British Counting Schemes

I’ll be the first to say, as a veteran of the first Intifada, that the Israeli Defense Forces have a problem no less pervasive than America’s Los Angeles or New York City’s police departments in terms of how they treat Palestinians. (I mention these two as those US departments manage populations of civilians larger than Israel does the West Bank, only with better trained officers.) This does not eliminate reporters (seems that this is my theme of the week) from reporting factual information.

For the information of any reporters, a squad is five-eleven soldiers. 3 squads to a platoon. 3 platoons to a company.

The BBC believes (apparently in consultation with J.K. Rowling, their military correspondent) that a company of soldiers fits in a taxi. To set the record straight, neither Israelis, nor Palestinians, have managed to magick vehicles to seat the minimum of 35 or so soldiers necessary to be involved in the reported incident, where an apparently innocent Palestinian was shot by Israeli troops.

No, I’m not making apologies for illegal actions: any Israeli soldier using lethal force against a civilian should be held criminally liable. And if more than one soldier is involved, then conspiracy charges and the appropriate investigation should be launched.

Of course, this presumes that there’s some kind of reality to the BBC’s claims. No Israeli news or government sites, at the time of this writing, point to this issue at all.

Copyright © 2005-2006 DaShlom. All Rights Reserved. Contact the author at dashlom (at) gmail dot com for reprinting and republishing or site linking requests.

Random Artillery, Missile Strikes

First off, condolences to the family many of whose members were killed when an errant Israeli artillery shell hit a house in Beit Hanun. Innocent civilians should never be fired upon, and those firing should take every step to prevent such tragedies.

Of course, that would be a great statement had the terrorists running Gaza been holding to it. But they’re not. The only reason they’re not killing entire families of Israeli civilians is that they’re missing their targets with their entirely unguided missiles, whose sole purpose is to cause the kind of mayhem on purpose that the IDF caused in this latest, tragic, accident.

When I served in Ramallah a pair of terrorists took the opportunity, when a primary school let out, to take shots at me and my partner from behind the kids. These “freedom fighters” were counting either on our not firing back because our morals would deter endangering children, or firing at them, therefore possibly creating unsuspecting martyrs. Nice folks: we ducked and waited; they couldn’t outrun our radios.

Terrorists firing missiles from civilian areas, at civilian areas. These terrorists claim to control their civilian areas, and are therefore responsible for those civilians. Or would be, in any civilized (and I most certainly am including Islamic) country. With their total abdication of their responsibility for even their own civilians’ lives, damning Israel for their tragic mistakes when attempting to safeguard its country is political flimflammery.

If Hamas wants to stop Israeli incursions, Israeli artillery fire, and Palestinian deaths, they must stop firing rockets. It’s really that simple — although I’m sure that Hamas has already made that calculation, and would much rather bury its own citizens, deprived on purpose of any protection, than stop fufilling their genocidal charter. After all, there are always more shahidim.

Copyright © 2005-2006 DaShlom. All Rights Reserved. Contact the author at dashlom (at) gmail dot com for reprinting and republishing or site linking requests.