Israel uses excessive force to respond to children who are just throwing stones.

MYTH

“Israel uses excessive force to respond to children who are just throwing stones.”

FACT

Palestinians, young and old, attack Israeli civilians and soldiers with a variety of weapons. When they throw stones, they are not pebbles, but large rocks that can and do cause serious injuries.

Typically, Israeli troops under attack have numbered fewer than 20, while their assailants, armed with Molotov cocktails, pistols, assault rifles, machine guns, hand grenades and explosives, have numbered in the hundreds. Moreover, mixed among rock throwers have been Palestinians, often policemen, armed with guns. Faced with an angry, violent mob, Israeli police and soldiers often have no choice but to defend themselves by firing rubber bullets and, in life-threatening situations, live ammunition.

The use of live-fire by the Palestinians has effectively meant that Israeli forces have had to remain at some distance from those initiating the violence. In addition, the threat of force against Israelis has been a threat of lethal force. Both factors have inhibited the use of traditional methods of riot control.

According to the rules of engagement for Israeli troops in the territories, the use of weapons is authorized solely in life-threatening situations or, subject to significant limitations, in the exercise of the arrest of an individual suspected of having committed a grave security offense. In all cases, IDF activities have been governed by an overriding policy of restraint, the requirement of proportionality and the necessity to take all possible measures to prevent harm to innocent civilians.

Meanwhile, the Palestinians escalated their violent attacks against Israelis by using mortars and anti-tank missiles illegally smuggled into the Gaza Strip. Palestinians have fired mortar shells into Jewish communities in Gaza and Israel proper, and IDF reports indicate that anti-tank missiles have been fired at Israeli forces in Gaza. The Palestinian Authority (PA) has also been stockpiling weapons smuggled into Gaza by sea and underground tunnels linked to Egypt.

The possession and use of these weapons and other arms by the Palestinians violates commitments they made in various agreements with Israel. Under the Oslo accords, the only weapons allowed in the Palestinian-controlled areas are handguns, rifles and machine guns, and these are to be held only by PA security officers. The recent violence makes clear that in addition to the police, Palestinian civilians and members of militias, such as the Tanzim, also are in possession of such weapons.²⁶

The number of Palestinian casualties in clashes is regrettable, but it is important to remember that no Palestinian would be in any danger or risk injury if they were not waging a terror campaign. If children were in school or at home with their families, rather than throwing rocks in the streets, they too would have little to fear. And children throw more than rocks. Abu Mazen, Yasser Arafat's deputy revealed that children are paid to carry out terrorist attacks against Israel. He told a Jordanian newspaper that "at least 40 children in Rafah lost arms from the throwing of Bangalore torpedoes [explosive charges]. They received five shekels [approximately $1.00] in order to throw them."²⁷

Also, while the number of Palestinians who have died is greater than the number of Israelis, that should not minimize the traumatic loss of life on the Israeli side. From September 29, 2000, through June 7, 2005, 1,061 Israelis, including more than 730 civilians, were murdered by Palestinians. Contrary to Palestinian assertions that they are fighting a war against armed forces, fewer than one-third of the Israelis that have been killed were soldiers. In 2004, Palestinians successfully carried out 15 suicide attacks and Israeli security forces thwarted 367 others.²⁸

It is also worth considering how police in the United States and other nations react to mob violence. Abuses do sometimes occur when police are under attack, but no one expects them to stand by and allow their lives to be put in danger to assuage international opinion. In fact, the Palestinian Authority itself does not hesitate to use lethal force against protestors. For example, after the U.S. coalition attacked Afghanistan, Hamas organized a rally in the Gaza Strip in which thousands of Palestinians marched in support of suspected terror mastermind Osama bin Laden. Palestinian police killed two protestors when they tried to break it up.²⁹

It is only Israelis who are denied their right to self-defense or see it used as a propaganda weapon against them.

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Get Knowledge on the Palestine/Israel Issue

Two parts.  First the issue.  Second, how you should feel about this as a Christian believer.

It is unfathomable that there are people today who still believe Israel is somehow the problem in the Palestine State controversy.  ....well, maybe not.  There aren't many mainstream news sources that tell you how rockets (paid for by Iran) have been launched at schools and hospitals for the past 2 decades.  There aren't too many analysts that REMIND viewers that when Prime Minister Olmert OFFERED EVERYTHING the PLO wanted, including the land requested this week - they still turned it down refusing to acknowledge the right of Israel to exist.

But if we turn from emotion or what OTHERS tell us - we can figure out the RIGHT answer to this dilemma by asking 3 questions:  Who are the Palestinians, Whose land is it, and Who really wants peace?

Other questions that are good, (but never asked) include:

Has anyone asked WHY Jordan - a country with ideological sympathies to the Palestinians has never offered (or been pressured) to give land?

Does anyone ever wonder why, after the British and United Nations granted land to the Israelis that ALL Arab nations suddenly attacked, without provocation a tiny group of people that had just faced extermination by Hitler?

And why won't Hamas acknowledge TODAY Israelites right to exist?  No, those who insist that Israel is at the heart of the lack of peace have no understanding of history or they simply are too intellectually lazy to find out.

How about when Rome invaded Jerusalem and took the land.  Does that count?

Why 1967 CE?  Why not 967 BC? How about when islamic forces took it, raped women, leveled nearly every sacred synagogue and built their mosque on Jewish land with a history FAR better documented and OCCUPIED before they even existed?  Why not be incensed at that?

There are really 3 central questions that must be answered to come to an accurate understanding of the problem:

1. Who are Palestinians (I think we all know who the Jews are).
2. Whose land is it? (what is Palestine)
3. Who REALLY wants peace?

The first two questions can be answered well by this documentary:  Jerusalem, the Land of Covenant

However, suffice it to say that NO ONE called the land Palestine until the end of the Roman empire. SEE this short video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Xrnw-yIc9w&feature=related

The land has been documented to be in Jewish hands up until islamic forces tried to conquer in 636 CE (AD).  There was no legal right to the land then.  However, wars come and go (Texas and California anyone?) but it has been pretty well established that there were Jews in Jerusalem CONSISTENTLY (albeit in minority) for it's entire history.

So why 1967?  Why not 15 years prior when British rule prevailed.  Why not 1000 years before?  Those arguing for Israel to give up it's tiny slice of land (kind of like Virgina and Maryland asking for Washington DC) will always try and ground the debate in 1967.  WHY!!???  And why not JULY of 1967 when Israel took land from those who publicly declared they were going to annihilate them?

The dirty little secret is this: ONLY THE JEWS can lay history to the land before the modern area (BC).  ONLY THE JEWS have historic documentation that they BOUGHT (not conquered) the site where their religious shrines are.

Prior to the WW1 NO ONE  lived in Palestine/Israel. Well, maybe a few thousand people.  NO ONE WANTED IT!!  (see Jerusalem, Land of Covenant link above).  Prior to Islam, the Arabs  and Jews that lived there got along quite nicely even though Jews were an extreme minority after the Arab control.

Only when the United Nations granted them sovereignty, did it become valuable.  There were no trees, no culture, no farm land until the Jewish people populated and cultivated the land.

Which brings us to question #3: WHO REALLY WANTS PEACE?

An argument is made that Israel has tanks and the Palestinians have only sticks and stones.  This is a blatant lie (the flotilla that was attempted to land at Gaza months back on a "peace" mission had hundreds of thousands of lbs of rockets and guns.)  But EVEN if Israel had tanks and Palestinians did not-  it doesn't negate the fact Israel has an attempt to defend itself.

Israel does NOT do similarly to lands in Jordan, nor areas that are predominately populated by Arabs.  Only when attacked, and told they will be exterminated, do the Israeli's fight back.

Ironically, it is ISRAEL that had a baby dismembered last month by Palestinian forces (google it) and other atrocities.  Israel isn't perfect - far from it - but THEY are continually under attack under Hamas (Iran) sponsored terrorism.  (You don't find Israelites dressing their women and children up as suicide bombers.).  Who is the civil one here?

Again, WHY - when Islam takes over a region (like Lebannon) does it become an uncultivated war zone?  When Christians or Jews take populate an area THE REVERSE becomes true.  So even now, that the Jewish people have made Israel beautiful and viable - why suddenly is there such world pressure WHEN NONE OF THE WORLD CAME TO HELP THE JEWS WHEN THEY WERE ATTACKED IN 1967!???

Because, this is a spiritual battle.  Our grandparents and populations prior to them for hundreds of years NEVER would have believed that Israel would be reconstituted much less become the center of the world's attention.  It seemed impossible.  But as prophesied by the Bible, it WILL become the center of attention for the REAL end of the world in the coming years.

And if you are unsure where you stand.  READ.  INVESTIGATE.  And not just the sources you normally listen to!  Listen to BOTH sides and ask God for enlightenment and truth.

And if you are a Christian believer, you will also shiver at the curses upon those who attack God's chosen (not perfect) people. You should marvel at how in 1948, a nation was reformed that seemed impossible for hundreds of years.
http://www.alphanewsdaily.com/Warning%201%20Israel%20Jerusalem.html

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