Israel holds Nasrallah, the grocer

[IndianaGreen]

According to tonight's ABC News, the IDF bombed every house in which there was anyone named Nasrallah.

Israel holds Nasrallah, the grocer

Tuesday 22 August 2006, 17:09 Makka Time, 14:09 GMT

Hassan Nasrallah was briefly in Israel's hands, along with three members of his family and a neighbour.

Unfortunately for the embarrassed Israelis, he was the local green grocer - not the head of Lebanon's Hezbollah group.

Leah Tzemel, the Israeli lawyer who obtained their release on Monday, said Israel had snatched the four Nasrallahs and their neighbour on August 1 in a commando raid in the Hezbollah stronghold of Baalbek in northeastern Lebanon.

The army apparently believed he was related to Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah and could be used to pressure the leader.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/06921F67-5447-484D-8A94-F4C802A46B80.htm

[Maat]

1. This repressive, bullying behavior is disgusting, in my opinion (n/t).

[riverwalker]

2. Leah Tzemel

is one amazing woman.

http://www.commondreams.org/cgi-bin/print.cgi?file=/headlines02/1216-03.htm

[IndianaGreen]

3. "I used to be the 'lawyer of Satan.' Now I'm a 'human rights defender,' "

Published on Monday, December 16, 2002 by the Los Angeles Times
Justice Without Borders

A cadre of Israeli attorneys specializing in human rights has emerged. Many clients are Palestinians, and they rarely win in court.

by Tracy Wilkinson

"I used to be the 'lawyer of Satan.' Now I'm a 'human rights defender,' " Tzemel said. She didn't change, she says, Israel did. But in the current atmosphere of war, she and other attorneys worry they will once again be regarded as the devil's accomplices.

That Tzemel and her colleagues do the work they do is a testament to Israel's democracy. That the work is increasingly difficult testifies to an erosion in basic democratic values.

In the last two years of conflict, a horrific spate of suicide bombings targeting Jews has created a climate of fear and hate that leaves many Israelis believing that human rights and due process for Palestinians are a luxury the country can ill afford.

Consequently, the caseload for Tzemel and attorneys like her is full of controversial issues and questions of international law: home demolitions, deportations, alleged torture of prisoners, assassinations. They rarely, if ever, win a case.

http://www.commondreams.org/cgi-bin/print.cgi?file=/headlines02/1216-03.htm

[regnaD kciN]

4. So? Execute him anyway...!

I mean, if it's O.K. to kill off hundreds of Lebanese civilians with no connection to Hezbollah in order to "defend oneself" against the latter, why shouldn't it be O.K. to kill one grocer to do the same? It may send a message to the real Nasrallah and make him scared enough to disband his militias. Besides, if this guy wasn't a Hezbollah supporter, why didn't he change his name to disassociate himself from the terrorists?

:sarcasm:

[Sherman A1]

5. But, I thought the Israelis were sooo good

at the intel game? Can we say oops?

[gula]

6. They've come a long way from Entebbe.

Unfortunately it seems mostly downhill.