IDF General Sued For "Targeted Killings"

[Mycroft]

As the real Orwell said about one kind of partisan hack (i.e. nationalists): , and there is almost no kind of outrage — torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians — which does not change its moral colour when it is committed by ‘our’ side."

In other words, any opinion that doesn't agree with you can be dismissed.

The argument here is not who is doing the action, but how the action is done.

By your own admission, the Palestinians launch attacks from civilian areas because they expect the retaliation to create civilian casualties amongst their own population. The Israelis don't do that. Further, when they do retaliate, they make efforts to minimize civilian casualties, from advance warning to precision targeting. The Palestinians don't do that.

This Orwell quote you keep harping on, "Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them..." is a straw-man of your creation. If you were to pay attention, you would see that the distinction made is not who does the action, but what the action is and how it's done. That is, actions are held to be good or bad on their own merits.

 

[Orwell]

Orwell, this isn't a credibility pissing contest, it's about evidence, sites, opinions, and ethics. You're simply appealing to authority. I appreciate what Amnest International has to say myself, but simply saying "Amnesty International says it's so, so it must be so" is a very weak areguement.

I have been trying to say to these jokers that Israel is not the eternal victim of Palestinian perfidy that they believe it is (they also want very hard to convince others that their biased point of view is right). That both sides are guilty of a lot of crap. I simply don't buy into their "Israel-wrong-or-right" hogwash, and I want to show them why, and confront them about it.

How the hell do you expect me, some guy in front of a computer, to go about doing this? What options do I have? What can I show in a web forum that will sound the least bit convincing? I am bound by the limitations of this medium, so yeah, I appeal to the authority of human rights organisations. But see, an argument from authority isn't necessarily a fallacy, if you invoke a qualified authority. I believe AI, HRW and B'tselem to be credible, or at least a lot more credible than Haaretz, the IDF, the Israeli gov. and the "Israel-right-or-wrong" crowd. Now tell me, how would you go about it?

So ask once again: why should I believe them and not Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, B'Tselem, the refusenicks quoted in bunch of newspapers, etc.? What makes them more credible than these sources?

 

[Orwell]

In other words, any opinion that doesn't agree with you can be dismissed.

The argument here is not who is doing the action, but how the action is done.

By your own admission, the Palestinians launch attacks from civilian areas because they expect the retaliation to create civilian casualties amongst their own population. The Israelis don't do that. Further, when they do retaliate, they make efforts to minimize civilian casualties, from advance warning to precision targeting. The Palestinians don't do that.

This Orwell quote you keep harping on, "Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them..." is a straw-man of your creation. If you were to pay attention, you would see that the distinction made is not who does the action, but what the action is and how it's done. That is, actions are held to be good or bad on their own merits.

Mycroft, you keep confusing and conflating all Palestinians together, terrorists and civilians alike.

In the thread were I linked dozens of human rights reports, I said that IDF soldiers have shot at civilians, killed civilians, maimed civilians, and destroyed property belonging to civilians. I do not claim that all IDF soldiers behave like this, but I do believe that many do, and they're not punish for it. I said that the "accidental killing of civilians during military operations argument" does not explain a large number of the events described in the links I provided in that thread: it does not square with eyewitness accounts, casualty lists, and descriptions given by human rights organisations (which I linked and which, by the way, have a lot more credibility than the IDF, the Israeli government and you guys).

In other words, I do not believe that the IDF tries to minimise Palestinian civilian killings.

 

[Mycroft]

The IDF acts with precision, with design, and with professional management. Furthermore, IDF warns civilians IN ADVANCE to clear out of an area that is about to be targeted and hit, according to policy. When they target something with artillery, dude, they pinpoint it --- those guys on the cannons can hit the bedroom of a house and leave the kitchen untouched, several kilometers away!

Several years ago when I first began to educate myself on the Israeli/Arab conflict, one particular story I read impressed me.

Hezbollah fired anti-aircraft rounds into a neighboring Israeli town, killing a child. They claimed to be firing at an Israeli reconnaissance plane, but to get the shell to explode at ground level, the gun couldn’t have been aimed in the air. The Israeli response was to target and destroy the specific gun that fired the offending rounds, leaving other guns in the same position untouched.

I’ve read hundreds of reports of IDF actions, but that one stuck with me. The most common charged leveled against the IDF is of disproportionate responses to provocations, but the truth is their responses are typically more measured than any other fighting force on the Earth. I can’t imagine anyone firing at US civilians without the US military destroying all enemy targets within range, and I don’t think anyone would expect anything else of any other military either.

 

[Orwell]

Several years ago when I first began to educate myself on the Israeli/Arab conflict, one particular story I read impressed me.

Hezbollah fired anti-aircraft rounds into a neighboring Israeli town, killing a child. They claimed to be firing at an Israeli reconnaissance plane, but to get the shell to explode at ground level, the gun couldn’t have been aimed in the air. The Israeli response was to target and destroy the specific gun that fired the offending rounds, leaving other guns in the same position untouched.

I’ve read hundreds of reports of IDF actions, but that one stuck with me. The most common charged leveled against the IDF is of disproportionate responses to provocations, but the truth is their responses are typically more measured than any other fighting force on the Earth. I can’t imagine anyone firing at US civilians without the US military destroying all enemy targets within range, and I don’t think anyone would expect anything else of any other military either.

And you, of course, believed that story. May I ask why? Since you didn't say who was the source of that story, and how did you get to know about it, I'm kind of curious.

 

[Mycroft]

Mycroft, you keep confusing and conflating all Palestinians together, terrorists and civilians alike.

I also said "the Israelis" and not specifically "the IDF."

I don't confuse all Palestinians together, it's merely a semantic shortcut. Right now it’s Hamas that’s responsible for the rocket attacks, but Hamas isn’t the only group that does this. A broader term is required, and the very fact that I say ”… civilian casualties amongst their own population…” makes a distinction between civilians and militants.

In other words, I do not believe that the IDF tries to minimise Palestinian civilian killings.

Which is non-responsive from the post you’re responding to, which was about your straw-man claim that "Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them..."

 

[Mycroft]

And you, of course, believed that story. May I ask why? Since you didn't say who was the source of that story, and how did you get to know about it, I'm kind of curious.

The story was reported in multiple media outlets, it was not an IDF press release. Yes, I believed it.

However, had the story only been reported by the IDF I would still give it more credibility than I would a story from a spokesperson of Hamas, the Al-Aqsa Martyr's Brigade, or another terrorist group.

Why? Because the Palestinian groups blow their credibility when they make absurd claims, such as recently happened when a car carrying explosives exploded in the middle of a Hamas rally, Hamas claimed it was an Israeli missile attack and launched some 60 kassam rockets in "retaliation." Not only do they make absurd claims, but they don’t retract them even when debunked.

The IDF, on the other hand, takes responsibility when it’s likely they’re wrong. Sometimes they even take responsibility when they’re not wrong, such as what happened when they erroneously admitted fault in the Mohammed Al-Dura killing, and didn’t reverse themselves until a German television demonstrated he could not have been killed by Israelis.

 

[webfusion]

At the core of the confusion...

Orwell: "In the thread were I linked dozens of human rights reports, I said that IDF soldiers have shot at civilians, killed civilians, maimed civilians, and destroyed property belonging to civilians."

Nobody has ever said they didn't. We all recognize that many Palestinians who are non-combatants are killed and injured! That is not what we are discussing. Not at all. You persist in an error of defining that this is what is meant by 'targeting' --- it has been pointed out to you umpteenth times the IDF is not in the business of launching attacks, out of the clear blue sky, upon civilians in their homes, in their streets, in their office buildings. And civilian casualties have been minimized due to the precise planning, strong discipline and ultimate restraint throughout the entire IDF command structure.

What you fail to acknowledge is the IDF does not target civilians as a matter of going out on a mission and targeting civilians for the he11 of it.

Even General Ya'Alon, whose court case is the subject of this thread, did not order the IDF to launch artillery at Kfar Kana on a sunny April day in 1996, with the expressed intention of blowing up that school, just for sport, just to kill those school kids. If you fail to see the context of the IDF actions, then you are lost in a maze from which there is no exit...

Please remember, targeting civilians is exactly how the Palestinians operate. That is their modi operandi. Not the IDF.

================================
Palestinian leader AbuMazen has been quoted in the news today:
The Qassam rockets being fired from the Gaza Strip at Israel are "Israel's problem" and that he does not intend to interfere to stop the launches.
"Let the Israelis deal with it," he said.

{{{{ eta = mycroft, you say that HAMAS is launching rockets, but I believe it is not their doings, at the moment. Top Israeli officials attribute the continuing launches, including the recent focus on Ashkelon and environs, to specific directives from the headquarters of the Islamic Jihad in Damascus. Yeah, I know that is a very fine distinction, but I wanted to mention it. }}}}


{{{{ eta = orwell, you say that "Israeli security does not justify these human rights abuses." and I am here to tell you -- you have no idea what you are on about. Israel has not even scratched the surface of what is possible in pursuit of ending the reign of terror, and in the coming days I suspect another thread will be started here, as the IDF goes forward with their war against the terrorists guided from Damascus! }}}

 

[gnome]

Orwell--your arguments about Webfusion's identity are circular. You don't believe what he says about the IDF because you're not sure he's in it... and yet if he is, you don't believe him anyway. So the only way webfusion can seem truthful to you is if he agrees with you. Sorry bucko, that's not how truth works. He makes a statement of fact--from first-hand experience. Intellectual honesty requires that you either consider he might be telling the truth, or provide contrary evidence to the facts.

Disagreement does not imply dishonesty... and you make a weak case by presenting it so. This does not help the Palestinians one bit. I too worry about Israeli civil rights abuses--and I should fear for the Palestinians if you and demon are their best champions.

 

[Skeptic]

And you, of course, believed that story. May I ask why? .

Well, for starters, it had been widely reported in various media.

Also, it fits well with the history of the IDF as trying to minimize casualties. There are numerous examples, but here's a famous one: during the Yom Kippur war, the IDF supplied an entire Egyptian Army (the 3rd Army) with food, water, and medicine after it was surrounded--instead of, as any other army would have done, bomb them into bits?

Saving thousands of lives of soldiers who have only yesterday--literally-tried to kill you, not due to surrender or in a POW camp, but during the war, is a unique occurence in the history of warfare.

The more important question, Orwell, is why do you doubt this story. You have no reason whatever except for the fact that it makes the IDF look better than your biased and ignorant opinion of it allows. This is also the reason you glibly dismiss all evidence contrary to your opinion--from those who actually know something about the IDF, unlike youself--as "propaganda".

How do you know the IDF is bad? You look at the evidence. But how do you know which evidence is reliable? Well, since you know the IDF is bad, all evidence that claims it's bad is "bravely telling the awful truth", while all evidence claiming it isn't (or even that claims it isn't as bad as you think) is either "biased propaganda" (if it comes from someone who was in the IDF) or "ignorant pro-israeli attitude" (if it comes from someone who wasn't in the IDF).

Nice logic, Orwell.

 

[Skeptic]

Orwell--your arguments about Webfusion's identity are circular. You don't believe what he says about the IDF because you're not sure he's in it... and yet if he is, you don't believe him anyway. So the only way webfusion can seem truthful to you is if he agrees with you. Sorry bucko, that's not how truth works. He makes a statement of fact--from first-hand experience. Intellectual honesty requires that you either consider he might be telling the truth, or provide contrary evidence to the facts.

Disagreement does not imply dishonesty... and you make a weak case by presenting it so. This does not help the Palestinians one bit. I too worry about Israeli civil rights abuses--and I should fear for the Palestinians if you and demon are their best champions.

gnome--as I said in a previous post, Orwell's "proves" all reliable evidence shows the IDF is awful by only accepting as reliable evidence that claims the IDF is awful and dismissing the rest.

This, in Orwell's world, is called "brave skepticism" and "refusing to believe propaganda". But it is the same "logic" as the creationists consider all reliable evidence to prove creationism is true--when "reliable evidence" is defined to include only evidence (lousy as it is) that supports creationism.

 

[Orwell]

Double post

 

[Orwell]

gnome--as I said in a previous post, Orwell's "proves" all reliable evidence shows the IDF is awful by only accepting as reliable evidence that claims the IDF is awful and dismissing the rest.

This, in Orwell's world, is called "brave skepticism" and "refusing to believe propaganda". But it is the same "logic" as the creationists consider all reliable evidence to prove creationism is true--when "reliable evidence" is defined to include only evidence (lousy as it is) that supports creationism.

Oh Skeptic:

In the thread were I linked dozens of human rights reports, I said that IDF soldiers have shot at civilians, killed civilians, maimed civilians, and destroyed property belonging to civilians. I do not claim that all IDF soldiers behave like this, but I do believe that many do, and they're not punish for it. I said that the "accidental killing of civilians during military operations argument" does not explain a large number of the events described in the links I provided in that thread: it does not square with eyewitness accounts, casualty lists, and descriptions given by human rights organisations (which I linked and which, by the way, have a lot more credibility than the IDF, the Israeli government and you guys).

In other words, I do not believe that the IDF tries to minimise Palestinian civilian killings.

You all know on what my comments on IDF carelessness are based on. You, on the other hand, keep telling me how wonderful the IDF is, but you haven't backed it up much with links from reliable (or respected) sources.

 

[Orwell]

Orwell--your arguments about Webfusion's identity are circular. You don't believe what he says about the IDF because you're not sure he's in it... and yet if he is, you don't believe him anyway. So the only way webfusion can seem truthful to you is if he agrees with you. Sorry bucko, that's not how truth works. He makes a statement of fact--from first-hand experience. Intellectual honesty requires that you either consider he might be telling the truth, or provide contrary evidence to the facts.

Don't give me lessons on "truth", it makes you sound like a pretentious twat. See, in the past, before I read about his IDF stories, Webbie clearly showed a heap of a lot of bias about this subject. He made it very clear that he was a gung-ho Israeli nationalist. He even said a few things about Palestinians in general that were clearly hateful, if not racist. See, from my point of view, he lost all credibility right there. I have trouble taking people who say bigoted things seriously, 'cause I figure that if you hate something enough you are liable to say anything to support your prejudices.

Disagreement does not imply dishonesty... and you make a weak case by presenting it so. This does not help the Palestinians one bit. I too worry about Israeli civil rights abuses--and I should fear for the Palestinians if you and demon are their best champions.

Funny that you think I'm "championing" something. All I'm doing is pointing out that Israel is not the squeaky clean victim of evil, evil Palestinians that Zenith-Nadir, Webfusion, Mycroft and Skeptic would like to make us believe it is. I don't champion anyone here. I believe that Israelis have the right to security. I just don't believe that their right to security must be obtained with massive human rights abuses. By the way, it's not "disagreement" I have trouble with, it's the manner how the "israeli-right-or-wrong" types disagree that gives me the screaming willies.

 

[Orwell]

Two occasions were Israeli officials have been quoted acknowledging that they were purposely shelling civilians.

Moreover, although the first stage of Operation Accountability was marked by a number of precision attacks by the IDF on purported guerrilla targets, the IDF engaged in wide-scale shelling during the rest of the operation. The damage done during the shelling was then justified as necessary as a deterrent. One express aim of Operation Accountability was to punish the inhabitants of southern Lebanon for Hizballah's activities. The extensive nature of the damage sustained in numerous southern Lebanese villages confirms this stated intent. Human Rights Watch has found that in addition to the large number of civilian homes damaged, the basic infrastructure of many villages had been targeted and destroyed. By the end of Operation Accountability, conservative damage estimates suggested that some 1,000 houses had been totally destroyed, 1,500 houses had been partially destroyed, and 15,000 houses had sustained light damage.20 Israeli forces cut civilian water and electricity supplies, damaged schools, mosques and churches, and targeted a number of cemeteries with shell fire.

http://hrw.org/reports/1996/Israel.htm

Human Rights Watch today called upon Israel to halt indiscriminate and reprisal attacks on civilians and civilian objects in Lebanon. The organization also called upon Hizballah to refrain from carrying out indiscriminate attacks on Israeli civilians in Qiryat Shemona and other communities in northern Israel. Since Thursday, the attacks have claimed the lives of two Israeli civilians and at least eight Lebanese civilians. Israeli officials explicitly stated that the attacks were reprisals against the Lebanese civilian population. Internal Security Minister Avigdor Kahalani said that he wanted "all the inhabitants of Lebanon feel what all of Israel feels." Reprisals, when aimed at civilians or civilian objects, violate international humanitarian law.

http://hrw.org/english/docs/1999/06/26/isrlpa925.htm

There are other events, but Israeli officials don't usually get caught saying that they're deliberately shelling civilians...

 

[demon]

webbie:
"They weren't even Palestinians prior to being Jordanians, because they were residents of the various Turkish sanjaks. And since the Turks got on the wrong side of a world war, am I supposed to feel sorry for that entire fiasco, as well?"


gnome et al (orwell is already up on the game), take note the way webfusion conforms to type and uses exactly the same rhetorical tricks I indicated, incredibly responding to my ironic questions about Jordanian, Syrian etc nationality by reminding us gravely that there were never any such things as Palestinians either just Turkish Sanjuks. On this basis all post-colonial nations are entirely fictional and to be qualified to enter the comity of nations at the behest of western countries and of course Israel.

Of course nobody is asking webfusion to aquiese in anything (his rather demented belief that the idea of a Palestinian state is simply a plot derived to spread terrorism is another example of his denial of history and reality to the Palestinian people). Who designated Israel as the judge of nationhood? Who designated the west as the judge of nationhood?

And no webbie, I did not say they were going about things in the right way. I said that according to your arguments they are. Why are you so frightened of getting your hands dirty, where are you right now exactly? And I am sure that your typing is entirely more noble and meaningful then mine. Tougher perhaps.

 

[demon]

Mycroft:
"Who's ideology is one of perpetual warfare? Is it the ideology of those who envision and work towards a two-state solution? Or is those who can’t imagine sovereignty without weapons?"

Mycroft, I expect Israel to disarm immediatly then. What kind of ridiculous double standard is this?

 

[demon]

Oh and I've just noticed that webbie uses the word "squat". This is a term usually used by ultra's to describe the status of Palestinian Arabs (note that one can say Palestinian Arabs in the same way on can say Israeli Jews without imagining either that there are no Israeli's or on the other hand no Jews that are not Israeli's).
The Jewish people have a (mythical) kingdom a few thousand years ago. Then the Romans evicts the Jews from Jerusalem. In the meantime all kinds of squatters come in. When the Jews come back they rightfully evict all the squatters. I can remember seeing a delighted guffawing regaling of this line between two backslapping ultrazionists on another blog.

This seems to me a perfect example of the combination of theology with western racism. When Europeans first came to the holy land they were very disapointed it did not look like what they'd learned about in Sunday school. Who were all these dirty uncivilized people? Clearly the Jews of the bible had been like Europeans (with fancy dress obviously) and these eastern types (including the Jews of Jerusalem despised by the early Zionists) were simply interlopers and squatters.

Combine all this colonial era racism and theology with modern era US style bigotry and on the other hand the accumalated racist practices of an actually existing settler state, and hey presto, Palestinians as a bunch of dirty squatters.

 

[demon]

ZN:
"lets' look at the "cycle of violence" myth and use Gaza as an example..."

So Palestinians just have this desire to inflict suffering on Israel. Every demand they make is only really motivated by a desire for to better carry out terrorism. It`s what they all are after all. Just terrorists. Is this mind numbing racist crap really supposed to be some kind of an argument?

 

[demon]

webbie:
"Case in point -- the terrorist tactics of Saddam Hussein in 1991..."

No quid pro quo? That`s just nonsense. WTF has Saddam Hussein got to do with any of this by the way?

As to all the offensive rubbish about how the IDF doesn`t kill civilians but when it does its someone elses fault, well one could give example after example of the wanton brutality and deliberate targeting of civilians by the IDF, but those in the grip of extreme nationalism are incapable of rational dialogue. Essentially the line is, we don't target civilians, but if we do the dirty scum bags deserve it anyway. I much prefer this late 1970's interview between a naive liberal Zionist and General Gur, then Chief-Of-Staff of the Israeli Army for a real taste of what this rhetoric conceals:

Q- Is it true [during the March 1978 Israeli invasion of Lebanon, rarely mentioned curiously] that you bombarded agglomerations [of people] without distinction?

General Gur - I am not one of those people who have a selective memory. Do you think I pretend not to know what we have done all these years? What did we do to the entire length of the Suez Canal? A million and a half refugees! Really: where do you live?...We bombarded Ismailia, Suez, Port Said, and Port Faud. A million and a half refugees...Since when did the population of South Lebanon become so sacred? They knew perfectly well what the terrorists were doing. After the massacre at Avivim, I had four villages in South Lebanon bombed without authorization.

Q- Without making distinctions between civilians and noncivilians?

General Gur - What distinction? What had the inhabitants of Irbid [a large town in northern Jordan, principally Palestinian in population] done to deserve bombing by us?

Q- But communiques always spoke of returning fire and counterstrikes against terrorist objectives.

General Gur - Please be serious. Did you not know that the entire valley of the Jordan had been emptied of its inhabitants as a result of the war of attrition?

Q- Then you claim that the population ought to be punished?

General Gur - Of course, and I have never had any doubt about that. When I authorised Yanouch [diminuitive name of the commander of the northern front, responsible for the Lebanese operation] to use aviation, artillary and tanks [in the invasion] I knew exactly what I was doing. It has been thirty years from the time of our Independence War until now, that we have been fighting against the civilian [Arab] population which inhabited the villages and the towns, and everytime we do it, the same question gets asked: should we or should we not strike at civilians?

(Al-Hamishmar, May 10, 1978)

Three lovely phrases in this interview. "where do you live?", "please be serious" and "It has been thirty years since..etc".

Here was a man who at least understood the real basis of the dirty war the IDF had been fighting against a dispossed population for the previous thirty years, and the continuity between their dispossession and their pursuing and down right harrying right across the middle east.