‘I Want Your Son to Die Here’

Another horrifying story from the Occupied Territories. This one took place yesterday in Nablus. An Israeli raid on a house where a Palestinian was apparently accused of owning a weapon. A beating. A 20-year-old neighbor, Waled Fareed Fretekh, comes to witness. He is shot repeatedly in the legs. The soldiers refuse to let him be taken away to a hospital for 90 minutes. He dies of loss of blood. The mind reels. Coetzee tales of South Africa. Gestapo. East German police. Gulag stuff. But now, and in our name.