GAZA, Palestinian Territory (WNB) - Scooter Van Neuter is reporting live from Gaza, as Israeli forces mount a ground offensive against Hamas positions in the Gaza Strip.
Reporting live from a war zone is dangerous work, something my editorial assistant Mistee and I found out over the weekend when an arranged tour of a Hamas smuggling tunnel led to us being locked in our hotel's basement supply closet to the point of near death.
Paying my Palestinian contact $5000 for the trip was almost as humiliating as the four days Mistee and I spent drinking our own urine, eating crickets and part of a mop, and watching each other poop at close range. I'm pretty sure the latter turned Mistee into a lesbian, as she left me and has apparently moved in with the cleaning woman who rescued us.
One thing is for certain, I will never stay at the Grand Palace Hotel again, especially since they saw fit to add the three nights in the supply closet to my room bill, and the crickets and mop to my restaurant tab. Excuse my rant, but where do they get off charging nine dollars a cricket? I've had better ones in Detroit for half that price. I packed my bags and checked out.
When I got to my new hotel the first thing I did was place a call to the Israeli Defense Force tip line to report Hamas was transporting rockets with the Grand Palace Hotel manager's new Mercedes. Two hours later you can still see the smoke :)