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Posted on 10/07/2002 5:45:36 PM PDT by RCW2001
The U.S. government called on Israel Monday to investigate the circumstances surrounding the deaths of 14 Palestinians killed during an IDF operation in the Gaza Strip earlier in the day.
"We call on the Israeli military to investigate the circumstances surrounding these deaths and we expect immediate steps to be taken to prevent the recurrence of tragic incidents such as these," U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said, telling a daily briefing that the U.S. government was "deeply troubled" with the outcome of the operation.
"Israeli operations were undertaken in crowded civilian areas and involved firing on a medical facility. It's very important that Israeli forces do their utmost to act in a manner that avoids harm to civilians and humanitarian facilities," Boucher said.
Fourteen Palestinians were killed and dozens wounded when IDF tanks backed by helicopters raided a Palestinian neighborhood in the Gaza Strip early Monday morning, with the Palestinians insisting all were civilians, and the IDF equally adamant that all but one were armed militants.
Several hours later, IDF troops fired assault rifles and machine guns into Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis, where hundreds of people had gathered to learn about the fate of relatives, witnesses said. Four more people were wounded by army fire at the hospital, including a 14-year-old boy hit in the neck and a paramedic wounded in the chest.
Israeli security officials called the operation "very important" and "obligatory" in striking at a Hamas stronghold that Israel had refrained from attacking since the start of the uprising more than two years ago.
Also Monday, Palestinians said that IDF troops had shot dead a 42-year-old Palestinian man near the West Bank city of Nablus.
"The moment that the army went in there, they were fired on from every window and every opening, so our soldiers had to do the job," said Deputy Defense Minister Weizman Shiri. "The most militant of Hamas men are located there, and if damage was caused to innocent civilians, we can be sorry, but what can you do - this is war."
"They made this massacre against our people," Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat said at the start of a meeting in his West Bank headquarters with Javier Solana, the European Union's foreign policy chief.
Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer issued a statement saying most of the Palestinian dead in the assault in
the town of Khan Younis were "armed men who shot at our forces." He also said that the raid was mounted to "stop terrorist attacks and arrest Hamas terrorists".
The operation began in the pre-dawn hours, when Givati Brigade infantry troops, combat engineers and more than two dozen IDF tanks and armored vehicles rumbled into the al-Amal neighbourhood west of Khan Yunis.
After a single missile was fired at a house in the area, viewed as a stronghold of Hamas activity, the troops were met by a volley of fire from Palestinian gunmen and a gunfight ensued. The circumstances of the raid were not clear, though the army said before the operation began that Palestinian militants had fired a rocket at a nearby settlement, causing no casualties.
But as troops began to pull out of the area several hours
later, a helicopter fired a second missile which struck close to a crowd of Palestinians who had ventured out of their shelters to return home, killing several people, witnesses and medics said.
Brigadier-General Yisrael Ziv, commander of the IDF's Gaza Division, said Monday that the neighborhood was a Hamas "nest of terror" and that an initial investigation showed that IDF forces had aimed only at armed men.
Ziv dismissed reports that the casualties were local residents en route to mosque services.
The missile strike came at the end of the four-hour incursion. Residents said people came out into the streets around 4:30 A.M. (02:30 GMT) when they heard the tanks pulling out, but two helicopters remained overhead, and one of them fired the missile.
Abed Ouda, 29, said he was parking his car when the missile struck. "I heard a huge explosion," he said, "and people were wounded and bleeding on the ground in front of my car."
Dr. Mohammed Abu Dallal from the Nasser hospital said two of the dead were killed in the gunbattle, while at least seven more "were killed as a result of the missile fire."
An IDF source confirmed an operation was taking place in the area but would not give details.
Erekat denounces raid as massacre
Palestinian Minister Saeb Erekat denounced the Israeli raid as a massacre and called on the international community to protect the Palestinians.
Erekat said he believed the raid was timed to disrupt the visit of Javier Solana, the foreign policy chief of the European Union, to the region.
"Every time we witness efforts to revive the peace process and put it back on track, like those being exerted now by Solana, the Israeli government moves to conduct such war crimes and murder innocent civilians because the end game of the Israeli government is to resume full occupation of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank," he said.
A senior aide to Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, called for an international peace-keeping force to protect the Palestinians.
"This is a crime that proves that Israel should be punished and isolated. There should be international sanctions. Israel is sabotaging efforts by the Quartet and the U.S. to revive peace efforts," he told reporters in Ramallah.
That is the stupidest statement ever! If your enemy is hiding behind churches, hospitals, and little kids, then it's their fault when bad things happen to their people. It's Israel's fault that the Pallies chose to put those people in harm's way? Whatever. Doing this sort of thing to artificially generate civilian casualties is a classic muslim tactic.
I don't understand this constant beration of Israel. Who the hell are we to scold them for taking means to protect themselves?
I'm sick of this illogical, unGodly and infuriating policy of kissing the ass that s***s on us.
Un-effen believable.
When did anybody announce this as a massacre:
 LAST SUMMER ITAMAR'S SHABO FAMILY WAS DESTROYED BY "FRIGHTENED" ARAB NEIGHBORS (from above right)- Rachel [killed], Avishai [killed], Boaz, Meir, Yariv (bottom)- Avia [wounded], Tzvika [killed], Asael [wounded], Neria [killed], Atara |
For lighter fare I might suggest.
“Hamam in Amsterdam”
The comic trials of an Egyptian émigré whose struggle to make it in Europe is thwarted at every turn by a bad guy called Yehuda.
“A Girl from Israel”,
The father of the Israeli seductress is portrayed as a satanic manipulator. When the naive Egyptian youth’s father—a man who has a habit of quoting sagely from “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion”—washes after shaking hands with the devilish Israeli, the water runs red.
Did the amazon dyke attorney general Janet the Rhino or her traitor boss Clinton ever stand trial for ordering the feds to lob C4 gas into the waco building? C4 gas is fatal to children. Nobody was ever prosecuted for these crimes. This is justice?
The Bush administration swept all the crimes committed by the traitor in chief Clinton regime under the rug. Now they are calling for little Israel to stop defending themselves and to just lay down and die in the face of muslim murderers.
This insanity must stop soon. This pandering to musliim butchers and calling this war that islam declared on the world a war against 'terror' must end because America faces nuclear holocaust whether we know it or not.
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