Collective punishment is a War Crime:
Collective Punishment
No general penalty, pecuniary or otherwise, shall be inflicted upon the population on account of the acts of individuals for which they cannot be regarded as jointly and severally responsible.
Laws and Customs of War on Land (Hague IV); October 18, 1907, Article 50
No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited.
Pillage is prohibited.
Reprisals against protected persons and their property are prohibited.
Any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons, or to the State, or to other public authorities, or to social or cooperative organizations, is prohibited, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations.
International law also prohibits an occupying power from imposing collective punishment on the occupied population.
But some engage in it nonetheless.
Israeli troops in the West Bank shot dead a Palestinian man and gravely wounded another on Sunday during a violent protest against Israel’s deadly air campaign against Hamas in Gaza, the army and a Palestinian medic said.
The medic, Basem Abu Sheikh, said 22-year-old Arafat Khawaja was hit in the chest by live fire in the village of Ni’ilin, near Ramallah. Residents said some demonstrators were hurling rocks at Israeli forces, but it was not immediately clear if the dead man had been among them. Abu Sheikh and the Israeli military said another man was also shot during the protest and was in critical condition.
The IDF said troops stationed near the village were attacked with a hail of rocks and only used live ammunition after other crowd control methods failed to halt the barrage. A spokesman said the incident was being investigated by military authorities.
Some 280 Palestinians have been killed in a wave of Israeli airstrikes into Gaza launched Saturday in an attempt to halt cross-border rocket attacks on Israeli towns from the territory ruled by the radical Islamic Hamas movement.
Demonstrations against the strike have erupted across the Arab world and in Israel itself, where Arabs in the northern village of Deir al Asad fired rifles during one rally, and two children were injured by stray bullets, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said….
And many mouths remain closed, in complicit silence.
Anyone who cares should consult the respected Haaretz site often, if for no other reason than to learn that criticism of Israeli military actions are usually more heated inside that country than in the USA. You may recall the lockstep support (in the U.S.) for Israeli’s invasion of southern Lebanon, which included the use of U.S.-made cluster bombs. That invasion turned out to be a genuine fiasco.
One analysis at Haaretz: “A million and a half human beings, most of them downcast and desperate refugees, live in the conditions of a giant jail, fertile ground for another round of bloodletting. The fact that Hamas may have gone too far with its rockets is not the justification of the Israeli policy for the past few decades, for which it justly merits an Iraqi shoe to the face.”…
Many mouths remain closed, in complicit silence.
Not this one.
Courage.
So a group — whose mission is the destruction of your entire country — chucks hundreds of missiles into your territory and thereby kills a bunch of innocent civilians. After warning and warning and warning, you retaliate with overwhelming force, killing over a hundred of the group’s leaders and terrorists with a pinpoint precision unheard of in the annals of war.
It appears the recent reliatory attacks killed 240, of whom 180 were Hamas leaders or fighters. This means that less than 25% (we’re not sure exactly how many) of the dead were civilian casualties. The number is elevated because Hamas intentionally places its facilities next to hospitals, schools and mosques. In other words, Hamas routinely uses human shields. These acts violate every facet of any moral code.
Further, Hamas rocket attacks and suicide bombings are aimed strictly at civilian targets and result in almost 100% civilian casualties.
Put simply, Hamas attacks civilians and Israel responds by attacking Hamas leaders and fighters.
How do you react?
Well, if you’re a liberal, you complain when the folks getting attacked retaliate.
What’s the alternative, genius?
Well, thanks for the rationalization.
As your mother knows, if “Johnny did it” that justifies whatever evil thing that you did, right?
But JOHNNY DID IT FIRST!
It’s amazing when someone is confronted with a clear “Right versus Wrong” choice, that they can always find a way to rationalize wrong.
You see, there will always be bastards. There will always be murderers. There will always be criminals. But you can’t justify your actions by THEIR criminality. You can only become a criminal yourself.
(Which is why “collective punishment” is a war crime. )
And then rationalize it with added ad hominems.
I seriously doubt that “genius” was intended in any literal sense by someone who feels themselves above human or moral law. Quod erat demonstrandum. I have found my poster child for evil masquerading as good, right “canspot”?
Hart, did you raise a stink when that rocket went off course and killed two palestinian teenaged girls? Of course not, those 13 year-old girls were sacrificed for “the cause”. “The cause” is of course, the empowerment of tyranny over civilization. Besides it allows Greenwald and his fellow traveling losers to cheer against Bush, America and those evil Jews. This is a veritable hat-trick for haters!
Why is it that the ‘collective punishment’ and ‘disproportionate response’ shticks are only rolled out for those evil Jooooooooz? Who else gets that kind of attention when they react as any sovereign nation might?
I won’t hold my breath waiting for answers.
Perhaps because Israel is a civilized nation under a democratic form of government. One would expect that they would care about unlawful behavior.
Moreover, you haven’t added any refutation, nor, seemingly, comprehension of yesterday’s reply. You seem so far up your own ass with fantasies of retribution and revenge that sneering and “sarcasm” are your only (non sequitur) responses. Behave like an adult and you will be treated like an adult.
Let me make it easy for you:
Mothers and Judges agree: Two wrongs do not make a right.