[quote]JERUSALEM – The Israeli military indicted a soldier Tuesday on a charge of manslaughter during last year's war in the Gaza Strip — the most serious criminal charge to come out of an internal investigation into the devastating offensive in the Hamas-ruled territory.
The soldier was among three troops, including a field commander, to face new disciplinary action stemming from their conduct during the offensive, which has drawn international condemnation for its civilian death toll. An Israeli human rights group praised the announcement, but said the disciplinary measures announced by the army so far were insufficient.
The steps against the soldiers were linked to four specific incidents during the offensive, which Israel launched to halt years of rocket fire from Gaza.
Around 1,400 Gazans, many of them civilians, were killed in three weeks of fierce urban fighting and aerial bombardments. Thirteen Israelis were killed. A report commissioned by the U.N. Human Rights Council accused Israel of deliberately targeting civilians, a charge Israel rejects.
In a statement Tuesday, [b]the military said its chief prosecutor would indict an infantry sergeant for manslaughter in connection with an incident in which two Palestinian women — a mother and daughter — were killed while reportedly holding white flags.[/b]
The military said there were discrepancies between the troops' accounts of the incident and the details reported widely by human rights groups, The troops reported shooting one man at the site, not two women, and on a different date. Also, it was unclear exactly whom the soldier was charged with killing. Asked for clarification, the military did not offer further details.
The military said this was the first manslaughter indictment from the Gaza war.
The incident was mentioned in U.N. report, which accused both Israel and Hamas of war crimes.
[b]In addition, the military said a battalion commander was disciplined for allowing his troops to use a Palestinian civilian as a human shield. Soldiers sent the man toward a house where militants were holed up to persuade them to come out, a violation of army regulations, the announcement said.[/b]
[b]In a third incident, the military said it disciplined an officer who ordered an airstrike near a mosque, an attack that the U.N. report said killed at least 15 civilians and wounded 40.[/b]
The military said the strike targeted a Palestinian militant outside the mosque and that the harm to those inside the building was unintentional, so it did not violate international law. But the military also said the officer was negligent and "failed to exercise appropriate judgment," and he would be barred from serving in "similar positions of command" in the future.
In the fourth incident, the military prosecutor ordered a new investigation into the deaths of two dozen members of a family who were ordered by troops into a building that was shelled later in the fighting.
Israel says Hamas bears overall responsibility for the casualties because it fired rockets and fought from heavily populated towns and cities. An internal military investigation last year largely cleared the army of any systematic wrongdoing, while promising to prosecute individual cases of misconduct.
One soldier has been convicted of stealing and using a Palestinian's credit card, while two others are being prosecuted for using a Palestinian boy as a human shield.
An army spokesperson said these indictments are part of an ongoing investigation of nearly 50 claims.
Sarit Michaeli, a spokeswoman for the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem, praised the military for making progress in its investigations but said they were insufficient.
"The main questions about the Gaza war concern policy, and a military investigation can't handle this," she said. "There must be an external investigation that will deal with the whole chain of command and chiefly with the people at the top who approved the directives."
Also Tuesday, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu landed in Washington for talks with President Barack Obama, B'Tselem released a report showing that much of the West Bank, where Palestinians want to establish a state, is under the control of Israeli settlements.
Although the actual buildings of the settlements cover just 1 percent of the West Bank's land area, they have jurisdiction over more than 42 percent, the B'Tselem report said. Much of that land was seized from Palestinian landowners in defiance of an Israeli Supreme Court ban, the group said.
The Palestinians claim all of the West Bank, captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war, as part of a future state.
Dani Dayan, chairman of a settler umbrella group, disputed the report, saying settlements control just 9.2 percent of the West Bank, and charged that the report was aimed to sabotage the Netanyahu-Obama meeting.
Israeli government officials would not comment.[/quote]
Least they're doing something now, seems like they want to save their image after what they did to the Freedom Flotilla. But hopefully it better not be an empty promise, a slap on the wrists like the IDF has carried out in the past.
Good.
It seems like an attempt at damage control - judging from the past disciplinary actions ([URL="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article7010851.ece"]Such as a slap on the wrist[/URL]) I doubt it really means anything.
It's not like they said "hmm our image is bad, well let's do something to fix it". B'Tselem, an Israeli human rights organization, conducted research and found some evidence about it, it wasn't initiated by the IDF.
[editline]12:58AM[/editline]
[QUOTE=starpluck;23161143]It seems like an attempt at damage control - judging from the past disciplinary actions (Such as a slap on the wrist) I doubt it really means anything.[/QUOTE]
It wasn't a slap on the wrist, one official said this and he was speaking figuratively.
this doesn't really mean anything. they're just gonna get a slap on the wrist.
[editline]05:59PM[/editline]
[QUOTE=BurnEmDown;23161158]It's not like they said "hmm our image is bad, well let's do something to fix it".[/QUOTE]
"oh shit, someone called us out for all our war crimes. we'll pretend that we're gonna do something about it."
Probably, but they are soldiers that were acting in a war-zone inside a highley-hostile area. I don't think that they should be punished severly for killing civilians ([b]unless[/b] it is proven they did it intentionally).
[QUOTE=BurnEmDown;23161158]
It wasn't a slap on the wrist, one official said this and he was speaking figuratively.[/QUOTE]
Obviously the defense official didn't mean it as literal, but instead an extremely weak punishment such as "Bad soldier".
[QUOTE=JDK721;23161183]this doesn't really mean anything. they're just gonna get a slap on the wrist.
[editline]05:59PM[/editline]
"oh shit, someone called us out for all our war crimes. we'll pretend that we're gonna do something about it."[/QUOTE]
For as much as Israel has done already, I doubt it feels the need to "improve its image". If it wanted to do that, it would tried a long time ago.
[QUOTE=starpluck;23161248]Obviously the defense official didn't mean it as literal, but instead an extremely weak punishment such as "Bad soldier".[/QUOTE]
Oh please, what they did was way worse than this guy, and he's going to jail for sure.
Sporkfire, every time I see your avatar, I think it's General O'Neil from Stargate: SG-1
[QUOTE=BurnEmDown;23161263]Oh please, what they did was way worse than this guy, and he's going to jail for sure.[/QUOTE]
....
To be disciplined does not mean you're going to jail.
[QUOTE=JDK721;23161183]"oh shit, someone called us out for all our war crimes. we'll pretend that we're gonna do something about it."[/QUOTE]
That's what armies usually do when they're proven to be guilty, and the IDF is no different.
[QUOTE=BurnEmDown;23161318]That's what armies usually do when they're proven to be guilty, and the IDF is no different.[/QUOTE]
well except for the punishment part and rate of frequency.
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;23161300]Sporkfire, every time I see your avatar, I think it's General O'Neil from Stargate: SG-1[/QUOTE]
God, I wish he would play a role in Iron sky
[QUOTE=starpluck;23161317]....
To be disciplined does not mean you're going to jail.[/QUOTE]
Sometimes a short-period of being at a military prison is part of the punishment that being disciplined is.
[QUOTE=starpluck;23161317]....
To be disciplined does not mean you're going to jail.[/QUOTE]
In the IDF it does. Very minor things can get you sent to military jail for a few days, imagine what breaking direct rules of conflict will get you.
[QUOTE=BurnEmDown;23161387]In the IDF it does. Very minor things can get you sent to military jail for a few days, imagine what breaking direct rules of conflict will get you.[/QUOTE]
I need a source for this.
[QUOTE=starpluck;23161477]I need a source for this.[/QUOTE]
I have no idea where to get a source on it but it's well-known in Israel. For example, even breaking the smallest law in the IDF can get you "grounded" for a weekend, as in, you stay in your base instead of returning home.
[QUOTE=BurnEmDown;23161545]I have no idea where to get a source on it but it's well-known in Israel. For example, even breaking the smallest law in the IDF can get you "grounded" for a weekend, as in, you stay in your base instead of returning home.[/QUOTE]
That pretty much goes true for any army, to be grounded like that for small offenses.
[QUOTE=BurnEmDown;23161545]I have no idea where to get a source on it but it's well-known in Israel. For example, even breaking the smallest law in the IDF can get you "grounded" for a weekend, as in, you stay in your base instead of returning home.[/QUOTE]
So? I can claim to know a lot of shit as well, but without a source it's kinda useless.
[QUOTE=Jund;23161671]So? I can claim to know a lot of shit as well, but without a source it's kinda useless.[/QUOTE]
Well I don't care if you don't believe me, but starpluck and friends don't have proof that the officers weren't punished as well.
[QUOTE=Jund;23161671]So? I can claim to know a lot of shit as well, but without a source it's kinda useless.[/QUOTE]
Well, I think someone who lives in Israel and served or serves in the military is a lot more knowledge then you on the daily life there, and how things which are domestic work. I don't see any reason you won't believe him...
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;23161575]That pretty much goes true for any army, to be grounded like that for small offenses.[/QUOTE]
Well I only know about the IDF, don't know much about other armies.
[editline]01:19AM[/editline]
[QUOTE=ohadje;23161715]Well, I think someone who lives in Israel and served or serves in the military is a lot more knowledge then you on the daily life there, and how things which are domestic work. I don't see any reason you won't believe him...[/QUOTE]
Still didn't serve, I'll be enlisted in a few months.
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