Reply #34: Now this is going to get interesting.

[msmcghee]

I have spent the last hour reviewing the "new" evidence presented in this HRW report.

I have no problem condemning Israel for attacking two ambulances if that's what Israel did. But this report leaves much to be desired in terms of proof. I'll just draw attention now to two of what I see as major omissions / inconsistencies in this report.

My problem lies mostly in the area of the shrapnel holes in the roofs of both ambulances. The photos show the shrapnel entering from the outside and directly above the roof based on the orientation of the clearly visible bent back edges of the holes in both ambulance roofs. (This report shows the only clear views of the roof of 777 - these were not shown in the Zombietime report.) They match the images of the 782 roof from before pretty well. The edges are all bent inward.

That means that the "missiles" had to explode in the air above both ambulances and before they entered either ambulance.

That raises several questions.

a) Why didn't HRW pick up a few pieces of shrapnel from inside the ambulances and show them to us? By looking at the pictures there should have been hundreds of pieces of jagged metal that would not look anything like the metal from the ambulance itself. That would have gone a long way to dispel doubts but there is no shrapnel offered as evidence.

b) All the shrapnel holes appear to be from objects traveling straight down through the roof. I see no holes that appear to come from projectiles coming in at an angle to the roof. How can that be? The missile is reported by HRW to have come straight down from above. If it explodes most of the shrapnel would have to have a trajectory at right angles to the missile trajectory (based on the cylindrical shape of missiles). Some, probably most of the shrapnel, from a missile from that angle would have made angular cuts in the roof. None of those holes that I can see fit that description.

c) If the missiles exploded above the ambulance, what made the clean circular holes through the roof vents, what was left to amputate Fawaz's leg, what made the clean hole in the gurney, and what then was left to cut the small clean holes in the pavement.

d) Why didn't HRW gather samples from the holes in the pavement and have them analyzed. Missiles are not usually made of same metals that ambulances are. To save weight they use things like aluminum and titanium (although some projectiles are loaded with heavier metal parts to cause damage on explosion). Ambulances are made of sheet steel. These certainly were as the rust shows. This would have been an easy definitive way to show that the missiles actually existed and that the holes in the pavement and the roofs of the ambulances were not made in some other way.

e) The whole question of why a missile would be set to explode before it hits its target dissipating its energy into the air above the target rather than in the target itself. And of course how an already exploded missile is still intact to make clean circular holes in the pavement after traveling through ambulance roof and floors and gurneys. I notice that HRW did not provide photos of similar holes made by any of the many missile strikes in Lebanon or elsewhere. Such clean holes in the pavement from an already exploded missile seem quite improbable to me.

I see many more inconsistencies in this report. But rather than me argue about them now, I'll just make a prediction that anyone here is free to hold me to.

In the following days there will be many serious questions raised about this report and HRW's credibility in issuing it.

We should all stock up up on popcorn.

And again, if I see any conclusive evidence that this happened the way HRW described it here, I will change my mind and join in condemning those responsible for such an inhumane and immoral act. (That's assuming there were no mitigating factors like targeting errors or things like that - which seem pretty unlikely.)