NOVANEWS
the war against Gaza continues
My friend Adie Mormech reports from the Gaza Strip:
When 91 year old Ibrahim Abu Sayed left his home this morning to check on his land and animals by the remains of his old house, he took with him his 17 year old grandson Hossam and his friend and neighbour Ismail Abu Oda, who was 16. His son and Hossam’s father didn’t want to come because it was the final day of EID, the muslim celebration that follows Ramadan.
Despite his age, Ibrahim Abu Sayed was still mobile enough to regularly check his three dunums of land, as he had done for decades, the last decade being the hardest as his house was destroyed in 2000 by Israeli bulldozers and his rebuilt house destroyed in the three-week attacks by Israel on Gaza over the new year of 2009.
But early Saturday evening would be the last time Ibrahim, Hossam and Ismail would work their land. 700 metres from the border where their land was located, north of Sharab street, Israeli tanks made an incursion into Gaza. The grandfather, his grandson and friend did not stand a chance as the tanks fired shells directly at them.
We met the family members at the hospital. The wife of Ibrahim was devastated, screaming in horror at the fate that had befallen her family.
“I was there half an hour before it happened”, said Mohammed Abu Oda, another relative. “I saw them by their sheep. I heard the shells from the Israeli tanks, the shells we learned soon afterwards had killed our relatives.”
They were killed instantly, and according to the doctor (who wished to remain anonymous) who examined once they had arrived at Beit Hanoun hospital. Ibrahim suffered severe shrapnel injuries to his face, chest and stomach and his grandson Hossam had the back of his head blown away. We verified this immediately as we saw the mutilated bodies in the morgue. Ismail, the friend of Hossam, had arrived at the hospital 30 minutes after the others but had been buried before we got there; most part of his head was shot away. The boys were close friends, studying in the 9th and 10th grade respectively, and had expected to return to school the following day after Eid.
But on that day they still were on holidays, so they helped Ibrahim, like they were used to do. Because despite of having faced their hardest times, after their house was destroyed and their land bulldozed, the bedouin family still had no other job other than farming. Although they were obliged to farm their land close to the border, it was still far enough away to be outside the Israeli imposed “buffer zone”
“Israel claims that there’s a three hundred meter buffer zone, but they were 700 meters far from the border”, said an Uncle of Ismail, Majdy Abu Oda. “The people there are farmers who’ve been living there for years. We, the people here, were never dangerous for the Israelis. They have photos of the people who live and work here, the area is full off observation cameras. So they knew them.”
That was why the family considered themselves to be safe, even though there were tanks at the border. But they paid with their lives for that. More victims of Israel’s ‘collective punishment’, a crime against humanity according to article 33 of the Geneva Convention of which Israel is a signatory member.
So a 91 year old man, his grandson and a friend of his were killed while tending to their livestock on their own farm, 700 metres from the border with Israel. Where is the clamour for justice? Where is the international outrage that at least should be comparable to the Israeli settlers shot a week ago, who actually were not settled on their own land according to international law? Israeli armed forces have continued to wage a war against civilians in Gaza, long after the Israeli air and ground assault in the winter of 2008/2009.
With the family clearly posing no threat, and known as long term residents of the area, there is little imagination required to understand the ease with which these Israeli soldiers felt they could kill these three men with impunity, once their livelihood had already been destroyed.
Saber Zaneen General Coordinator of the Beit Hanoun solidarity group, ‘Local Initiative’ released a callout for justice in a statement:
“Today the occupation committed a new crime which will be added to its black list. Three martyrs now rest in heaven after the shelling and again we call on the international community and civil society to pressure the occupation forces to stop such crimes against Palestinian civilians and to start working on giving some protection to the local people in the Gaza Strip.”
[Graphic below the break]
Tilde’s photos. She and Adie went to the morgue to bear witness.
I don’t post them to be horrifying but because they happened, they died, they are real. This is what happens when Israel occupies. The New York Times will never print these pictures.
As I write this, the Times report, by Mark Landler and Isabel Kershner, had this to say about Gaza:
In a reminder of the violence that could upset the peacemaking environment, militants from Gaza fired two rockets into Israel on Monday. Though they landed in open areas and caused no injury or damage, they brought the total number of rockets fired since Sunday to six, a steep increase, the Israeli military said. Last week, a rocket landed near a kindergarten in an Israeli communal farm near the Gaza border. The kindergarten was empty at the time because of the Jewish New Year holiday.
Hamas, the Islamist militant group that controls Gaza, virulently opposes the peace talks. Its military wing claimed responsibility for two shooting attacks on settlers’ cars two weeks ago, timed to coincide with a peace summit meeting in Washington. Yuval Diskin, the director of Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security agency, has said he expected an increase in terrorism by Palestinian militants trying to derail the talks.
The only human reaction to the story and the photos above is revulsion–then a search into causes. We all know where that leads. Better to head it off entirely: pretend the dead don’t exist, or if the story goes up tomorrow, print some IDF press release about militants preparing to attack Sderot. Re-read the above. Victimless rockets are a “reminder of violence,” while shepherds literally blown apart, disassembled, by Israeli munitions do not count as a reminder of violence. It is Bronner and Kershner who through their dishonest apologetics–through their propaganda–create the cognitive illusions that let this kind of atrocity continue, and it is Times editors like Jonathan Landman and Bill Keller who print such garbage, which lets the conflict go on and on. It takes a lot of brainwashing to create a Zionist.
And that indoctrination must be carefully maintained and cultivated, otherwise people revert to their natural state–human beings. Can’t have that. Is Yuval Diskin interested in figuring out who to blame for terrorism? The civilian leadership in Tel-Aviv and Washington for sure. And then also the Times propagandists interviewing him, and their editors living in Manhattan.
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