Really great article from GNN
Behold the dreaded Qassam rockets of Hamas
They look like toy model rockets, and apparently they pretty much are, except that they’re packed with explosives.
It occurred to me just tonight that I had no idea what these rockets looked like or how dangerous they are. So I used Google to find this informative page at Aerospaceweb.org.
I present to you some of the text and images:
Most of these rockets are not that much different from large model rockets sold in stores in the west except they are packed with explosives. The weapons are fired randomly into Israeli areas and typically do little damage. Their value lies more in spreading fear and chaos among civilians rather than attacking specific buildings or military targets.
The Katyusha is used by Hezbollah and launched from Lebanon into northern Israel. Qassam rockets are instead used by Hamas in the Gaza Strip and fired upon Israeli communities. … Though media reports often refer to these weapons as missiles, they are actually rockets. We have seen in previous articles that the difference between a rocket and a missile is that a missile has a guidance system while a rocket does not. A basic military rocket is a cylindrical tube containing an explosive warhead and powered by some type of propulsion system, typically a solid rocket motor.
The weapons Hezbollah uses most frequently are collectively referred to as Katyusha (pronounced car-too-zuh) rockets. However, the Katyusha was actually one specific type of rocket used during World War II though the term has since become synonoymous with a wide variety of different rocket types.
If you click that link to read the fascinating details, you’ll learn that Israel is being menaced and forced into extreme total-war-style “self-defense” by what are essentially World War II era weapons.
The Quassam rockets used by those pesky Palestinians in Gaza are actually homemade versions of the more advanced ones used by Hezbolah in Lebanon, which are somewhat inaccurately referred to as Katyushas.
While the Katyusha rockets used by Hezbollah are made in Iran, the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip have been building their own homemade rockets since about 2000. These rockets, developed by Nidal Fat’hi Rabah Farahat and Adnan al-Ghoul, are known as the Qassam (or Kassam) and were first used by Hamas terrorists in 2001. Hamas began constructing these weapons because of the strong security barriers surrounding the Gaza Strip that prevented direct raids on Israeli towns. The Qassam rockets are designed to fly over the barrier to strike population centers within Israel. The Qassam rockets are not nearly as advanced as those employed by Hezbollah, however, and both their range and explosive payload are quite limited.
Three different versions of the rocket have been seen so far. The Qassam 1 has a diameter of 60 mm, carries a warhead weighing 1 lb (0.5 kg), and has a maximum range of only 2 miles (3 km). Early attacks using these rockets failed because they landed inside the Gaza Strip itself rather than upon their intended targets. The first Qassam strike to hit an Israeli town occurred on 5 March 2002 when two of the weapons hit Sderot just north of the Gaza Strip. This community has taken the brunt of Qassam attacks given its close proximity to the Palestinian town of Beit Hanoun where most Qassam strikes are launched. The first fatalities caused by the rocket also occurred in Sderot on 28 June 2004 when two Israelis were killed.
As noted in this article recently posted on GNN, the Israeli killed by a Palestinian rocket last Saturday was the first such casualty in more than a year. Moreover, as this map shows, most Israelis are quite safe from rocket attacks:
The danger posed by Qassam attacks began to grow as improved versions were developed. The 150-mm Qassam 2 carries a warhead between 11 and 15 pounds (5 to 7 kg) over a distance of about 5 miles (8 km). The most advanced version seen so far is the Qassam 3 with a 170-mm body containing a 22-lb (10-kg) warhead and traveling as much as 6 miles (10 km). The farthest Israeli town attacked by late 2005 has been Ashkelon about 5 miles (8 km) from its launch point. Attacks using the improved Qassam 3 had succeeded in reaching the central part of Ashkelon by July 2006. The Qassam attacks have generally done very little damage and killed or injured just a handful of people since most of the rockets fall harmlessly in open areas.
Holy shit Batman! Talk about living in fear.
Although crude and inaccurate with a small payload and short range, the Qassam rockets have still caused significant concern in Israel because they are so difficult to protect against. Israel has acquired a defense system called Red Dawn that features a radar to detect the rockets at launch and sets off loudspeakers advising people in nearby towns to take cover. The system gives about 20 seconds of warning before the rocket strikes. It has also been reported that Israel will purchase a system from Switzerland called Skyshield to help prevent Qassam strikes. Skyshield is a rapid-fire anti-aircraft defense system designed to shoot down the rockets before they can reach civilian populations.
I guess Patriots don’t work so well for swatting at mosquitos.
The increasing frequency of Qassam attacks has also prompted Israel to launch raids on the Gaza Strip to destroy facilities where the rockets are manufactured and launched. Israeli attacks have included strikes on terrorists, targeted assassinations of those developing the rockets, destruction of metal shops used to build the rockets, and clearing out orchards or farmland where the rockets are often launched. Among those killed in the attacks was Adnan al-Ghoul who was known as “Father of the Qassam.” The Israeli attacks have included Army tanks and soldiers, Air Force aircraft, and Navy vessels firing shells from off the coast.
And now, you can add to that total war involving tanks, Predator drones, one-ton house-smashing bombs and bizarre new weapons that smite infidels nearly as well as Yahweh Himself would.
Ain’t righteousness wonderful?
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Pat Robertson: Israel Should Strike Iran Before 2008 Election
Think Progress
July 23, 2008
On yesterday’s edition of The 700 Club, Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson sharply criticized the “moderate tone” the Bush administration has allegedly taken toward Iran and its nuclear weapons program. Robertson advocated that Israel look out for the “survival of its nation” and “make some kind of a strike” against Iranian nuclear facilities. He also predicted that it will likely happen before the 2008 elections:
But nevertheless, I think we can look in the next few months for Israel to make a strike — possibly before the next election — because I think George Bush — to use the term an “amber light” — he’s given the amber, the yellow light, saying, “Caution, but go ahead.”
Robertson’s predictions often turn out to be wrong. In 2004, Robertson claimed that the Lord told him it would “be like a blowout” re-election for President Bush. (Bush ended up receiving just 51 percent of the vote.) In 2006, he incorrectly predicted that “the outcome of the war and the success of the economy will leave the Republicans in charge.”
He does, however, have an inside track into the Bush administration. Last year, Robertson’s Regent University estimated that one in six of its graduates were employed in government work. Approximately 150 served in the Bush administration.
Today, top McCain surrogate Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) is also talking to controversial Pastor John Hagee’s organization. In 2006, Hagee declared:
The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God’s plan for both Israel and the West… a biblically prophesied end-time confrontation with Iran, which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation, and Second Coming of Christ.
Other members of the right wing have also been unifying around the idea of striking Iran before Bush leaves. Both John Bolton and Bill Kristol have made the same argument.
Kagan: ‘The only way’ to ‘force’ Iran to halt its nuclear program is an ‘attack.’
Think Progress
July 23, 2008
Appearing on MSNBC this afternoon, Iraq surge architect Fred Kagan criticized direct talks with Iran and made his case for attacking Iran, claiming it is the only means to “force” the country to halt its nuclear program:
Well, there’s nothing we can do short of an attack to force Iran to give up its nuclear program. … At the end of the day, the only way that you can make for sure that [a nuclear arm’s race] doesn’t happen is with an attack. There are a variety of things you can do short of an attack and hope that they will work, but hope is not a method here.
Top Israeli official: If nuclear talks fail, Bush will order Iran attack between November and January
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Bluetooth is watching: secret study gives Bath a flavour of Big Brother
· Covert monitoring system raises privacy issues
· Signals can be used to track mobile phone users
- The Guardian,
- Monday July 21 2008
- Article history
The Circus, in Bath. Photograph: Christopher Thomond
Tens of thousands of Britons are being covertly tracked without their consent in a technology experiment which has installed scanners at secret locations in offices, campuses, streets and pubs to pinpoint people’s whereabouts.
The scanners, the first 10 of which were installed in Bath three years ago, are capturing Bluetooth radio signals transmitted from devices such as mobile phones, laptops and digital cameras, and using the data to follow unwitting targets without their permission.
The data is being used in a project called Cityware to study how people move around cities. But pedestrians are not being told that the devices they carry around in their pockets and handbags could be providing a permanent record of their journeys, which is then stored on a central database.
The Bath University researchers behind the project claim their scanners do not have access to the identity of the people tracked.
Eamonn O’Neill, Cityware’s director, said: “The objective is not to track individuals, whether by Bluetooth or any other means. We are interested in the aggregate behaviour of city dwellers as a whole. The notion that any agency would seriously consider Bluetooth scanning as a surveillance technique is ludicrous.”
But privacy experts disagree, pointing out that Bluetooth signals are assigned code names that can, to varying degrees, indicate a person’s identity.
Many people use pseudonyms, nicknames, initials, or abbreviations to identify their Bluetooth signals. Cityware’s scanners are also picking up signals that are listed using people’s full name, email address and telephone numbers.
Contacted about the Cityware project, the office of the information commissioner said in a statement that the public should “think carefully” before switching on their Bluetooth signals. A spokesman said the government watchdog would “monitor” the experiment.
“This is yet another example of moronic use of technology,” said Simon Davies, director of Privacy International, an independent campaigning group defending personal privacy. “For Bath University to assert that there aren’t privacy implications demonstrates an astonishing disregard for consumer rights. If the technology is as safe as they claim, then all the technical specifications should be published and people should be informed when they are being tracked.”
He added: “This technology could well become the CCTV of the mobile industry. It would not take much adjustment to make this system a ubiquitous surveillance infrastructure over which we have no control.”
Although initially confined to Bath, Cityware has spread across the planet after the software was made freely available on the internet sites Facebook and Second Life. Thousands of people downloaded the software to equip their home and office computers with Cityware scanners.
More than 1,000 scanners across the world at any time detect passing Bluetooth signals and send the data to Cityware’s central database. Those with access to the database admit they do not know precisely how many scanners have been created, but there are known to be scanners in San Diego, Hong Kong, Australia, Singapore, Toronto and Berlin.
In Bath alone scanners are tracking as many as 3,000 Bluetooth devices every weekend. One recent study used the scanners to monitor the movements of 10,000 people in the city.
About 250,000 owners of Bluetooth devices, mostly mobile phones, have been spotted by Cityware scanners worldwide.
O’Neill, who described his project as “public observation” rather than surveillance, said the data would improve scientific understanding of the privacy and security threats posed by Bluetooth technology. A “potentially immensely valuable side-effect”, he added, was that data about people’s movements could help research into the spread of biological epidemics.
“Just as we continue to research forms of defence against other more traditional threats, we must research forms of defence against new digital threats,” he said, adding that the database eventually would be destroyed.
However Vassilis Kostakos, a former member of Cityware who now does Bluetooth experiments on buses in Portugal for the University of Madeira, accepted such tracking was a problem.
“We are actually trying to fix this,” Kostakos said. “If a person’s phone is talking to a scanner, then they should be told about it. Any technology can have good and bad consequences. In many ways, I think the role of a scientist is to point out both. I agree this is complex and I agree there are harmful scenarios.”
The technique has echoes of the thriller Enemy of the State in which the character played by Will Smith is followed by satellite surveillance.
Kostakos said he could foresee complex ways in which criminals could exploit the technology, adding: “I recently tried to look at people’s travel patterns across the world, and we [saw] how a unique device which showed up in San Francisco turned up in Caracas and then Paris.”
Bluetooth tracking technology is already being used to aim advertisements at people, for example as they walk past shops or billboards.
Bluetoothtracking.org, a website based in the Netherlands, is using the same technology to publish live data about people’s movements across the town of Apeldoorn. The facility allows people to search the whereabouts of friends and associates without them knowing about it.
Some scientists using the technology describe a future scenario in which homes and cars adapt services to suit their owners, automatically dimming lights, preparing food and selecting preferred television channels.