[News] Israel sinks to new low by smearing slain children as "terrorists"

[Anti-Imperialist News]

electronicintifada.net
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/israel-sinks-new-low-smearing-slain-children-terrorists>
Israel sinks to new low by smearing slain children as "terrorists"

Maureen Clare Murphy
<https://electronicintifada.net/people/maureen-clare-murphy> - 15 December
2022
------------------------------

Palestinian mourners attend the funeral of Jana Assaf, 15, after she was
shot and killed in the West Bank city of Jenin, 12 December.
APA images

Leave it to innovative Israel to sink to ever-new lows.

It isn’t anything new for the state to smear Palestinians killed
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/50-hamas-members-claim-does-not-justify-gaza-massacre>
by its police and military as terrorists
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/israel-knew-slain-man-smeared-terrorist-was-innocent>.
But it seems to be a fresh twist for Israel to try to convince the UN that
most of the Palestinian children slain by its forces had “terror” ties.

According to media reports
<https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-said-set-to-show-un-envoy-proof-most-slain-palestinian-minors-had-terror-ties/>,
Israeli officials planned to tell Virginia Gamba, the UN special reporter
on children and armed conflict, that Palestinians are exploiting children
who are then killed by its forces.

Gamba was visiting Israel, the West Bank and Gaza ahead of her annual
report on the conflict’s impact on children.

“Regarding the Palestinian casualties, Israel will present data indicating
that most teenagers were operatives of the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terror
groups, or engaged in military activity or military-linked activity,” an
unnamed diplomatic source told Israel’s Channel 13.

The gambit is part of Israel’s overall strategy of deflecting its
responsibility for Palestinians slain by its forces.

More than 50 Palestinian children have been killed in 2022, according for
Defense for Children International-Palestine.

Last year, Israeli forces and armed civilians killed 78 boys and girls in
the West Bank and Gaza, making it the deadliest year for Palestinian
children since 2014.

Israel’s most recent Palestinian child victim is Jana Majdi Issam Assaf,
15, who was shot while on the roof of her family’s home in the northern
West Bank city of Jenin on Sunday night.

Defense for Children International-Palestine said
<https://www.dci-palestine.org/israeli_forces_shoot_kill_15_year_old_palestinian_girl_in_jenin>
that the girl “sustained two gunshot wounds to her upper chest and one to
the right side of her head.”

The rights group added that doctors who examined the child’s body “alleged
the bullet fragments and wounds were consistent with the use of expanding
bullets by the Israeli military.”

Jana was the second Palestinian girl killed by Israeli forces in the West
Bank this year.

Last month, Israeli soldiers shot and killed
<https://www.dci-palestine.org/israeli_forces_shoot_kill_14_year_old_palestinian_girl_near_ramallah>
Fulla Rasmi Abdulaziz Mallouh, 14, in the town of Beitunia near Ramallah.
The girl was in the passenger seat of a car that was fired upon by
soldiers, hitting Fulla in the head and chest.
Chief salutes killers

In the case of Jana, the girl killed in Jenin on Sunday, Amir Cohen, the
chief of Israel’s Border Police, saluted the officers who shot her
<https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/border-police-chief-troops-who-mistakenly-killed-teen-girl-in-jenin-acted-correctly/>
.

During a military ceremony on Wednesday, Cohen said “our fighters acted
morally, with values, with courage, with determination and saved lives.”

The Israeli military has said that it was likely that one of its snipers
“accidentally” shot the girl.

Israel has made the same claim that a soldier “unintentionally” killed Al
Jazeera correspondent Shireen Abu Akleh
<https://electronicintifada.net/tags/shireen-abu-akleh> in Jenin during
May, despite all evidence and witness testimony suggesting that she
was intentionally
targeted
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/israel-intended-kill-shireen-abu-akleh-probe>
.

But for Israel, the facts surrounding the death of a Palestinian at the
hands of its forces do not matter. Ultimately, Palestinian civilians killed
by the Israeli military are “mistakes” to be dealt with as a public
relations problem and nothing more.
Denied entry

That is probably why Israel has allowed Virginia Gamba, the UN special
reporter, into the country while it denies visas to other human rights
investigators and researchers.

If Israel’s spin doctors didn’t see some opportunity in her visit, it is
unlikely that the state would allow her access.

Earlier this year, Israel denied entry
<https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/un-mandated-rights-inquiry-rebukes-israel-seeking-complete-control-2022-06-07/>
to investigators with an independent commission of inquiry set up by the UN
Human Rights Council to examine Israel’s system of oppression as a whole.

Michael Lynk, the former UN special reporter on the human rights situation
in the West Bank and Gaza, was denied entry
<https://reliefweb.int/report/occupied-palestinian-territory/report-special-rapporteur-situation-human-rights-19>
by Israel during his tenure.

Israel now appears to have banned
<https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-724023> Lynk’s successor,
Francesca Albanese, and a smear campaign
<https://www.timesofisrael.com/appalled-us-israel-jewish-groups-slam-un-official-for-past-antisemitic-rhetoric/>
intended to destroy her reputation and credibility is currently underway.

The unprecedented slanderous & malicious attack on @FranceskAlbs
<https://twitter.com/FranceskAlbs?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw> based on old
misrepresented statements only aim at silencing her now & criticism of
Israel’s apartheid regime & its international crimes committed against the
Palestinian people!#WeWillNotBeSilenced
<https://twitter.com/hashtag/WeWillNotBeSilenced?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>
#EndImpunity
<https://twitter.com/hashtag/EndImpunity?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>
— Al-Haq الحق (@alhaq_org) December 15, 2022
<https://twitter.com/alhaq_org/status/1603331563240001544?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>

Thank you to those who have expressed their solidarity after yet another
politically-motivated attack against my mandate. The aim is to obscure the
oppressive reality I am mandated to report on. I will not let anyone define
who I am and what I stand for. pic.twitter.com/8QVgiBXD46
<https://t.co/8QVgiBXD46>
— Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt (@FranceskAlbs) December
15, 2022
<https://twitter.com/FranceskAlbs/status/1603394239236378630?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>

And the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
in the Occupied Palestinian Territories says that Israeli authorities have
delayed issuing new visas for new staff.

Gilad Erdan, Israel’s ambassador to the UN, said
<https://edition.cnn.com/2022/12/12/middleeast/israel-un-staff-visas-mime-intl/index.html>
that he recommended freezing the visa applications of new recruits to the
monitoring group.

“They shouldn’t come in because there’s no reason that UN staffers that lie
and create a false picture of the Palestinian narrative at the Security
Council, there’s no reason they should be on such a stage from within
Israel,” Erdan said during an interview with Israel’s Channel 12.

Last year, Israel designated several prominent Palestinian civil society
groups as “terrorist” organizations and recently raided
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/israeli-army-shuts-down-prominent-palestinian-rights-groups>
their offices.

And now Miki Zohar, a lawmaker with Likud – the party of incoming Israeli
prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu – is seeking to outlaw the recording of
on-duty soldiers because it harms Israel’s image.

Future coalition member @zoharm7
<https://twitter.com/zoharm7?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw> supports passing a law
outlawing photographing soldiers on duty because organizations like @btselem
<https://twitter.com/btselem?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw> is doing "bad PR" for
Israel. MK Zohar: Documenting crimes isn't bad PR; the crimes themselves
are. https://t.co/iMe6soLi5h
— Eitan Nechin (@Etanetan23) December 8, 2022
<https://twitter.com/Etanetan23/status/1600905916743925760?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>

MK Miki Zohar, who wants to ban the filming of on-duty Israeli soldiers,
says he would have "preferred that the Elor Azaria incident was not filmed
— it did great harm to Israel. @btselem
<https://twitter.com/btselem?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>'s footage does harm to
Israel."

ICYMI: Azaria shot an incapacitated Palestinian in the head
https://t.co/stkVnnf2Ne
— Edo Konrad (@edokonrad) December 8, 2022
<https://twitter.com/edokonrad/status/1600894911976722432?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>

For Israel, if there is no evidence for its crimes, then all of its PR
problems will simply go away – no matter how many Palestinian men, women
and children are killed.
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