Targeted Killings

Here's an article with some really frightening logic. Some of which is being used in courts of Israel. Let's start with the context.

The Islamic Jihad's Dec. 5 suicide bombing in Netanya, in which five Israeli civilians were killed, led Israel to resume its controversial targeted killings in the Gaza Strip.

Israeli officials have said they stopped targeted killings in the West Bank because their control there is such that they can -- and do -- arrest the wanted people, interrogate them and glean more intelligence. Wanted people were killed but that happened in battle.

Such policing operations are impossible in Gaza.

Sunday the High Court of Justice resumed deliberations on the policy of targeted killings. A panel of three Supreme Court judges considered an appeal that the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel and the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights and the Environment filed in 2002.

Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights? Whose rights would that be?

Their attorneys, Michael Sfard and Avigdor Feldman, argued that targeted killings are war crimes verging on crimes against humanity.

International humanitarian law recognized only two kinds of people: Civilians, who must not fight and must never be targets, and combatants who, in most cases, are legitimate targets and have a right to fight. Combatants wear uniforms, carry their arms openly and have a command structure, Sfard noted.

Palestinians suspected of having attacked Israeli civilians are still, 'civilians ... protected persons,' Sfard argued. They may be attacked 'only when they are directly involved in combat, or at least when they are enroute to the planned target,' he maintained.

'The moment the civilian returns home, the moment he is not in active combat, even if he intends to take part in (fighting) again, at a later date, he ceases being a legitimate target, but he may be arrested and tried for taking part in fighting,' Sfard and Feldman said in their brief.

OK, so you're a murderer and a target only when you're murdering or on the way to commit murders. I take it that those that organize and recruit murderers are completely off the hook with this scenario. Just doesn't sound logical to me.

Deputy State Attorney Shai Nitzan argued that the rules of armed conflict govern the battle with the terrorist organizations. They are identical to laws of war and differ from the laws concerning a belligerent occupation.

As the battle against international terror spread around the world to include Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries, international law experts have reached an 'almost consensus' that the laws of war govern also the confrontations between states and big terror organizations, Nitzan argued.

Most experts who participated in an International Red Cross sponsored conference in Geneva, in 2004, agreed that a confrontation with armed groups outside the control of the authorities should be considered 'an armed conflict' in which rules of war apply, he added.

They almost have a concensus that everyone that might fight is protected. So why do we have protections for soldiers? Why do we have definitions of legal combatants? I would have to put forward that the Red Cross should not be the group to define what combatants are legal or otherwise. For some odd reason they seem to be solely concerned with those willing to kill innocents rather than the lives of the innocents themselves.

The article's primary topic is about the change of Gaza's status from being an occupied territory to a theater of war.

Since then Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip and Nitzan asked the court to rule that the issue, concerning Gaza, is not justifiable.

The last soldier left Gaza on September 12, and, 'Since then the rules of belligerent occupation... no longer apply in the Gaza Strip,' he said.

The Gazans are no longer considered protected persons under the 1949 Geneva Conventions and the rules concerning the armed conflict there are now the rules of war, he maintained.

'Since the Israel Defense Forces` soldiers left the Gaza Strip completely ... fighting there is carried out in alien territory, outside the state`s territory ... and is similar to (fighting in) the area of a foreign state from which hostile acts are launched against the State of Israel,' he said.

According to the army`s figures Gazans have this year launched some 165 Qassam rocket and mortar bombs attacks into Israel. That is the 'dominant mode of attacks,' according to the latest figures of GHQ`s Operations Directorate.

Interesting. The change now allows Israel to act by the open conventions of war rather than as an occupier. Of course to Sfard the fighting is still a war crime.

Israeli attacks 'especially those carried out in areas outside the state (of Israel) ... are not justiciable and that includes the operations in Gaza,' Nitzan argued.

Sfard maintained Israel still controls Gaza. It controls border crossings (except Rafah), Gaza`s imports and exports, its population registry, the air space and its coast. One does not have to physically be in an area in order to control it, he said.

The fact the army no longer bears responsibility for some civilian topics does not change the fact that Israel is still the occupier and, therefore, the rules of belligerent occupation apply, he said. This means the residents are protected persons under the Geneva conventions, he implied.

Supreme Court Judge Mishael Cheshin`s questions, put forward as arguments with Sfard, indicated Cheshin did not agree Israel was still responsible for the Gaza Strip. Cheshin let the matter rest when the Supreme Court`s President Aharon Barak whispered something to him.

I think the argument still falls flat. Control of the borders and air space is not occupation. Expecting Israel to take no actions against people who have previously attacked, and intend on further attacks on the Israeli population, is ludicrous.

The argument comes down to simple concepts. Can you shoot a rabid dog, which has bitten others, while he's walking around? Or, do you have to wait for him to be in the act of biting someone in order to kill him? The Palestinian Terrorist may not be a rabid dog, but I'd put forward that he is a step worse.