War Crimes In Gaza
AP, of all terrorist-enabling, Israel-bashing news agencies, locates some Palestinians who confirm that Hamas was firing mortars from the vicinity of the school, and other aspects of the IDF’s story:
GAZA CITY, Gaza – Israeli mortar shells exploded Tuesday near a U.N. school in Gaza that was sheltering hundreds of people displaced by Israel’s onslaught against Hamas militants, killing at least 30 Palestinians, tearing bodies apart and staining streets with blood.
Israel’s military said its shelling — the deadliest single episode since Israeli ground forces invaded Gaza Saturday — was a response to mortar fire from within the school and said Hamas militants were using civilians as cover.
Two residents of the area who spoke by telephone said they saw a small group of militants firing mortar rounds from a street near the school, where 350 people had gathered to get away from the shelling. They spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
Sounds like a lede to me, but AP didn’t think so. You have to go another 17 Israel-bashing graphs before you get to this:
An Israeli military statement said it received intelligence that the dead at the girls school included Hamas operatives, among them members of a rocket launching cell. It identified two of them as Imad Abu Askar and Hassan Abu Askar.
That’s getting pretty specific.
Two residents who spoke to an AP reporter by phone said the two brothers were known to be low-level Hamas militants. They said a group of militants — one of them said four — were firing mortar shells from near the school.
An Israeli shell targeted the men, but missed and they fled, the witnesses said, refusing to allow their names to be published because they feared for their safety. Then another three shells landed nearby, exploding among civilians, they said.
Palestinian militants have frequently fired from residential areas in the past.
I’m pretty sure if Israel was drawing fire on a girls school, it would lede. Big war crime. Now that I think of it, Israeli firing is all that ever does lede. Anyway, looks like someone needs to stick his trotter in his mouth:
By Cernig
The Israeli Defense Force has shelled a UN school in the Gaza strip, killing 30 and injuring 55. Israel claims that Hamas militants were using the school as a base to mortar their troops, but the UN says that all the dead and injured were civilians. Even if the IDF were correct, something the Right accepts unquestioningly because the IDF never, ever lies like their enemies do, then Israel would only be responding to Hamas’ war crime by committing another war crime. You can’t get to the moral high ground - let alone win a COIN operation - by allowing the rules of war to be set by barbarians, something that the intellectually and morally bankrupt Right never seems to acknowledge.
And there are good reasons to believe that the IDF is simply lying as part of a propaganda war it admits has been eight months in the planning …
You know, it’s one thing to be an amateur. Brave new world, there’s a lot of them out there, some even doing good work. It’s another thing to be an ignorant amateur. Then you’ve got stupid and ignorant.
He’s got a point, though, about Israelis never, ever lying like their enemies do. Their enemies, and ours, are usually much more flamboyant, outlandish, exaggerated and prefer more flowery language. Their misinformation is usually intentional.
Hot Air: “It’d take an ‘enlightened’ progressive indeed to believe the IDF would lob artillery shells at a school just for giggles.” We have a winner!
Malkin, about that “school.”
Topics: Israel, Palestinians, media
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 11:19 pm on Tuesday, January 6, 2009
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October 13th, 2009 at 7:06 am
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