The Israeli army rejected a Human Rights Watch report that
accused its troops of committing "warcrimes" in the Jenin refugee
camp as biased and ill-conceived.
"It appears that the report completely ignores the root cause of
the Israeli army operation in Jenin," army spokesman Lieutenant
Colonel Olivier Rafowicz said Friday.
"The report did not study the intricate terrorist infrastructure
in the Jenin camp, and the placement of such infrastructure in a
densely populated civilian area," he said.
The army spokesman argued that the "proportion of Israeli
casualties (in Jenin) is roughly one to two, fully compatible with a
combat situation."
The report by the US-based Human Rights Watch released Thursday
concluded the Israeli army did not commit massacres in the camp as
Palestinians had claimed.
But it ruled that human rights were violated in apparent "war
crimes," including the alleged army use of Palestinian human
shields.
Rafowicz rejected allegations the army had used Palestinians as
human shields, instead accusing the militants of placing the lives
of civilians in jeopardy by basing their alleged terror cells in the
heart of the camp.
Palestinians have accused the Israeli army of massacring hundreds
of civilians in a nine-day assault. Israel says it killed 52
Palestinians, most of them gunmen, while losing 23 of its own men in
fierce fighting.
Human Rights Watch also accused Israel of demolishing civilian
homes after the military phase of the battle had been completed.
But Rafowicz said the army razed 130 homes, "amounting to less
than 10 percent of the houses in the camp."
"It bears asking when a country is fighting a war against terror
how is it that those who are engaged in fighting terrorists come
under suspicion, while the perpetrators of terror are not subject to
scrutiny?" he said.
The United Nations Thursday disbanded a fact-finding committee it
wanted to send to Jenin after the Israeli government refused to
cooperate with the team unless it complied with conditions the UN
deemed unacceptable.
Israel expressed concerns that the panel would only investigate
conduct of its own army without looking into allegations that
Palestinian terror cells had been based in the camp, and wanted to
select its witnesses the team would interview.
Copyright 2002
AFP
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