How low can one stoop.
Father of Muhammad al-Dura rebukes Israeli report on son's death
Report re-ignites war of words over death of 12-year-old al-Dura in Gaza in 2000 by claiming the incident was staged
In a scrubby cemetery in central Gaza, where crumbling tombstones nestle in the sand amid wind-blown rubbish, Jamal al-Dura crouched at the grave of his son Muhammad to recite the Muslim prayer for the dead. With the youngest of his 11 children at his side, he took his hands from his face, laid them on the marble slab and looked up, a bitter as well as a bereaved man.
"Israel says my son isn't dead. Can you imagine how this feels for a father who has lost his child? They have all the technology tools in the world. He's not dead? Then bring him to me," he said.
The long, acrimonious war over the death of 12-year-old Muhammad al-Dura in September 2000 was reignited this week with the release of an official Israeli report attacking a 55-second television broadcast, aired on that day 13 years ago, for what it said was distortion, falsehood, fabrication and incitement to terror.
The Israeli report – commissioned by the prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, who endorsed its conclusions – suggested that the entire event may have been staged as a propaganda exercise and that Muhammad was not killed or even injured. This was dismissed with weary incredulity by Jamal, Talal Abu Rahma, the cameraman who filmed the incident, and by France 2, the television station whose broadcast ricocheted around the world.
The filmed scenes of Muhammad and Jamal cowering behind a concrete block on a street corner amid heavy gunfire, with the boy screaming in terror before slumping across his father's lap, became the most potent image of the Palestinian intifada, or uprising, that started shortly afterwards. It was reproduced on posters, stamps and murals across the Arab world and cited by al-Qaida in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks in the US.
It swiftly became part of what this week's Israeli report described as "the battle for the TV or computer screen [which] is often as or even more important than the actual military clash". Almost immediately, supporters of Israel sought to cast doubt on the veracity of the footage, and the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) retracted an early statement at a press conference that "apparently the boy was hit by our fire".
The day itself, 30 September 2000, began with an outing to buy a car. Jamal and Muhammad travelled from their home in the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza north to a car market in Gaza City. At the time, the Gaza Strip was punctuated with Israeli military checkpoints, heavily fortified army posts and watchtowers, there to protect 21 Jewish settlements.
Unsuccessful in their mission, the al-Duras embarked on the return to Bureij by taxi. When they reached the Netzarim junction, a military gateway between the northern and southern halves of Gaza and a frequent flashpoint between the IDF and Palestinian youths, trouble had already started. The taxi driver refused to go further, and Jamal and Muhammad set off to cross the junction by foot.
As gunfire started, father and son sheltered by a concrete water barrel close to the crossroads, diagonally across from the IDF post and round the corner from a Palestinian security forces command post. "I tried to hide by the cement block. I was raising my hands and waving to ask them to stop," Jamal told the Guardian this week. "I could see the soldiers in the tower but they didn't stop shooting.
"I was only thinking about one thing: how to protect my son. He was scared. When he was shot by the first bullet, I was telling him, don't be afraid, the ambulance will come. He said, I'm not afraid, you don't be afraid. When he fell across my lap, I realised he was dead. These seconds felt like hours, days."
Pressed on the sequence and timings of the events, Jamal became agitated, saying he did not remember details amid the confusion and terror of the moment. He and his son were under sustained fire for 45 minutes, he said, at the end of which he was seriously hurt and Muhammad was dead.
The pair were taken to the Shifa hospital in Gaza City, where local reporters insist they saw the child's corpse in the morgue. Jamal was evacuated by the Jordanian authorities to a hospital in Amman, where he spent around three months being treated for his injuries.
In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, Guardian correspondent Suzanne Goldenberg visited the scene. In her dispatch, she described "a circle of 15 bullet holes on a cinder block wall, and a smear of darkening blood … Aside from the circle of bullet holes – most of them below waist level – the expanse of wall is largely unscarred. This appeared to suggest that the Israeli fire was targeted at father and son."
Goldenberg quoted a volunteer in the ambulance attending the scene. "There was still some breath in [Muhammad] when we reached the ambulance, but when we opened the doors, they started shooting again," said Bassam al-Bilbays. The ambulance driver was shot dead.
An affidavit given by Abu Rahma, the France 2 cameraman, on 3 October 2000, said: "I can assert that shooting at the child Muhammad and his father Jamal came from the above-mentioned Israeli military outpost, as it was the only place from which shooting at the child and the father was possible. So, by logic and nature, my long experience of covering hot incidents and violent clashes, and my ability to distinguish sounds of shooting, I can confirm the child was intentionally and in cold blood shot dead and his father injured by the Israeli army."
These eyewitness descriptions were challenged by the Israeli report, which relied on military accounts, analysis commissioned of the footage and medical reports. It concluded that "contrary to the [France 2] report's claim that the boy was killed, the committee's review of the raw footage showed that in the final scenes, which were not broadcast by France 2, the boy is seen to be alive. The review revealed that there is no evidence that Jamal or the boy were wounded in the manner claimed in the report, and that the footage does not depict Jamal as having been badly injured. In contrast, there are numerous indications that the two were not struck by bullets at all."
Central to its conclusions are the final few seconds of footage showing Muhammad as he "raises his arm and turns his head in the direction of [the cameraman] in what are clearly intentional and controlled movements". Abu Rahma's statements, the report says, "have been shown to be replete with contradictions, inconsistencies and falsehoods … Many additional contradictions, inconsistencies and falsehoods are to be found in the accounts given by [France 2's Jerusalem bureau chief, Charles] Enderlin, Abu Rahma, Jamal al-Dura and Palestinian medical professionals, which together make up the al-Dura narrative accepted throughout the world".
It also asserted that "the boy labelled as Muhammad al-Dura in photos from the Shifa hospital autopsy, and the one borne aloft at what was allegedly Muhammad al-Dura's funeral, has different physical characteristics than the boy seen crouching behind the barrel in the France 2 footage."
The Israeli committee did not contact Jamal, Abu Rahma or Enderlin in the course of its eight-month review of the incident, although it included Abu Rahma's affidavit in the appendices of its report. In a statement to the Guardian, the Israeli ministry of intelligence and international affairs said the committee "requested information and materials from France 2, of which Mr Enderlin and Mr Abu Rahma are employees, via the French ambassador to Israel. In addition, the committee conducted an extensive review of dozens of interviews, statements and written accounts regarding the incident given by Mr al-Dura, Mr Abu Rahma and Mr Enderlin from 2000 until today."
In response, Enderlin said no request had ever been received through the French foreign ministry. "If they want to contact us, I am here in Jerusalem; I have an Israeli lawyer, they do not need to go through the French ambassador. We have said many times we are ready for any independent investigation following international standards."
All three said they were prepared to testify before an independent international commission of inquiry, and Jamal said he was willing to have his son's body exhumed for forensic and DNA analysis.
"All the answers are in the footage. The camera is trustworthy," Abu Rahma told the Guardian this week in his Gaza City office. He said he was not surprised at the Israeli committee's conclusions. "In whose interests is this committee? I am ready to stand, anywhere and any time, in front of an independent international commission."
The Israeli report spoke of "malignant narratives", "mendacious media coverage" and "repeated attempts [by local stringers] to stage or fabricate media items". Abu Rahma pointed to his 27 years experience as a journalist and cameraman, working for, among others, France 2 and CNN, and an award in 2009 from the Rory Peck Trust. "No one else has accused me of bias," he said.
France 2 is also engaged in a long-running libel case in Paris over its broadcast after a pro-Israel media monitor claimed the incident had been staged. A ruling was expected three days after Israel published its report, but has been deferred until 26 June.
Jamal said he had no idea at the time that he and his son were being filmed, and that he didn't see the broadcast until two months later. "These are lies from Israel. They are trying to hide the truth, but the truth is too strong to be hidden."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/may/23/israeli-report-denies-death-al-dura
