Even Enemy Children May Be Exterminated - Khalid Amayreh

[Dr. Shabbir]

GWB at His first National Security Council Meeting, Stunned His First Secretary of State, Colin Powell, by Rejecting Any Effort to Revive the Israeli-Palestinian Peace Process. When Powell Warned That ‘the Consequences of That Could Be Dire, Especially for the Palestinians,’ Bush Snapped, ‘Sometimes a Show of Force by One Side Can Really Clarify Things.’ He Was Making a ‘Clean Break’ Not Only With His Immediate Predecessor But Also With the Policies of His Father.”
Talmudic Council: In War Time, Even Enemy Children May Be Exterminated

Khalid Amayreh, Jordan

http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/am/publish/article_19432.shtml

The Talmudic council of Rabbis and Torah sages known as “Yesha”, which represents Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem, has ruled that it is permissible, even desirable, to target and exterminate non-Jewish civilians during war time. The council’s latest edict, published on the Israeli newspaper Yedeot Ahronot’s website “Ynetnews” Tuesday, stated that “according to Jewish law, during a time of war, there is no such term as ‘innocent civilians’ of the enemy.”

“All of the discussions on Christian morality are weakening the spirit of the army and the nation and are costing us in the blood of our soldiers and civilians,” the statement said. The same council issued a similar ruling two weeks ago, urging the Israeli army to “exterminate the enemy” and “not to flinch from killing enemy civilians.”

The council described as “Christian morality” international conventions and laws prohibiting the deliberate targeting of civilians during war time. It called the targeting and killing of enemy civilians “a mitzvah” or a good deed.

According to Israeli sources, much of the non-secular camp in Israel, which includes powerful religious and national-religious movements, expressed deep satisfaction at the Qana-II massacre, which took place on 30 July and resulted in the death of as many as 60 Lebanese civilians, 37 of them children and babies.

The Israeli army claimed initially that Hizbullah fighters had been staying inside the 3-story building targeted by the Israeli air force. However, Israeli military commanders changed their account of the atrocity Tuesday, acknowledging that they had no evidence that any resistance fighters were among the civilians massacred in the bombing. Some Israeli officials apologized for the carnage, upsetting rabbis and Talmudic sages who argued that Israel shouldn’t apologize for killing enemy civilian since according to Halacha or Jewish religious law there is no such thing as civilians and innocents in war time.

This is not the first time such rulings are issued. Nearly two years ago, a group of prominent rabbis urged the Israeli army “not to flinch from killing Palestinian civilians including children.” In a letter to Shaul Mofaz, then Defense Minister, the rabbis, who represent mainstream Orthodox Judaism, wrote that “killing civilians was a normal thing in war time” and that the Israeli army “should not hesitate to kill non-Jewish civilians to save Jewish lives.”

“The Christian preaching of ‘turning the other cheek’ doesn’t concern us, and we will not be impressed by those who prefer the lives of our enemies to our lives,” said the letter, signed by dozens of rabbis, including Haim Druckman, a former Knesset member who heads a large religious youth movement known as the Bnei Akiva Society. Other signatories include Elizer Melamed, head of the West Bank religious college, Youval Sharlo, the head of the Talmudic college in Petah Tikva which combines Talmudic studies with active military service, and Dov Lior, the rabbi of Kiryat Arba near Hebron.

Lior, who had called Jewish mass murderer Baruch Goldstein a “great saint,” argued that “it is very clear in light of the Torah that Jewish lives are more important than non-Jewish lives.”“A thousand non-Jewish lives are not worth a Jew’s fingernail.” Goldstein on 25 February, 1994, murdered 29 innocent Palestinians who were praying at the Ibrahimi Mosque in downtown Hebron.

Jewish lives worth more

Talmudic edicts encouraging the targeting by the Israeli army of “enemy civilians” are based on several Talmudic injunctions as well as passages from the Old Testament where the Israelites are instructed by Yahweh to massacre every man, woman and child in the Land of Canaan and not to leave a living thing. In fact, many Jewish rabbis supporting targeting enemy civilians in war time rely on Biblical passages such as Joshua 6-20:

“Then the people cried out, and still the trumpets blew, till every ear was deafened by the shouting and the clangor and all at once the walls fell down flat…and they took the city and all that was in it they slew, sparing neither man nor woman, neither youth nor age, even cattle and sheep and asses were put to the sword.”

There are also numerous and unmistakable passages in the Babylonian Talmud that view non-Jews as animals whose lives have little or no significance. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert publicly declared in June that “Jewish lives are worth more than non-Jewish lives.”

Talmudic edicts of this nature shouldn’t be dismissed as insignificant.
Indeed, with nearly 50% of high-ranking officers serving in the Israeli army indoctrinated in the Talmudic ideology and affiliated with the so-called national-religious camp, e.g. Talmudic rulings are unlikely to fall on deaf ears in the Israeli army.

This should explain, at least partially, the callous killings of Lebanese and Palestinian civilians by the Israeli army without the slightest remorse or compunctions.

[tammyswofford]

Dr. Shabbir,
The whole issue of children in a war zone present questions of a distinct nature which evade ethicists, because of the nature of warfare and haunt the warrior who is possibly involved in taking the life of a child.

In attending a briefing on "Operations other than War" there was a story told by a medical person who was working in a humanitarian field hospital in Africa. A mother came in with six children. She was near death as was the youngest child. American military personnel focused their attention on the child and saved his life, counting his life as valuable. Meanwhile, the mother died while they intervened for the younger and weaker. Later in a debriefing they realized that the focus should have been to save the mother and put the child in the "loss column" instead. Now, they had six orphans without a caregiver. True story.

So, if the intent of any war becomes to inflict the maximum damage to a civilian population yet intentionally spare the young; if the young then succumb to disease and hunger over several days, is the death more humane? The fact is fairly established that if an army destroys the adult population, the children will also die in the aftermath.

Children are God's gift to remind us of our humanity. Should children be the direct target of war? Of course not. The situation in Beslan was globally intolerable because a school housing small children was intentionally targeted and children were killed. I believe any military operation which is shown to intentionally target children will not be tolerated by a global community. But do children die in conflict? Yes. Probably all of the time. And when a child is buried, it serves to remind us of the human condition.

Americans are distinctly compassionate regarding the safety of their young. This passion for our children is seen in the movie "The Patriot" with Mel Gibson. In one of the beginning sequences, his eldest son is taken captive. Setting out after the British to free his son, he arms his two younger children to kill the enemy. Throughout this movie there is a strong underlying theme of keeping the children safe during time of war. If you have never rented this movie, it will help you understand American psyche regarding our own children, our values.

Tammy Swofford