3.11.06

Israel, the neighbour's Cooking-Pot and other illogical categories

The story goes like this:
One day a woman lended her neighbour a cooking-pot. Months passed and the pot was not returned. The woman went inquiring for the cooking pot. The neighbour first started by denying that he had ever borrowed a cooking pot from her. Then he declared that the cooking pot had a hole in its bottom and was not convenient for cooking. Finally he said that he had never seen such a cooking-pot and didn't know what his neighbour was talking about.

Every time Israel commits violations to the rules of war and violations of human rights it follows this illogic.
Yesterday, the Israeli Occupation Forces shot at women who came to the village of Beit Hanoun to protect Palestinain men (sons, brothers and husbands) who were besieged in a mosque. The women carried a white flag. According to their account:

''Elham Hamad, 48, said she left her house in Beit Hanoun at 5am yesterday with two of her daughters-in-law to join the march into the centre of the town. Her son Mazen, 30, like hundreds of other men from the town had been held by Israeli troops for questioning.
"There were about 30 women in our group, all in the main street. We were moving into the town and passing by the Israeli tanks. We carried two white flags. They didn't ask us to stop and then suddenly we saw them shooting at us," she said. "I was hit but there were no ambulances. We were calling for them but there was nothing." Her husband found a donkey cart and put the injured women on the back and led them out of the town to waiting ambulances. Mrs Hamad was hit on the forehead and in the left shoulder and was yesterday being treated at the al-Ouda hospital in Gaza.''


What the IOF and israeli authorities had to say about the killing ?

Follow the cooking-pot story:

First: Israel's military denied shooting at women.
''The Israeli military said its operation was against militants who have been launching crude Qassam rockets from Gaza into Israel. The military said it was investigating reports that women had been shot....''

Second: Israeli military said gunmen were hiding between the women and that the women intended to free the besieged gunmen.
''...but said its snipers identified hitting eight gunmen who were hiding among the crowd of women.''
''A spokesman for the Israel Defence Force said the women had marched towards the mosque intending to free the gunmen holed up inside.''

Third: My bet is that an investigation by Israel will conclude to the non existence of women at that moment around the mosque of Beit Hanoun when shots were fired by its soldiers. Israel will be able to produce a video showing no women around the mosque (remember the shooting of a Palestinian family on a beach few months back ?), accuse the press of doctoring the pictures and ultimately proclaim its right to defend itself while accusing its critics of anti-semitism and holocaust denial. Hence, the very careful declaration of UK foreign secretary Margaret Beckett who knows very well the story of the cooking pot:
"Israel has a right to defend itself but any action should be proportionate and in accordance with international humanitarian law"

UPDATE:
The human cost of the six day Israeli incursion of Beith Hanoun. Total Hubris !

12 comments:

Dr Victorino de la Vega said...

Hi Sophie, Behem,

Sorry for my radio silence: I'm currently moving houses and won't have any proper internet connection before mid-November…

Re: Israel, Have you read the stuff that man writes?

I’ve rarely seen something as powerful in the blogosphere: the guy is sort of a cross between Gintzburg circa 1955 and Ed Said!

Spk ltr,

Dr V

Texas Bankruptcy Nerd said...

YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY RIGHT!

God help me if my actions are ever caught by the piercing eye of Sophia.

Sophia said...

Behemoth,

In my own work, I have to spot all the time my illogical categories and correct my thinking.

Sophia said...

Victor,
You may be right about the guy but still the langauge shocks me.

Anonymous said...

Sophia
you have compared Gaza to Warsaw Ghetto and Zionists to Nazis. May I use the current events to distinguish:

In Gaza, Hamas ran to a mosque b/c Israel would not invade a mosque. Also Hamas called women to be human shields, because Israelis would not shoot women.

Nazis herded innocent Jewish men and women INTO synagoguges and burn the buildings down with Jews in them.

Texas Bankruptcy Nerd said...

Israelis would not shoot women?

Now what should lead anyone with even a goldfish's memory to believe that pearl of wisdom?

Sophia said...

Anonymous,

These women had their sons, brothers and husbands inside the mosque. Hamas did not call the women to shield the men. It was the women who decided to march toward te mosque to protect their men. I would have domne the same thing if I had a relative besieged in this mosque by the most brutal army in the world.

It is insensitive to blame these women for their courage. They went there to protect their sons and their husbands. And what is this habit of yours to always blame the victims ?

Israel is killing Palestinian men en masse (if you go to my links, at the end you will find a post on the alleged use of children by Palestinians in which Israeli army charts show that there is clearly an intent in Israel's actions of targeting young Palestinian men), in herds and is making a global war on Islam while polishing its public image. Killing men inside a mosque is no different fronm what israel is doing now.
Please save your advocacy for another site.

Texas Bankruptcy Nerd said...

Actually, Israel's next doublespeak strategy is to find some "Westernized" Palestinian person to say that women keep AK-47 under their clothes.

Anonymous said...

anonymous,

you may not have a memory but do you know a little math?

The oh so humanitarian Israelies have killed "43" Palestinians since Wednesday? How many have the murerous Hamas and their female shiled killed? "0"!

You may be comfortable with your head deeply stuck in sand; but prolonged lack of oxygen turns a brain dead!

Anonymous said...

Naj - there is at least one Israeli soldier dead and more are injured. And Hamas has tried to kill many more. This morning a female suicide bomber blew herself up near a group of Israeli soldiers.

Anonymous said...

E,
I don't see the point of comparison here? So you like me to give a medal of honor to Israel for not treating Palestinians in the way Nazis treated Jews? Someday history will render a judgement about the Palestinan ghetto of Gaza.

Julie,

A WOMAN blew HERSELF up next to soldiers! ASK YOURSELF WHY? Just ask yourselves WHY???

Anonymous said...

e,

I am all for a productive life. I say, how about creating a new state for Palestinians. Or better yet, how about integrating them and their homes in the state of Israel and treating them with human dignity?

I am sorry about half of your family being killed by Germans. Perhaps you have forgiven them because the Germans did apologize; did acknowlege their horrendous deeds; and did not go about the world justifying how they killed Jews in self-defense, and in the name of the survival of their "culture" and "supremacy"!

And for clarification, I did not in ANY POINT IN TIME make any comparison between Gaza and Warsaw; I am not going to admit to strange comparisons that YOU fabricated! So these are not MY allegations! It is YOU who create a phantom enemy and fight it and call yourself justified in so doing! It is quite abhoring how you use the name of your own dead to seek moral amnesty! Speaking of western backfiring, in your shoes I'd be watching for that!

Sophia, forgive me; I don't intend to debate these people in your blog; but you had a point about them being dishonest liars! I'll make sure I will not create a forum for nonsense by conversing with these zion-fascists anymore.

 
Since March 29th 2006