An Israeli Shin Bet agent was killed yesterday by “security personnel” in a friendly fire incident along the Gaza fence near the Kerem Shalom border crossing. The victim’s name was Amir Maimoni. This much has been reported by Israeli media. But this Haaretz report says that the case is under a gag order.
After inquiring from an Israeli security source, I learned this: the Shabak was conducting a security operation in which a rakaz (Shabak officer who “runs” Palestinian spies) was to meet a Palestinian agent at the security fence separating Gaza from southern Israel. Besides the rakaz and the spy, there were two other agents disguised as Palestinians (in Israeli police jargon they would be called mistarvim) who were providing security for the meeting.
In some unspecified way, one of the security guards mistook Maimoni for a real Palestinian who posed a threat to those he was guarding. He opened fire, thus killing Maimoni. As you can imagine, this is a major fashlah which should never have happened. It also indicates dysfunction within the unit which conducted this operation. Israel’s spy agencies hate bad PR. So Shabak turned to the rubber stamp security court to secure a gag order suppressing the most important information about this incident. As a result, the incident will be handled, if at all, internally. And Shabak will face no political or external pressure to explain what happened and why.
Standard operating procedure in the national security state.
In a related matter, last week Israeli Border Police and an armed Israeli settler confronted an alleged Palestinian assailant attempting to stab an Israeli. In the ensuring fight one of the Israelis shot and killed one of the officers. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the armed settler. But we’ll never know since Israel will likely never report who was at fault in this incident.
In these multiple Gaza border incidents (incident usually meaning that one or more Palestinians are killed) it seems that any real Palestinian is thought to pose a threat. No matter on which side of the border, armed or not, shooting and killing is always justified by the army.
It’s ironic that your standards for the Shabak are so high that mistakes should never happen, and the “fashlah” is interpreted as general incompetence. Perhaps out of love and dedication to Israel’s welfare you can organize an overhaul of the GSS from your office in Seattle. As you know. most of their activities are unknown to the public, so the “successes” aren’t even counted. That you cry foul over the accidental friendly fire death of an Israeli, and are silent about a Palestinian who goes berzerk stabbing 10 people in Yafo (while the Palestinian media honors him as a martyr and hero
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/biden-israel-palestinian-stabbing-attacks-killed-american-taylor-allen-force/),
speaks volumes about your bias and integrity as a progressive. It sounds like schadenfreude to me.
Or, perhaps I should expect from you that the Palestinians get a pass for whatever they do. Your silence is deafening. And when the Israelis do something by accident, in your book they are incompetent, corrupt and stupid at best, evil at worst.
@ Yehuda: The day when you are permitted to judge which progressives have bias and integrity is the day I resign from the human race. Nor will anyone here take such narischkeit seriously coming from you.
Is believing that Shabak agents shouldn’t kill each other setting such a “high standard?” I hope not. Generally, most armies and intelligence agenices frown on such incidents. But I guess in Israel it comes with the territory and no parent who loses a child in such circumstances blinks an eye. It’s simply the price of doing business, right??
Instead of questioning why you as an Israeli are not permitted to know that one Shabak agent killed another, you shrey about why I don’t denounce Palestinian attacks on Israelis (and what does one have to do with the other anyway?). The day you affirm a 2 state solution returning to 67 borders and sharing Jerusalem is the day I’ll say Palestinians no longer have a right to resist Occupation. Till then, you get what you pay for…
And yes, when a soldier or spy kills a fellow solider or spy that is inevitably a major fashlah. Unlike you, I hope the Shabak examines what went wrong in a serious way. I’ll also be sure to tell Maimoni’s family that you think his death was due to the general extraordinarily high standards of Shabak.
This sort of acid, cynical comment rubs me the wrong way. If you want to lose your privileges to comment, keep it up.
Gag order??? It is all over the news!
Will you also ask for credit for this ‘scoop’?
http://m.ynet.co.il/Articles/4776128
It says absolutely nothing about a meeting with a Palestinian agent at the security fence, and there being agents disguised as Palestinians.
Fake Jack: You can’t read Jackie boy, show me a story which reports a rakaz was meeting his Palestinian informer. If you can’t, then shut your piehole.
That’s not what the title says. -BREAKING: Shin Bet Agent Killed in Fellow Agent in Friendly Fire Incident
maybe you should work on your writing skills.
@Fake Jake: No Israeli news source has reported he was killed by a fellow Shabak agent while providing security for meeting a Palestinian informer as that headline did. Yer outa luck Jack. For snark, you’re now moderated. Send in the next hasbara clown to take yer place “Jackie.”
Nonsense!!!
They all reported that is the investigation lead at the moment and Shabak head even said it in funeral which was published on GLZ. glz.co.il/1064-78254-he/Galatz.aspx
@ Jack Cohen: I published it first moron. Prove that an Israeli publication reported that Maimoni was killed protecting a meeting with a Palestinian spy BEFORE I published my post. If you don’t I just might ban your ass for being a stupid twit. I’ve only done that a few times in the past, but you might be the next.
Apparently, you have changed the title of the article to address exactly my point.
So… instead of cursing me, say THANK YOU for caring for your journalist credibility.
@No JackASS: I edited the title to better reflect the content of the post, which you denied. Nor have you proven yr claim that Israeli media reported that the killing happened at a meeting with a Palestinian spy before I did. You are moderated.
You “care for my journalist [sic] credibility?” Don’t make me laugh!
I guess this is the best apology I’ll get from you.
A person who just saw your title or Twitter feed would’ve thought the whole story was broken by you, not just the meeting fact.
It seems even you forgot that in your comment -“Instead of questioning why you as an Israeli are not permitted to know that one Shabak agent killed another”.
@ Jack-ASS Cohen: Apology? Are you out of your mind? I owe you no apology nor will you get one. You lied about my post not being a scoop or original. You lied claiming Israeli media had already reported that the killing involved a meeting with a Palestinian spy. You didn’t produce any article supporting those claims.
In fact, I don’t even believe that Israel press said one Shabak agent killed another. Haaretz did report Maimoni was killed by “security forces.” Though perhaps another source did say it was a Shabak on Shabak killing. But I’m not aware of it.
If you persist, you’ll be banned entirely. My finger is just itching to do it. If you want to comment here again, you’ll move on to another thread.
Your headline represented the whole story as a scoop and so did your comment later on.
You are confused yourself!
@ Jack Cohen: Nonsense. Anyone reading my post and the Israeli mainstream media could compare the two and tell very easily what was the new material I was exposing–except you and the other hasbarists here. I wonder why that is. I take that back, I don’t wonder. I know.
You’re done in this thread.
I find it difficult why it matters who published first. It sound likes narischkeit to me to involve this factor in as much as it is secondary to the article/info published.
@iliya: Are you living in the 21st century or 19th? To journalists & those for whom information and reporting are important it certainly matters who publishes first. Not only that, no one in Israel has reported at all that this was as meeting with a Palestinian spy, because that is what is under gag order.
@Richard- I still don’t know what you’re kvetching about. Gag prders of various types have to balance the public’s right to know with the interests of protecting privacy, prevent harm to suspects, prisoners, witnesses, victims, or to protect national security. That’s what the courts are for. They are used in many countries including the US and UK
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gag_order#Examples
And yes, I care if there was a friendly fire incident. But I don’t have to know the details especially if there are national security concerns, as determined by a court or similar professional body, which is subject to scrutiny, as it is here.
But the details may show that trigger happy behavior is the cause. And that should concern you, because it means your armed forces make unnecessary victims.
@ yehuda: Gag orders are used widely in Israel. They are used exceedingly sparingly in other countries. In the U.S., they’re almost unheard of. In Israel they don’t “balance anyone’s interests” but the wealthy, powerful & military-intelligence elites. Sure they protect accused rapists as well if they have well paid lawyers.
You may not need to know that your domestic intelligence agency royally screwed up. But in most democratic states, people not only want to know when their government fails, they have a right to know. Israel is perhaps the only nation calling itself a democracy in which this right is routinely denied the public. And the public, like you, is blissfully happy in their ignorance.
In a democratic country, transparency in such matters leads to accountability and proper functioning of government. Where there is no real accountability, no oversight, then government lapses into dysfunction.
This is how real democracy goes: if you want rights you fight for them. If you don’t, you don’t have a democracy. You don’t fight, hence you have no democracy.
@Richard- you don’t have a hegemony on the concepts of democracy. Just because its not super left liberal as you would want it doesn’t mean its not a democracy. Wikileaks Assange and Snowden are criminals and traitors in my book, not heroes as some here might see them.
And BTW how do you define a “royal screw up”? Do you even understand about military and intelligence operations, to classify when an operational failure is a “screw up”? Is not every accident a “screw up” in some way? Don’t I know that any human endeavor is fallible?
@Elizabeth– no our system isn’t perfect– and I’m not naive, but I and most Israelis have enough basic trust in the military and courts that there are checks and balances, and that we learn from our mistakes (even if the courts don’t decide to let Richard or you or I in on it).
“but I and most Israelis have enough basic trust in the military and courts that there are checks and balances, and that we learn from our mistakes ”
I do not believe that anymore.
Just one example: A while ago 30 people or so from Gaza were shot demonstrating on their side of the fence by Israeli military from the other side of the fence. That kind of thing is OUTRAGEOUS! How come you cannot see this?
@ yehuda: “Democracy” and “hegemony” are contradictory values. I believe in democracy, hence I oppose hegemony, whether it’s Israeli or anyone else. Israel wouldn’t have to be “super left liberal” to be a democracy. The U.S. isn’t super left liberal, but it is a democracy. A flawed one, but a democracy nonetheless.
Anyone who can call whistleblowers like Julian Assange & Edward Snowden a “criminal and traitor” (btw how CAN you do that if you’re neither an Australian or U.S. citizen??) is a far right-wing autocrat, if not worse. How much worse are you?
How do I define a “royal screw-up?” When one Israeli agent kills another, that’s a perfect definition. I appear to understand military and intelligence operations much better than you. YOu appear to see such tragic accidents as perfectly acceptable and expected. I don’t. But again, I wish you’d tell Maimoni’s parents that he was expendable, a cog in the machine, & they should just suck it up. That will console them, undoubtedly.
Do please show us an Israeli court decision in a security case acknowledging a mistake and learning from it? Can you?
You are done in this thread. Move on.
@yehuda:
” @Richard- you don’t have a hegemony on the concepts of democracy. Just because its not super left liberal as you would want it doesn’t mean its not a democracy. Wikileaks Assange and Snowden are criminals and traitors in my book, not heroes as some here might see them.”
If you play to the delusions of people like you, who claim that the occupied Palestinian West Bank is “Judea and Samaria” (which never was, isn’t, and never will be) or “part of Israel”, then it is clear that the Israeli state proper is not remotely a democracy– in fact, in that scenario, the israeli state proper is unequivocally an apartheid state.
If you don’t consider the “settlements” to be part of Israel, and the occupation to be part of Israel– then it remains to be seen how you feel about the statements of the Palestinians living in Israel proper themselves.
They largely see themselves as socially and politically marginalized, and third or second class citizens at “best”. Do you dismiss them out of hand?
What about the fact that many Israeli Jews are more then willing to strip Palestinians in Israel of all their limited rights, if or when the Palestinian population increases in size, even to a marginal degree?
How do you feel about the fact that many of the aforementioned Israeli Jews seem to be hypothetically fine with wholesale ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Israel proper if that would allow for the continuation of a “Jewish and zionist state”?
Israeli “democracy” is a farce that only serves the Jewish zionist camp, no matter how you look at it.
Sorry if the comment is posted twice, the browser crashed
@Elizabeth– please post a link for the even to which you are referring. I don’t remember the details, but I recall that the protest became violent.
@Kyle– your false claims are too numerous to debunk here. But it boils down to a simple question: Are you in favor of or opposed to 2 states, a Jewish State and a Palestinian state living side by side in peace? It seems from your statements, and correct me if I’m wrong, that you are attacking Zionism, the very right to a Jewish State to exist. If so, state it explicitly, so we know where you stand.
As I stated previously, I would support a 2 state solution more or less based on 67 boundaries, if it were to bring true peace. This would require the Palestinians to give up their aspirations to eliminate my country. It would require Israel to make a painful withdrawal and a massive population transfer. For the time being, such a solution is not in the cards for a lot of reasons having to do with both sides of the conflict. Polls are interesting (and I could quote many polls about the Palestinians views), but mostly they reflect people’s emotions and reactions to what is going on in the moment. They are very fluid.
The main barrier at this time, in my view, is the political constellation of both sides, neither of which are willing to pay the price required for a resolution. The cost of doing something is higher than keeping things the way they are. This is game theory, and assumes that both sides are rational actors, which I believe they are.
I’ll see if I can find the incident. For now, a link on how you need not do anything violent to be executed if you approach the fence.
http://www.btselem.org/gaza_strip/hostilities
@ Yehuda:
Patently false. There is no fault on the Palestinian side in this regard. Palestinian leaders have even been willing to sell out their own constituency to get a deal.
This too is nonsense and a lie. Not only that, hasbarati before you (too numerous to mention) have published almost the same exact words here. A reminder of the comment rules: we’re not interested in hearing your opinions or claims here. If you have evidence that shows your claim is correct (& by “evidence” I mean credible evidence from a credible source) offer it. If not, keep your opinions to yourself.
And if you start slinging around more “evidence” that we’ve already seen here before spouted by others, I will become very tired of it very fast. If you haven’t already, read the comment rules…carefully.
@Richard : “we’re not interested in hearing your opinions or claims here…”
It seems that you ARE interested in hearing from people with opinions similar to yours (from whom you don’t demand “credible evidence from a credible source”), such as Kyle. Their comments are full of editorializing and you don’t demand evidence.
Since clearly we would be unable to agree on what is valid “evidence” on the subject, I will stop commenting on this.
@ Yehuda: You are free to dispute Kyle’s sources or evidence if you have equally or more credible evidence of your own. If you feel he is offering opinions without supporting them with credible evidence, you’re free to bring that to my attention.
I see that you’re conceded you don’t have a credible source to support yr claim that Palestinians are at fault for the current impasse. Next time, don’t make the claim.
I also did not want to go too far off topic and get deleted., but since you invited me…
Here is what I think is a credible and balanced source
http://www.cfr.org/israel/pitfalls-israeli-palestinian-peace-talks/p32971
He makes it pretty clear what I claimed, ie that both sides are unwilling/unable to pay the price.
I hope you won’t tell me that CFR and the writer are Israeli Zionist hasbarists.
@ Yehuda: Aaron David Miller? Really? A credible source? Aipac’s lib Dem face in the Clinton administration, along with his pal, Dennis Ross?
So yes, Miller is a liberal Zionist shill. Not to mention an anti-Iranian shill. But that’s another subject.
As for the Council on Foreign Relations, it’s a bastion of the Washington foreign policy elites, who of course tilt heavily toward Israel.
And again, Miller is offering his own opinion, which in some inner-Beltway policy wonk circles counts for something. But he offers no facts to support them.
Once again, you’re done in this thread.