To the list of Israel’s deliberate attacks on civilians must be added this brilliant report by Lia Tarachansky from Nablus on Israeli assassinations in December of three Palestinians–"three terrorists"– who Israel said were responsible for the recent killing of a settler (and that killing was a Palestinian reprisal for settlers torching a mosque).
Note Tarachansky’s exploration below of why two of these Palestinian "terrorists" were selected for an illegal procedure, assassination. The rationale seems very flimsy indeed, and recalls the flimsy connections that Israel made in Gaza in seeking to justify killings there.
Tarachansky: In the government press release, the Israeli army explained the reason for Raed Sarkaji’s death was that he was once imprisoned by Israel and that he was an activist with Fatah Tanzim [second intifada group] in the past. For his alleged involvement with the group, Sarkaji was jailed for six and a half years, followed by an extra six months of military detention, and was reportedly interrogated for 140 days. When asked whether her husband was indeed involved in the Al-Aqsa Brigade, Tahani said that after being released last year, Raed was trying to get hired by the Palestinian Authority.
WIDOW TAHANI SARKAJI: Then the soldier said, "Where’s his M-16? Where is it?" And I said, "I don’t know. Aren’t you searching the house? He doesn’t have one. Look around, fish around, explode the house if you have to, but you won’t find a gun in here, because my husband did not have a gun."
TARACHANSKY: The Israeli press release said that soldiers gave the three men the opportunity to surrender and that they didn’t. This, however, directly contradicts the testimonies of the witnesses. The Real News also spoke to Abu Sharkh, the mother of Ghassan Abu Sharkh, who was also assassinated that night. The only reason the army gave for targeting him was that he was the brother of Nayef Abu Sharkh, a militant the Israeli army assassinated in 2004.
