|
The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings & Torture |
|
April 22nd,
2009 - Israel Denies Violating International Law in Gaza News article from the
Associated Press News article from the New York
Times |
|
Israel Denies Violating
International Law in Gaza By Aron Heller Associated Press April 22, 2009 Tel Aviv, Israel - An
internal Israeli investigation into the Gaza war released Wednesday found no
violations of international law, outraging human rights groups that allege
war crimes were committed. Rights activists renewed
their call for an independent inquiry, with Human Rights Watch denouncing it
as "an insult" to Gaza civilians and proof the military would not
objectively examine its conduct. In Norway on Wednesday, a
group of lawyers filed a complaint accusing 10 Israelis, including former Prime
Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, of war crimes. The
Norwegian government must now determine whether there are grounds for charges
or a police investigation. Israel launched its
three-week offensive on Dec. 27 to try to halt daily rocket attacks from Gaza
that had terrorized southern Israel for years. The use of air and ground
power against Gaza's Islamic Hamas rulers was unprecedented in Israel's war
against Palestinian militants, who operate within residential areas. Palestinians say more than
1,400 Gazans were killed, including 926 civilians. Israel says 1,166
Palestinians were killed, including 709 Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants,
295 civilians and 162 men whose identities could not be confirmed. The military conducted five
separate investigations into some of its most controversial actions during
the war, including attacks on and near U.N. and international facilities,
shooting at medical workers and facilities, the widespread destruction of
Palestinian homes, and the use in densely populated Gaza of white phosphorus,
a chemical agent that causes horrific burns. The investigations uncovered
"a very small number of incidents" in which intelligence or
operational errors took place during the fighting, the military said. One
included an airstrike that killed 21 members of the same family. "These unfortunate
incidents were unavoidable and occur in all combat situations, in particular
of the type that Hamas forced on the (Israeli military), by choosing to fight
from within the civilian population," the military concluded in a report
issued at the briefing. Deputy chief of staff Maj.
Gen. Dan Harel said the military maintained "a high professional and
ethical level" while facing an enemy that took cover among uninvolved
civilians. Rights activists were
outraged. "This statement is an
insult to the civilians in Gaza who needlessly died and an embarrassment to
(Israel Defense Forces) members who take military justice seriously,"
Human Rights Watch said in a statement from New York. "It shows that the
IDF leadership will not objectively monitor itself." Israeli rights activists
called for an independent inquiry "that would look at the whole range of
violations the army is incapable of looking at." "It shows how important
it is that Israel cooperate with the fact-finding mission of Goldstone that
would look at violations,' said B'Tselem spokeswoman Sarit Michaeli, speaking
for various Israeli human rights groups that have made this demand in the
past. Richard Goldstone, a former
U.N. chief prosecutor for war crimes, recently was appointed to head a U.N.
investigation into atrocities allegedly committed by both sides during the
war. Israel has not said whether
it would cooperate with his investigation. "If they aren't guilty,
they should allow entry to international investigators from the U.N.,"
Hamas adviser Ahmed Youssef said after the military released its findings. Among the questions being
raised is whether Israel used disproportionate force and failed to protect
civilians. In one case, Israeli
artillery fire hit near a U.N. school where hundreds of Gazans had sought
refuge, killing 42 people. Israeli said troops responded to fire from
militants nearby. Israel also has been
criticized for using white phosphorus weapons, which can be legitimately used
in war. But rights activists have said its use over populated areas can
indiscriminately burn civilians and constitute a war crime. Israel says its military
took great care to avoid harming civilians in Gaza, preceding some airstrikes
with leaflets or phone calls warning civilians to flee - a contention
confirmed by Gaza residents. In Jerusalem, the U.N.'s top
Mideast envoy, Robert Serry, toured several Palestinian areas where Israel
had demolished or threatened to demolish homes. He expressed concern about a
rising number of demolitions recently and urged Israel to halt the practice. Serry visited the ruins of a
home that had been demolished hours earlier. The demolition left the Hdaidoun
family of seven, including five children, homeless. He said the family's
distress was "pretty shocking." Also Wednesday, the
grass-roots OneVoice Movement released a poll showing the vast majority of
Israelis and Palestinians are willing to live alongside each other peacefully
in separate states. Results indicate that 74
percent of Palestinians and 78 percent of Israelis are willing to accept a
two-state solution. The group said the poll counters fears that the two-state
solution is losing support in Israel and the Palestinian territories. Copyright © 2009 The
Associated Press. External link: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ioi_0jtO9RjMwPNRoXNCndRPRq3gD97NKHL02 Israel Says Its Actions in
Gaza War Were Lawful By Isabel Kershner New York Times April 22, 2009 Jerusalem - The Israeli
military on Wednesday presented the conclusions of several internal
investigations into its conduct during the recent war in Gaza and stated that
it operated in accordance with international law throughout the fighting,
countering widespread international criticism over its actions and continuing
accusations of possible war crimes. The military said it had
“maintained a high professional and moral level” during the 22-day war that
ended Jan. 18, though it faced “an enemy that aimed to terrorize Israeli
civilians whilst taking cover” among Palestinian civilians and “using them as
human shields.” Israel mounted its campaign
against Hamas, the Islamic militant group ruling Gaza, with the stated
purpose of preventing rocket fire on southern Israel from the densely
populated Palestinian territory. But the offensive sparked international
outrage and condemnation as the Palestinian death toll grew, as United
Nations facilities and medical teams came under fire and as allegations
emerged of improper use of white phosphorous. Earlier this month, the
Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council appointed an internationally
renowned judge, Richard J. Goldstone, to lead a high-level mission to
investigate allegations of war crimes during the Gaza war. Though Mr. Goldstone, a
former judge of the South African Constitutional Court and the former United
Nations chief prosecutor for war crimes in Yugoslavia and Rwanda, has said he
will investigate possible violations by both Israel and Hamas, officials in
Jerusalem have said it is highly unlikely that Israel will cooperate with the
mission. Gaza health officials said
more than 1,300 Palestinians died during the Gaza fighting, but Israel
disputes Palestinian claims that most of them were non-combatants. By the
Israeli military’s count, 1,166 people were killed of whom 295 were
noncombatants, 709 were what it called Hamas terror operatives and 162 were
men whose affiliations remained unidentified. The Palestinian Center for
Human Rights in Gaza put the number of dead at 1,417, of whom it said 926
were civilians and 236 combatants. Israel says that about 400 Gazans die of
natural causes every month, possibly accounting for the discrepancy in
numbers. Thirteen Israelis were
killed during the fighting, among them 10 soldiers and three civilians. Gen. Dan Harel, the Israeli
military’s deputy chief of staff, told reporters on Wednesday that the army
“discovered a small number of mistakes, not many, among the dozens of
incidents we investigated, and we have already examined them and learned
lessons from them.” General Harel added that the
army had “not found a single case of an Israeli soldier deliberately hurting
innocent Palestinian civilians, whether from the land, air or sea.” If any
such case was discovered, he said, it would be treated with the full severity
of the law. Describing the mistakes as
“unfortunate” and ascribing them to “intelligence or operational errors,” the
military said such incidents “were unavoidable and occur in all combat situations,
in particular of the type which Hamas forced” on the army “by choosing to
fight from within the civilian population.” Three separate
investigations whose conclusions were presented on Wednesday dealt with
specific events that were brought to the army’s attention by the news media
or other means. Two others examined general subjects, namely the use of
weapons containing phosphorous and the destruction of infrastructure and
buildings by ground forces. In one now notorious case
where Israeli shells killed up to 40 Palestinians outside a United Nations
school in the Jabaliya refugee camp, north of Gaza City, on Jan. 6, the soldiers
were responding, according to the military, to mortar shells fired by
militants in the vicinity of the school. Israel says that between 12 and 17
Palestinians were killed, five of whom were militants. Soon after the shelling,
however, Palestinian hospital officials in the Jabaliya area told a reporter
that 40 people had been killed, among them 10 children and 5 women. At a mass
funeral in Jabaliya the next day, a reporter was unable to count the bodies
in the press of the mourning crowd, but described seeing the bodies of the
children laid out in a long row on the ground. One of the mourners, Huda
Deed, said she had lost nine members of her extended family, ages 3 to 25. Another case investigated by
the military involved the Daia family, 21 of whom were killed when their
home, in the Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City, was hit in an Israeli strike
on Jan. 6. Expressing regret for the incident, a senior military official
said the army had intended hitting the house next door, which was a weapons
storage facility; the Daia home was struck because of an “operational error.” Israel has already come
under heavy criticism for its use of white phosphorous in heavily populated
Gaza. White phosphorus is a standard, legal weapon in armies, long used as a
way to light up an area or to create a thick white smoke screen to obscure
troop movements. But it can cause horrific burns, so using it against
civilians, or in an area where many civilians are likely to be affected, can
be a violation of international law. Last month, Human Rights
Watch issued a report citing six cases of improper use ofwhite phosphorus by
Israel and calling them evidence of war crimes. The military said it used
two types of munitions containing white phosphorous, incendiary shells for
marking and range-finding, which it said were used in limited quantities, and
non-incendiary types of munitions used to create smoke screens. But officials
said that both types were used in open areas only, in accordance with the
limitations of international law. The military noted that
these investigations, conducted by officers with the rank of colonel, are not
a replacement for the central operational army investigation of the entire
campaign, which will be concluded by June. The findings are not
exhaustive. For example, the case of the Samouni family, some 30 of whose
members were killed when their home in Zeitoun was hit on Jan. 5, remains
unresolved. Maj. Avital Leibovich, a military spokeswoman, said the case was
still being examined, and that it was not yet clear if the Samounis were
killed by Israeli fire. Israeli and international
human rights groups rejected the Israeli military’s internal investigations
as inadequate. Human Rights Watch called Wednesday’s statement by the
military “an insult to the civilians in Gaza who needlessly died.” The army
leadership, the group said, is “apparently not interested, willing, or able
to monitor itself.” External link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/world/middleeast/23gaza.html Israeli army
admits ‘isolated’ mistakes in Gaza At a briefing Wednesday, a top officer described the findings of an
internal inquiry, insisting Israel acted in accord with international law. By Joshua Mitnick The Christian Science Monitor April 22, 2009 Tel Aviv - Israel's
second-ranking military officer admitted Wednesday the army made mistakes
that caused civilian deaths during the January Gaza war against Hamas, but he
reiterated the Army's assertion that it did not violate international
conventions on warfare. Deputy Chief of Staff Maj.
Gen. Dan Harel said the Army will forward to Israel's military prosecutor and
the attorney general the findings of an internal inquiry into accusations of
illegal use of white phosphorous munitions, targeting humanitarian and
civilian infrastructure. "We found a very small
amount of cases where we had operational or intelligence mistakes during the
fighting," General Harel told journalists attending a briefing at the
military's national headquarters. Still, Harel insisted, the Israel Defense
Forces (IDF) "conducted itself in the Cast Lead operation under
international rules of law." The briefing was an attempt
to address charges at home and abroad of war crimes. Palestinians and human
rights groups allege that the Army used disproportionate force in Gaza's
densely packed residential areas that left more than 1,000 Palestinians dead,
thousands more injured, and a swath of physical destruction. The UN is investigating some
of the charges, and the International Court of Justice is mulling its own
inquiry. Human rights lawyers abroad have said they are planning to introduce
lawsuits in European domestic courts willing to exercise principles of universal
jurisdiction over accusations of war crimes in third-party countries. On Wednesday, six Norwegian
lawyers said they were planning to bring charges of war crimes against former
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and other top officials, according to Agence
France-Presse. Army: We hit 1,400 Hamas targets The Army said the deadliest
error occurred Jan. 6 when Israeli soldiers killed 21 civilians who were
taking cover in a house. The soldiers mistook the house for a nearby weapons
storehouse. Harel said the mix-up was
due to an "intelligence mistake," but insisted that the Army
successfully identified some 1,400 Hamas other targets during the war. In a
reiteration of the military's defense of the civilian toll at the time of the
fighting, Harel said Hamas was to blame for the destruction for
booby-trapping residences and hunkering down near hospitals. Israeli human rights
organizations disputed the findings and called on the government to cooperate
with independent human rights groups seeking to investigate the war. Military
commentators have reported that the Army used overwhelming firepower inside
Gaza for fear that a high casualty rate among its own soldiers would sap
support among the Israeli public for the offensive. "The doctrine of using
extreme armed force was a doctrine set from above," says Sarit Michaeli,
the spokeswoman of the human rights watchdog B'tselem. She adds that the
military inquiry "is not the correct forum to conduct this
investigation" into accountability. Inquiries at home and abroad Israel so far has refused to
cooperate with a UN fact-finding team to investigate the war on both sides of
the Israel-Gaza divide. The Army denied accusations
that it illegally used artillery shells with the incendiary white phosphorous
agent against civilian areas. While saying it launched white phosphorous
shells into open areas to target its fire, the military also acknowledged
using smoke bombs that scattered fragments with small amounts of phosphorous
over civilian areas. The munitions were used to obscure forces and didn't
endanger civilians. "I cannot buy it after
being on the receiving end," said Eyad Sarraj, the director of the Gaza
Community Mental Health Program. "I felt it. I sniffed the white
phosphorous in my house. My children almost suffocated by it." Human rights and
international news groups have documented medical experts who assert that
numerous Gazans were injured by white phosphorous burns. During the war, accusations
that Israel used excessive force against third-party civilians in Gaza
instead of Hamas militants helped erode the initial understanding
internationally of Israel's opening response to continued rocket fire from
the Gaza Strip at southern Israeli towns and cities. Last month, Israel's
military prosecutor opened and then closed an inquiry into the testimony of
several war veterans who claimed that soldiers had fired indiscriminately on
noncombatants. The stories were dismissed by the Army as "hearsay." The Army says it is
investigating additional allegations of misconduct, but it's unclear whether
the military prosecutor will open its own inquiry or even press charges. Israel said it destroyed 636
residential buildings over the course of the war. Palestinians say about
4,000 structures were destroyed and some $2 billion in damage was caused. The Army also reiterated
that about 1,100 Gazans were killed, about 70 percent of whom were identified
as Hamas operatives. Palestinians say the number was about 1,400 and that
only 30 percent of the casualties were militants. Israel also was accused of
targeting UN installations and humanitarian workers, though some of those
claims were dropped. Israel still is grappling
with the international fallout from the war. The Guardian newspaper reported
Wednesday that Britain will review all weapons shipments to Israel following
the war. External link: http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0422/p06s10-wome.html Israel backs down over white
phosphorus By Sheera Frenkel The Times April 22, 2009 Israeli troops stopped using
white phosphorus shells in Gaza this year after The Times published evidence
that they were injuring civilians. In its first explicit
admission, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said that “media buzz” had forced
the army to withdraw the shells from its arsenal on January 7 - the day that
The Times obtained photographs of stockpiles and two days after the newspaper
had exposed the effect of white phosphorus on the population of Gaza. Phosphorus bombs may be used
to create smokescreens but their use as weapons of war in civilian areas is
banned by the Geneva Conventions. They cause severe burns that can penetrate
to the bone. An IDF briefing yesterday
after an inquiry into the three-week Gaza offensive disclosed that two
different munitions containing white phosphorus had been used. Mortar shells
fired by ground forces and 76mm rounds fired from naval vessels both
contained phosphorus as an active ingredient. Until now the IDF has denied
the Times accounts. On January 7 a military spokeman said that the shells in
question had “no explosives and no white phosphorus”. Yet it was clear from
yesterday's briefing by Major-General Dan Harel, the IDF Deputy Chief of
Staff, that commanders were concerned by the controversy. “Since this was a
big buzz in the media, we issued an order 7 Jan '09 to stop using white
phosphorus shells,” he said, adding: “These shells were used only to create
smokescreens, in keeping with international law.” Even after the January 7
order the IDF continued to deploy less dangerous “smoke shells”, which
contain felt soaked in phosphorus. Israel launched Operation
Cast Lead on December 27 in an effort to halt daily rocket attacks by Hamas
militants from Gaza that were terrorising residents in southern Israel. Yesterday's briefing was
based on five IDF investigations into alleged violations committed by the
military during the operation, in which more than a thousand Palestinians
were killed. An Israeli official said that inquiries “revealed a very small
number of incidents in which intelligence or operational errors took place”.
By and large, the army had “maintained a high professional and moral level”. The incidents included an
attack that killed 21 people when forces targeted a home rather than a nearby
weapon storage facility. “These unfortunate incidents are unavoidable and
occur in all combat situations, in particular of the type which Hamas forced
on the IDF by choosing to fight from within the civilian population,” the
official said. Human Rights Watch said: “We
consider the IDF investigations a cover-up for serious violations of
international law. Hamas also seriously violated the laws of war.” Timetable of allegations and rebuttals January 5 - The Times
reports tell-tale smoke above Gaza. An Israeli military official says: “We
categorically deny the use of white phosphorus.” January 8 - The Times runs
pictures of white phosphorus shells stockpiles. Major Avital Leibovich, a
military spokesman, says: “This is what we call a quiet shell - it has no
explosives and no white phosphorus. It is not for killing people.” January 12 - The Times finds
more than 50 phosphorus burns victims in hospital January 14 - Gabi Ashkenazi,
Israel Defence Forces Chief of Staff, says: “The IDF acts only in accordance
with international law and does not use white phosphorus .” January 16 - UN Relief and
Works Agency HQ hit with phosphorus munitions January 21 - Major Leibovich
admits use of white phosphorus “according to international law”. Major-
General Amir Eshel, the army's head of strategic planning, says: “It is the
most non-lethal kind of weapon. I don't see any issue with that.” January 23 - Israel launches
investigation into white phosphorus munitions: “Some practices could be
illegal. The IDF is holding an investigation concerning one specific unit and
one incident.” April 22 - Israeli military
official tells The Times that a “media buzz” led to the order to stop using
white phosphorus shells. External link: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6150448.ece |