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ABOUTBy Gideon Levy, Haaretz – 9 Jan 2011
www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/the-idf-s-bag-of-lies-1.335985
Gideon Levy
Jawaher Abu Ramah died young. She stood facing the demonstrators against the separation fence in her village, inhaled very large quantities of the gas that Israel Defense Forces soldiers fired that day, collapsed and died several hours later at a Ramallah hospital.
These are definitive facts. The IDF should have immediately issued a statement expressing sorrow for the death of the demonstrator, and said it would investigate the excessive means used for dispersing demonstrations at Bil’in, which had killed Bassem, Jawaher’s brother, for no reason. He was hit by a gas canister fired directly at his chest two and a half years ago.
So, the IDF began with the spreading of lies, making up facts and spinning tales, originating with officers who did not dare identify themselves. Following the investigation into Jawaher’s death, it is also necessary to investigate how the army dares to distort in this way. Perhaps it will disturb Israeli society more than the death of a demonstrator.
It started with the first announcement of the IDF spokesman who spoke of an “illegal demonstration.” Illegal, Avi Benayahu? Stealing land for the construction of enormous settlements and the enrichment of questionable developers is legal; the defense establishment’s continuously ignoring the High Court decision that the fence route needs to be changed is legal; the killing of Bassem is legal; and only the demonstration is illegal. Why is it illegal? Are the Palestinians and the anti-occupation activists not entitled to demonstrate? What demonstrations can be more legitimate than peasants protesting against the theft of their lands – demonstrations that resulted in the High Court ruling? How could the Palestinians demonstrate legally? And why are the IDF and the police capable of dispersing the demonstrations of wild and violent settlers without deaths and only the dispersal of Palestinian demonstrations becomes – not for the first time – fatal?
But that was not enough. The day after Jawaher was killed, the IDF began disseminating lies. It’s not clear why the army chose to embark on this campaign since a day after Jawaher’s death IDF soldiers intentionally killed a youth carrying a bottle at the Bik’ot crossing, but that did not stir any outburst. The IDF left little that it did not disseminate about poor Jawaher. It was said that she died at home in peace, and not in hospital. Oops, it was proved that she died in hospital. When the IDF learned that this trick did not succeed, it came up with other stories, a bag full of lies. Jawaher was not at the demonstration. There are no photos of her. She was there, observing from about 100 meters, and was choked by the smoke.
Another lie from the bag of the IDF: Jawaher had cancer, not just any cancer, but leukemia. She stood at the demonstration and suddenly collapsed and died of leukemia. Where did they pull that from? Perhaps because her father died of leukemia five years ago. Blood? Through its propagandists in the media, the IDF said that the funeral was “strange,” that her face was “covered” and that her body was covered in a “blood-soaked” shroud (perhaps she cut her wrists? ). No one saw the shroud, nor the covered face – only God knows their importance, but whatever. It’s enough that the IDF says leukemia and bloody shroud for the army or right-wing analysts to raid the media and spread their tales.
Jawaher watched the demonstration, inhaled gas, collapsed, was taken, in serious condition, by ambulance, to the hospital and died there the next day. As far as anyone knows, she did not suffer from leukemia. She had complained of vertigo, and the doctor diagnosed an ear infection. There was no autopsy, and the inventions on her medical past only desecrated the honor of the dead and her family. Even if she was taking medicine, as the IDF disseminated, did she not die as a result of inhaling gas?
It’s good to know that the death of Jawaher is on the IDF’s conscience. That is how it should be. All 21 Palestinian anti-fence demonstrators who were killed over the years, and with them dozens activists who were injured, including an American student who lost her eye during the summer, should also be on its conscience. But the way to deal with a troubled conscience needs to be through the exposure of the truth, not through lies. For the attention of the new IDF spokesman: The IDF is not a propaganda ministry of an authoritarian regime.
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{ 1 comment }
Consience: collective and individual.
‘Worth noting is that fear almost always relates to future events, such as worsening of a situation, or continuation of a situation that is unacceptable.’ (Wikipedia.)
Since fear is one of the main reasons that drive this struggle and delivers most of the fuel that keeps it in being, it might be to everyone’s advantage to examine that emotion in somewhat greater detail.
Fear, certainly from the Israeli/Palestinian experience, is a difficult condition to overcome, especially when it has been left largely untreated over many decades.
The customary treatments, those involving guarantees of good faith and best behaviour, signing accords and peace treaties, these have never had that much influence in the region. There have been too many false starts, too few positive results; never enough traction to be found when some new affront or atrocity can still drag the whole process all the way back to square one.
The possibility of eradicating fear in all its forms may be unattainable; fear of the other, fear of the unknown, fear of oneself, of our own human nature and the depths to which we all know it can sometimes sink. These are too deep-rooted and universal for even partial extraction. But is there then a tendency to overlook the obvious when faced with such an all-consuming response to events and circumstances?
What if, somehow, an even greater fear could be used to offset existing ones, supplanting those more commonly held by mere dint of size or intensity?
Much as in the manner of a man chased by wolves through a dense forest, no thought is given to the thorns his flesh encounters in his headlong flight from danger. Not until that flight has put some safe distance between himself and his pursuers does he notice the relatively minor damage done to his person. Even then, he might think himself most fortunate that nothing more serious has happened and feel his escape from so deadly a predicament well worth the relatively small amount of pain attaching to it.
Could this be what the situation has been calling for all along. Not just a big, bad wolf but a veritable pack of the biggest, baddest there has ever been; something everyone will be glad to leave behind, never to return.
So, dare we summon up the big, bad wolf?
http://yorketowers.blogspot.com
Or will we be content to live with our conscience when incidents as detailed above take place, knowing all the while that, in large measure, we could so easily have forestalled them?
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