.jpg){kind=small}
mini.jpg)
Relative mourns death of Palestinian killed in Israeli targeted assassination (photo: AP)Haaretz reported yesterday that Israel assassinated two Islamic Jihad militants with an airstrike which also killed three young Palestinian civilians:
The military operation took place in Gaza City at about 5:30 P.M., when IAF jets fired two missiles at an ice-cream van in which Munir Sukar, 27, and Ashraf Shaluf were traveling. According to the security services, Sukar is responsible for numerous Qassam launches at Israel, as well as an attempt to send a suicide bomber to Jerusalem last month, while Shaluf is also a Jihad operative.
However, the strike also killed Raad Al-Batash, 8, Mahmoud Al-Batash, 15, and Ahmed A-Susi, 24, who were nearby when the missiles hit. Eight other passers-by were wounded, and Sukar’s aunt, who lives nearby, died of a heart attack apparently brought on by the strike.
Apparently, for Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, such collateral damage is a small price to pay for ridding the world of such terrorist scum. Ariga.com notes he even has the temerity to use the old Reaganesque term “cost benefit analysis” which was used to obviate any moral qualms arising from a questionable government policy:
One of the ‘untargeted innocents’ (photo: Alquds Alarabi)Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz told Army Radio that ‘of course we regret any innocent loss of life … but the cost benefit of eliminating the terrorists, whether those who launch the Qassams or those who send them to do so, is quite clear. And it is clear to all that we do not target innocents.’
And this statement from the IDF reassures me no end that the raid was carried out with the purest of intentions:
According to the probe, an IAF observation unit identified the target vehicle as it was traveling. However, the spotters only saw that the vehicle was approaching a crowd of civilians when it was too late.
Military sources said that by the time the crowd was identified, it was already too late to divert the two missiles from their courses.
IAF Commander Major General Eliezer Shakedi said on Tuesday morning that the air force makes “super-human efforts in order to reduce the number of innocent casualties in aerial strikes.”
Shakedi presented data indicating a change in the number of “non-combatants” killed in IAF aerial strikes in the territories. Non-combatant deaths made up about half of all Palestinian casualties resulting from IAF strikes until 2003 but only 3.5 percent of such casualties last year. Shakedi said Monday’s casualties were the first civilians harmed in aerial assassinations since the beginning of 2006.
Go tell it to the parents of the Palestinian dead. I’m sure your statistics will comfort them. I have 16 month-old twins and a five year old son. For me to lose them in such a way would break my heart irreparably and mark me for tragedy for life. Essentially, I would no longer have a life. There is no “cost benefit analysis” that can justify such killing of innocents. Mofaz can argue till he’s blue in the face that Israel does not “target innocents.” But the fact is that it kills them. And it kills them in the hundreds during these nameless, faceless raids from the sky. This is a calculus of death that I can never accept.
Mofaz, keep making statements like this. There are lawyers around the world collecting them and preparing to try you before an international criminal tribunal. I am sorry to speak so harshly. I do believe that Israel has a right to protect itself from terror. But not by killing innocents whether it targets them or not. This is treif and morally impermissible.
Tags: haaretz, israel, palestine, shaul-mofaz, targeted killings
I don’t think that you’re an enemy. I think your POV and articulate expression of that POV is the danger here because it strengthens the enemy.
I have been to too many lectures given on campuses where the speakers attack Israel and use Israeli or Jewish entities, historians or people of some prominence who have criticized Israel in order to make their points. It’s almost like saying, “And there are some good Jews out there [as opposed to the evil Zionists] who also agree with us.” They take your reasonable approach and attempt at fairness and use it against Israel and in some cases against the Jewish community. However, frequently, their intentions are far from noble. When they say they want peace, they visualize peace where Israel does not control Jerusalem or where Israel is no longer a Jewish state. When they attack Israel, it is always in the most extreme of terms using language such as apartheid, cantons, war crimes, genocide, state terrorism, etc., etc.
In some ways, some of the most well meaning peaceniks have become shills for what has been a very effective decades-long propaganda campaign against Israel. The war crimes accusation, for example, is simply incredible to me. I have met numerous Israeli officers over the years and they are simply far from the blood-thirsty, brutal murderers that one would expect to charge with war crimes. In most cases, I have found them to be quite the opposite. That doesn’t mean that they won’t kill and it doesn’t mean that they don’t take tough actions, but if you compare Israeli actions in a very challenging environment over the decades of the occupation to, say, what Russia has done to Chechnya or China to Tibet (I purposely bring these two nations into the discussion because they were on the high court that ruled the security fence to be illegal), I would say that there’s no question those countries should be in the dock long before any Israeli general.
You and I both know that no Russian general will ever face censure of any form for their crimes against the Chechnyans. No Chinese general will either and let’s not even go to the discussion where British or US generals may get sanctioned for actions in Iraq. Nope, Israel is the target. Israel is small, full of Jews and its enemies have a resource that the world needs. But if I come to your site, you advocate charging Israelis who have spent their lives in service of the idea of Zionism and of Jewish self-determination with war crimes. As I recall, the Israelis were out of Areas A before Arafat launched his war in 2000. As I recall, before Israel re-entered Areas A, the Palestinians were having amazing success at killing and maiming Israelis. If I look at the stats now, those attacks have been eliminated and the Israeli generals are bragging about how low the innocent Palestinian bystander death toll has become. For this you want to charge them with war crimes?
Let’s go another route. What if Israelis started to find themselves being charged with war crimes? Is it possible that the same generals who are charged would then decide to act like war criminals? What would that look like? My guess is that war criminal generals would attack Palestinian civilian centers in a way that would ensure mass flight and a Jordanian and Egyptian refugee problem. Sudan anyone? How difficult would it be for the Israelis to accomplish this? Not very considering their firepower. And yet, not only do they not behave this way but, for example, before entering Jenin they didn’t even “soften” the city with artillery and in fact drove around the city for two days warning residents to evacuate for their safety.
The notion that if some Israeli general is sitting in prison for war crimes, somehow Israel would shape up seems not only to miss the point that Israel is already fighting as humanely as they can while minimizing danger to their soldiers and civilians, but also misses the point that it would be an indictment of the entire army and nation. Why? Why would you support this when we both know that Israel offered the Palestinians a state and when we know they could be brutal with the Palestinians but haven’t been.
There’s a movie called Checkpoint about the checkpoints in the West Bank/Judea and Samaria. It’s a documentary where the filmmakers had good access to checkpoints and filmed for over a year. Of course, like any movie, it seeks to show the highlights of that year but when you watch the film you see that while the checkpoints are maddening and affect the quality of life of the Palestinians, at no point do the Israelis act inhumanely. Quite the opposite. I was struck by how in virtually every checkpoint, the Palestinians felt completely comfortable talking back aggressively to the soldiers. There was no fear there whatsoever; they just talked back or complained or even verbally attacked the soldiers. The soldiers did not retaliate and at times were even defensive.
If that’s an army whose generals deserve to be charged with war crimes, then I am missing something about what such charges mean.
Now that is an incredibly defensive position to take regarding criticism of Israel. I guess I’m more optimistic than you are both about Israel’s ability to absorb such criticism without collapsing in the face of the onslaught of her enemies. You do no one a favor when you pull your punches regarding issues like this. There is a common refrain among some circles of Israel supporters that all criticism somehow hurts Israel by “opening it up” to the attacks of anti-Semites, etc. I reject this. Well to be more precise I don’t reject the notion that anti-Semites are looking for ammunition to use against Israel. But I do reject the notion that somehow this hurts Israel in any serious way.
I read somewhere that by some accounts the IDF is ranked fifth among the world’s military forces. I think Israel can more than hold its own against its enemies whether they be Palestinian terrorists or anti-Semites.
I don’t doubt that. There are also IDF officers who reject the notion that they must abuse Palestinians during their military service. But that’s not the majority. The majority serve willingly and follow orders faithfully and are willing (& sometimes even eager) to do whatever it takes to subjugate Palestinians.
But have you met Yaalon, Halutz, or Doron Almog (who was almost arrested in England on a war crimes charge) all of whom have done or said dreadful things about Palestinians? Did you ever meet Rafael Eitan (a former chief of staff) who likened Palestinians to “cockroaches in a bottle?”
Well, yes certainly I agree with you. But why is this an either or situation? I’d say a few Russian generals, Chinese bureaucrats and Israeli generals should all suffer the same fate–to be tried for their actions. By the way, I again mention that I’d be perfectly content if an Israeli court would adjudicate this issue–but they simply won’t do so.
No, I don’t “know” this nor do I accept it. Remember, justice takes a long view. Justice doesn’t come overnight. But in many cases (not all certainly and not enough) justice does come.
For which you seem to wish to credit the IDF when I credit at least as much if not more that the two main Palestinian factions that have observed a yr long hudna.
I have not seen Checkpoint & so can’t comment on the contents of the film. But if you believe that Israeli military checkpoints are as a whole loci of Israeli tolerance and understanding you are sadly mistaken. I can point you to several blog posts I’ve written here about absolutely heartbreaking stories including one in which Israeli soldiers deliberately allowed two twin newborns to freeze to death in the winter cold while waiting to unlock a checkpoint gate so the family could travel to hospital. And pls. don’t argue that this is but a single incident. I think we both know I could point you to links for hundreds if not thousands of such incidents. Checkpoints are hell. They make Israeli soldiers into brutes and Palestinians into subjects. There’s simply no way to humanize them. But do I doubt that there may be Israeli soldiers who man checkpoints & who make it a point of treating Palestinians humanely–certainly not. In fact, I’m certain there are such soldiers. But their existence does not ameliorate the Occupation.
In addition, unless the filmmakers were filming incognito and the soldiers did not know they were filming, I’d fear that they tailored their behavior for the camera. No soldier wants to be seen to abuse someone before a filming camera (except those idiots at Abu Graibh).