{"id":145204,"date":"2015-03-28T18:15:35","date_gmt":"2015-03-28T18:15:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=145204"},"modified":"2015-03-28T18:15:35","modified_gmt":"2015-03-28T18:15:35","slug":"israel-uses-lethal-force-against-palestinian-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/editorials\/israel-uses-lethal-force-against-palestinian-children\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel Uses Lethal Force Against Palestinian Children"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stephen Lendman
\nRINF Alternative News<\/a><\/p>\n

It’s longstanding Israel practice – shooting defenseless Palestinian children in cold blood.<\/p>\n

Defence for Children International-Palestine (DCI-P) explains what’s virtually unreported in the West.<\/p>\n

On March 23,\u00a0DCI-P<\/a>\u00a0called on UN member states to hold Israel accountable for crimes against Palestinian children.<\/p>\n

It issued a statement to the UN Human Rights Council saying in part:<\/p>\n

“A generation of Palestinian children living under prolonged Israeli military occupation have been arrested, shot, shelled and bombed since 2000, and, during this time, Israeli forces have killed over 1,900 children.”<\/p>\n

“Israel is the only state to automatically and systematically prosecute children in military courts that lack basic standards of due process.”<\/p>\n

“Recent amendments to Israeli military laws concerning children have had little to no impact on ending widespread and systematic ill treatment and torture.”<\/p>\n

“Despite well-documented evidence of grave violations of international law, justice and accountability is persistently denied to Palestinian children.”<\/p>\n

“Instead, (they) continually bear the brunt of Israel\u2019s repeated military offensives and suffer from a completely man-made humanitarian crisis created by Israel\u2019s eight-year long blockade of Gaza.”<\/p>\n

“Between July 8 and August 26, 2014, Israeli attacks on Gaza killed over 500 Palestinian children.”<\/p>\n

“(T)he need for justice and accountability is urgent.”<\/p>\n

DCI-P reported on Israel repeatedly using live fire against peaceful protesters.<\/p>\n

Since January, at least 30 Palestinian children were shot in cold blood.<\/p>\n

According to DCI-P accountability program director Ayed Abu Eqtaish:<\/p>\n

“The high rate of incidents involving live ammunition against children amounts to a de facto policy that permits Israeli forces to use lethal force on (defenseless) civilians.”<\/p>\n

“Soldiers operate with the knowledge that their brutal actions will go unchecked whatever the result.”<\/p>\n

They have license to kill. They take full advantage. Palestinian lives don’t matter.<\/p>\n

Young children are treated as brutally as adults. In December, DCI-P quoted Israeli General Tamir Yadai saying the IDF adopted a “tougher approach” against Palestinian protesters.<\/p>\n

“In places where we used to fire tear-gas or rubber (coated steel) bullets], we now fire Ruger bullets and sometimes live bullets.”<\/p>\n

“We\u2019re at around 25 people hit here in the last three weeks. That\u2019s a relatively high figure on any scale.”<\/p>\n

Yadai’s statement contradicts Israeli military regulations.<\/p>\n

They permit live fire only in cases of real threats. Peaceful protesters pose none. They’re shot anyway.<\/p>\n

In the past three months, Israeli goon squads injured 258 West Bank Palestinians.<\/p>\n

Between March 10 and 16 alone, 18 Palestinians were shot with live ammunition – including nine children.<\/p>\n

Since 2000, Israeli goon squads murdered nearly 9,000 Palestinians – including about 1,900 children.<\/p>\n

A February 2015 UNICEF report confirms ill-treatment of Palestinian children. Horrific abuse is systematic and widespread.<\/p>\n

DCI-P’s Eqtaish said “(d)espite an ongoing dialogue with UNICEF over nearly two years, Israeli authorities have persistently failed to implement practical changes to stop violence and ill-treatment against Palestinian child(ren).”<\/p>\n

Especially torture and ill-treatment during detention. Militarized brutality makes life in Occupied Palestine unbearable.<\/p>\n

Nothing is done to hold Israel accountable for its high crimes.<\/p>\n

DCI-P’s Brad Parker explains Palestinian “children are shot in circumstances that fail to justify lethal force under the Israeli military\u2019s own live-fire guidelines, yet no soldier is held accountable.”<\/p>\n

“Nobody is held accountable for violating regulations and definitely not for the actual lethal conduct.”<\/p>\n

“Systemic impunity essentially guarantees that Israeli soldiers will go unpunished even for lethal conduct.”<\/p>\n

They’re given carte blanche freedom to brutalize and murder Palestinians – including young children.<\/p>\n

When rare investigations are conducted, they’re routinely whitewashed.<\/p>\n

Accountability is entirely absent. Children too young to understand what’s happening are targeted.<\/p>\n

Six-year-olds are shot. Israeli soldiers murdered 10-year-old Khalil Mohammad Ahmad al-Anati meters from his home while at play.<\/p>\n

Parker was clear and unequivocal saying “(t)he bottom line is that Israel\u2019s military occupation directly threatens the lives of Palestinian children.”<\/p>\n

“Until soldiers are held accountable for their actions, more children will be killed.”<\/p>\n

Occupied Palestine is a war zone. Israel takes full advantage murdering defenseless young children with impunity.<\/p>\n

On March 25, DCI-P advocacy officer Olivia Watson told Maan News:<\/p>\n

“The pace at which we are documenting injuries from live ammunition in 2015 shows no sign of slowing down.”<\/p>\n

“\u2026Israeli forces continue to shoot at (Palestinian) children with impunity.”<\/p>\n

They live in constant danger of being brutalized, shot, killed, injured or maimed for life.<\/p>\n

World leaders able to intervene responsibly do nothing.<\/p>\n

Palestinian lives and welfare don’t matter – not earlier, now or any time ahead in the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.<\/p>\n

His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.claritypress.com\/LendmanIII.html<\/p>\n

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.<\/p>\n

Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.<\/p>\n

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stephen Lendman RINF Alternative News It’s longstanding Israel practice – shooting defenseless Palestinian children in cold blood. Defence for Children International-Palestine (DCI-P) explains what’s virtually unreported in the West. On March 23,\u00a0DCI-P\u00a0called on UN member states to hold Israel accountable for crimes against Palestinian children. It issued a statement to the UN Human Rights Council […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":131920,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[461],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-145204","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-editorials"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}