Israel treating al-Qaida fighters wounded in Syria civil war

[shaayecanaan]

Amos Yadlin, the former military intelligence chief who is currently in the running to be defense minister should the Zionist Union, led by Isaac Herzog, succeed in defeating incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the elections next week, told the Journal that Hezbollah and Iran "are the major threat to Israel, much more than the radical Sunni Islamists, who are also an enemy."

“Those Sunni elements who control some two-thirds to 90% of the border on the Golan aren't attacking Israel. This gives you some basis to think that they understand who is their real enemy - maybe it isn’t Israel,” Yadlin is quoted by The Wall Street Journal as saying.

The fact that the Israel-Syria border area along the Golan Heights has remained largely quiet has sparked accusations among supporters of embattled President Bashar Assad that the Sunni Islamist alliance, which includes al-Qaida, is backed by Israel.

“Some in Syria joke: 'How can you say that al-Qaida doesn’t have an air force? They have the Israeli air force',” Assad told Foreign Affairs magazine earlier this year. “They are supporting the rebels in Syria. It is very clear.”

http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Report-Israel-treating-al-Qaida-fighters-wounded-in-Syria-civil-war-393862

The U.S. and Israel: Diverging Interests

Unfortunately, Israel, and by extension the American Zionist lobby, had lost interest in U.S. concerns about al-Qaeda. Indeed, Tel Aviv had come to take the opposite point of view, seeing some merit in Islamic terrorists as long as they were Sunnis. One has to keep in mind that the Israelis are obsessed with Shiite Iran and its nuclear energy program, which Prime Minister Netanyahu has hysterically proclaimed a danger to the survival of Israel. From that point of view any enemy of Iran is a friend of Israel – even if it is al-Qaeda.

Indeed, in 2013 Michael Oren, then Israeli ambassador to the United States (actually he grew up in West Orange, New Jersey), told the Jerusalem Post, “We always wanted Bashar Assad to go, we always preferred the bad guys who weren’t backed by Iran to the bad guys who were backed by Iran.” A year later he was at an Aspen Institute Conference and declared that Israel would prefer the victory of ISIS to the continuation of an Iranian-backed Assad. Nor have the Israelis been shy about acting on this preference. They have established a non-aggression pact with an al-Qaeda Syrian affiliate called the al-Nusra Front, cared for al-Nusra wounded in Israeli hospitals, and mounted attacks on the Lebanese and Iranian forces opposing al-Nusra.

So, at least in Syria, Israel is actively supporting a group that had, in an early incarnation, attacked the U.S. – one that represents forces that still pose a major worldwide risk to U.S. security. Perhaps someone ought to update Congress on this point.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/04/08/the-u-s-and-israel-diverging-interests/

[oberliner]

1. Israeli hospital cares for Syrian children

NAHARIYA, Israel —The hospital clown had seen and heard enough. After making the rounds of children’s wards for months in Western Galilee Medical Center in northern Israel, he had met many injured and sick children — some with terminal diseases, others with severe, life-threatening injuries. His job was to bring out a smile. But after he met one 9-year-old Syrian boy, the clown briefly considered hanging up his hat for the last time.

“The boy arrived severely injured and in complete shock,” said Sara Paperin of the International Affairs department of the hospital. “He kept describing over and over again how he had seen his brother decapitated in front of his eyes,” she recalled, saying the boy was devastated at the thought that he had lost all of his family. “After meeting the youngster, the hospital clown called me and said, ‘I just can’t do this anymore.’”

Over the last year, the hospital has treated 230 injured Syrians, more than 40% of them women and children, and as the months go by, the stream of patients with critical injuries is only increasing.

To many around the world, the story about Syrians being treated in Israeli hospitals is well-known. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad himself takes every opportunity to denounce it as propaganda at best and Israel’s alleged collaboration with Syria’s rebels at worst.

http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/ru/originals/2014/03/israel-hospital-syria-children-care.html#ixzz3X3oA60Ti

[shaayecanaan]

3. Maybe Netanyahu can take over clowning duties

he can tell a few jokes or juggle for the kiddies whenever he's visiting his al Qaida friends.

[shira]

23. So you prefer that Israel turns away Syrians requiring life-saving medical aid? n/t

[shaayecanaan]

24. I would prefer that Israel not give medical support to al Qaida, yes

Obviously they're not about to give medical support to Hezbollah, so I hardly think this counts as a humanitarian gesture.

[shira]

25. They're all in plain clothes & don't have big signs on them saying....

.....they're from al-Qaeda.

You want Israel to ask them first if they're al-Qaeda? What if they lie?

I get it.

You think the clever Zionists can read thoughts and know exactly who they're treating.

Those Zionists....

====================

BTW, Israel has given free medical aid to Hamas members who needed it. They even treated Ismael Haniyeh's daughter, grand-daughter, and brother-in-law.

Next, you'll claim Israel supports Hamas too.

[shaayecanaan]

27. So Israel's helping al Qaida accidentally?

That doesn't say much for their intelligence agencies. And I'm sure poor old Mrs Leibovitz with her dicky knee and bad case of piles wouldn't be too happy if she knew she was sharing a room with al Qaida militants.

[shira]

28. Israeli hospitals treat terrorists and victims alike

http://www.haaretz.com/life/science-medicine/1.633374

...The commitment of Israeli hospitals to treating perpetrators of terror, says Charles Sprung, director of the general intensive care unit at Hadassah in Ein Karem, and head of the hospital’s Institute of Medicine, Ethics and Law – is indeed one of those things that cannot be changed. Nor, he stresses, should it be.

He references the Hippocratic Oath, under which he, like all physicians, is bound to act “for the benefit of the sick according to… ability and judgment,” and to keep patients from “harm and injustice.” Sprung, a religious man, also cites the Oath of Maimonides, the famed 12th-century Jewish physician, which obligates doctors to “never see in the patient anything but a fellow creature in pain.” Sprung shrugs. That is all there is to it, really.

A counter argument could be made, and sometimes is, that the Geneva Conventions ־ which provide guidelines for the medical treatment of enemies and prisoners of war – do not extend to “terrorists,” as these are defined as “unlawful combatants or unprivileged belligerents” who themselves, so goes the logic, do not follow the laws of war.

“Is it incumbent upon individuals in a nation whose very existence is constantly being threatened to act compassionately toward those who set out to destroy them?” asks Avi Rivkind, head of Hadassah’s Division of Emergency Medicine and Trauma, in an oft-quoted 2009 paper co-authored with colleagues from the IDF and Haifa's Rambam Medical Center in the American Journal of Bioethics (“Medical Care for Terrorists – To Treat or Not to Treat” by Gesundheit, Ash, Blazer and Rivkind). “Should hospitals expend limited public health care resources on a terrorist, thereby perhaps depriving other patients of medical care?” the authors wonder.

The answer, they conclude, is clearly “yes.”

“It’s not that we applaud what such terrorists do,” explains Rivkind, who has spent 30 years at Hadassah, a hospital which, due to its location and the fact that it runs a sophisticated trauma unit, says it has over the years treated more terror victims – and terrorists – than any other medical institution in the country.

“Quite the opposite. They take human lives whereas we try to save them. There is a big discrepancy between us and no bridge" between terrorists and physicians, he says. “But we have our obligations under the Hippocratic Oath. So, at the end of the day, there is really no question.”

[shaayecanaan]

30. Perhaps Israel should look to its own victims first...

Apparently Israel's magnanimity does not extend to the Palestinian refugees (there are no Palestinians from Syria in Israel's hospitals). Funny that.

And the al Qaida fighters that Israel keeps patching up are helping to besiege the Palestinian refugees at Yarmouk:-

Aknaf Beit Al Maqdis, along with those who had volunteered that day (in total about 500 fighters), waited for reinforcements to arrive from other armed opposition groups. These fighters came from Babilla and Beit Sahem. They attempted entrance into Yarmouk after 6PM on April 1st from Palestine Square in the east of the camp but were prevented by Nusra, who had placed heavy weaponry in the square to halt their entrance. It was at this time that Nusra entered the clashes. It was then realized that Nusra had allowed ISIS into the camp, giving them access via streets they had been controlling previously. The two have now joined forces against Aknaf Beit Al Maqdis and other volunteer Palestinian fighters.

Aknaf Beit Al Maqdis and other volunteer Palestinian fighters continued to fight throughout the night, killing and injuring tens of ISIS fighters.

April 2, 2015

- See more at: http://mondoweiss.net/2015/04/chronicles-palestinian-refugee#sthash.ujnQUHQ6.dpuf

[shira]

32. The Palestinian refugees in Syria are the victims of the Arab world & UN

Israel offered to help transfer them to what the UN has already recognized as Palestine, but Abbas refused, saying it's better they die in Syria than revoke a fictitious right of return.

That was the choice.

Would you have rejected Israel's offer and left them to die?

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

29. It's strange that Israel will take in this group, but they won't take in

Palestinian refugees from Yarmouk.

[shira]

33. Israel offered to help transfer them to Palestine but Abbas refused....

....saying it's better 150,000 of them die in Syria.

Why would you object to Israel offering to facilitate their transport to what the UN has already recognized as the Palestinian state?

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

37. That's not what I was writing about, but if you distract yourself this way with your talking points

how will you ever stay on topic?

[Jefferson23]

2. How very interesting, and the fucking Saudi leaders....at every turn they're a disaster

in the making.

[shaayecanaan]

4. If there was a world championship for underachieving, the Saudis would romp it in every time

amazing that a country with shitloads of money, Western backing and sites that half the world's population are religiously compelled to visit manages to consistently lose out to an isolated and beleaguered country with absolutely no allies in the world apart from Syria, which is on the ropes itself.

[oberliner]

5. Some wounded Syrians seek treatment from Israeli hospitals

GOLAN HEIGHTS – Syrians wounded in their country’s three-year civil war have recently been crossing their country’s southern frontier to seek medical care in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Israel and Syria remain technically at war, and recovering the Golan Heights — occupied by Israel since the war of June 1967 — is a shared goal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime and the opposition. A roadside bomb targeting an Israeli jeep wounded four soldiers near the Golan town of Majdal Shams on Tuesday. Still, Israel’s Military Medical Corp has opened its doors to the most seriously injured Syrian patients.

Col. Dr. Salman Zarka says he “swore to give medical assistance to people in need” and decided to take on a humanitarian project by helping set up a field hospital close to the frontier, giving patients with life-threatening injuries a chance to survive.

Zarka says some of those crossing are Syrian civilians caught in the crossfire. But more often than not, they receive rebel and government fighters unable to find substantial care on their side of the frontier.

“I can remember Ibrahim,” says Zarka. “Ibrahim used to be an Assad regime officer. He told us very clearly, he used to think we are inhuman and now that we saved his life, he thinks different.”

Zarka believes medicine can change people and feels privileged to help those he always learned were his enemy. A Palestinian Druze citizen of Israel, he speaks Arabic with his patients and does what he can to make them feel comfortable and welcome.

The Israeli paramedics patrol the border and provide treatment for casualties they encounter. Once Syrians are evaluated, some are sewn up and treated on the ground. Others are taken to a makeshift field hospital for basic surgery and recovery. But patients who require extensive surgery are sent to a civilian hospital, Ziv Medical Center, in the Israeli town of Tsfat, about an hour away.

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/3/18/some-syrian-woundedseektreatmentfromisraelihospitals.html

[Jefferson23]

7. Yep, their rulers are a pile of opressive, violent, corrupt and dumb control freaks...every time.

Off topic, somewhat..you see Bibi on Iran? They're reliable, just not me. lol

[oberliner]

6. Israeli hospital rebuilds injured Syrian man's face

It is not far, as the crow flies, from the battlefields of Syria to the bustling Israeli port city of Haifa.

But for one gravely injured young man, waking up after two days of unconsciousness, it was another world.

Mohammed is a young farmer from Deraa, where protests against President Bashar al-Assad began, back in 2011.

We are not using his family name, to protect his identity, but he is one of a growing number of injured Syrians receiving medical attention in Israel.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-31449362

[shaayecanaan]

8. Israel remains Syria’s only neighbour which has still not accepted refugees

As the conflict in Syria enters its fourth year, Israel remains Syria’s only neighbour which has still not accepted displaced persons and refugees fleeing the armed conflict.

International and Israeli human rights organisations are increasingly calling on Israel to open its eastern border for humanitarian reasons. Although members of the Israeli public and government invoke a moral obligation to help Syrian refugees, the government’s preferred approach is through provision of humanitarian aid to refugee camps, in particular to Jordan as Israel has tense to non-existent relations with the other neighbouring countries who are receiving Syrian refugees. While the aid is welcome, Israel – which has repeatedly cited its neutrality in the Syrian war – has the capacity to help in more direct ways.

In early 2012, the Israeli government stated it was making preparations to accept Syrian refugees in the Golan Heights as it anticipated the impending fall of the Assad regime. However, six months later, the Israeli Defence Minister asserted that any refugees attempting to cross the border into the Golan Heights would be stopped. Subsequently, invoking serious security concerns, Israel has undertaken quick and thorough measures to re-fortify the eight-metre-high, 90-kilometre-long fence along the ceasefire line between the occupied Golan and Syria, which is also monitored by a UN peacekeeping force. The Israeli military has also indicated that it would lay new minefields along the border with Syria due to the failure of previous landmines to detonate during demonstrations in 2011.

...

Whilst the medical treatment provided by the Israelis is commendable, it should be noted that after treatment the Syrian patients are then repatriated to Syria. In 2011, the UN Human Rights Council declared a blanket status of refugee to any Syrian fleeing the country due to the conflict, yet Israel continues to violate the principle of non-refoulement in this regard. Physicians for Human Rights-Israel have advocated for Syrian patients to be allowed to apply for asylum after medical treatment, rather than being involuntarily returned to a war zone.

- See more at: http://www.fmreview.org/syria/plotner#sthash.8VavvkKR.dpuf

[oberliner]

9. Palestinian leader rejects deal on Syria refugees

From 2013:

Abbas said he asked U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon last month to seek Israeli permission to bring Palestinians caught in Syria's civil war to the Palestinian territories. The request came after fighting between Syrian troops and rebel fighters in Yarmouk, the largest Palestinian refugee camp in Syria. About half of the camp's 150,000 residents have fled, according to a U.N. aid agency.

Abbas told a group of Egyptian journalists in Cairo late Wednesday that Ban contacted Israel on his behalf.

Abbas said Ban was told Israel "agreed to the return of those refugees to Gaza and the West Bank, but on condition that each refugee ... sign a statement that he doesn't have the right of return (to Israel)."

"So we rejected that and said it's better they die in Syria than give up their right of return," Abbas told the group. Some of his comments were published Thursday by the Palestinian news website Sama.

http://news.yahoo.com/palestinian-leader-rejects-deal-syria-refugees-105551580.html

[shaayecanaan]

10. Is it golden oldies time again?

Fair enough. Stick this one on the jukebox:-

"If I knew it was possible to save all Jewish children of Germany by their transfer to England and only half of them by transferring them to Israel, I would choose the latter—because we are faced not only with the accounting of these Jewish children but also with the historical accounting of the Jewish People.”

David Ben Gurion, First prime minister of Israel

[shira]

13. This quote came right after the 1939 White Paper, denying Jews entry into Palestine

You ever see the movie Sophie's choice? Great choice, huh?

==============

The UK would take in some children but forever close off Jewish access to Palestine in the process. Millions of Jews helpless, with nowhere to go.

You think the UK was being benevolent to the Jews?

[shaayecanaan]

15. Getting closer...

"The UK Israel would take in some children but forever close off Jewish Arab access to the rest of mandatory Palestine in the process. Millions of Jews Arabs helpless, with nowhere to go."

And now you know why Abbas had to refuse. He has indicated his flexibility on RoR before, but it would be difficult for him to sign it away without even the promise of a final status agreement.

Do you think that Israel was being benevolent to the Palestinians?

[shira]

16. Huh? There's no comparison.

Refugees and their descendants would be allowed back into part of Mandatory Palestine, their homeland.

Jews were being closed off entirely from theirs as they faced annihilation.

[shaayecanaan]

17. You're right

The UK was willing to offer Jews permanent asylum and citizenship on equal footing with every other Briton.

Whereas Israel was only willing to offer continued statelessness in a rump state that Israel has no right to anyway and where they could be shot or jailed at the more or less unfettered discretion of Israel's armed forces.

You're right. There really is no comparison.

[shira]

18. The UK was not willing to offer Jews permanent asylum...

They were willing to take in some Jews, while closing off Israel entirely to the rest of Jews (greater than 99.99%) worldwide.

Meanwhile, Palestinian refugees today could be absorbed into Gaza and the W.Bank easily.

[shaayecanaan]

19. Yes they were

"take in" some Jews means to offer them permanent asylum. Whether we're talking a lot of Jews, some Jews or a few Jews is another question, the fact is that Britain was prepared to offer citizenship, whereas Israel was of course offering far less than that.

[shira]

20. There's still no honest comparison b/w Ben Gurion and Abbas.

You're actually defending the British proposal to take in a few Jews so that the doors would slam shut on Jews throughout Europe seeking asylum in Israel.

Abbas only consigned 150,000 refugees to death in Israel.

With your defense of the Brits, you're consigning millions of Jews to their deaths in Nazi occupied Europe.

Correct me if I'm wrong about your view here.

=============

But yes, you're right. The Brits were willing to give permanent asylum to some Jews.

[oberliner]

14. 2013 was only 2 years ago

The current Israeli PM was still PM then and the PA leader then is the same as the current one.

Israel offered to facilitate getting Palestinian refugees out of Syria and into Palestine and was rejected by the current leader of the PA who said he would rather see them die than give up RoR.

Maybe can we focus on current events rather than going back to WWII and The Holocaust? I know that is a favorite topic of Bibi's but I think we can be better than that here.

[azurnoir]

31. So it could seem you support Israel's attempt to circumvent any negotiation on RoR

by holding the lives of Palestinian refugees as a pricetag, how far does this type of thing go?

[shira]

34. The RoR is fiction. Israel offered to help save 150,000 but Abbas refused.

They could be in what the UN has already recognized as the State of Palestine, ie, the West Bank.

Would you rather see them die than give up on some make-believe RoR?

[azurnoir]

35. so it is fiction that RoR was designated to be part of a negotiated peace?

[shira]

36. It's an individual choice, isn't it? Abbas gave them no choice but to die...

Seems you agree with Abbas' decision to deny the refugees their choice, so apparently they die if it were up to you.

Nice.

[shira]

11. Damned if they take Syrians in, damned if they don't. n/t

[grossproffit]

12. YEP! SSDD! eom

[oberliner]

21. Alternate reality version: Israel Refuses to Treat Injured Syrians

Dozens of injured Syrians made their way to Israeli hospitals only to be turned away and refused treatment.

This callous disregard for human life is symptomatic of a larger problem in Israel where Arabs are seen as something less than human.

Medical professionals have a responsibility to treat people who are suffering life threatening injuries regardless of their nationality or political leanings.

In turning away these injured Syrians, Israel commits another shameful act that is typical of a nation that is built on racism.

Something like that?

[shira]

22. Exactly. Israel bashers damn them when they help and damn them if they don't. n/t

[leftynyc]

26. Precisely why

I no longer give a shit and couldn't possibly care less what the Israel sucks brigade has to say about anything. Just this week, watching them fall over themselves whining about congress voting to be involved in the Iran deal - after watching bush/cheney in action for 8 years - hypocrites. They're against congress being involved right up to the second a Democrat is not in the White House - and all because they hate Bibi.

On this story - Good for the Israeli doctors who take their oath seriously.