Israeli Who Revealed Nuclear Secrets Is Freed after 18 years

The report called on the PA to prevent Palestinian gunmen from using Palestinian populated areas to fire on Israeli populated areas and to arrest the perpetrators of attacks.

Correct me if I am wrong, but in the case of the tunnels, eventually a lot of children end up on the street (without concluding whether their parents are guilty of terrorist activities or not). My point: these children are homeless for something they can not control - they can not be responsible for, nor influence their parents actions. Meanwhile, these children are mentally scarfed (in my opinion).

Another generation with hate against Israel is born.

Hundred of thousands more children have been recruited, both into governmental armed forces and armed opposition groups. While most child soldiers are aged between 15 and 18, many are recruited from the age of 10 and sometimes even younger. In many countries, both girls and boys are used as soldiers

But does the IDF not takes to much for granted that civilians can get killed by IDF's bullets? You justify it by calling it collateral damage; in that case the IDF never seems to be guilty - it's always collateral damage.

But I do not think the families of the victims feel the same.

First of all, it is not an anecdotal evidence. I did not get information from the other participants' stories, I am a participant.

OK, I cannot prove this, since no certificates were issued to those taking part in the Defense Shield operation. It is clear that not being a professional mediaman or lawyer, I cannot unequivocally substantiate my claims for technical reasons. Even if I had in my disposal photographic pictures of the makeshift landmines factory, this would not prove that the barrels found there contained ammonia nitrate, aluminum powder, gasoline and other explosives ingredients and not, for example, flour, olive oil or sugar. I saw these barrels and their contents, but smell of ammonia and gasoline cannot be transferred by means of the WWW.

Palestinians use their own civilians as human shields.

IDF has enough discrimination in its activity, but when the fighting occurs in the densely populated areas collateral damage is inevitable.

If Palestinian militants change their tactics from terror attacks to frontal battle against IDF in some non-populated areas, there will be no collateral damage at all.

And the fact that they are weaker than IDF is a bad excuse. If they do not feel that they can defeat IDF without causing damage to their own compatriot civilians, then they should cease their activities, if they are really concerned in the latters' security and well-being.

IDF is not involved in any provocative or inciting activities.

It acts when there is an intelligence information available, regarding illicit weapons trade and manufacturing, preparation of the terror attack or terror organization leaders' whereabouts.

I do not regard a common Palestinian kid as a terrorist, unless he is caught armed.

steissd wrote:

I do not regard a common Palestinian kid as a terrorist, unless he is caught armed.

Merely being armed makes them terrorists?

It also acts when there is a lull in violence coupled with pressure toward settlement so as to remove said pressure.

The IDF routinely targets edifices that have nothing to do with terror in retaliatory attacks.
One such example of this kind of attack are the air strikes the IDF often performed on PA police stations as immediate retaliation to suicide bombings.

So Sharon, who was armed and admittedly prepared to kill hostile Arabs as a child was a terrorist?

Craven de Kere wrote:

It also acts when there is a lull in violence coupled with pressure toward settlement so as to remove said pressure.

It is a non-substantiated statement.

Right now, both PM Sharon and Secretary of Defense Mofaz advocate withdrawal from Gaza combined with removal of all the settlements.

It has not been yet implemented due to some difficulties pertaining to democratic procedure (Mr. Sharon is neither an absolute monarch, nor a dictator, and if parliament rejects his plan, he will be unable to implement it; meanwhile he searches ways to bypass resistance of the hardliners in his own party, starting contacts with opposition; but all this takes time).

The recent escalation of violence was not caused by the settlements issue. It was a result of explosion of the armed personnel carrer in course of the routine raid of IDF aimed to destroy Palestinian makeshift landmines and explosive belts manufacturing facilities (I hope, you will not deny obvious connection between such "industrial enterprizes" and terror). The aim of the recent operation in Rafah was to impair abilities of enemy to attack our troops, this is quite a legitimate task in course of any war.

Defence Shield

Craven de Kere wrote:

The IDF routinely targets edifices that have nothing to do with terror in retaliatory attacks.
One such example of this kind of attack are the air strikes the IDF often performed on PA police stations as immediate retaliation to suicide bombings.

First of all, these edifices were not residential buildings, therefore they have no relation to the humanitarian problems under discussion.

These are offices of PA, in other words, enemy's facilities.

Second, police stations were not destroyed as a response to a homicide bombings. The police station in Ramallah was shelled after two captured Israeli reservists were lynched in its premises.

Another episodes of police stations destruction pertain to the initial stages of the current intifada, when Palestinian policemen in uniform took active part in hostilities.

In all these cases PA was warned, and the police stations were abandoned when being shelled. So, this caused no human casualties. It was tantamount to a warning shot into the skies that precedes opening fire toward a perpetrator.

You publicize episodes of Mr. Sharon's biography that are unknown even to himself.

To Ms Lowan: There is a law protecting POWs, they are not the ones, since they are not soldiers. There is a law protecting the unarmed civilians on the territories occupied by the army; they are not these either. They are irregular combattants, and laws of any country provide such people no protection.

When the fertility rate is 6.17 per female ( http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/gz.html ), they value their own kids much less than the European mediamen do.