Thursday, November 22, 2012

B'tselem Claims But Are They Correct?

 my right word
From the latest B'tselem attempt to protect terrorists:-


Additionally, the media – including those belonging directly to the parties to the conflict – are not legitimate military targets, even if they are used to disseminate propaganda.
 
I think that a terror group's units - including its communications  networks - are very much a legitimate target for how else would they be able to direct their terror campaign, and that includes general programming because it is used to recruit and mobilize.

But B'tselem claims.

International law seems to claim otherwise:

Journalists are not protected against deliberate attacks if and for as long as they take a direct part in hostilities




and as to what the law refers to


the 1977 Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions (AP I) deals specifically with journalists engaged in dangerous professional missions in areas of armed conflict



"Professional" means not a terrorist.

As clarified:


As civilians, journalists and their crew must under no circumstances be the object of a direct attack. Parties to an armed conflict have the obligation to take all feasible precautions to ensure that attacks are only directed at military objectives.



Al-Aqsa TV and others are not civilians and are not professional journalists.

P.S.  I am beginning to wonder in whose service is B'tselem?

________________

UPDATE

Have been alerted, from NGO-Monitor:

B’Tselem writes that its

...investigation indicates that several Al-Quds TV employees were present in their offices in Shawwa-Husari Building at the time of the attack, as they were under the assumption that the Israeli military would not bomb it.
They report that after the attack on the Shawwa- Husari Building, they removed some of their equipment from their building’s top floors, out of concern that the Israeli army would strike that building as well, because of the location of Al-Aqsa TV’s offices on its 15th floor.
In other words, B'tselem fail to mention the presence of the Islamic Jihad fighters in the Al Sharouk tower.


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