Mourning a West Bank wife

[Scurrilous]

In a small room on the edge of Tulkarm, they are wailing for 44-year-old Eitas Zalat.

<snip>

"There are tears, screams, and whimpers. Women turn to me in sorrow, and in anger.

Eitas Zalat was a mother of five. She was killed at dawn by an Israeli army bullet while sitting in her living room.

Now she lies on a stretcher on the floor. Women kiss her face, and then collapse.

Outside one of Tulkarm's mosques, as the people of this impoverished West Bank town prayed, I spoke to Eitas Zalat's husband.

Yousef Zalat is an English teacher. He is still - I think, as we speak - in shock.

"I feel just like an ordinary man who lost his partner," he tells me.

"We were sitting next to each other and the Jews shot her while we were speaking together. There were no weapons, there were no bombs. Why they do this? Why?"

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[Englander]

1. B'Tselem;

1 May 2006: Apologies aren't enough – the IDF must investigate those responsible for the death in Tulkarm

The circumstances under which 'Itaf Zalat, a 44-year old woman, was killed in Tulkarem last night, raise the grave suspicion that Israeli security forces acted as if they were conducting an assassination rather than an arrest operation. Such behavior constitutes a blatant violation of the principles of International Humanitarian Law.

B'Tselem has yet to complete its investigation into the incident. However, its initial findings indicate a clear similarity between the security forces' behavior in this incident and those in past arrest operations in which innocent civilians were killed. In past cases investigated by B'Tselem, and documented in the organizations 2005 report Take No Prisoners, soldiers used lethal force without being in any life threatening situation, demonstrating a pattern of indifference to the safety of Palestinian civilians.

Between January 2004 and May 1, 2006, 157 Palestinians were killed in what the IDF terms arrest operations in the West Bank . Of these, at least 35 were civilians, whom the military admits were mere bystanders to the operation. An additional 54 of those killed were defined as wanted by the military. However, they were either unarmed or did not attempt to use their weapons at the time they were killed.

B'Tselem emphasizes that the military's expressions of regret and the promise to conduct a field debriefing are insignificant. The Judge Advocate General must immediately order a military police investigation of the incident.

http://www.btselem.org/English/Press_Releases/20060501.asp