Hizbullah's War Crimes -- Amnesty & Human Rights Watch Falsify International Law to Smear Israel

The propaganda attacks on Israel --the continual defamation by the media, politicians, diplomats, and so-called "non-governmental organizations" [that are usually funded by governments]-- are meant to defame Jews and Israel and justify attacks on them. These attacks are similar in purpose to smear campaigns against Jews in the past, such as the Damascus Affair of 1840, the Beilis Case, the Nazi lies against Jews, the recent [2001] racist Durban Conference [which pretended to be anti-racist], and others.

Jimmy Carter, ex-president of the United States, has smeared Israel as an apartheid state. This is a big lie worthy of Goebbels. Two American political scientists, Walt & Mearsheimer, falsely claim that Israel controls --and has always controlled-- American policy in the Middle East, thereby disregarding the weight of the American oil lobby and of the immense wealth of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Abu Dhabi, and other oil-rich Arab states, in addition to the ties to Arabs and oil of many influential Americans, just coincidentally including President George Bush Senior, father of the current president, of the aforementioned Carter, of Bush family henchman Jim Baker, and many others. Curiously, most of the so-called Left sides with the big bucks, with the Arabian billions, and joins in smearing the Jews and Israel. Of course, this can partly be explained by the ties of much of the Left to well-established, well-financed foundations which just coincidentally have a Judeophobic policy. This goes too for many "non-governmental organizations" [NGOs] that claim to defend human rights, civil rights, peace, and other Good Things.

Avi Bell takes up the issue of war crimes in the recent war in Lebanon, an issue on which both Amnesty International & Human Rights Watch found a way to condemn Israel more than the avowedly Nazi-like Hizbullah. See our discussion of the international laws of war, including quotes from the documents, here. And here.

Here are some excerpts from Avi Bell's article:

· Hizballah still holds two Israeli prisoners of war incommunicado, without permitting access to the Red Cross, in violation of the laws of prisoners of war in the Third Geneva Convention. Hizballah combatants dressed as protected civilians, thereby committing illegal acts of perfidy. They carried out military operations from civilian areas in order to use protected persons as shields, another violation of the laws of war.

· The accusations against Israel by international NGOs such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch are made on the basis of bad or no evidence, linguistic misdirection, non sequiturs, and misapplication or misstatement of accepted legal standards.

· Under the laws of war, if a residential home serves as a base or a hiding place for combatants or a storehouse for weaponry, it is a legitimate military target. Thus, if one sees a residential home bombed, or even fifty bombed homes, this is not evidence per se of a war crime.

· French President Jacques Chirac claimed that Israel’s counterstrike on Lebanon was “totally disproportionate” to Hizballah’s attack on Israel. Yet such a claim has no basis in international law. When states act in self-defense, in response to an armed attack, they may use as much force as necessary to achieve the military objective. Thus the United States could use as much force as it needed in order to topple the regime in Afghanistan; it did not need to limit itself to the amount of force used by al-Qaeda in the 9/11 attacks.

Hizballah launched thousands of rocket and mortar attacks on civilian areas in northern Israel far away from plausible military targets, deliberately targeting civilians in violation of the rule of distinction – one of the most important of the laws of war. Hizballah still holds two Israeli prisoners of war incommunicado, without permitting access to the Red Cross, in violation of the laws of prisoners of war in the Third Geneva Convention. Hizballah combatants fought while disguised as protected persons such as non-combatant civilians, thereby committing illegal acts of perfidy. They placed their military assets and carried out military operations in schools, hospitals, residential areas, and next to international peace-keeping forces in order to use protected persons as shields, another violation of the international laws of war.

Hizballah is an organization that illegally calls for genocide and commits acts of aggression, crimes against humanity, and continues to hold arms in violation of Lebanon’s binding international commitments. By permitting Hizballah to operate in Lebanon, Lebanon violates its obligations under Security Council Resolution 1373, adopted under Chapters 7 of the UN Charter, as well as its obligations under the Genocide Convention.

Bell also takes on Kofi Annan, UN secretary general, and Louise Arbour, a Canadian, another UN highly placed collaborator in smearing the Jews and Israel. Read the whole article at the link above.

Prof Bell is on the faculty of law of Bar Ilan University and is now a visiting professor at Fordham law school, a Roman Catholic institution in New York.
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Coming: The follies of G W Bush Junior [Dubya], the follies of Signorina Riso Amaro [Secretary Bitter Rice of the State Dept], the paradoxes of peace-making, Jews in Jerusalem & Hebron, etc.