Who gave the instruction?

On the police explanatory attack on the journalist's funeral

After being offended by the hypocrisy of the world media, one can admit that what was seen at the funeral of journalist Sheerin Abu Akala in Jerusalem was a failure that may end in policemen fitting in coffin matters, but starting the highest there is: this time the minister and police commissioner can not escape the charge

Nir Kipnis

14/05/2022

Saturday, 14 May 2022, 20:48 Updated: 20:53

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In the video: The funeral of al-Jazeera reporter Shirin Abu Akla who was shot in Jenin (Photo: Reuters)

After finishing talking about the freedom of the press, the conscious danger that every journalist in battlefields takes upon himself, this is an explanatory attack.

But if the incident in which she was shot to death was very difficult to prevent, let alone plan, then what happened at her funeral was already a real omission.

A masterpiece of lack of thinking, zero planning ability, a very bad reaction of the direct commanders to what was happening on the ground, which led to one of the poor demonstrations of the Israel Police recently - and it is not that there was no competition.

Soon we will return to the funeral, or to be more precise: policemen storm with batons and beat coffin bearers and other funeral attendants carrying a cross, which is dropped from their hands during the event and raises the coffin from an unlucky journalistic rank to a sacred rank in the eyes of hundreds of millions of Christians around the world. And we'll go back two steps, to the incident where she was shot.

One of the poor demonstrations by the Israel Police.

The riots at the funeral, yesterday (Photo: Reuters)

When you come to shoot, shoot - do not use tweezers

A lot of effort was put into trying to find out who fired the fatal shot: Was it an IDF soldier or a Palestinian armed? A lot of effort on this very unimportant question. How does it not matter? Europe and North America, we, the State of Israel, are

responsible

for this very well-publicized death.

The sole blame is on him - and these are other friends of Israel, who are trying to understand us

. Nia but only closer to the center of media attention) - and there is of course more than a kernel of truth.But the question now is not who is right,But what to do.

No investigation that is stopped at a lower level should be accepted.

Saturn and Bar Lev (Photo: Israel Police Spokeswoman)

Since the incident in which Sheerin Abu Akala was killed is not the issue, it can only be summed up in one question and that is about the wisdom that the army used in surgical operations.

We seem to have fallen in love with a concept that gives us some sophistication, here - only the bad guys on the target and the uninvolved are left out.

The problem is that even when working "surgically", or if you want "with tweezers", there will always be some uninvolved who will be harmed: once it will be a boy named Muhammad a-Dura, and once a famous journalist and more - if you do the cynical calculation to the end - also a Christian.

In fact, this is another situation in which the character of Lee Van Cliff, a Western spaghetti hero who says: "If you came to shoot, shoot - do not speak", or in other words: did you decide to put the IDF in the Jenin refugee camp? The power, because in the end you will also not achieve deterrence - and will also snatch on the "tweezers" as if it were an atom bomb.

Chronicle of a pre-determined event

But this is another part that can be dismissed with clichés like "chopping wood flying chips", something that Israeli citizens have learned to live with: the feeling that we are like a Western country - watching the same series on TV, wearing the same brands, listening to the same music - and unlike everyone else doing That is, even forced to live on our sword.

The part that could have been prevented was the harsh sight of Israeli police officers blowing up a funeral.

There is no way to embellish this reality: it was clear in advance that this was an event that needed to be contained, it was clear in advance that it would be used to the full political end, it was clear that it would become a national-Palestinian show of force. Even in this pre-known scenario.

"We have reached an agreement with the family" was the pathetic sentence in which senior police officials would excuse the "surprise".

Oh really, as if the family has the ability to control events.

And suppose for a moment that a senior police officer, one who has already investigated hundreds of tough criminals that telling the truth is not exactly a candle to their feet, was tempted to believe that silence would be maintained and that the summaries would not be violated - what happened when it turned out to be not really happening on the ground?

After all, the cops did not just attack with batons - someone gave them an instruction, someone confirmed this thing, that even if we assume for a moment that had a stump of operational logic, was photographed so bad - with a coffin swinging from side to side, almost falling and with the cross collapsing to the floor - And when the victims are the ones who clearly did not attack the policemen (I am not a great expert in police work, so I will just carefully assume that the subjects of the coffin are a little difficult to attack policemen).

From an unlucky journalist - to holiness in the eyes of hundreds of millions around the world.

Abu Akala (Photo: Reuters)

It could have been grotesque, even funny in the bizarre way we have already learned to observe events in the Middle East, had it not come after two days in which all the political and security elite twisted in an attempt to show that our hand was not over, that it was impossible to determine who fired and that fact (impossible). It is because of the Palestinian refusal.

For a moment there was someone who hoped we had filed some explanatory draw or at least a non-defeat loss, that in a day or two another mass grave would be discovered in a Ukrainian town that would divert the world's attention to another arena - and then the Israeli police came in a hallucinatory show, just like dreams.

We have known the Israel Police since today, and public opinion about it is not good.

Citizens who have already learned that there is no point in complaining to the police about property offenses, about fraud, about the neighbor holding a karaoke party into the night and the one who in response to an innocent encounter on the road, pulled these out and dismantled your vehicle.

Precisely the serious events we have experienced recently have also presented another aspect of the police that we have managed to forget: the dedication, the Sisyphean work, the risk to life to the point of being willing to sacrifice them.

Even if we ignore for a moment all the emotions and try to coldly analyze the events, the moment when ultra-Orthodox in Bnei Brak identify with a Christian Arab policeman, Amir Khoury, who defended them physically, was an amazing moment - and when you return to cynicism for a moment, you can say Following him.

Then came the command and operational omission that caused images of one funeral procession to be broadcast over and over again around the world.

More on Walla!

Criticism of the US administration over Israel's conduct at the press funeral: "Disrespectful burial"

To the full article

Precisely the serious events we have experienced recently have also presented another aspect of the police that we have managed to forget: the dedication, the Sisyphean work, the risk to life to the point of being willing to sacrifice them.

Even if we ignore for a moment all the emotions and try to coldly analyze the events, the moment when the ultra-Orthodox in Bnei Brak identify with a Christian Arab policeman, Amir Khoury, who defended them physically, was an amazing moment.

And when we return for a moment to cynicism, it can be said that the Israeli police knew how to get the most out of it and raised its profile in its wake.

Then came the command and operational omission that caused images of one funeral procession to be broadcast over and over again around the world.

This time it will not stop in the field

If it was just frustrating, we would be content to ask where the world media cameras were at Israeli funerals massacred on city streets.

We would get upset, reminding ourselves for the thousandth time that there are things that the Gentiles will never understand about the circumstances of our lives so special in this place, but these things have consequences - and these will be serious.

This is not just a condemnation of Israel in the world, with it we have already learned to live.

This is a different attitude towards Israelis around the world, which harms academic, business, cultural activity and more - and worst of all, it will ultimately hurt security as well: here we will not be approved what budget is needed, where they will impose restrictions - and the price will be paid by Israeli citizens.

The tendency of all of us is to be forgiving towards our security bodies.

After all, the IDF is us - our parents and we and our children, and the police, during a turbulent security period, also enjoy an upgrade in its image, after all, the police are the ones guarding us. And not cynically.

US demands answers. Biden (Photo: Reuters)

Only this time there is no room for forgiveness: Forgiveness can be when someone is arrested by mistake, when someone uses a machete unnecessarily, whether the victim is a leftist, settler, ultra-Orthodox or Ethiopian - all these are cases where you can somehow settle for a brief investigation, refining procedures, promising to learn The lesson.

This time the case is so different that the question that concerns the public in Israel promotes DNA: Who gave the order?

And in the contemporary context: who would have thought it a good idea to send cops with batons to pounce on coffin-bearers, in a ceremony filmed and broadcast to the whole world?

The answer is required for us not to slam the Israeli police, but quite the opposite - so that we can continue to find among us the warm feeling towards it, as someone who maintains the security of the citizens of Israel during this sensitive period.

Moreover: the inquiry this time can not be stopped at the field levels.

It was a political event, it was a pre-determined event, it was an event that required staff work in preparation - and therefore the citizens of Israel deserve the answer, not only how this event became such a serious explanatory failure, but also how the minister in charge and the police commissioner prepared for it.

No investigation that is stopped at a lower level should be accepted this time.

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