This post expands on my original one reporting this incident. Some of the material in it may look familiar to those who read the original post. This one names, for the first time outside of Arabic media, Munther Khalil, the Syrian Islamist killed by Golani Druze this week. It also confirms that the IDF lied in claiming he was a civilian.
When Israel conquered the Golan in 1967, it launched a 50-year occupation of the Syrian Golan in which tens of thousands of Syrian Druze lived. Though an armistice line now separates the Druze in Syrian and Israeli-occupied zones, both communities are deeply intertwined. The sense of solidarity now, in the midst of a raging civil war, is no different than Diaspora Jews felt in 1967 before the war broke out. Millions rallied around the world concerned about Israel’s fate. Now the Druze in Israeli-held Golan are fearful for the fates of their brothers and sisters.
Israel claims, falsely, that it is neutral in the Syrian civil war. Unfortunately, the world media are taken in by this charade. Israel intervenes regularly on behalf of the Syrian Islamist rebels. The UN observed the IDF unloading supplies in boxes at the armistice fence, which were then picked up by Islamist fighters. Al Monitor even reported that the IDF shells government positions inside Syria. The Israelis meet regularly with al-Nusra commanders (who are affiliated with al-Qaeda) to offer intelligence. A Syrian Druze videotaped one such meeting, which was aired on Syrian TV. He was promptly secretly arrested by the Shabak. The Israeli media was forbidden from reporting his name, Sedki al-Maket, thanks to a security gag order (I was the only journalist outside Syria who reported his name and story).
Israeli TV reported that Israel has built a camp for Syrian army deserters in Israeli occupied Golan. Israel has also bombed Hezbollah and Iranian convoys inside Syria carrying advanced weaponry meant for the Lebanese front. It has assassinated several senior Iranian generals and Hezbollah commanders on Syrian soil as well. It opposes Assad not so much for political or ideological reasons, but because the regime’s chief allies are Israel’s arch-nemeses, Iran and Hezbollah.
Israel’s alliance with Islamists makes for some strange bedfellows. Prime Minister Netanyahu is the first to raise the rallying cry for western resistance to the tyranny of Islamism. He regularly invokes the specter of the savagery of ISIS in counterpoint to the civilizing force of Israel. But when it’s in Israel’s interest, it’s more than willing to make common cause with such forces.
Not only is it hypocritical for Israel to join forces with Islamists; it’s likely that today’s allies will turn into tomorrow’s enemies. Maariv journalist Jacki Hugi said it well:
…Jerusalem must ask itself some difficult questions: can its bet on the rebels pay off? Or does stability on the northern border depend on the continuation of the regime? Support for these sectarian groups carries many dangers. Their trustworthiness fluctuates, as do the figures who lead them. He who today will not act against Israel may change his spots [literally “shed his skin”] tomorrow.
…Israeli policy over the past few decades has been characterized by a series of bad bets. At the end of the 1980s, it enabled Hamas to rise from the midst of Gaza’s Islamist groups. It did this out of the flawed assumption that this was the proper way to weaken Fatah…As a result [Israel] created its own Trojan Horse [within Palestine].
With the IDF’s entrance [sic] into Lebanon in 1982, Israel disregarded the Shiites and rushed to ally itself with those it saw as the most powerful in the land: the Christians. So it paved the way for Tehran to offer protection to the disadvantaged and enable the rise of Hezbollah.
Something very similar happened in Afghanistan when the mujahedeen were first our friends, and then morphed into the Taliban and became our sworn enemies.
So far, the Syrian Islamists have deliberately not targeted Israel. This is no doubt due to the aid it offers them on the battlefield. Further, al-Nusra knows that Hezbollah is Israel’s primary opponent. The Lebanese militia constantly probes in this sector and mounts attacks against Israeli forces. Al-Nusra doesn’t seek or need to compete with Hezbollah in that regard. It would rather confine is efforts to the Syrian theater, than expand to attack Israel itself.
Recently, fighting on the Syrian side of Golan has heated up. There, the Druze villages have been largely loyal to the Assad regime over the decades. When al-Nusra and FSA forces attacked Druze villages in northern Syria, killing 20 residents, those living on the Israeli-occupied side of the Golan became restive and angry. They couldn’t sit back and watch as their cousins died at the hands of Islamists.
Not to mention that their religion, though an offshoot of Islam, is considered heretical by fundamentalist Islamists. The Druze under threat rightly believe that they and their ancient religious traditions are in grave jeopardy. Thus, Israel’s alliance with the al-Nusra front puts it diametrically at odds with the Golani Druze under Israeli Occupation.
In recent days, Israeli TV aired an interview (Hebrew, at the 2:00 mark) with a wounded Syrian fighter who was treated in Israel after being evacuated from the combat zone. What he said raised the ire of the local Druze to the boiling point:
TV interview: “What would you do if you captured a Druze?” “It depends.”
In this context, the interview I mentioned above was a lightning bolt through the Druze community. The interviewer asked the fighter (who was affiliated with the FSA):
Interviewer: [What would u do] if you caught an Alawite?
A: I would kill him
I: And if you caught a Druze?
A: It depends
I: And if you caught a Shiite?
A: I would kill the Shiite
This answer didn’t go down well among the Druze. Sandwiched between this vow of murder directed at Syrian Alawites, the traditional Druze ally, is a temporizing claim that he might or might not kill a captured Druze. This, with the backdrop of 20 Druze murdered only a few days earlier, was enough to mount a mini-revolt among Golani Druze.
Israel regularly evacuates Islamist fighters wounded in the fighting against the regime in the region. Angry local Druze intercepted an IDF ambulance carrying two wounded Syrians, whom the IDF claimed were civilians. They beat the army medics, who were forced to flee. They then beat one of the wounded Syrians to death and severely wounded the other, before the authorities intervened and rescued him.
Munther Khalil: the IDF’s Faux Syrian “Civilian”
Syrian Islamists calling themselves the Revolutionary Command Council in Quneitra and the Golan, published a Facebook memorial to the victim who was killed in the attack. The page says in Arabic:
Munther Khalil – the wounded man who was killed by Druze people from Majdal Shams in Israel
May Allah have mercy on you, and accept you as one of the Shahids
His picture features him brandishing a gun in full rebel garb. He is clearly not a civilian.
Haaretz reporter Amos Harel also reports (Hebrew and English here) that the two Syrians were Islamist rebels:
The two wounded were from one of the Syrian rebel organizations fighting in the heart of the Golan against the Syrian army.
The IDF lied in order to conceal its own contributing role in this tragic incident. A common occurrence in such circumstances.
The Israeli military is aghast at the Druze attack, since it infringes on its right to meddle in Syrian internal affairs unmolested. Defense minister Yaalon called the killing a “lynch.” This is Israeli code for ‘Arab savagery.’ It is used to differentiate Israeli behavior, supposedly civilized and humane, from that of Palestinian (or Arab) militants.
In the case of the Golan killing, the IDF is attempting to paint the Golani Druze as uncivilized beasts when, in fact, they are legitimately angry at Israel’s new alliance with their enemies, the al-Nusra Front. When Israel first occupied the Golan did it figure that the inhabitants would embrace the occupiers and become like them? Did it give any thought to the views and interests of the occupied and how they differed from those of Israelis? It’s doubtful. Now they are paying the price for their obliviousness and for fifty years of military occupation of Syrian Druze.
The latter are now demanding that Israel intervene in the civil war to save their brethren under attack from al-Nusra. This is the sort of insanely complex strategic dilemma that comes from playing with fire. If Israel continues its “arrangement” with al-Nusra and the latter conquers Syrian Druze villages and imposes fundamentalist Islam replete with revenge killings and beheadings, then it risks igniting a tinderbox inside Israeli-occupied Golan. If it takes the side of the Druze against al-Nusra it risks the leverage it has with the only viable force opposing Israel’s most dangerous enemies, Hezbollah and Iran.
When you play with matches, you’re bound to get burned.
Richard, you are so theatrically pompous when you claiming “first time” about mentioning something…
http://www.93fm.co.il/radio/208926/
@ nikkor1: His image is displayed but he is not named in the report to which you linked. I did name him. Go suck eggs.
Not so fast, habibi!
here are several Israeli sites published the name of purported Al-Nusra terrorist a day before you:
http://www.hona.co.il/news-5,N-11946.html
http://www.a5barna.co.il/index.php?page=Details&id=21516#.VY5x8xuqpBc
That’s a stretch to call them “Israeli” given that “real” Israelis (the Jewish citizens) don’t read any Arabic nor engage with the Arabic language media in their own country.
It doesn’t matter how much israeli those sites are- Silverstein lied about “first time”
@Nikkor1: Nope. I wrote that I “named him for the first time outside of Syrian media.” Which is absolutely true. I never said I posted his picture for the first time, which is what you claimed. Israeli media posted his picture & didn’t name him. It makes you a liar. You are now moderated. Do not try to publish any further comments in this thread or you will be banned.
That’s largely true & further indication of Israeli Jewish racism. But there are a few hearty Jewish souls who do the right thing, study Arabic & do what they can to break barriers. I know some of them first hand.
@ nikkor1: So tell us, my dear hasbarist, how you came up with 2 Arabic reports which supposedly name Munther Khalil? I very strongly doubt you know Arabic. Other readers can test you on this. I suggest you had some “inside help” in this from some official sources. Nice to know we’re monitored here so closely by Israeli foreign ministry and other official outlets.
When the forest is on fire, only an idiot will sit in his wooden cabin and do nothing.
“It also confirms that the IDF lied in claiming he was a civilian. ”
Where did the IDF use the word ‘civilian’?
IDF lied to who?
Three major Israeli newspapers reported that the victim was a ‘fighter’.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/several-injured-as-druze-attack-idf-ambulance-carrying-syrians/
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4671371,00.html
http://www.haaretz.com/news/israel/.premium-1.662498
@ Mitchell: Oh please, read the Israeli press & not just the right wing schmattehs! And stop wasting my time with your nonsense:
Army Radio:
IDF spokesperson: “The wounded were civilians, we don’t aid al-Nusra.”
Munther Khalil was FSA, not al Nusra.
http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Moderate-Syrian-rebels-claim-militant-killed-by-Druse-mob-was-their-man-407309
@Mitchell: Nope. FSA & JPost are as credible as creationism. Numerous media sites have IDed them as alNusra.
What amazes me most is to see that the Facebook memorial simply situates Majdal Shams in Israel, it seems pretty ironic for a group claiming to be a revolutionary council in the Golan. Except Israel and its inconditionnal supporters everyone considers Majdal Shams to be illegally occupied Syrian territory.
@ Deir Yassin: I wouldn’t be surprised if al Nusra hadn’t the faintest idea about Golan geography & where Majdal Shams is located. As far as they’re concerned it’s on the other side of some fence controlled by Israel. Hence it’s “Israeli” to them.
Not to mention that given the al-Nusra-Israel alliance it’s no surprise that the rebels might follow an Israeli narrative saying Majdal Shams is Israeli.
These guys are Islamists, but not Syrian nationalists.
Sure (by the way Daesh was been filmed burning the flag of the Baath party, very similar to the Palestinian flag) but knowing that ‘liberating Jerusalem’ is part of the Islamists’ rhetoric, Daesh or Nusra Front likewise, it’s still amazing that they just put Majdal Shams (which is clearly a name in Arabic) within Israel. Go figure ….
“Israeli TV reported that Israel has built a camp for Syrian army deserters in Israeli occupied Golan” – That isn’t what the article says. It talks about a refugee camp on the Syrian side that Israel doesn’t interfere with.
And ‘Lynch’ is also used when Israeli beat up Arabs (http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-4536873,00.html) but in the past those events end up only with injuries (not that it makes them better). regardless, it isn’t ” Israeli code for ‘Arab savagery.’ ” but a description of the event.
@James: Nonsense. Of course Israeli couldn’t interfere with a camp on the Syrian side because it would be by definition Syrian. The camp is on the Israeli side & likely built by Israel, & under Israeli protection. “Lynch was first used to describe the beating ro death of two Israeli soldiers on the West Bank by Palestinians years ago. It has been used frequently as well to describe physical attacks on Israelis in which no weapons are used. Only recently did a few Israeli attacks on Palestinians merit this term & then largely due to Haaretz & Israeli activists who deliberately used the term for political reasons to show Israelis were capable of similar brutish violence. As for how savage these attacks are, I assure you that a Palestinian put in a coma by a merciless onslaught by Israeli thugs who are neither caught or punished, is devastating devastating to the victim. I resent your insulting, racist claim that Palestinians are not savagely injured or killed by such lynches.
I didn’t write a Palestinian wasn’t injured in lynch by Israelis but that no Palestinian was killed (to my knowledge). And I read of people being arrested for that crime.
The word Lynch is rarely used
That depends on how one defines “Lynch”, there are plenty of cases where Palestinians have been brutally killed by Israeli Police or settlers and plenty more where they were brought to within an inch of their lives.
In Israel a “Lynch” is defined by a large group of people (dozen/dozens) beating up another person/people. The first time I remember it being used is in Ramallah. It isn’t used often, it was used before for Israeli violence and is completely due in this case.
That may well be… but it doesn’t meet the definition of a lynching
@ Ed: Not if you’re a hasbarist, it doesn’t meet the definition of a lynching. But for the rest of us it does.
James. Definitions by the folks in power are designed to favor the folks in power and work against the weak ones. When Israeli Jews create a definition that “Lynch” only applies to a mob-killing, they are pretty certain the situation will not arise among Jews.
Dictionaries define the term as “Murder for a supposed crime” that can even include some poor Palestinian walking down a street and getting beaten to death for the crime of being a Palestinian in Israel.
Jafar – nonsense. Most definitions I can find on the web mentions ‘mob killings’. There were articles about Israelis lynching Palestinians. There were extremely few cases of articles about Palestinians lynching Israelis. How would you define the lunching in Ramallah in 2000? “a few freedom fighters winning a battle against an IDF unit”?
It wasn’t stabbing or sniping. It wasn’t a few individuals but a big crowd, just like in the Golan now. It is completely in like with how the word lynch used in world media.
What ‘deal’ does Israel have with the Syrian rebels?
Read here.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4674139,00.html
For an alternative to this tripe, I recommend:
https://mkaradjis.wordpress.com/2015/06/29/%E2%80%8Bthe-israel-backs-jabhat-al_nusra-fairy-tale-and-its-deadly-consequences/
Pretty bold Lewis and I admire Richard for leaving it in. Whenever I try to enter a comment in one of the Jewish media (The Forward, The Jewish Press or other places), it never gets in. I’ve stopped trying.
Well it does mention Richard as ‘inventive’, that’s a good adjective for a writer, no?
@Respect: Not a good adjective for a reporter I’m afraid.
Richard, I’d be very interested to know… what, in your opinion, is the moral distinction between an American who lives in the United States on land stolen from the native Americans, and an Israeli who lives on land in the West Bank purchased from the Palestinians?
@ Ed: I’d be very interested to know what, in your opinion should I think of someone like you who’s asking a question already asked by at least five members of the hasbarafia in comment threads here over the years? Don’t you guys coordinate your nonsense? Or is repetition ad nauseam part of the hasbara strategy?
I may compile a compendium of all the hasbara memes here & refer you to a numerical code with a link referring to specific memes with the hasbara and the answer. It would save me a world of time. It reminds me of the joke about the prisoners who’d told each other the same jokes so often they simply numbered them & instead of tellng the joke would just shout out the joke number so everyone could laugh.
Further, Israelis stole Palestinian land & expelled them in 1948. They continue such expulsions and theft till today. My ancestors were in Poland and eastern Europe in the late 1800s when America was committing genocide against the Native Americans. But today, I also support restorative justice for these indigenous peoples. In regards to Israel, what do you support in relation to repairing crimes against Israel’s indigenous people, the Palestinians? If as I suspect you support doing little or nothing, shut your mouth because you’re a friggin’ hypocrite.
I also note Mr. Hasbara calls land Israel has stolen from Palestinians “purchased.” Really? How does an Israeli state edict confiscating Palestinian land amount to a “purchase?” A significant percentage of the land on which Israeli settlements stand is privately owned Palestinian land. Not purchased. Just stolen by various means. In the few instances in which settlers claim they did purchase land, more likely than not they used fraud, forged documents, shady agents to steal the land. Settlers have even ‘purchased’ Palestinian land from people who don’t own it!
Since you’ve posted four questions in rapid succession I’m invoking the comment rule restricting you to no more than three commments per day.
One happened within a generation ago and is still continuing and the other happened over a hundred years ago…two hundred years ago. Neither is a forgivable crime, but the is present deserves attention and the robbers do not deserve to benefit from their crimes.
How, pray tell, did Israel come into possession of the Golan? Would it have something to do with the war that followed shortly after the Egyptians demanded UN peacekeepers be withdrawn from the Sinai?
@ Ed: Under international law it doesn’t matter how a nation comes into possession of conquered land. Israel conquered land to which it never had rights and continues not to have rights. Possession of the Golan is & has always been illegal. Conquered land must be returned to the original party at the inception of an armistice or end of hostilities. Israel never did this.
Hasbara of your sort here goes over like a lead balloon. And your quality is pretty inferior.
So, if properties stolen during war are justifiable loot, why bother to return properties of Jews stolen during the Shoah?
Do we want to get into the never-ending disputes of who actually wanted the war to start and who continued to fight even after the ceasefire (at Kissinger’s encouragement) until the Golan was taken?
Jafar – there is a huge difference between individuals and states. private property vs public property. Do you suggest Israel should give back all the tanks captured during the war? Army truck, rifles etc? Is that a joke?