The verdict handed down today by a Haifa court in the lawsuit filed by the parents of Rachel Corrie will be denounced by Israel-bashers everywhere, and taken as confirmation of their dim view of the country’s justice system. For them, Corrie, a 23-year-old member of the International Solidarity Movement who was killed in 2003, is a martyr to the cause of peace and freedom for the Palestinians. They continue to believe Corrie was deliberately run over by an Israeli bulldozer knocking down the homes of innocent Arabs. But, as the court rightly pointed out, the truth is that though her death was regrettable, it was an accident caused by her own rash behavior.
The structures that she was attempting to protect by lying down in front of a bulldozer were fronts for tunnels along the border between Egypt and Gaza through which munitions and explosives intended to kill innocent Israelis were being smuggled. Even more to the point, the idea that Corrie was in Gaza to promote peace is a myth. The purpose of the International Solidarity Movement’s activities in Gaza was to shield Hamas and Fatah terrorists and to prevent the Israel Defense Forces from carrying out measures intended to stop the flow of arms and terrorist activity. If Corrie’s parents, who have pursued efforts to hold the state of Israel responsible for her death, should sue anyone it is the group that led the foolish American to Gaza and deliberately placed her in harm’s way.
Over the past decade, pro-Palestinian groups and activists have done their best to burnish Corrie’s legend as an American idealist whose death shone a spotlight on Israeli evil. Her diary was adapted by actor Alan Rickman and Katherine Viner into a play–“My Name is Rachel Corrie”–which earned raves in London and a slightly less enthusiastic reception in New York. The play was the centerpiece of a propaganda campaign aimed at convincing the world that Israel was committing barbarous acts in Gaza against helpless people.
But the truth about the International Solidarity Movement was something very different than what has been depicted on stage. Rather than advocating a two-state solution, the group is opposed to the existence of the State of Israel and opposes all measures of self-defense on the part of the Jewish state. What was going on in Gaza during Corrie’s time there was a terrorist war of attrition in which Palestinians sought to bring Israel to its knees with a campaign of suicide bombings and other attacks which, over the course of the second intifada, took the lives of over 1,000 Israelis. You hear nothing about this in “My Name is Rachel Corrie” or any of the accounts of her activities by her fans. Nor do you see the Rachel Corrie captured in a photo of her at the time, face contorted by rage as she joins Palestinians in burning an American flag.
But, as British journalist Tom Gross memorably wrote back in 2005 in his piece, “The Forgotten Rachels,” those promoting the cult of Rachel Corrie don’t seem to care about the Jewish girls by the same name who were slaughtered by the terrorists the ISM activist sought to shield.
As for the particulars of the incident, Corrie’s death was unfortunate. But, as the judge said in his verdict, her death was an accident that occurred during “a military activity meant to prevent terrorist activity.” As the Times of Israel noted:
The commander of the troops on the scene, an infantry major, testified last year that the activists had ignored repeated warnings to leave and were endangering his troops. “It was a war zone,” he told the court. The judge repeated that description in Tuesday’s decision, saying that from the outbreak of violence in September, 2000, and until the day of Corrie’s death Israeli forces counted some 6,000 hand grenades thrown at them in the area, as well as 1,400 shooting attacks, 150 explosive devices, 200 anti-tank rockets and more than 40 instances of mortar fire.
As the judge said in his verdict: “She chose to put herself in danger. She could have easily distanced herself from the danger like any reasonable person would.”
The Jewish Rachels who died at the hands of Ms. Corrie’s Palestinian friends had no such chance. They were blown up or shot by Palestinians with munitions like those smuggled in the same tunnels that Corrie was protecting, while driving in a car, sitting in a pizza parlor, waiting for a bus, shopping in a grocery store or just sitting in their own home. But there are no plays about them.
Rachel Corrie should not have put herself in front of a bulldozer in the middle of the confusion of a military action in a war zone in which she was taking a side. Her death was as unnecessary as the intifada itself. Had the Palestinians accepted Israel’s offers of an independent state in 2000 and 2001 (and repeated and turned down again in 2008), there would have been no need for any hostilities in Gaza. But they chose war instead of peace and were aided by fools like Corrie in this futile endeavor. Peace will never come to the Middle East so long as Palestinians devoted to destroying Israel can count on the support of Western elites and pilgrims like Corrie to support their murderous activities.
Corrie's death was an ideological,anti-Semitic version of "suicide by cop",aided and abetted by ISM-whom the parents should be suing and attacking in op-eds and on Cable T.V.
They should sue Evergreen College — and we should all ask some serious questions because, as I understand it, she was over there *as* a college student. Hence our Federal Tax Dollars were being used to subsidize her presence there. n nIf some right-wing college was sending kids down to South Africa to help overthrow the existing government and re-impose Apartied, we would not only never hear the end of it, but the US DoE would be having all kinds of investigations — why not here? n nAnd this all can be answered with two very simple facts. First, the guy driving the bulldozer couldn't see her — it's not like he was driving a car, there was a very big piece of steel blocking his view. Second, if he (she/it) *had* known she was there, all he would have had to do was lob a couple CS grenades (tear gas) over the blade and she wouldn't have been there long…. n nWe can argue if this would constitute "excessive force" or not (she would have been badly burnt if either grenade physically touched her, they burn to produce the CS and are quite hot), and I am not even sure that the IDF rules would have permitted him to do this. But the simple fact is that she wouldn't have stayed there long if he had. n nBut the more one hates the IDF and Israel itself, the more one has to concede that this would have removed her — and the more one hates the IDF and Israel itself, the more one has to concede that the guy would have done this — and he didn't. QED he didn't know she was there. n nAnd any rational person who has ever driven a bulldozer knows that you can't see what is in front of you and have to steer by looking down the sides. Even if an America-bashing left-wing lesbian is driving the bulldozer, she can't see what is directly in front of her either….
You are being too nice to her. She was a terrorist supporter who could be prosecuted for giving aid to terrorists.
According to Lee Kaplan writing at Arutz 7, she and her companions were deliberately trying to lure Israeli soldiers into sniper fire by forcing the soldiers to remove them.
if i provide aide and comfort to a terrorist, do you call me a terrorist supporter or a terrorist? n nwhy has the state dept refused to label the ism as a terrorist org?
Israel, a sovereign state, permitted her parents to sue them in their own courts. Would Iran have done this? n nIf she had died in an incident involving the Washington State Police, would the State of Washington permitted her parents to sue them in *its* courts? (I doubt it — most states still claim some form of "sovereign immunity.") So she got more justice in Israel than she would have gotten in her own country — and a LOT more than she would have gotten in those countries she loved.
After reading the Comments section of the NY Times' article, one would think that Rome should consider Corrie for beatification.
Corrie's death was the worst thing that could have happened to her parents, and, it seems, the best thing that could have happened for her Palestinian handlers. n nMy understanding is that she was alive in the ambulance that carried her to a Palestinian hospital. n nHaving said that, it is beyond disgusting that these foreigners think their presence would somehow dissuade Israeli troops from doing their duty. n nI am reminded of the danish noodnik, who though waving his blond hair in the face of an Israeli soldier at a checkpoint would somehow get them to let them pass. He got a rifle in the face for his trouble. n nThe implication of these efforts is that the Israelis are racist fiends, and would therefore have special sensitivity to 'white' foreigners. It is a projection on the part of these foreign idiots, for whom everything is about race.
Corrie's death varies from that of any random suicide bomber only by the level of western white girl arrogance she exhibited. The brutal truth of it is that when you chose to be a human shield you may actually be called upon to be a human shield.
The San Francisco Jewish Film Festival which specialized in anti-Israel films, showed the Rachel Corrie film 2 years ago, and included an hour-long talk by Corrie's Israel-bashing mother. The Bay Area's pro-Israel community protested so that pro-Israel Dr. Mike Harris was given 5 minutes to offer a differing point of view. He was greeted with resounding boos from the supposedly mainly Jewish audience in the ~2000 seat theatre. When the booing slowed, and Harrts was finally able to speak, he mentioned Ahmadinejad of Iran. The audience burst-out with a mighty cheer! These are the paskudniaks that insist that they are part of the Jewish community. Since then, the director of the film festival has been ousted, and so has the director of the Jewish Federation, which provided a grant to the film festival. That director, Daniel Sokatch, fell in to being appointed director of the New Israel Fund; the sponsor of Adalah, B'Tselem, and other anti-Israel oganizations.The film festival has promised to reform itself, and this year I wasn't aware of any blatently anti-Israel films.
Don't think this is the end of the Rachel Corrie tragedy and travesty. The anti-Israel Left will continue to "milk" this story ad infinitum. Ain't it strange how internecine slaughter is continuing in Syria for over a year, with tens of thousands deaths and countless injuries and there is only deafening silence from the entire world, and especially from the activists who continue to espouse the "cause" of Rachel Corrie?
Rachel Corrie WAS a peace activist. She was that in her mind, in the minds of her family and friends, and in the minds of millions who behold a battlefield where Jews are brutal oppressors. n nThey see Rachel Corrie as gentile goodness putting the lie to a Jewish pose as exemplars, teachers of humankind, the light onto the nations, victims of Christians. n nIn short Rachel Corrie marks a strategic Arab victory. Israel prevails endlessly on the battlefield but for much of the world, Palestinian propaganda routinely beats her bloody. n nHasbara is Israel's weakness. She fails there, though she has the truth and the most articulate spokesmen on her side. Feelings, not words are her undoing. Subliminal Jew hatred is riding the identification of the Jew as contradicting human equality and democracy. For how else can so few prevail against so many? n nThe answer to Rachel Corrie is propagating a better understanding of what is equality and justice, and what is conscientious and noble. A mouthful, yes. But that is what it will take.
Democ-rat US Senator from Washington State, Patty Murray, sent a representative to the witch's funeral! Today she is the "Chairperson" of the Democ-rat Senate Campaign Committee which recruits candidates and raises funds for Democ-rat senators and candidates. She disgraces the seat of Senator Henry Jackson which she holds and not one Democ-rat of Jewish origin, not one Democ-rat senator, every rebuked her; not Schumer, not Lieberman, not Cardin, not Feingold, not Kohl, not Boxer, not Feinstein, NOT ONE! All of them are beneath contempt and the moral equivalents of the Judenrats–the last syllable is the same–no accident! n
Pat Murray is revolting and you are right to point out the silence of the so called pro Israel Dems.
Sen. Feinstein is as Jewish as Barry Goldwater or John Kerry. Her father was Jewish. She is not.
Senator Feinstein converted to Judaism before she married Mr. Feinstein, or so she said. But, after all, she IS a Democ-rat and therefore a liar!
I was not aware of that. Was it a valid conversion?
I've no idea about whether it's a "Reform" conversion like John Kerry's brother's or a "real" conversion. I read about it so long ago that only the fact of it remains with me, and only HER word about it and after all, she is a Democ-rat and therefore prone to lies.
dave, thanks for the information. n nFWIW: it seems to me that dialgogue between people of differing views or party affiliation is difficult enough already and is getting more difficult all the time; in my view, terms like Democ-rat are both a symptom and a cause of that problem. n nI have friends and relatives who are Democrats (used to be one myself until just over a decade ago, in fact). When I talk to them, I feel as though I have to tiptoe thru a mine field. I have learned to avoid certain topics (e.g. the housing melt down, minimum age, Obamacare, the failures of the recovery program) all together. They get angry enough when you try to point out a few simple facts. Mocking their party name is not going to make dialogue any easier.
Ahad writes: n" nI have friends and relatives who are Democrats (used to be one myself until just over a decade ago, in fact). When I talk to them, I feel as though I have to tiptoe thru a mine field. I have learned to avoid certain topics (e.g. the housing melt down, minimum age, Obamacare, the failures of the recovery program) all together. They get angry enough when you try to point out a few simple facts. Mocking their party name is not going to make dialogue any easier." n nWe are supposed to grant the patriotism and sincerity of people like your (and most of my) especially Jewish "friends and relatives" but this becomes difficult especially when people who HAVE TO know that the policies they support and advocate will lead to disaster, as their housing finance policies did. They pass "stimulus" legislation that did not solve the unemployment problem, made it worse and want to spend even more knowing that it will do no good and in fact will do harm. They advocate policies in the Middle East that will destroy Israel–and they HAVE TO know this is the case because if they're OUR relatives and in our sicial circle they are not stupid. n n
So, how does one NOT mock them at every opportunity? They simply do not deserve respect, only disdain at the least. Educated Democ-rats are the lowest form of life in the world today–the moral equivalents of Judenraete and Kapos. To support Obama, Dodd, Frank, Pelosi, Reid, the Gaza 54 and all the other, yes, scum and vermin that populate that Party earns the disdain of decent people. And if they get angry when you point that out, too bad about it. WE have more to be angry about from them than they do from us!
Past ISM campaigns have used the following tactics:r n “white-face defense”r nr nIdiots being used to further the Palestinian cause….r nr nActing to deter military operations. Some ISM volunteers object to the use of the term human shield to describe their work because, they argue, in a Palestinian context the expression more usually refers to forced use of captive Palestinians by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) when searching Palestinian neighborhoods. They argue that the IDF is far more likely to shoot the darker skinned Palestinian civilians than white western looking activists, given the difference in international response. This tactic is colloquially referred to as the “white-face defense”r nr nShe was relying on this; means she was a fool. I feel for the parents but then again they were idiots also.. For allowing this to happen……
Thank you. That image is revolting. It should be treason what she did.
Shame on you and on the writer of this mindless article. Maybe the people who drive Bulldozers in Israel are blind…they can't see someone in front of them ?? n nMaybe if your family was crushed to death under a bulldozer and were called 'rash' and stupid later on, it would knock some sense into you. But who am I kidding ? You Zionists (separate from the definition of true Jews no matter what propaganda you use to say otherwise) are no better than the Nazis…what did they say: If you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes the truth… n nJust remember- the Truth always prevails.
No it should be…"My dear Siam, we are so sorry we raised you to be a monster who hates people on the basis of their religion…we should have raised you better" n nShame on you! Get out of your Nazi-victim complex…you hurt others, and they will hate you back