- The Israeli army is under growing pressure to explain
a series of deaths of Palestinians in a three-week operation in the West
Bank city of Nablus. According to witnesses and medical evidence, at least
two of the 19 deaths during the operation have the hallmarks of executions.
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- The operation was launched on 16 December to track down
Naif Sharekh, who the army say was behind the movement of suicide bombers
from Nablus to Israel. The UN representative in the city described it as
'one of the largest military operations in Nablus since Operation Defensive
Shield started in April 2002'.
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- By the time the army reduced its presence on 6 January,
it had killed four gunmen and 15 unarmed civilians including six children.
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- One Israeli and one Palestinian human rights group are
investigating the killings and want the army to launch its own inquiry,
but it is reluctant.
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- Following the shooting of British student Tom Hurndall,
21, last year, it insisted that its soldiers had shot an armed terrorist.
Six months later, following immense pressure from the Hurndall family,
the army charged one of its soldiers with unlawful killing.
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- Ala Dawaya, 21, was on his way to work as a baker when
he was shot by Israeli soldiers in the old town of Nablus on 18 December.
An ambulance was called and driver Adnan Soso arrived to see the wounded
man sitting upright and still alive a few metres from an army Jeep.
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- 'I was called at around 3am to an area known as the onion
market,' he said. 'I got there within about three minutes and saw an injured
man lying against a wall within metres of an Israeli Jeep.'
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- He reversed to the end of the street, from where he could
still see the injured man and the Jeep. 'Then they started shooting at
the man from the Jeep. Every time they shot, the body moved and they waited
then shot again, sometimes twice. They shot him about ten times over several
minutes,' he said.
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- Eventually, the shooting stopped and the Jeep allowed
the ambulance to approach. 'The man was dead and both his eyeballs were
hanging out. I looked at what he had in the black plastic bag next to him.
Trousers, shoes and an overall, covered in flour. We put him on a stretcher
and got him into the ambulance.
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- 'As we were about to pull away, the Jeep approached.
The soldier said: 'Is he dead?' He then asked what was in the bag and I
showed him. He asked for the dead man's identification card and spoke on
the radio for a few minutes. He then told us to take the body away.'
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- The ambulance took the body to Rafidia Hospital where
it was examined by Dr Samir Abu Zarour. Although not trained in post-mortems,
he is the closest thing to an expert in Nablus, having examined 250 shooting
victims in the past three years.
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- 'He had been shot between eight and 10 times, including
twice in the face and once in the testicles, and had a series of fragmentation
wounds in his legs,' he said.
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- The army spokesman said that Nablus was under curfew
at the time of the shooting in order to separate civilians from terrorists.
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- 'Soldiers identified a terrorist planting an explosive
device in the road. They shot him and when they examined the bag, it contained
explosive material, as suspected. They later discovered he was a member
of Islamic Jihad.' The spokesman denied soldiers had shot him several times.
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- On 7 January, as part of the same operation, a large
number of troops entered the al Makhsia neighbourhood around 3am, surrounded
the house of the Qassas family and ordered them to leave, according to
Mofida Qassas. 'My father, my uncle and aunt and I had to leave, but they
kept my four brothers inside. The last time I saw Abdul he was tying his
shoelaces surrounded by Israeli soldiers,' she said.
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- Addul Qassas, 25, had returned to Nablus from Saudi Arabia
two years ago after learning to make curtains at a relative's business.
His three brothers were taken away by the Israelis. One remains in jail,
but the others were released. The soldiers searched the house, spraying
some rooms with bullets and a prolonged gun battle began outside. Witnesses
were unable to say what was happening because they were keeping their heads
down. Qassas was taken to the next door garden, where he was questioned.
Nobody saw what happened to him.
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- Amra Sadija, a secretary at the Palestinian Ministry
of Education, said: 'The shooting was continuous for hours. Between 5am
and 6am, I heard a man screaming. He kept repeating: "I swear to God,
I don't know who he is." His voice was so high I could not recognise
who it was. I could not tell what happened to him because there was still
shooting everywhere. Eventually, everything went silent. At about 6am,
I heard movement and at 6.30am the soldiers moved out.'
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- Neighbours found the body of Qassas metres from his home.
Again the body was taken to Rafidia Hospital and Dr Zarour. 'I was called
at 6.45am and arrived at the hospital 7am. Abdul Qassas had been shot twice,
once through the upper lip with the bullet leaving the body in the middle
of the back,' he said.
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- The bullet's trajectory suggested the victim was kneeling
when he was shot, said Zarour and the size of the wounds suggest it was
fired from a range of between three and five metres.
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- The army spokesman said soldiers spotted Qassas hiding
and feared he was a sniper: 'They began an arrest procedure, shouting at
him in Arabic and Hebrew. They fired warning shots. Then, fearing he was
about to shoot, they shot him. He was found to be unarmed, but the soldiers
later found out he was a wanted man.'
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- His family do not know why Abdul was shot, but it is
possible the troops suspected him of sheltering a man whose body was found
in the same garden that morning. Ibrahim Atawi, 32, was a senior figure
in the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade in Nablus.
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- It is not clear whether he was involved in the gunbattle
or how he died. Zarour said: 'His body was like a collander. I counted
15 bullet wounds of different calibres and there could have been more.
Three bullets were fired directly at his nose. His right knee had been
smashed to pieces. I think it was with a rock because the injuries looked
as if there had been a grinding effect. Also his trousers were shredded
around the knee and there were bits of grass on his skin and in his flesh.'
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- His left arm had been cut twice with a knife and there
were what looked like dog bites on his arm and around his testicles. 'I
do not have the expertise to say if the wounds were administered before
or after he was shot,' he said.
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- The army spokesman said Atawi approached soldiers with
a handgun. 'They fired before he could shoot them. The gun was later found
to be loaded.' He denied Atawi had the injuries the doctor alleges.
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- The high number of deaths in Nablus over Christmas and
their brutal nature have largely been ignored by human rights groups and
the media because Nablus is isolated, but slowly people are beginning to
pay attention.
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- Noam Hossfatter, a spokesman for B'tselem, an Israeli
human rights group, said they were examining Qassas' death with a view
to pressing the army to investigate: 'At the moment there is no eyewitness,
so we cannot yet say there was an execution but if someone was in custody
and was then found dead it would suggest something very unusual took place.'
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- Bassem Eid, director of the Palestinian Human Rights
Monitoring Group, said his organisation's lawyer was expected to write
to the Israeli military attorney-general asking him to investigate.
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004
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- http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1136426,00.html
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