West Bank settlers use ‘price tag’ tactic to punish Palestinians

On a hilltop, blankets, pots and broken chairs are strewn where the Israeli army tried to demolish an illegal Jewish settlement outpost. In the fields opposite, 70 olive trees are scorched and blackened after the settlers took revenge — not on the army, but on the local Palestinians.

It is a new and effective settler tactic known as the “price tag”: if the Government sends police or soldiers to dismantle an outpost that is being built, the settlers make the Palestinian population pay the price.

“It’s quite simple and smart but evil,” said Michael Sfard, a lawyer with the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din. “They attack Palestinian property, people, and blockade roads every time the Israeli security forces do something they don’t like” — such as demolish outposts.

SNIP

Ahmed Ghanem, a Palestinian farmer from Imatin and the owner of the burnt trees, said that the settlers invaded his land opposite the outpost before dawn, at the same time as the army was trying to evict a large group of settlers from the nearby hilltop.

His son went to see what was happening but ran when he saw that some of the men were armed. “Even if I plant the land again, they’ll come back and burn it,” he said.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6875304.ece

Nukes, money, other advanced weapons, and support from the US?

Are the arsonists being charged and incarcerated?

I'm asking silly questions again, aren't I?

They're attacking civilians because they're soft targets, and they should be treated the same way as the Israeli authorities would treat any other terrorist. It's astounding that they're allowed to remain free to continue terrorising the population when they should be arrested and returned to Israel....

Israel doesn't want them in Israel. They are crazy, nutcase people that no one would want for a neighbor.

of turning Palestine into a Pastrami sandwich.

.

They're Israelis and right now what Israel's doing is allowing these terrorists to run loose in territory occupied by Israel. The fact that Israel is teh occupying power makes them responsible for them, apart from the fact they're Israeli citizens....

Unfortunately, that is unavailable from the Israeli side; and the Palestinian police likely dare not respond.

All settlements should be dismantled and settlers trying to establish new ones should be shot down.

Is that allowed in the law, to simply murder people without a trial?

under the same circumstances. Seems pretty straightforward to me. :shrug:

Whether it is an Israeli, a Palestinian, or an American people who do that are criminals who should be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

Are you saying that the Israelis treatment of the Palestinians is a war crime? My position is that the same standards should be applied to all people living in the territories. If Israelis ransack a Palestinian village, the repercussions should be the same as if it were the other way around.

Dismantling illegal settlements is well within the law but not the use of deadly force against civilians trying to build that settlement unless they attack the dismantlers. Simply shooting settlers down without apprehension and a trail is a war crime against civilians. No one is allowed to make war on a civilian population, even their own.

And, yes, there are a number of cases where it appears to me Israel has committed war crimes. (Collective Punishment (Bulldozing houses), the use of Palestinians as human Shields (as testified to by Israeli soldiers)) The same is true of the Palestinians who casually and as a matter of policy attack civilians. They should all be arrested, charged, and if found guilty put in the same jail cell together.

Everyone should be treated equally, but that equality is measured by the legality of actions.

No military can simply just shoot civilians, even those who are are tresspassing and comitting a crime. If that civilian is not armed or activly resisting, then shooting them down is an act of murder and a warcrime by the soldier. The policy of shooting them down is a warcrime by the military command and the government.

The post you quoted was from damntexdem.

I simply said that the settlers should be treated in exactly the same way that Palestinians would be treated if they were engaging in the same activities. You accused me of advocating war crimes.

Nothing new about it, nor unique to the Isreal/Palestine issue.

We were taught about it in school as a lesson of lecture. Never once was it called "evil", simply the way humans are.

Maybe it is evil. If some guy wants to plant trees, and does so, then some trolls come along and burn the trees down, what farmer in a sane mind would replant them again? Wouldn't a sane mind move on and find something else? Can that mind that first planted the burned-down trees love again? That work of love, the grove of trees, was destroyed by hate.

Using the Palestinians as hostages.

October 16, 2009

In the occupied West Bank this week, Israeli authorities forcibly evacuated an illegal outpost established by a group of Jewish settlers. The settlers responded with an attack on nearby Palestinian land.

It's a tactic extremist settler groups are calling "the price tag." Each time settlers are evicted from an illegal outpost, they retaliate with an attack on Palestinian property.

In this case, some 20 settlers set fire to Ahmed Ghanem's orchard a few hours after Israeli police evacuated a small outpost on Sunday, he says. The Palestinian farmer's field and olive orchard lie just between the Jewish settlements of Kedumim and Yitzhar, in the northern part of the West Bank.

More:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113811498&ft=1&f=1001

This story caught my eye and I couldn't ignore it. After all this time, still no "road map we can live with..." ;(