Israelis applaud, UN condemns, shoot to kill policy


April 2, 2016
Sarah Benton


Tel Rumeida, Shuhada Street, a closed military zone in Hebron. Photo from International Solidarity Movement.

Israeli army stations dedicated PR officer at site of Hebron execution

By Dan Cohen, Mondoweiss
March 31, 2016

The blood stain where Ramzi Aziz al-Qasrawi was shot dead remains on the ground. The spot where Abed al-Fattah Yusri al-Sharif was executed is no longer visible.

“We washed it off,” a young soldier standing at the checkpoint a few metres away tells me.

Two of the soldiers at the checkpoint were in full combat uniform, while a third was sitting on a concrete block in a form-fitting outfit. She was from the IDF spokesperson unit, apparently stationed to control the narrative and prevent journalists from speaking to combat soldiers. When I first approached the checkpoint, the heavily-armed Bedouin soldier who demanded identification deferred to her when I asked him if he spoke English.

She was more than willing to speak on subjects other soldiers typically would not. They usually say they are barred from doing so.

She told me Hadeel al-Hashlamoun and the other young women who had been killed at checkpoints did it because their boyfriends had broken up with them.

“I saw it on her Facebook page,” she assures me, then telling me about another girl who attempted to stab a soldier after her boyfriend dumped her by text message. “Most of them are like this.”

Incensed by her comments, my colleague and Hebron local Sohaib Zahda had joined the conversation. “I was born here and have lived here my whole life. People are carrying out stabbings. Why? Ask yourself why!” he says rhetorically.

She interrupts him, “Because of the radio stations. From 2003 or 2002, we’re in different times. Fifteen years have almost passed, you can not compare then to now.”

“Life is impossible here! You know life is impossible here,” he says to her, becoming exasperated.

“Life isn’t easy,” she says.


Soldiers at the checkpoint where two Palestinian men were killed after an alleged stabbing. Hebron has been encircled by these mobile checkpoints. Photo by Dan Cohen

Tel Rumeida, one of Hebron’s neighbourhoods being most aggressively colonized, was declared a closed military zone on November 1. Just below is the infamous Shuhada Street, the once-bustling thoroughfare of Hebron’s old city, now a ghost town after the army shut it down and sealed the shops following the 1994 massacre in the Ibrahimi mosque by American-Israeli settler Baruch Goldstein.

Back at the scene of the execution, Youth Against Settlements activist Issa Amro was showing another team of journalists where the execution took place.

An American settler and Chabadnik named Mordechai walks by and confers with the soldiers. As he begins to walk away, I ask him if he speaks English.

“Yes,” he replies in an American accent.

“Where are you from?” I ask him.

“Here.”

“Are you American?”

“I was born there,” he tells me. “I came home!”

Mordechai is from the Crown Heights neighbourhood of Brooklyn, where the Chabad Lubavitch movement is based. He is one of a few hundred settlers living in Hebron’s old city guarded by thousands of soldiers.

I ask him what he thinks about the killing. He tells me about terror attacks. “I can understand why the soldier did it,” he adds.

Minutes later, a settler driving a bus full of children stops. The driver opens the door and shouts at Issa Amro. “I saw it,” the settler laughs as kids stare out the windows. “His head went like this!” he says putting his hands behind his head and making an exploding motion.

Minutes later, children who were in the bus walk by. I estimate them to be eight years old.

“My father will kill you,” one of them shouts across the street at Amro.


Aziz al-Qasrawi and family members sit in the mechanic garage they own. Photo by Dan Cohen

Just several hundred metres away, al-Qasrawi’s father and uncles gathered in a family-owned mechanic garage.

Aziz al-Qasrawi’s grief over his son’s death made him distraught and skeptical of journalists.

“When was the website you work for founded,” he asked me.

“2006.”

“That was ten years ago. I haven’t seen any change since then,” he replies.

He’s right. It’s an internal struggle I go through from time to time.


Murals painted by Palestinians line the walls cutting off Tel Rumeida from the rest of Hebron. Photo by Anna Baltzer

“I would never say that my work will change anything or bring justice,” I tell him. “But I think that in order to make change, the first thing is that people have to know what is happening. So that’s my job.”

“How long will that take to achieve” he asks.

“Such a violent reality can’t last forever,” I tell him.

The grieving father remains sceptical, but indulges me.

“Ramzi liked to play with children and would take them to buy chocolates” al-Qasrawi said. “He was ambitious and loved to joke. He was engaged and worked a lot for his dream to get married.”

“He was a good man,” his fiancée’s father interjected. “He was well-educated and treated me with respect.”

Al-Sharif employed al-Qasrawi in his carpentry business. Neither was politicized or belonged to any political factions, according to Aziz al-Qasrawi.

The father doesn’t believe that the two friends and colleagues carried out an attack.

“They planned to go to Eizariya [Palestinian neighbourhood in occupied East Jerusalem] that day,” he said.

“I was working and someone told me there were two guys killed in Tel Rumeida. “My brother called me and told me that my wife saw the pictures on Facebook and realized it was our son.”

“I saw the pictures but didn’t know if it was my son or not because his face was covered. I tried to call Abdel Fattah. The phone rang but there was no answer. Then I tried to call my son but his phone was disconnected.”

I thank Aziz al-Qasrawi for his time, give condolences and get up to leave. Still stoic, he thanks me.

“Would you like to eat with us?”



Outside a court, Israelis demonstrate support for the soldier who has been apprehended for the extrajudicial execution of a Palestinian teen, taken near the city of Kiryat Malachi, March 29, 2016. Photo by Reuters

UN officials harshly condemn “extrajudicial execution” of wounded Palestinian teen by Israeli soldier

By TRT World [Turkish state radio and TV]
March 31, 2016

A UN professor on human rights on Wednesday condemned the “extrajudicial execution” of a Palestinian teen by an Israeli soldier last week as he lay on the ground wounded and motionless in Hebron in the occupied West Bank.

A video released by Israeli human rights group B’Tselem last Thursday showed one of the wounded teenagers lying on the bitumen while a nearby Israeli ambulance didn’t treat the victim, shortly after, the footage showed an Israeli soldier shooting the teenager in his head, smearing the teenager’s brains onto the bitumen.

“The images shown carry all the signs of a clear case of an extrajudicial execution,” said Christof Heyns, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, of the Hebron shooting.

“Whatever legal regime one applies to the case, shooting someone who is no longer a threat is murder.”

Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said he was “extremely concerned” about the “apparent extrajudicial execution” of the Palestinian man.

Colville said he was chilled at the way none of the 20 or so people at the scene, including medical personnel, appeared to pay any attention to the wounded man while he was still alive, he added that “they barely show any reaction in the immediate aftermath of his killing”.

Conville urged that a prompt, thorough, transparent and independent investigation is essential while he stressed that the man filming the incident should be protected since he is “a key eyewitness to the killing.”

“Some reports say he and his family are being intimidated… he should be protected from any reprisals.”

The video went viral over social media with critics slamming Israeli soldiers for its ongoing occupation and excessive use of force.

The soldier, who was unapologetic, had been apprehended, but had not been charged, meanwhile prosecutors told a court they were looking into manslaughter charges instead of a murder investigation.

The “gruesome” execution by the Israeli soldier in the West Bank was harshly condemned by the United Nations on Friday.

UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East peace process Nickolay Mladenov had also “strongly condemned” the “apparent extrajudicial execution” of the Palestinian teen.

“This was a gruesome, immoral and unjust act.”

He called on Israeli authorities to “bring to justice” the perpetrator of the incident.

Three other soldiers who were on the scene received a slap on the wrist for not treating the wounded teenager.

A boil of debate arose in Israel over whether Israel used excessive force against Palestinians.

A similar video went viral on Twitter where an Israeli soldier threw a knife next to a Palestinian school girl, then arrested her for an alleged stabbing attack.

Although the video clearly shows signs of an execution, the teen’s body will be autopsied to determine the severity of the charges to be brought against the soldier.

A legal suppression order has prevented the soldier’s identity to be released.

Israel’s military chief on Wednesday sent out a letter to troops in which he said the army will support any soldier in an act of wrong.

Israeli demonstrators clashed with police outside a military court during the hearing of the convicted soldier, one demonstrator was seen holding photos of soldiers holding guns while another man was seen showing extreme contempt by waving his middle finger at press.

Demonstrate outside a military court during a hearing of an Israeli soldier who murdered a wounded Palestinian teen near the southern Israeli city of Kiryat Malachi, March 29, 2016.

The past six months has seen the worst period of sustained violence in the West Bank and Jerusalem since Israel’s controversial bombing of civilians in 2014.

Colville was concerned that the execution was not a lone incident since more than 200 Palestinians have died since October last year, all shot by Israeli forces under controversial allegations of knife attacks or car-rammings.

Many other Palestinians were also shot during demonstrations and protests.

Israelis have been accused of using excessive force in most other cases, all of which they have mostly denied.

Source:
TRTWorld and agencies

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