Why there continue to be doubts

[Wayne Johnson]

>From BBC - Worldviews, the following sad stories.

I guess we could use some of these articles as examples of how other 
(Allied) military forces treat their foes.  The 21st Century is certainly 
off to a piss poor start.  If Abu Ghraib MPs and IDF idiots are our 
future....the 21st C will messily morph into the 13th.



wgj





For the Israel Defense Forces, December has gotten off to a very rough 
start, as discussion has reached a fever pitch over several controversial 
incidents that have taken place in recent weeks involving members of 
Israel's proud and image-conscious military.

First, there was the audio recording that surfaced "of an Israeli [army] 
officer pumping the body of a 13-year-old [Palestinian] girl full of bullets 
and then saying he would have shot her even if she had been three years 
old." Then there were "the pictures in an Israeli newspaper of 
ultra-orthodox soldiers mocking Palestinian corpses by impaling a man's head 
on a pole and sticking a cigarette in his mouth." (Guardian) And in recent 
days, conflicting reports have emerged about just what happened when Wissam 
Tayam, a young Palestinian musician, tried to make a routine crossing of the 
Israeli-controlled Beit Iba checkpoint near Nablus, in the West Bank, early 
last month.

A videotape made by a human rights organization that monitors the Israel 
Defense Forces' treatment of persons making their way through checkpoints 
between Israeli and occupied Palestinian territories caught what appeared to 
be IDF personnel forcing Tayam to open his violin case and play his 
instrument for them before they would let him pass. But an army 
investigation of the disputed incident refuted that version of events. 
(Ha'aretz) As a result, the head of the IDF's central command "said ... the 
soldiers had shown a lack of sensitivity but not a lack of respect, nor did 
they intend to ridicule Tayam." (Israel Insider)

Tayam, who lives in a West Bank refugee camp, studies music at university in 
Nablus. He told an Israeli reporter, "They asked me to open the case and 
show them the instrument, which was fine by me. But then they asked me to 
play; I did not offer to play." He said the incident made him feel 
"humiliated" and added, "I always identified with the Jews who suffered in 
Europe [at the time of the Nazis], and after that they come and do the same 
thing to us." (Ha'aretz) Tayam also pointed out that, had the IDF soldiers 
feared his violin case might have contained explosives, they would have 
asked him to step back and play his instrument at a distance, which, 
apparently, they did not do. (BBC)

The video footage of Tayam playing his violin for the checkpoint personnel 
as they inspected his documents "sparked a debate in Israel, where some 
media compared the army's conduct to Nazi coercion of Jewish musicians 
during the Holocaust." The images of Tayam performing for the soldiers 
reminded some Israelis that "[c]oncentration-camp prisoners were forced to 
perform classical music for their Nazi guards [during] World War II." (BBC)

Yoram Kaniuk, the author of a book about a Jewish violinist who was forced 
to perform for a Nazi concentration-camp commander, wrote in the daily 
Yedioth Ahronoth "that the soldiers responsible [for the Tayam incident] 
should be put on trial 'not for abusing Arabs but for disgracing the 
Holocaust.'" Kaniuk wrote, "Of all the terrible things done at the 
roadblocks, this story is one which negates the very possibility of the 
existence of Israel as a Jewish state. If [the IDF] does not put these 
soldiers on trial, we will have no moral right to speak of ourselves as a 
state that rose from the Holocaust." (cited in the Guardian)

Even the right-wing Jerusalem Post featured an op-ed piece by 
Jerusalem-based writer Noga Tarnopolsky headlined "The Army Has Lost Its 
Way." In it, Tarnopolsky observed that "Captain R.," the IDF soldier who 
shot the Palestinian schoolgirl, "should have gone home and awaited his 
trial [but] instead spun a web of lies around his soldiers' and his own 
behavior, ensnaring even his own all-too-gullible commanders." But an 
investigative-news program on Isareli TV dug up "audiotapes that 
incriminated Captain R and proved his malfeasance." Nevertheless, 
Tarnopolsky noted, the IDF's investigation of the killing, "it almost goes 
without saying, accepted R.'s version of the events." Tarnopolsky was moved 
by the voice of another soldier caught on the audiotape, who can be heard 
saying, "She's a little girl, maybe 10," and then, "in a chilling choice of 
phrase," adds, "She's scared to death." (Jerusalem Post)

"In another era," Tarnopolsky noted, "this scandal might have brought about 
a resignation. It would have been a convincing indication that for the IDF, 
the death of an innocent child on the way to school ... is not a matter to 
be taken lightly. Instead, [IDF Chief of Staff] Ya'alon did what any 
third-rate celebrity would do: He blamed the media. 'The tape was badly 
edited,' [he] whimpered."

Referring to the schoolgirl's shooting and, by implication, to other recent 
events that have tarnished the IDF's image, Tarnopolsky pleaded, "What the 
hell has gone wrong?" (Jerusalem Post)

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Michael Eisenstadt" <michaele@hotpop.com>
To: <austin-ghetto-list@pairlist.net>
Sent: Tuesday, December 07, 2004 6:11 PM
Subject: Re: grounds for optimism in the Zionist entity-Palestinian problem


> Wayne,
>
> well, apparently you didnt read or didnt understand
> my original message.
>
> No terrorist attacks in Israel for months. Egypt &
> Israel & possibly moderate Palestinians cooperating.
> Religious fanatics reduced to accepting truce.
>
> None of this got through to you apparently. You'd
> rather envisage never ending disaster on the jews
> there. Where is that coming from? Maybe you
> are a bit shall we say conflicted about Israel and
> its citizens.
>
> Regards to Honor,
>
> Mike
>
>
>
>