Genocidal Israelis
Napalmed Civilian Refugees
We should hardly be surprised that the International
Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague has found that there is a basis to proceed
in the case brought by the government of South Africa against Israel for
genocide in its attack on Gaza. Israel
has a very bad record in matters such as this, most notably, in its ethnic
cleansing of Palestine in 1948. Less
well known is its barbaric behavior during and immediately after the Six Day
War of June 1967.
At least those who are familiar with the
event know that the Israelis shot up lifeboats and even dropped napalm on the
deck of the USS
Liberty during that war. Less
well known is its use of napalm in its eastern theater of operations. The following account is from Canadian
religious journalist A. C. Forrest in his 1971 book, The
unHoly Land:
One of the horror stories being told in
Amman was of the experiences of fleeing refugees being sprayed with
napalm. At first
I didn’t believe it and shuddered at the thought of using some of the pictures
of victims available in Jordan.
“If it were about Vietnam you’d publish them wouldn’t you?” a Palestinian said.
General Sir John Glubb,
in his interpretation of The
Middle East Crisis, published in July 1967 and frequently reprinted,
states:
“The greater part of the Jordan army were [sic] destroyed by napalm....”
He quotes from a signed statement from a team
of doctors of the American University of Beirut who volunteered to help in
Jordan military hospitals:
“I handled 600 to 700 patients of whom 160
were civilians. Two hundred were
suffering from secondary degree burns. I
did not see a single bullet wound.”
“Many soldiers say that their units were
destroyed by fire without their ever seeing an Israeli soldier.”
“A doctor reported that the Mobile Field Hospital,
containing 350 patients, was incinerated with all its patients and staff by
napalm,” Glubb says..
Israel tried to keep the outside world
from knowing about their quiet, effective use of napalm, and Zionists abroad
denied it. But some of the living
victims were in an Amman hospital.
Mr. [Shukri] Saleh* was very upset about
Mr. Sami Oweida, a Jericho official who remained at
his post until the afternoon of July 7th, then gave in to the pleas
of his family and left for the East Bank.
I decided to interview Mr. Oweida, but he
spoke only Arabic. Later I got a
translation of his transcribed story.
“We left at 2:30 P.M. on Wednesday, and on
the way to the bridge saw about 200 bodies of soldiers and civilians.... We crossed the King Hussein [Allenby] Bridge,
walking. Planes were going
overhead.... We tried to avoid big crowds,
thinking the planes would bomb the crowds.
“Then at that moment [about 4 P.M.] I saw
a plane come down like a hawk directly at us.
We threw ourselves on the ground and found ourselves in
the midst of fire. Children were
on fire. Myself, my two daughters, my
son, and two children of my cousin. I tried
to do something but in vain. Fire was
all around. I carried my burning child
outside the fire. The burning people
became naked. Fire stuck to my hands and
face. I rolled over. The fire rolled with me.
“I saw another plane coming directly at
us. I thought it was the end. I saw the pilot lean over and look at me.
“My daughter, Kabiba
[four years old], died that night. Two
children of my cousin also died. My daughter
Adla, seventeen years old, died four days later.”
The Oweidas were
still in hospital. When I went to
Jerusalem later I had pictures of them, I am not sure
why, with a lot of other film. I showed
some of them to a travel agent in East Jerusalem with whom I was arranging
transport to Bethlehem. His name was
transliterated as “Aweidah.” “My God,” he exclaimed when he saw the
pictures, “that’s my nephew from Jericho.
My niece begged me to go to Amman too.
But I was a refugee before and decided not to go this time.” He looked at the pictures again—of nephews
and nieces and cousins, civilians who had fled from Jericho and had been
napalmed from the air.
I wished I had stuck to the business of
going to Bethlehem and hadn’t shown pictures from the other side.
Later I did publish one of the pictures in
the United Church Observer, of a little girl recovering from napalm
burns. That, I was told, proved I was
anti-Semitic. To condemn napalm in
Vietnam is alright. To report its use by
the Israelis is considered anti-Semitic. (pp. 16-17)
*Shukri Saleh was the Palestinian
Secretary of the Jordan office of the Near East Council of Churches refugee
division who hosted Forrest’s visit to Jordan.
David Martin
January 29, 2024
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