The IDF spokesperson says: "no comment"

webfusion

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webfusion
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According to various News Agencies reporting from the Gaza Strip,

  • An Israel Air Force attack on a militants' training camp in the Gaza Strip killed four people Friday (one of the fatalities was a young girl) and seven others were wounded, Palestinian security officials said.

    Palestinian security officials said Israeli aircraft fired four missiles at the camp, run by the Popular Resistance Committee, a militant group responsible for attacks on Israeli targets in the past.

    The IDF had no comment.

What comment could they make?
 
webfusion said:
According to various News Agencies reporting from the Gaza Strip,
  • An Israel Air Force attack on a militants' training camp in the Gaza Strip killed four people Friday (one of the fatalities was a young girl) and seven others were wounded, Palestinian security officials said.

    Palestinian security officials said Israeli aircraft fired four missiles at the camp, run by the Popular Resistance Committee, a militant group responsible for attacks on Israeli targets in the past.

    The IDF had no comment.
What comment could they make?
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How about, "Sorry about the little girl"?
 
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BSPCG: How about, "Sorry..."?
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These kinds of surgical strikes have their use, and are effective, but it seems that indeed if a young girl was killed in the area, it's a shame. She most likely was innocent, just a passer-by as the car travelled down the streets.

The IDF is not in the business of apologizing for collateral injuries or fatalities.
 
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webfusion said:
These kinds of surgical strikes have their use, and are effective, but it seems that indeed if a young girl was killed in the area, it's a shame. She most likely was innocent, just a passer-by as the car travelled down the streets.

The IDF is not in the business of apologizing for collateral injuries or fatalities.
Click to expand...

Maybe they should be.
 
webfusion said:
The IDF is not in the business of apologizing for collateral injuries or fatalities.
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Orwell said:
Maybe they should be.
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I agree. The minute Hamas stops deliberately killing Israeli civilians, the IDF should stop accidentally killing Palestinians.

In fact, I have a hundred bucks (US ones, not the inferior Candian variety) that says that when Hamas stops deliberately killing Israeli civilians, the IDF will stop accidentally killing Palestinians.

You game? I'll let The Fool hold my hundred, Mycroft can hold yours.
 
BPSCG said:
How about, "Sorry about the little girl"?
Click to expand...

Or "Whilst we regret the death of the little girl we attacked a known training camp that was training people to attack our country. The people responsible for the camp should consider how it was their actions that directly led to the death of the little girl."

ETA - posted this before I read about the update to the report. However if the IDF were targeting a legitimate target then my response would remain the same.
 
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Cleon said:
As far as I am aware, they stopped a while ago. When was the last Hamas-sponsored attack?
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Dunno. I'm sure webfusion or z-n will have the answer for us momentarily.

In any case, do you honestly believe Hamas has stopped them for good? It would be a change in their policy, wouldn't it? Have they made some announcement I wasn't aware of? Do tell.
 
BPSCG said:
Dunno. I'm sure webfusion or z-n will have the answer for us momentarily.

In any case, do you honestly believe Hamas has stopped them for good? It would be a change in their policy, wouldn't it? Have they made some announcement I wasn't aware of? Do tell.
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HAMAS claim they are holding a ceasfire, but other factions don't feel bound by it.
 
BPSCG said:
Dunno. I'm sure webfusion or z-n will have the answer for us momentarily.

In any case, do you honestly believe Hamas has stopped them for good? It would be a change in their policy, wouldn't it? Have they made some announcement I wasn't aware of? Do tell.
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As far as announcements go, Hamas has offered a hudna (cessation of hostilities) in the past. It's certainly not beyond their capabilities. (I believe they announced a unilateral one in 04, but I can't find any news stories to that effect. I could be wrong.)

But more to the point--the moment Hamas decided to participate in the elections marked a decisive shift in their policy as well as outlook. Up until now, they've seen the PA as illegitimate; their participation in the elections means not only do they see it as legitimate, but they're also willing to accept the deals made by the PA.

Hamas ran on a platform of anti-corruption and reform, not an all-out war with Israel. Notice that they have not been carrying out any attacks or stepping up the anti-Israel rhetoric; if anything, they've been defensive and guarded with respect to that issue. At this point, using their position to begin an all-out war would indicate a betrayal of their electorate and quite possibly ignite a civil war. So they face serious risks in starting a military campaign.

What I think is happening is that Hamas wants to focus on repairing the PA. They don't want a war at this point. It wouldn't be good for their position, and would just destroy what little PA infrastructure is there to begin with. Also keep in mind that at this point their cashflow is nil; international aid to the PA has stopped, and Israel has decided to keep the tax money they've been collecting on the PA's behalf. The last thing they want to do at this point is rock the boat.
 
Cleon said:
As far as I am aware, they stopped a while ago. When was the last Hamas-sponsored attack?
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From one of the articles quoted for the OP:

The surge in violence in Gaza came one day after a Palestinian suicide bomber killed four Israelis in the West Bank . Top Hamas officials defended the suicide bombing as "resistance" against Israeli "crimes," putting them at odds with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who condemned the bombing.
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http://www.localnewsleader.com/elytimes/stories/index.php?action=fullnews&id=168491
 
Cleon said:
As far as announcements go, Hamas has offered a hudna (cessation of hostilities) in the past. It's certainly not beyond their capabilities. (I believe they announced a unilateral one in 04, but I can't find any news stories to that effect. I could be wrong.)
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According to Umdat as-Salik, a medieval summary of Shafi'i jurisprudence, hudnas with a non-Muslim enemy should be limited to 10 years: "if Muslims are weak, a truce may be made for ten years if necessary, for the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) made a truce with the Quraysh for that long, as is related by Abu Dawud" ('Umdat as-Salik, o9.16).

Are there any Arabic words for cease fire that don't imply they will resume their maniacal genocidal ambitions the moment they feel strong enough?
 
Mycroft said:
Are there any Arabic words for cease fire that don't imply they will resume their maniacal genocidal ambitions the moment they feel strong enough?
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Yes. "Hudnah".

If I call someone an "adulterer", this doesn't imply that I intend to stone them to death, even if some medieval religious nut says that this is what I should do to adulterers. I may not, you see, agree with the medieval religious nut.
 
minefield

OK, this requires walking carefully through a minefield to reply with a degree of accuracy. Try to stay alert.

1. The PRC (Palestinian Resistance Committees) is one of several factions that continues to daily launch Qassem rockets into Israel.

On March 31st, when a car exploded in Gaza (next to a mosque, with several passers-by seriously injured in the blast) the PRC accused the Jewish state of assassinating Abu Youssef al-Quqa, one of the group‘s two top commanders. Although the IDF denied being involved in that event, the response was predictable: The PRC immediately blamed Israel.
"We declare an open war against the Zionist enemy," said PRC spokesman Abu Abir.

2. Hamas, now in charge of the Palestinian Authority, defended publicly in the media, a suicide bombing (which had been perpetrated 24 hours earlier, killing several Israelis, who had thoughtfully picked up a hitchhiker they thought was a religious jew, but was really a palestinian terrorist disguised as one) --- Hamas defined that heinous act of brutality against innocent jews as "resistance" against Israeli "crimes"

3. More details of today's operation are coming out now, several hours after the car was destroyed earlier. Eyad Abu Al-Ein, a known bombmaker in Gaza, was the target of the IAF strike against his vehicle. His good friend, another fiendish bomb-maker, was also in the car.

------ a} These terrorists had actually brought their kids along to watch training exercises at the base. It was Abu El-Ain's own little girl who was killed, along with another boy (not originally reported).

------- b} The armed wing of Hamas, an Islamic armed group that took over the Palestinian government last week after winning parliamentary elections in January, warned of quick retaliation.

------- c} Ghazi Hamad, a spokesman for the new Hamas-led government, called the IAF attack on the car a "brutal massacre."

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
I hope this post clears things up, that's as much as I know so far...
 
Dr Adequate said:
Yes. "Hudnah".

If I call someone an "adulterer", this doesn't imply that I intend to stone them to death, even if some medieval religious nut says that this is what I should do to adulterers. I may not, you see, agree with the medieval religious nut.
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It's Hamas we're talking about.
 
Hamas may be nuts, but unless they're nuts who are sworn to uphold the Shafi'i school of jurisprudence come what may, then "hudnah" just means "truce" or "ceasefire". And there doesn't seem to be another Arabic word for the concept.

(They have over a hundred words for "sword", though. Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, anyone?)
 
BPSCG said:
I agree. The minute Hamas stops deliberately killing Israeli civilians, the IDF should stop accidentally killing Palestinians.
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This kind of thinking makes peace impossible. The death of the girl was NO accident. Somebody released a missile with the knowledge that such a death could occur. So in somebodies mental calculation this collateral damage was acceptable. By no means an accident. If you shoot into an area that houses civilians this will happen.

The collateral damage might be justified or not by the intended outcome. But for sure it was not an accident.

I do not intend to bash the IDF. The Palestinians take it a large step further by declaring every Israeli a soldier and therefore a legitimate target. In this case you don't have collateral damage anymore. Everthing you hit is a 100% success.

The innocent victims of this conflict are no accidents. Either they are deliberately targetted (by the Palestinians) or their lives are considered so meaningless that their death is acceptable as long as some terrorists are originally targetted (in the case of the Israelis).
 
Keeping the record straight --

In my OP, the report was that a young girl had been killed. The working assumption was that she was a bystander.

After further information has been made available from Gaza, it turns out that --

Palestinian medics said Eyad Abu Al-Ein's son, 5, was killed. They had earlier said his 7-year-old daughter had been killed. But later the family identified the body as the son, the sources confirmed.

ingoa, I am telling you, and anyone else that is listening, if you bring yours or other's children to a terrorist training camp, and they are injured or killed when the IDF decides to target you as a combatant, then no amount of rationalization or excuses can say they were 'innocent victims' --- the same applies to setting up qassem rocket-launching sites inside of Gaza neighborhoods and then crying 'foul' when the IDF artillery returns fire or retaliates with naval bombardments or IAF strikes.

Meanwhile, while you were sleeping: Another two Palestinian terrorists killed just a few hours ago, as the IAF targets their car. Israeli military aircraft dropped leaflets in northern Gaza on Friday, urging civilians to stay away from rocket-launching sites "for your own safety."


  • ingoa states: "If you shoot into an area that houses civilians this (collateral deaths) will happen."


Well, they are being fairly warned in advance --- "get out of there now, or suffer the deadly consequences when we open massive artillery fire and level your neighborhood to cinders"

(loose translation from the arabic in the leaflets)
 
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