NOVANEWS
In the background of this a video has surfaced of armed Israeli soldiers firing shots as they walk through a Palestinian neighborhood, using a hand-cuffed Palestinian boy as a human shield. Rights groups have accused Israel on previous occasions, claiming that Israel uses Palestinian teens as human shields with impunity.
Press TV has interviewed Mark Glenn from the Crescent and Cross Solidarity Movement, Idaho about this issue. What follows is an approximate transcript of the interview.
Press TV: I’m sure you’ve seen the video – I’ve seen it myself. It violates so many rights conventions. In some views it is tantamount as war crimes as well. I’d like to get your reactions on what has happened.
Glenn: Anybody who has been following the events taking place in that part of the world for the last 60 years knows that there’s nothing original or new about this. This literally is an event that takes place on a daily basis and with very little international attention or outcry unfortunately.
If the roles were reversed and that were a Jewish child in some part of the world and that child was being used as a human shield while volleys of bullets were being fired at unarmed protesters of course the outrage would be absolutely tsunamic in terms of the decibels that would be created by it.
But of course when it’s a Palestinian who’s being abused by the Israelis then there’s no noise over this whatsoever.
At the same time we should not necessarily be surprised by this because when you are dealing with a political entity such as Israel that is governed by certain religious principles, a few of which include viewing Palestinians as cattle and as non-human; all we have to do is look at some of the statements that come out of Israel’s religious leaders such as Rabbi Ovadia Yosef who once compared non-Jews and donkeys who were created in order to serve the Jews, you can understand that this is the kind of “wisdom” that is filtered down to the people – Why should we be surprised then when its practical applications are made manifest with events such as what we saw just take place in this video?
Press TV: You mentioned the Israelis have been carrying out such acts with impunity of decades. My question is what has to happen or in other words what has to change to get to see the Israelis held accountable for their actions and their constant rights violations?
Glenn: Well, I think that the change is taking place now. Because of things such as the internet and because of the increased interest on the part of a lot of the world that is really just sick of the fighting, sick of the war, sick of the supremacism, the racism… With the internet and of course with international news outlets such as Press TV the truth is finally getting out and the spell is beginning to wear off.
It’s going to be a long process I think. It didn’t take us a day to get us into the mess that we’re in; it’s certainly not going to take us a day to get out of it; but I think as long as we keep moving forward as we are with broadcasts such as this and with information such as this, eventually the world will wake up to the crimes that are being committed.
And the world will eventually speak with one voice to say “no more, never again” and we will see then end of this kind of outrage and hopefully at that point the world will begin to finally experience this thing known as peace.
