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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20210907-how-many-more-palestinians-must-die-for-the-sake-of-israels-security/">middleeastmonitor.com</a>
<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">How many more Palestinians must die for the sake of Israel's 'security'?</h1>
<div class="gmail-credits gmail-reader-credits">Dr Ramzy Barou - September 7, 2021<br></div></div>
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<div class="gmail-moz-reader-content gmail-reader-show-element"><div id="gmail-readability-page-1" class="gmail-page"><div id="gmail-post-content"> <p>A major Israeli army campaign is <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-when-it-comes-to-security-the-israeli-right-is-a-lot-of-talk-little-substance-1.10176895" target="_blank">taking</a>
social media by storm. The unstated aim of the "#Untie_Our_Hands"
initiative is the desire to kill, with no accountability, more
Palestinian protesters at the nominal border with the Gaza Strip. The
campaign was motivated by the <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/8/30/israeli-police-officer-shot-at-gaza-border-protest-dies" target="_blank">killing</a> of an Israeli sniper, Barel Hadaria Shmueli, who was reportedly shot from the Palestinian side of the fence on 21 August.</p> <p>My immediate question is this: what more do Israeli soldiers want? They have already <a href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/opinion/Whats-Next-for-Palestinian-Popular-Resistance-in-Gaza-Speaking-to-Journalist-Wafaa-Aludaini-20200607-0008.html" target="_blank">killed</a>
more than 300 unarmed Palestinian protesters and wounded and maimed
thousands more at the Gaza fence during what Palestinians referred to as
the "Great March of Return" protests between 2018 and 2020. And they
have done so with impunity. Nobody is "tying their hands".</p> <p>This "march" is now being <a href="https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/palestinians-protest-along-the-gaza-border-again-report-678549" target="_blank">renewed</a>,
though it often takes place at night. Frustrated Palestinian youth
gather in their thousands, chanting anti-Israeli occupation slogans and,
at times, throwing rocks at Israeli snipers deployed nearly a mile
away.</p> <p>Months after the latest Israeli onslaught against Gaza — a relatively brief but still <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/07/27/gaza-apparent-war-crimes-during-may-fighting" target="_blank">deadly war</a> between 10 and 21 May — the stifling status quo in the besieged Strip has not changed: the hermetic Israeli-led <a href="https://www.oxfam.org/en/timeline-humanitarian-impact-gaza-blockade" target="_blank">siege</a>; the snipers; the occasional night bombardment; the devastating<a href="https://gisha.org/en/gazas-workforce-continues-to-shrink-43-unemployment-in-the-last-quarter-of-2020/#:~:text=As%20many%20as%2079%25%20of,earn%20less%20than%20minimum%20wage.&text=April%2013%2C%202021-,April%2013%2C%202021.,2020%20(October%2DDecember)." target="_blank"> unemployment</a>; the closures; and the lack of everything, from clean water to cement and even cancer <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanonc/article/PIIS1470-2045(18)30667-3/fulltext" target="_blank">medication</a>. All are still a daily reality.</p> <p><strong>READ: <a title="Occupied West Bank: Israeli soldiers kill Palestinian in Ramallah" href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20210901-occupied-west-bank-israeli-soldiers-kill-palestinian-in-ramallah/">Israeli soldiers kill Palestinian in Ramallah</a></strong></p> <p>It
should not be surprising, therefore, that Palestinians in Gaza,
especially the youth, are in desperate need of a platform to express
their justifiable rage at this ongoing misery. Hence, the renewed mass
protests at the fence.</p> <p>Israeli politicians and media intentionally exaggerate the "threat" to Israel's security posed by the Gaza protesters. They <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/gaza-terror-groups-send-fire-balloons-into-israel-sparking-four-blazes/" target="_blank">speak</a>
of "incendiary balloons" as if they are 500-pound bombs dropped by
fighter jets. They are terrified at the prospect of Gaza kids "breaching
the border", a reference to the fences that Israel has established
arbitrarily around Gaza without respecting any UN-recognised ceasefire
demarcation.</p> <p>This fear-mongering is back with a vengeance. The
deadly Israeli sniper's killing provides an opportunity for politicians
in Israel to <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium.HIGHLIGHT-after-border-policeman-s-death-public-rage-is-directed-at-the-idf-and-bennett-1.10169596" target="_blank">present</a>
themselves to the electorate as defenders of the army and the champions
of Israeli "security". A political witch hunt is ongoing against those
who are supposedly "cuffing the hands of our troops".</p> <div id="gmail-attachment_285740" class="gmail-wp-caption"><p><img src="https://i2.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/16-4-2018.jpg?fit=933%2C579&quality=85&strip=all&zoom=1&ssl=1" alt="Israeli snipers shoot at Palestinians and Press during protest - Cartoon [Sabaaneh/MiddleEastMonitor]" style="margin-right: 0px;" width="439" height="272"></p><p class="gmail-wp-caption-text">Israeli snipers shoot at Palestinians and Press during protest – Cartoon [Sabaaneh/MiddleEastMonitor]</p></div><p>This same assertion was <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-when-it-comes-to-security-the-israeli-right-is-a-lot-of-talk-little-substance-1.10176895" target="_blank">made</a>
by Naftali Bennett in 2019, long before he became Israel's prime
minister. "The High Court is cuffing the hands of [Israel Defence
Forces] troops," he claimed, before vowing to "free the IDF from the
High Court."</p> <p>A year earlier, Bennett offered more details on how
he intends to end Palestinian protests at the Gaza fence. Responding to a
question during an <i>Israeli Army Radio</i> interview on what he would do if he were the country's defence minister, he<a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/bennett-says-idf-should-shoot-to-kill-gazans-who-cross-border/" target="_blank"> replied</a>:
"I would not allow terrorists to cross the border from Gaza every day…
and if they do, we should shoot to kill. Terrorists from Gaza should not
enter Israel… Just as in Lebanon, Syria or anywhere else we should
shoot to kill."</p> <p>The emphasis on "killing" in response to any form
of Palestinian protests seems to be the common denominator between
Israeli officials, senior army officers and ordinary soldiers. The
latter, who are behind the social media campaign, seem to be enjoying
their time at the Gaza fence. According to their own testimonies,
snipers track the number of Palestinians they shoot, try to break each
other's records and cheer on video when they document a "clean shot"
against a protester. This illustrates the level of horrific violence
meted out against those largely young Palestinians, including children.</p> <p>Israeli
snipers work in pairs. A third person, known as the "locator", helps
them to identify their next target. Eden is an Israeli sniper who, along
with some others, <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium.HIGHLIGHT.MAGAZINE-42-knees-in-one-day-israeli-snipers-open-up-about-shooting-gaza-protesters-1.8632555" target="_blank">gave</a> his testimony to the Israeli newspaper <i>Haaretz</i>, in March 2020. He is particularly proud of a grizzly milestone that he and his team "achieved".</p> <p>"On
that day, our pair had the largest number of hits, 42 in all," he said.
"My locator wasn't supposed to shoot, but I gave him a break because we
were getting close to the end of our stint, and he didn't have knees.
In the end, you want to leave with the feeling that you did something,
that you weren't a sniper during exercises only. So, after I had a few
hits, I suggested to him that we switch. He got around 28 knees there,
I'd say."</p> <p>Such testimonies are further validated by occasional
video footage of Israeli snipers cheering after shooting Palestinian
children at the fence. In April 2018, a particular video of cheering
soldiers, along with the kind of dialogue that indicates that Israelis
have no regard for Palestinian lives whatsoever, was leaked to
international media. Even <i>CNN</i> <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/10/middleeast/video-israeli-sniper-intl/index.html" target="_blank">reported</a> it.</p> <p>This
violence is not confined to Gaza. The debate on Israel's
"shoot-to-kill" policy in the rest of the occupied Palestinian
territories has been raging for years. In 2017, Human Rights Watch
linked the increased number of Palestinians killed at the hands of
trigger-happy soldiers to the violent discourse emanating from the
Israeli government itself.</p> <p><strong>READ: <a title="Israel injured 14 peaceful Palestinian protesters in Gaza" href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20210826-israel-injured-14-peaceful-palestinian-protesters-in-gaza/">Israel injured 14 peaceful Palestinian protesters in Gaza</a></strong></p> <p>"[HRW]
has documented numerous statements since October 2015, by senior
Israeli politicians, including the police minister and defence minister,
calling on police and soldiers to shoot to kill suspected attackers,
irrespective of whether lethal force is actually strictly necessary to
protect life," <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/01/02/israel/palestine-some-officials-backing-shoot-kill" target="_blank">said the organisation</a>.</p> <p>The above issue was highlighted in the <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/north-africa-west-asia/untold-story-of-how-killing-of-abdulfattah-al-shareef-was-/" target="_blank">execution</a> of the already incapacitated Abdel Fattah Al-Sharif in the occupied city of Al-Khalil — Hebron — in March 2016, and in the <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/erekat-execution-israel/" target="_blank">killing</a>
of Ahmad Erekat at a military checkpoint in the West Bank in July last
year. Not only did Erekat pose no immediate threat to the lives of the
occupation soldiers, but also, according to a <a href="https://www.fidh.org/en/region/north-africa-middle-east/israel-palestine/83-ngos-urge-international-justice-and-accountability-for-israel-s" target="_blank">statement</a>
by 83 Palestinian and international NGOs, he "was then left to bleed to
death for an hour and a half, while the Israeli occupying forces denied
him access to medical care."</p> <p>Given the disproportionate number
of Palestinian casualties which, at times, fill the mortuaries in Gaza,
it is impossible to understand what the soldiers, their generals and
politicians actually want when they say "untie our hands". Far more
bewildering is the international community's apathy while Israelis
debate the number of Palestinians to be killed. How many more must die
for the sake of Israel's "security"?</p> <p>The views expressed in this
article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the
editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.</p>
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