Israel ‘hit squad’ kill 3 Palestinians in West Bank Hospital

Going by your posts on this subject matter, not only on this thread but others relating, you do not have a genuine interest in asking.

I think that my posts on this thread have explained things quite clearly.

Thanks for the perfidy explanations all. I'm a bit better informed.

Perfidy is classed as a crime because it breaks down the distinction between civilians and combatants in conflicts.

It's essentially a situation where combatants disguise themselves as, say, civilians in some manner in order to gain an unfair advantage in conflicts.

But simply disguising oneself as a civilian isn't in and of itself enough to qualify as perfidy. Undercover operations under both International Humanitarian Law (military) and International Human Rights Law (police) aren't explicitly prohibited.

So perfidy involves significantly more than the mere act of disguising as a civilian, to give an example.

Like I said before, I really wouldn't speculate on precisely what happened in Ibn Sina Hospital. There's too many variables to consider. And a lack of detail.

But you can clearly see the automatic really quick to condemn posts in this thread ahead of information. I've seen this kind of reaction before in other special forces operations and those who are really quick very rarely come to accept what actually happened later on which can be years down the line. In the example I've got in mind, nearly 10 years down the line.

Credible information won't be forthcoming any time soon, I wager.

Very basically
In this case perfidy relates to them dressing up to disguise who they really are in uniforms which, doctors patients etc, in war should give them immunity.

@BackandForthRoundandRound Can I ask why this particular incident is upsetting you so much, as it has clearly enraged you.

Was it the method of taking out the terrorists? Was it where it happened? It seems to have struck a particular chord with you judging by the number of posts

Just interested in understanding why this is such a trigger

I must say I don't understand the perfidy issue - what it is, why it's a crime etc. What puzzled me is why the men were not arrested and tried. There's a possibility that they resisted, but I've not seen that claimed yet. I would have thought there were different punishments for different crimes, and how can they be decided on without a trial. I think it might become clearer over the next few days.

Agree@BackandForthRoundandRound
and now they are disguising themselves as doctors, carrying wheelchairs and wearing hijab in order to carry out these heinous crimes.
Wheres the military insignia if they are legitimate army personnel or will Israel say ‘ it wasn’t us’!!
Just waiting for the excuses now

As has been posted before at various points, hospitals are not necessarily protected spaces.

And the presence of protected persons also cannot be used to render an area immune from military operations.

Like I said, we don't currently have enough information. On top of that, it is the ICC which would be the correct forum to determine if this specific case the thread was started can be considered to be a war crime.

It also doesn't get away from the point that hospitals are meant to be safe places under law.

This has been broken countless times.

It should never be broken at all.

There have been countless confirmed reports about maternity wards being shot at also. Babies being left behind at another hospital as the remaining staff were forced to leave at gunpoint.

But wait as it is happening in Palestine that doesn't matter. Imagine it happening at a hospital here. Or Imagine this happening to one of your family members or close friends. It is horrific.

They went in there with one reason and one reason only ~ to execute these men.

As for your suggestion that the hospitals are "arms dumps or hiding places for hostages" there is literally no evidence/proof that is the case.

That was the intital claim given for the destruction of several hospitals. It was untrue. They raided others and nothing was found. (But they still left countless amounts of bodies behind.)

It is inflammatory to suggest what you are and irresponsible.

It still stands that if you're fine with this happening then it would also work in this country, too. Or wait, that would be a bit too close for comfort though, wouldn't it?

Trying to create a hypothetical where Bin Laden is in a hospital would be playing the Hypothesis Contrary To Fact.

Imaginary events don't change anything about the details or truth of a given situation, so is unhelpful.

But the United States has targeted hospitals under other situations in the past.

As it currently stands, yes, not a lot of credible information is known about this particular operation in the West Bank hospital.

Yet witness pages of confident pronouncements of an Israeli breach of IHL via perfidy.....🤷‍♂️

I agree
Although I doubt there will be any statement from the dead. They can’t plead their innocence anymore

Oh Ok, I get what you are saying, though don't have the time to look it up again myself. Sounds like the arrest option was unlikely, but they would have taken it if Bin Laden surrendered. I really don't want to draw comparisons, but had he been in a public hospital bed, and not in a guarded compound, the operation may have been different. I think Bin Laden was also a public figure, his views and intentions public knowledge, also, whereas I have never heard of these men and don't know what crimes they committed. But I'm really waiting for more details or a statement before I draw conclusions. Too much is unknown for me.

@stormy4319trevor by the way, the SEALs had full authority to kill Bin Laden. It was not a capture or arrest mission.

They fully planned to kill since nobody believed Bin Laden would surrender. The faint possibility of arrest existed, sure, but highly unlikely ahead of the mission Operation Neptune Spear.

CIA Director Leon Panetta said on PBS NewsHour: "The authority here was to kill bin Laden. ... Obviously under the rules of engagement, if he in fact had thrown up his hands, surrendered and didn't appear to be representing any kind of threat, then they were to capture him. But, they had full authority to kill him."

But if we took that attitude then anyone considered a terrorist could be shot without trial.! Even if unarmed, holding your hands up or lying in a sick bed in a hospital
Mm 🫤wonder why Thatcher even bothered to put all those non convicted no trial Irish men in the Hblocks when she could have just shot them all at dawn.

News reporting and a particular slant they go with can turn out to be wrong, inaccurate and/or incorrect.

In some cases, the news slant is still perpetuated years down the line despite the facts eventually having established those media reports to have been misleading and so on. Especially when highly flawed documentaries were made too. In at least one case I'm familiar with, there was very deliberate misleading reports made on the circumstances where they characterised the operation as "shoot to kill"/assassination when it actually wasn't.

I wouldn't necessarily hang anything on media reports either.

I don't think that there is any suggestion that the execution of these men had anything to do with 'arms dumps' or that there is any suggestion that the hostages are in a hospital in the West Bank unless you know differently? It feels like making excuses as to why its OK to execute people in one hospital far away from you but it definitely wouldn't be OK for it to happen in a hospital down the road from you where you might actually be impacted.

The difference between NHS hospitals and OPT hospitals is that to the best of my knowledge NHS hospitals aren't used as arms dumps or hiding places for hostages. They are also not overtly political places. When Hamas took over Gaza they sacked all hospital staff connected to Fatah. This would be a very strange move for an organization that was actually trying to look after people rather than get involved in the armed struggle.

@DownNative I agree we don't know enough yet. I must say the reporting so far suggests the aim of mission was execution though, as opposed to the SEAL's aim of capture or arrest. I'm sure you are right that it's too soon to be making comparisons, however, and was simply responding to someone who suggested one might be drawn.

We have all the relevant information on the US Navy SEAL operation against Osama Bin Laden under Obama's Presidency.

But we do NOT possess all the facts regarding the Israeli Special Forces operation against two PIJ and one Hamas targets in this hospital.

Therefore, it's not possible to compare it with other incidents from the world of Special Forces where information is widely available and established, be it US Navy SEALs or UK SAS operations.

Reports suggest a pistol was recovered. Under what circumstances, we don't currently know. If one of the targets was reaching under a pillow or a bedside cabinet for something, a soldier can shoot in the honest belief the individual has a weapon there. Especially if prior intelligence suggested targets may be armed.

Even if no weapon was found afterwards, the honest belief still stands. It would be legal action from the soldiers themselves - not premeditated murder.

However, questions can and, I'm sure, will be asked of the planning of this specific Israel Special Forces operation. That's a different consider and issue to the actions of the soldiers themselves.

But as I said, we don't have enough information so I'm not going to compare it with a few cases involving Special Forces I'm aware of.

Going into NHS hospital is worrying enough at the moment, without worrying you might get shot in the head by accident1

@Startingagainandagain @MercanDede posted explanation of Bin Laden's killing. He was in his compound and given the chance to surrender. The SEALs were going for arrest, but he ordered his guards to shoot. If you scroll back you'll see it was carefully evaluated decision, and a different situation altogether.

Well isn't there talk of the UK going to war, let's hope everyone is as OK with it when Russian hit squads dressed as medics are in your hospitals executing people without trial. I'm sure people would be rushing to mumsnet to talk about how it's totally fine.

I have no issue with this to be honest.

Those are not civilians, they are 3 terrorists...

Do you think these 3 men cared about the law or who they have killed or who they were planning to kill? They didn't.

Bin Laden was executed too by a hit squad. No need to go through a lengthy trial. This is what terrorists who have taken the lives of civilians deserve.

I am not Jewish by the way I simply have no sympathy or mercy left for anyone engaged in terrorist activities.

It's clear from the first post that it's a separate incident
The second post not so much although not intentional to confuse
Will ask mumsnet to remove