Does Israel Kill Palestinian Children to Blame on Hamas?

[michael]

Well, I don't think so. It's just the logical outcome of 30+ years of occupation and anti-Arab incitement fed by "their schoolbooks and sermons and media".

But it's a question worth asking in light of CanDo's original thread, in which he offered nothing other than his opinion to make his claim. The issue has recieved some attention in the Israeli media after the murder of a 13 year old school girl.

As more information comes to light, the nature of this particular crime seems worse than I originally thought. In the initial reports I got the impressiopn that it all happened rather quickly. An unidentified figure approaching a closed military area, nervous soldiers and a fast reaction prior to, or at the same time as, indentification of the target.

But it seems that there was a time delay betwen the girl being recognised and her being shot to death. Reports suggest it was four minutes between one soldier identifing her as "a little girl........a girl about 10" and Captian R. finishing her off with a few rounds in the head. In the meantime she tried to hide behind a mound of earth as soldiers directed fire at her.

[Mediocrates]

Actually she was prompted to wander towards them to test their responses. Maybe she sort of knew what she was doing, maybe not. But she was sent. Now midlevel terrorists have a better sense of the reactions of the IDF troops plus they probably get a slightly slower response from them as payback. I'm sure you'll have no problem with the next checkpoint bombing either.

[Canajew]

Actually she was prompted to wander towards them to test their responses. Maybe she sort of knew what she was doing, maybe not. But she was sent. Now midlevel terrorists have a better sense of the reactions of the IDF troops plus they probably get a slightly slower response from them as payback. I'm sure you'll have no problem with the next checkpoint bombing either.

there have been many incidents where the Palestinians send children to recon areas and borders, not to mention smuggle weapons and boimbs and the like. Michael, you can't seriously pretned this has not happened enough times to consider it a practice.

[michael]

A reasonable question by Canajew.

So lets' assume (there's zero evidence for this) that 13 year old Iman Al-Hams was sent by terrorists to test the IDF position. Naturally, we condemn this as an appalling crime. If we acept that this is a common "practice", than the IDF must have known this also. The IDF fires it's warning, but seeing that it's a child (identified at the time as a 10 year old) continue to shoot until she's dead, with the summary provided by Captian R. that, even if she was 3 years old she should still have been shot dead.

The terrorists displayed their contempt for the life of a child. So did the IDF.

Canajew does make an good point - if an occurance happens regulary enough, it must be considered a standard practice.

How many innocent people have been killed by the IDF. Depending on whose figures you prefer it's any where between a few hundred to 1-2 thousand.

So it's not an accident, a regretable error etc, it's actually IDF practice to kill the innocent. Thanks Canajew, point taken.

[michael]

It's worth exploring Canajews point a little further. Is the shooting of children by the IDF standard practice?

Here's another case from last year that has just resurfaced,


"Israel Defense Forces troops killed a 15-year-old Palestinian boy last March while on a hike in the Gaza Strip marking their graduation from basic training. In the course of the hike, near the Morag settlement in the south of the Strip, the Givati Brigade soldiers fired live rounds, hitting Khaled Mahdi, who was in a field at the time with his father. The Ynet Web site of the Yedioth Aharonoth daily reported yesterday that the case is under investigation by military prosecutors and awaits a verdict by the Military Advocate General.
The boy's father, Suleiman Mahdi, claims the gunfire was not accidental. 'Seven bullets pierced Khaled's head, so you can't talk here about a mistake or random gunfire. This was an act of direct and clear sharpshooting.'

The Mahdi family lives in Khan Yunis. According to the father, he was working with Khaled and two of his other sons out in the open in the family's field. Ground-clearing operations had previously been conducted in the area, so there could not have been any hidden danger to the soldiers who passed by not far away. 'The area is wide open and contains nothing special. The only thing was the shooting at us, which killed Khaled,' the father said.

According to one report, the boy was hit in the head by a heavy IDF machine gun.

The IDF Spokesman announced that Military Police had investigated the incident, but no decision has been reached in the matter by the military prosecution. Soldiers and officers involved in the incident admitted there was no justification for shooting the boy, since he posed no threat, and the gunfire in question was not for operational purposes.

Lieutenant Colonel A., who was battalion commander at the time, was recently promoted to a staff posting in the Land Forces Command. According to Ynet, this officer's promotion was not hampered by the affair because the military police investigation had not flagged him as a candidate for indictment. Being flagged in this manner ordinarily prevents officers from moving up to more senior posts because they could be convicted in the future. However, the fact the A. was not flagged does not prevent the military prosecution from trying him.

Suleiman Mahdi does not plan on filing charges against the IDF. As in many other cases, the Palestinians harmed by IDF action in the territories feel helpless in the face of what they term "the occupation machine."

'I only hope the Israeli army takes care such an event does not recur,' the father said. 'There are lots of children here who work with their parents, and I hope Khaled was the last casualty.'

Ynet's report comes on the heels of other episodes alleging unethical IDF behavior in the territories. Several weeks ago there was the affair of an officer in the Gaza Strip who "confirmed the killing" of 13-year-old Iman al-Hams, which the chief of staff conceded was not properly investigated in the IDF's initial probe. On Monday, the human rights group B'Tselem reported that IDF soldiers had killed an Islamic Jihad militant, Mahmoud Qamail, near Jenin last Friday when he lay wounded on the ground after being disarmed.

The high-level team set up to investigate the Qamail case will begin collecting testimony today from the naval commando unit involved and commanders in the sector. It will also rely on testimony B'Tselem collected from Palestinians." - Ha'aretz. 8/12/04

[KettleWhistle]

anti-Arab incitement fed by "their schoolbooks and sermons and media".

Excuse me?

[MGB8]

Tiny furry terrorists on Palestinian TV

Tarabisho is a talking chick. He's cute and yellow and wears a little black hat. He beams out his message to thousands of little Palestinian children. This rather putrid piece of poultry is a tool to poison the minds of little children. It spews out Palestinian propaganda designed to brainwash impressionable young minds.

This talking chick was once the center of a discussion on the importance of trees. The moderator of about 12 asked Tarabisho the seemingly illogical question of what he would do if someone, specifically "a little boy," were to chop down his trees. Tarabisho plumped himself up to his full 20 centimeters and in a squeaky little voice these were the words that came out of his vile little mouth.

"I'll fight him and make a big riot; I'll call the whole world and make a riot. I'll bring AK-47s (assault rifles) and the whole world; I'll commit a massacre in front of the house".

This delightful little show appeared on Palestinian T.V. on October 22, 2004.

"Al-Kihta" or "Al-Kua" is a Palestinian term used to describe locally manufactured hand bombs. As'ad 14 still keeps his amputated finger that he lost while playing with one of these contraptions. He stares at his hand that was seriously disfigured in the incident and says "I want to keep it. It is my finger".

As'ad is not the first casualty from this cottage industry and tens of children have lost their limbs or even their lives from these bombs. A commander of the terrorist organization Al-Aksa Martyr's Brigade has denied reports that their organization has any intention for children to participate in military resistance activities. He went on to lament that the reason behind so many injuries to children is that some resistance fighters have been known to store explosives in certain areas frequented by children. It would seem that it is then purely coincidental that these children then play with them.

Rami another victim of these explosives had three finger amputated. He knows the materials are dangerous, but goes on to say; what can we do. This is the only thing remaining for youths to do.

Abdullah Quraan was 11 years old when he arrived at a checkpoint near Nablus. He attracted the attention of the Israeli soldiers. The bag on his back seemed too heavy for him to carry and there were wires dangling outside. They stopped the young boy and discovered a bomb weighing 8 kilos. The terrorist's that had planted the bomb in the boy's bag were watching from a distance. Not enough that these people have no moral conscience when it comes to the indiscriminate killing of innocent Israeli civilians, they don't even have any towards their own children. When they realized their plot had been foiled they dialed a cell phone in the bag, which had it rung would have detonated the bomb, killing both the child and the soldiers. Fortunately there was a fault preventing the bomb from going off.

Abdullah was relieved of his bag and the bomb was safely detonated. It transpired that the terrorists had given this child approximately $3.35 to carry the bomb across the checkpoint. Had he succeeded it would have been handed over to be used for the mass murder of countless innocent people in Israel.

This is the cheap price of Palestinian terrorism where innocent children are literally "a dime a dozen".

On the 22nd of September, 2004 "Alfatah" the Hamas children's newspaper showed a picture of a pretty Palestinian girl on the front page of their magazine. The picture intended for children shows this young girl with her severed head lying on the ground under the caption. "Suicide bomber Zainab Abu Salem. Her head separated from her pure body, and her Ra'ala (Moslem head scarf) remains to decorate her face. Her place is in Paradise, where in the highest heavens, Zainab?sister (who has been raised to the level) of men".

This heroic young woman was on her way into Israel to commit mass murder. Only the alertness of two young Israeli soldiers, barely older than this brainwashed young woman and just out of basic training prevented a far worse massacre. Both of the young boys lost their lives while confronting her. She was turned into a cult hero.

This year Sky news had access to a Palestinian summer camp. No capers in the pool or frolics on the basketball court for these children, some of them as young as 10 years old. The camp, at an undisclosed location was run by a group called the Popular Resistance Committee. They said that the next generation of Palestinians needed to know how to fight the Israeli occupation and activities centered round drilling these youngsters in the ways of war. Many of these children were dwarfed by their AK-47 assault rifles as they were taught to carry out ambushes. One of the camp highlights was an obstacle course where children were made to crawl under barbed wire and leap through hoops of fire, while live bullets were fired overhead by their instructors. At the end of the course the children received certificates.

On October 12, 2000 two Israeli reservists took a wrong turn and ended up in Ramallah. Seeking refuge in a police station it was soon taken over by a blood thirsty Palestinian lynch mob. These dehumanized people turned on the two men with almost unbelievable savagery. They beat and stabbed the two men. The gouged out their eyes and literally disemboweled them. The highlight of this attack came when one of the ring leaders held up his bloodied hands to a cheering crowd.

Almost two years later a kindergarten in Gaza took the much loved activity of hand painting to an almost all time low level of depravity. Beaming parents cheered ecstatically as their children, dressed in clothing to represent this Ramallah lynch mob held up little red painted hands at their graduation ceremony.

The Palestinians use the media and especially television to indoctrinate their children in hatred. They promote violence and many of these children are given to believe that their greatest value in life is through their young deaths.

Since the start of the Intifada in 2000 clips used to maximize intolerance and a longing for death have been used on an almost daily basis. They are beamed out continuously to thousands of impressionable youngsters.

In Israel every mother longs for the day when she can say "My son the doctor". The height of every Palestinian mother's aspiration is to say "My son the shahid" (martyr).

The PA has almost successfully removed every mother's natural instinct which is to protect their child at all costs. In September 2004 PA TV returned a once popular clip to their TV screens call the "Farewell letter clip". It teaches children to aspire to "Shahada" Martyrdom, calling it sweet. In this particular clip civilians are shown attacking Israelis with a hand grenade. The clip, to maximize the impact changes to slow motion as one of the attackers falls dead.

His body is brought to his mother who kisses him, then raises her hand above her mouth to call out the traditional Arab call of joy. After this scene she dramatically hands the rifle firmly in the hands of her next son so he too can fight and die for this noble cause.

Many of these mothers have been interviewed on PA TV and far from expressing their repulsion, speak proudly of their son's and how they can now walk with their head held high in the streets. They say it brings honour to the family and people will say as she walks the streets; "There goes the mother of the Shahid"

Of course thousand of dollars, often donated by the Saudis go a long way in cushioning the blow as she now looks longingly in the direction of her other seven sons.

These are just some of the examples of how the Palestinians have abused their children. They breed them in an atmosphere of intolerance, where a three year old has been so well brainwashed that when interviewed she said she hated Jews.

What sort of society produces children of this age, who would normally only be able to express an opinion of hatred towards a certain vegetable or pair of socks.

Yasser Arafat once said his best weapon was the Palestinian mother's womb.

Golda Meir said "We can only have peace with the Palestinians when they love their children more than they hate Israel"

From the 8th-10th May, 2002 a special Session of the General Assembly on Children convened at the United Nations.

It was attended by a Palestinian delegation. The focus of their address to the assembly on May 9th was on the state of Palestinian children. They said that these children continued to be denied the rights guaranteed by the Convention on the Rights of the Child and Declaration on the Rights of the Child. They went on to stress that this was the result of the continuing denial and violation of Israel, the occupying Power of even the most basic of their rights.

One can only wonder from what planet these delegates were coming from and maybe a heavy dose of PA TV would have been a more appropriate approach at the United Nations. The UN, had they had anything better to do other than slap endless ridiculous resolutions on Israel, should have instead passed any number of much needed ones on the Palestinians for the blatant abuse of their children.

Maybe the Palestinian delegates should start by insisting their own government reverses their campaign of 24/7 hate incitement, not just from their TV, but from their mosques, schools and homes. They have deliberately targeted these poor children to believe in nothing worthy, except the lies and this horrible death cult they have deliberately and systematically created for them.

For this, Israel is blameless.

They should make a start by taking Tarabisho, the evil-talking chick out to a field at the dead of night, strap him with explosives and detonate him so he can talk no more. The PA should allow their kids the very basic right of every child -- their innocence.

[tandem]

Well, I don't think so. It's just the logical outcome of 30+ years of occupation and anti-Arab incitement fed by "their schoolbooks and sermons and media".

But it's a question worth asking in light of CanDo's original thread, in which he offered nothing other than his opinion to make his claim. The issue has recieved some attention in the Israeli media after the murder of a 13 year old school girl.

As more information comes to light, the nature of this particular crime seems worse than I originally thought. In the initial reports I got the impressiopn that it all happened rather quickly. An unidentified figure approaching a closed military area, nervous soldiers and a fast reaction prior to, or at the same time as, indentification of the target.

But it seems that there was a time delay betwen the girl being recognised and her being shot to death. Reports suggest it was four minutes between one soldier identifing her as "a little girl........a girl about 10" and Captian R. finishing her off with a few rounds in the head. In the meantime she tried to hide behind a mound of earth as soldiers directed fire at her.

it's difficult to say what happened. the first soldier who saw the girl, not the unit commander in question, was interviewed on an israeli talk show and he said that some of the soldiers in the unit made up the story that the commander "confirmed" the kill because they despise him. his story is the girl looked suspicious, she entered a known marked military zone carrying a bag even though the school was in the opposite direction. the soldiers did not know she was a civilian, partly because palestinian terrorists have used children plenty of times in the past to target soldiers and civilians in israel. so they shot her and killed her. the main issue is whether the commander did "confirm" the kill and whether he knew he would be shooting a civilian and not a terrorist.

[eyl]

According to Ynet's report, they didn't know the kid was there until the next day when they heard he was hit.

It's worth exploring Canajews point a little further. Is the shooting of children by the IDF standard practice?

Here's another case from last year that has just resurfaced,


"Israel Defense Forces troops killed a 15-year-old Palestinian boy last March while on a hike in the Gaza Strip marking their graduation from basic training. In the course of the hike, near the Morag settlement in the south of the Strip, the Givati Brigade soldiers fired live rounds, hitting Khaled Mahdi, who was in a field at the time with his father. The Ynet Web site of the Yedioth Aharonoth daily reported yesterday that the case is under investigation by military prosecutors and awaits a verdict by the Military Advocate General.
The boy's father, Suleiman Mahdi, claims the gunfire was not accidental. 'Seven bullets pierced Khaled's head, so you can't talk here about a mistake or random gunfire. This was an act of direct and clear sharpshooting.'

The Mahdi family lives in Khan Yunis. According to the father, he was working with Khaled and two of his other sons out in the open in the family's field. Ground-clearing operations had previously been conducted in the area, so there could not have been any hidden danger to the soldiers who passed by not far away. 'The area is wide open and contains nothing special. The only thing was the shooting at us, which killed Khaled,' the father said.

According to one report, the boy was hit in the head by a heavy IDF machine gun.

The IDF Spokesman announced that Military Police had investigated the incident, but no decision has been reached in the matter by the military prosecution. Soldiers and officers involved in the incident admitted there was no justification for shooting the boy, since he posed no threat, and the gunfire in question was not for operational purposes.

Lieutenant Colonel A., who was battalion commander at the time, was recently promoted to a staff posting in the Land Forces Command. According to Ynet, this officer's promotion was not hampered by the affair because the military police investigation had not flagged him as a candidate for indictment. Being flagged in this manner ordinarily prevents officers from moving up to more senior posts because they could be convicted in the future. However, the fact the A. was not flagged does not prevent the military prosecution from trying him.

Suleiman Mahdi does not plan on filing charges against the IDF. As in many other cases, the Palestinians harmed by IDF action in the territories feel helpless in the face of what they term "the occupation machine."

'I only hope the Israeli army takes care such an event does not recur,' the father said. 'There are lots of children here who work with their parents, and I hope Khaled was the last casualty.'

Ynet's report comes on the heels of other episodes alleging unethical IDF behavior in the territories. Several weeks ago there was the affair of an officer in the Gaza Strip who "confirmed the killing" of 13-year-old Iman al-Hams, which the chief of staff conceded was not properly investigated in the IDF's initial probe. On Monday, the human rights group B'Tselem reported that IDF soldiers had killed an Islamic Jihad militant, Mahmoud Qamail, near Jenin last Friday when he lay wounded on the ground after being disarmed.

The high-level team set up to investigate the Qamail case will begin collecting testimony today from the naval commando unit involved and commanders in the sector. It will also rely on testimony B'Tselem collected from Palestinians." - Ha'aretz. 8/12/04

[michael]

It would be an amazing situation for several trained soldiers to fire their weapons into an open field hitting someone in the head several times, and not be aware of it. Possible, but not very likely.

[Canajew]

A reasonable question by Canajew.

So lets' assume (there's zero evidence for this) that 13 year old Iman Al-Hams was sent by terrorists to test the IDF position. Naturally, we condemn this as an appalling crime. If we acept that this is a common "practice", than the IDF must have known this also. The IDF fires it's warning, but seeing that it's a child (identified at the time as a 10 year old) continue to shoot until she's dead, with the summary provided by Captian R. that, even if she was 3 years old she should still have been shot dead.

The terrorists displayed their contempt for the life of a child. So did the IDF.

Canajew does make an good point - if an occurance happens regulary enough, it must be considered a standard practice.

How many innocent people have been killed by the IDF. Depending on whose figures you prefer it's any where between a few hundred to 1-2 thousand.

So it's not an accident, a regretable error etc, it's actually IDF practice to kill the innocent. Thanks Canajew, point taken.

don't be so wantonly manipulative. It only makes it easier for others to see through it. You need to understand the dichotomy between correlation and causation. There are significant Palestinian civilian casualties. of course, relative to other conflicts elsewhere, numbers are relatively small, and therefore you must be prepared to say that while Israel's killing of civilians appears to happen often, it happens far less frequently than in other similar conflicts, and therefore it must be an Israeli practice to minimize civilian causalties, as opposed to, say, the Americans, british, Russians, french etc.

Otherwise, you introduce an omission bias that distorts your analysis.

Why can't you just take a really open mind and try to do analysis for its own sake, not just for the propaganda value. What's your interest in all this?

[eyl]

Read the article again and note the weapon. It was apparently a single burst.

It would be an amazing situation for several trained soldiers to fire their weapons into an open field hitting someone in the head several times, and not be aware of it. Possible, but not very likely.

[minusthejihad]

If michelle's purpose here is to make every ill from the sniveling, whinny, illogical lies he tells, he's doing a fine job of it. His posts sometimes "make me throw up in my mouth a little".

[Mediocrates]

are you on Fark too? nvermind.

[Semsem]

Actually she was prompted to wander towards them to test their responses. Maybe she sort of knew what she was doing, maybe not. But she was sent. Now midlevel terrorists have a better sense of the reactions of the IDF troops plus they probably get a slightly slower response from them as payback. I'm sure you'll have no problem with the next checkpoint bombing either.

I don't blame the Israeli soldiers. The Palistinians have sent children as suicide bombers. The BBC report about the incident was disgusting. No word of this was mentioned.