A Daily Analysis
By Marc Schulman

December 25, 2008--IDF Prepares to Act- The New York Times Fails to Report Hamas Rocket Attacks

Today was a quieter day in Israel, only 6 missile hit the south. What a ridiuculous statement ONLY 6 missiles. The limited sending of six missiles was more of a public relations decision by Hamas, coinciding with Livni's was in Cairo. It was also likely designed to give Israel pause from attacking Gaza, although by all indications, that train has left the station. Both Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi gave public statements today indicating Hamas will pay heavy price for the attacks of the last few days. Ashkenazi spoke at the graduation ceremony for new pilots, and his speech made it clear that the rules of the game need to be changed. It was also clear from the statements made by the Egyptian foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit that Egypt expects Israel to take action.

The expectation is Israel will launch an intense air and land assault at high value Hamas targets. The goal is not to stop the rocket fire but to extract such a price for the rocket fire that Hamas will be reluctant to use them again. It is hoped that the action will only take a few days, and there are expectations that during the actions Hamas will fire between 100 and 200 rockets a day into Israel. The home command has prepared cities such as Qiryat Gat to be ready as best as possible for attacks. In the meantime, the Lebanese army found seven missiles ready to go off aimed at Israel. This is a reminder that Israel needs to be prepared for the possibility of a two-front war, where Hezbollah tries to come to the aid of Hamas by firing missiles from Lebanon.

Nothing is certain. It was interesting watching the Israel Channel 10's military commentator go through a full analysis of what the army is likely to do, and then say we just have word that Defense Minister Barak has agreed to allow 40 trucks of humanitarian supplies to enter Gaza tomorrow... Therefore, it is totally unclear who knows what is happening. I believe the two are mostly unrelated.

I have never been one of those big critics of the New York Times, although I am not always happy with what they write, or more usually, the headlines they use. Today however, I thought what they did not write was outrageous. For the NYT NOT to mention 80 Hamas rockets hit Israel in one day is simply outrageous. Last night for a while it was the lead story in the International section of NTY online, however, when I received this morning's paper, on a slow Christmas newsday, not one article reported on Hamas' attack on Israel.