| Subscribe! | Judaica Gifts |
| RSS | Advertise with Us | Blogs | Judaica Gifts |
| 
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
|
|
Ron defends use of live bullets Former northern police district commander Insp. Alec Ron yesterday defended the use of live bullets by policemen, including snipers from the anti-terror unit, during the October 2000 riots in the Israeli Arab sector. Thirteen Arabs were killed during eight days of violent demonstrations, which Ron described yesterday as a 'civil insurrection involving a wild mob. It was like the 1930s, with Arabs screaming 'Slaughter the Jews.' In my opinion, the riots threatened the state of Israel.' According to Ron, 25,000 Israeli Arabs participated in the violence in his district. Ron is one of 14 people who received warning letters from the Or Judicial Commission of Inquiry into the riots. According to the letter, he is suspected of contributing to the poor relations between him and the local Arab leadership, failing to prepare the police to handle the riots, not making sure enough troops were deployed on October 1, not keeping himself informed of events in the district during the first two days of the riots, not taking steps to prevent more fatalities after the first two days, and being responsible for the unjustified sniper fire in Umm el-Fahm on October 2 in which one rioter was killed. Regarding the use of snipers, Ron argued that the lives of the policemen deployed at the Umm el-Fahm intersection on October 2 were in danger after rioters began to use slingshots, and a policemen was struck by a stone and wounded. Ron said that a study carried out by the US and Israel proved conclusively that slingshots could kill. Furthermore, a policeman had been wounded by gunfire the night before the clash at Umm el-Fahm. 'The police were in grave danger,' said Ron. 'We were not trigger-happy.' Ron said that he was surprised by the intensity of the riots that broke out on October 1. According to reports by police intelligence and Israel's security agency, the Shin Bet, the riots that broke out at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on September 27, 2000 were expected to continue in Jerusalem and the territories but not in northern Israel, said Ron. Furthermore, between 1997 and the outbreak of the violence, the police had been devoting most of their energy to crime fighting. Internal security took a back seat during these years, and therefore the police were not geared to cope with outbreaks of violence on such a scale. Ron added that he had personally warned government leaders and the police of the climate in the Arab sector, but said his warnings had gone unheeded by then-Minister of Internal Security Shlomo Ben-Ami. He accused Attorney- General Elyakim Rubinstein of ignoring his complaints regarding pronouncements or actions against the police or the state by Israeli Arabs. Ron also added that he had asked for police reinforcements to cope with potential trouble in the northern district, including an additional 5,000 policemen. He said that a war game played by northern district police was not serious because the government did not follow up on the lessons learned and provide the police with the manpower and weapons they needed. But during questioning, Ron acknowledged that a plan code named Magical Tune did envision the widespread riots that erupted in October 2000. According to the plan, a total of 640 police were to have been deployed in the Misgav area, one of the most sensitive in the North, in the event of riots on such a scale. In actual fact, only 48 policemen were on duty in the Sahknin area on the morning of October 2. During that day, two Arabs were killed in the area. Ron admitted he had said harsh things about local Arab leaders, including Ra'ed Salah, head of the radical branch of the Islamic movement, whom he called an 'incorrigible liar.' He told the head of the commission, Supreme Court Justice Theodore Or, that he should not always have expressed himself in such a harsh way, but that what he said about the Arab leadership was true.
|
|
|
|
|
 |
