Israel admits Rafah dead were civilians

international | anti-war / imperialism | news report

Tuesday May 25, 2004 10:03

by kokomero

Professional liars beware ... the truth bites back!

An Israeli army spokesman said 12 unarmed Palestinian civilians were killed during the course of Operation Rainbow, including seven killed by a tank shell during a demonstration in the Tel Sultan neighborhood last Wednesday.

"We did not use the tank shell in order to disperse the demonstration but rather to create a boom effect," Zakai said. "To the best of my professional judgement, the tank commander's decision was correct."

The running dispute between the army and human rights groups, who have been pressing for an independent inquiry into the deaths of the demonstrators, is complicated by the fact that the army say eight people were killed.

Officials at Rafah's main hospital have said 10 people were killed in a protest outside the Tel Sultan neighbourhood where an army siege was lifted yesterday.

But the new admission contradicts early claims by government sources that as many as five of those killed were armed militants. It came as General Zakai also said the whole operation had claimed the lives of 41 militants and 12 civilians. Palestinian human rights groups, who put the total at more than 60 over the past fortnight, claim that the proportion of civilians is significantly higher.

General Zakai also said that 56 homes had been destroyed or damaged during the operation. The figure was an increase on previous military estimates of damage but still falls short of a figure of 67 over the past eight days estimated by the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=431465&displayTypeCd=1&sideCd=1&contrassID=2

The longer a war lasts, the more ways there are to lose it.

The principle is not lost on the officials of the Foreign Ministry and the IDF spokesperson unit, Israel's front-line troops in the media war with the Arabs. From the standpoint of domestic morale as well as that of international diplomacy, the officials have long stressed that the media war is of critical importance to Israel's future.

Of late, some have suggested, it is also the war that Israel cannot win.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1224056,00.html

Bulldozers threaten Gaza 'school of hope'

Chris McGreal in Rafah
Tuesday May 25, 2004
The Guardian

Each day, Darwish Abu Sharakh climbs to the top floor of Rafah's only school for the deaf, unfurls the Palestinian flag on the balcony and waves at the shadowy outline of an Israeli soldier in a gun tower across the wasteland that was once a sea of roofs.

It is a dangerous act of defiance, but one that has taken on added symbolism as the headteacher faces up to the prospect that the El-Amal school's days may be numbered.

"They know me now. I'm sure they won't shoot me," he says on the balcony, even though there is a standing order for Israeli troops to fire at anyone seen on the upper floors of buildings facing the free-fire zone of the "Philadelphi road" security strip along the Egyptian border.

Until last week, the El-Amal school for the deaf had 131 students between four and 16 years old - the only facility of its kind in southern Gaza.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/431683.html

IDF opens inquiry into house demolitions

Because of severe discrepancies about the numbers of houses that were demolished, the army has started an inquiry. The army was saying over the weekend that only five houses were demolished, but that number climbed to 12 by Sunday - and still was far from the number of houses that Palestinians and journalists visiting the scene said were destroyed or damaged beyond use by tanks and armor moving through the neighborhoods.

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Comments (2 of 2)

Israeli terror

by Potblack

Wed May 26, 2004 10:37

If we define “terrorism” as the intentional harming of innocents for political gain, the routine Israeli use of excessive force should also fall into that category.

The Israelis know that the use of heavy firepower in populated areas to target a few activists will kill or injure substantial numbers of innocents. The Israelis are especially culpable when other more “surgical” methods are available—for example, the use of raids by special forces to apprehend Palestinian activists.

Even targeted assassinations of militants—a questionable tactic—would kill fewer civilians than the blunt method Israel is using. Thus, Israel’s policy seems to be only a slightly more subtle retaliation for the Palestinian killing of innocents. Instead of blatantly targeting civilians, a military target is found in a densely populated area and then excessive force is applied.

Amnesty International has also criticized the Israeli military for destroying vast tracts of cultivated land, water and electricity infrastructure and thousands of Palestinian homes. The organization also notes that the Israelis have quarantined entire Palestinian towns and cities for long periods of time, employed Palestinians as human shields during military operations, targeted medical personnel and blocked medical assistance, used torture on Palestinian detainees, seized Palestinian land to expand infrastructure for Jewish settlements and failed to protect Palestinians under attack from Jewish settlers. To mollify influential domestic pressure groups in the United States, those unacceptable Israeli tactics are routinely ignored by President Bush, the Congress and the American media.

The sad part is that such aggressive Israeli behavior—and the American subsidies of military and economic aid that encourage and underwrite it—actually worsens the Jewish nation’s long-term security outlook. Even worse, such excessive Israeli responses to security problems are now being imitated by the U.S. government. The Bush administration invaded Iraq—a nation that had nothing to do with the September 11 attacks—and is consciously adopting tough Israeli-style tactics in its occupation.

Anti-Israeli and anti-U.S. terrorism will not go away until the root causes of both are removed. Israel—if nothing else, to end violence that is debilitating its economy—should make the concessions needed to negotiate a comprehensive peace settlement with the Palestinians. For its part, the United States should terminate its one-sided support for Israel and become neutral in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. America should also end profligate meddling in other nations' business around the world—especially in the Middle East—the primary cause of anti-U.S. terrorism.

http://www.wrmea.com/archives/june2003/0306020.html

Conflicts in the Middle East have been very costly to the U.S., as well as to the rest of the world. An estimate of the total cost to the U.S. alone of instability and conflict in the region—which emanates from the core, Israeli-Palestinian conflict—amounts to close to $3 trillion, measured in 2002 dollars. This is an amount almost four times greater than the cost of the Vietnam war, also reckoned in 2002 dollars.

Even this figure underestimates the costs because certain classes of expenditure remain unquantified. In particular, no reliable figure is available for the costs of "Project Independence," Washington's lavishly promoted effort to reduce U.S. dependence on oil from the Middle East. That effort, which was subverted early on by diverse local special interests, was designed primarily to insulate Israel from any new "Arab oil weapon" after 1973/74, and may easily have cost $1 trillion. Even though the outlays were rationalized in the interest of "national security," however, they contributed little or nothing to reducing U.S. strategic dependence upon imported oil from the Middle East. Similarly, aid to Israel—and thus the regional total—also is understated, since much is outside of the foreign aid appropriation process or implicit in other programs. Support for Israel comes to $1.8 trillion, including special trade advantages, preferential contracts, or aid buried in other accounts. In addition to the financial outlay, U.S. aid to Israel costs some 275,000 American jobs each year.

28 minute video

by video links :-)

Tue May 25, 2004 18:05

of a bunch of people who went out and had a look at Palestine. (It's not snuff)
but it shows the reaction of Palestinians to the BOOM.
the commentary is in english.
yankee english.

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Israel admits Rafah dead were civilians

Comments (2 of 2)