Sometimes Israeli soldiers troubled by the misbehavior of their fellows made use of Eid. In 1990 a reservist contacted him to report that his unit had rounded up a bunch of youths in the village of Aboud, near Ramallah, who were suspected of having thrown stones at some Jewish settlers. The soldiers beat them and humiliated them. It happened to be the Jewish holiday of Purim when costumes are donned, and some soldiers forced the boys to put paint on their faces and repeat a Purim song. Eid gathered corroborating testimony, and several other soldiers eventually confessed and were punished.

Although he was a thorn in its side, the army came grudgingly to respect Eid. It recognized that his reports were free from the fancy and exaggeration that is all too common in Palestinian discourse. “Why exaggerate?” asks Eid. “For example, if 2,000 houses have been demolished, why make it 10,000? If the Israelis killed four, why say it was 40?” He did not take complaints from fellow Palestinians at face value. On the contrary, he made it a practice to probe the accuracy of the testimony he received before telling his colleagues in the B’Tselem headquarters to send a formal letter to the army asking for its version of the events described to him. It was not uncommon for him to discover distortion.

Once, a 6-year-old girl died from a gunshot wound to the head that her father, a member of the Palestinian security forces, said an Israeli settler fired into his car. It only took some phone calls to neighbors for Eid to learn that, in truth, the bullet came from the father’s own gun as he was cleaning it in his home. Another time, a little girl died of an Israeli soldier’s gunshot into a car. Her father reported he had been driving and they were attacked for no reason. Bassem discovered that the girl’s 15-year-old brother had taken the family car for a joy ride, without parental permission, and invited her along on promise of an ice-cream cone. On reaching a checkpoint, he had turned to speed away because he had no driver’s license. A soldier then fired the fatal shot. The soldier was punished because his orders were to shoot out the tires of a fleeing suspect vehicle, not to shoot the passengers, although the story was not the cold-blooded murder that the father had claimed.

on the planet that you respect...none.

Simon Wisenthal Center, ADL...

I'd ask you to name the best human rights group you respect, but I doubt you'd answer out of embarrassment - knowing how easily they could be exposed as posers.

B'tselem, HRW, AI, Rabbis for Human Rights, just to name a few..there are more.

I have no need to be embarrassed of what human rights groups report.

I asked for the best of the HR groups. Which one do you think would be most difficult to discredit when it comes to bashing Israel?

As anyone can read from Eid, he wasn't into exaggerating and making up claims like the groups you just mentioned. He also didn't have a problem going after the PA for human rights violations as opposed to the groups you mentioned.

So if you're going to argue that groups aren't genuine Human Rights Orgs if they don't criticize Israel, then B'tselem and their like-minded friends who don't go after the PA or Hamas for violations against their own people - are not human rights groups either.

From the article:

neocon you're touting..talk about funny.
No, the groups you listed do not go into the OPT to document any abuses.

The worst crimes they ignore or deny.

They have blood on their hands.

years...yours do not.

do not document abuses, period.

And anyone entering the OPT must report what Hamas and the PA want them to report.

IOW, propaganda. Certainly not criticism or else reporters pay the price.

Including human rights reporters.

a lie. You've already been given reports you reject, and have posted no human rights
groups reports..because you can't find a legitimate one that absolves Israeli government
of their crimes. You never cry foul with the torture and abuse the human rights
groups write about the US and Bush, do you? Your selective group doesn't either, did you
think no one would notice that?

I understand your dilemma.

https://www.hrw.org/news/2012/10/03/gaza-arbitrary-arrests-torture-unfair-trials

Background on Human Shields
Published:
1 Jan 2011

On 6 October 2005, Israel's High Court of Justice ruled that it was illegal for the army to use Palestinian civilians during military actions. The court ruled on a petition submitted by Adalah in the name of B'Tselem and six other human rights organizations in 2002. The petition followed the army's use of Palestinian civilians as human shields since the beginning of the second intifada, primarily during operations carried out in densely populated Palestinian areas, as occurred in Operation Defensive Shield.

The method was the same each time: soldiers picked a civilian at random and forced him to protect them with his body, and do dangerous tasks for them. For example, soldiers have ordered Palestinians to:

enter buildings to check if they are booby-trapped, or to remove the occupants;
remove suspicious objects from roads;
stand inside houses where soldiers set up military positions, so that Palestinians would not fire at them;
and walk in front of soldiers to shield them from gunfire, while the soldiers point a gun to their backs and sometimes fire over their shoulders.

The soldiers in the field did not initiate this practice; rather, the order to use civilians as a means of protection was made by senior army officials.

In August 2002, Nidal Abu Mheisen, a 19-year-old Palestinian from Tubas, was killed by Palestinian gunfire when soldiers forced him to serve as a human shield.

Despite the High Court's decision and army orders given before and after it, security forces continued to use Palestinians as human shields, although the number of cases dropped. In 2007, for example, B'Tselem documented 14 such instances. The organization wrote to the Military Advocate General Corps, demanding an investigation into each of the cases. B'Tselem’s monitoring indicates that a Military Police investigation was opened in 13 of them: in two of the cases, the investigation is continuing; in seven cases, the file was closed; and four were transferred to a military advocate for a decision whether to file charges.

During the course of Operation Cast Lead, which took place in Gaza in January 2009, B'Tselem and other organizations were informed of cases in which soldiers used Palestinians as human shields. In one case, two soldiers were prosecuted for ordering a nine-year-old boy gunpoint to open a bag that they suspected was booby-trapped. The two were given a three-month conditional sentence and demoted from staff sergeant to private

http://www.btselem.org/human_shields

Those organizations are frauds who cover for terror groups.

What Israel does in comparison pales to what Hamas is guilty of doing.

....are fraudulent, pro-fascist organizations.

Not human rights groups.

Last edited Mon Nov 23, 2015, 05:18 PM - Edit history (1)

Eid urged his superiors at B’Tselem to open an investigation into abuses by the new Palestinian National Authority, but they said that as an Israeli organization, it was their mission to criticize misdeeds by Israel, not by the nascent Palestinian government. So, Eid began to keep his own records. As these files thickened, Eid appealed to B’Tselem to reverse its policy and allow him to prepare an official report on the abuses. He collected sample testimonies, translated them into Hebrew, and distributed them to the members of the board, which then voted to authorize the report. It was published in August 1995, and it cited cases of:

extra-judicial punishment, abduction of residents, illegal arrests, prolonged detention without any judicial scrutiny, refusal to allow legal representation, refusal to allow regular family visits, and use of torture techniques such as beatings, painful tying-up, threats, humiliation, sleep deprivation, and withholding of medical treatment. The refusal of most of those who gave testimony to B’Tselem, and many others who have been interviewed by the media on these matters, to have their names published indicates that many West Bank residents refrain from publicly criticizing the PSS out of fear of a severe and violent reaction by the PSS.

In response, Rajoub denounced Eid as a “collaborator” and an “Israeli police agent.” This all but put a bounty on Eid’s head. Human Rights Watch reported: “Many rights groups protested this remark as a malicious and unsubstantiated allegation that could endanger Eid’s personal safety. The PA gave assurances that human rights groups were free to work in the self-rule areas, but did not formally retract the accusation.”

The threat Rajoub unleashed forced Eid to alter his methods. Now when he visited dangerous areas, he would take along a colleague, particularly Israeli or foreign journalists, whose presence as potential witnesses would deter attacks. But he did not back down.

In January 1996, the Palestinians held elections for a president and a legislative council. In a public statement, Eid criticized Arafat for the failure of Palestinian TV to give coverage to other candidates. That same night, as Eid arrived home in Shuafat about 11PM, a man got out of a parked car and approached him. He identified himself as Abu Fuad Jneidi, an officer of Force Seventeen, a security service tasked with protecting Arafat among other special duties. He asked if Eid would accompany him to his office in Ramallah for “a cup of coffee.” Eid laughed and said: “I know of many people invited to drink coffee with you who never returned.”

Jneidi acted offended, acknowledging Eid’s eminence and assuring him that he would be treated as a guest. Eid calculated that if he refused, this would be put into the rumor mill as proof he was a “collaborator,” so he assented. Jneidi asked him to come in his car, but Eid said he would follow in his own. They took a circuitous route to avoid Israeli checkpoints, since Jneidi would have been arrested. En route, Eid called some journalists from Reporters Sans Frontières to tell them his situation. Apparently they started at once making calls on his behalf.

At the office in Ramallah, Eid asked, “Is this going to take long?”

“Probably until tomorrow,” Jneidi answered.

“Am I under arrest?” asked Eid.

“No,” insisted Jneidi, “please do not misunderstand us.”

“So what am I?” asked Eid.

“You are a guest.”

“May I leave?” said Eid, making as if to rise.

“No,” said Jneidi placing his hand on Eid’s to restrain him.

The next day, Israel Radio broadcasted a report about Eid’s disappearance. It quoted a Palestinian commander claiming to have scoured Palestinian detention facilities for Eid and arguing that it must be the Israelis who were holding him. But then Ahmed Tibi, an Arab member of the Israeli Knesset who was also a close adviser to Arafat, appeared at the police station where Eid was being held and ordered his release. Direct appeals to Arafat by U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher and Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres and widespread news coverage had saved him.

This experience strengthened Eid’s resolve to monitor abuses by the Palestinian authorities. But the leadership of B’Tselem was divided about whether the group should make itself the watchdog of Palestinian authorities as well as Israeli. Those who placed human rights above ideology wanted to do so, but there was another group, led by Uri Avnery, that sympathized with the PLO, and wanted B’Tselem to keep its emphasis on only Israel. In July 1996, Eid announced his resignation from B’Tselem and set about creating his own organization.