← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Centinel
Thread ID: 5339 | Posts: 3 | Started: 2003-03-04
2003-03-04 18:51 | User Profile
From Agence France-Presse, available online at: [url=http://www.prolog.net/webnews/wed/ab/Qmideast-us-israel-reject.Rd6C_DM4.html]http://www.prolog.net/webnews/wed/ab/Qmide...t.Rd6C_DM4.html[/url]
Israel rejects US criticism of its deadly raids
March 4, 2003
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel on Tuesday rejected US criticism of its killing of Palestinian civilians during increasingly deadly raids into built-up Palestinian areas.
"We are active everywhere because there cannot be even the smallest sanctuary of immunity for the terrorists," said a senior Israeli official who asked not to be named.
He said Israel's raids were "legitimate self-defence operations".
In the latest raid into the Gaza Strip early Monday, eight people were killed, including a pregnant woman and a 13-year-old boy, in an operation aimed at senior members of the radical Islamic group Hamas, which refuses to recognise Israel's right to exist.
"The Israeli army attacks because the Palestinian Authority and its security services are doing nothing against the terrorist organisations, and on the contrary are encouraging them to continue their attacks."
"The terrorists hide in neighbourhoods in the middle of the civilian population, who serve as their human shields," said the official.
In a rare rebuke Monday, US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said that while Washington respected Israel's right to defend itself, it was troubled by the soaring Palestinian death toll.
"We continue to be seriously concerned about civilian casualties and we have urged the Israeli government to take all appropriate precautions to prevent the death and injury of innocent civilians and damage to civilian and humanitarian infrastructure," Boucher said.
"We are also deeply concerned at the increasing Israeli use over the past few months of demolitions and the civilian deaths that have resulted from this practice," he said.
Nuher Sweidan el-Makadna, 33, who was nine months pregnant, was killed when Israel troops blew up houses in the El Bureij refugee camp south of Gaza City.
Since June 2002 the army has destroyed more than 150 houses belonging to Palestinians allegedly involved in attacks, a policy human rights groups describe as collective punishment.
2003-03-04 19:55 | User Profile
This is REAL death and destruction by an unholy regime which is a blight on the face of the world. Bastards.
2003-03-04 20:02 | User Profile
The self appointed "Chosen" never will listen to any mere mortals.