Amnesty International has issued a report accusing Hamas to a campaign of abduction, torture and wanton executions of Palestinians during last year’s conflict in the Gaza Strip. The report identifies roughly two dozen Palestinians who were shot and killed by Hamas and dozens of others who were arrested and tortured.
Victims of Hamas included political rivals of Hamas, including members of the Fatah party of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, and those accused of cooperating with Israel. The spasm of violence started on August 22nd. One execution was even held outside of a mosque in front of children.
Another account involved Atta Najjar, an ex-Palestinian Authority policeman imprisoned since 2009 and killed by Hamas in August. He brother describes his gruesome end at the hands of Hamas militants: “His arms and legs were broken … his body was as if you’d put it in a bag and smashed it … His body was riddled with about 30 bullets . . . He had slaughter marks around his neck, marks of knives … And from behind the head – there was no brain. Empty … It was difficult for us to carry him … He was heavy, like when you put meat in a bag; no bones. His bones were smashed. They broke him in the prison.”
Some of the torture was carried out at a hospital, according to the Report.
Source: CNN
Po … the saddest part is that I do not know what else I could have done. Just that somehow I could have reassured her more that she was in America and not to blame perhaps? I did the best I could at the time, but it doesn’t feel like it was enough. With all the Ninja clad guys with machine guns (had no idea we had so many among our 5000 or so) running around our building that I had just left may have rattled me more than I am willing to admit. It might have been my own fear I suppressed. I don’t know why she broke down in front of me, but I suspect it might have been my Army affiliation, which everyone around here knows. I’ve seen that fear in other eyes half a world away and it was just as disconcerting…that a uniform could cause that fear. That’s why I tell the story about kids and baseball from back in those days…a moment when we did everything right for those who had the most to fear. It is a good “story” and it feels good to know it really happened. Back then we tried hard (really a great number of us did) to be allies in spirit and I don’t think we succeeded. So we’re left with at “least we tried.”
When I communicate with former RVN soldiers and sailors (they ran a decent coastal patrol operation to block supply to the enemy) today I can still sense the disappointment, sometimes stated outright in terms of today’s world mess. I wish it were not so.
Po … I could have done more, and I should have. That remains my lesson of that day. I saw fear in the eyes of my subordinates, so I sent them home. I saw fear in the eyes of that young woman and I did not do enough.
But what would/could you have done other than what you did?
Po … said more simply, I failed that young woman long ago. I should have done more, said more, and relieved her of her grief.
Ari
I do no think you failed that woman…she approached you with horror at what happened and fear that she would be blamed for it, and when instead she looked into your eyes and saw you did not blame her, that was gift enough!
The fact that she remembers you years later says much about the solace your reaction to her that day must have given her. Imagine how she must feel everytime she sees you knowing that you are very likely/possibly the one person who does NOT blame her!
Po … I have this quirk. Anyone who can illuminate my thinking about places I likely will never ever see personally, I am grateful. So long as their description isn’t nonsense, I listen. Yeah, some are nonsense, viewed through a prism focused upon here not there…when the whole point is about there. Living amongst an nearly all Arab community I have garnered a far better understanding of their homelands and their plights and why they moved here. I will never forget the young woman crying at my fence on 9/11/2001 saying what we fled has followed us here. She knew I was US Army. She had a tone of desperation…and I had no answer except to say I did not hold her complicit. Hopefully, she was wrong, with the exception of that day. None-the-less, I acknowledge her feelings and what they portend. When we met by chance recently, she asked if I remembered her…and I answered, how could I forget? At one moment in time we both shared a feeling, something I experienced in places half a world away long ago, and cannot forget. Life is what you make of it, none of us should waste it.
I hear you, Ari 🙂
Po … my main issue with your comment that implied I was an idiot vis a vis geography was just that. I agree that too much information can be detrimental. Which is precisely why I cited few locations for my friends…one of them is in a business that makes too much information outright dangerous. None-the-less I appreciate their reminiscences of what they experience, and frankly find it illuminating. If you knew these folks you’d realize that they might have been the least likely to become ex-pats anywhere in Africa. As it is now, their older daughter has just taken her tests to enter a university and it was a chore unlike anything we experience here in the USA. In short, it is better….and no points awarded for whatever “race” or gender they might be. I was once accepted at Columbia but couldn’t afford it. Today I doubt I’d be accepted. In short, I look for positives in any locale that excels. Feel free to incorporate your experiences when appropriate to a thread, because we can all learn from it.
BTW…anyone who says to you “go back where you came from” is off the wall. Ignore them. My daughter heard this many times in her younger days and had to combat it, sometimes with fists and sometimes by just walking away. In all instances I supported her…even to her school administrators who questioned my teaching her things from Taekwondo for that purpose. “Aghast” isn’t strong enough to describe their attitudes … never thinking that such racial discrimination could occur in “their” schools. I hated suburbia and soon moved out of it back to the city.
Aridog
1, May 29, 2015 at 10:30 am
Po … I am going off topic here, because you are here and something you said earlier elsewhere has bugged me. You said you’d previously cited the fact you live in in California, and previous were from Senegal, a place you still assert an affinity. That makes perfect sense to me since I know many immigrants who have such affinities. When you insulted my intelligence on basic geography I reacted. Actually, upon some thought, I am sorry you did not get more specific about Senegal (did I miss it, too?) because it seems, from my weak research, to be a good place with civil government and responsible citizens. Believe it or not, I think some of us would have been interested in any details you could share about Senegal. You missed the fact I am delighted about learning more about “Africa,” a continent where I’ve never been, of many nation states today, each one worth the time to learn about, as my friends move about there. If you do have details and are willing to share about Senegal, I’m more than pleased to know about it from a resident of the place. Same as I am from my friends. An outreach is better than devoting all the time to criticism of those you really know little about…I am interested in Senegal, but are you going to force me to learn what little I can from Google?
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Ari, would you please stop putting me on the defensive?
Any info I give on this blog will be used to denigrate me! When I said I was from Senegal, my allegiances to this country were challenged, and I was told to go back where I am from. Why would I reveal more than necessary about me in such circumstances?
I don’t doubt you are interested in Africa, but short of you asking me directly, I would not volunteer any unrequested info lest I am being accused of talking down to people. I have used Senegal quite often as an example of a place that is 92% muslim yet where the Catholic minority is so part of the community that our first president was catholic, supported by all the Muslim leaders.
It may be hard to believe, but the reason why I would want to tell you about Senegal, is the same reason why I asked you to use the specific country rather than the general Africa, for each one of us African, whether from Senegal, the Gambia, Nigeria, Morocco and Algeria, like our country and wish it to be given the dues of specific identity.
i have no interest in criticizing you for the sake of criticism…though I have such established relationship with some, it needs not extend to you. As I say before, I respond to people in kind, polite to some, rude to others. If you deem me rude to you
1-make sure I am actually talking to you
2- make sure what I said was actually offensive
3- make sure I am not responding in kind.
Meanwhile, any question about Africa, ask away.
Commoner, saying that Israeli Arabs prefer Israeli rule by a wide margin says absolutely nothing…it is akin to saying that Native Americans prefer living in America better than living on the reservation by a wide margin. Or saying that Black americans prefer living in the US better than living somewhere in Africa by a wide margin.
An Israeli Arab is just that, an Arab who has Israeli citizenship, second class citizenship however by fact of not being Jewish. That Israeli Arab however, is from israel, not from anywhere else but from Israel. That Israeli Arab speaks hebrew, goes to Israeli schools, works in Israeli, raises his kids in Israel. Asking him whether he wants to be under PA rule or Hamas rule is a patently fallacious question.
Po you premise presumes that the Palestinian people like Hamas or Abu Mazens excuse for a government. In fact the Palestinians who have been given citizenship, marriage rights etc. Or a million of them as Israeli Arabs prefer Israeli rule by a very wide margin. Fewer than 18% want Hamas or the PA to rule them. I have seen several independent polls to that effect. My quoting from Iraq Body Count shows that Islamo-Fascism
which includes Hamas use civilians casualties as a political expedient.
To AI, its about time!
PS: I meant with outside money, not without it. Ramalah is not Gaza.
BTW … the reason for the rose of Ashkelon is because I know people there, and farther north along the Lebanon and Israeli line. Neither side, taken as individual civilians, wants this war hawking. Yet it continues? There must be a better way, and there really is, but it cannot accommodate the political aspirations of the opposition groups. Well, in fact it can, but it will take a leap…as for how well the PA has done, without money from outside none-the-less, as well as their own, is illustrated by Ramalah, where even Israelis acknowledge success. It is no longer the dust bowl hell spot of the 60’s…and now an example of what can be done, if it would be done.
Erhm, said another way: That “light at the end of the tunnel” may just be the flash of a grenade. Men and women who actually do the fighting have a different perspective than those who count the bodies by the day, week, month, or year(s) afterwards. No matter whihc side is doing it. I’ll include Hamas in this summary outlook, because I do not doubt the humanity of regular Arabs, whom I live among and do so quite happily. When a political group, which Hamas is (by dint of elections no less), sets out to kill and maim, they do so knowingly, and the same thing applies to everyone in the conflict(s). It is about who kills whom and why? Who uses civilians as fodder and those who do not? If I had an answer to the Middle East’s problems I’d be yelling from the roof tops…as it is, I merely squeak from the cellar. The rocket found in Ashkelon that I have sculpted in to a rose and sits on my mantle is representative of this insanity. All I can ask is “why?”
Po … I am going off topic here, because you are here and something you said earlier elsewhere has bugged me. You said you’d previously cited the fact you live in in California, and previous were from Senegal, a place you still assert an affinity. That makes perfect sense to me since I know many immigrants who have such affinities. When you insulted my intelligence on basic geography I reacted. Actually, upon some thought, I am sorry you did not get more specific about Senegal (did I miss it, too?) because it seems, from my weak research, to be a good place with civil government and responsible citizens. Believe it or not, I think some of us would have been interested in any details you could share about Senegal. You missed the fact I am delighted about learning more about “Africa,” a continent where I’ve never been, of many nation states today, each one worth the time to learn about, as my friends move about there. If you do have details and are willing to share about Senegal, I’m more than pleased to know about it from a resident of the place. Same as I am from my friends. An outreach is better than devoting all the time to criticism of those you really know little about…I am interested in Senegal, but are you going to force me to learn what little I can from Google?
Okay, back on topic and I apologize for the interruption. As I’ve said before, I am often disappointed in the use of “statistics” and body counts to illustrate the efficacy of killing per se. Killing is a last resort, not the resort of thinking men or women. My war had them, of course, and they all asserted we won…whoops, then came 1975. The political “killing” thereafter dwarfed that before it. And nothing was really gained in the end, for anyone. When one fights in war your focus narrows to a pin point, only bureaucrats later calculate statistics.
I basically agree with Bam Bam’s comments above. I have traveled around Israel and also Jordan and Egypt in the 1980s. The Hamas types are terrorists who need to be killed. Gaza should go back to Egyptian control. And I mean control. The so called West Bank needs to be split so that Israel gets half and the other half goes back to Jordan– not some “Palestinian State”. Then Jordan can be responsible for its punks and terrorists and accountable. It is called a three state solution: Israel, Egypt and Jordan. Arabs are basically from various identifiable tribes. There is no Palestinian ethnic group or tribe. I am a Labrador. I can claim to be an American but by Dog (opps God) it is a bit of a contortion.
*those whom you hate so much!
So bam, is the issue religion or is it Hamas? Is it Palestine or is it Islam?
Right now you are all over the place, makes it hard to have a fruitful discussion.
Were you to temper your relish at the idea of muslim blood dripping, dripping, you’d realize that Muslims died in the towers…that some of the firefighters there (one of whom lost his life) were muslims…as well as were some of the cops Muslims….some of your children’s teachers? muslims!
One of your congressmen? Muslim!
Some of the military fighting your wars of choice in muslim lands? Yes, you’ve guessed it, Muslim!
Even your president is muslim!
Muslims here, muslims there, muslims everywhere! Black Muslims, white muslims, asian muslims, hispanic muslims, native american muslims…. sucks to be you, surrounded by those who hate so much!
1-‘The only thing that deters a suicide bomber is the knowledge that if he pulls the trigger or blows himself up, his sister will be raped,’ says Bar-Ilan University professor.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/israel/.premium-1.606542
2-Promoting the Rape of Gaza and Its Women
http://muftah.org/israels-war-gazas-women-bodies/#.VWe6Ks9VhBc
3- Eyal Qarim […] the second-most powerful chaplain in its ranks, […] ruled that raping Palestinians was permissible during wartime.
4-Rabbi Noam Perel, the global leader of Bnei Akiva, the largest religious Jewish youth group in the world, authored a Facebook post calling for the mass-murder of Palestinians and the taking of their foreskins as trophies. Perel received no censure for his horrific comments.
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noticed, bam, that you did not address my other points!
I am done however discussing Israel, pretty unfair to those supporters of Israel who did not make this about Israel.
po – read the article from mufta. It was like reading Pravda again.
po
That’s right po! Your heroes, soulless creatures, hid behind the skirts of their women and children, and launched rockets at their neighbors. Your heroes trapped their own men, women and children by refusing to allow them to leave the area just so they could increase the casualties. Your heroes forced the inhabitants to remain in an area that Israel had flooded with notices, warning of the rockets, literally threatening their lives if they attempted to flee. This is well-documented by various sources, so don’t even try to deny it. Your heroes launched missiles from mosques, hospitals and schools, and then cried to the world that Israel bombed them.
You confuse the glee shown by the adherents to your religion at the downing of the towers on 9/11 and the sick and twisted celebrations in the Arab streets when an Israeli or a Jew dies. Those are the sick and twisted people you need to mention.
bam bam
1, May 28, 2015 at 7:58 pm
po
It’s obvious you salivate every time there is even the most remote chance of vilifying Israel,
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Said by the one who jumped on a topic about HAMAS, to justify Israel’s massacre of Palestinians!
Unlike you, I speak of a government, not a people. I can distinguish between Hamas and Palestinians, Israel and Israelis, you can’t distinguish between Arabs, Palestinians and Muslims!