Israel's 'execution' troops face death quiz

[Scurrilous]

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1136426,00.html

<snip>

"The Israeli army is under growing pressure to explain a series of deaths of Palestinians in a three-week operation in the West Bank city of Nablus. According to witnesses and medical evidence, at least two of the 19 deaths during the operation have the hallmarks of executions.

The operation was launched on 16 December to track down Naif Sharekh, who the army say was behind the movement of suicide bombers from Nablus to Israel. The UN representative in the city described it as 'one of the largest military operations in Nablus since Operation Defensive Shield started in April 2002'.

By the time the army reduced its presence on 6 January, it had killed four gunmen and 15 unarmed civilians including six children.

One Israeli and one Palestinian human rights group are investigating the killings and want the army to launch its own inquiry, but it is reluctant."

[Must_B_Free]

1. Like I always say

why don't the palestinians just give up and go home? :shrug:

[Aidoneus]

2. "go home"?

They're in their homes, being attacked there practically every day.. where do you suggest they go?

[Must_B_Free]

3. Why can't they go back to their historic homeland

to build the protective nation state like Israel did?

(By the way, where is the Palestinians' historic homeland?)

[Aidoneus]

5. well, um.. they're in part of it right now

somebody else is shacking up in the rest, at the moment..
...being sarcastic, right?

I worked out some figures on this a few weeks ago when an approximate census was drawn up, in a past thread.

[tinnypriv]

4. Media pressure

Is the only thing that will possibly re-open the IDF file on these deaths, so this is a good article.

Incidentially, the military correspondent for Israel's largest daily made this point recently, noting that the IDF's "investigations" (when re-opened) are found to be a joke, rife with inaccuracies.

The IDF doesn't even interview Palestinians/civilians in the first investigative stage, so the overwhelming majority of cases end right there. They do change their mind if they need testimony for propaganda reasons though.

The most charitable thing you can say is that IDF encourages a climate of impunity when dealing with Palestinian deaths (though perhaps outright complicity could be argued in some cases).