Wait a second. I thought Richard Goldstone’s United Nations report on the Gaza assault was "a distorted, false, and irresponsible report."
From Haaretz:
The Israel Defense Forces prosecution on Thursday filed an indictment against two combat soldiers suspected of inappropriate conduct during Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip in 2008.
The soldiers, who served as staff sergeants in the Givati Brigade during Operation Cast Lead, allegedly forced a 9-year-old Palestinian boy to open a number of bags they thought might contain explosive materials. The bags turned out to be harmless.
The soldiers, who breached the army’s rule against using civilians as human shields during war, will be tried for violating their authority and for inappropriate conduct. An Israeli military official said the soldiers could face up to three years in jail.
The incident in question occurred in the Tel Al-Hawa neighborhood in south Gaza City in January 2009, toward the end of the war.
The military said it opened the investigation after the incident was brought to its attention by the United Nations, but emphasised it was "completely unrelated" to a report issued by United Nations investigator Richard Goldstone.
The Goldstone report (pages 218-232) examined four similar cases of Israeli soldiers using Palestinians as human shields. Mondo published Goldstone’s findings on the case of Majdi Abd Rabbo.
Here’s more from Goldstone:
The Mission received allegations that in two areas in north Gaza Israeli troops used Palestinian men as human shields whilst conducting house searches. The Palestinian men were allegedly forced to enter houses at gunpoint in front of or, in one case, instead of soldiers. The Mission investigated four cases. One incident took place in the Izbat Abd Rabbo neighbourhood and another in al-Salam neighbourhood, both east of Jabaliyah, close to the border with Israel. Two incidents took place in al-Israa neighbourhood, west of Beit Lahia. The Mission visited each of the locations and interviewed a number of witnesses. In each case, the Mission found the allegations to be credible.
[...]
In more general terms, the Mission notes that the statements of the men used as human shields by the Israeli armed forces during house searches are corroborated by statements made by Israeli soldiers to the NGO Breaking the Silence. The soldier providing testimony 1 speaks of the “Johnnie procedure”: “It was the first week of the war, fighting was intense, there were explosive charges to expose, tunnels in open spaces and armed men inside houses. […] Close in on each house. The method used has a new name now – no longer ‘neighbour procedure.’ Now people are called ‘Johnnie.’ They’re Palestinian civilians, and they’re called Johnnies […] To every house we close in on, we send the neighbour in, ‘the Johnnie,’ and if there are armed men inside, we start, like working the ‘pressure cooker’ in the West Bank.” This soldier then mentions that some commanders were “bothered” by the fact that “civilians were used to a greater extent than just sending them into houses.”
Here we go with the tokenism and the sacrificial lamb. As if they did not act with impunity and none of the murderous “rules of engagement” came from the top, no surprises here. However, in reality this is not the issue – the issue is that the whole assault was illegal, and that it was meant to inflict damage on the innocent civilian population. In Gaza the gulag, the open air prison there are no escape routes, and the only reason why more were not killed was because of how it would appear in the judgment of the Israelis. They thought they could put a spin of PR on the massacre, and they have failed. The rest, like this, is just bare minimum, and lame damage control.
“A few bad apples.” Where have we heard that before?
Maybe here?
link to globalpolicy.org
Incidentally, the article was written by a former US Marine sergeant. Lots of
parallels.
Another staff sergeant takes the fall for the Minister of “Defense” and Gabi Ashkenazi.
It must be nice to have those peons doing your dirty work.
I bet the two who were indicted still feel the same sense of patriotism.
Some people just have a penchant for getting screwed and taking it with stride. Amazing.
Avi – You’re absolutely right about the staff sergeants (a rank most Israeli grunts attain by the end of their service – and retain in the reserves). Not an officer in sight, of course, not even a lowly lieutenant. And the IDF Spokesman treats us to the classic “all soldiers were instructed not to endanger civilians”. Of course an indictment does not a conviction make, not to mention a reasonable sentence. Just yesterday, a junior officer was sentenced to time served, without demotion, for beating a Palestinian. Another token, of course, but worthless even as a token.
One would like to know what the ‘orders’ were for the low-level soldiers and also for the commanders. Were Geneva Conventions, for example, part of their ‘orders’? Even implicitly?
And were there contradictory orders, either explicit or by “general understanding”, spoken (not written) exhortation by officers, macho-Israeli-feeling, “do what you have to do” instructions or feeling, vague instructions (“don’t unnecessarily risk your own lives or those of your fellow”), rabbinic instructions, etc.?
Anyway, why all the angst? Soldiers risk their lives (or used to, anyway) in warfare, and they also risk being poisoned by their own armies (by inoculations or depleted uranium weapons or agent oramge that they are required to undergo or use) and, now, very occasionally, to be tried for small-scale war-crimes.
There is risk in war. For low level soldiers.
From Breaking the Silence:
There have also been numerous reports in the press about the nature of the orders, atmosphere, distributed literature and guest speakers in combat units, before and during the Gaza massacre.
Any chance any of these people would be willing to testify at the Hague, you think?
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