Military police arrest soldier who shot Briton in Rafah

[Scurrilous]

http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/378227.html

<snip>

"Military police this week arrested and questioned the Israel Defense Forces soldier suspected of shooting British civilian Tom Hurndall in Rafah last April, who suffered severe brain damage and lies in a vegetative state in England.


Hurndall's family has begun proceedings allowing him to eventually be disconnected from respiratory and other life-support systems.

Hurndall, 22, a student from Manchester and a member of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), was wounded by IDF gunfire directed at Palestinians in the Yabne neighborhood of the Rafah refugee camp an April 11, 2003. Other ISM activists on the scene at the time of the incident charged that IDF snipers starting shooting at Palestinians - including children - in the street without any provocation.

The soldier suspected of shooting Hurndall, whose remand the Southern Command military tribunal extended Wednesday by seven days, initially claimed that he returned fire after an armed Palestinian shot at him. He later admitted to shooting at the unarmed British civilian with the intention of intimidating him."

[xchrom]

1. this is all that can come

from the current status in palestine.
hurndall is intimidated all right.

[newyorican]

2. Intimidated to death

apparently. So much for several metric tons of drool spilled into this forum about whom the IDF *doesn't* target.

[The Magistrate]

3. Well, Sir

This is evidence. The man's word, against his own interest, must be accepted. He shot at Mr. Hurndell intending to frighten him badly.

It will be interesting to see what emerges at trial, and clearly there will be one. At this point, it is not possible to say more than that this soldier acted personally. Whether he offers a defense of being ordered or encouraged to the act by his superiors remains to be seen.

[bemildred]

4. Indeed. It has the air of truth, and raises some interesting

questions. Let's see how it develops.

[Resistance]

17. It has the air of total lies, in my opinion.

He shot a peace worker in cold blood and now this is the excuse for why he even fired in that direction at all.

[bemildred]

18. You are certainly welcome to your opinion.

It's not that I have no sympathy with it. But one
does well to remember that soldiers are people too, and
they often would be somewhere else if they could, and they
often make bad mistakes under pressure. It is wrong to
simply demonize all of them because some are assholes, and
unproductive too, IMHO. Ex-soldiers can make some of the
most effective weapons in the fight for justice.

[cantwealljustgetalong]

20. actually, he doesn't demonize ALL soldiers...

just the IDF ones...

one can only hope that since this was an Arab Bedouin IDF soldier, the demonization will be somewhat softened...

[newyorican]

21. a distinction without a difference...

The problem here is with the IDF. Not the ethnicity of the shooter.

[cantwealljustgetalong]

22. consider me...

humbled by your nobleness...

[Resistance]

23. not true

just the ones who murder peace activists.

[Violet_Crumble]

5. Nope...

This is evidence. The man's word, against his own interest, must be accepted. He shot at Mr. Hurndell intending to frighten him badly.

The only thing yr right about is that it is evidence. The thing yr wrong about is that the man's word must be accepted and because he's said what his intention was, that's the final word in what his intention was. That's for the investigation to decide. Personally, I tend to believe there might be some truth in a claim that Tom Hurndell was shot at to intimidate him, and in that case, the soldier was shooting with impunity and with no regard for civilians or for the children there as well, one of whom Tom Hurdnall tried to protect. If this is the incident I think it was, I've read some outlandish and obviously untrue claims from the IDF, such as that Tom Hurndall was armed and dressed in combat clothes...

Also, the article said that that his family are currently going through the hoops in an attempt to have his life-support turned off. I hope they succeed, because being forced to watch a family member kept alive artificially in a vegetative state is right up there on the torment scale...


Violet...

[bemildred]

6. One must give a certain credence to it, IMHO.

The man has other options if he wishes to dissemble, although
I will admit this is less damaging than an admitted intent to kill.
At a minimum he is entitled to the same protections we all would
want in his position, i.e. some presumption of innocence where not
proven guilty.

That does not make it the end of the matter. It raises a lot
of other questions, some of which you mention.

[Violet_Crumble]

8. Of course...

But that's a completely different thing than thinking that because this man has said what his intent was, that's what his intent was. It's definately less damaging than an admitted intent to kill, but even what he's admitted is damaging, and also is an admission of him being a crappy shot :)

Violet...

[newyorican]

7. Take Mag literally Vi...

"The man's word, against his own interest, must be accepted."

Means he stipulated to incriminating evidence. Doesn't mean investigation is over. At least that's my take.

A stipulation such as this can actually speed up an investigation greatly. Not that I'm overflowing with faith that this wont be whitewashed at some point.

[Jack Rabbit]

9. True

They can charge the soldier with murder, but it would be a difficult case to prove. The soldier was in a war zone and firing a warning shot in order to control a crowd would not be out of the ordinary.

[newyorican]

10. I think almost every reasonable

person would say there's a significant difference between a warning shot and an intimidation shot.

[The Magistrate]

19. Thank You, Mr. Newyorikan

You have stated my intended meaning precisely: no one can now argue the man was shooting at someone shooting at him, or anything else exculpatory. There certainly ought to be further investigation into the matter, and it sounds, at least, like there will be.

[Gimel]

11. Need to verify

Your statements like "I've read some outlandish and obviously untrue claims from the IDF, such as that Tom Hurndall was armed and dressed in combat clothes..." should be verified. After all, the IDF has made few official statements in this case.


The IDF has previously agreed only to carry out an internal investigation with the soldier's unit, the Bedouin patrol battalion.

http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/378227.html

[Violet_Crumble]

12. You don't believe Tom Hurndall's family?

They're the ones who spoke about the claims by the IDF. There was an IDF report into the shooting. That's the report that claimed he was armed and wearing combat fatigues. And it's a claim that did the rounds, it appears. If a conservative source will be more convincing to some here, here's an FrontPage article with a link to a JPost report (the link is broken) that he was armed and dressed in combat fatigues....

At the time of his injury, Tom Hurndall was armed, wearing tiger fatigues, and shooting at a Israeli Defense Force outpost, taking cover behind a nearby building between shots.

Those of you reading about Tom Hurndall in the American or British media might start at this last sentence. After all, you read a dramatically different version of events in your weekend papers, which probably went something like this:

At the time of his injury, Tom Hurndall was unarmed, dressed in the bright orange jacket of the International Solidarity Movement, and steering two Palestinian children away from a firing Israeli tank-mounted machine gun.

That sound better? The first story, which cast Tom Hurndall as an armed combatant, was based on a Sunday, April 13th report of the Israeli Defense Forces. The second story, which cast Tom Hurndall as a heroic rescuer of defenseless children, was based on 'eyewitness' reports from Tom's fellow activists in the International Solidarity Movement. This second story got picked up by Reuters, who wrote that the Israeli Defense Force critically wounded a "British peace activist helping Palestinian children cross a street under gunfire." It also got picked up by the Associated Press, who also claimed Hurndall was helping "children out of the line of fire." With the aid of these two newswire services, the second story made its way into almost every major American paper by Saturday, the day after.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=7361

Violet...

[Gimel]

14. Soldier's testimony

It is part of today's news that the soldier has changed his testimony. He previously said that he was returning fire, and now says he shot in the direction of Tom in order to intimidate him. That is not exactly an IDF statement. The investigation has been going on and was intensified two months ago, as reported. I don't think there's an intended cover-up by the IDF, as the frontpagemag article implies.

[GabysPoppy]

15. An example of

those genuinely interested in discussion.

[Gimel]

16. Not an IDF target

The fact that there has been an investigation since the event, the soldier has been questioned, although his identity remained unrevealed until now, testifies to the fact. The IDF is opposed to soldiers firing at unarmed civilians.

The soldier suspected of shooting Hurndall, whose remand the Southern Command military tribunal extended Wednesday by seven days, initially claimed that he returned fire after an armed Palestinian shot at him. He later "admitted to firing in proximity to an unarmed civilian as a deterrent," said a release from the army.

http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=378227

On edit: As Hurndall's family was not present at the time, I don't see how their testimony could be considered, and as Tom was unconscious, and obviously dressed in the same clothes when taken to hospital, I doubt that what he was wearing could be disputed. Again, the report about that sounds rather fabricated. The IDF couldn't claim that he was wearing combat uniform and armed. Only that the soldiers were fired on.

[drdon326]

13. Reckless act.

unlike the PA , who are still investigating the korine -a
and the murder of the americans, the israeli gov't has arrested
the responsible person.

Can someone tell me how the korine-a investigation is going??

for some reason i haven't heard much. hmmmm