dave@utcsrgv.UUCP (Dave Sherman) (09/25/83)
ima!jim (Jim Balter) says: >>>This is even more significant in light a tactic used throughout the war: >>>heavy bombardment and shelling of other refugee camps and West Beirut. >>>This caused many times more civilian deaths than the Phalangist massacre did. >>>The justifications given in both cases were similar: the PLO was said to be >>>"hiding behind civilians" in Sabra and Shatila as well. ************************************************************************* * The PLO was much more than "SAID TO BE" hiding behind civilians. * * May I present some documented facts: * ************************************************************************* ============================================================================== The overall PLO strategy was cowardly camouflage: hiding behind civilians, enjoying the protection of churches, mosques, hospitals, schools, embassies and archeological sites, believing that the Israeli artillery and aircraft would not deliberately attack such targets. TESTIMONY OF RETIRED AMERICAN GENERALS A team of retired U.S. generals inspected Southern Lebanon during the first week of August. In their report they compared the fighting they had observed in Lebanon to other wars and said Israel acted "extremely cautiously" to avoid civilian casualties. Maj. Gen. (Ret.) Hugh Hoffman, former head of the Army Readiness Command, remarked: "We could see buildings damaged that had undamaged buildings on either side. Obviously it was a very selective use of fire-power." (The Washington Post, August 11, 1982) The London Times reports (June 19, 1982): "Several residents told the same story, although one middle-aged, middle class woman, the owner of some orange groves, expressed her plight most drama- tically: `When the Israelis came', she said, `the Palestinian fighters took their guns and placed them next to our homes, next to apartment blocks and hospitals and schools. They thought this would protect them. We pleaded with them to take their guns away but they refused. So when they fired at the Israelis, the planes came and bombed our homes.' The woman was telling the truth. At their own Ein Hilweh camp, the Palestinians actually put their guns on the roof of the hospital. Dr. Labib Abu Dahar, 55, a graduate of Beirut's American University and an intern at the Fordham Hospital of the Bronx, runs a prestigious medical center in Sidon. He told "Haaretz" correspondent on July 30, 1982: "I was on the PLO blacklist. They threatened to blow up my hospital, and since then I have had bodyguards watching me day and night. The reason why? When the war began the PLO mounted two anti-aircraft guns - one near the building and the other near the garden. When I protested that this would attract the fire of the Israeli planes to my hospital and endanger the life of my patients, they just burst out laughing." Abbas Al-Haj, 55, resident of Ein Hilwe, told Haaretz (August 20, 1982): "This camp did not have to be destroyed. It could have remained intact. In leaflets* dropped by Israeli planes, we were requested to leave the camp, but the PLO would let nobody out. My neighbour, Saleh, tried to escape. They shot him in the back and tied him to a pillar in the square until he bled to death. Three hundred people were killed in our camp. Who is to blame for their death? Write down - only the PLO." *To offset the influence of the Israeli appeal, PLO propagandists spread rumours to the effect that the leaflets were sprayed with poison. I am looking at photographs with the following captions: Sport Stadium Used as Arsenal and Training Center Vehicles and Training Manuals in Ancient Hippodrome Anti-Aircraft Gun Placed Between Buildings (the buildings in the picture are clearly residential apartments) PLO Gun Position Adjacent to Hospital Gun Positions Inside Museum Arms Cache in Mosque A Damour church is turned into a weapon dump and garage by the PLO. During the fighting and in their flight, the PLO terrorist changed into civilian clothing and mixed with the people in the camps. When Israeli forces occupied a hospital in Sidon, they caught 14 PLO terrorists dressed in the white attire of physicians and orderlies. In several other instances, PLO men waving white flags shot and killed Israeli soldiers approaching to accept their "surrender". There were also cases of hoisting white flags atop buildings and firing from their shelter at the approaching Israeli soldiers. CHRISTIAN DAMOUR - A JOINT PLO-MOSLEM CONQUEST As the Israeli forces entered the town of Damour, 18 km south of Beirut, TV screens world-wide showed scenes of destruction, in brilliant colour. Whether stated or implied, the world assumed that Israel was responsible. Few knew or remembered that the Christian town of 30,000 had resisted the PLO, the target for an all-out PLO and Moslem attack as early as 1976. As the Christian world remained silent, the massacre of Damour took place, with some 10,000 inhabitants brutally murdered and the survivors fled. Damour, empty of its residents, was taken over by the PLO, which made it into a stronghold, including its churches. American correspondents who visited the town following its capture by the Israeli forces reported (New York Times, June 21, 1982, by David Shipler): "For nearly seven years, until the Israeli army attacked and captured it last week, the town was inaccessible to its own people; the Palestine Liberation Organization made it a strong- hold, using its churches as firing ranges and armouries. A huge new church, left unfinished by the fleeing Maronite Christians in 1976, is covered with spray-painted Palestinian nationalist slogans and plastered with posters. On inside wall where the altar was to have stood, two bulls eyes can be seen, the stone in and around them roughened by bullet holes. Above them, where a cross would have hung, a triangular PLO symbol is painted in the Palestinian nationalist colors of red, green, black and white, framing a silhouette of a rifle and hammer. High in the belfry, a concreted cross has obviously been used as a target over the years, for it is chipped and gouged in a thousand places." The Washington Post's corespondent, William Braning, adds: "The wall of the church where the cross once hung is pockmarked by bullets. Below where the altar once stood, lies a pile of greasy engine casings and spare parts. Oil stains spot the floor of the church, which evidently had been turned into a garage. "In another part of town, the large St. Elias church is in similar disarray. The Palestinians had apparently found a new use for this church was well: the pews inside have long since been removed and a volleyball net stretches across the interior between two pillars." (International Herald Tribune, July 7, 1982) RETURN TO DAMOUR Um Attala [picture of elderly woman] told Israel Television viewers on Friday, July 23, 1982, her story of Damour: "The PLO came (in 1976) and looted our houses - which were beau- tifully furnished - and took our money. They were the PLO and the other wretched ruffians they brought from the Arab countries. They cut men and women to pieces with hatchets. We fled to the palace of President Chamoun and from there we were taken by ship to Jounieh. We left Damour ablaze behind us. For years I was told `You will be back'. Now, thank God, we have returned home. =========================================================================== All quotes are from "PLO: Now the story can be told", Dept. of Information, WZO, P.O.Box 92, Jerusalem, copyright 1982. -- {cornell,decvax,ihnp4,linus,utzoo,uw-beaver}!utcsrgv!lsuc!dave
swatt@ittvax.UUCP (Alan S. Watt) (09/26/83)
If you're going to quote from an Israeli publication, you ought to at least indicate whether you have any independent substantiation of it. Early in the war, the Israelis were also putting about the story that they had captured a PLO armory in Beruit with enough arms to "equip a million men", which is pure moonshine. Remember: "In any war, the first casualty is truth" - Alan S. Watt
aaw@pyuxss.UUCP (09/28/83)
the existance of the armaments has never been really questioned by either side ( millions of rifles, hundreds of tanks, etc, etc. ) apparently they are East block countries version of tax deductable contributions- they gave huge amounts of outdated (read WW II and on) equipment to the PLO (and Cuba and ...). There was also more modern equipment than most medium sized armies have, but only a small percentage of the total. The reason for this is that by giving outdated armaments to "revolutionary" groups that much scrap iron becomes a political brownie point. Aaron