by StarmanSkye » Sat Apr 08, 2006 7:05 pm
Sepka said:<br>--quote--<br>If you're willing to grant that setting off bombs on school busses, in shopping centres, restaurants, tourist attractions, etc., is a reasonable response to a land dispute on the Palestinians' behalf, then how can you criticize the Israelis responding in a manner proportionately harsher? If one side is justified in blowing up a bus to express their unhappiness at somethng like not being allowed to make their homes where they wish, then surely the other side is justified in causing much greater suffering as a response to the bombing?<br><br>-Sepka the Space Weasel <br>--unquote--<br><br>After I read ALL of Alice's post meticulously explaining through typical examples the real nature of the horrific abuses, crimes, atrocities and inhumanity routinely inflicted on the Palestinian people through what can only be adequately described as Israeli's state-sanctioned terror (terrific job, BTW Alice <sigh>) and then rereading your comment I can only conclude that you know absolutely NOTHING about the current and ongoing tragedy of systematic mistreatment and killings.<br><br>It boggles the mind that you could be so grossly uninformed and even worse, so disinterested in discovering or knowing the truth, that you would, that you COULD actually dismiss Palestinian issues as nothing but 'unhappiness' over not being able to build a home where they want --<br><br>You apparently feel facts have nothing to do with the 'Palestinian problem' -- that it was Palestinian truculance that provoked righteous Israeli reprisals and not, as it was, Palestinian growing resentments over patterns of Israeli colonialism, terrorism, land-theft and appropriation, injustices, economic disparity and exclusion, forced displacement, and exploitation, and that culminated in the '69 war with voluntary temporary evacuation of citizens that Israel prohibited re-entry to --and whose property and assets Israel confiscated <br>-- that aroused the population to anger and displeasure, and whose treatment at Israeli hands continued to get worse.<br><br>It's astonishing you know none of this, AND that you never even suspected as much and made an effort to get better informed. That capacity for questioning one's assumptions and critical thinking and learning which distinguishes most of the folks on this forum I had assumed was something you shared too. Your comment spoken by a slow third-grader would STILL be unexcusable. I think even the most arrogant self-righteous extremist-Israeli/Zionist wouldn't claim to believe such an absurd thing -- Before saying that, I'd think he'd prefer something like, "We treat them worse than animals because they ARE worse than animals).<br><br>Starman<br>******<br>More thoughts and observations -- Why the Palestinians are so damn 'difficult';<br><br>The entire occupation is illegal under the Oslo Accords, the Geneva Conventions, multiple United Nations directives etc etc etc. The IDF are prohibited from enforcing curfew (which are called willy-nilly and often not adequately announced, in effect for days and weeks or longer, with no exceptions for elderly, sick, mothers in childbirth, medical emergencies, etc. -- in other words, conditions consituting cruelty if the Palestinians were animals) with anything stronger than Tear-Gas, but the Israeli's typically use deadly force, especially snipers shooting silenced weapons and dum-dums -- bullets designed to fragment causing horrific wounds. Another IDF innovation is fitting 22 cal. bullets to larger -caliber shells, with the effect that the bullet tumbles as it flies thru the air <br>-- creating gruesome, life-threatening injuries even when only hitting legs or arms. Dum-dums, silenced-weapons and tumbling rounds are all specifically classified as illegal under Geneva rules of engagement. But like the US, Israel doesn't feel bound to respect International laws or agreements.<br><br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.bristolfoe.org.uk/wildfire/palestine/eva.and.baha.htm">www.bristolfoe.org.uk/wil...d.baha.htm</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br>--quote--<br>Aftermath. The examining doctor at El Ethad Hospital in Nablus said the following about Baha's killing: "...shot under the axila passed through the left lung to right lung and heart. There was an accumulation of blood in thorax cavity. Died of Haemo-Thorax. X-Ray showed multiple fragments in chest. Main injuries in left lung and the heart." He said that the location of the shot in the upper torso and massive internal damage caused by the "dum-dum" bullet was consistent with an intentional kill. Dum-dums explode and fragment on impact, a bit like landmines, causing maximum multiple injuries. <br><br>The Israeli army initially stated that Baha was carrying a bomb at the time of his assassination. This is not true. It does however prove that the shot was fired to kill, not to stun or frighten but to kill. The statement then changed to accuse Baha of carrying a Molotov cocktail. This was supposed to have exploded in his hand. Setting him on fire and killing him. <br><br>'It was his fault'. This is what the IDF said about the boy they shot in the head in Balata the night before. 17-years-old. He died when the ambulance carrying him was refused entry through a checkpoint to the hospital. A double killing. They said he killed himself, shot himself. This is a common statement released after the Army murders people here. All armies and police do it. Blame and demonise the victim. It's a pattern consistent with the murder of hundreds of people in police custody in the UK too. 'They were mad, they were drug addicts, uncontrollable, suicidal'. Here, it's because 'they're terrorists'. 328 children have been murdered by the Israeli army or armed settlers (the Israeli State's bought-off reserve force) since September 2000. (In 2 years)<br><br>*****<br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.ww4report.com/73.html">www.ww4report.com/73.html</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br>--quote--<br>On Jan. 31, the New York Times reported the following account of a messy Israeli hit by a Border Police death squad dressed in mufti ("civvies") in the West Bank town of Tul Karm: <br><br>"The Israeli Army said the raid in Tulkarm, conducted by the border police, was a mission to arrest two members of a militant group, al-Aksa Martyrs Brigades, which is affiliated with Mr. Arafat's Fatah party and has claimed responsibility for many attacks on Israelis. The army said that as the police entered the city, Palestinians threw stones and gasoline bombs at them. The police dispersed the crowds with tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets. Palestinian officials said seven people had been wounded. The army said that after the police spotted the two wanted men and closed in on them, officers came under fire from gunmen nearby. The police returned fire and ordered the two men, who tried to escape, to halt, then fired warning shots, the army said. When the men did not stop, the army said, the police shot and killed both of them. Palestinian witnesses said that only one of the dead men belonged to the militant group and that the other was a bystander taking refuge in a candy shop." (NYT, Jan. 31) <br><br>An International Solidarity Movement (ISM) activist working in Tul Karm had the following observations on the incident: <br><br>"You may have heard about the 'successful' Israeli operation that killed the head of the local branch of al-Aksa two weeks back. Israeli soldiers have since voiced their glee at killing 'the fucker' at checkpoints where ISMers have been. Several local witnesses told me that Special Forces simply sprayed the area with machine gun fire. According to hospital records, 18 bystanders sustained injuries from the shooting which makes me think they are probably right. In this 'successful' operation they also mistook a sweet seller they had shot in the stomach who was in full store uniform for a shot militant and chased him into his store and shot him twice in the head with dum-dums. They then proceeded to unload an additional clip into him just for good measure and then dragged the body into the street. He was known as a poor man of great integrity and the only one with an income in his family. He had been building a home with his meager savings for 5 years and was hoping to complete it shortly and get married. Perhaps this was all just a mistake on the Israeli soldiers parts. I would like the Israelis to tell that to the devastated family. Tell it to his brother who is 12 and now will be forced to seek employment and probably stop going to school." (ISM, Feb. 10) (David Bloom) [top] <br><br>RANDOM DEATH FROM AN APC IN TUL KARM<br>An ISM activist in Tul Karm describes the death of Muhamed, 21, a worker in a clothing store, on Feb. 8. The activist was watching as Israeli armored personnel carriers (APC) were returning to their base in Tul Karm after driving around to enforce curfew: <br><br>"Just past us...I shuddered at three bursts of machine gun fire that came from the APC. I ran in the direction of the shooting and witnessed the vehicles rush off. Within seconds a man exited a shop and called in a shrill voice for an ambulance. I was one of the first to the scene and rushed into the clothing store. A young man lay on the floor of the shop. He looked like a ghoulish yellow puppet with an extra joint in his legs. Both his femur bones in his legs were snapped by two bullets and blood was visibly spurting from one of his legs into a growing pool that surrounded him on the shop floor. He was reaching with his hands into the air and in severe shock and excruciating pain, but conscious. All I could do was hold his hand... <br><br>"The evidence at the scene is quite damning. The store had been closed with steel doors at the time of the incident. The heavy gun just shot right through the cement wall and the steel doors into the back of the store and the man. When contacted, the Israeli occupation forces spokesperson explained that shooting at random was illegal and therefore not done..." Muhamed died the next day, in a ambulance on the way to Nablus. The ambulance was delayed on its way three times by Israeli soldiers. (ISM, Feb. 10) (David Bloom) [top] <br><br>ASSYMETRIC WARFARE IN TUL KARM: APCs vs. STONE-THROWERS<br>The District Co-ordinating Offices (DCO), originally places where Israeli and Palestinian security forces coordinated under the Oslo accords, are now the bases of the Israeli army occupying Palestinian territory. In Tul Karm, the DCO is down the road from a cluster of schools, and Israeli armored vehicles often pass through. This area is often the scene of uneven battles between stone-throwing Palestinian youth and Israeli armored vehicles. Activists report hearing troops in Israeli vehicles exhorting the youth to come out over loudspeakers, in Arabic. One ISM activist in Tul Karm reports that on several occasions he heard Israeli troops in APCs broadcasting taunts at Palestinian boys, such as "Ta'al Sharmuta" ("come out, whores"). <br><br>WW3 REPORT witnessed a Jan. 28 battle in which an Israeli soldier, sounding quite drunk, sang "Hatikva," the Israeli national anthem, over an APC's loudspeakers before firing rubber bullets at local youth. <br><br>On Feb. 10, one ISM activist in Tul Karm described the death of a youth in the town at the hands of Israeli troops: "This was after a tear gas bout that literally covered the whole downtown core in a 30 foot high column of gas. It was the worst gassing I had ever underwent and I was 2 blocks away. I hate to think how children the elderly and the sick handled it in the actual area affected, the center of town and a highly populated area. The same morning R****** and I witnessed a 17-year-old boy who was pathetically throwing stones at an armored vehicle being shot between the eyes by border police with a kind of gold bullet that fragments upon impact. I could see the Israeli soldiers aiming from the vehicle next to us and actually said 'oh no, they are going to shoot one of these boys' to R****** right before they shot. The boys nose was destroyed and fragments entered his skull. We saw him at the al-Zakat Hospital in Tul Karm and apparently he is now in a hospital in Israel and will undergo neuro-surgery to try to remove the fragments from inside his skull. Another boy, 13, lost an eye and part of his face with a similar bullet... We were not far away when it happened; the two Israeli military vehicles had just passed us on the road before carrying out another tragic act." (ISM, Feb. 10) (David Bloom) <br>*******<br>Shooting incident: Boy killled with dum-dum:<br>www.thornwalker.com/ditch/wrightthird.htm <br>--quote--<br>Besides the obligatory solemn excursion to Masada, the propaganda show included a trip to the West Bank and places now in the news as sites at which the Israeli army regularly shoots teenagers in the head. The inhabitants of Nablus and Bethlehem and other Arab towns were polite, but, except for the merchants, very stand-offish. By and large they pointedly ignored us. It was obvious to me at the time that there was some tension between them and our Israeli guides, all of whom carried Uzis or M-16s.<br><br>Actually, however, the people living in Nablus and the other towns had it pretty good — at least compared to those living in the refugee camps. The camps were inhabited by the Arabs who had been forced out of their homes in what is now Israel proper during the 1948 war of conquest. The Israelis told us that the Arabs had left because the Arab countries had urged them to do so in radio broadcasts. (They never explained why the Arab countries would do that.)<br><br>I learned the truth much later: it was the Israelis who urged the Arabs to leave their homes, telling them they could return when the conflict was over. When the time came to go back, the Israelis refused to let them in, and confiscated their land and houses. They wound up in squalid — and I do mean squalid — camps made up of shacks, because the Jordanians and Egyptians and Lebanese didn't know where to put them and didn't care. There they lived from hand to mouth, on what assistance international organizations could provide and whatever work they could get in Israel — insofar as they were allowed in.<br><br>Squalor, however, was not the most striking feature of the camps. Through every one at least two huge, straight gashes had been literally bulldozed from one end of the camp to the other, each one the width of a two lane highway. Our guides told us the Israeli Army had done that after occupying the West Bank in 1967 to make it easier to patrol the camps. <br><br>*<br>Although it certainly wasn't meant to, that trip planted the seeds of my current anti-Zionist, or at least, anti-Israeli-state, attitude. Our Israeli guides tried to portray themselves as kind, tolerant, and progressive. But every now and then the mask slipped, and a glimmer of their contemptuous attitudes toward the Arabs could be seen.<br><br>Nowadays, of course, that mask is becoming pretty tattered. Not too long ago the Israelis admitted that they had official death squads, after a failed assassination attempt in Jordan on a Palestinian politican. Here's an excerpt from a news story in Britain's Web news site "The Independent" on the current ongoing violence in the West Bank:<br><br>An analysis of the injuries of the [Arab] dead by Palestinian doctors — working with American Physicians for Human Rights — has found that almost half of the dead were shot in the head or neck, several from the back, while the other half were shot in the chest or stomach.<br>"This is a very clear indicator that the Israeli army is shooting to kill. They decide which of the demonstrators they want to kill and then they act as assassins," said Dr Mustafa Barghouthi, the president of the Union of Palestinian Medicial Relief Committees, which has been collecting data on the victims. It also found that nine out of 10 were killed by live ammunition — including "dum-dum" style exploding bullets, used by Israeli army marksmen.<br><br>"Dum-dums," by the way, are illegal under the Geneva convention. They were invented by the British at the turn of the century, for use on the frontiers of their Empire against recalcitrant Afghan tribesmen who did not appreciate British attempts to rule them. To the chagrin of the Brits, the Afghans often refused to fall down and die like respectable Englishmen when shot by the standard Enfield .303 bullet. In response, the original dum-dums were made — at the British arsenal in India called, naturally, Dum Dum — by taking a bullet and cutting a deep "x" in its nose with a knife. That made the bullet split into fragments when it struck a human body, increasing the damage immensely.<br><br>It's interesting to note that the original version of the Colt Model 1911 pistol — the famous Colt .45 Automatic — was developed by the U.S. Army for a similar purpose. After the U.S. liberation of the Philippines from the evil Spanish in 1898, many of the natives of the islands were unappreciative. They decided that they did not want Benevolent Assimilation (the actual term used) into the United States, any more than they had wanted to be a colony of Spain.<br><br>Their attacks on American soldiers were terrifying and effective, because the Filipinos often kept coming after they had been shot at close range by the medium-caliber revolvers the soldiers were using. The .45 automatic addressed that problem by holding seven rounds (or eight with one in the chamber) instead of six, firing and reloading more quickly, and, especially, by throwing a much larger, heavier bullet. Despite that and other technological advantages, the Americans took heavy losses before they were able to persuade the Filipinos to do the right thing and give up their dream of independence. Even then, the fighting didn't end completely until 1914.<br><br>... The Israelis have the Palestinians surrounded with crushing firepower, and the Arabs' weapons are pitiful — rocks and a few rifles. They certainly have nothing as sophisticated as the most rudimentary anti-aircraft ability, as demonstrated by the arrogant impunity with which Israeli helicopters hover in the open at a few hundred feet while they fire rockets at apartment complexes, Arab-owned orchards, and other civilian targets. Nor could the Arabs hope to overwhelm even one Israeli West Bank settlement or garrison (they're usually the same thing, really). So the use of illegal exploding bullets, or live bullets at all, is not necessary for the most part.<br><br>*<br>To justify their atrocities, the Israelis and their American shills have revived the old song-and-dance they used for years: The Arabs want to "drive the Israelis into the sea." Besides, they are engaging in acts of "terrorism" by attacking well-armed soldiers with stones, and they have endangered the Jews, also well-armed, who live in illegal West Bank settlements. And it's all being orchestrated by that Arab version of Fu Manchu, the evil terrorist Yasser Arafat. Obviously, then, despite their total lack of any offensive capability, they must be shown no mercy. So a hundred or so get bumped off, and a few thousand wounded. They're only Arabs, after all.<br><br>Leaving aside the possibility of any moral flaws in that policy, and any possible reasons the Arabs might have for their unreasonable attitudes, the truth behind the recent events was let slip by an Israeli official I heard on the National Bolshevik Radio show "Morning Edition." The Palestinians, he said, were engaging in a "guerrilla war of attrition" and a "war of independence." As I pointed out elsewhere on this site, that's the same thing our ungrateful terrorist ancestors perpetrated against their British benefactors — although, admittedly, they were better equipped for the job. They had guns.<br><br>"Independence!" Nothing strikes more terror into the heart of the Establishment type, whether he's George the Third, Father Abe, or a New York City politician dealing with disgruntled Staten Islanders. And nothing provokes more vicious reprisals than people's attempts to obtain it. The British, at the time the highest expression of Western civilization, took care of the thousands of Indian soldiers who revolted against them in the great Indian Mutiny of 1857 by tying them over the muzzles of cannons and literally blowing them away. In the Philippines, American troops looted houses and shot dead Filipino prisoners of war and civilians. In a city called Malabon, they murdered every Filipino man, woman, and child. More recently, as the Soviet Empire was collapsing — surely one of the most salubrious events of the twentieth century — Bush the Elder remonstrated against what used to be called the "captive nations" for seeking their independence from the Russians!<br><br>And now the Israelis assassinate Arabs.<br><br>But the Israelis are learning what the Americans learned in the Philippines and Somalia, what the British learned in India, South Africa, and many other places, and what countless other regimes learned going back to ancient times. Forget Arafat and his supposed machinations. Sometimes, people just get fed up with being treated like animals, and then you've got a devil of a job beating them back into submission.<br><br><br> <p></p><i></i>
