Re.: 8 Palestinians Killed, Media Mostly Silent

["M. Junaid Alam" <redjaguar@xxxxxxxxx>]

"On NPR I heard a very brief mention of a "claim" that Israeli Defense
Forces promised it was going to "investigate."

The logic of Israeli 'investigations' is the logic of removing 'illegal'
Israeli outposts. You initiate a fraudulent effort to fix one part of a
wrong, in order to justify the remaining 9/10th portion of similar wrongs.
If we remove one or two meaningless trailer parks out in the sand dunes,
then we give the appearance of doing something while real settlements
continue to swallow up real land. If we create a couple investigations here
and there, we appear to care about civilian casualties while we continue to
starve the natives and impoverish them wholesale.


For the life of me, I cannot distinguish the tone of the media towards
Palestinian deaths from the tone towards a dead rat, or rodent, or some
other infestation. Reminds of Reich vis. Latin America.

===============

Monday, September 09, 2002, HAARETZ.

IDF finds no blame in deaths of 13 Palestinians; soldiers acted properly

By Amos Harel

An Israel Defense Forces panel has released its findings on the deaths of 13
Palestinian civilians in three recent incidents. The committee, headed by
Major General Yitzhak Harel, found that soldiers followed correct procedures
in all three cases. Based on the findings the IDF will not to take
disciplinary measures against any of the officers or their subordinates
involved in the incidents.

The committee was set up early last week by IDF Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon
after a directive issued by Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer. The
committee reviewed three incidents.

l On August 28, near Netzarim settlement on the Gaza Strip, an IDF tank
fired needle-like flechettes that killed four persons - a 55-year-old woman,
her two sons aged 19 and 22, and an 18-year-old cousin. The troops suspected
the four of trying to infiltrate Netzarim. Ben-Eliezer apologized at the
time for the deaths of "innocent civilians."

l On August 31, four young Palestinians were killed in the West Bank village
of Tubas, near Nablus during the IDF's attempted assassination of a terror
suspect. Two teenage boys in the targeted car and two children playing
nearby were killed by helicopter missiles.

l On September 1, IDF soldiers shot and killed four Palestinians -
32-year-old twin brothers, their 21-year-old cousin, and a 20-year-old man -
near the Beni Nai'im quarry in the Hebron area. An IDF spokesman said at the
time an army unit had identified several suspects who had broken into a
Jewish-owned plot of land close to the quarry.

Major General Harel and his committee found that rules of engagement
procedures followed by IDF soldiers in all three cases were correct. In the
first and third cases, Netzarim and Beni Nai'im, Harel said, IDF soldiers
operated "in response to suspicious Palestinian behavior, which including
infiltration into prohibited areas late at night."

IDF officers believe the four Palestinians killed near Beni Nai'im were
involved in terror activity. Shin Bet security service agents, however, have
compiled no evidence linking any of the four to a terror organization. IDF
sources claim that the four carried wire cutters, knives and axes, and
planned to perpetrate a terror attack or gather intelligence information.
The four operated at a site where explosives have been planted in the past,
the IDF sources said. IDF soldiers fired at the four only after they
observed wire cutters clipping the quarry fence. Two of the would-be
infiltrators were masked, the sources said.

As to the Netzarim incident, IDF sources say that more than two weeks
earlier the commander of the IDF platoon in the area met with local
Palestinians and warned them not to approach IDF posts at night. The IDF
tank spotted suspicious movement in its area, and responded. The committee
found that the tank unit carried out a few warning measures before opening
fire. The IDF probe concluded that the IDF tank commander acted
appropriately in the incident.

As to the Tubas incident, Harel concluded that the innocent persons "were
struck due to an errant missile. The reason for the missile's misfiring was
apparently technical, though this issue has yet to be determined
conclusively."

Officials close to Ben-Eliezer are pleased with the committee's work. The
panel based its findings on interviews with officers and soldiers who were
involved in the incidents, and on reviews of footage filmed by drones in the
area, and intelligence material compiled by the Shin Bet and military
intelligence.



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