Ray Cook - As I See It

Israel, Zionism and the Media

Tag: IDF (Page 2 of 3)

Ging, Ging. Gone Native

19/03/2010 / / 0 Comments

As EU foreign policy chief, Baroness Ashton, arrived in Gaza to view the situation and make some pointless noise to demonstrate she was doing something,  the head of UNRWA, John Ging was making outrageous claims about Israel’s so-called ‘blockade’.

UNWRA is the UN Relief Agency which for 60 years has been dedicated ONLY to Palestinian refugees and the the 3 or 4 generations of their descendants since 1948. As such, it is totally separate from the UN’s main refugee organisation and is the only UN body set up to deal with a single issue.

It just so happens that most of UNWRA’s workers in Gaza are Palestinians and it has been shown, by various reports, and by its own admission, that some, if not many, of these workers are members of Hamas or other terrorist groups.

During Operation Cast Lead John Ging became world famous for his interviews including a notorious one where he claimed that the Israelis had killed dozens of people in a school when he later had to admit that it was about 7 (who were ‘militants’) outside the school.

As a member of the UN, Ging should be politically neutral. If he chooses to criticise Israel he should be careful about his facts and not do the propaganda job of militants and murderers and Israel bashers.

This is what he had to say yesterday, as reported by the BBC:

We have to have action. A thousand days and a thousand nights of a medieval siege is far too much. It’s a shame – it’s a disgrace

What! A medieval siege? Does this man know what a medieval siege was? A medieval siege stopped ANYTHING getting in to a city with the aim of starving its population. ‘Blockade’ is a term used which is itself a lie, but ‘siege’ is beyond acceptable. Where is the furore about this man’s clear alignment with the narrative of terrorists. Ging appears to have gone native.

On Tuesday day this is what was reported by the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) on their website:

13,144 tons of humanitarian aid crossed into the Gaza Strip last week

In addition to that, 1,215,602 liters of diesel fuel and 883 tons of cooking gas entered the Gaza Strip; 470 medical patients and accompanying individual were transferred to Israel and the Judea and Samaria region to receive medical treatment

Over the last week, a total of 550 truckloads, consisting of 13,144 tons of humanitarian aid, were transferred into the Gaza Strip from Israel via the various border crossings. 1,215,602 liters of diesel fuel and 883 tons of cooking gas also crossed into Gaza. Likewise, nine truckloads of carnations were exported from the Gaza Strip to Europe.

In addition to that, 470 medical patients and accompanying individuals from the Gaza Strip crossed into Israel and the Judea and Samaria region for medical treatment, and 93 Gazans entered Israel for other various reasons. 216 staff members of international organizations crossed into the Gaza Strip, and 279 crossed from the Gaza Strip into Israel.

Essential humanitarian food products, wheat and flour, meat, chicken, fish, legumes and other agricultural produce as well as animal feed, hygiene products and medical supplies were among the goods that crossed into Gaza this past week.

Now, you may not like Israel’s policy of preventing those who want to destroy it from having the means to do so, but ‘medieval siege’ is deliberately emotive language and Ging should be sacked. In fact UNWRA should long ago have been disbanded as it is now just a propaganda weapon for Hamas. In fact, Gaza receives more aid than Haiti. See The Gaza Siege myth article in ynetnews which shows the totally unbalanced approach the UN and, thus, the gullible or disingenuous world treats Israel and its relationship with its would-be murderers.

Living in Gaza is not great, but no-one is starving, hundreds of Gazans receive medical treatment in Israel and Israel co-operates with UN agencies to rebuild Gaza without Hamas or Islamic Jihad getting hold of materials with which to rebuild their terror infrastructure.

Why did Ging not condemn the rocket attack yesterday which killed a Thai worker? Why did the BBC use Ging’s locution and call it ‘the Israeli siege’? Why is everyone so purblind to the fact that Egypt has a border with Gaza and Egypt is completing a metal barrier along its entire length to shut down the smuggling tunnels which are supposed to be a ‘lifeline’ to the ‘besieged’ of Gaza when they are a death line administered from Tehran.

The only thing medieval about Gaza is the religious fanaticism of Hamas et alia and their medieval blood lust which openly declares its desire to exterminate Jews, not Israelis but Jews wherever they can be found. Why does Ging not condemn that as medieval?

Ging has become a tool of Hamas and therefore the UN is a tool of Hamas.

Ban Ki-moon and the credibility gap

05/02/2010 / / 1 Comment

The irredeemably flawed Goldstone Report, which was produced at the behest of UN Human Rights Council, came to the conclusion that both Israel and Hamas probably committed war crimes during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip between December 2008 and January 2009.

Both Israel and Hamas were charged with responding to the allegations in the report and conducting their own investigations into it to be presented to the UN Security Council.

The very idea of asking an organisation such has Hamas (which not only brutally represses its own people and murders its political opponents, but is also intent on the genocide of the Jewish people and the destruction of Israel as is written into its own charter and its many public broadcasts), to present a response to the UN is as mind-boggling as it would be for the UN to ask the Taliban to present a report on its actions in Afghanistan.

Whereas Hamas boasts of its war crimes and comes up with a ludicrous response to the UN, Israel, at least, has spent thousands of hours, conducted hundreds of interviews, brought dozens of indictments against its own soldiers and is still in the process of producing a 1000 page response to the Goldstone report.

This is what Hamas has to say, as reported by Ha’aretz, and so condemns itself from its own mouth:

The Hamas report will be submitted to the UN later this week, said the official, Mohammed al-Ghoul. Its argument is that rockets fired from Gaza were meant to hit military targets, but because they are unguided, they hit civilians by mistake. (My emphasis)

Anyone with even a minimal smattering of law and logic can see not only the contradictions in this last statement but must also see that this lie is so patent and so crass that were Mr al-Ghoul (and what an appropriate name that is!) a wooden puppet his nose would stretch from Gaza City to al Quds!

IT IS A WAR CRIME TO FIRE MUNITIONS WHICH CANNOT BE GUIDED TOWARDS AREAS OF POPULATION. PERIOD.

And if they are unguided, how can they possibly be meant to hit military targets!? This is the organisation and these are the people who are being legitimised by the UN just by treating them on an equal footing with a member of the UN. This is moral equivalence of the most pernicious and degrading kind. But Ban says, according to the Jerusalem Post,

he was uncertain whether Israel or the Palestinians had met UN demands to undertake “credible” investigations into allegations that they deliberately targeted civilians during last year’s Gaza offensive….

He said he hoped the assembly’s resolution will, in fact, result in probes “that are independent, credible and in conformity with international standards.”

But, he added that “no determination can be made on the implementation of the resolution by the parties concerned.

Eh? He may be uncertain about Israel but he must surely be god-damned bloody positive that Hamas targeted civilians because, apart from the overwhelming evidence AND their ongoing operations (e.g. barrel bombs along Israel’s coastline this week), THEY ADMITTED IT AND BOAST ABOUT IT. What the hell does he mean ‘he’s uncertain’? He’ll be wanting an investigation into Copernican heliocentricity soon.

The Ha’aretz article quotes al Ghoul as saying:

Palestinian armed groups have repeatedly confirmed that they abide by international humanitarian law, through broadcasting in different media that they intended to hit military targets and to avoid targeting civilians,” the Hamas report stated, citing casualties from “incorrect (or imprecise) fire.

What planet, indeed, what specie are these people from? The only media broadcasts I know about are vicious, Jew-hating, genocidal, blood-libelling filth.

This is what Israel has done according to the Jerusalem Post:

Israel released a 46-page paper last Friday documenting the steps it had taken to investigate IDF actions during Operation Cast Lead, stressing that its military judicial system was independent and came under civilian review, and dismissing four of the 36 allegations of war crimes found in the Goldstone Report.

The document also revealed that disciplinary action had been taken against two top officers – a brigadier-general and a colonel – for permitting artillery fire near a UN compound in a neighborhood in Gaza City…

The IDF, meanwhile, is continuing preparation of an in-depth, point-by-point rebuttal of the Goldstone report, which is expected to number over 1,000 pages and be ready within a number of weeks.

A subtly different response to Hamas.

It is true that Israel neither co-operated with the Fact Finding Mission led by Goldstone nor does it appear to be intending to have an independent judicial enquiry. Ban appears to be saying that such an enquiry may not be necessary because he has not dismissed the Israeli army enquiry as being an inadequate response; all he says is that response is incomplete, which is self-evident since they have not yet delivered the 1000 page document. Hamas’s report is incomplete because it is a risible heap of bovine excrement and the Palestinian Authority which decided it should have a report to (it can’t let its rival Hamas have all the glory) only began at the end of January!

It’s not the credibility of Israel that’s is being highlighted here but the credibility of the UN itself and its ridiculous playing out of the farce of a ‘credible’ report from Hamas and giving them the respectability of playing out that farce as if they were a responsible national entity and not a bunch of murderous genocides intent on spreading their obnoxious, pathological hatred of Jews.

Ban ki-moon? Ban ki-rupt more likely.

IDF team in Haiti coming home

25/01/2010 / / 1 Comment

The IDF spokesperson announced today that the IDF medical and rescue missions in Haiti would end tomorrow.

Their achievements are immense.

The IDF Medical and Rescue team, including personnel and equipment for setting up a field hospital and a small rescue team, left for Haiti 11 days ago, on January 15th 2010, and had a significant role in providing aid to survivors of the earthquake.

During their stay in Haiti, the delegation treated more than 960 patients, conducted 294 successful surgeries, delivered 16 births including three in caesarian sections and saved many from within the ruins.

In the last few days, after most rescue operations were concluded, much of the delegation’s efforts were turned to other forms of civilian assistance, including setting up water tanks assisting daily life, and more.

The IDF Medical Corps and Home Front Command will hold a series of briefings following the activity in Haiti in order to improve its preparedness for similar future events.

I like the last paragraph. No complacency here and a clear commitment to meet future world crises.

I will end my Haiti posts with this, unless something significant come sup in the days ahead.

I have been proud of Israel in the past, many times and I have also been less proud on some occasions, but I can’t think of a week in which that pride has been so unalloyed.

There is a saying in Hebrew – Kol HaKavod – which is not easily translatable but roughly means ‘Well done, good job.’

Kol Hakovod to all the Israeli teams and Kol Hakavod to all the men and women from all over the world who gave assistance. Let us hope that Haiti can come out of this tragedy and build a better society. But they now know they have a friend in Israel.

Israel expands Aid in Haiti

25/01/2010 / / 0 Comments

Yesterday IsraAID sent a second medical team to Haiti. According to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs Israel is

working in partnership with other international teams to assess the situation in the surrounding hill area and to determine the medical needs on the ground including post-trauma interventions and with the movement of victims to refugee camps the purchase of additional relief items to sustain them.

The Israeli MFA issued a long communique today listing a full assessment of all the aid that Israel agencies have sent since disaster struck Haiti more than a week ago.

The media have shown coverage of, and expressed admiration for the Israeli field hospitals. The MFA lists the following news reports:

News reports on Israeli aid mission:
– Fox News (16 Jan): Makeshift ICU saving lives in Haiti
– AP Video (16 Jan): Israeli pulls man from rubble in Port-au-  Prince
– Fox News (17Jan): Israeli doctors in Haiti
– Sky News (17 Jan): Sky reporter spends a day in the rubble with Israeli rescue team
– IBA News (17 Jan): Israeli rescue team in Haiti
– LA Times (17 Jan): Israel: Sending soldiers of peace to Haiti
– TF1 (17): Les miraculés de Port-au-Prince
– CBS News (18 Jan): Israeli IDF hospital the “Rolls Royce” of medicine in Haiti
– ABC News (18 Jan): Miracle birth amid Haiti’s rubble
– WABC News (18 Jan): Brother of Queens NY resident rescued from rubble by Israeli rescue team
– U.N. MINUSTAH (Jan 18): Haiti: Israeli field hospital working around the clock
– NBC News (18 Jan):Medical response in Haiti
– CNN report (18 Jan): Patients desperate for better medical care
– NBC News (19 Jan): Field hospital a model for crisis care
– CNN report (19 Jan): Israel aids Haiti – Israeli field hospital in Haiti has treated hundreds of patients

Reports on UK TV, especially ITV, have shown the work of the IDF medical teams including a moving piece about a maternity ward the IDF medics had set up.

Yesterday the BBC showed an Israeli officer reporting on a survivor they had pulled out but although the officer spoke with a clear Israeli accent and had an Israeli flag badge on his uniform the BBC did not mention the fact that he was Israeli. The reporter was Orla Guerin, so no surprise there.

A couple of YouTube videos from the MFA report:

IDF Medical Team

IDF Rescue Team

This is the same IDF that has been accused of war crimes in Gaza.

This disaster has show the best of Israel and also the best of mankind with so many countries providing help and aid. Israel has just 7 million people and is several thousand miles from Haiti. This is a proud time for Israelis. This is the true face of Israel and the Jewish people. Nothing better expresses why the world should be supporting the Jewish State instead of trying to destroy it. Nothing better exposes the lies of Israel’s enemies than the Israeli actions in Haiti.

It’s magnificent.

Sky News with Israeli Rescue Team in Haiti

20/01/2010 / / 0 Comments

Very moving video on Sky News website from reporter Dominic Waghorn.

An Israeli rescue team worked for 8 hours to save a man’s life.

‘He who saves a life it is as if he saved the entire world’. The Israelis are certainly doing a wonderful job.

Here is an IDF rescue on YouTube

I was particularly gratified to see the Israel effort given prominence on an Arab website – OK, it was under their Palestine section and Israel doesn’t appear to exist for them,  but it was good to see anyway.  Thanks to dvardea for this link (http://www.albawaba.com/en/countries/Palestine/259537).

And here’s a couple more pictures:

Why Israelis and Jews can take pride in Israel’s response to Haiti Eathquake Disaster

18/01/2010 / / 1 Comment

Some heart-rending but also heart-warming stories have emerged over he past few days about the really terrible situation in Haiti. So many countries responding in very difficult circumstances.

Israel has taken so much bad press in recent months that it gives me, as a Jew, and a Zionist, an enormous sense of pride to see that whatever the issues are in Israel politically, whatever the attempts to demonize and delegitimize the State, whatever lies and half-truths, double-standards, blind hatred, genocidal rhetoric are used against it, there is still a deep, deep, thread of humanitarianism which lies at the core of the Jewish-ness both secular and religious.

Nowhere is this seen to better affect when disaster strikes anywhere in the world and Jewish and Israeli charities and organisations are mobilized not for propaganda but because it is an essential and abiding element of Jewish belief and consciousness to help our fellow man.

Here are some stories which are a moving tribute to the State of Israel and its people:

A story in the Jerusalem Post Jan 17th 2010 ‘Rescuers describe ‘Shabbat from hell‘. The IDF, that’s the Israeli Army has set up a field hospital in Port au Prince and within a few hours was treating dozens of patients.

Children with severe fractures set only with cardboard arrived at the hospital for treatment. Some young patients had been freed from rubble but had to have limbs amputated due to severe gangrene, he said. Within a few hours, operations were performed….

The Israeli facility, set up in very hot and humid weather, has enough equipment to function for about two weeks. The 121-member team has 40 doctors, including a psychiatrist, 20 nurses, 20 paramedics and medics, 20 lab and X-ray technicians and administrators.

The report tells us that many of the medical team are Orthodox Jews who travelled on the Jewish Sabbath, something which is normally completely against Jewish belief but when evem a single life can be saved then the Sabbath laws can be broken.

The official IDF bulletin tells us:

The field hospital is prepared to receive dozens of ambulances evacuating injured children from the different disaster struck areas. Between Friday night and Saturday, dozens of truckloads of medical and logistical equipment were unloaded and the field hospital set up.

The Israeli delegation landed in the capital of Port-Au-Prince yesterday evening and has located itself in a soccer field near the air port. Upon arrival, C4I teams deployed communications infrastructure in preparations for the hospital’s establishment.

Two teams, comprised of search and rescue personnel and canine operators from the IDF canine unit were sent out on rescue missions. The first team was sent to the Haiti UN headquarters in order to assist in rescuing survivors.

The ZAKA organisation (which was formed to deal with the aftermath of suicide bombings in Israel and other terrorist acts in Israel, but then extended its reach to make itself available throughout the world to help deal with the dead and injured of natural disasters via its Search and Rescue arm) is also an Orthodox Jewish organisation. On this occasion they were prepared to deal with the dead but ended up:

pull(ing) eight students alive from the collapsed university building, after a 38 (hour) operation



Perhaps only a Jew can fully appreciate the extreme emotion that the story of  what followed evinces, but I’m sure no-one can fail to be moved by this:

Amid the stench and chaos, the ZAKA delegation took time out to recite Shabbat prayers – a surreal sight of haredi men wrapped in prayer shawls standing on the collapsed buildings. Many locals sat quietly in the rubble, staring at the men as they prayed facing Jerusalem.

At the end of the prayers, they crowded around the delegation and kissed the prayer shawls.

Then today another significant and moving story from the JP:

Overnight Saturday, in what staff described as one of the most fulfilling moments of their work, the Israeli doctors delivered a baby boy, whose mother, Gubilande Jean Michel, promptly declared would be named “Israel.”

How appropriate that the work, compassion and dedication of Israelis will be remembered and recalled throughout this boy’s lifetime in his very name.

IsraAID has headed for the hospital:

Just minutes after landing in the airport in Port-au-prince the IsraAID team was met by David Darg, Operation Blessing Director in the field and his staff and joined with them to unload a planeload of food and medical equipment.

The Israeli medical professionals of IsraAID – F.I.R.S.T. traveled to the main Port-au-prince Hospital to start treating patients, joining local physicians at the site of the collapsed central hospital where thousands of wounded have gathered desperate for help.

“The scenes in the hospital were horrible we saw people everywhere on the floors in the building and outside, people with amputations and bone-deep wounds, hundreds of them, the size of the catastrophe is unbelievable. All of the injured were treated until we came by only one local doctor and we were the first foreign backup team to operate in the hospital.”  Said Nurse Sheva Cohen from Kibbutz Ein Yahav in the Negev

When the team arrived at the hospital they found most of the injured outside the building laying in beds in the building’s garden, probably out of fear of aftershocks and further collapse. The IsraAID team set up treatment rooms in four empty rooms, treating 60 patients with IV and administered medicine. While in the hospital, an infant with 60% burns died and bodies that had not yet been removed for burial were piled up in back.

In the meantime, the logistical personnel remain in the airport area to set up camp and assist local NGO partners with logistical support for relief items that were continuing to land.

Currently the teams are working around the clock to provide assistance to the injured. In light of the scale of the disaster, IsraAID is currently focused on expanding the scale of its operation, preparing an additional team that would be sent next week.

At the beginning of his cabinet meeting this week Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said:

I think that this is in the best tradition of the Jewish People; this is the true covenant of the State of Israel and the Jewish People.  This follows operations we have carried out in Kenya and Turkey; despite being a small country, we have responded with a big heart.  The fact is, I know, that this was an expression of our Jewish heritage and the Jewish ethic of helping one’s fellow.  I hope that the team saves lives and that Haiti succeeds in recovering from this awful tragedy.

There is a long, long way to go for the Haitian people but they can count on the Jewish People and Israel to help them in their time of dire need.

Israeli Army heading for Haiti

14/01/2010 / / 1 Comment

The Israeli Defense Force (IDF)  has just issued this communique:

IDF Humanitarian Aid Delegation Scheduled to Depart to Haiti Crisis Zone

Later tonight or early tomorrow morning, an IDF delegation is scheduled to depart from the Ben Gurion International Airport on board two leased airplanes in order to provide medical care and services to victims of the earthquake in the Republic of Haiti.

Brig Gen. (Res.) Shalom Ben-Arye, the Commander of Home Front Command’s National Search and Rescue Unit will head the IDF delegation and Col. Dr. Itzik Kryse will serve as his deputy as well as the head of the medical team and the hospital commander.

The IDF delegation will construct a field hospital in the disaster area that will include 220 personnel, among them Home Front Command rescue teams and IDF Medical Corps teams.

The field hospital will include 40 doctors, 25 nurses, paramedics, a pharmacy, a children’s ward, a radiology department, an intensive care unit, an emergency room, two operating rooms, a surgical department, an internal department and a maternity ward.

The hospital can treat approximately 500 patients each day, and in addition will perform preliminary surgeries, and will house approximately ten tons of equipment.

The Home Front command forces will include 30 rescue workers, task force intelligence, logistics forces and a communications department, in addition to search and rescue and population aid experts from the Home Front Commands Search and Rescue Unit.

On Tuesday, a preliminary force of five people left for Haiti, for the purpose of establishing a status assessment of the crisis zone for the expanded delegation and will coordinate the majority of the activity until the arrival of the Israeli delegation including transportation, hospital location, food, etc.

In addition to the hospital and the medical team, the delegation will include a logistics branch, a security force and a search and identify force, among others.

The delegation is expected to stay in Haiti for two weeks. In those two weeks, forces will conduct a status assessment regarding the possible need for further stay.

The delegation will also include a media pool of reporters (Israeli television cameraman, a radio reporter, print reporter, and one international reporter).

Today, as instructed by OC Home Front Command Maj. Gen Yair Golan, all members of the delegation will be given vaccines and a detailed briefing regarding the mission and the actions needed to ensure their personal safety.

Over the years, the Home Front Command has operated in several major crisis zones in the world, acquiring high level skills, both technologically and in the ability to find creative solutions:

Below are a number of examples of the Home Front Command’s missions abroad:

  • Car bomb explosion at the China Hilton Hotel in October, 2004 – Immediately after receiving the initial details of the attack, the Search and Rescue Unit was called to the scene in order to rescue those trapped in the hotel ruins. The staff began intensive activity at the site of the incident in order to evacuate the injured and locate the persons trapped in the ruins.
  • Kenya 2003 – An aid delegation, headed by the outgoing OC – Home Front Command at the time, Brig. Gen. Eitan Dangot departed for Mombassa following a terror attack at the Paradise Hotel. Dozens were injured, among them 21 Israeli citizens. The mission intended to provide medical aid to those injured in the hotel and to return the Israeli citizens back home at the fastest possible speed. After 12 hours, 270 Israeli citizens were returned to Israel.
  • Aid to victims of the earthquake in Northwestern Turkey 1999 – Two Search and Rescue delegations were sent to Turkey following the disaster and a field hospital was constructed. The delegation  rescued 12 survivors and 140 victims. The field hospital in Adapazari serviced 1200 injured patients, performed 40 surgeries and delivered 15 babies.
  • Greece 1999 – Assisting in the search and rescue mission following an earthquake in September 1999.
  • Car bomb explosion at the American Embassy in Kenya in August, 1998 – Following the explosion of a car bomb in close proximity of the American Embassy in Kenya, the  Search and Rescue Unit worked to locate and evacuate 96 victims. The Israeli delegation received appreciation and recognition from the Kenyan and world public. The Israeli delegation was the first to arrive on the scene from abroad and began its mission immediately.
  • Bombing of the Jewish community building in Argentina, June 1994- In which the building collapsed as a result of a car bomb. Over nine days of intensive efforts, the Rescue unit, in cooperation with additional rescue forces, was able to rescue those trapped, among them 81 dead.
  • Earthquake in Armenia, December 1988- The Search and Rescue Unit, in cooperation with additional forces, operated for 12 days in an attempt to rescue those trapped under the ruins of buildings that collapsed.
  • Earthquake in Mexico, September 1985- The Search and Rescue Unit, in cooperation with additional forces, operated for 16 days in an attempt to rescue those trapped under the ruins of buildings that collapsed (55 people).

These IDF war criminals seem to have a terrible track record!

Israeli aid to Haiti continues to grow

14/01/2010 / / 3 Comments

Today the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs made this announcement:

Israel wishes to express its solidarity with the Government and people of Haiti during this great disaster. We send our condolences to the families of the casualties, and wish the injured a speedy recovery.

Israel is doing all in its power to help the people of Haiti cope with the disaster in their country. A 220-person delegation, headed by Ministry of Foreign Affairs officials, will leave this evening (Thursday, 14 January 2009) for Port-Au-Prince on two Boeing 747 jets leased from El Al by the IDF. The relief package includes a Home Front Command field hospital and rescue unit, as well as teams from Magen David Adom and Israel Police.

Israel’s ambassador to the Dominican Republic, Amos Radian, is currently in Port-Au-Prince, where he is coordinating Israel’s contribution with local authorities and international aid agencies.

This is, perhaps, another example of Israel making a disproportionate response? After all, for a small county of some 7 million this is a massive response and fully in keeping with the country’s moral traditions which it has exercised many times in the past.

I have not yet discovered what the response of Israel’s near neighbours or even not so near neighbours has been? I’m happy to be enlightened.

Israel among the first to offer aid to Haiti after quake

13/01/2010 / / 2 Comments

Israel’s Government Press Office issued the following statement today:

Jan 12, 2010 –   A major earthquake struck the capital of impoverished Haiti on Tuesday, toppling many buildings and burying thousands of people under the rubble. The magnitude 7.0 quake, whose epicenter was inland only 10 miles (16 km) from Port-au-Prince, sent panic-stricken people into the streets as clouds of dust and smoke from falling buildings rose into the sky.

Tens of thousands of people were left homeless and injured.

IsraAID members have been in direct contact with local partners on the ground who together will be treating the injured and offering expertise to the local government.  A 12-man search-and-rescue team, which includes emergency medical staff are in the process of leaving to the field. IsraAID has turned to the Israeli public in request for donations to support the Israeli civilian aid.

Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and has a history of destructive natural disasters. Some 9,000 U.N. police and troops are stationed there to maintain order.

The Israeli Defense Force Issued the following statement:

An Israeli delegation including Ministry of Foreign Affairs, IDF Home Front Command and IDF Medical Corp Personnel has departed at 11:30 Israel time to the Republic of Haiti in order to examine the possibilities of offering aid following the recent earthquake.

The delegation includes engineering, medical, logistics and rescue experts from the IDF Home Front Command.

Binyamin Netanyahu issued the following statement:

PM Netanyahu Orders Aid Delegation to Haiti

(Communicated by the Prime Minister’s Media Adviser)

Following the tragic earthquake in Haiti, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today (Wednesday), 13.1.10, ordered Defense Ministry, Foreign Ministry and Public Security Ministry officials to quickly consider how to render humanitarian assistance to the Caribbean nation.  To this end, an advance IDF Home Front Command, IDF Medical Corps and Foreign Ministry delegation has already departed for Haiti .

Israeli Ambassador to the Dominican Republic Amos Radian has been instructed to proceed to Haiti in order to report on the situation there.  The Israeli Embassy in the US has been instructed to be in contact with American aid officials in order to coordinate humanitarian assistance and rescue activities and adapt them to the needs of the affected area.

The BBC says:

The UK said it was mobilising help and was “ready to provide whatever humanitarian assistance may be required”.

Canada, Australia, France and a number of Latin American nations have also said they are mobilising their aid response.

No mention of Israel, of course.

Israel routinely is amongst the first to send aid and logistical support after natural disasters, even offering help to Iran on one occasion.

Goldstone Report – an opportunity for Israel?

06/11/2009 / / 1 Comment

Yesterday the UN General Assembly approved the Human Rights Council sponsored Goldstone Report recommendations.

The Report found that Israel and Hamas may both have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during Operation Cast Lead in Gaza.

Israel refused to cooperate with the fact-finding mission because it believed that those doing the fact finding had already made up their minds that Israel (and not Hamas) had committed war crimes. The report, therefore, was biased from the start.

The report itself focused almost entirely on perceived Israeli infringements whilst barely mentioning Hamas at all. The weight of the report was firmly against Israel with accusations of disproportionality, deliberately targeting civilians and even attacked the Israel Supreme Court and its justice system, acknowledged to be one of the very best and most impartial in the world. In other words, Israel was accused of the very things it prides itself as not being.

The HRC decision to recommend to the General Assembly was made by a rag-bag of dictatorships and human rights offenders including Libya and Egypt. The HRC and, indeed, the UN General Assembly have proved to be obsessed with condemnations of Israel whilst overlooking gross injustices and crimes elsewhere in the world which dwarf even the worst accusations against Israel.

Any country which has such accusations against it must surely respond to the recommendations which would be to set up an independent body to investigate the findings of the report.

Israel (that is the IDF) had already begun and completed a number of investigations even during the conflict and these investigations are ongoing. Israel considers itself to be as capable as any Western democracy in investigating alleged crimes that it or its citizens are accused of making.

But the problem Israel has in agreeing am independent internal investigation is that it gives legitimacy to a UN and an HRC that comprise members whose sole obsession is to paint Israel as the fount of most of the evil in the world whilst ignoring the crimes of other UN members including Security Council members Russia (Chechnya, South Ossetia) and China (Tibet).

But there is some confusion about what any investigation should investigate. Goldstone did not seem to be concerned with named soldiers as much as the state itself in the areas of: proportionality including inter alia the extent of destruction to civilian infrastructure, illegal weapons use and  rules of engagement including white flag infringements.

In other words it is state policy that is in the dock although, in theory of course, individuals in government and senior officers could be held accountable within Israel or abroad.

Israel has already stated that it will allow no IDF officer to be prosecuted abroad. If Israel does not hold internationally credible investigations it seems we will shortly be in a position where Israeli politicians and soldiers will be unable to travel to Europe, for example, for fear of arrest. There have already been attempts by pro-Palestinians in Britain to have Israeli politicians arrested.

So what is the ‘opportunity’ in my title. Well it is this: both Israel AND Hamas have been asked to carry out credible investigations. Despite the absurdity of a terrorist organisation investigating its own terrorism, here’s the opportunity: if Israel complies, however hard that bitter pill is to swallow, and if the conclusions of such an investigation are accepted, then there will be no need for the International Criminal Court to issue warrants or whatever it is they do. But as Hamas surely won’t investigate themselves then they will be subject to such actions and their gross violations laid bare, even in absentia, perhaps.

Is this too much to hope for? Well, the first question is: is there any way that Israel could ever satisfy the international community that their own investigations are fair when that same community is so clearly bent on the destruction of Israel and the glorification of its enemies? Probably not.

Then there is the issue of interpretation of international law. Proportionality, which lies at the heart of the accusations against Israel, depends on who is doing the proportioning. If you are a Human Rights NGO or you are predisposed to be anti-Israel for whatever motivation, then your interpretation of what is proportional will be different to that of Israel itself which is fighting an existential war against forces which are fanatically committed to its destruction and who use all and every means to further their genocidal war against Israel and the Jews. I speak of Hamas, Hizbullah AND Fatah (the latter who are seen as moderates but whose intentions ultimately are the same – destroy Israel, destroy Jewish culture and blot out and annihilate Jewish history in the Holy Land).

Israel’s definition of proportionality will depend on its interpretation of the level  of threat posed by Hamas and the methods Hamas used to wage war from within a civilian population and to exploit that population and all its instruments mercilessly and cynically.

So it is likely that any putative independent Israeli investigation’s conclusions will not be accepted by an Israel-hostile world. But as I have argued before, it is still worth doing for Israel’s sake because the Goldstone Report despite its many flaws does ask serious questions about the conduct of asymmetric warfare (although it does not properly give weight to the challenge of such warfare) and an independent investigation is necessary for Israel’s moral health and will also bring to the fore some of the most important questions we face: how do you fight an enemy which hides behind the sick, women, children and the elderly; how do you fight an enemy prepared to sacrifice itself and its own civilians; how do you fight an enemy that has a cult of death; how do you fight religious fanatics; how do protect the innocent under such circumstances; what value do you put on your own life and the life of your fellow soldiers and civilians when compared to the lives of the enemy and its civilians with whom you have no quarrel.

The laws of warfare and human rights have developed apace since World War II. They were framed for a very different world order. That doesn’t make those laws any less valid, but it does mean that interpretation of them has to be nuanced  and contextual. If the UN and the HRC are not even-handed when it comes to investigating nations then the HRC and the UN should be held in contempt. Sadly, as flawed as the UN is, a world without it and the opportunities it provides for dialogue among nations and even enemies, would be a lot worse.

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