commentary from Israel & the West Bank
Posts tagged bat ayin
Fabrication of the Occupation
Jun 2nd
In recent months there have been multiple encounters between activists and settlers in the West Bank that the major news outlets in Israel have chosen to cover. I was appalled by the unabashed lies that both Yedioth Ahronoth and the Jerusalem Post published last Saturday regarding the settler attack on Ta’ayush activists in the West Bank village of Safa.
Last Saturday Ta’ayush activists accompanied Palestinian farmers in Safa, where there is a history of assaults by settlers from the fanatic settlement of Bat Ayin. While farming, 15-20 masked settlers came down from the settlement onto Palestinian land and assaulted Ta’ayush activists and Palestinian farmers. They threw stones, hit and slapped, grabbed and destroyed a camera and flipped over Ezra Nawi’s car. The army and border police arrived and herded the Ta’ayush members with sticks, using excessive force and ultimately arresting five members for violating a closed military zone order. Nothing happened to the settlers – yet another instance in which they are not held accountable for the assaults or damage they inflict.
As the events were unfolding, I informed Haaretz about the situation. I have often been quoted in Haaretz about Ta’ayush activities in the West Bank. When they do decide to publish an item on the web site, they obviously put their own spin on it. They certainly do not adopt my language and tone (I say “we were attacked by settlers” and they report “settlers, leftists clash”), but at least they do not compromise the facts.
Yedioth Ahronoth and Jerusalem Post, on the other hand, have no problem making up complete fabrications.
This is how Yedioth chose to portray the same story:
“Stones were thrown during the clashes, but no injuries were reported, and quiet was restored. An initial police investigation revealed that the incident took place when a group of some 20 leftists and Palestinians convened in the area, and were spotted by Bat Ayin residents who arrived at the same location.”
The only stones that were thrown were by settlers, and we were not “spotted” by Bat Ayin residents, but rather targeted for attack without having committed any provocation.
It then goes on: “At one point the area was declared a closed military zone and settlers left the area. Three Palestinians and two leftists were detained for remaining in the area illegally.”
Actually, the settlers fled under the nose of the army and border police well before the area was declared a closed military zone and the five Israeli Ta’ayush activists detained were beaten with sticks and subjected to police brutality. Two Palestinian residents of Safa aged 14 were detained on claims that they threw stones, butt not a single stone was thrown at a single settler.
The Jerusalem Post account is just as false, but arguably more ludicrous.
“Palestinians and Left-wing activists demonstrating near Bat Ayin on Saturday scuffled with settlers from the area.”
The Ta’ayush activists were not “demonstrating” but rather simply escorting farmers on their own land, where they have been earning their livelihood long before Bat Ayin was constructed next door. The Jerusalem Post must have confused us with protestors of the separation barrier in Ni’lin, which is the image in the photo they selected to accompany the piece.
I guess I knew it happens, but when you actually experience such a blatant construction of lies and disregard for journalistic integrity, it is hard to grasp. I guess it is similar to how so many Israelis know there is settler violence, but can’t possibly understand how it feels to actually witness it, or bear the brunt of it. Such false reporting makes it all the more abundantly clear how crucial it is for Israelis to observe facts on the ground with their own eyes.
IDF Concerned Soldiers Joining Settler Revenge Actions
Nov 15th
Posted by Joseph Dana in Unarmed Resistance
No comments
From the excellent blog maintained by Didi Remez comes a report on IDF concerns about settler soldiers. Not a new story but one that is quite ongoing. From Didi’s blog:
Channel Ten TV’s military affairs correspondent reported Monday evening that “these [see video below] pictures give the IDF a serious headache,” because they show soldiers who join rioting settlers and using their IDF-issue weapons. Soldiers manning an observation post of the Etzioni Brigade, which is the Bethlehem brigade, were amazed when their security cameras spotted two of their comrades out there. Corporal Baruch Brandoi of the anti-terror school and Sergeant Nahman Alfasi of the Artillery Corps, both residents of the settlement of Bat Ayin, took their M-16’s and joined their friends on a revenge campaign against the nearby Palestinian village of Hirbat Zafa. The incident took place shortly after the lethal ax attack in Bat Ayin. The settlers wanted revenge. A group of settlers started throwing rocks at the Palestinian village. The Palestinians responded in kind, but then came the two armed soldiers. Brandoi fired 26 rounds and kept firing even after the Palestinians have fled. Alfasi fired 12 rounds. [Full translated transcript here.]
The “headache” was not bad enough, apparently, for the IDF to put some serious effort into disciplining these soldiers, despite the extraordinary evidence.
Presenting the pictures before the court, the military prosecution argued that the two soldiers were under no life threat and thus had no reason to open fire, but was forced to make a plea bargain deal with them, and each of the shooters was handed down a sentence of 21 days in the military prison.
The de facto parallel hierarchies – military and rabbinical — that the many fundamentalist combat soldiers owe allegiance to have been a major problem for IDF operations in the West Bank for some time. One only needs to skim through Yesh Din’s numerous publications in order to understand how blurred the lines between the IDF and settler paramilitaries have become.
The IDF’s patent inability or unwillingness to deal with the problem is evident on a nearly daily basis. Here are two examples just from this morning:
IDF reservists in a unit specializing in West Bank operations publish a petition calling on the unit to desist from participating in outpost evacuations. This is shortly after the a group of new recruits to the unit who staged a protest [!] in the middle of a major basic training ceremony were given slaps on the wrist.
Students at Mercaz Harav Yeshiva find “the subject of killing gentiles, and more specifically Palestinians as part of the ongoing battle against terrorism, particularly relevant for [those] who have served, are presently serving or plan on serving in the IDF.”