And my favorite piece of blame the victim, defensiveness:
At the same time, he questioned why the UN had manned the outpost in Lebanon near the Israeli border as bombs exploded all around."Bitch shouldn't have been wearing those 'come fuck me' pumps after dark in that neighborhood. It's her fault and she probably wanted it.""We want to find out why this United Nations post was attacked and also why it remained manned during what is now, more or less, a war during obvious danger to these individuals," he said.
Because it's their job jackass. Specifically it was their duty to monitor Israel's departure from and respect for Lebanese territory after the last time this happened.
But we encourage you not to draw any logical conclusions from that Steve, you toadying neo-con starfucker.
Want to do that poll again CanWest? I suspect the Canadian people have some exciting new numbers for you.
Update: The UN outpost contacted the IDF ten times over six hours begging them to stop shelling them:
6 comments:
"The deepest pit of Hell is reserved for those who believe in it because they're afraid they'll go there if they don't."
Whoa. Deep, man.
Perhaps Harper is reserving judgement on whether the post was deliberately targeted because he is aware of an email that Major Paeta Derek Hess-von Kruedener (the Canadian soldier killed) in which he informed his colleagues back in Canada that:
"The closest artillery has landed within two metres of our position and the closest 1,000-pound aerial bomb has landed 100 metres from our patrol base. This has not been deliberate targeting, but has rather been due to tactical necessity.”
Major General Lewis MacKenzie explains what "tactical necessity" means in this context:
"This is what we call 'veiled speech' in military jargon. It means hiding the truth in lingo that outsiders would not necessarily understand. What he is saying translates roughly as: “We have Hezbollah fighters all over our position engaging the IDF and using us as shields. They will probably stay, hoping that the IDF won't target them for fear of hitting us.”
This is why we shouldn't have unarmed peacekeepers in volatile regions of the world, and if we must, they should be pulled out as soon as serious fighting begins.
As Lewis MacKenzie says, "When there had been a semblance of peace, UN monitoring made considerable sense, so minor violations could be dealt with quickly. But to leave the observers in place with a war under way stretches the credibility of the UN's operational judgment close to the breaking point."
Armed peacekeepers can deal with this sort of situation, but unarmed observers are pretty helpless when combatants over-run their position and use them as human shields. Again, MacKenzie describes a similar situation from his own experiences, only when he was leading ARMED peacekeepers:
"I have served in another mission where one side constantly set up its weapon systems, including mortars, in and around hospitals, medical clinics, mosques and, yes, UN positions, knowing full well that, when it engaged its enemies and received return fire, it would make for compelling TV as the networks covered the civilian carnage. (When they took up positions around my soldiers, I advised their leaders that I would authorize my soldiers to kill them within the hour if they didn't withdraw. Fortunately, as I was not an unarmed observer, I was in a position to do that.) In many cases, the weapon systems were moved immediately after firing, and their positions around civilians were abandoned before innocents paid the price for their despicable techniques. You have to admit this technique helps to win the PR war, which often is as important as the fighting one."
Considering this information from people who know a lot more about war and peacekeeping than me (including the Canadian who was killed) I have no problem with our Prime Minister refusing to call the act "deliberate" before any investigation takes place. Like the PM, I rather assume the Israelis would NOT deliberately target a UN mission, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if Hezbollah set up their offensive positions all around the post, and I don't think that's such a wacky assumption.
Regardless, the standard is generally "innocent until proven guilty", not "innocent until the Secretary General can get to a mic".
10 calls in 6 hours.
10 promises to stop shelling.
Other nations with dead UN observers are filing grievances with Israel. Stand up for canada - don't count on the CPoC to do it.
These military burn-outs that attempt to deflect criticizm by asserting that using laser-guided bombs to hit a position that has existed for some time, is populated with civilians simply because hezbollah is "hiding behind them" does not justify the actions of the israeli military. This is not a measured response, and Israel is assuming that it has the green light to continue to destroy an entire country because mincing cowards like stephen harper and his israeli apologists are unwilling to take a stand.
Its pretty easy to blame the dead guy isn' it? Pa-thetic, folks.
Lord Kitchener :
I fail to see how an email written by Paeta Derek Hess-von Kruedener regarding artillery fire on July 18 refers in any way to his being killed by a 500lb bomb a whole week later.
Re that "green light", alberta report:
"Israel says Wednesday's decision by key world powers not to call for a halt to its Lebanon offensive has given it the green light to continue.
"We received yesterday at the Rome conference permission from the world... to continue the operation," Israeli Justice Minister Haim Ramon said."
~ From BBC
As for Major General MacKenzie, he failed to mention some details about his position and activities in his piece in the Globe.
It's certainly relevant that he was the Keynote Speaker at the Stand With Israel rally in Toronto yesterday.
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