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Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Arab MKs call Peretz a 'child killer'

2006-08-01

Termed a "child killer" and "scoundrel" by Arab MKs during an appearance at an emergency Knesset session Monday, Defense Minister Amir Peretz said Israel must not agree to an immediate cease-fire, but rather expand and strengthen its attacks on Hizbullah.

Of course, opposition members of parliament in the Arab countries frequently call government ministers phrases like 'child killer.' We have those articles here on Rantburg all the time.

Peretz's speech was interrupted dozens of times, and three Arab MKs - Ibrahim Sarsour and Taleb a-Sanaa (United Arab list) and Jamal Zahalka (Balad) - were eventually ejected from the session by Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik. Sarsour called Peretz a murderer and a child killer. Zahalka said he was a liar and a warmonger.

Strange, in an Arab country the opposition usually is thumped and jugged.

Itzik said she was giving the three the "gift" of throwing them out, since they had plainly sought to cause a stir with their own constituency. She threatened to eject Ahmad Tibi (United Arab List) as well, but calmed him down after reminding him that he is a deputy Knesset speaker and that it would be undignified for him to find himself thrown out.

Aside from the heckling by members of Arab parties, however, Peretz's speech was widely echoed by MKs across the political spectrum, including opposition leader Binyamin Netanyahu, who added that Hizbullah posed a strategic threat, and that Israel therefore required a strategic victory.

In the wake of the attack on Kafr Kana, Peretz insisted that the IDF had not deliberately targeted civilians. "There was no, and there will be no, Israeli commander who will issue an order to hurt uninvolved civilians," said Peretz.

And those commanders would give a front tooth if they could get the human shields out of the way without harming them.

He said that Israel was fighting "for the home" and that Hizbullah, a terror group with a murderous ideology, was the proxy force of the extremist regime in Iran. "We didn't choose the military option," Peretz stressed, adding that Israel, by pulling back to the border lines, had demonstrated that it had no territorial ambitions in either Lebanon or Gaza.

But the terrorists "never rested,' he said, and Israel could not afford to "shut our eyes" to the threat.

Peretz praised soldiers who had come to hear the session, and their colleagues on the front, for their valor in the "fight for the state of Israel." A new generation was displaying "courage, sacrifice, camaraderie" and a willingness to do everything for Israel. "We are proud of you. You are doing an exceptional job," he said.

Netanyahu, backing the government's declared goals in the conflict, noted: "The journey of war is like any other journey. It starts easily but midway there's a difficult junction where we must decide whether we continue to climb the mountain or stop. I call on the government: Don't stop midway. Complete the job."

Benny is a man and loyal to his country. This is exactly the speech he needed to give.

Netanyahu began his speech by also thanking the IDF for its work, saying first he was doing so in the name "of all the MKs." But he was quickly forced to reword his statement to "in the name of most of the MKs," as Arab Knesset members interrupted his speech.

Netanyahu recounted that during World War II, Britain's Royal Air Force intended to bomb the Gestapo headquarters in Copenhagen, but missed and hit a children's hospital nearby, killing 83 Danish children.

"This is a tragedy of war, but it happens," said Netanyahu. "Unlike the other side, which rejoices when our children are killed, we are truly sorry when it happens, and we really and truly try to reduce casualties on the other side."

Which side fights in front of a baby carriage, and which side hides behind one?

He added that, "The difference between us and the terrorists is that we hit [civilians] by mistake, and they do it with malice. This is the difference between a legitimate war and war crimes. This is the difference between us and them."

Don't expect the usual suspects to hear that, or even care.

Posted by:Steve White

#3 Twenty percent of Israelis are Arabs. Post-Oslo, there has been a steady trickle of family unification citizenships given to Palestinians from the PA, who've brought their curious ideas with them. The womb competition is not a shoe-in for the Arabs, though. While the Europe-descended Jews (Ashkenazis) tend to have small families, those that fled/were expelled from the Muslim world post-1948 have birth rates approaching that of the Arabs. If I recall correctly, the Ashkenazis are now less than half of the Jewish population, taking the Labour party with it -- and the non-Ashkenazis do not have the same Western guilt hang-ups, but they do remember the pleasures of dhimmitude.

Posted by: trailing wife 2006-08-01 12:02

#2 I'll let more knowledgeable (not hard) people comment, but IIRC, about 20% of the israeli population is arab (don't know the muslim/christian/druze %, neither the part of bedouins, could look it up online I guess); during the last intifada round, the shifting of loyalty of israeli arabs towards their "brothers" has been quite evident, both in acts (coordinated demonstrations right at the very start of the preplanned "al aqsa intifada", terror) and politically, as demonstrated here.

IMHO, Israel should be very, very aware of that. Also, the "maternity war" is raging in Israel too, so don't think that Europe alone is threatened by the boumedienne "we'll conquer you with the wombs of our wimmen" strategy..

Posted by: anonymous5089 2006-08-01 04:59

#1 And exactly how do they refer to the Sunni-Shiite killers in Iraq?

Posted by: Snease Shaiting3550 2006-08-01 04:13

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