Saturday, January 24, 2009

Amal Abed Rabbo, age two, shot dead at close range by Israeli soldier


The list of Israeli war crimes go on and on, but this well documented story of a two year old being shot to death by an Israeli soldier is perhaps the most egregious one. Here is the story as reported by Sherine Tadros of AlJazeera.



The details of the story are revealed in various online articles.

From the Guardian, "Child casualties of Israel's war on Gaza: Stories of 10 of the 280 or more children who died during the three-week military operation".

Amal Abed Rabbo, two, was shot dead by Israeli soldiers outside her family's five-storey house in the village of Izbit Abed Rabbo, in eastern Gaza, on 7 January. Shortly after midday, soldiers from an Israeli tank ordered the family out of the house, according to her father, Khalid, 30. There was gunfire from the tank and Amal and her sister Souad, seven, were killed immediately. Another sister, Samer, four, was severely injured – she is now paralysed in hospital in Belgium. Later, the soldiers demolished the house. When she was shot, Amal was carrying her favourite toy, a brown bear, which still lay in the ruins yesterday. Khalid, a policeman under the pre-Hamas authority, said: "Israel knows very well that no one in this house belonged to Hamas. I want to know from the Israeli army: why did they kill my daughters? What have they done?"
From the Age in Australia, "Soldier gunned down my daughters, says Gaza father".
"There were 25 of us in the house, so we started to come outside as we were instructed," Mr Abed Rabbo said.

"On one of the tanks we could see two soldiers … then a third soldier came up from inside the tank and he drew his gun and started firing."

Mr Abed Rabbo, a policeman whose wages are paid by the Palestinian Authority based in the West Bank city of Ramallah, believes his two-year-old daughter Amal was the first to be hit.

"She was shot in the chest and abdomen and you could see her organs coming out," he said.


He said his seven-year-old daughter Souad was shot next, in the neck, chest and abdomen.

A third daughter, four-year-old Samar, was shot three times and sustained severe spinal injuries. She was eventually taken to intensive care at a hospital in Belgium.

Mr Abed Rabbo said his 60-year-old mother was also shot after she screamed at the soldier to stop shooting. She is now recovering in al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.

After rushing his daughters to the nearest hospital, Mr Abed Rabbo said he returned to find the five-storey apartment block where he lived was a pile of rubble.
From the BBC, "New evidence of Gaza child deaths".
Samar [Amal's sister] had been shot in the back at close range. The bullet damaged her spine, and she is unlikely to walk again.

At her bedside, her uncle Hassan told us the family had been ordered out of their home by Israeli soldiers who were shelling the neighbourhood.

A tank had parked in front of the house, where around 30 people were taking shelter.

The women and children - mother, grandmother and three little girls - came out waving a white flag and then, he said, an Israeli soldier came out of the tank and opened fire on the terrified procession.

Samar's two sisters, aged seven and two, were shot dead. The grandmother was hit in the arm and in the side, but has survived.


Samar's uncle said the soldier who had shot his niece was just 15m (49ft) away. ''How could they not see they were shooting at children?'' he asked.
This is a case of pure cold blooded murder. Any government that does not do everything within its power to prosecute such a horrific act can only be considered a rogue state living outside the international community of civilized countries. But I fear that as in the case of the brutal murder of Rachel Corrie by an Israeli bulldozer operator, this murder will also go unpunished.

How is it possible that this story goes untold in the US mainstream press. Only the foreign press has carried the story. Is it true that the US press is controlled by the Zionist as claimed by ex-CIA operative Bob Baer.
RB: In American politics, you can't do anything in the Middle East without the approval of Tel Aviv, at least on some level. It's impossible. I mean, I cannot think of a country that is so beholden to a small country like this, even a superpower, in all of history. I can't even think of it.

IPS: And why is that?

RB: Look at New York City. Look at the major newspapers. They have a Zionist agenda. They do. I'm not Jewish. I'm not anything. I don't care about the Israelis. And I'm not anti-Semitic. It's just a fact. I suggested to my publisher writing a book on Israel, and he said forget it. You can't talk about the reality of Israel. The only place you can talk about the reality of Israel is in Israel. They tell you things you will never hear in the United States.

IPS: Like what?

RB: For instance, why are people on Gaza so unhappy? Well, if you had to live in a prison, wouldn't you be unhappy? You would never get that in the New York Times. Look at the New York Times; it's almost an extension of Israel.
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