No amnesty for war crimes

Hezbollah accused of war crimes

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL has accused the Hezbollah militant group of committing war crimes by targeting Israeli citizens with long-range attacks during the 34 day Israel-Lebanon war.

Thousands of Hezbollah rockets were fired across the border into northern Israel, killing 43 Israeli civilians. Hundreds of thousands more fled their homes to find safety further south.

In a report released yesterday, Amnesty accused the Shiite militant group of deliberately failing to distinguish between civilian and military targets, and of wrongfully seeking to justify its barrage by claiming to be retaliating for Israel's attacks on Lebanese civilians.

Amnesty and several other human rights groups have already accused Israel of committing war crimes with an air and artillery bombardment which Amnesty says killed "some 1000" Lebanese civilians. It called on the United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, to set up an international investigation into the conduct of both sides in the conflict.

"The fact that Israel in its attacks in Lebanon also committed violations of international humanitarian law amounting to war crimes, including indiscriminate and disproportionate attacks, is not an acceptable justification for Hezbollah violating the rules of war, whether as a deterrent or as a means of retaliation or retribution," the report says.

Hezbollah war crimes: Amnesty International cries Uncle
By Jules Crittenden

In utter defiance of the predominant American left, European and United Nations view that Israel engaged in gross war crimes against civilians and freedom fighters in Lebanon, Amnesty International has announced that in its opinion, Hezbollah is guilty of war crimes. Hezbollah purposefully and indiscriminately targeted Israeli civilians.

The AI report notes that despite Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s subsequent protestations to the contrary, he stated publicly and repeatedly during the conflict that he was firing his missiles at civilian areas to make Israeli civilians pay for their army’s actions, and with his uncontrolled Katyushas, an indiscriminate weapon, he killed 43 of them.He had advised Israeli Arabs to leave those areas.He had provoked the war with a cross border attack in which some Israeli soldiers were killed and others seized.

Readers will recall that perceived Israeli transgressions were what attracted the most attention and condemnation during the Lebanon conflict, and that those occurences were largely presented as Israel’s fault. It will be interesting to see if AI attempts to sort out how many of those 1,000 were actually Hezbollah guerrillas, and how many cases of "Israeli" attacks on civilian buildings and vehicles -- such as ambulances -- were staged Hezbollah propaganda events, and in some cases, if the dead were actually dead, or play-acting, or being recounted and shuffled around.

The question raised now, when Amnesty International loudly accuses a terrorist non-state organization and holds it to the standards to which it holds nations: Is AI turning over a new leaf?In the past, this organization and others have been disproportionately interested in isolated incidents of U.S. military excess in Iraq and the legality and morality of a well-appointed detention camp for non-state terrorists at Guantanamo Bay, while paying only lip service to the nature of the foe the United States faces. Gangs of terrorists for whom wanton murder of civilians and mutilation of captives, military and civilian, are matters of policy, strategy and tactics.

Does AI now recognize that, if it is going to be taken seriously, and hopes not be to broomed out of the room with its upcoming report on Israeli actions, there is no way it can ignore that blatant and purposeful crimes of Hezbollah?Is this the result of earnest introspection and a sense of proportionality or is it a matter of angling for position and credibility?

But perhaps we can look forward to this kind of evenhandedness becoming a trend. Terrorist organizations, long given a pass as liberation movements for whom all manner of criminal activity is overlooked, will not bear up well under this kind of scrutiny.The ripple effect of this kind of report from so prominent an organization at Amnesty International could be huge, if honest, proportionate examination of criminal activity comes into vogue among those who watch from the sidelines, and view warring parties with moral indifference.They may begin to recognize that in intent, action and at heart, there are parties in this global conflict who are intensely interested in justice and rule of law, and those who are not.