On the matter of indicriminate Killing
May 27, 2007 7:39 AM
“So from this document it is clear that Israel is in violation of International Humanitarian Law when it indiscriminately kills Palestinian civilians in armed response to the rocket attacks.”
On principle, yes.
Yet, I would like to point out that IDF is often accused of “indiscriminately killing civilians” that are in fact not civilians, but illegal combatants, i.e Palestinian Militants concealing their arms.
Another problem here is the fact that those illegal combatants are exactly that because they refuse to wear any kind of distinguishing mark that will set them apart from the actual civilian population.
A third problem is that those illegal combatants have developed tactics that make use of the civilian population as human shields - which makes it difficult for the IDF to target military positions, weapons caches and depots without causing damage and death to civilian habitation and population.
This is not meant to excuse the killings, it is only meant to point out that “indiscriminate killings” is not always just that.
SB/Dov
