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10/25/2004:

"Executing Another Child in Rafah"

by Omar Barghouti
Iman al-Hams was a 13-year old refugee schoolgirl who was executed -- after being wounded -- by an Israeli platoon commander on the sad sands of Rafah.


According to testimonies given by soldiers in the same company to the mass Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth, a soldier in the watchtower identified Iman and cautioned his commander shouting, "Don't shoot. It's a little girl". The company commander, the soldiers testified, "approached her, shot two bullets into her [head], walked back towards the force, turned back to her, switched his weapon to automatic and emptied his entire magazine into her." (1) Eyewitnesses corroborated the soldiers, account, saying that Iman was shot almost 70 meters away from the Israeli military position. After a bullet hit her leg, Iman, who was wearing her school uniform, fell. Then, they said, the officer went over to her, saw that she was bleeding from her wounds, but still shot her twice in the head to "confirm the killing", an Israeli euphemism for the practice of executing a wounded Palestinian. A cursory army investigation later cleared him of any "unethical conduct", as is customary, and suspended him only because of "poor relations with subordinates".(2)

In a flash, Israel proved to the world -- yet again -- that it is not only intransigent in its patent and consistent violation of international law, but also incapable of adhering to the most fundamental principles of moral behavior.
Full Article: counterpunch.org

Masked Haitian Police Shoot Children While Arresting Priest
by Bill Quigley
Jeanine (not her real name for reasons you will shortly understand) is a quiet 14 year old girl who lives with her family of 18 off a rutted dirt road near the international airport in Port au Prince. Twice a week she walked the mile or so to eat a meal at St. Claire's church.

Fr. Gerard Jean-Juste is the pastor of St. Claire's. He has been in jail for more than a week after his church was surrounded by heavily armed masked men while feeding 600 children at his parish His arrest was violent. The police ripped metal bars out of their concrete surroundings and smashed the windows of the church house to enter. After beating and handcuffing Fr. Jean-Juste, they dragged him out though the smashed window, threw him into a car and raced off to jail.

After the arrest, the people of the parish publicly complained and said the masked police had even shot children. Haitian authorities flatly denied any children were shot and no police inquiry into the arrest has been made.

Government-friendly media and US Embassy personnel also scoffed at the reports of children being shot by police. They said the stories of the children were products of the Haiti rumor mill and propaganda from the opponents of Haiti's unelected government.

Now the wounded children have appeared in public. They have real bandages and real medical reports.

And then there is the bullet.
Full Article: counterpunch.org

And then there is the fact that these countries are close US allies, and US taxpayers pay for those bullets.