocket fire um and so because the rocket fire pushed the soldiers into their bases into their bomb shelters um they weren't able to pick up the paragliders um that were coming over the wall the paragliders were the first run um and we if we watch as this video goes on you'll see the paraglider come right through the screen there you see him there um and you can see the breaching operation that's happening there that's the breaching and there's the paraglider flying through uh the screen there so um so this missile system we haven't this rocket system rocket artillery system we haven't seen Kasam use this not hasn't been in the field report since December um so not only are they not running out of weapons they're clearly choosing weapons for uh the appropriate circumstances and so um now that we had a situation uh on the ground where Israeli forces were mustering um outside and if we show the satellite images here tomorrow 3 B um we could see the satellite imagery um of the mustering of the IDF forces on the other side of the border from Rafa um and this is across this is three miles uh 3 kilometers across the border well within range and you can see the armored vehicles build the armored vehicles build up there um there's about 300 of them that are counted in this satellite footage from Al jazer you could just toggle through these here here tomorrow because the next one shows a little bit more a little easier to see the row upon row of uh marava tanks nammer troop carriers uh armored bulldozers D9 armored bulldozers um and so this when you're seeing this this is the attack uh this was the area that's been under attack by rocket Fire by the Palestinians for the last week because under the closed military zone under the military The Silence of the military sensor uh Israel over the last week have been building up their forces outside of Rafa and this is part of it's the beginning of um what I've been saying on the show for a while that we will see the buildup for the invasion of Rafa it wouldn't just happen uh without people knowing um because we see signs like this it's necessary to bring in hundreds and hundreds of armored vehicles and position them uh across the border so even though there's a military sensor um even though the entire South is abandoned and is a closed military zone um we're still going to get opportunities like through this satellite footage to see the buildup of these forces and that's what we're seeing this week um and if we go to the next one tomorrow we can see this was the attack on the 5th um this was on this weekend Sunday the 5th the sign says uh here you can see The Fighter um using the resume here he's testing the Fidelity of the wi ERS here um the fighters are in this video this is a kassam video from May the 5th um and they indicate uh the the day of the operation day 212 um Sunday May 5th day 212 and the cam brigades um that's what it said on that sign there you're seeing so you're seeing the first shots um of the reume at the Israeli military base and I left the audio in so I'm going to let you guys listen to this because you can hear Palestinians in this footage responding to The Rime attack uh on the IDF Base outside of Rafa [Music] [Applause] incidentally that's a car alarm you're hearing that's not Air Raid Sirens uh in Israel the air raid sirens uh didn't start uh immediately on this attack um and so the soldiers began arriving this week at this base um throughout this past week and immediately started making Tik Tok videos giving up their positions Instagram live videos doing what they've been doing all war um and also the surveillance from Kasam has been watching them move into place um for this past week and they're able to fire on that um if we show it maybe one more time around tomorrow we can see that there was there was 10 Rockets fired um out of this resume um 10 Rockets fired and the IDF uh claimed 14 casualties they admitted to 14 casualties um on this base so four were killed three seriously wounded um out of the 14 casualties so 14 casualties on 10 Rockets none intercepted by the Iron Dome uh in this particular instance again you're seeing that sign say the date date 212 date 212 of the oper ation um day 190 of plus of the ground war um and Palestinians are still able to use appropriate weapons um and be precise with something like rocket artillery which is not a precise weapon it's an area weapon um it's an artillery shell that explodes in a blast radius um that has uh tens of meters of a blast radius um and so it's an area weapon the idea is is you fire many of them um you can change the angle of the launcher um and you calculate the speed and the trajectory in order to aim uh and the Palestinians were clearly able to uh the cassam brigades in this case were clearly able to um calibrate perfectly to hit uh to hit this base um this is the buildup of 300 tanks that are on their way um for the invasion of Rafa it's part of it if there's actually a full-scale invasion of Rafa they're going to need more Vehicles more vehicles and more troops than we're seeing right now um but like Israel said this is a limited uh incursion right now to the Eastern edge of Rafa so possibly um that's enough troops for that um so let's show number five tomorrow this is this is what it looked like from the Israeli side so this is the base this you can hear the air raid sirens and you can see sorry about that sorry about this uh telegram stamp across this video it's it's unfortunate that they do this but in any case you're seeing uh D9 armored bulldozers you're seeing dozens of them um you could hear the alarm going off in this video um and you can see the soldiers hiding behind their vehicles right here you can see the depth of there's another strike there that you can hear um so there there there's another strike so they're able to hit repeatedly um that's the third one and there's still no air raid siren uh no air raid siren no Iron Dome responds to these missiles over this base um and just gives you a real sense there was another one that you heard um just a real sense of how close these uh artillery shots and now you hear the air raid sirens so the air raid siren is coming at far too late for uh warning of their troops um so a lot of this vaunted air defense system there's another one there's another one Landing um he's going to hide behind his bulldozer here um and if we show the next one too tomorrow we can see in number six you could see the shell land these soldiers are having fun bringing drinks over to their card table and now they see the first rocket come in you see it land there on the base on the tent of the base Kasam identified that as the command tent it's unclear if that is true the casualties that the Israelis admitted to the the four dead uh four dead soldiers were young soldiers um it didn't appear to be in soldiers from that command tent um but but these soldiers immediately are doing this this video is from the IDF these are their soldiers making Instagram live videos um just messing around giving up their positions giving up the detail of how their vehicles are parked Kasam has other intelligence assets and ways of getting uh knowledge of how the vehicles are right they have drone and surveillance reconnaissance um of this area um and so it really according to in the Israeli media they were saying that they left these soldiers as Sitting Ducks because they had been there for uh a week and a half um and hadn't entered Rafa yet and so it gave the resistance time to calibrate their fire and you can see that that we're watching for people listening um you can see that artillery shell hit the the the IDF tent on this makeshift base and this is where they muster they stage um and then they enter Rafa from this position so um and it's a closed military zone so no reporters are in there no civilians are in there um able to see the buildup so cam saw the buildup uh of the invasion of Rafa uh before anybody else did we had heard that the generals the division commanders there's two divisions there that the two division commanders had their briefing notes um and that that they had been briefed on the operation that it could begin any day um but that was a week ago and we had had heard anything uh in the week in between until Sunday when we saw that footage from Kasam and then we saw the Israeli soldiers footage showing how much of a buildup actually had been there um and so these the combination of the Palestinians cheering the Israelis giving up their position through uh Tik Tock videos um and the ability of the Cassandra Gades to use weapons built in the Gaza Strip to attack are all three strong themes that we have been following of course throughout this entire War so that's on the outskirts uh of Rafa on the other side of the Border it's at Karam Shalom the BBC the state department and the New York Times um they followed the Israelis saying that that was an attack on that the attack with casualties was an attack on kamam Shalom on the aid Crossing um but it's not and we could see from those uh satellite foot is that it was clearly not uh a Target on The Crossings the aid crossings that the Palestinians for obvious reasons don't Target the aid Crossings um they target massive concentration of American primarily American built uh Weaponry uh and they hit it effectively so that's that's the operations outside of Rafa thanks for watching this video please subscribe to our YouTube channel hit like leave a comment these engagements help us with the YouTube algorithm and it helps us to get around Silicon Valley censorship as much as possible it does make a difference you can also support our journalism by going to electronic 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