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Now Hezbollah Stands Accused of War Crimes

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Posted on Aug 8, 2006

Just a few days after reporting that Israel was committing war crimes against Lebanese civilians, the watchdog group Human Rights Watch has accused Hezbollah of similar crimes inflicted upon Israeli noncombatants.

HRW:

Hezbollah must immediately stop firing rockets into civilian areas in Israel, Human Rights Watch said today. Entering the fourth week of attacks, such rockets have claimed 30 civilian lives, including six children, and wounded hundreds more.
“Lobbing rockets blindly into civilian areas is without doubt a war crime,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “Nothing can justify this assault on the most fundamental standards for sparing civilians the hazards of war.”

Hezbollah claims that some of its attacks are aimed at military bases inside Israel, which are legitimate targets. But most of the attacks appear to have been directed at civilian areas and have hit pedestrians, hospitals, schools, homes and businesses. 

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By yadid, August 10, 2006 at 11:16 am #
(Unregistered commenter)

I can’t believe to what I read!!!!!!!!!
I the blood of the labenese is redder??
If you will fire at an Israeli wo’nt he bleed????
May peace guide you and not hate.
Good bye

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By blues, August 8, 2006 at 2:14 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)

Unlike Israel, Hezbollah does not have a massive lobby in Washington. But you see, the whole point of having a lobby is to get laws passed to ban your adversaries. Of course, the rocket scientists at “Human Rights Watch” fail to understand that it costs huge amounts of cash to put on a war, and you cannot allow these stupid civilians to just stand around as if it were a traffic accident. Who is this “Human Rights Watch” anyways? It was Israel that that put it’s ear to the tragic violent background noise, and decoded what it heard as the justification it needed to start this war. I can still remember back further than a week. I am not very fond of people who are always looking for good reasons to start wars. I guess you could decode that as sort of some kind of a prejudice…

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By kevin99999, August 8, 2006 at 9:02 am #
(Unregistered commenter)

Its lauaghable. The Human Watch came up with this as a balancing act. May be the U.S. should give Hezbullahs precision bombs to minimize Israeli’s civilain casualties. Give the disproportionate death and destructions levelled against Lebanese, accusing Hezbullah of war crimes is ludicrous.

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By Hilding Lindquist, August 8, 2006 at 8:13 am #
(Unregistered commenter)

Yes, it is a tit for tat conflict going back before the founding of the current State of Israel. Another way of describing it is, “Little boys are always getting into a pissing contest.”

I have few if any illusions about Hezbollah ... they use terrorism in their conflict with Israel. I condemn them for this.

However—even though I consider myself an existentialist who has chosen to not believe in a God as Being—a core value attibuted to a person named Jesus, that I subscribe to, is that I should first be concerned about the 2 X 4 in my own eye before I worry about the sliver in the other person’s eye. And also since the leaders of my nation call ours a Christian nation, I typically start with what we or our allies are doing in foreign affairs.

And we and Israel have regularly used state terrorism in our conflicts for some time. And I condemn us and Israel for this.

But I am pragmatic about it. I don’t condemn tit fot tat violence because I believe in non-violence. I condemn it because tit for tat violence in a world with nuclear weapons will destroy the human race.

I personally accept as justified violence in defense of one’s person, family, or to protect the innocent ... to keep us safe if a tiger attacks ... which leaves plenty of room for violence for those who feel they need it ... but violence as a conscious effort to inflict damage as payback, as vengence, is what simply and clearly escalates the conflict rather than resolves it.

Here again, Jesus taught us a core value. The strong must stop the cycle of violence. “Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God.” Matthew 5:9

Turning the other cheek is not a sign of weakness. It is the older brother/sister to the young, smaller sibling. The parent to the child. The sane to the insane.

It is the heroic personal strength of the individual police officer who willingly comes between us and the criminal while protecting both of our rights as human beings under the law.

The Christian message is, “Avenge not yourselves, but [rather] give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance [is] mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.” Romans 12:19

And I don’t for a moment think it is as simple as what I have just written ... but I do think this is a viewpoint—a blind man touching the elephant—from which to participate in the dialogue for peace ... one of many. In a convergence of views, maybe we will find a consensus for peace.

Note: Quotations are from the King Jmes Version of the New Testament, courtesy of:

http://www.blueletterbible.org/index.html

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By Mad As Hell, August 8, 2006 at 2:45 am #
(Unregistered commenter)

Took them long enough!

To be fair, unlike everyone else who has heaped criticism on Israel, only Human Rights Watch is criticising Hezbollah as well.  Hezbollah isn’t even aiming at military targets, usually, so these civilian deaths can’t be called “collateral damage”.

The apologists are now saying the 2 Israeli soldiers were patrolling inside Lebanon when they were kidnapped, not that Hezbollah committed a raid into Israel to grab them as bargaining chips.

But I have to give HRW credit--they are working to be fair.

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