Whenever Israel or its military forces are accused of some incident the almost automatic response is one that the allegation is false or that it is being investigated. And that seems to end the matter! How often has anyone seen a report by, or information from, the IDF in relation to any incident?
It is a subject the fearless Gideon Levy - who seems to becoming a more fierce critic of Israel and its IDF by the day - takes up in this piece in Haaretz "Twilight Zone / 'they told me daddy died'":
"As the war in Gaza raged, Israel Defense Forces reservists apparently thought anything was permissible: It was possible, maybe even necessary, to kill innocents, in the West Bank, too. Under cover of war, they thought, they could also kill a handcuffed Palestinian.
After all, they could always claim he tried to steal their weapons - never mind that he was bound with plastic handcuffs practically impossible to get out of. A bullet in the stomach from close range finished him off. Thus ended the life of Yasser Temeizi, 35, who had a work permit and jobs in Israel all of his adult life; in the past year he had worked for the Harash company in Ashdod. He was a young father who'd never gotten in any trouble with the IDF before. The soldiers arrested him for no reason, beat him for no reason in front of one of his small children and finally executed him for no reason.
A month and a half has passed since this horrifying incident, and the army's criminal investigations division is still looking into the case. An investigation that could have been completed in an hour is going on without end. Not a single Palestinian was questioned, as usual; not a single soldier was arrested, and most likely none will be - also as usual. The reservist soldiers who killed Temeizi have likely already been sent back home; perhaps they returned feeling good about their experiences and about doing their national duty. Granted, they didn't take part in the war in Gaza, but they killed, too. Why not? Herewith, as a service to them, is the story of the consequences of their actions, which senior IDF officers have already termed "a grave incident," that involved "a series of serious failures."
It is a subject the fearless Gideon Levy - who seems to becoming a more fierce critic of Israel and its IDF by the day - takes up in this piece in Haaretz "Twilight Zone / 'they told me daddy died'":
"As the war in Gaza raged, Israel Defense Forces reservists apparently thought anything was permissible: It was possible, maybe even necessary, to kill innocents, in the West Bank, too. Under cover of war, they thought, they could also kill a handcuffed Palestinian.
After all, they could always claim he tried to steal their weapons - never mind that he was bound with plastic handcuffs practically impossible to get out of. A bullet in the stomach from close range finished him off. Thus ended the life of Yasser Temeizi, 35, who had a work permit and jobs in Israel all of his adult life; in the past year he had worked for the Harash company in Ashdod. He was a young father who'd never gotten in any trouble with the IDF before. The soldiers arrested him for no reason, beat him for no reason in front of one of his small children and finally executed him for no reason.
A month and a half has passed since this horrifying incident, and the army's criminal investigations division is still looking into the case. An investigation that could have been completed in an hour is going on without end. Not a single Palestinian was questioned, as usual; not a single soldier was arrested, and most likely none will be - also as usual. The reservist soldiers who killed Temeizi have likely already been sent back home; perhaps they returned feeling good about their experiences and about doing their national duty. Granted, they didn't take part in the war in Gaza, but they killed, too. Why not? Herewith, as a service to them, is the story of the consequences of their actions, which senior IDF officers have already termed "a grave incident," that involved "a series of serious failures."
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