[GushShalom] Army at Rafah - severe violations of international law

[Gush Shalom (Israeli Peace Bloc)]

GUSH SHALOM  pob 3322, Tel-Aviv 61033 www.gush-shalom.org

Press release, October 14, 2003

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Soldiers and officers may be charged with severe violations. Those 
responsible failed to make army personnel adhere to legal norms, says  
Gush Shalom in  letter to General Menachem Finkelstein, head of the Israeli 
Army's Legal Branch. 
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Following is the translation of a letter sent today by Gush Shalom - Israeli 
Peace Bloc - to General Menachem Finkelstein, head of the Israeli Army's 
Legal Branch.  

Dear General Finkelstein

Last Friday (October 10) the armed forces of the state of Israel staged a 
wide-scale invasion of the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip and its 
adjacent refugee camps - the largest-scale invasion of Rafah launched 
during the three years of the present confrontation. In the course of that 
invasion, the army deployed armoured bulldozers which embarked upon 
systematic demolition of Palestinian homes. According to reports in 
today's Israeli and international press, 120 houses were destroyed - some 
of them being three- and four-storey houses in the refugee camp's main 
street - leaving 1240 people homeless. This morning (Tuesday, October 14) 
it was reported that the invasion of Rafah was resumed and that the 
bulldozers are at this very moment engaged on yet further destruction of 
Palestinian homes. 

Destruction on such a wide scale does not, and cannot, have any relation 
to the army's effort to locate tunnels used by arms smugglers - the official 
pretext under which this invasion was launched. This is manifestly a 
collective punishment of Rafah's entire population, an act constituting a 
severe violation of International Law and specifically of the Fourth Geneva 
Convention. All soldiers and officers involved in these acts - from the IDF 
Supreme Command, through Colonel Eyal Eisenberg of the Givati Brigade, 
which the Israel press mentioned as being in direct command of the 
operation, and down to the bulldozer drivers implementing the actual 
destruction - are liable to be charged with severe offences. 

This is not the first time that the army perpetrates such acts in Rafah. It is 
part of an ongoing policy, which started already in the term of General 
Yom Tov Samiya in the IDF Southern Command [1997-2001]. General 
Samiya was quite frank in describing that policy at an interview to Kol 
Yisrael Radio on September 26, 2001. According to Samiya, it is the army's 
aim to totally raze all houses and structures within a strip of 300-400 metres 
of the Egyptian border - a very densely populated area in which tens of 
thousands live - so as to create a fait accompli and ensure that this 
evacuated strip remain under Israeli  rule  in any permanent status 
agreement.  Samiya also noted that the policy is being carried out 
incrementally, and that any conspicuous suicide bombing is being used as 
a pretext to "pull down another two or three rows of houses" (even when 
the bombing had nothing to do with Rafah). 

Ever since the army is consistently carrying out this policy, causing a 
terrible suffering to the people of Rafah. Over the years, the Army's Legal 
Branch did nothing to stop this manifestly illegal policy, totally abdicating 
its responsibility to make soldiers and officers adhere to legal norms of 
behavior. This ringing silence has made the Legal Branch itself share in 
legal and moral responsibility to severe and continuous violations of 
International Law - and is increasing the chance that soldiers and officers 
may eventually face  punishment by international judicial agencies. 

Sincerely Yours

Uri Avnery 
Adam Keller
For the Gush Shalom Movement 

Note: the Samiya interview was extensively quoted by Akiva Eldar in the 
article "Under cover of revenge" (Ha'aretz, January 15, 2002) written in the 
wake of an earlier invasion of Rafah, in the course of which 59 houses 
were destroyed. 

For more information:
Gush Shalom Spokesperson Adam Keller: 03-5565804 / 056-709603

Appendix a) 
http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE150912003?open&of=ENG-
ISR
[Amnesty International: Wanton destruction constitutes a war crime ]

Appendix b)
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/349478.html
[Arnon Regular's eyewitness report on the Rafah destruction in Haaretz, 
Oct.14]