Posted on 09/03/2002 5:20:12 AM PDT by MadIvan
Israel's Supreme Court has approved the expulsion of relatives of a Palestinian militant from the West Bank to the Gaza Strip.
In a landmark ruling, a nine-judge panel upheld an order issued last month against the brother and sister of a Palestinian suspected of organising suicide bombings.
It said a third Palestinian related to another militant suspected of two shooting attacks near a Jewish settlement in the West Bank should be set free.
Palestinian officials called the decision a "black day for human rights" and said they might file a complaint with the UN Security Council and the International Criminal Court.
The militant Palestinian group Hamas called the ruling a "grave escalation" which "will be met by an escalation in the Palestinian resistance".
The three accused had appealed against the order, saying it was a form of collective punishment and violated international law.
Israel said the move was intended to deter future attacks by Palestinian militants.
Militant helped
The Israeli army said the brother and sister - 28-year-old Kifah and 34-year-old Intisar Ajouri - knew in advance about their brother Ali's plan to carry out attacks but did not act to prevent them.
The two are accused of providing logistical support for their brother, helping him avoid capture and having moved bombs.
The Israeli army (IDF) said Ali Ajouri masterminded several suicide attacks, including one in Tel Aviv on 17 July, 2002, which killed five people and wounded 40 others.
The IDF said Intisar had sewn explosives into a belt used by a suicide bomber in one of the attacks.
Ali Ajouri was shot dead by Israeli troops on 6 August, 2002.
The court said that it "had proved that they [the Ajouris] were involved in terrorism to the extent required such that they presented a reasonable possibility of danger".
It ruled that the Ajouris could be expelled from their home in the Iskar refugee camp in Nablus to the Gaza Strip for two years.
But the judges overturned an expulsion order against Abdel Nasser Asidi, the brother a militant accused of two West Bank ambushes which killed 19 Israelis.
Burden of proof
In handing down the ruling, Chief Justice Aharon Barak said Israel could only expel a suspected militant's relative if they presented a real security threat.
Legal experts say the decision means Israel cannot expel people merely to deter future attacks, and that the army will have to provide proof of some form of involvement before it can issue expulsion orders.
"The court ruled with a loud voice that deterrence cannot be a cause to take steps. This is a very, very positive point," said the Ajouris' lawyer Leah Tzemel.
The order against the Ajouris has been condemned by human rights organisations, who say it contravenes the Geneva Conventions and therefore constitutes a war crime - a charge that Israel denies.
The judges said they had not breached international law because the West Bank and Gaza formed one territorial unit and the orders were relocations rather than expulsions.
If the expulsions are carried out it will be the first time Israel has expelled a Palestinian from the area in which they live for 10 years.
Such sophistry with words.
I believe any property seized from innocent Japanese who were interred during WWII should be immediately returned to them.
Same principle. Justice. What is it to you if someone gets back what's theirs? What's wrong with trying to see justice done?
Send me some more clintonian weasel-words....I get a kick out of watching the convolutions in your morality.
Sorry. While I could easily deal with your arguments, I refuse to do so since you feel my morality is questionable. Simply put, further discussion would be pointless.
Perhaps the next time we debate you will be less quick to try to insult.
After reviewing your words and deciding that you were straight up with me throughout, I'd like to admit that I was entirely too hard on you above.
I apologize for mischaracterizing your words and intentions.
(ps: not Jewish....but you were nonetheless right...I over-reacted to something I thought I saw in your posts. It wasn't there today when I reread them. Sorry.)
Now, as to your concerns above.....
I believe any property seized from innocent Japanese who were interred during WWII should be immediately returned to them.
We agree on this. However, I'm sure you will agree that the comparison is not really on point. For one thing, the Japanese did not deliberately target civilians and especially children. And most, if not all, Japanese-Americans did not applaud the murder of innocent American citizens, much less American servicemen and women. If they had done so, the outrage of the American public would have been such that few Japanese-Americans would have survived.
Same principle. Justice. What is it to you if someone gets back what's theirs? What's wrong with trying to see justice done?
Let's assume that the principle is "Justice". Again I have to ask the question, who decides and how is it accomplished from a practical point of view?
Let me give you an example. According to Arab accounts, in 1948 the Jews drove the Arabs out and these Arabs and their decendents are entitled to "return". Yet, to allow them to return would destroy the Jewish character of the State. In contrast, the Israelis claim that the Arabs left of their own free will despite Israeli pleas not to leave. They left because they were promised that after the invading Arab armies slaughtered the Jews, these Arabs could return and steal the property of the dead Jews (much like Europeans did to those who were murdered during the Holocaust. When some of the Jews did return to their former homes, the Christians living in them murdered the Jews so that they could keep their homes).
Now, who decides what justice is in this case and how do you go about arranging it?
Also, there is something to be said for, for lack of a better word, "collective guilt".
Take, for example, the recent killing of Salah Shehada, the head of Hamas military wing. Israel killed him with a 1 ton bomb which also killed a number of "innocent" civilians. The world screamed in protest (something they have not done when Jews are blown to bits). Here's a statement from Shoshana Bryen of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs: "If "the people" don't believe evil leaders are using them against their own best interests; and if "the people" like having Shehada and his goons among them; and if "the people" do as Hamas said they would, i.e., turn them into human torches so that restaurants in Israel will run with Jewish blood, they and we will have to accept that "the people" are morally inseparable from "their leaders". And there are consequences to all of that." I don't know about you, but I can certainly see her point. Is it justice? I don't know. What is the price we must pay for "moral laxity" in the face of evil? What about when the evil exists amongst us and we do nothing? What about when our leaders are the ones perpetrating the evil?
When Bill Clinton bombed the Serbs, I was outraged. But, I didn't do anything more than verbally protest. Had the Serbs decided to "revenge themselves" by attacking American citizens, G-D forbid, I would have also been outraged, but I think I might have understood their anger/motivation.
Bottom line, it is sometimes difficult to know what justice is and how best to achieve it.
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