Reckless Clarity
It is very difficult to understand much of anything about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict if your primary news source is the NY Times. Case in point this NY Times report of an incident involving the Israeli Border police and a Palestinian. The headline reads: Police kill a Palestinian Driver
JERUSALEM — Israeli border police officers fatally shot a Palestinian man in the contested East Jerusalem area on Friday after he hit them with his car, the Israeli police said, although the exact circumstances remained unclear.
A police spokesman, Micky Rosenfeld, said that two border police officers were lightly injured after being hit by the car in the predominantly Palestinian neighborhood of Wadi Joz and that the police were studying whether the driver had hit them deliberately. The driver was shot after he fled the car on foot and ignored calls by the police to stop.
Actually, the exact circumstances surrounding the shooting appear quite clear to me and can be found at the Israeli Leftie daily Ynet News:
Four Border Guard officers were lightly injured Friday after being run over by a Palestinian driving a pickup truck in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Joz. The driver was shot, and quickly died of his wounds. His body was later snatched from the hospital and he was buried at a cemetery near Temple Mount.
After the incident, the assailant attempted to escape by foot and was shot by a Border Guard force stationed in the area. He was critically wounded and died shortly afterwards. Police suspect the incident was nationalistically motivated.
According to an initial investigation, the Palestinian spotted Border Guard officers arriving at the neighborhood following warnings of upcoming riots. Soldiers belonging to a Border Guard training base were walking single file when the driver began speeding and driving towards them.
Some of the policemen managed to jump to the side, but four of them were hit by the vehicle and evacuated to the Hadassah Mount Scopus Hospital. The company commander began chasing the assailant, who tried to flee the scene. According to the police, he was shot after failing to obey the police’s call to stop.
The driver was evacuated by the Red Crescent to the al-Maqasid Hospital in east Jerusalem. Another passenger who was in the car with him was apparently injured by stones hurled at the road earlier and was evacuated to the Hadassah Mount Scopus Hospital. The police are looking into his version that the driver who ran over the officers was trying to evacuate him to receive medical treatment.
Now the only thing which is not clear is whether the injured Palestinian passenger in the car is telling the truth or not in regards to the driver’s motives. After all, he’s suffering from a head injury which he got at a rock throwing protest against the Israelis. Be that as it may what is quite clear is this – if you use your vehicle to run over 4 border police in Israel the Border police tend to preceive such actions as a personal intent to kill rather than just reckless and negliant operation of a motor vehicle.
