Israel as a Rogue State 75

NY Times:


Indictments in Gaza War Are Announced


By ISABEL KERSHNER


Published: July 6, 2010


JERUSALEM - The Israeli military said Tuesday that it had indicted "a
number of" officers and soldiers for their actions during Israel
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritorie
s/israel/index.html?inline=nyt-geo> 's three-week offensive in Gaza
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritorie
s/gaza_strip/index.html?inline=nyt-geo>  in the winter of 2008-9,
including a staff sergeant accused of deliberately shooting at least one
Palestinian
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/p/palestin
ians/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>  civilian who was walking with a
group of people waving a white flag. 

The announcement came nearly 18 months after the end of the war, and on
the day that Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/n/benjamin_n
etanyahu/index.html?inline=nyt-per> , met President Obama
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/o/barack_oba
ma/index.html?inline=nyt-per>  in what many saw as a fence-mending visit
after months of strained ties. A spokesman for the Israeli military
denied any link between the timing of the announcement and the prime
minister's trip. 

According to the army statement, the chief military prosecutor has
decided to take disciplinary and legal action in four separate cases,
including some already highlighted by human rights groups and by a
scathing United Nations report
<http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/docs/12session/a-hrc-12-
48.pdf>  on the war. The report, by a committee led by Richard
Goldstone, a South African judge, was published in September 2009 and
pointed to evidence of possible war crimes
<http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/16/world/middleeast/16gaza.html> . 

The offensive came as a response to years of rocket fire against
southern Israel from Gaza, and after Hamas
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/h/ham
as/index.html?inline=nyt-org> , the Islamist militant group, took full
control of Gaza in mid-2007. Up to 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis
were killed in the war. 

Israel refused to cooperate with the Goldstone mission, arguing that the
mandate was biased from the outset, and it rejected the report. It also
resisted calls by Israeli and international human rights organizations
for an independent Israeli investigation outside the military framework.


The staff sergeant accused of killing at least one civilian faces a
manslaughter charge. Beyond that, the military said a battalion
commander had been indicted for deviating from "authorized and
appropriate" army behavior and from an Israeli Supreme Court ruling when
he authorized a Palestinian man to act as a kind of human shield by
entering a house where militants were sheltering in order to persuade
them to leave. 

The Goldstone report accused Israel of several cases of using
Palestinian civilians as human shields during the Gaza war, a practice
forbidden by Israel's Supreme Court. The Goldstone report stated that
such practices violated international law. 

In a third case, the chief of staff ordered disciplinary action against
an officer who ordered an aerial strike on a militant involved in
launching rockets. The man was standing outside the Ibrahim al-Maqadma
mosque, the army said, and the shrapnel caused what it called
unintentional injuries to civilians inside. The Goldstone Report said
that an Israeli projectile struck near the doorway of the mosque, in
northern Gaza, during evening prayers, killing at least 15 civilians who
were mostly inside. 

The military said that the officer had "failed to exercise appropriate
judgment," adding that he would not serve in similar positions of
command in the future and that he had been rebuked. 

In addition, the chief military prosecutor ordered a criminal
investigation by the Military Police into an airstrike on a house that
held about 100 members of the extended Samouni family in Zeitoun, a
district of Gaza City. 

That case stirred particular outrage
<http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/10/world/middleeast/10gaza.html>  around
the world as Palestinian paramedics were prevented by Israeli forces
from reaching the house for days after the initial strike. Red Cross
officials then publicized their discovery of four emaciated Samouni
children who had been trapped in the home with the bodies of their
mothers. In all, up to 30 Samounis died. 

The white flag episode has been widely publicized. According to
Palestinian witness testimony gathered by Human Rights Watch
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/h/hum
an_rights_watch/index.html?inline=nyt-org> , the Goldstone mission and
others, a group of 28 Palestinian civilians from two families set out on
Jan 4, 2009, in the Juhr al-Dik area, south of Gaza City, trying to
evacuate the area after their homes were shelled. 

According to the witnesses, the group was fired on from the direction of
some Israeli tanks. They said that Majida Abu Hajjaj, in her 30s, was
killed while waving a white flag. Her mother, Rayya, was also fatally
shot. 

The Israel military said it had been unable to match the testimonies of
the Palestinians with those of dozens of soldiers and commanders who
were questioned, but that the soldiers testified that on Jan 5, 2009, a
man was shot and killed in the same location. 

The military determined that "the two events are apparently one and the
same," and that after reviewing the evidence, the military advocate
general, Maj. Gen. Avichai Mendelblit, ordered that a staff sergeant be
indicted on charges of manslaughter by a military court. 

"This decision is based on evidence," the military said, "that the
soldier, who was serving as a designated marksman, deliberately targeted
an individual walking with a group of people waving a white flag without
being ordered or authorized to do so." 

In Gaza on Tuesday, Majed Abu Hajjaj, the son of Rayya and a brother of
Majida, said that the opening of the military investigation was "an
achievement in itself," but he expressed doubts that the soldier would
receive adequate punishment. 

He added that imprisonment for the soldier would not be enough. "What
about the chief who refused to let us evacuate the bodies, and the
driver of the bulldozers who buried them near the house and kept them
there until the end of the war?" he said. "All of those should be
prosecuted." 

Earlier this year, the military said it had reprimanded
<http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/01/world/middleeast/02mideast.html>  two
senior officers - a brigadier general and a colonel - for the firing of
artillery shells that hit a United Nations
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/u/uni
ted_nations/index.html?inline=nyt-org>  compound in Gaza, and two
Israeli staff sergeants were charged with instructing a 9-year-old
Palestinian
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/p/palestin
ians/index.html>  boy to open several bags the soldiers suspected were
booby-trapped during the war. Another soldier was convicted of stealing
a Palestinian's credit card. 

The military says that more than 150 cases have been examined since the
Gaza campaign, and nearly 50 criminal investigations have been started
since the war. 

Fares Akram contributed reporting from Gaza.