Young Israeli (alleged) terrorists have been arrested by the Shin Bet and charged with various acts of (price tag) violence against a Palestinian car dealer in a village near their home in Migdal HaEmek. Several cars and trucks were incinerated by the hoodlums. The victim suggested that the terror attack was retaliation for a Palestinian terror attack in Tel Aviv. While arrests have been reported, the names of the suspects are under gag order. An Israeli security source informs me that they are Noam Mermelstein and Yosef Bar-On, both age 15. They are both students at the Migdal HaEmek yeshiva.
Honenu, the NGO which defends Israeli terrorists, complained the boys had been refused visits with their attorneys. It also released a statement mourning the “democracy is dead.” While I believe all suspects are entitled to such rights, I don’t recall any settler or Honenu complain when such a right is denied Palestinian security detainees. Nor have I ever heard them affirm that Israeli Palestinians deserve the full rights of a democracy. Chutzpah, much??
They respond saying there’s a difference between Palestinian and Israeli suspects: the former are “ticking bombs” threatening to kill Jews; while the latter are tender young boys only out for a little fun messing up Palestinian property. This neglects the fact that thousands of Palestinians are arrested for alleged security offenses without even being charged with a crime, and face the same treatment; while many Jewish terrorists murder Palestinians, not just vandalize property. But why confuse things with facts when lies, amnesia and prejudice do so much better?
You can suspect that these suspects will not be charged with a crime; or if they are charged they will not be tried; or if they are tried they will not be convicted. You have to kill a Palestinian in cold blood, preferably a helpless teenager and light him with kerosene before you’ll go to prison as a Jewish terrorist in Israel. These boys are only apprenticing before they reach the terror big-time. Though a terror cell organized the murder of the Dawabsheh family, only one Jewish settler terrorist has been arrested.
NOTE: I just published an op-ed in the Seattle Times, Don’t believe that Washington state is awash in anti-Semitism, rebutting charges by local Jewish leaders that the state is rife with anti-Semitism. Please give a read and circulate it to friends, colleagues, family, etc.
This sounds like property vandalism and not an act of terror. No bodily harm was inflicted, and the crime seems to amount to arson of cars and graffiti.
Obviously, prima facie, this would be a crime but calling this terror? Had they thrown stones at people or attempted to harm in some other way then terror would perhaps be an appropriate tag.
@ lepxii: They’re junior terrorists. How do you think all the Jewish terrorists who murdered Palestinians started? Do you think they stopped at burning cars? No, it was a training ground leading to bigger & better acts of terror. Hence, this is an act of terror. It’s motive is expression of violent political hatred, the definition of terror.
To paraphrase Heine: a terrorist who starts by burning cars will end by burning people.
[Off topic–comment deleted]
Richard, Excellent, I have to hand it to you – There is a basis for agreement between us. You speak of ‘junior terrorists’ who begin by burning cars and wind up burning people.
On the same wavelength, any ‘junior terrorist’ who throws rocks or firebombs at people, not at cars, will surely end up as ‘senior terrorists’ who shoot people or blow themselves up as suicide bombers.
Therefore, if suspected auto burners can be held without any judicial assistance by attorneys, etc. then surely, proven (via photos, videos) juniors who have taken part in rock-firebomb attacks should be immediately expelled from Israel. This is preferable than feeding them in Israeli prishotels, while providing them with education courses in terrorism 101, 202 and 303.
Thanks.
By the way, my name is not George Habash, it is George Haabas. Greek origin. And not of terror origin.
throwing rocks or firebombs at the soldiers of a military occupation is Resistance not terrorism. Just as the French Resistance attacked the Nazi occupiers or indeed how the Irgun attacked British soldiers (something conveniently consigned to a Zionist memory hole).
On the other hand Jewish settlers attacking Palestinian civilians is, of course, racist terror because Palestinians don’t maintain a military occupation of the settlements. The Israeli settlers are no different from the Volksdeutsche settlers in the Warthgau of Greater Germany/Poland and are therefore legitimate targets.
Obviously you aren’t related to the great George Habash. He was a communist not a fascist and racist.
Following your line of thought that ‘settlers are legitimate targets’, I guess that murdering 13 year olds in their bed as they sleep is also a legitimate form of ‘resistance.’ As well as shooting at cars and killing people while driving.
Nothing I like better than to see the truth in black on white. Legitimazation of violence and terror and murder. Hurray Hurray!
And by the way, George Habash was a terrorist’s terrorist, responsible for hijackings and killing of innocent people. His organization, the PFLP was a ‘pioneer of modern international terror operations and is described as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada, Australia, and the European Union.’ (Wikipedia)
@ George Habash: Israel practices terror on a scale far more massive than any Palestinians can muster. All the resources of an entire state are marshalled to maintain illegal Occupation, enforce ethnic cleansing.
Since you are the new hasbara intern it’s appropriate to have a bit of fun with your name. If George Habash was a terrorist, then you certainly support something along the same lines, just a different flag and religion.
@ George Habash: Read the comment rules. DO not publish more than 3 comments in any 24 hour period.
Rather than arguing which child murder is more heinous (and I assure you I can list six times as many Palestinian child murders as you can list Israeli child murders) there is a simple solution. Get the hell out of Palestine, return to 67 borders, recognize a Palestinian state and its shared capital in Jerusalem. Then all this killing will stop. Until you do, yes little bitty babies on both sides will die horrifically. If you refuse, all their blood will be on your hands & those of Israel’s ultra nationalist leaders who reject compromise.
@George Habash: You’re confused. Palestinian terror such as it is derives from Israeli state terror and Israel’s refusal to recognize the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people.
Read the comment rules for this site and adhere to them. No more than 3 comments on any 24 hr period. And make sure yr comments directly relate to the post topic. If you don’t, you run the risk of being modetated.
Mr Silverstein, do you mean to say that there wasn’t ever any Arab terror prior to 1967?
@Elana: There was far more Israeli state terror & oppression than Palestinian. Which continues to this day.
Palestinians who (allegedly) throw stones at IDF occupation militants aren’t in Israel. They are exercising their rights under international law to resist their occupiers by any means available to them. These (alleged) stone-throwers are in Palestine. The ones who need to be expelled are Israeli troops and settlers – expelled from Palestine where they have no right to be.
100% correct. Out of control youth = out of control terrorist adults.
@Lexpii:
They are illegally occupying terrorists, hiding behind their Judaism.
Palestinian stone-throwing is not terrorism, though. If these illegal “settlers” did so (and they do) then it would be, though.
There are no Palestinian “terrorists” in the occupied Palestinian West Bank, just as there are no Israeli “innocents” in the occupied Palestinian West Bank.
How can an illegal Palestinian-hating “settler” or the members of an occupying army be “innocent victims”?
Richard. You said:
“In July 2014, Palestinian activists held a rally at Westlake protesting Israel’s war on Gaza. That summer, in Operation Protective Edge, 500 Palestinian children were killed. ”
The Westlake rally was held on July 13. From the onset of Operation Protective Edge on July 8 to July 13, relatively few Gazans had died. Maybe two hundred, and many of them were combatants.
So on July 13, there would have been no justification for calling the IDF ‘babykillers’. Would there?
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28439404
@ Trapper: Israel has killed 40,000 Palestinians since 1948. I am completely uninterested in counting the dead within a certain time frame and insisting that Palestinian activists adhere to a proportional response within the arbitrary limits you specify.
Palestinians see their reality within a larger context rather than 5 day intervals. It is entirely legitimate to protest in this manner since 500 Gaza children eventually died during the entire war.
@Trapper Jon:
Semantics. The IDF killed (murdered) or caused the deaths of many, many Palestinian children in the context of this conflict before the demented orgy of civilian blood-letting that was the “defensive war” two summers ago.
In the context of Palestine and Lebanon, “babykillers” is an epithet that suits the IDF well. Enough said!
So Haabas let us talk about “terrorism” then. According to the 20-volume edition of the Oxford Dictionary, so I learned from an article in the Guardian, the word is of French origin:
“Etymology: French terrorisme system of the ‘Terror’ during the French Revolution (1794), violent measures taken in order to come to political power or to maintain a government (1795), (in extended use) intolerant attitude of the partisans of certain ideologies < classical Latin terror terror n. + French -isme -ism suffix. Compare Spanish terrorismo (1799), Italian terrorismo (1794), German Terrorismus (1796), all originally after French. Compare slightly earlier terrorist n.”
Interestingly, this original definition had largely to do with state terrorism. But during the nineteenth century the definition was widened to cover individual acts of resistance against state power such as those by Irish dissidents and anti-tsarist revolutionaries. It is now this latter meaning that predominates even though, as Tony Greenstein rightly points out, we are dealing here in many cases with legitimate resistance against state terrorism.
States can cover up even the most egregious cases of wanton use of violence to terrorise a civilian population with chillingly “utilitarian” explanations. One can in most cases not resort to soothing descriptions of this kind when deeds of individual resistance against an occupying force are concerned.
For a misleadingly “utilitarian” description of state violence take the murder of those four little boys on that beach during the last Israeli onslaught on Gaza:
“Mohammad Ramiz Bakr, 11, Ahed Atef Bakr and Zakariya Ahed Bakr, both 10, and Ismail Mahmoud Bakr, nine, were killed when they were hit by explosive rounds. Three of them died as they sought to flee the beach after the first child was killed.” So they were hit when they were trying to run away.
The IDF subsequently had this explanation: “An account of the investigation, posted late on Thursday by military spokesman Lt Col Peter Lerner, said the strike had targeted a “compound” which had been known as belonging to Hamas’s Naval Police and Naval Force (including naval commandos)”.
The running figures were supposed to be Hamas militants. So the IDF is trying to tell us that in spite of its supposedly state of the art equipment it could not tell that 10 to 11 year old boys were involved.
And what about that “compound” supposed to have been belonging to “Hamas’s Naval Police and Naval Force” (are there any such outfits?)
A reporter of the Guardian, Peter Beaumont, happened to be very close to the strike which was near to his (beach) hotel.:
“Beaumont says that he has no idea what the target could have been. "The building that was hit was just a shipping container next to where one of the kids' father keeps his boat and stores fishing nets. The kids were just playing hide and seek there. They shoot missiles (against Israel) from this neighborhood but none from that location."
read more: http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.605568”
@Arie
““Mohammad Ramiz Bakr, 11, Ahed Atef Bakr and Zakariya Ahed Bakr, both 10, and Ismail Mahmoud Bakr, nine, were killed when they were hit by explosive rounds. Three of them died as they sought to flee the beach after the first child was killed.” So they were hit when they were trying to run away. ”
The boys were killed as the result of aerial reconnaissance that directed naval fire on them. I’m not sure aerial recon can adequately determine the height of a target. I’m not sure aerial recon can distinguish boys from men.
@ Trapper Jon: Israel has the most sophisticated visual technologies available. It can tell what targets it is firing at. It can tell whether a target is a child or adult. At any rate, if you can’t tell what target you’re firing at then don’t fire. If you do, you’ll make mistakes & kill children and end up in the Hague, where you’ll belong.
You are done in this thread. Move on to another thread if you choose. But not this one.
“Israeli onslaught on Gaza” – after Israel withdrew from Gaza, leaving it to the Arabs, Hamas was ‘democraticly elected’ to rule. They then proceeded to fire11,000 rockets into Israel, from the land which Israel gave them.
I don’t know where you live, but if the Mexicans or Canadians fired three rockets into the United States, or if the Cubans started shooting rockets in the US, what do you think the US reaction would be? Would the US wait until thousands of rockets had attacked US territory, or would they react a little sooner? Or perhaps Mr. Obama would appease the attackers by following a policy of ‘restraint,’ while Americans were targets.
Sorry, but your facts and definitions are a bit off. Hamas, Hizbullah, ISIS and other such murderous organizations are the terrorists; certainly not Israel.
@George
Shit, The United States wouldn’t let the Soviets build rockets on Cuban soil, 90 miles away from South Florida.
But Israel isn’t the United States, so she has to sit down, shut up and do nothing while 100,000+ rockets that can blanket the whole country are placed right on her borders.
@ Trapper Jon: She sure does. The Soviet Union placed nuclear armed ballistic missiles in Cuba and it made this country mighty nervous. Iran doesn’t even have such missiles, yet Israel wanted the U.S. to invade Iran to eliminate such a future threat.
But the U.S. wasn’t occupying CUba and so we had more reason to protest against those missiles. If we occupied the entire island or say, Havana, the world would’ve looked on our protestations differently. In case you hadn’t noticed, Israel occupies part of Lebanon (Shebaa Farms) & the Golan in violation on international law. So those nations whose territory is occupied have a right to protest & resist Israel’s violations.
To repeat, don’t post another comment in this thread.
@Trapper Jon:
Israel as a woman; a fat, ugly, spoiled and hypocritical excuse for the “fairer sex” who deserves absolutely no sympathy when “she” causes problems for “herself’ or otherwise makes enemies for “herself”.
I’m picturing a worthless, evil crone like Golda Meir. Sounds about right, ha ha ha.
@ George Habash: WE’ve been down this road before, Georgie. Hasbarniks like you have regurgitated the same stupid arguments countless times. I will not force myself the repeat my own rebuttals.
Read the comment threads and search for the issues you want to write about. If you repeat arguments offered before I will take you to task.
The arguments you offer are stupid. The U.S. is at peace with its neighbors. Something not true of Israel. We don’t have neighbors who want to fire rockets at us. SO your hypothetical is stupid & irrelevant. But if we continued to occupy say, Mexico City or Toronto & those countries fired rockets at us in protest, then you bet they’d have a legitimate reason to hate us & attack us. And no one in the world would shed a tear for us, nor should they.
Do not publish another comment in this thread on pain of moderation. Keep your comments on topic & directly related to the post. If they are not I will delete them & warn you again.
@Haabas
If ever there was a case of legitimate resistance against occupation it is that of Gaza.
“Despite the 2005 Israeli disengagement from Gaza,[22] the United Nations, International human rights organisations, and the majority of governments and legal commentators consider the territory to be still occupied by Israel, supported by additional restrictions placed on Gaza by Egypt. Israel maintains direct external control over Gaza and indirect control over life within Gaza: it controls Gaza’s air and maritime space, and six of Gaza’s seven land crossings. It reserves the right to enter Gaza at will with its military and maintains a no-go buffer zone within the Gaza territory. Gaza is dependent on Israel for its water, electricity, telecommunications, and other utilities.” (Wikipedia).
And the resistance with these rockets, seeing their lack of effect, has been largely symbolical.
It is interesting to see in your case how effective Israeli propaganda has been. I must forego the pleasure of probing your delusions any further right now because it is past midnight here.
The above post by Richard seems to have the comments disabled. Was that deliberate?
@ ToivoS: Don’t you see a blank comment box at the bottom of the page? I do. I don’t have comments turned off on any posts as far as I know.