[Peace-discuss] Comprehensive article on Israli allegations against U.N.

[David Green]

Stretcher case
By Amos Harel

Ha'aretz
October 7, 2004


Israel's eagerness to persuade the world of the
rightness of its
path by means of photos of an UNRWA ambulance carrying
Qassam
rockets led to an embarrassing mistake. Peter Hansen,
the
agency's director, celebrated his victory with
restraint - and on
the way, also tripped up


It was an excellent morning for Peter Hansen. For
three days the
director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency
(UNRWA)
fought a stubborn battle against Israeli allegations
that
employees of his agency had assisted terrorist groups.
But at
first glance, the evidence put forward by Israel
looked quite
convincing. The films taken by an Israel Air Force
drone seemed
to document staff of the agency placing a Qassam
rocket in an
UNRWA ambulance. Hansen's explanation, that the rocket
was
actually a stretcher, met with skepticism from the
Israeli media,
and even the international media devoted space to the
accusations
against UNRWA.


However, on Monday evening a change occurred in the
Israeli
position. In the light of repeated questions by
reporters, the
self-confidence of Israeli army officers began to
crack. Suddenly
they no longer sounded so certain that the object in
question was
a Qassam. Maybe it was an antitank missile launcher,
senior
officers intimated. In fact, "it's impossible to swear
that it
wasn't a stretcher." In the meantime, the army is
reexamining the
films; the ostensibly "incriminating" images have been
removed
from the Israel Defense Forces' Internet site.


In view of the IDF's surprising retreat, Hansen was
able to allow
himself a certain satisfaction. After all, the Israeli
accusations were aimed not only at UNRWA but at Hansen
himself.
But the Danish professor of political science, who has
been here
for the past eight and a half years, did not depart
from European
courtesy. In an interview to Haaretz, in his office on
the "seam
line" in northern Jerusalem, near Ammunition Hill
(Hansen also
has an office in Gaza), he was cautious in his
remarks. Only the
Israeli explanation that it was an "innocent mistake"
extracted a
sharp comment from him. "So if they begin to admit it
as an
innocent mistake - I wish it was innocent, and it
would be much
easier to accept, but these circumstances do not look
like
innocence to me. I say all this in sorrow as much as
anger,
because Israel and UNRWA have very common interests
and
responsibilities at this stage of the conflict. [Both
of us have]
responsibility for the well-being of the civilian
population in
the occupied territories. If UNRWA was not there to
carry the
main part of the burden, it would fall, according to
the Geneva
Conventions, on Israel."


No doubts


Hansen maintains that he had no doubts from the
beginning. The
ambulance crew was located, he says, and "the whole
paramedics'
team recognized themselves in the tape and said, yes,
yes, that's
us, that's our ambulance, we were there." Hansen says
he watched
the tape "many, many times," adding, "Now I am not a
military
expert. I think I have been justly ridiculed for
looking up on
Google what a Qassam rocket looks like." He discovered
that one
model of the rocket weights 23 kilograms, another more
than 90
kilos. That, he says, is not consistent with "somebody
with that
kind of thing running with a lightly bent arm and
jogging and
throwing it casually in."


Hansen was "very sure" of his case. "From the bad
quality of the
picture, and the fact that the dates had been
doctored, and the
fact that I'm told - I haven't seen the IDF Web site -
but I'm
told that three sequences [are] occurring. One, about
the Qassam
rocket, two about our ambulance, and a third segment
where a
Qassam rocket is seen fired. Now that would seem
again, to
implicate this incident in one sequence. For this
particular
fabrication to take place, the date on the time of the
picture
has been erased from the army version."


As Hansen celebrates his victory, albeit with courtesy
and
restraint, the Israeli side also started to draw its
own
conclusions. The days ahead will undoubtedly see an
exchange of
accusations, more or less anonymous, between those who
were
involved. However, a quick analysis of the episode
shows that it
involved a typical Israeli mix of amateurishness and
self-righteousness, over-eagerness and lack of
willingness or
patience to listen to the explanation of the other
side.


The pressure came from above. Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon wanted
to show the world films that would demonstrate the
potency of the
Israeli case. The IDF, which in the past objected to
releasing
similar films to the media due to field security
concerns, this
time acceded to Sharon's vigorous demand. However, the
examination of the material appears to have been
sloppy. The
identification of the mysterious object as a Qassam
rocket was
not positive, even though it was portrayed as such by
the Israeli
spokesmen. Overeager to persuade the world of the
justness of
Israel's path, those involved indulged in "shortcuts,"
such as
connecting the images in an unequivocal sequence on
the Internet.


There was also another mistake, which is often made by
countries
that enjoy a technological advantage over their foes:
the belief
that superiority in this sphere is the be-all and
end-all. All
you have to do is show advanced techniques, and the
objective
Western observer will be persuaded. The similarity to
the
American fiasco - the presentation of the suspect
sites in Iraq
which were described as sites of weapons of mass
destruction
before the American incursion - is probably not
accidental.


Overall, Israel seems to attribute inordinate
importance to
questions of hasbara ("explanatory information," or
positive
publicity): If the world could only see the "real"
images,
everyone would immediately be convinced that justice
is on our
side. It's as though images of dead children and
demolished
houses, with tanks and bulldozers across the way,
could induce
anyone to support the Israeli position if only they
were shown
through the right softening "filter." In any event,
the next time
the IDF shows films (authentic ones, one hopes) about
Palestinian
activity, the level of skepticism can be expected to
rise. It's
Israeli hasbara that emerges from this episode on a
stretcher.


These, of course, are not the problems that are
preoccupying
Hansen. In the past two days, he relates, UNRWA
ambulances have
encountered new difficulties at IDF checkpoints.
Soldiers are
asking the drivers if they are carrying Qassam rockets
and are
showing a more hostile attitude than usual. At Allenby
Bridge,
too, UNRWA employees have been subjected to more
rigorous checks
than usual by customs officials. This story exposes
his staff to
risks, he says.


Hansen accuses Israel of conducting "grave incitement"
against
his organization. "I see a pattern of false stories
against UNRWA
doing the damage that they are doing, but not when
they are found
out to be false or fabricated, as this one seems to be
on the way
to be found out, we don't see the effective
counteraction."


About four years ago, an UNRWA ambulance driver was
arrested in
Qalqilya on suspicion of aiding a terrorist
organization. He was
held in custody for 26 months and released without
being charged,
Hansen says. In May of this year, he continues, "an
outrageous
story" was making the rounds that "an UNRWA ambulance
was used to
pick up body parts of Israeli victims [referring to
the bodies of
Israeli soldiers who were killed when their armored
personnel
carrier was blown up in Gaza] and ferry them around...
[The
story,] incidentally, was quoted by two ministers no
less, [but]
when I asked for evidence about it, we have not
[received] any."


For "quite a while," Hansen says, accusations have
been leveled
at him personally. "There was language about Peter
Hansen is a
liar, a hater of Israel, without checking into my
personal
history, which is actually quite to the contrary."
Such
accusations, he says, "usually come after I have made
criticisms
of Israeli behavior in the occupied territories. There
seems to
be a correlation here." For example, he notes, just
last week he
protested the destruction of three schools in Jabalya
refugee
camp and the death of a schoolgirl in Gaza from
Israeli gunfire.


Hansen denies outright the accusations that his staff
provides
aid to terrorists, even though Israel cites quite a
few cases. To
this day, he says, only one UNRWA staff member has
been convicted
"of ferrying some people who were terrorists from one
place to
the next in his own car." He was said to have been a
senior
employee of the organization and it was alleged that
he used an
UNRWA vehicle, Hansen says. "Now all these things were
manifestly
untrue. He was a very low-ranking UNRWA member, he did
not drive
an UNRWA car, and he does not have an UNRWA passport."
He was
convicted "after 12 months in solitary confinement ...
and I am
less than fully impressed by due process having been
done in
accordance with what I take to be the legal norms and
standards
of the Israeli justice system."


And what about the photograph showing armed men
entering an UNRWA
ambulance in an operation in Zeitun? "In Zeitun, an
ambulance was
commandeered, not to take any weapons, but to take a
wounded
Palestinian commando, whatever you call him, to the
hospital,
where he died upon arrival from his wounds."


Hansen's arguments are less convincing when it comes
to UNRWA's
turning a blind eye to activity by terrorist
organizations under
cover of UNRWA facilities in the territories. Israel
has compiled
evidence about a speech delivered in 2001 by a senior
UNRWA staff
member at a ceremony held in Gaza, with Sheikh Ahmed
Yassin - the
Hamas leader whom Israel assassinated earlier this
year - by his
side (Hansen says that the matter was checked and that
the person
in question denied knowing that Yassin would be there,
"but we
still disciplined him because he was present at the
place and he
had no business being at a political rally"); about
ceremonies
held in memory of suicide bombers ("sometimes, certain
people
break the gates of our UNRWA schools ... under the
pretense that
the school yard is the only public facility available
in the camp
to accommodate this type of activity"); and about the
identification of many of the agency's Palestinian
employees with
Hamas.


Newspapers in the Persian Gulf reported that Hamas has
repeatedl
won the elections to the union of UNRWA staff. Hansen
maintains
that the elections are not political. Hamas, he says,
published
congratulatory notices to the elected candidates in
order to use
them to win credit, after the elections.


However Hansen, who chalked up a victory in the
information
battle involving the Qassam rocket, provided Israel
with
alternative ammunition when he admitted this week, in
an
interview to Canadian television, that his staff
includes Hamas
people. "I was directly asked about that," he says.
"Of course, I
should have evaded, and given a non-answer, but I said
as far as
I know, it is very likely." He then quotes from the
UNRWA staff
regulations, which state, among other points, that
staff "shall
not engage in political activity which is inconsistent
or might
reflect upon the independence and impartiality
required by
[UNRWA] staff."


The UNRWA director says he is very much aware of the
Israeli
sensitivity to terrorism and of Israel's refusal to
accept the
distinction made by some Europeans between "political
Hamas" and
"military Hamas." However, a few minutes later, he
careens into
another pothole, typical of European interviewees.
When asked
whether he is pro-Palestinian, he admits frankly that
identification with the suffering of the Palestinians
is a
position that grows with service in his post. But then
he seeks
to present his record as a supporter of Israel in the
past, and
trips again.


He says he grew up in a European generation that
identified with
the image of Israel in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. He
was, he
notes, "considered sufficiently pro-Israeli" to be
invited to
Israel in 1974, "just after the 1973 war." However,
"my
experience in having lived here and seen the
occupation and felt
the occupation obviously leads to balancing that
picture a little
better than I had originally had it. When people say I
am
pro-Palestinian in the same sense that we all
identified with the
Jews under the occupation in Europe, and with Israel
after that."
He adds quickly that he does not want to stretch "that
comparison
any further than it can be" and continues, "but people
are often
identifying with the underdog, with who is being
perceived as
being the main victims. There are victims on both
sides in this
conflict, but the Palestinians are living under the
conditions
that they are, their fatality figures are what they
are ... They
are clearly the ones who are in the first line of
suffering, not

belittling Israeli suffering at the same time.
"http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/485478.html




		
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