Israeli soldiers maim Palestinian children
By Alec Smart
EAST JERUSALEM — On December 16, I sat in a Lebanese restaurant discussing the ins and outs of the forthcoming millennium celebrations with Ralph. Ralph works for the Temporary International Presence (TIPH), an unarmed peace-monitoring operation that patrols the West Bank town of Hebron, occupied by Israel.
Ralph received a call on his mobile. At first he was irritated to be disturbed during dinner, although the nature of his work means that the phone must be left on at all times. But the interruption was serious. A 14-year-old Arab boy had just been shot in the head by an Israeli soldier's rubber bullet during some sort of disturbance in the centre of Hebron.
The young victim was transferred by ambulance from Alia Hospital in Hebron to the Hadassa Hospital's neurological unit in Jerusalem (the bullet punctured his skull).
Ralph explained that Israel's "rubber" bullets are different to the standard issue crowd control ammunition that Britain deploys in Northern Ireland (I souvenired one when I was shot at covering a riot in West Belfast). Northern Ireland's Royal Ulster Constabulary are armed with large solid plastic projectiles, about the size of a roll-on deodorant container). The Israel Defence Force (IDF) uses smaller, rubber-coated lead bullets that can penetrate flesh.
As we were relatively close to Hadassa Hospital, if necessary, Ralph was to urgently visit the injured boy, accompanied by George, another TIPH officer. Phone calls were made to the Palestinian Authority in Hebron to ensure that the boy's family had been notified, and to Hadassa Hospital to check on his condition. The boy's relatives were by his bedside. He had slipped into a coma.
Jerusalem is out of TIPH's mandated region and Ralph has little authority outside its jurisdiction of Hebron. The frustration showed clearly on Ralph's and George's faces. A seriously injured boy lay helpless, perhaps near death, and they were powerless to act.
Once the boy's family and friends were at the hospital, and witnesses to the shooting had made statements to the police, there remained little more that they could do. Reluctantly, the pair continued eating their dinner.
Sadly, this is not an isolated incident for the TIPH personnel. IDF soldiers regularly target children that resist its occupation of the West Bank.
Peace monitors
Marked by their distinctive cornflower-blue tunics with red logos emblazoned on the chest and arm bands, the TIPH patrol the divided city of Hebron on foot and in marked cars. On call 24 hours a day, they are a continuous presence. They also respond to emergency call-outs.
The TIPH was created as a result of the February 25, 1994, massacre of 29 Palestinian worshippers at the al-Haram al-Ibrahimi Mosque during Friday dawn prayers. An Israeli citizen and resident of Kiryat Arba settlement, Baruch Goldstein, had opened fire. Following UN Security Council's resolution condemning the massacre, Palestine Liberation Organisation chairperson Yasser Arafat announced the PLO's withdrawal from any further peace negotiations with Israel unless Israel agreed to a presence international observers in Hebron.
On March 31, 1994, representatives from the PLO and Israel signed an agreement asking Italy, Denmark and Norway to provide support staff and observers, which became the TIPH. Its main mandate would be to assist in promoting stability and restoring normal life in Hebron. The TIPH mission was came into being on May 8, 1994.
However, the PLO and the Israel government, could not reach an agreement on an extension of the TIPH's mandate, and TIPH withdrew from Hebron on August 8. TIPH's current operations date from September 28, 1995, Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Under the agreement, Hebron was divided into two sectors: Area H1, where the majority of the Palestinian population resides, and in which the Palestinian police assumed responsibility for law and order; and Area H2, containing all the Israeli residents and some 20,000 Palestinians, in which all responsibilities for security remained with the Israel government. Civil powers and responsibilities in both areas were transferred to the Palestinian Authority.
A new agreement on the TIPH was signed January 21, 1997. From February 1, 1997, the multinational TIPH mission was again active, now with six participating countries.
Israeli impunity
On December 17, I visited 16-year-old Ziad Ghazi Al Batsh who had his nose broken by Israel soldiers the previous evening. The boy explained that he was walking home after buying provisions at the pharmacy, when he was arrested by the IDF. They drove him to a discreet location and viciously beat him, confiscating his bloodstained jacket to hide the evidence of their violence. After wiping his face clean — his nose was swollen to twice its normal size — they abandoned him.
Because of his family's limited health insurance coverage, Ziad had to wait two months — his 17th birthday, as chance would have it — before he could have his nose operated on.
On December 29, I witnessed the arrest of 12-year-old Fouad Abu Hadid. It seems the boy, with a group of his friends, had heckled a squad of Israeli soldiers. He was marched at gunpoint away from his buddies, then made to sit in the sun, back pressed against a concrete pillar, while the soldier supervising his arrest berated him. The IDF soldiers themselves were scarcely beyond their teenage years.
TIPH personnel arrived at the scene to observe the arrest — which under the Geneva Convention is illegal. In response to the monitors' unexpected arrival, the boy was marched to the al Shuhada Street IDF compound, out of public view. The young soldiers approached the TIPH vehicle and challenged the monitors' authority to make notes. When George asked why the boy had been arrested, he was insultingly called a "Zoub" ("dick" in Hebrew).
The TIPH has documented hundreds of reports of injuries sustained by minors during IDF security operations. None of these reports are made public, nor does TIPH comment publicly on specific incidents.
Where the H1 and H2 areas meet is the al-Ibrahimi mosque. Just within H2 is the dominating structure of a synagogue. Pedestrian access from the Jewish quarter on the hilltop to the synagogue was through the narrow "Prayer Walk", which was surrounded by Palestinian homes. In mid-1998, some Jews were making their way through this neighbourhood were shot at by an unknown sniper. One sustained a bullet wound in the arm.
In response, Israel authorities moved out the entire neighbourhood "temporarily" and the residents were forced to lodge with relatives elsewhere, ostensibly under an order to "upgrade" their homes. Once contractors had rewired and rendered the stone walls, the Israeli army compulsorily purchased the buildings that lined the path to the synagogue. Using the "Freedom of Access to Holy Sites" agreement signed between the Palestinian Authority and Israel, the homes were made uninhabitable.
In Palestinian tradition, houses are passed down through the generations along the male lineage; a home is a distinguished family heirloom that contains important familial memories. Typical of this dirty war, the children from this neighbourhood — uprooted from their schools and friends and scattered among relatives in overcrowded homes throughout the West Bank — have been punished to allow supposed "safe passage" for citizens of the dominant culture to pray.
I met a 12-year-old boy who had his kneecap shattered by an Israeli soldier in early 1999. Jawad Al Mohtasbe, whose father runs the souvenir shop directly in front of the synagogue, was kicking a football in the street when an IDF soldier asked him to pass it to him. Jawad refused. The soldier levelled his M16 machine gun at him. Jawad dared him to shoot, hopelessly underestimating Israeli soldiers' vindictiveness.
The soldier fired into Jawad's leg. Jawad's 6-year-old sister Sada sustained head injuries from flying shrapnel. The soldier was arrested and eventually tried; locals say that he was merely fined, transferred and allowed to remain on active service.
Jawad now hobbles about, a plastic brace supports his crippled right leg which will never kick a football again. The time taken off school whilst his injuries healed, the costs in physiotherapy and transportation to and from hospital will not be reimbursed. No compensation money will be forthcoming from the IDF.
As I checked-in at the departure gate at Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion Airport, to return to Britain, two young customs officials interrogated about my daily itinerary whilst in Israel. When they discovered I had visited, they asked: "The Arabs, did they hassle you? Did they give you any trouble?". They were shocked (and disappointed) to discover I had found the Arabs of Hebron to be approachable.
They then proceeded to search my luggage to "check to see if the Arabs put in any bombs". Seven staff take part. The customs officials could see I was a journalist from the two cameras and laptop computer I was carrying. It is not a security check; I am being punished for leaving the tourist route and daring to investigate the plight of Israel's Palestinian neighbours.
[TIPH employees' names have been changed for this article. TIPH employees did not assist in the research for this article, as this would be beyond its legal mandate.]