Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: IED

Showing posts with label IED. Show all posts

Monday, September 04, 2023

Today's Jenin raid was remarkable - and it shows how Israel adheres to human rights law in even impossible conditions

The Israeli military arrested three members of the Hamas terror group during a raid in the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank on Monday morning, marking the first overt entry of forces to the camp since a major operation was carried out in the area two months ago.

In a joint statement, the Israel Defense Forces, Shin Bet security agency, and Border Police said troops entered the camp and nabbed Abdullah Hassan Mohammed Sobeh, Ward Sharim, and Mus’ab Ja’aydah.

The IDF said troops opened fire at the wanted gunmen as they attempted to flee a building when the forces arrived. One of the armed Palestinians shot in the leg and seriously wounded, and was taken by helicopter to Rambam Hospital in Haifa.

An assault rifle belonging to one of the wanted Palestinians was seized, the IDF said.

The IDF said troops also responded with live fire against Palestinian gunmen who opened fire at forces in the area, and Palestinian rioters hurling stones.

A local wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group said its gunmen opened fire at Israeli forces on the outskirts of the camp.

The Palestinian Authority health ministry said four people were lightly wounded by Israeli fire in the area and taken to nearby hospitals.

No Israeli soldiers were wounded in the operation.

The IDF did injured the captured terrorists, and transported them by helicopter to a hospital.

Imagine the difficulty of such an operation.

The goal, as always, is to arrest terrorists - not to kill them. The IDF knows that it will be attacked from all directions in a crowded camp that is filled with booby-traps, IEDs and angry youth with stones, firebombs and automatic weapons.

And in the end, no one was killed on either side. The terrorists were captured alive.

This must have involved many, many hours of planning, intelligence and practice.

But this result is always what the IDF wants to see. It doesn't want to kill people, but when under fire, soldiers must return fire towards the source. Nearly every person killed in the past two years were involved in fighting or members of terror groups. For urban warfare, this is incredible, and military experts know this.

But the media ignores all of that. "Human rights groups" insist on perfection in a war zone and that the IDF use peacetime, law enforcement standards when the enemy is often a heavily armed military group. As much as they can, Israel tries to live up to those standards, and it showed that today, even if it is not at all clear that the more flexible laws of armed conflict wouldn't apply to Jenin today.

The world is so obsessed with demonizing Israel that it ignores how unique it is for an army to have so few civilian casualties in urban war zones.

Try to find stories where US or British troops entered a crowded town and extracted wanted men under constant fire without killing anyone. If it has ever happened, it is incredibly rare. Yet the IDF strives to do that each and every time - and its success today proves that.

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Let's see how "human rights" groups discuss this morning's deadly PA raid in Tulkarm - if at all

This morning, the Palestinian Authority clashed with terror groups in Tulkarm, leaving one person dead.

The specifics are disputed depending on whether one is reading PA-affiliated or terror-affiliated media.

According to the PA:

The Political Commissioner General and the official spokesperson for the security establishment, Major General Talal Dweikat, said today, Wednesday, that the security services removed dangerous materials and barriers from inside the Tulkarem camp.

Dweikat added, in a telephone conversation with WAFA, that the Palestinian security forces had received several complaints from institutions and individuals in Tulkarm governorate, about the presence of dangerous materials and barriers in front of children's schools and on the roads inside the Tulkarm camp. Accordingly, the security services moved and removed them, to prevent any risks that might arise. about its existence.

He pointed out that after the security force finished its mission, some armed youths opened fire in front of the governorate building, which necessitated the intervention of the security forces to take the necessary measures and measures to control the security situation and prevent any manifestations that threaten civil peace in Tulkarm governorate.

"Dangerous materials" appears to be a euphemism for explosives - IEDs that terrorists bury in the road, that are meant to slow down Israeli forces when they conduct arrests and raids. We already know that these IEDs are a danger to children - even the UN reluctantly admits this. (Update: Other media confirm explosives near schools.)

It appears that the PA, perhaps for the first time and ahead of the beginning of the school year, decided that IEDs and iron barriers in front of schools is already a step too far when it puts children at risk.

And the terrorists were not happy about their hard work of risking the lives of their neighbors to be able to possibly damage an Israeli vehicle being removed, so they naturally started shooting at the PA forces.

Hamas media says that the PA used bulldozers to remove the barricades.

One person died - the accounts differ as of this writing but it appears that the gunmen killed an innocent bystander while shooting at the PA forces. Terror media says the PA killed the man.

.This video shows some of the tear gas, and apparently one older man - a father of a "martyr" so he may have been one of the protesters - was injured.

Will "human rights groups" side with the terrorists in this case? The PA did what Israel does - employed bulldozers and shot tear gas to quell a violent demonstration, and possibly used live fire. NGOs usually adopt the narrative that the PA is almost as bloodthirsty as the IDF.

On the other hand it is hard for them to say that the PA should allow IEDs and barricades to be placed in the middle of public areas and near schools. Amnesty and HRW have never, to my knowledge, berated the local armed groups for putting their own people at risk, and they are loathe to start a new complicating narrative that might indirectly exonerate the IDF for its own similar raids.

So chances are that they will remain silent, and the dead Palestinian bystander will not be mentioned at all.

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The "child" killed by the IDF was an expert in building IEDs

Earlier this week I reported on Othman Atef Abu Kharj, a 17 year old who was killed during clashes near Jenin.

Most Palestinian media referred to him as a "child" ruthlessly killed by the IDF. Islamic Jihad, on the other hand, celebrated his ascension to Paradise as "a heroic mujahid knight" - but claimed that he was 18.

Now, Hamas-linked Felesteen writes a more detailed article about Abu Kharj, where we learn more of the truth.

Yes, his family confirms the teen was 17 - and they are proud that he was an expert on building IEDs.

[His brother] Mahmoud, 22, could hardly complete his talk about his younger brother, saying, "Othman was throwing his "elbow" IEDs one after the other towards the armored jeeps.

The young men resort to using various tools to confront the repeated incursions of the occupation forces into the cities and governorates of the West Bank, in whose camps and villages the resistance action is escalating. Among these means are Molotov cocktails, stones, "elbows", igniting tires and closing streets with them.

But Othman had mastered making "elbows" and using them in several confrontations against the occupation soldiers, which they did not like, so they decided to assassinate him.

Wikipedia Arabic describes "elbow bombs":

It consists of a short, serrated tube and is closed at both ends with two metal pieces, one of which contains a hole through which the ignition fuse passes into the interior, which is ignited with sulfur. It is stuffed with gunpowder or black sulfur.

His family knew that he went out if his way to attack soldiers. "They all knew his courage, which always put him at the forefront of confrontations against soldiers heavily armed and fortified with armored vehicles," the article adds.

This was a child soldier and an active militant. Even so, Defense for Children International ignores all the evidence and merely calls him a "Palestinian boy."

In English, he is an innocent child. In Arabic, he is a heroic Islamic Jihad mujahid - and also a child..

And the media doesn't want the truth to be published.

(h/t Ibn Boutros)

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UN reluctantly admits that terror groups put Palestinian children at risk

Every year, Lynn Hastings, the UN Humanitarian and Resident Coordinator in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, issues a press release before the school year discussing how Israel and Jewish settlers have been awful to Palestinian children.

This year, as far as I can tell for the first time, the press release also mentions a couple of ways that Palestinian terror groups are endangering Palestinian children..

Physical barriers placed by Palestinians in refugee camps, some rigged with explosive materials, are threatening the safety of children and making it harder for them to reach their classrooms. And reports continue of children being enrolled in “summer camps” by armed groups, increasing their risk of being exposed to violence or military content.

I've mentioned that the IEDs that Palestinian terror groups have been placing on the roads of camps in order to blow up Israeli vehicles are a danger to ordinary Palestinians, but this is the first time I have seen any NGO mention the danger, even if it downplays the danger.

Similarly, even though these "summer camps" have been run by terror groups for decades, this is the first time I have seen the UN say anything negative about them. The sentence is comical: "increasing their risk of being exposed?" That is the entire purpose of the camps, and there are lots of videos and photos showing the children with real or mock weapons!

Hastings fails to mention that most of the "children" killed by Israel this year were either child soldiers recruited by terror groups or were actively engaged in attacks.

Perhaps the UN felt forced to mention Palestinian responsibility towards the children's welfare because it has had to admit that it couldn't open up schools in the Lebanese Ein el-Hilweh camp because of terror groups that have taken over the schools.

Although there is plenty wrong with this press release, it is a slight improvement over the obsessively one-sided anti-Israel propaganda of the past.

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In English, Palestinians are poor, hapless victims. In Arabic, they are strong jihadists.

A tweet from Palestinian propagandist Nour Odeh:

Overnight, Israeli forces attacked Nour Shams refugee camp in Tulkarem and literally plowed the streets & infrastructure leaving devastating & destruction in its wake.

She showed a video of an IDF bulldozer and then a bulldozed street.

But in Arabic, Palestinian terrorists are celebrating - because they have video of IED exploding in those same streets.

In other words, they mined their own streets - endangering their own people - in an attempt to blow up soldiers, and the IDF is forced to use the armored bulldozers to clear the IEDs.

An explosion like that would barely slow down an armored D9R bulldozer.

As usual, the Palestinians are trying to have it both ways - claiming victimhood status while they bury IEDs in their own streets. Their placement of the bombs are meant to protect terrorist infrastructure as they whine about civilian infrastructure that they are subverting for attacks.

(h/t Jon S)

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At Joseph's tomb, mujahadeen proudly trying (and dying) to stop Jews from visiting a holy site

Every month or so, Jewish pilgrims go to visit Joseph's Tomb in Shechem (Nablus).

Under the Oslo Accords, Jews should have free access to the holy site. But Palestinians would rather kill them.

So the IDF has to go in to protect the worshipers, and the worshipers go in the middle of the might, to cause as little of a disturbance to the nearby residents as possible.

Fat chance. Terror groups are hell-bent on blocking the Jews from visiting their holy spot, so they try to stop the pilgrimage - with bullets, with IEDs, and generally turning the city into a mini-war zone.

Every month.

On Wednesday night, one mujahid was killed as he tried to prevent Jews from visiting the site.

Terror-linked media gleefully brag about how much firepower they use to be active Jew-haters:

The Al-Quds Brigades - the Nablus Brigade responded to the storming of the occupation forces and settlers, by firing heavy salvoes of bullets at them and detonating a number of explosive devices in more than one area in the vicinity of Joseph's Tomb.

Islamic Jihad issued a press release saying that they successfully repelled the Jews:

Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine, confirmed that its mujahideen in the Nablus Battalion repelled, tonight, the occupation forces' incursion into the eastern region of the city and the vicinity of Joseph's Tomb, with heavy salvoes of bullets and explosive devices.

The Saraya said in several military reports, "The soldiers of the Al-Mayamin Battalion targeted the occupation vehicles on Al-Hisba Street with heavy bullets, and they were also able to detonate a number of explosive devices in the occupation vehicles on Amman Street and Al-Hisba directly.

They appear to be lying.

The terrorists up the ante to bury IEDs in the road. Israel brings in armored bulldozers to detonate them.

The only reason there is escalation on the Palestinian side is a burning desire to stop religious Jews - they type they claim that they don't hate - from worshiping.

The only reason there is escalation on the Israeli side is to continue to protect the Jewish worshipers, and not to knuckle under to terror.

The PA should be the ones protecting the Jews under signed agreements. Obviously, they cannot. And almost certainly some members of the Al Aqsa Brigades are there, shooting at and trying to bomb the Jews, who are also members of PA security forces during the day.

These are the facts around Joseph's Tomb. It is all antisemitism. But no media has the guts to report that.

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Horrifying: Palestinian terror groups use children to build and plant their explosives

PCHR reported on July 3 that Israeli forces shot Ali Hani Al-Ghoul in the chest, killing him. It admitted that he was a member of an armed group and said he was 20 years old.

Later, the Israel/Palestine Timeline site said that al-Ghoul was shot in the head, and that he was 17 years old.

His mother was interviewed:

His mother brought back some of her memories with her little Ali, which she will never forget; She says, "About two years ago, Ali used to come home at night, with his clothes dusty and his eyes red, and he was suffering from severe pain, which was caused by the explosive materials he was using."

"Ali was one of the resistance fighters who made explosive devices in the Jenin camp from primitive materials, but their impact was great and effective by damaging many Israeli military vehicles," according to his mother, who expressed her pride in what her son did and what his friends say about his actions that are beyond his age.

That means that Ali al-Ghoul had been building bombs since he was 15 years old.

Now, the Jenin Brigades division of Islamic Jihad have issued a video celebrating Al-Ghoul's "martyrdom" - showing him building IEDs together with other children.

It doesn't show anyone else's faces, but you can see that the hands that are stuffing explosive powder into IEDs are not those of full grown adults.

Jenin's bomb-makers are children.

Ali's mother continues: “Before Ali left the house, he carried a sack full of explosive devices on his shoulder, and later he planted them in the streets and alleys of Jenin camp with the help of his friends, who confirmed that Ali participated with them in a confrontation with the occupation from zero distance."

Palestinian terror groups recruit children to build bombs.

They encourage kids to turn their homes into bomb depots.

They instruct children to plant these bombs in the roads of Jenin where they can kill not only the children but anyone who happens to come by.

And they freely and proudly admit this.

This is not just child abuse: this is systemic and widespread child abuse that is a source of pride to Palestinians.

Now listen to the silence from UNICEF, the UN Human Rights Council, Defense for Children-International, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.

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The Palestinian Authority has been trying to walk a tightrope between publicly supporting terror to its people and quietly doing a small part to retake police control over the parts of the West Bank that have become fully subjugated to terror groups.

The local terror groups complained loudly after Israel's Jenin operation last week that the PA had reportedly intercepted terrorists en route to the camp to fight Israeli forces.

Abbas was humiliated when one of his senior Fatah officials, Mahmoud Aloul, was expelled from Jenin while attending a funeral for some of the terrorists killed during the operation.

Today, the PA arrested a member of Fatah's Al Aqsa Brigades, a 17 year old who was transporting bombs in his car in Nablus.

The "Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades - Youth for Revenge and Liberation" group called on the PA to release their member, stating, "We direct our words to the security personnel and whoever may be concerned, that what was seized is an honorable weapon, and it is on its way to our soldiers in the camp."

And they warned the PA, "Do not deviate from the proper direction, and do not be a helping hand for those who want to kill us and want to arrest us. Do not be like our enemies, we are one people, do not sow the fuse of sedition."

The statement concluded, "We still speak the language of dialogue, and we do not want to start to use methods that we do not want to reach."

Sources said that the PA police seized five homemade explosives, along with wires, a battery and switch for detonation inside the vehicle driven by a child.

Protesters against the arrest closed Al-Quds Street, adjacent to Balata refugee camp, with burning rubber tires.

At this point it is unclear how much of the PA's arrest spree is due to pressure from Israel, or pressure from the US and Arab countries, and how much is just because it does not want to lose what power it has left in the face of the proliferation of terror groups in the West Bank.

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Islamic Jihad publishes a great advertisement for Israeli armored Caterpillar D9 bulldozers

For the past week, Palestinian media has been filled with articles about how the Jenin Battalion defeated the IDF in Jenin. They don't quite explain how they come to the conclusion that 12 dead terrorists and much destroyed terror infrastructure is a "victory."

Today, the Islamic Jihad-linked Palestine Today published a video of their latest "proof" of this illusory victory.

The video shows an IDF armored D9 bulldozer clearing an area and being targeted with 3 IEDs.

The terror website claims that their explosives "disrupted" the bulldozer's work.

But the video shows that the bulldozer didn't even slow down while detonating these bombs.

Israel has created many different armored versions of the Caterpillar D9. According to this Wiki page, in testing the D9R version withstood IED belly charges of 500 kg - more than 5 times the mass of high explosives needed to destroy a main battle tank!

The IDF has been using D9s since the 1950s, and the armored versions have been recognized as saving many lives. D9s prompted top Palestinian terrorists in Jenin to surrender in 2003 as the machinery would slowly dismantle the buildings the terrorists were in - and they had no defense against it, forcing them to surrender before the building would collapse. (It takes about a half an hour for a D9 to destroy a building.)

The terrorists released this video to pretend that they effectively countered the D9s - but in the end, they created an advertisement that showed that these bulldozers are effectively indestructible.

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Jenin militants sprinkled explosives on their own roads. Where are the anti-landmine activists? (UPDATE)

The Times of Israel reported last week during the Jenin operation:

The Israel Defense Forces says troops located and destroyed at least 11 improvised explosive devices hidden along roads in the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank.

Operatives of terror groups “are planting IEDs and bombs on the roads in the refugee camp and in the city, in a civilian environment. This poses a threat to the security forces who use the roads in counterterrorism activities and to innocent people who also use them,” the IDF says in a statement.

The military says that during the last few hours, dozens of combat engineering vehicles have been combing the streets for such IEDs.

This is confirmed by the Washington Post:

One long street was plowed like a farm furrow where Israeli bulldozers had intentionally detonated explosives embedded in the pavement.

Embedded explosives in the ground are pretty much the definition of landmines. The Jenin terrorists are burying landmines in their own town, where their own people could be killed.

If the mines can be triggered by a person, they are considered illegal under the 1997 Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention.

It sure looks like many of these IEDs can indeed be triggered by someone stepping on them. Here is a relatively small one being detonated by the IDF.

I have yet to see a condemnation by any NGO or state about Palestinians putting their own people at risk of being blown up by these IEDs.

Israel's clearing of the mines is considered a bigger crime than the mines themselves.

Which tells you a lot.

UPDATE: The "State of Palestine" acceded to the 1997 Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, which proves yet again that the only reason they signed these conventions was to be accepted as a state, but had no intention to actually do anything to adhere to the various conventions' rules. (h/t Ian)

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