Israeli troops engage in Jenin shoot-out

[Darranar]

Israeli troops and Palestinian fighters were locked in an intense gun battle today in the West Bank town of Jenin, witnesses said.

The shoot-out started when soldiers manning a makeshift observation post in a tall building came under fire, the army said.

Eight Israeli tanks and armoured cars moved into the centre of town, and troops fired machine guns at Palestinian gunmen who ducked behind the corners of buildings for cover.

http://breakingnews.iol.ie/news/story.asp?j=78683700&p=786844x6

[The Magistrate]

1. It Is Worth Pointing Out, Sir

This is a legitimate action, and on both sides. The Arab Palestinian irregulars engaged military personnel, and were engaged in return. If this were the principal mode of operations by the Arab Palestinian irregulars, my own attitute towards them, and probably that of many others, even in Israel, would be much different than it is.

[Darranar]

2. I know...

i was just showing that more violence is occuring, and more is on the way-if it needed showing.

Additionally, however, a settler was shot. That is targeting of a civilian, and is therefore illegitimate.

[StandWatie]

3. was he armed?

and what was he doing?

Settlers have a paramilitary sort of nature, and may or may not be combatants depending on the circumstance.

[Darranar]

4. I don't know if he was armed...

though it is important to know in order to understand exactly what happened, and whether it was legitimate or not. I gave the settler the benefit of the doubt in my post; perhaps I shouldn't have.

He was driving in his car.

[The Magistrate]

5. The Occurance In Ramallah Was a Seperate Incident, Sir

While simply shooting at a car is taking a civilian for a target, there is something to Mr. Watie's cold-blooded attitude. A number of the settlements are, in essence, para-military militia camps, and certainly their adult male inhabitants could from some angles therefore be viewed as combatants, by the same measure it is my practice to employ towards Arab Palestinian irregulars. It would surprise me if the Arab Palestinian fighters lacked their own intelligence concerning settlements of this sort, and it is not impossible some of these shootings at settler's automobiles are directed in some wise at least analogous to Israel's shootings at automobiles containing Hamas officials. There is insufficient information provided here to make such a judgement, either way, with any certainty.

[Darranar]

6. Agreed...

But how would the shooter have known, while firing on the car, who the settler was? It seems to me that it was meant to target civilians, whether or not it did.

[The Magistrate]

7. That Is An Imponderable, Sir

But here is how it might work.

Those settlements from which armed men periodically emerge to wreak havoc on Arab Palestinians and their fields and orchards are well known to the locals, just as, in a rough neighborhood of an urban area in our own country, those places where toughs gather consistently will be known to the peaceable inhabitants. It would surprise me if Arab Palestinians did not keep a close watch on such settlements, and did not have a pretty good idea of what automobiles were associated with them, and even of the appearance of persons with a name for thuggery among their inhabitants. It would be much to their interest to do so, and to keep some track of the movement of such persons: it might, if nothing else, give some timely warning of an impending outrage. Therefore it does not strike me as impossible that in some instances, anyway, shooters might have a good idea of who was in an automobile they were shooting at on the highway, or of what settlement it was attached to, anyway, and be making an attempt to strike persons associated with settler violence towards Arab Palstinians.

[Darranar]

8. Yet again...

you are correct.

However, this method of targeting, though better than indiscriminate firing, strikes me as easily fallible. The Israeli tactic of assasinations has in the past killed civilians, often unnecesarily, based on similar tactics, though of course the details are far different. This particular method has probably killed several civilians as well.

I'm not saying that this is unjustified; as both you and I have pointed out in the past, during wartime such tactics, despite the possible civilian casualties, are sometimes neccesary. I'm simply saying that there may be a better method in both situations.

[StandWatie]

9. it's not great..

and without a doubt breaking into a settlement and just murdering whoever you find (which happens) is an odious war crime but I think there is more going on than just mindless violence. Gunmen got Kahane's son (who was a known terrorist unarested and guarded by the IDF) and a number of other Kach irregulars at a rate that can't be accounted for by pure statistical random chance.