|
Comment on this article |
Email this Article
|
|
Editorial: Lack Of Accountability For The Israeli Border Police |
Current rating: 0 |
by haaretz via gehrig
(No verified email address) |
22 Apr 2003
|
|
Reaction to a B'Tselem investigation of the cover-up of the revenge killing of a 17-yr-old Palestinian by four Israeli border police |
Abuse, cover-up and forgiveness
The arrest of four border policemen suspected in abusive acts that led to the death of 17-year-old Amran Abu Hamadiya of Hebron follows a three-and-a-half-month intensive investigation. The affair's horrifying details, first exposed by the B'Tselem organization, outline how the suspected policemen - Bassam Wahabi, Shahar Butbika, Yanai Lalzeh and Dennis al-Hazub - who served in Company 25 in Hebron, took Palestinians into their jeep, abused them, brutally beat and injured them, and threw them out of the moving vehicle.
The police internal affairs unit believes the act was a revenge killing for the November 15, 2002 Palestinian attack on Hebron's Worshipers' Path. This is not the only severe case revealed, however. B'Tselem reports, media reports, and Palestinian complaints to the police are testimony that acts of abuse, revenge, thuggery and humiliation of Palestinian civilians have spread like an infectious plague during the 30 months of the intifada.
Investigators probing some of these complaints have encountered a lack of cooperation, procedural obstructions, and factual cover-ups. In the recent case, internal affairs investigator Aryeh Zuk said during debates regarding the extension of the four suspects' remand, that "this is a protected Border Police company, which in the past has been involved in cover-up acts and obstruction of the investigation."
In some of the cases, the witnesses or plaintiffs themselves have been afraid of testifying, either because they realized how helpless the investigators are, or because they fear the border policemen would take revenge against them.
During the first intifada in the late 1980s, the IDF and Border Police top brass made efforts to present cases of abuse or of shooting against orders as deviant incidents. These efforts were backed by a convincing in-depth inquiry, and those who violated such orders were punished immediately. Hundreds of cases were opened against soldiers, and dozens of them were indicted.
This, however, has not been the case in the intifada that erupted in September 2000. The fatal terrorist attacks marking this intifada must have blurred, for some security forces, the vital line between innocent civilians and terrorists.
For them, the entire Palestinian public became the enemy. Perhaps these are the roots of the spreading abuse, which could thrive only in a forgiving atmosphere where the abusive soldier or policeman, who goes against orders, knows he will not be held accountable for his acts, and will receive support from his colleagues and maybe even his commanders.
The IDF, Border Police and other security forces have the public's confidence when they take legitimate measures that can be justified by security needs. This confidence will be preserved as long as security forces maintain the distinction between a security act and an offense rooted in feelings of revenge.
This distinction requires not only putting suspects on trial, but also making a real change in the atmosphere that encourages their growth. The security forces have all the means and approval to act against terrorists and those who send them. But abusing and humiliating civilians must not be part of this.
---
@%< |
