As you may recall, the brains heading up the British Israel Communications and Research Centre claimed in a recent(ish) letter to the Guardian that the death of Reuters cameraman Fadel Shana (pictured below) was "accidental" (see my earlier response here).
Shana was killed by Israeli forces in Gaza earlier this year when a tank crew fired two shells at him as he was filming from a mile away. Eight other civilians aged between 12 and 20, including six children under 16, were also killed in the attack.
An Israeli military inquiry this week reached the same conclusion, exonerating the soldiers responsible on the grounds that they had "reasonably" mistaken Shana's camera for a mortar or anti-tank weapon. As excuses go this is nearly as risible as Israel's claim that Mohammed Omer, a Palestinian journalist who suffered a complete nervous breakdown and several broken ribs after being beaten and tortured by Israeli agents, merely "lost his balance and fell".
Fitzsimons will no doubt consider herself vindicated; others have reacted rather differently. The Committee to Protect Journalists, observing that "Shana and his colleague were operating in an open area and were identifiable as civilians" and that "Shana’s sport utility vehicle and flak jacket bore "Press" markings", condemned the ruling as "a message to journalists in the Gaza Strip that they can come under fire any time they raise a camera". Reporters Sans Frontières was similarly "outraged", noting that "Israeli soldiers enjoy an impunity that endangers many journalists covering their operations". It commented further that the inquiry's conclusions were "unsurprising" given Israel's dismal record of failing to hold its security forces accountable - RSF reported earlier this year, for example, that the "Israeli justice system has never taken proceedings against those allegedly responsible" for previous murders of journalists, noting that "the soldiers responsible for the death[s] of journalists Raffaele Ciriello (2002), Imad Abu Zahra (2002), Nazeh Darouazi (2003) and James Miller (2003) are still benefiting from an inexplicable impunity."
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights "strongly condemn{ed}" the ruling as another demonstration of the "chronic failure of the State of Israel and its occupation forces to properly investigate hundreds of crimes they have committed against civilians in the OPT". The Foreign Press Association likewise expressed "dismay" at the results of the investigation, which it described as just "the latest in a long line of cases clearing... {IDF} soldiers of deadly negligence", while Reuters condemned the decision as "effectively giving soldiers a free hand to kill", thereby "severely curtail[ing] the freedom of the media to cover the conflict." B'Tselem condemned the inquiry for its lack of independence, noting that,
"[f]rom the beginning of 2007 to mid-2008, B'Tselem called for investigations to be opened into 99 cases in which 189 persons were killed. Up to the present, only 4 Military Police investigations have been opened."
Amnesty International scathingly denounced the "so-called inquiry" as "scandalous" and lacking "any semblance of impartiality". It continued:
"Independent investigations into killings of unarmed civilians by Israeli forces are virtually never carried out. Even in cases where international outcry forces the Military Advocate General’s office to look into the cases, the process is limited and lacks any independence and impartiality. In this case, as in virtually all such cases, witnesses were not interviewed.
No proper investigation was carried out into the cases of the 13 other unarmed civilians, including eight children, killed that day after Palestinians had ambushed and killed three Israeli soldiers."
The effect of the ruling, Amnesty concluded, will be to "reinforce the culture of impunity that has led to so many reckless and disproportionate killings of children and other unarmed civilians by Israeli forces in Gaza."
The impunity enjoyed by Israeli soldiers is not, of course, limited to the murder of journalists. According to Amnesty International's most recent annual report,
"Israeli soldiers and other members of the security forces as well as Israeli settlers continued [in 2007] to enjoy impunity for human rights abuses committed against Palestinians, including unlawful killings, torture and other ill-treatment, physical assaults and attacks on their property."
Take, for example, the case of Staff Sergeant L., who was filmed in July shooting an unarmed Palestinian detainee at very close range with a rubber-coated steel bullet during the anti-wall protests in Nil'in, and Lt. Col. Omri Burberg, his commander, who was shown holding the detainee down as he was being shot and who, according to Staff Sergeant L., gave the order for the shooting. The incident was unusual not because of what happened - such behaviour is routine in the occupied territories - but because it was captured on film, which prevented the Israeli authorities from issuing a flat denial (the standard response) and enabled human rights organisations to generate an international outcry. Israel initially responded by doing nothing - the soldier responsible for the shooting was seen serving in the same unit the following day. Pursuant to a B'Tselem press release about the incident, he was briefly detained and then returned to serve in his unit. The next Friday at Bil'in Palestinian demonstrators demanded justice, chanting, "Where's Omri?", to which Israeli troops responded with tear gas.
Where was Omri? After the video clip was broadcast around the world, he was 'dismissed' from his post (in fact he was merely transferred to another position, and according to some of his associates his resignation was voluntary, with "some of his superiors" even attempting "to convince him to stay on") to face charges of "unbecoming conduct" - a trivial offense entailing no serious punishment, or even a criminal record. In the event of a civil trial the soldiers may well receive the support of the military, while IDF Chief Gabi Ashkenazi has speculated that Burberg will likely be permitted to resume his position as commander once the public furor has abated. Recall again that Burberg and his subordinate were caught on film shooting an unarmed detainee at close range with potentially lethal weaponry ('rubber bullets' have been "reported to have killed many Palestinians, including children" [.pdf]). B'Tselem, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel and Yesh Din comment:
"[The decision to indict the soldiers on such trivial grounds] transmits to officers and other soldiers an extremely grave message of contempt for human life, and paves the way for future cases ... It is hard to avoid the conclusion that a systemic defect is involved, one that has spread not only among IDF officers but also among those responsible for enforcing law and order in the army".
While the Israeli authorities failed to take any action against the soldiers, they did manage to "arrest" the father of the girl who filmed the abuse during a non-violent demonstration, apparently in retaliation for the publication of his daughter's footage. A military judge last week ordered his release citing lack of evidence, and accused the prosecution and police of being "unprofessional" in their conduct. Meanwhile, also in Nil'in, Israeli soldiers killed two Palestinian children aged 10 and 17. Both were shot in the head.
Cross-posted at The Heathlander