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Iran is calling for a ban on all armed attacks against nuclear installations anywhere.
Of course, this has nothing to do with them fearing an Israeli attack on their nuclear facilities – “Nobody dares to do anything against Iran” said Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran’s chief envoy to the IAEA. No. This is a matter of principle. Such an attack “will have radiological consequences all over the world.” And as well all know, Iran is dead against “radiological consequences.”
Oh Chutzpah of the Day award, you have a winner.
Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)
10:04PM: Channel 10 has reported the IDF is close to completing the count of soldiers to determine if anyone is missing.
9:52PM: Channel 1 has reported that IDF officials estimate it will take another hour to finish counting all the soldiers to determine if there is really a soldier missing.
9:40PM: Since I haven’t had too much time myself to respond to today’s HRW report libeling the IDF, I’ll point to some good posts by others on the subject:
Noah Pollak: Human Rights Watch’s New Blood Libel
Richard Landes: Human Rights Complex Take 13476: HRW Does Hatchet Job on IDF and (silently) exculpates Hamas
9:22PM: Now I understand why traffic was so heavy on the way home from work this evening – police set up roadblocks on all of the main roads around the airport.
9:12PM: A female soldier reportedly witnessed two civilians forcefully push a soldier into a car near Ben Gurion airport and then fleeing the scene.
8:48PM: The IDF is investigating reports of a kidnapped soldier, following claims by a previously unknown palestinian group called “Al-Quds Army” claiming that it had kidnapped an Israeli soldier today.
According to Ma’an:
“A group of our resistance fighters captured a Zionist soldier near Ben Gurion Airport and withdrew along with the soldier without incident … We will provide details about the captured soldier later,” the statement said.
6:42PM: There’s nothing contrived about those colorful child accessory-rubble contrast pictures, right? (for more, see here)
A Palestinian boy plays with a balloon amongst the rubble of his house which was destroyed during Israel’s 22-day offensive in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip, April 2009. Israeli soldiers unlawfully shot and killed 11 Palestinian civilians, including four children, who were in groups waving white flags during the Gaza war, Human Rights Watch has said. (AFP/File/Mohammed Abed)
AFP get bonus bias points for the way they constructed that last sentence, with the killing of the palestinian civilians sounding like undeniable fact until the last 5 words.
2:32PM: As another response to today’s HRW report about IDF soldiers shooting at civilians waiving white flags, the IDF has released the following aerial footage taken on Jan 8 where you can see a Hamashole plant an IED, climb into a civilian residence and then hide amongst the civilians when they exit the building waving a white flag.
1:00PM: Human Rights Watch has published a report claiming palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip were shot by Israeli soldiers during Operation Cast Lead, despite the fact that they were carrying white flags.
The IDF has responded by saying the report is “based on unreliable witness reports,” and HRW “didn’t bother to give the report to the IDF before releasing it to the public via the media, in order to allow for in-depth investigation.”
NGO Monitor had already sent out the following release, highlighting a number of anticipated problems with the report:
NGO Monitor: Will HRW’s ‘White Flags’ Report Raise Red Flags?
(Jerusalem) – Jerusalem based research organization NGO Monitor highlighted a number of anticipated problems and inconsistencies in advance of Human Rights Watch’s (HRW) release of the report “Civilians Killed Holding White Flags in Gaza”.
- The report is HRW’s third lengthy publication condemning IDF actions during the Gaza conflict (following allegations over white phosphorous and drones), in five months.
- Timed only one week after HRW’s release of a publication critical of Hamas, the ‘white flags’ report seems designed to shift the focus back onto condemning Israel. This theme was reported as central in the HRW fundraising event in Riyadh in May 2009.
- The ‘white flags’ report describes seven supposed incidents, an entirely insufficient basis for accusations of systematic war crimes.
- Should the ‘white flags’ report follow a similar pattern to HRW allegations in “Rain of Fire” (on white phosphorous) and “Precisely Wrong” (on drones), it is likely to be based wholly on speculation, unprovable Palestinian claims and unreliable ‘evidence’ from politicized NGOs.
- HRW’s allegations against Israel over ‘white flags’ incidents during the Second Lebanon War proved to be false. In one case HRW claimed no Hezbollah presence as the IDF allegedly killed 3 and wounded 14 civilians fleeing in a van in Kafra while they “waved a white flag”. Independent analysis showed that Hezbollah admitted flying white flags to prevent IDF attacks, 17 rockets were fired from within Kafra village houses and Hezbollah regularly transported arms in vans.
NGO Monitor’s President Prof Gerald Steinberg said, “The release of a third lengthy publication condemning Israel over Gaza within the space of a few months, is reflective of HRW’s Israel obsession. Its timing, only a week after criticizing Hamas, confirms that this was no more than a token attempt by HRW to display artificial balance. If the methodology and ideology repeat past ‘reports’, this will be more evidence of HRW’s moral collapse in promoting the agendas of Hamas and Hezbollah.”
9:22AM: Following yesterday’s predictable report of progress towards a Shalit-terrorist swap deal comes today’s equally predictable Hamas denial of any such progress.
