quote:

Originally posted by jerZ07002 i never said innocent. you suggested that the israelis are far worse. i don't buy into that. i do agree they do disproportionately more damage, but i feel the tactics of the palestinians are worse. i have known a few IDF soldiers in my life, they were all good kids and not one hated palestinians. those kids weren't going out trying to kill palestinian kids. we don't know what happened in your examples. not one of us was there. we are relying on secondary sources, and sources that are clearly sympathetic to the palestinian cause because they are in gaza/west bank helping the palestinians. i'm not saying that you are lying or that your information is wrong, what i'm saying is that you should be critical of the source of the information. putting the word out that an israeli bulldozer flattened an american is a good way for the palestinians (or a sympathetic group) to pressure the americans to exert influence against israel.

quote:

Originally posted by jerZ07002 i'm sure i can find pictures of dead Israelis on the internet and post it for effect, but that's pointless because it's pandering to emotions.

It's not for "effect," but to demonstrate a point. Heavy civilian casualties and injusries is irrelevatn to the IDF, and not only does it deliberately target civilians, but also western media reported and peace activits. Militant attacks on Israeli civilians pale in comparison to what the state of Israel's state sanctioned military agression and policies inflict indiscriminately on the entire population, not just one coffee shop, bus, or night club. Human rights watch organizations have countless records of the IDF deliberatley brutally against civilians, including defenseless childen and women. This is old news and nothing new.

This in no way "deliberatrely target's civilans" at all? Hmm, I guess it has no obvious or predictable ramification for civilians whatsoever:

quote:

Gaza: Israel’s Energy Cuts Violate Laws of War Attacks by Palestinian Armed Groups No Excuse for Collective Punishment (New York, February 7, 2008) – Israel’s cuts of fuel and electricity to Gaza, set to escalate today, amount to collective punishment of the civilian population, and violate Israel’s obligations under the laws of war, Human Rights Watch said today. These cuts, which Israel says are intended to pressure Palestinian armed groups to end their unlawful rocket attacks against civilians in southern Israel, are having a grave impact on Gaza’s hospitals, water-pumping stations, sewage-treatment facilities, and other infrastructure essential for the well-being of Gaza’s population. Starting today, Israel will reduce the electricity it sells directly to Gaza by 1.5 megawatts over the next three weeks. This adds to a series of Israeli measures since 2006 that have caused a 20 percent shortfall in Gaza’s electricity needs. The Israeli Supreme Court approved the most recent cuts last week, rejecting a petition by 10 Israeli and Palestinian human rights groups. “Israel views restricting fuel and electricity to Gaza as a way to pressure Palestinian armed groups to stop their rocket and suicide attacks,” said Joe Stork, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “But the cuts are seriously affecting civilians who have nothing to do with these armed groups, and that violates a fundamental principle of the laws of war.” Human Rights Watch said that indiscriminate Palestinian rocket and suicide bomb attacks against Israeli civilians constitute war crimes, but Israel’s attempts to suppress those attacks must not also violate international humanitarian law. Israeli officials have implicitly acknowledged that the fuel and electricity cuts amount to collective punishment. “There is no justification for demanding we allow residents of Gaza to live normal lives while shells and rockets are fired from their streets and courtyards at Sderot and other communities in the south,” Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on January 24. Morever, Israeli Defense Ministry spokesman Shlomo Dror said on January 18: “If Palestinians don’t stop the violence, I have a feeling the life of people in Gaza is not going to be easy.” Israel normally sells to Gaza 120 megawatts of electricity per day, delivered by 10 feeder lines across the border. Gaza’s sole power plant currently produces 55 megawatts. Its full capacity is 100 megawatts, but a 2006 Israeli Air Force attack and subsequent fuel restrictions have prevented the plant from operating at capacity. An additional 17 megawatts come from Egypt. The electricity that Israel sells to Gaza is paid for by taxes that Israel collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority. In addition, the Israeli company Dor Alon sells the industrial fuel on which Gaza’s power plant depends. The funds for these purchases come from the European Union. According to the United Nations, Gaza requires roughly 240 megawatts of power per day during the winter. The 48 megawatt deficit has forced the Gaza Electricity Distribution Company to institute rolling blackouts of up to eight hours per day in most areas. In addition to private homes, these blackouts affect hospitals, water pumps, schools and sewage-treatment facilities without distinction. Further cuts of industrial diesel fuel for Gaza’s power plant will make the deficit grow. During power outages, hospitals and health clinics rely on generators that require regular diesel fuel, as do residential buildings. Restrictions on the supply of diesel in recent months and prohibitively high prices have limited the use of generators. Citing security concerns, Israel has restricted the import of spare parts to repair overused generators. At Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital, power surges following outages have caused equipment to break. The problems have been exacerbated by a strike of the Gaza Petrol Station Owners Union, which from January 16 to February 5 refused to distribute some fuel sold by Israel out of protest to the cuts. The union deputy head told Human Rights Watch that, while they blocked delivery of gasoline for cars and regular diesel, which would affect generator use, they did not restrict cooking gas or the industrial diesel fuel used by the power plant. He said the union also delivered diesel fuel as fast as possible to all hospitals that requested it, but poor communication and mismanagement of government institutions at times made delivery difficult. The authorities in Gaza also have obligations to ensure the well-being of the civilian population under its control, including facilitating the delivery of humanitarian supplies, Human Rights Watch said. Israel claims the cuts are not depriving Palestinians in Gaza of their “essential humanitarian needs.” But Human Rights Watch, as well as major humanitarian agencies, says that civilians are paying a heavy price. According to the UN’s top humanitarian official, UN Deputy Secretary-General John Holmes, Gaza in October already faced a “serious humanitarian crisis.” On January 29, the United Nations said that border closures and fuel and electricity cuts have had the following effects in Gaza: • The World Food Program was unable to provide full food rations to 84,000 of its poorest beneficiaries; • Around 50 percent of households in Gaza had access to running water for only four to six hours per day; and • Due to a partially functioning wastewater system, up to 40 million liters of untreated sewage were being dumped daily into the Mediterranean Sea. On January 25, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) called the humanitarian situation in Gaza “critical.” A health worker for the ICRC said hospitals in Gaza were cold because the heating units had been switched off to conserve fuel, and the gas to cook meals for patients and staff was running low. One patient on a ventilator at Ahli Arab hospital died while the hospital switched from the power plant to its generator during a blackout. A report by the World Health Organization (WHO) on January 21 expressed deep concern. “Whilst the frequency of electricity cuts and limited power available to run hospital generators is extremely serious for all hospital services, its impact is particularly felt in intensive care units, operation theatres and emergency rooms,” the report said. As of January 21, three out of the 11 Ministry of Health hospitals were facing “severe shortages of fuel,” the WHO said. On February 6, Human Rights Watch visited the al-Nasser Pediatric Hospital and the Psychiatric Hospital in Gaza City. Both facilities were facing average daily blackouts of nine hours, forcing them to rely on backup generators. The pediatric hospital had enough diesel fuel to run its generator for nine hours. The psychiatric hospital had enough fuel for four hours of generator use. On January 25, the pediatric hospital ran out of diesel fuel entirely, the director said. The hospital had to close the X-ray department, diagnostic lab, and its four general pediatric wards, keeping open only the intensive care unit and the department with incubators, thanks to a smaller reserve generator. A diesel truck that the hospital uses to transport food, laundry, and blood samples has not been in operation for the past week, the director said. The deputy head of the petrol station owners’ union said the hospital had not contacted the union to request a delivery. “The impact on civilians in Gaza is clear,” Stork said. “Children, the mentally ill, and others with no connection to armed groups are suffering from the Israeli cuts and mismanagement by Gaza authorities amidst the confusion, and at least one person has died.” Israel’s pressure on Gaza’s civilians began after Hamas took over the Palestinian Authority in March 2006, following its electoral victory the previous January. Since then, Israel has increasingly limited the flow of people and goods into and out of the territory. Israel further clamped down on the movement of goods and people after Hamas violently seized power in Gaza from Fatah in June 2007. Israel also imposed restrictions on people with emergency medical needs who need care only available outside Gaza. The border closures have forced 85 percent of Gaza’s factories to close or to operate at less than 20 percent of their capacity, frozen 95 percent of construction projects, and driven unemployment to record highs. Eighty percent of the population relies on food aid. The Israeli government says the border closures and fuel and electricity cuts are in response to ongoing indiscriminate rocket attacks on Israel by Palestinian armed groups. On February 3, in the first suicide attack in a year, a suicide bomber from Hamas killed a 73-year-old Israeli woman and injured 11 in a shopping area in the town of Dimona. Israel retaliated the next day by killing nine Hamas militants in Gaza. Human Rights Watch has repeatedly condemned suicide-bombing attacks that target civilians as war crimes. According to the latest statistics provided by the United Nations, during the third week of January, Palestinian armed groups in Gaza fired 147 Qassam rockets and 82 mortars toward Israel, injuring three Israeli civilians. During that same time, Israeli military operations from the ground and air killed 23 Palestinians and wounded 70 inside Gaza. At least seven of the dead and 40 of the wounded were civilians, although the information from the UN was inadequate to determine whether those casualties resulted from any Israeli violations of international humanitarian law. Human Rights Watch said that cutting fuel or electricity to the civilian population violates a basic principle of international humanitarian law, or the laws of war, which prohibit a government that has effective control over a territory from attacking or withholding objects that are essential to the survival of the civilian population. Such an act would also violate Israel’s duty as an occupying power to safeguard the health and welfare of the population under occupation. Israel withdrew its military forces and settlers from the Gaza Strip in 2005. Nonetheless, Israel remains responsible for ensuring the well-being of Gaza’s population for as long as, and to the extent that, it retains effective control over the area. Israel still exercises control over Gaza’s airspace, sea space and land borders, as well as its electricity, water, sewage and telecommunications networks and population registry. In addition, Israeli military forces can and have re-entered Gaza at will. Article 55 of the Fourth Geneva Convention places a duty on an occupying power to ensure the food and medical supplies of the population, as well as to permit and facilitate the consignments of humanitarian relief. In the conduct of a conflict, each party must allow and facilitate rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief to civilians. A deliberate refusal to permit access to these supplies in response to military action can constitute collective punishment or an illegal reprisal against the civilian population. Collective punishments are prohibited as a matter of customary international law in all forms of conflict. Under article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which governs occupations, collective punishments and all measures of intimidation are explicitly prohibited. Reprisals against civilians and their property are also prohibited under both customary law and the Fourth Geneva Convention. “Israel should understand the danger of policies that appear to justify the targeting of civilians,” Stork said. “Having suffered so much from such attacks, it should reject anything that suggests that the targeting of civilians is acceptable.” Background Israel’s Energy-Supply Cuts to Gaza Israel’s policy of reducing Gaza’s electricity began in June 2006, after a Palestinian armed group from Gaza captured the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. On June 28, the Israeli Air Force fired eight missiles at Gaza’s sole power plant, rendering the plant’s six transformers inoperable. Israel subsequently delayed or blocked the delivery of material needed to repair the plant. Today, the plant is capable of producing at 80 percent of its former capacity (80 megawatts per day out of an original capacity of 100 megawatts). The pressure intensified after Hamas took control of Gaza by force in June 2007. On September 19, the Israeli cabinet declared Gaza a “hostile territory” and decided to restrict “the passage of people to and from Gaza” and to reduce supplies of fuel and electricity. On October 28, a group of 10 Palestinian and Israeli human rights groups petitioned the Israeli Supreme Court, seeking an injunction against the fuel and electricity cuts, which they said, among other concerns, amounted to collective punishment. The court rejected the injunction request as it applied to deliveries of fuel, and Israel began to reduce its deliveries of EU-funded diesel fuel to the power plant from 2.2 million liters per week to 1.75 million liters. At the time, the power plant had 3.5 million liters of reserves to compensate for the reduced supply in diesel fuel. On November 29, in an interim decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the fuel cuts could continue because they would not cause a humanitarian crisis. At the same time, it requested more information from the state before the electricity cuts could proceed. On January 5, the low level of industrial diesel fuel reserves at the power plant forced a reduction in output. On January 18, following a surge in fighting between Israeli forces and armed Palestinian groups, Israel fully closed its borders with Gaza, denying the delivery of all food, medicine, and fuel, including humanitarian aid. On January 20, the reserves ran out and the plant stopped production altogether for two days. Two days later, the plant restarted at partial capacity after Israel allowed restricted fuel and limited humanitarian deliveries. On January 23, Hamas helped Palestinians break through sections of the wall and fence separating Gaza and Egypt, to the west of Rafah, allowing tens of thousands of Palestinians to flood into Egypt, where they bought goods, many of them essential, including fuel. Egyptian forces, with cooperation from Hamas, resealed the border on February 3. The temporary border breach did not change Gaza's near-total dependence on Israel for fuel and electricity, nor could it, given the time it takes to develop alternative energy supplies. Israel still allows fuel deliveries to come only through its Nahal Oz crossing with Gaza. On January 30, the Supreme Court issued its final ruling on the human rights groups’ petition, saying the fuel and electricity cuts could proceed, because it understood that the state was going to “fulfil the essential humanitarian needs in the Gaza Strip.” The ruling garnered little media coverage in Israel because that same day the Winograd Commission, which looked into Israel’s conduct of the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war, released its much-anticipated final report. The Supreme Court ruling said the state could do the following: • Order a reduction of up to 5 percent on three of 10 power lines (1.5 megawatts total) in the electricity sold to Gaza by Israel’s electric company; • Restrict the amount of industrial diesel for Gaza’s power plant to 2.2 million liters a week (the plant needs 3.5 million liters per week to operate at capacity); • Cut supplies of gasoline to Gaza to 75,400 liters a week (compared with 400,000 liters a week delivered in October 2007); and • Cut supplies of diesel fuel to 800,000 liters a week (compared with 1.4 million in October 2007). The Supreme Court accepted without challenge the state’s proposal to maintain a “minimum humanitarian standard,” which has no basis in international humanitarian law. Israel has never defined what constitutes Gaza’s minimum humanitarian needs, nor how it will determine if those needs were not being met. The government’s proposal is also not the appropriate standard for such a long-term occupation as Gaza’s. The court had said that two Palestinian utility officials, Rafiq Maliha, project manager at Gaza’s Power Generating Company, and Nedal Touman, an official from Gaza’s Electrical Distribution Company, could testify at the January 30 hearing regarding the affidavits they had submitted about the effects of the cuts on their operations. But on that day, the Israeli military prevented them from crossing into Israel in time to testify. Rafiq Maliha told Human Rights Watch that both men arrived at the Erez crossing at 7:30 a.m. on the day of the hearing, but they were not allowed to cross into Israel until 11:30 a.m. “When we arrived in Jerusalem, the court session was over and we were unable to give our testimonies,” Maliha said. “We were going to show the court the needs of the station from a technical side and explain for them that the amounts of fuel are insufficient for normal functioning of the station.”

Source: Human Rights Watch

Here's an article from the Jerusalem Post

quote:

Mar 3, 2008 23:19 | Updated Mar 3, 2008 23:24 Barak checks legality of options against rocket fire By REBECCA ANNA STOIL AND DAN IZENBERG Hours after pulling ground forces out of the Gaza Strip, and facing international criticism for IDF activities against the Hamas-controlled region, Defense Minister Ehud Barak held a meeting Monday evening to weigh the legal possibilities of alternative responses to continued Kassam fire against Israeli communities. Barak called together a wide range of legal experts, including Justice Minister Daniel Friedmann, Attorney-General Menahem Mazuz, IDF Military Advocate General Brig.-Gen. Avichai Mandelblit, assistant Attorney-General Shai Nitzan and the members of the Defense Ministry's Legal Adviser's office to discuss the various legal concerns, particularly those surrounding artillery fire against launch sites in populated areas. The IDF has pushed for greater freedom of action against the Kassam-launching cells, which, Barak emphasized, intentionally use houses and populated areas as platforms for firing Kassam rockets, working under the assumption that the IDF would not launch retaliatory strikes on densely populated buildings or areas. Artillery fire has been used in the past to deter and respond to Kassam launching cells, but its use was discontinued following a series of incidents, including the November 2006 shelling of two houses in Beit Hanun in which 21 Palestinians were killed. Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilna'i proposed that the IDF deploy bulldozers to destroy houses from which rockets were launched. Other proposals included a warning system, through which announcements would be distributed in the areas used by terrorists warning civilians to leave. After that, smoke bombs would be fired at the coordinates, in order to further warn civilians to depart, and only afterward would live fire be used to destroy buildings from which rockets were fired. At the end of the meeting, Friedmann was tasked with preparing a legal opinion to determine the feasibility of the various options, with an emphasis on providing a quick response to the rocket fire. In another development, the Foreign Ministry said Monday that Hamas was responsible for Palestinian civilian casualties because it used civilians as human shields. The allegation came in a background paper entitled, "Responding to Hamas Attacks from Gaza, Issues of Proportionality." "Clearly, the deliberate placing of military targets in the heart of civilian areas is a serious violation of humanitarian law, and those who chose to locate such targets in these areas must bear responsibility for the injury to civilians which the decision engenders," the paper stated. It then quoted from a book written by Tel Aviv University international law expert Prof. Yoram Dinstein, who wrote, "Should civilian casualties ensue from an attempt to shield combatants or a military objective, the ultimate responsibility lies with the belligerent placing innocent civilians at risk." Nevertheless, the Foreign Ministry continued, the "callous disregard of those who hide behind civilians does not absolve the state seeking to respond to such attacks from the responsibility to avoid or at least minimize injury to them and their property." Regarding the requirement that the injury to civilians caused by an attack must be proportional to the military advantage anticipated from the attack, the question was who was to determine the balance between civilian cost and military benefit. The paper answered this question by quoting from a report prepared by a committee established to review NATO bombings in Yugoslavia. The committee recommended that the question of proportionality be determined by "the reasonable military commander," who is effectively responsible for deciding whether to attack or refrain from attacking. Furthermore, proportionality is to be measured "not against any single specific attack but in light of the overall threat being faced," the Foreign Ministry said. Thus, "Israel's response has to be measured not only in respect to any specific cross-border attack, or even the total number of thousands of missiles and mortars which have already been fired at Israeli civilians in the vicinity of Gaza, but also against the threat posed by the stockpiles of missiles, weaponry and ammunition which Hamas still has at it disposal and threatens to use against Israel." The human rights organization B'Tselem said in response to the meeting Monday that "attacks on legitimate military targets are prohibited if they are likely to cause disproportionate harm to civilians, or to breach the duty to take caution not to harm civilians. If the military's intention is to allow shelling of general areas or whole neighborhoods from which rockets are fired, such an attack would be indiscriminate and a grave breach of the laws of war." Meanwhile, Noam Peleg, an attorney for Gisha, Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, wrote Barak and Friedmann that "fire directed at areas inhabited by civilians, even if hostilities emanate from those areas, is prohibited according to international law and can be considered a war crime." Furthermore, "the obligation to refrain from deliberate targeting of civilians or disproportional injury to civilians when attacking military targets is not conditional on the behavior of the other side," Peleg wrote.

Source: jpost.com

___________________
"The Greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." -Stephen Hawking
"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me— and there was no one left to speak out for me." -Martin Niemöller

quote:

Israel/Lebanon: Israeli Indiscriminate Attacks Killed Most Civilians No Evidence of Widespread Hezbollah ‘Shielding’ (Jerusalem, September 6, 2007) – Israel’s indiscriminate airstrikes, not Hezbollah’s shielding as claimed by Israeli officials, caused most of the approximately 900 civilian deaths in Lebanon during the July-August 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Human Rights Watch investigated more than 500 of the deaths. “Israel wrongfully acted as if all civilians had heeded its warnings to evacuate southern Lebanon when it knew they had not, disregarding its continuing legal duty to distinguish between military targets and civilians,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “Issuing warnings doesn’t make indiscriminate attacks lawful.” The 249-page report, “Why They Died: Civilian Casualties in Lebanon during the 2006 War,” represents the most extensive investigation to date of civilian deaths in Lebanon during the war. In five months of research, Human Rights Watch investigated 94 cases of air, artillery and ground attacks by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to discern the circumstances surrounding the deaths of 510 civilians and 51 combatants, nearly half the at least 1,109 Lebanese deaths during the conflict. Of the approximately 510 Lebanese civilian deaths investigated by Human Rights Watch, at least 300 were women or children. Human Rights Watch visited more than 50 Lebanese villages and interviewed 316 victims and eyewitnesses, as well as 39 military experts, journalists and Israeli, Lebanese government and Hezbollah officials. Human Rights Watch found that a simple movement of vehicles or persons – such as attempting to buy bread or moving about private homes – could be enough to cause a deadly Israeli airstrike that would kill civilians. Israeli warplanes also targeted moving vehicles that turned out to be carrying only civilians trying to flee the conflict. In most such cases documented in the report, there is no evidence of a Hezbollah military presence that would have justified the attack. “Hezbollah fighters often didn’t carry their weapons in the open or regularly wear military uniforms, which made them a hard target to identify,” Roth said. “But this doesn’t justify the IDF’s failure to distinguish between civilians and combatants, and if in doubt to treat a person as a civilian, as the laws of war require.” Human Rights Watch’s research shows that the IDF’s repeated failure to distinguish between civilians and combatants cannot be explained as mere mismanagement of the war or a collection of mistakes. The evidence suggests that Israeli officials must have known that their assumption regarding the absence of civilians in southern Lebanon was erroneous. There were numerous media reports of a continued civilian presence in the south, and Israel’s own experience in past conflicts showed that not all civilians are willing or able to leave their homes according to the timetables of a belligerent military force. In fact, despite IDF warnings, many civilians remained in southern Lebanon during the war, yet the IDF often seemed not to take that fact into account in making its targeting decisions. Indiscriminate attacks were the frequent result. The IDF also targeted people and civilian buildings associated in some way with Hezbollah’s political or social structures, regardless of whether the targets constituted valid military objectives under the laws of war, also known as international humanitarian law. Under international humanitarian law, civilian members of Hezbollah lose their protected status only if they are taking a direct part in the hostilities. Hezbollah’s political and social structures may be targeted only if they are being used for military purposes and attacking them offers a “concrete and direct” military advantage. Human Rights Watch research shows that the IDF struck a large number of private homes of civilian Hezbollah members during the war, as well as various civilian Hezbollah-run institutions such as schools, welfare agencies, banks, shops and political offices. In the densely populated southern suburbs of Beirut, Israeli warplanes attacked the offices of Hezbollah’s charitable organizations and its parliamentarians, its research center, and multi-story residential apartment buildings in areas considered supportive of Hezbollah. Statements by Israeli officials strongly suggest that the IDF deliberately hit entire neighborhoods because they were seen as pro-Hezbollah, rather than specific Hezbollah military targets as required by the laws of war. “Israel’s treatment of all parts of Hezbollah as legitimate military targets flies in the face of international legal standards and sets a dangerous precedent,” Roth said. “To accept the argument that any part of Hezbollah can be targeted because it aids the military effort would be to accept that all Israeli institutions that aid the IDF can be targeted. The end result would be a weakening of the protection of civilians.” Human Rights Watch’s on-the-ground investigation refutes the argument made by Israeli officials that most of the Lebanese civilian casualties were due to Hezbollah routinely hiding among civilians and using them as “human shields” in the fighting. Hezbollah at times did fire rockets from, and store weapons in, populated areas and deploy its forces among the civilian population. That violated its legal duty to take all feasible precautions to spare civilians the hazards of armed conflict. In a few cases documented by Human Rights Watch, these Hezbollah violations led to civilian deaths. However, in contrast to this unlawful endangering of civilians, Human Rights Watch found no evidence in these cases of the separate legal violation of shielding, which is the deliberate use of civilians to render combatants immune from attack. The various film clips and photos published by the IDF and its allies do not provide that evidence. Hezbollah also fired from the vicinity of United Nations outposts on an almost daily basis, which often led to Israeli counterstrikes. For observation purposes, the UN outposts tended to be located on hilltops, which also offered strategic positions for Hezbollah to fire at Israel. However, insofar as Hezbollah commanders or fighters chose those locations to launch attacks because the proximity of UN personnel would make counterattack difficult, that would constitute shielding. That the motives of Hezbollah combatants may have been mixed does not preclude that finding. Further investigation is needed in this regard. With these few exceptions, Human Rights Watch found that Hezbollah stored its rockets in bunkers and facilities located in uninhabited fields and valleys; ordered its fighters and civilian officials away from populated civilian areas as soon as the fighting started; and fired its rockets from pre-prepared positions outside villages. In the vast majority of airstrikes resulting in civilian deaths investigated by Human Rights Watch, there was no Hezbollah military presence or activity to justify the attack. In their investigations, Human Rights Watch researchers conducted detailed interviews with multiple witnesses, cross-checking testimony with people who had not spoken with each other and often testing it in details that would have been hard to concoct and coordinate. The researchers also conducted on-site inspections of attack sites, examining them for signs of Hezbollah presence or the types of weapons used. For each site visited, Human Rights Watch researchers photographed the site, documented any forensic evidence found, and collected the GPS coordinates. Whenever possible, Human Rights Watch researchers also visited the cemeteries where those killed in Israeli strikes were buried, to examine whether their gravestones identified them as civilians or as “martyrs” or “fighters” for Hezbollah or other armed groups. Because family members typically relished the “martyr” or “fighter” label for any loved one who died fighting, gravestones provided important evidence about who was and was not a combatant. The report makes the following main recommendations: * Israel should revise its military policies that effectively treat all persons remaining in an area following evacuation warnings as combatants, so that in the future it targets only people or structures that constitute valid military objectives under the laws of war. Israel’s Winograd Commission, in particular, should investigate this issue. * Hezbollah should take all feasible measures to ensure that Hezbollah forces do not place civilians or UN personnel at unnecessary risk by deploying in, firing from or storing weapons in populated areas. The Lebanese government should investigate these practices. (Human Rights Watch’s report on Hezbollah’s deliberate and indiscriminate rocket attacks on civilian areas of Israel also calls for the Lebanese government to investigate those practices). * The United States should investigate Israel’s use of US-supplied arms in violation of the laws of war and suspend the transfer of those arms that have been used unlawfully, as well as funding or support for such materiel, pending certification by the US State Department that Israel has stopped using such arms in violation of the law and has changed the military doctrine behind that misuse. * Syria and Iran should not transfer to Hezbollah any material, including rockets, which Hezbollah has used in violation of the laws of war, until Hezbollah commits that it will not use them as such and in fact ceases such use. * The secretary-general of the United Nations should establish an international commission of inquiry to investigate reports of violations of the laws of war by all parties to the conflict, including possible war crimes. The report builds on Human Rights Watch’s August 2006 report, “Fatal Strikes: Israel’s Indiscriminate Attacks Against Civilians in Lebanon.” In a report issued last week, Human Rights Watch addressed indiscriminate and deliberate Hezbollah rocket attacks on civilian areas of Israel in violation of the laws of war. In a forthcoming report, Human Rights Watch will address Israel’s unlawful use of cluster munitions in Lebanon during the 2006 conflict.

Source: Human Rights Watch

___________________
"The Greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." -Stephen Hawking
"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me— and there was no one left to speak out for me." -Martin Niemöller

quote:

Originally posted by shaolin_Z Source: Human Rights Watch

I agree that israel's actions by cutting power is definitely disproportionate. I definitely don't support that move. What do you feel about that comment from the humanitarian group stating that the rocket attacks are "war crimes?"

please explain how the Jerusalem post article supports what you are saying. The article actually states that Israel considers the risk of civilian deaths when attacking houses from where rockets are fired. that means they are attacking houses from which they think rockets were fired (it specifically states that they are targeting such houses). that doesn't sound like targeting civilians to me. The articles contemplates how much collateral damage they will allow in the case it occurs. collateral damage is an inevitable in any military operation and we shouldn't think that it won't occur in any military operation.

do you agree that palestinians who shot rockets from civilian areas share some blame? The benefit of doing so is two fold: one, they are hopefully protected from a full out assault because israel will refrain because it won't kill too many civilians, and two, if israel does attack and kill civilians they can post the deaths online in a public media attack. That's irresponsible on the part of palestinians.


EDIT: as to the last article, come on man! Could any other result occur from the research sample:

quote:

Human Rights Watch visited more than 50 Lebanese villages and interviewed 316 victims and eyewitnesses, as well as 39 military experts, journalists and Israeli, Lebanese government and Hezbollah officials.

I also like how the article states that hezbollah didn't use civilians as shields, yet it continues in the next paragraph to say that hezbollah used a UN post as a shield, but couldn't conclude whether that was shielding, although it could be shielding after further investigation. also, i like how they marginalized the fact that hezbollah stored ammunition in civilian areas and operated from civilian villages. It's hard to take an article like that serious because they marginalize the main reason Israel even kills civilians (which i'm not denying).

quote:

With these few exceptions, Human Rights Watch found that Hezbollah stored its rockets in bunkers and facilities located in uninhabited fields and valleys

yeah, i'm sure your interview of hezbollah officials and villagers sympathetic to hezbollah (especially after the war) would undercover that hezbollah was using civilian areas as military outposts.


As with everything in life, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle. contrary to what you think, israel has no advantage to purposefully killing civilians. it creates more pressure for them and doesn't enable them to effectively fight against the palestinians who are attacking israel.

Last edited by jerZ07002 on Mar-09-2008 at 17:45

There's no point in arguing if you "don't have the time" or are too lazy to read releveant and central material to the issue or are simply not going to ignore previous posts that completey destory the framework of your argument. Which is why I guess you're still respondin g the way you are.

___________________
"The Greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." -Stephen Hawking
"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me— and there was no one left to speak out for me." -Martin Niemöller

quote:

Originally posted by jerZ07002 I also like how the article states that hezbollah didn't use civilians as shields, yet it continues in the next paragraph to say that hezbollah used a UN post as a shield, but couldn't conclude whether that was shielding, although it could be shielding after further investigation. also, i like how they marginalized the fact that hezbollah stored ammunition in civilian areas and operated from civilian villages. It's hard to take an article like that serious because they marginalize the main reason Israel even kills civilians (which i'm not denying). yeah, i'm sure your interview of hezbollah officials and villagers sympathetic to hezbollah (especially after the war) would undercover that hezbollah was using civilian areas as military outposts.

What military force has not ever engaged in battle in urban areas? To think that deploying in such areas is akin to using "civilian shields" is ludacris. Anyways, the fact that Israel launched an all-out assault on Lebanon just for two Israeli captives really boggles the mind. It's got to be one of the stupidest strategic moves I have seen any country do; almost on the level of the Bush admin's invasion of Iraq.

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Originally posted by shaolin_Z There's no point in arguing if you "don't have the time" or are too lazy to read releveant and central material to the issue or are simply not going to ignore previous posts that completey destory the framework of your argument. Which is why I guess you're still respondin g the way you are.

b/c i said that i don't have the time in the post.

just because my interpretation of the articles doesn't fit within your warped perception of what the article said doesn't mean i ignored anything or that i was too lazy to read it. considering there are numerous people who disagree with most of your positions, perhaps the incorrect stance is the one you are taking.

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Originally posted by jerZ07002 b/c i said that i don't have the time in the post. just because my interpretation of the articles doesn't fit within your warped perception of what the article said doesn't mean i ignored anything or that i was too lazy to read it. considering there are numerous people who disagree with most of your positions, perhaps the incorrect stance is the one you are taking.

Zionism has necessarily required theft (illegal expansion and annexation), genocide, and displacement since day one. That hasn't changed at all since over the course of the decades. End of story. But of course you're going to ignore that once again.

___________________
"The Greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." -Stephen Hawking
"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me— and there was no one left to speak out for me." -Martin Niemöller

quote:

Originally posted by Krypton What military force has not ever engaged in battle in urban areas? To think that deploying in such areas is akin to using "civilian shields" is ludacris. Anyways, the fact that Israel launched an all-out assault on Lebanon just for two Israeli captives really boggles the mind. It's got to be one of the stupidest strategic moves I have seen any country do; almost on the level of the Bush admin's invasion of Iraq.

it's a matter of degree. what's the difference between shouting at israelis from a school with children in it so that the israelis don't shoot back, or shooting at israelis with a child in your arms. nothing really.

quote:

Originally posted by shaolin_Z Zionism has necessarily required theft (illegal expansion and annexation), genocide, and displacement since day one. That hasn't changed at all since over the course of the decades. End of story. But of course you're going to ignore that once again.

incorrigible. end of story.

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Originally posted by jerZ07002 incorrigible. end of story.

So you approve of a premeditated agenda to brutally coerce, displace, and "ethnically cleanse" the indigenous population to aquire their land? Okay, I guess that says everything.

___________________
"The Greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge." -Stephen Hawking
"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me— and there was no one left to speak out for me." -Martin Niemöller

quote:

Originally posted by shaolin_Z So you approve of a premeditated agenda to brutally coerce, displace, and "ethnically cleanse" the indigenous population to aquire their land? Okay, I guess that says everything.

no. but that's not what i've been saying at all. you are ignoring my comments and making emotional pleas about something that can't be changed.