Human Rights Watch backtracks on Gaza blast accusations

[Womble]

HRW: We can't contradict IDF findings

While sticking to its demand for the establishment of an independent inquiry into a blast on a Gaza beach 10 days ago that killed seven Palestinian civilians, the Human Rights Watch conceded Monday night for the first time since the incident that it could not contradict the IDF's exonerating findings.

On Monday, Maj.-Gen. Meir Klifi - head of the IDF inquiry commission that cleared the IDF of responsibility for the blast - met with Marc Garlasco, a military expert from the HRW who had last week claimed that the blast was caused by an IDF artillery shell. Following the three-hour meeting, described by both sides as cordial and pleasant, Garlasco praised the IDF's professional investigation into the blast, which he said was most likely caused by unexploded Israeli ordnance left laying on the beach, a possibility also raised by Klifi and his team.

"We came to an agreement with General Klifi that the most likely cause [of the blast] was unexploded Israeli ordinance," Garlasco told The Jerusalem Post following the meeting. While Klifi's team did a "competent job" to rule out the possibility that the blast was caused by artillery fire, there were still, Garlasco said, a number of pieces of evidence that the IDF commission did not take into consideration.

The main argument between Klifi and HRW surrounded the timeline of the blast, which the IDF said took between 16:57 and 15:10, at least 10 minutes after artillery fire in the area had stopped. HRW however disputes this claim and basing itself on Palestinian hospital documentation, claims that the explosion actually took place right around the time of the IDF artillery fire.

Meanwhile Monday, The Post learned that the IDF was currently inspecting a second piece of shrapnel doctors had retrieved from one of the Palestinians wounded in the blast and currently being treated at Soroka Hospital in Beersheba. A first piece of shrapnel, examined by the IDF as well as by an independent academic institute in Beersheba was found to not have come from a 155 mm shell, the type used in IDF artillery attacks on Kassam launch sites in the Gaza Strip. The second piece of shrapnel, sources said, was currently being examined in an IDF lab.

Garlasco told Klifi during the meeting that he was impressed with the IDF's system of checks and balances concerning its artillery fire in the Gaza Strip and unlike Hamas which specifically targeted civilians in its rocket attacks, the Israelis, he said, invested a great amount of resources and efforts not to harm innocent civilians.

"We do not believe the Israelis were targeting civilians." Garlasco said. "We just want to know if it was an Israeli shell that killed the Palestinians."

Lucy Mair - head of the HRW's Jerusalem office - said Klifi's team had conducted a thorough and professional investigation of the incident and made "a good assessment" when ruling out the possibility that an errant IDF shell had killed the seven Palestinians on the Gaza beach.

'We differ when it comes to other pieces of information from other sources that don't relate to the military strike such as the timing and the type of injuries," Mair explained. "While they [the IDF] made a very good presentation, we still think there are enough unanswered questions that have not been examined by Klifi's team…and that is why we believe there should be an independent investigation."

Just to put things into perspective, the aforementioned Marc Garlasco is a long-time professional Israel basher. If THAT guy is impressed with the quality of the IDF investigations and its system of checks and balances, I don't know what the hell else anyone might want.

[Illuminatus]

Reminder to MGB8:

It is not polite to say "I told you so".

http://www.israelforum.com/board/sho...&postcount=135

[NewsGuy]

the Human Rights Watch conceded Monday night for the first time since the incident that it could not contradict the IDF's exonerating findings.
[...]
Garlasco told Klifi during the meeting that he was impressed with the IDF's system of checks and balances concerning its artillery fire in the Gaza Strip and unlike Hamas which specifically targeted civilians in its rocket attacks, the Israelis, he said, invested a great amount of resources and efforts not to harm innocent civilians.

"We do not believe the Israelis were targeting civilians." Garlasco said.

At least this HRW has the decency to admit it was wrong.

On the other hand, look at the Israeli Leftists, including Olmert's daughter, who had the audacity to accuse the IDF of murder without waiting for the results of the investigation. Where are they now? You sure don't see them demonstrating in the streets to make the facts known.

[Reffo]

On the other hand, look at the Israeli Leftists, including Olmert's daughter, who had the audacity to accuse the IDF of murder without waiting for the results of the investigation. Where are they now? You sure don't see them demonstrating in the streets to make the facts known.

What do you expect? They have uttered their assertions and accusations. In their eyes, Israel is always guilty, always at fault, no matter what the circumstances.

Heck, these guys are professionals. They wait with abated breath for incidents such as these so they can point an accusing finger at Israel and satisfy their oozing self righteousness. But even in between such incidents, they just wing it and make their general accusations. These are the guys that make up the slogans about "apartheid walls", "racism" and "ethnic cleansing", they are the professional reflexive Israel bashers!

[Womble]

Human Rights Watch backtracks on backtracking:

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Human Rights Watch accused an Israeli army investigation on Wednesday of ignoring evidence that challenges its decision to clear the military of blame for a blast that killed seven Palestinians on a Gaza beach.

The deaths on June 9, a day of heavy Israeli shelling designed to stop militants firing rockets from Gaza, drew international condemnation and prompted the ruling Palestinian Islamist group Hamas to call off a 16-month-old truce.

Major-General Meir Califi, who led the army investigation, dismissed the accusations by the U.S.-based rights watchdog, which has carried out its own inquiry into the explosion that killed seven family members on an outing to the beach.

In a statement, Human Rights Watch said the Israeli army (IDF) had excluded all evidence gathered by other sources. It had either called into question or declined to accept evidence collected by the group, the statement added.

"An investigation that refuses to look at contradictory evidence can hardly be considered credible," said Marc Garlasco, senior military analyst at Human Rights Watch.

"The IDF's partisan approach highlights the need for an independent, international investigation."

Israel has ruled out an international probe.

The army has said shelling of the area, in response to rocket fire into the Jewish state, had ended before the beach blast. Retrieved shrapnel samples also ruled out the possibility of a direct Israeli artillery barrage, it said.

Evidence collected by Human Rights Watch researchers indicated the civilians were killed within the time period of the shelling, the statement said. That evidence included computerized and hand-written hospital records showing the time when some of the wounded were admitted.

Califi, who met Garlasco earlier this week, said the army had accounted for all shells fired during the time period.

He said nothing Garlasco presented had undermined the army's investigation.

"All his evidence is circumstantial. The evidence was either brought to him or not collected at the scene," Califi told reporters in Tel Aviv, partly referring to shrapnel from victims that Human Rights Watch had obtained.

The Human Rights Watch statement followed a report by Israeli television on Tuesday that said the delayed explosion of a dud Israeli shell might have killed the beachgoers.

The army has not ruled this out.

Hamas has blamed Israel for the explosion and violence has increased since. Three children were killed on Tuesday in an Israeli air strike against militants behind rocket fire. The militants escaped.

I suppose it was to be expected. HRW admitting a fault on their Israel related judgements sounded too good to be true.

And speaking of covering up evidence:

Representatives of the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center (Ichilov) said on Tuesday that Ralia Niham, a 21-year-old woman who was seriously wounded in the Gaza beach explosion on June 9 that is at the center of a continuing controversy over who is to blame, suffered unnecessary cuts at the hands of the Palestinian doctors who treated her initially.

Niham, who regained consciousness at the hospital on Tuesday but remains in serious condition, suffered serious damage to her abdomen and upper limbs, with cuts all over her body, as a result of the surgical intervention performed on her at Shifa Hospital in Gaza, the hospital said.

The Tel Aviv hospital added that no shrapnel was found in the woman's body except for one piece that is not reachable by surgery and will have to be left there. The damage to her body was "without doubt" caused by shrapnel; Israeli authorities say the chances are "one in a billion" that she was hurt by an Israeli missile.

In most cases, some shrapnel remains in the victim's body and stays there for the rest of his or her life, the hospital said.

The hospital stopped short of accusing Shifa's doctors directly of removing shrapnel for no medical reason, but it did say that it had never received such a patient with all the reachable shrapnel removed.

"This is surprising and raises questions" about the care that Niham received in Shifa, the Sourasky spokeswoman said. Asked whether Sourasky surgeons had contacted Shifa doctors who treated the patient to ask the reason for the incisions to remove shrapnel, the spokeswoman said: "We are not in such close contact with Shifa. We received the medical report on the patient, and that's all."

On Monday night, Human Rights Watch conceded that it could not contradict the IDF's exonerating findings regarding the explosion that wounded Niham and killed several members of a single family.(Not anymore, apparently- W.) HRW, along with the Palestinians, claimed the explosion was caused by Israeli shelling.

Maj.-Gen. Meir Klifi, head of the IDF inquiry commission that cleared the IDF of responsibility for the blast, met with Marc Garlasco, a military expert from HRW who had claimed that the blast was caused by an IDF artillery shell. Garlasco agreed the explosion was most likely caused by unexploded Israeli ordnance left lying on the beach, a possibility also raised by the IDF.