Links from my del.icio.us account for January 24th:
- FT.com / Comment / Opinion – Saudi patience is running out – Humble civil servant Turki al-Faisal sends warning to Obama.
- Notes from Palestine – "I met a mother who was at home with her ten children when Israeli soldiers entered the house. The soldiers told her she had to choose five of her children to 'give as a gift to Israel.' As she screamed in horror they repeated the demand and told her she could choose or they would choose for her. Then these soldiers murdered five of her children in front of her. "
- Revolution, Facebook-Style – Can Social Networking Turn Young Eygptians Into a Force for Democratic Change? – NYTimes.com – A so-so piece on April 6 and Egyptian bloggers.
- Iran’s Postmodern Beast in Gaza – The Atlantic (January 5, 2009) – The reliably Zionist Atlantic (remember James Fallows' article on Muhammad al-Dura, or Jeffrey Goldberg's rantings) has Gaza as "the western edge of the Iranian empire."
- Israel indicts two Iran TV journalists for reporting on Gaza ground invasion – Haaretz – Israel News – Sounds like bullshit excuse to go after Iran-affiliatied journos.
- Out of the rubble – The National Newspaper – Mouin Rabbani writes Mahmoud Abbas' obituary: "In his initial response Abbas laid responsibility for the conflict at Hamas’s doorstep, in one stroke reducing his role to that of a factional leader opportunistically siding with his cousin against his brother. More to the point, he unleashed the full power of his security forces against his own people. Not to prevent a Hamas coup in the West Bank, or even attacks against Israel, but to suppress pro-Palestinian demonstrations of the kind permitted even within Israel."
- Ibrahim: Al-Qaeda wants to Hit the US Again and turn Obama into another Bush – Egyptian Gamaa says Qaeda wants to attack US soon in revenge for Gaza.
- Jamal’s Propaganda: 6 degrees of Myopia – New Orascom deal for Lebanon mobile network, signed by Hizbullah ally, forgets Orascom has business interests in Israel. Will Sawiris get swindled in the Sham again?
I know you don’t agree or endorse every link you post — and I respect and appreciate that as a blogging technique — but do you really think the “notes from palestine” post is at all likely to be at all accurate? I know the IDF is not, in the big picture, very ethical in its operations, but it’s a far stretch from “the commanders and politicians in charge were prepared to accept the death of civilians to further their own agendas” to “individual IDF soldiers murdered children in front of their mother for the hell of it.” The former, yes, this is known; the latter seems beyond the pale of anything I’ve seen reported by B’tselem or ICAHD or Ma’an. Brutality at checkpoints and disregard for civilian deaths, yes, but cold-blooded murder of children? Cast Lead has enough deeply serious problems with it that adding to the debate unsubstantiated allegations of such extreme nature without comment as to the reliability of the sources pushes the discussion in a way that makes the conflict not only tragic/criminal but unworthy of the serious engagement that could lead to peace* (in the same way that Likud allegations of Hamas’ inhumanity justify their refusal to consider them a potential party to a solution).
*confession: comment is from a supporter of a two-state solution
The allegation is indeed extremely serious, but I have no reason to believe that it’s from a propagandist organization. It may be that the person who posted it was lied to by the Palestinian mother. But such an act of violence is not at all impossible, as we know from pretty much all wars. It does not mean it was Israel’s policy.
No shame in being a two-stater! I remain one – barely as it looks increasingly undoable.
I’m not saying the story above is true, but one thing about the Israeli military is that they take 18-year-olds and immediately thrust them into roles where they have power and responsibility. One take on this, heard peddled to Birthright trip-goers, is that Israeli young people have to grow up very quickly. The other is that you have people in situations, particularly at checkpoints, who are simply unqualified for it due as much to maturity as anything else. By extension, I can certainly see the occasional sicko getting a weapon.
That said, after reading that a couple of times, it sounds enough like a crude attempt at propaganda that I’d want to see more evidence.
It’s worth noting that the author of the post is Barbara Lubin, a Jewish-American activist, and that the site (and organization she works for) is the Middle East Children’s Alliance, a NGO. I very much doubt there’s any deceit on her part, although she might have been deceived. This is why we need as many journos and investigators on the ground as possible (which Israel has prevented).
Although not comparable to this, the routine cruelty displayed by Israeli soldiers (often young and immature ones) at checkpoints suggests that part of the Israeli army experience is to quickly get a view of Palestinians as non-people. It’s certainly a plausible explanation of why so many Israelis were in favor of this war despite its limited strategic value and clear, broad targeting of civilians.
Also important in Israel is the sense of history Israelis carry with them about what has happened in the past few years. One is the idea that Israel offered a great deal to Arafat and got the al-Aqsa Initfada, the other is that the Palestinians had a chance to make something of Gaza and instead it became a grounds for attacking Israel. Add to this a perception of world opinion as places they or their parents fled in part due to rampant anti-Semitism, and major doses of examples of Hamas using human shields. You don’t need me to point out the flaws in all this, but if that’s your over-arching narrative, you can see why so many decent people in Israel support military actions like Gaza.
On Israeli military life, it’s possible, but there’s also a difference between the IDF and the Border Patrol in terms of the social niches from which they recruit and the culture that leads to within each organization. In particular, the Border Patrol, seen as a surer path to career advancement, mans a lot of the WB places, and draws heavily from recent post-communist immigrant communities who come from anti-Semitic environment, have a cliched view of the conflict, and transfer those ideas to their life in Israel. While the officer corps of the IDF tends to be very conservative, the average IDF soldier is very much a sabra, and you can even see a limited social mixing between them and the people whom they are occupying in areas like Jerusalem’s Old City.