It’s really, really hard to become a citizen of most countries. Or really, really expensive.
Interestingly, Purim, which was yesterday (or today in Jerusalem I think), is nominally about Esther and Mordechai saving the Jews from the wrath of the jealous Haman, and thus sort of about standing up to tyranny. But the other part of the story, the massacre of tens of thousands of people the Jews felt were threats to them (a boon granted by Ahasuerus), isn’t as often mentioned. Apparently the current Israeli government prefers the bloodier side of the tale rather than partying with hamantashen.
jpinard
5023
This does not sound good. Though I’m entirely unfamiliar with many of the things discussed.
Thrag
5024
More resistance to Bibi’s power grab.
KevinC
5025
I’m sorry, I wish there was something I could say or do. I honestly feel like we (the US) could be an election or two away from going down a similar authoritarian path.
I hope things can turn around in Israel.
Lamalo
5026
Most Israelis with a foreign passport are getting it from being decendants of people emigrating/thrown out of various countries during the last couple of centuries.
My mother is 8th generation local(on one side) while my father came/ran away from Argentina. Both of my grandmothers were born in Ukraine around 1900, was that even Russia back then? All that leaves me with no practical options to get a passport.
That seems bizarre. Distraction tactic to take attention away from judicial overhaul?
Sadly, the Israelis long agon spiraled into a place where in their minds the only ones who matter are them, and anyone who objects or opposes anything they do or say gets labeled as an anti-Semite at best or a terrorist at worst.
Timex
5032
I think it’s worth noting the specific phrasing of the claim being made there.
The ambulance “was fired upon”, but it’s not saying who did the firing.
From what I’ve seen about that Jenin raid, the Hamas members were doing a lot of shooting and throwing a lot of explosives in the area. I wouldn’t be so sure it was the IDF who shot that ambulance.
So it’s like bystander being killed in an “officer-involved shooting”.
Timex
5034
Kinda. I feel like if the IDF was the one who shot that ambulance, we’d be seeing more direct attributions of blame, since the folks making the statements aren’t the IDF themselves.
Really? We see that passive language all the time with the media.
I’m not saying absolutely that the IDF did it, but it does raise my eyebrows to see doubt expressed based just on that wording.
Timex
5036
Maybe, but the “media” in this case aren’t just general media groups, but rather the red cross and DWB and groups like that. In some of these cases, the folks reporting aren’t particularly friendly to the IDF to begin with.
Given what I know about how that raid went down, and the combatants involved, I don’t really see any particular reason to think it was the IDF that shot that ambulance. Ultimately, the indications seem to suggest that it was caught as collateral damage, and not intentionally fired upon by anyone, but I woudl suspect based on the other actions that we know happened, that the Hamas agents involved were likely less trained and less careful than the IDF soldiers. Certainly not a guarantee, since the IDF has definitely demonstrated lack of control, but in this particular case, the Hamas fighters were definitely doing stuff with less regard for the safety of bystanders.
Multiple media outlets reported the attack and others like it. Here’s Haaretz on the IDF’s standing policy of preventing ambulances from coming to the rescue of people injured in their attacks on Jenin, by firing on them if necessary.
Since early January, residents of the Jenin refugee camp and Palestinian rescue teams in the city have known that the Israel Defense Forces bars ambulances from accessing the area of its military raids in real time to extricate the wounded. The army ordered Palestinian Authority employees to send a message to this effect to rescue teams during the January raids in Jenin, camp residents told Haaretz.
From experience, residents also know that whoever approaches the wounded to administer first aid is risking his life: An Israeli sniper will likely fire at him. That’s how a sniper killed Jawad Bawaqneh, 57, on January 19. It’s also how an IDF soldier or sniper fired and hit the front windshield of an ambulance being driven by 51-year-old Fadi Jarrar on January 26.
Here is Al Jazeera reporting on a similar incident:
Here’s the BBC reporting in the most recent incident, with the added wrinkle that the IDF claims the ambulance contained combatants who fired at them.
Human Rights Watch has been reporting for decades that IDF forces prevent ambulances from coming to the aid of injured people in Jenin, by blocking / colliding with them by tanks, and by firing on them.
https://www.hrw.org/reports/2002/israel3/israel0502-08.htm#P802_138360
Yeah, sorry, regardless of the specifics on any one case, it’s been made pretty clear that medical personnel, journalists, bystanders, whomever, if you are seen as favoring the Palestinians, or simply not being pro-Israel all the way, it’s open season on you pretty much. The IDF long ago stopped caring.
Timex
5039
Eh, if the IDF actually fired on the ambulances, that’s different and I was perhaps giving them too much credit… although, I guess if the people in the ambulances really WERE firing at the IDF, then that’s a shit show all around.
They have been shooting at ambulances for decades. Seriously.
