AC writes:
For those wanting compelling, video evidence of Palestinian non-violent
resistance and the sin inherent in subjugating humans to live under the
boots of others, see the following two videos shot on Friday February 13, at the International Solidarity Movement site,
one which shows the Israeli army meeting non-violent resistance with
the compulsion of a bludgeoner as it forcefully occupies a family's
house and another documenting the same ferocity applied again to
non-violent resisters in the aftermath. If one reads and watches the
material, it speaks for itself in lucid prose. Elaboration is
superfluous but may prove helpful.
Nothing that the soldiers did in the videos was outside of the law; occupying powers are the law, despite international agreements -- everything done by them can and will be justified by various forms of legal witchcraft and declarations of military necessity. Furthermore, nothing that the soldiers did was wrong. They are the occupiers, they were proceeding in their legal activities in their capacity as occupiers, they were met with unlawful disobedience, and they acted to complete their objective in accordance with their mandate. Lastly, nothing that the soldiers' political and military leaders, in their position as occupiers, do is wrong or illegal. They believe that they have a legitimate right to the land and that any contrary view or infringement upon that right is unlawful, wrong, and deserving of death.
But to anyone who maintains a tender heart and uncorrupted
conscience, everything was unjust. What is legal and just are two
disparate things, and the law of man can very well be the enemy of
justice. All of the resisters in the videos understood this principle
deeply. Notice the variety of their accents, Palestinian, Israeli,
European, etc. It doesn't require a certain nationality to have an
unsullied conscience, to know with doubtless resolve the injustice of
what was and is being done.
[Be sure and check out this second video here. Brave great international volunteers!]
The soldiers seem to be using force according to domestic Israeli rules of engagement, knowing that they are on camera but also responding to the illegal use of force against them in an appropriate fashion.
A brutal arab regime's soldiers would hit the protesters hard with a nightstick at 3cv and drag the corpse away by the arms before the urine and feces could soil the house to be occupied, even on camera.
You're a fucking moron. Urine/feces?
Sorta like the IDF soldiers who defecated in Palestinian homes during the latest massacre? In addition to writing death to all arabs?
Eurosabra is right. Israel has the right to defend herself. And the occupants of the house were resisting. As Phil mentioned, it is completely legal (according to Israeli military occupation rules).
Whether it's "legal" is not the end of it, by any means:
Equity is the name given to the set of legal principles, in jurisdictions following the English common law tradition, which supplement strict rules of law where their application would operate harshly, so as to achieve what is sometimes referred to as "natural justice". It is often confusingly contrasted with "law", which in this context refers to "statutory law" (the laws enacted by a legislature, such as Parliament), and "common law" (the principles established by judges when they decide cases).
From Wikipedia
The Occupation is the gift that keeps on giving, from the Three "No"s of Khartoum in '67 to the present day.
If you are counseling a unilateral Israeli withdrawal, know that Gaza constitutes a precedent; the Israelis would expect rockets to arrive in Hadera, Ramat Gan, Tel Aviv. Since that is untenable, there will only be a large-scale withdrawal in the context of a peace agreement, since Mujahadin can't make peace, but only truces, Hamas may get to play Last Man Standing after all, in which case everyone loses.
If you are counseling a unilateral Israeli withdrawal, know that Gaza constitutes a precedent; the Israelis would expect rockets to arrive in Hadera, Ramat Gan, Tel Aviv. Since that is untenable…
Actually, shithead, what is untenable is but one more moment of the deprivation of the basic human/civil rights for millions of people.
David is correct. In law school one learns quite quickly, often with public humiliation, that law and justice are distinct. However the laws of Equity are used by the judiciary to temper strict legal result, especially if there is case precedent in analogous cases before the court. Further, even as to interpretation of legislation enacted into law via statute, equitable principles may come into play to achieve the result the court desires, e.g., where plaintiff or complainant case does not meet the law's protective coverage on the face of the statute raised in support, to prevent operation of the rule of law, the court may look to the spirit of the law. At that point the court and parties turn to
records evidencing legislative intent, found in bound congressional records. Equity itself may be eventually legislated, that is appearing as part of
a new statute where it did not appear in the statute replaced. And example of this is often found in Civil Rights statutes. Discrimination
is rarely limited these days to carefully set factual criteria or intent, or scienter, but also includes "discriminatory impact" on designated classes of people. This is
especially true in Constitutional Law.
Israel has its own rules of military engagement. They differ distinctly from, e.g., those of the US Army. The US Army manual does quite well
spelling out rules consistent with Nuremberg and the international law set up thereafter covering war crimes. At times, the US army fails,
as was made clear in the aftermath of the second Gulf War. Remember how a couple of low level soldiers were condemned, while the
trickle down fast policy from the top escapes any responsibility? Remember Lt. Calley? But those are isolated falls, as compared to
the rules of engagement give every IDF soldier entering Gaza during the three week seige.
The quartering of Brit soldiers in US colonial days was a significant custom the rebels acted against. No video cameras or cameras in those days… Wonder how much worst the IDF acts when there are no cameras around?
Imagine someone coming into your home that way.
Anything similar to this during the US civil rights era, down south? A street demonstration, a counter sit down, dogs and water hoses, night sticks, yes–did the cops ever take over any US citizen's house this way? And in apartheid S Africa?
You're a fucking moron. Urine/feces?
He may have war experience. Obviously the dead can't control their body functions, their sphincters anymore. But he is suggesting his knowledge is based on the Arab's routines. Peculiar, no?
His point is. If the Arabs did this everybody would be dead in the end.
Evidence Eurosabra? Evidence of house evictions on Arab ground that leave dead bodies?
Wonderful, thanks, citizen, I love these precise unambiguous, defined words: scienter.
We seem to not have a legal definition for Vorsatz,=willful intend, you can only approach it via subjective and objective circumstances of the offense.
The soldiers act accordingly to Israeli Law. They may act lawfully, but this does not change the fact that they should not be in Occupied Palestinian Territories in the first place. Majority of the abuses against justice and morality are carried out in the "legal" zone. It takes people speaking out against injustice for the law to be changed. Paying women less than men was legal. Owning slaves was legal. Beating wives was legal. Refusing university places to Blacks/Jews/Hispanics was legal. Using IRS to destroy dissidents was legal (Upps, this one is still legal). Better society starts with disquiet between the grassroots public opinion.
No grunt work, sorry. Why should I compile evidence when you are against me no matter what? Darfur yields plenty of evidence of entire villages evacuated by force, littered with corpses of the Fur by the Sudanese Army. That's so elementary that I am cheered by how uninformed you are about the MIddle East and Africa, because you are obviously incompetent and marginal.
Eurosabra, who on this earth are you talking to? And to whom do you address your vague perceptive opinion of Sudan, and how does that become applicable to the Middle East? Please enlightened us.
Eva, yes you have grasped the main point. The IDF soldiers act according to Israeli law, at least while they know they are on non-Israeli camera. No question from me that a state's law may be valid, but worthy to contest. Hitler came to power, and was enabled by German law.
The legal mechanism worked exactly the same as in Israel, and in the USA under the Shrub machine from the inception of Gulf War 2. The derived point from those examples is that anything is justified in the name of self-defense. The statutory enabling acts rollover.
When will the USA, Canada, Great Britain, to name three principles for the current status quo, wake up to what their own highest values
hold dear? The WASPs, as it were, are still feeding Israel in the name of Justice, even as they are crushed by organized zionist jewry in behalf a tribal morality they themselves no longer honor de facto or de jure.