Some excerpts from this Guardian article, with a few comments. Being the Guardian, of course, their verdict is already in.

...Amnesty has collected a number of witness statements alleging, among other things, that extra-judicial executions took place, that some Palestinians were shot while in the process of surrendering or even afterwards, that detainees were used as human shields and that medical workers were attacked in circumstances where there was no reason to suspect they were terrorists in disguise.

I'm not sure what "witness statements" are worth in a case like this, on either side. A bald-faced lie comes rather easily under the circumstances. I notice that no one is complaining about the summary executions that the Palestinians have inflicted on "traitors," but maybe Palestinians killing other Palestinians doesn't count. Kind of like black street crime to certain police departments.

Apart from these specific incidents, where the complaints suggest a pattern rather than isolated cases of indiscipline by Israeli forces, there are two very disturbing allegations about the way the "operation" against Jenin was conducted.



The first is that Israel failed to take reasonable steps to protect civilians in the refugee camp. This is highly reminiscent of the Sabra and Chatila massacres in 1982 - for which an official Israeli inquiry decided that Ariel Sharon, the current prime minister, bore "personal responsibility".

Jenin refugee camp covered an area of about one square kilometre and, in normal times, about 13,500 people lived there. According to Amnesty International, the number actually in the camp at the time of the attack may have been much higher, because many Palestinians had taken shelter there from attacks elsewhere.

Whatever the number, the Israelis were perfectly aware that they were attacking a densely populated area containing thousands of civilians as well as a few dozen men who were wanted as terrorists.



Again, note the implication that the entire city was attacked, rather than a concentrated area of resistance. And there were a lot more than a "few dozen" armed resisters and terrorists in this area.

It was therefore incumbent on them to take reasonable steps to protect the civilians, but preliminary evidence indicates that they failed to do so. The Red Cross says Israel breached the Geneva conventions by recklessly endangering civilian lives and property. Amnesty International says the Israeli authorities gave civilians trapped in the camp no opportunity to escape.



"At the time the helicopter gunfire began there was no warning," Dr Kathleen Cavanaugh, a law lecturer from the National University of Ireland, told a press conference in London yesterday.

"In all the witness statements there was never a period of time that safe passage could be guaranteed for civilians," she said. "There was never a chance to leave the camp safely."



This is utterly priceless, and shows what kind of minds we are dealing with. I guess what should have been done is that Israel should have given a 24 hour warning: "Everyone except terrorists, please leave before we attack." 24 hours later, well whattaya know, no terrorists, no evidence, and one hell of a lot of booby traps. If anyone can think of a plausible mechanism by which the civilians could have been allowed to flee ahead of time while somehow keeping the bad guys and their equipment fixed in place instead of streaming out with the refugees, please let me know.

I think this warning of a coming surprise attack should become a major feature of warfare from now on. We probably should have given a three-day notice on D-Day to allow civilians to leave the battlefield.

The second allegation of systematic criminality is that even after the battle of Jenin was over, Israel wilfully prevented humanitarian access to the camp, including attempts to save the injured and dying.



Both the Red Cross and Amnesty say the Israeli authorities blocked access by medical personnel for six days - in effect allowing time for the wounded to die.

"We were there for six days offering our services and we were refused," Rene Kosirnik, head of the Red Cross delegation, said yesterday.

The Red Cross says that even now Israel is continuing to obstruct efforts to recover the dead and search for any lingering survivors. It goes almost without saying that the longer the delay the less evidence of any war crimes there will be.



The Israelis have described the use of medical vehicles and personnel by terrorists. Maybe Israeli medical personnel could have been used, although it would place them in harms way. As for "evidence," I'm not sure what war crimes evidence can be actively hidden by the Israelis with the place currently crawling with reporters.

Professor Derrick Pounder, a forensic pathologist at Dundee University, visited Jenin hospital on behalf of Amnesty to examine some of the bodies that had been recovered. But what surprised him most was the absence of severely injured patients, since the hospital is less than a kilometre from the camp.



"In a conflict of this type in a densely populated are, where the Israeli army lost a substantial number of men, it is inconceivable that there were not also large numbers of severely injured," he said.

Normally, he would have expected to find three people severely injured for every one killed. Even if one accepts the Israeli claim that "only" 40 Palestinians died, there ought to be another 120 lying badly wounded, in hospital. But they are nowhere to be found.

"We draw the conclusion that they were allowed to die where they were," Professor Pounder said. Turning to the Israeli claim that all those killed were "terrorists", he said that the 21 bodies recovered at the time of his visit were a mixture of Palestinian civilians and fighters. They included three women.



So, by this fellow's math, we have a statistical massacre. One assumes that these 120 theoretical additional injured who were allowed to theoretically die in place will eventually show up in recovery operations. Some actual evidence wouldn't hurt.

He had examined the bodies of two men who had been shot. "One was a man of 52 who was wearing sandals, and I cannot think he was a fighter. He had been shot once through the chest."

Ah, you can't be a fighter if you are wearing sandals. Vietnam veterans might have some comments on that. Is this idiot assuming that everyone shooting a gun at the Israelis was in uniform?

"The second man was 38, wearing ordinary clothing. He had been shot in the back. He carried in his back pocket a picture of his wife and four children."

If you wear ordinary clothing, and carry a picture of your family, you can't be a combatant either. American veterans might be interested in that as well. For the record, I have not noticed a single suicide bomber to date who was wearing a Palestinian military uniform.

He continued: "Three others were killed as a result of an explosion of some type. A fragment of what appeared to be a rocket was in one of the body bags." From their clothing, it was reasonable to assume two of these were fighters, he said.

Doesn't say what they were wearing that finally flagged someone as a combatant to the good doctor. Camo outfits? Army boots?

In Amnesty's view, there is ample preliminary evidence to warrant a war crimes investigation on the same basis as that in the Balkans, which has now brought Slobodan Milosevic and others to justice in the Hague.



What we have got instead is UN Security Council resolution 1403, approved last Friday, which says: "The Security Council ... welcomes the initiative of the Secretary General to develop accurate information regarding recent events in the Jenin refugee camp through a fact-finding team and requests him to keep the Security Council informed."

This wording was pushed through by the United States, at the behest of Israel, to fend off demands for serious action.



Obviously it is preferable to take "serious action" against Israel BEFORE any "accurate information" is obtained. Facts can be so inconvenient. Has Israel not published those aerial photographs, do you think anyone would have seen them? The rest of the article is basically a series of complaints about Israel objecting to the witch hunt attitude of the current investigators.

I'm still waiting to see what finally comes out of all this.