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Politics : Foreign Policy Discussion Thread -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: zonder who wrote (3827)	2/12/2003 2:28:31 PM
From: bela_ghoulashi	Respond to of 15987

>>Sick and tired and literally nauseous of repeating the same sentences over and over again... << Just imagine how we feel seeing them over and over again.

To: zonder who wrote (3827)	2/12/2003 3:02:47 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 15987

The Western media does run articles on recruitment of children for martyrdom I am speechless. And tired of saying that THAT IS NOT WHAT I HAVE OBJECTED TO. Look, zonder, you have doubted that the PA was actively recruiting young martyrs or using children as combatants. Can we take it now that you agree that the PA is actively pumping martyrdom to children, and is using children as combatants? so the only question that remains is, are the young combatants being used as "shields"? My objection is to fabrication of bizarre stories like Palestinian gunmen hiding behind children, who then unfortunately and accidentally get killed while Israelis are trying hard to aim behind them. As in, it is the fault of the heartless Palestinians that their children get killed, and not that of the Israeli army that kills them. As in, "See what animals Palestinians are, as opposed to the singularly civilized Israelis in this Middle Eastern sea of barbarians". I see where you are coming from re "a small leap from encouraging suicide". However, I urge you to consider the considerable difference between praising martyrdom and literally using small children's bodies as shields while you are shooting from behind them. Now, you seem to have misapprehended that "shields" was meant in a very literal fashion, as if the Tanzim gunmen was literally clutching a child about the waist while shooting. This was never the charge. The charge was that a gang of kids and youths throwing stones, grenades, or molotov cocktails was in front, while gunmen positioned somewhere behind the kids fired, leaving the IDF with the choice of not answering deadly fire or killing children. Why the Israeli press reports this is obvious - they are reporting the conflict closely, and are horrified at this use of child combatants. Why the Palestinian press does not report this is also obvious; as I said, they published a public moratorium on pictures of kids with weapons. Why the Western press does not report more of it is more problematic. I would put most of it down to laziness and template journalism. There is a lot of 'he said, she said' in convering the conflict, especially from the Palestinian spokesmen, who lie continously (they clearly consider it their duty) even when the lies can be easily exposed. So it's easier to just report on the body count, that both sides agree on. Most Western papers have no problem with the headline "Israelis Kill Boy, 8" and don't bother with questions about where the boy was or what he was doing. This example from Reuters is typical reuters.com if you read thru, you see that the IDF says they shot a group of Palestinians who were throwing petrol bombs at them. Here's an interview where the (PA appointed) Mufti of Jerusalem praises child martyrs: "There is no doubt that a child [martyr] suggests that the new generation will carry on the mission with determination," said the Mufti, appointed by Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat. "The younger the martyr, the greater and the more I respect him. ... One wrote his name on a note before he died. He wrote: 'the martyr so and so.' In every martyr's pocket we find a note with his name on it. He sentences himself to martyrdom even before he becomes a martyr." operationsick.com and on the other side, an Amnesty International answer to Israeli complaints about child combatants, saying it doesn't matter if children are taking part in riots and confrontations at which guns are fired from both sides, they are not child soldiers and the Israelis must take care to shoot only the gun men, never the children (how they are supposed to do that is not explained) pmwatch.org

To: zonder who wrote (3827)	2/12/2003 4:51:45 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 15987

Speaking of Reuters, Steven den Beste notices another chapter in the long-running story of AP vs. Reuters, or, how to report the same story with completely opposite results: Belgium has a law on the books which states that it takes upon itself the power to try anyone anywhere in the world for war crimes. They've gotten a lot of steam for that, including an adverse ruling against them by the European court. But the law remains on the books, and for several years now Palestinian activists have been trying to use it to bring about criminal prosecution of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. At a certain point it became something of an embarassment and eventually lower courts there dismissed the case on a technicality (Sharon, as a head of state, has diplomatic immunity). Appeals have now reached the Belgian Supreme Court. The Associated Press reports: Belgian Court bars Sharon war-crimes case The Belgian Supreme Court threw out an appeal by a group of Palestinians on Wednesday to try Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for war crimes over a 1982 massacre in Lebanese refugee camps. The final court of appeal backed a ruling of a lower appeals court that dismissed the case on technical grounds last June. The lower court argued Sharon did not live in Belgium and could not be tried for war crimes and also enjoyed diplomatic immunity as the head of the Israeli government. The group of Palestinians had sought to bring Sharon to trial under a 10-year-old Belgian law that allows the country's courts to try war crimes committed anywhere. Wednesday's ruling marks an end to any possible investigation into allegations Sharon was responsible for the 1982 massacres at two refugee camps outside Beirut. That seems straightforward enough, doesn't it? The case is dead and the investigation will be closed until such time as Sharon leaves office and emigrates to Belgium, at which point he would come under the jurisdiction of Belgian law. Well, lookie at how Reuters reported it: Belgian Court: Sharon can be probed after Office Belgium's supreme appeals court ruled Wednesday that a genocide lawsuit against Ariel Sharon could go ahead once he no longer enjoyed immunity as prime minister of Israel, the plaintiffs' lawyer said. The ruling opened the way for survivors of a 1982 massacre of Palestinian refugees to press their case against the Israeli leader, whom they hold responsible for the deaths of hundreds of their kin in Israeli-occupied Beirut. "This is a victory for international justice and for the victims," Luc Walleyn, one of lawyers for the plaintiffs, told Reuters at the courthouse. It's interesting that the AP is actually reporting what happened. Reuters, on the other hand, is piping the Palestinian line; it's acting as a strait propaganda conduit and reporting the Palestinian's lawyer's spin as if it were straight news. denbeste.nu