The
Killing Fields Of Rafah
By Gideon Levy
Haaretz
02 December, 2003
Quietly, far from the public eye, Israeli
soldiers continue killing Palestinians. Hardly a day goes by without
casualties, some innocent civilians, and the stories of their violent
deaths never reach the Israeli consciousness or awareness. If there
is one consistent piece of data in the current intifada, it is the number
of Palestinian casualties: dozens a month, unceasingly.
There were 30 in November, 57 in October, 33 in September. In May and
June, the number of casualties reached 60 a month (all data supplied
by
B'Tselem). While Palestinian terror shocks us with its brutality, the
daily killing of innocent Palestinians in far greater numbers is ignored
- unless it is a case of an army operation as in Nusseirat refugee camp
in October.
Here's a list of
victims from the last month, taken from the margins of the daily newspaper
chronicles: A 32-year-old motorcyclist shot to death in the chest after
soldiers said he tried to escape a checkpoint near Iskar refugee camp;
a 10-year-old boy from Sejaya in Gaza who was bird hunting with a slingshot
near the separation fence around Gaza, killed by a tank shell fired
at him; an eighth-grader from Barukin, near Jenin, who threw stones
at soldiers, shot dead; a youth shot to death during "disturbances"
after the funeral of his
friend in Jenin; a taxi driver and father of six shot to death in Tul
Karm by soldiers who thought he was trying to get away; a 15-year-old
killed in Yata during some arrests; a nine-year-old killed by IDF fire
in Rafah; and three Palestinians who were on their way to the holiday
dinner last Wednesday in Gaza, killed by soldiers who claimed they thought
the three were an armed cell.
The IDF admitted
the next day that they were "accidentally" killed. But a day
later, Brigadier General Gad Shamni, commander of the Gaza forces in
the Strip hurried to say the soldiers actually behaved correctly. Even
though three innocent people were killed, he didn't even think it was
a mistake.
Life in the killing
fields of Rafah, for example, is as cheap as the hundreds of houses
that have been demolished there for various, strange reasons. Just a
few days ago, the IDF demolished the home of someone in their custody
whom the army claimed was responsible for the smuggling tunnels. There's
no need for blood on the hands to justify demolishing a person's house
in the current intifada. Only someone who has lately visited Rafah can
understand how cheap life has become in this remote place, where there's
practically no building that has not been damaged.
Last weekend, the
BBC broadcast a program titled "When the killing is easy"
about the killing of British TV cameraman James Miller, the death of
International Solidarity Movement volunteer Rachel Corrie under a bulldozer,
and the shooting of ISM peace activist Tom Hurndall, who has been rendered
a vegetable by his injuries. All three incidents happened within a few
weeks in Rafah.
The TV cameras caught
Miller walking in the night to his death: wearing a flak vest marked
with fluorescent ink identifying him as a journalist, white flag in
hand, walking slowly and cautiously, calling out to the soldiers in
the armored personnel car facing him so they calm down. Then, the sound
of a shot in the
dark, and then another and Miller falls, dying in the dirt. The single
bullet that struck his neck was well-aimed.
The soldiers in
the APC had the best night vision equipment and it is difficult to assume
that they were unable to identify their victim as a journalist. Maybe
they did not want to kill a journalist, maybe they thought it was a
Palestinian pretending to be a journalist, but there is no doubt he
was not endangering any of their lives inside the APC. They could have
warned him to halt, they could have only wounded him. Hurndall was also
an innocent victim of the easy fire. A bullet struck him in the head
and he's now a vegetable.
In effect, there
is no difference between how Miller was killed, how Hurndall was wounded
and how the three Palestinians were shot dead last Wednesday, except
for the fact that a movie was made about Hurndall and Miller, because
they are not Palestinians. When soldiers know they will not be prosecuted
- and usually no investigation will even take place - for
killing an innocent foreign photographer or innocent Palestinians on
their way to a festive dinner, they are getting a license to kill from
their commanders.
In the eyes of a
soldier's commander, at most he made a mistake. When Brigadier General
Shamni announced his soldiers operated "correctly" by
killing three unarmed residents, he paved the way for the next unnecessary
killing.
If there's no investigation
and no punishment, it means nothing wrong happened. If the pilots are
allowed to kill 10 civilians for a single wanted man, obviously the
killing of a single innocent resident is inconsequential. Thus the
line blurs between killing and murder. What was the sniper's bullet
that struck Miller in the neck? In the complacent response, the IDF's
senior command sends a worrisome message to its soldiers. No instruction
booklet about what is allowed and not allowed and no day of discussion
about "respecting human dignity" that certain units in the
territories have lately taken will erase the damage of the sweeping
license to kill that the IDF grants 19-year-olds in the territories.