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The Pentagon has announced it will soon start flying bombing missions out of the Kurdish region of northern Iraq as part of an expanded U.S.-led military campaign against militants from the Islamic State. But it remains unclear when the U.S. will begin launching airstrikes in Syria. According to McClatchy, President Obama has not yet authorized the U.S. Central Command to conduct offensive combat operations in Syria as many questions over U.S. strategy remain unresolved. To talk more about President Obama’s plans to expand U.S. military operations in Iraq and to bomb Syria, we are joined by one of the nation’s leading peace activists, Medea Benjamin, founder of CodePink which held a protest outside the White House on Wednesday during President Obama’s speech. She is the author of "Drone Warfare: Killing by Remote Control."
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: The Pentagon has announced it will soon start flying bombing missions out of the Kurdish region of northern Iraq as part of an expanded U.S.-led military campaign against militants from the Islamic State. But it remains unclear when the U.S. will begin launching airstrikes in Syria. According to McClatchy news service, President Obama has not yet authorized the U.S. Central Command to conduct offensive combat operations in Syria, as many questions over U.S. strategy remain unresolved.
AMY GOODMAN: On Thursday, 10 Arab countries—Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and six Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia and Qatar—agreed to help the United States fight the Sunni militants that have seized swaths of Iraq and Syria. The commitment came after foreign ministers from the countries met with Secretary of State John Kerry in Saudi Arabia.
SECRETARY OF STATE JOHN KERRY: Arab nations play a critical role in that coalition, the leading role, really, across all lines of effort: military support, humanitarian aid, our work to stop the flow of illegal funds and foreign fighters, which ISIL requires in order to thrive, and certainly the effort to repudiate once and for all the dangerous, the offensive, the insulting distortion of Islam that ISIL propaganda attempts to spread throughout the region and the world.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Secretary of State Kerry’s trip to Saudi Arabia came on the 13th anniversary of the September 11th attacks, which were carried out by 19 hijackers, among them 15 Saudis. On Thursday, Iran questioned the U.S. plan to fight the Islamic State and blamed Gulf nations, including Saudi Arabia, for stoking the Sunni militancy that led to the Islamic State’s rise. An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said Iran had, quote, "severe misgivings about the coalition’s determination to sincerely fight the root causes of terrorism." As part of the agreement, Saudi Arabia is expected to provide training for what’s been described as moderate Syrian opposition fighters, but it remains unclear what groups actually fit that description. There was also discussion in Saudi Arabia of using the newly formed coalition to also attack other Islamist groups besides the Islamic State.
AMY GOODMAN: To talk more about President Obama’s plans to expand U.S. military operations in Iraq and to bomb Syria, we’re joined by one of the nation’s leading peace activists, Medea Benjamin, founder of CodePink, which held a protest outside the White House Wednesday night during President Obama’s speech. Medea is author of Drone Warfare: Killing by Remote Control. She’s joining us from Oklahoma City.
Medea, welcome to Democracy Now! Can you respond to President Obama’s speech and the fact that the vast majority of Americans polled support taking military action in Iraq and Syria?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: I think President Obama has been hounded by the media, by the war hawks in Congress, mostly from the Republican side but also from the Democrats, and is going into this insane not only bombing in Iraq, but also talking about going into Syria, at a time when just a couple of months ago the American people had made it very clear that we were very tired of war. In fact, when Obama tried to do this a year ago, the American people rose up and demanded that Congress take a vote and that Congress say no, and Obama backed out. So, I think the support of the American people is very skin deep, Amy, and that if we, as a peace-loving people, do our job right now in getting out there and making some noise, we can actually have an impact in stopping the U.S. from getting into Syria and, I think, in stopping the U.S. from this insane, never-ending war.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Medea, what about the status of the peace movement right now? There has not been so far, in the last few days, much of an outcry from peace advocates on this new policy of the Obama administration.
MEDEA BENJAMIN: Well, the peace movement was really decimated when Obama came in, and has been trying to rebuild ever since. But I think now we have to think of all of us as the peace movement. Now is the time to say, if you’re an environmentalist, you better understand that war is the greatest environmental disaster and the U.S. military is the greatest polluter on the planet. If you care about having money for youth groups or for infrastructure or for green energy, you better understand that sucking money into the military—we’re now paying $7.5 million for just the bombing in Iraq. Imagine if we start going into Syria. We can’t afford this. If you’re people that care about money in politics, this is the time to get out there and say this is part of the subsidy to the military-industrial complex. This is an issue for all of us out there now, and we’ve got to get on the phones, we’ve got to get into the streets, we’ve got to demand town hall meetings, get our representatives and say to them, "We want you to vote on this. That’s your responsibility. And we want you to vote no."
AMY GOODMAN: President Obama vowed the U.S.-led operation against ISIS would not repeat the attacks of recent wars. This is what he said.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: I want the American people to understand how this effort will be different from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It will not involve American combat troops fighting on foreign soil. This counterterrorism campaign will be waged through a steady, relentless effort to take out ISIL wherever they exist, using our air power and our support for partners’ forces on the ground. This strategy of taking out terrorists who threaten us, while supporting partners on the front lines, is one that we have successfully pursued in Yemen and Somalia for years. And it is consistent with the approach I outlined earlier this year: to use force against anyone who threatens America’s core interests, but to mobilize partners wherever possible to address broader challenges to international order.
AMY GOODMAN: Medea, can you respond to President Obama and to the issue of, well, what is the alternative right now to U.S.-led military strikes?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: Well, it’s almost comical to hear him talk about Yemen and Somalia as positive examples, because they are disasters. If you look at the results of U.S. intervention, it’s been to take a relatively isolated place like Afghanistan, where there were extremists, and now spread them out to Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Iraq, Syria, Libya, northern Africa. I mean, this has been a policy that the results have been fantastically tragic. And to think that adding more fuel to the fire is going to be a positive result is just insanity. So, I think we have to come out and say, "Been there, done that." We’ve already destroyed Iraq and created the conditions, by not addressing the Sunni grievances, for ISIS to exist.
What we have to do now is be part of not this warmed-over "coalition of the willing" that George Bush put together, but a real U.N.-led effort. The Sunnis have to have their grievances addressed. We have to stop the flow of weapons to the entire region, where the U.S. is the purveyor of 80 percent of those weapons. We have to stop countries from buying the oil that ISIS is selling. We have to address the huge humanitarian crisis that we have helped create. There’s many things that we can do that could be positive, but certainly bombing is not one of them.
AMY GOODMAN: Medea, we’d like you to stay with us. We’re going to break right now, and when we come back, we’ll be joined by the Academy Award-winning filmmaker Haskell Wexler, who’s deeply concerned about using, invoking the name of James Foley, the beheaded journalist, beheaded by ISIS, when President Obama cited his name in explaining why the U.S. would be attacking Iraq and Syria. Stay with us.
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In his address on Wednesday night, President Obama invoked the memory of two American journalists, James Foley and Steven Sotloff, who were recently beheaded by the Islamic State, as he outlined his case for expanded military actions in Iraq and U.S. airstrikes against the group inside Syria. We speak to Academy Award-winning filmmaker Haskell Wexler, who worked with James Foley in 2012 in Chicago while he was making a film about protests against the NATO Summit. "For the President to use Jim’s name and other journalists as reason to pursue the stated military policy to 'degrade and destroy the Islamic State so that it is no longer a threat' is an insult to the memory of James Foley and to the intelligence of the American people," Wexler wrote this week. We speak to Wexler and hear James Foley in his own words, from a video interview he did with Wexler.
Image Credit: Haskell Wexler/fourdaysinchicago.com
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: In his address to the nation Wednesday night, President Obama invoked the memory of two American journalists, James Foley and Steven Sotloff, who were recently beheaded by the Islamic State, as he outlined his case for U.S. airstrikes against the group inside Syria.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: in a region that has known so much bloodshed, these terrorists are unique in their brutality. They execute captured prisoners. They kill children. They enslave, rape and forced women into marriage. They threaten the religious minority with genocide. And in acts of barbarism, they took the lives of two American journalists, Jim Foley and Steven Sotloff. So ISIL poses a threat to the people of Iraq and Syria and the broader Middle East, including American citizens, personnel and facilities. If left unchecked, these terrorists could pose a growing threat beyond that region, including to the United States.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: President Obama’s reference to James Foley in his bid for U.S.-led military aggression offended a filmmaker who worked with Foley during anti-NATO protests in 2012, shortly before he returned to Syria. Both Foley and the legendary cinematographer and director Haskell Wexler were in Chicago when veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars led protests against the NATO summit there and hurled their war medals toward its gates.
AMY GOODMAN: Haskell Wexler has won two Academy Awards for cinematography, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Bound for Glory. Over his six decades of filmmaking, he has also received five Oscar nominations and an Emmy. He is perhaps best known for his 1969 film, Medium Cool, which includes scenes of the '68 protests in Chicago during the Democratic National Convention. He returned to Chicago to make Four Days in Chicago, about the NATO protests, and interviewed James Foley, who was also there to report. After they talked, Foley offered to use his own camera to shoot footage for the Haskell Wexler's new film.
Well, shortly before Obama spoke Wednesday, Wexler wrote in a Facebook post, quote, "For the President to use Jim’s name and other journalists as reason to pursue the stated military policy to 'degrade and destroy the Islamic State so that it is no longer a threat' is an insult to the memory of James Foley and to the intelligence of the American people." Wexler will join us in a moment, but first, this is a clip Wexler shared with Democracy Now! from his 2012 interview with James Foley.
HASKELL WEXLER: What countries recently have you been filming, taping?
JAMES FOLEY: Libya, Syria. I was in Afghanistan with U.S. troops in 2010. And I’m really interested in the young guys, the ones that are just coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan, those guys’ perspectives, you know, because that—that has a huge impact, you know. And if they’re giving their medals back, that’s—that harkens back, right, to the Winter Soldiers, right, essentially in Vietnam and Kerry and what those guys did, right? So, I’m really interested in that young mentality. I’ve seen young vets that are in Occupy in D.C. and New York, and kind of gravitated towards them a little bit, because I think, I mean, they are the most authentic—they have the most authentic voice to criticize, you know, NATO right now. They were inside the beast. So...
HASKELL WEXLER: Yeah.
JAMES FOLEY: Of course, I was, too, but I was just a journalist. You know, I was a journalist.
HASKELL WEXLER: So, to a certain extent, you have to be embedded, and in order to get your credentials and when you travel, passports, [inaudible].
JAMES FOLEY: Yeah, you’re totally—when you’re embedded in this era, you’re totally dependent on the U.S. military, for logistics, food, security, of course, everything. And, you know, you develop a certain bond with these guys, that you have to wake up and remind yourself every day, "I’m a journalist."
HASKELL WEXLER: Yeah.
JAMES FOLEY: "I’m not one of the soldiers," you know, just to maintain your sense of objectivity, I’d say.
HASKELL WEXLER: Yeah.
JAMES FOLEY: And it becomes very difficult, because you’re out there in the sticks or whatever or mountains with them. And, you know, some of those guys would—you know, they would sacrifice for you, and your question is, well, what do you owe them? And ultimately, you owe them the truth, what you see. So, it’s tough. It’s tough, yeah. But it’s a good opportunity to be away from the embed, too, because you’re only seeing like the Afghans, for example, through that lens. You really can’t get any real knowledge of what the Afghan people really think, when you’re walking around with 15 guys and getting out of an armored vehicle and using an Army interpreter, you know? You’re not really getting an idea of what’s going to happen in the future of Afghanistan, you know, when we leave.
HASKELL WEXLER: The one thing that you mentioned, the feeling of brotherhood, in terms of valor, in terms of [inaudible] and so forth, is so bad, because that particular feeling, we all have and could be used for good things, you know?
JAMES FOLEY: Right, right.
HASKELL WEXLER: We should look out for one another and feel for one another.
JAMES FOLEY: Right.
HASKELL WEXLER: I mean, that’s—and the Army needs that, but so do human beings.
JAMES FOLEY: That is sad, because it’s some of the strongest bonds amongst young men, giving your life for your brother.
HASKELL WEXLER: Yeah.
JAMES FOLEY: But to what end are we—
HASKELL WEXLER: Yeah.
JAMES FOLEY: You know, to what end is the greater purpose? And that’s—I guess that’s the root question of NATO, right?
HASKELL WEXLER: Yeah.
JAMES FOLEY: What end are fighting these wars against?
HASKELL WEXLER: Yeah.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s journalist James Foley, who was beheaded last month by the Islamic State, speaking in 2012 with the legendary cinematographer, journalist, filmmaker, Haskell Wexler, in Chicago at the anti-NATO protests.
For more, we go directly to Haskell Wexler, who’s in Los Angeles right now. Haskell, thanks so much for sharing this incredible interview with us. We’re going to play more of James Foley. Talk about why you are bringing this out now.
HASKELL WEXLER: Amy, I’m pissed off. I am angry. I am—I see how the American public is being confused, lied to and given theater, to make us buy that war is the way to have peace, and to use a journalist like Jim Foley, who was truly a journalist—wants to search for the truth, actually was out amongst them, and volunteered to work with my film group in Chicago, which were there documenting an anti—anti-NATO demonstration. In fact, he himself took a camera, and I have 30 minutes of film of him talking to people in Chicago, so that he was not a person detached, objective journalist. He realized that our foreign policy is destructive, when you had a humanitarian crisis that hurt him deeply that he saw in Syria.
And a funny thing is, the government knew what his position is, with all the surveillance, was—and on just students in Chicago who were opposing NATO and the war, the taking of their computers, certainly the look into journalists and their points of view. If they didn’t know before, when James Foley took a camera to work with me and my fellow Chicago filmmakers in an anti-NATO film, there’s no question on what side of the fence he’s on. And the government functions on "you’re either 100 percent for us, or you’re the enemy." And that’s why a lot of our discussions and other interviews was Jim talking about the other, how authorities can establish who the other is, and once they’re other, they’re less than human, they’re less than smart, and you can do anything to them, because you have to teach them a lesson. So, for them to use him as a poster boy for more violence is obscene, and I think that the country has to know it’s obscene.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Haskell Wexler, let’s go to footage that you shared with us of Foley speaking with you in 2012 at the anti-NATO protests in Chicago. Here’s another clip.
HASKELL WEXLER: The other, that’s us. We’re the ones that make it insecure.
JAMES FOLEY: I’m interested in what you said about the other, the categorization of the other, because you see it in all conflicts and wars. And you see it in El Salvador, you see it here. And I saw it in Libya and Syria. And it’s like both sides attempting to, you know, paint a group as the enemy, as the other, and what happens, the dehumanization process of that. And that’s extremely dangerous. But I guess it has to happen; it happens in a war so that they can kill each other.
HASKELL WEXLER: Yeah.
JAMES FOLEY: So.
HASKELL WEXLER: But it seems like it’s slicker here—
JAMES FOLEY: Right.
HASKELL WEXLER: —in that they say, the policing authorities, they are Chicago.
JAMES FOLEY: Right, right.
HASKELL WEXLER: They are Chicago, and they are protecting Chicago. And then they call the word "security." How do they separate—I think the media helps separate us from people. TV does it, you know, normally.
JAMES FOLEY: Right. Because what is this coverage—you know, what is this coverage going to focus on? You know, we’ll see some shots of police, you know, and we’ll see cutaways to protesters. Hopefully they’ll get some kind of action in there. And then that’s essentially the story. Doesn’t go much deeper than that on broadcast news, certainly, so...
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Haskell Wexler, you were in Chicago at the NATO summit making a film, Four Days in Chicago. How did you—and that’s how you came across Foley. How did you end up deciding to make that film?
HASKELL WEXLER: I didn’t hear that question.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I said, the film that you were making in Chicago, Four Days in Chicago, at the NATO summit, when you met Jim Foley, how did you decide to make that film?
HASKELL WEXLER: I decided to make that film because Chicago is my hometown. And in 1968, when another antiwar demonstration was there, the power of the police and the state went in there and suppressed them brutally, and later it was called a police riot. And then, when the Occupy was announced to be in Chicago, the Chicago Tribune had an article that the mayor—quoted the mayor saying that this is not going to be like '68. And actually he mentioned my film, Medium Cool, and he said they're going to deal with these people in a new way. And so, I decided I better go back to my hometown and find out what’s there. And I went there with two West Coast filmmakers who were ex-Chicago people, Andy Davis and Mike Gray, and with the help of a lot of young people in Chicago, we made a film called Four Days in Chicago.
AMY GOODMAN: Haskell Wexler, I wanted to get your reaction to Diane Foley, James Foley’s mother, who did an interview last night with CNN’s Anderson Cooper. She said officials told her she could face prosecution if she tried to raise a ransom to free her son. She said the U.S. had also refused to exchange prisoners or carry out a military rescue effort early on.
DIANE FOLEY: I think our efforts to get Jim freed were an annoyance, you know? And I—
ANDERSON COOPER: An annoyance to the government.
DIANE FOLEY: Yes. And they—yeah, and it wasn’t—didn’t seem to be in our strategic interest, if you will. I was appalled as an American. Jim would have been saddened. Jim believed 'til the end that his country would come to their aid. We're dealing with very difficult people when we talk about ISIS. Their hate for us is great. And yet, some of our response to them has only increased the hate. You know? So, I feel there’s a need for debate, discussion. I pray that our government will be willing to learn from the mistakes that were made and to acknowledge that there are better ways for American citizens to be treated.
AMY GOODMAN: So that was the exclusive interview that Anderson Cooper of CNN did with Diane Foley, James Foley’s mother. They have a full-page ad in The New York Times today on their new foundation. Haskell Wexler, your response, as Diane Foley says the U.S. government treated these parents, before James Foley was beheaded, as an annoyance?
HASKELL WEXLER: I’m trying to get over my anger, that I expressed early, about the theatrical utilization of the opposite of what James Foley, and try to concentrate on what lessons we have from this situation. And I thought—I saw James Foley’s mother, and I thought here’s a brave, good woman, sort of representing everything that America is all about, and she’s saying that our government is not telling the truth. And our media, in the main—maybe a few breakthroughs now, certainly with you, but otherwise—are saying that—what they call America being "war-weary." It’s not we’re just tired of fighting war, but we’re tired of being deceived and having that deception taken from all the needs that we have in America today.
AMY GOODMAN: This is interesting also because the spokesperson for the family of the other beheaded journalist, Steven Sotloff, spoke to CNN on Wednesday, Barak Barfi, and said Sotloff was sold to ISIL by other so-called moderate Syrian rebels.
BARAK BARFI: For the first time, we can say Steven was sold at the border. Steven’s name was on a list that he had been responsible for the bombing of a hospital. This was false. Activists spread his name around.
ANDERSON COOPER: He was sold at the border?
BARAK BARFI: Yes. We believe that the so-called moderate rebels that people want our administration to support, one of them sold him probably for something between $25,000 and $50,000 to ISIS. And that was the reason that he was captured.
AMY GOODMAN: That is Barak Barfi, the spokesperson for Steven Sotloff, the family, the other journalist who was beheaded. I wanted to bring Medea Benjamin, leading peace activist, back into this conversation. As you listen to Haskell Wexler, Medea, and you hear the mothers, Diane Foley, and the spokesperson for Steven Sotloff, the two beheaded journalists whose names President Obama has invoked in justifying this military campaign, your thoughts?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: Well, first, my heart goes out to Diane Foley as a mother, but my heart goes out to the hundreds of people that we have killed in an equally barbaric fashion with our drone strikes, where we incinerate people alive, leaving pieces of their flesh lying in trees, doing this to mothers, to children, to teachers, to farmers. Every one of those drone strikes is a barbaric killing, a barbaric tragedy. So, we do not have the moral high ground in this, unfortunately.
AMY GOODMAN: And, Haskell Wexler, your final thoughts today, after you bring us the video of James Foley at this antiwar protest in 2012?
HASKELL WEXLER: Well, my final thought for today is that the government—that is, our military government— and I’m saying that it’s far more deeply militaristic than we even realize—that our government is going to do whatever it’s going to do. It’s certainly shown that about Syria. But they have to develop new theatrical events to make it seem like something good—you know, dropping bombs and then humanitarian aid, as the public thing is today of a new policy. So I think we have to know how the forces are, and to realize there is plenty in this country that will see through the sham before it’s too late.
AMY GOODMAN: Haskell Wexler, I thank you for being with us, legendary cinematographer, journalist, director, perhaps best known for his 1969 film, Medium Cool. Haskell Wexler has won two Academy Awards for cinematography in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Bound for Glory. Over his six decades of filmmaking, Haskell Wexler has also received five Oscar nominations and an Emmy. He worked with journalist James Foley in 2012 before Foley returned to Syria, where he was kidnapped and beheaded by ISIS. They met when Foley helped shoot video for Haskell Wexler’s film, Four Days in Chicago, about those anti-NATO protests led by veterans and soldiers opposed to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Haskell Wexler is 92 years old now. And thanks so much to Medea Benjamin, founder of CodePink, author of Drone Warfare: Killing by Remote Control. She joined us from Oklahoma City.
This is Democracy Now! When we come back, a former Israeli combat soldier speaks out. Stay with us.
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On July 20, at least 90 Palestinians and 13 Israeli soldiers were killed in the Gaza City neighborhood of Shejaiya. Days later, former Israeli soldier Eran Efrati was arrested by Israel after he posted details about the massacre based on interviews he conducted with Israeli soldiers who were there. Today he speaks out about what he learned and talks about the killing of 23-year-old Salem Khaleel Shamaly. Activists with the International Solidarity Movement posted a video on YouTube showing the fatal shooting of an unarmed Palestinian civilian during the massacre. Family members later stumbled onto the video and identified the man as Shamaly. In the video, Shamaly is seen lying on the ground, apparently wounded by an unseen sniper. As Shamaly tries to get to his feet, two more shots ring out, and he stops moving. Efrati interviewed three of the Israeli soldiers who witnessed the killing of Salem Khaleel Shamaly. His sources within the Israeli Defense Forces reportedly informed him soldiers were deliberately targeting civilians as "punishment" and "retribution" for the deaths of fellow soldiers in their units. Efrati is a former Israeli combat soldier turned anti-occupation activist and investigative researcher.
Click here to watch part 2 of the interview.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: The Israeli military says it has opened criminal probes into two of its most publicized killings of Palestinian civilians during the summer’s assault on Gaza. Investigators will examine the killing of four Palestinian children on a Gaza beach and a later attack that killed 14 people in a U.N. school, one of several that hit U.N. shelters. Over 2,100 Palestinians, more than 75 percent civilians, were killed in the Israeli assault. Critics say Israel is seeking to deflect international scrutiny, including a United Nations Human Rights Council probe and potential cases before the International Criminal Court. However, the Israeli army has not announced plans to investigate another notorious episode that occurred during its recent assault on Gaza. That’s the Shejaiya massacre in July, when nearly 90 Gazans and 13 Israeli soldiers were killed.
AMY GOODMAN: Shejaiya is one of Gaza’s poorest and most crowded neighborhoods. Activists with the International Solidarity Movement posted a video on YouTube showing the fatal shooting of an unarmed Palestinian civilian during the massacre. Family members later stumbled onto the video and identified the man as 23-year-old Salem Khaleel Shamaly. In the video, we see Shamaly lying on the ground, apparently wounded by an unseen sniper. As Shamaly tries to get to his feet, two more shots ring out. He stops moving.
Well, our next guest interviewed three of the Israeli soldiers who witnessed the killing of Salem Shamaly. His confidential sources within the IDF, the Israeli Defense Forces, reportedly informed him that the real reason for the recent IDF Shejaiya massacre was that IDF soldiers were deliberately targeting civilians as punishment and retribution for the deaths of fellow soldiers in their units. This former soldier is named Eran Efrati. He’s a former Israeli combat soldier turned anti-occupation activist and investigative researcher. Later this month, Efrati will testify at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine in Brussels.
Eran Efrati, we welcome you to Democracy Now!
ERAN EFRATI: Thank you. I’m happy to be here.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about why you went to the border to interview Israeli soldiers?
ERAN EFRATI: Well, I’m doing this job for almost five years now, since Operation Cast Lead. I’m collecting testimonies from soldiers. I started in Breaking the Silence, the organization, and moved on independently to take testimonies, collect testimonies from soldiers in the IDF, because I was there as a soldier, and I know that what we get in the mainstream media and what we get in the news is most of the time very far from what’s really going on in the area. In this summer, I was sitting in Jerusalem in my home, and the atmosphere in Israel, the fascist atmosphere in the streets in Jerusalem, and the overall approval of this terrible massacre that happened in Gaza was so overwhelming that I decided to go on down to the border with Gaza and try to speak directly with the soldiers, because I knew that I will get something else from them.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, I’d like to go to a—Channel 4 News’ Krishnan Guru-Murthy questioned Israeli spokesman Mark Regev about the shooting death of Salem Shamaly. He asked Regev if Israel plans to investigate the shooting. This is how Regev responded.
MARK REGEV: I’d urge that if anyone has information that is relevant, that they come forward and speak to our judge advocate general, the highest military man who deals with these sort of investigations. Obviously, if there are allegations of misbehavior by Israeli soldiers, they must be investigated. We can’t rely on hearsay from political activists. I urge people to come forward. The Israeli army, like other Western armies, like NATO armies, holds itself to a very high professional standard.
KRISHNAN GURU-MURTHY: So you’re saying nobody is currently investigating one of the most notorious shootings of the military incursion, that was widely circulated around the world. Now, someone has come forward now and has spoken, he says, to some of the Israeli soldiers involved, and they make very clear allegations, that you just heard, about the conditions under which they could open fire. Now, you’ve heard those allegations. Are you concerned? Do you believe there should be an investigation?
MARK REGEV: Well, first of all, first of all, I don’t think a YouTube put out by activists is necessarily objective reality, as you yourself know. But once again, the person speaking had no direct knowledge. He was relying on testimony of others. And I would urge—
KRISHNAN GURU-MURTHY: He’s a former soldier, not just an activist. He served his country.
MARK REGEV: I would urge—you said he was an activist, didn’t you? Or your reporter said so. At least that’s what I heard. But if he has information, it’s his duty. It’s his obligation. We have a very independent judicial branch of the army, which is very strong and independent in Israel. And if people have information, they must come forward.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Your response to what Regev said?
ERAN EFRATI: My response to the idea that if the Israeli army committed crimes against humanity in Gaza, what they want is to investigate themself. They actually want activists and other civilians to come to the army and tell the army that he was doing something wrong, and they think it’s independent. The Israeli army is independent in the way it’s controlling all of Israeli society. The Israeli media, the Israeli court—everybody is working underneath the army censorship. Nobody can publish anything in Israel—of course, not researchers—and I’m not talking only on TV or radio or newspaper; I’m talking on bloggers in the Internet. Nobody can publish anything if it doesn’t go through the IDF censorship, the same IDF censorship that censorship crimes for years under the occupation of the Palestinians in Palestine. And now they want us to come to them, to be silenced by them. It’s, of course, ridiculous.
AMY GOODMAN: What brings you to the United States?
ERAN EFRATI: Well, I’m here because I’m doing my research from here. For the last five years, I’m doing investigative research on the Israeli army and the American army and the arm trades between them. The Shejaiya story that I encountered this summer was the most recent incredible story that I found, because not only did the war in Gaza—the massacre that was going on in Gaza was, of course, terrible; the story of the Shejaiya neighborhood was a particular story in this war that I think really described the entirety of it.
AMY GOODMAN: Tell us more about it, because as you interviewed these soldiers on the border, who saw Shamaly killed—
ERAN EFRATI: Right.
AMY GOODMAN: —you were arrested by the Israeli military.
ERAN EFRATI: Right, after publishing it. What happened is that I was in contact with the soldiers. I knew the soldiers from before this operation, and of course I am continuing to be in touch with them until today. I was talking to them by phone from inside Gaza. What happened in Gaza in 2014 was very surprisingly for the Israeli soldiers in the Israeli army, because we are not used to—the Israeli army, not used to getting resistance from inside Gaza like we get from in Lebanon, for example. So, in 2009 and 2012, we didn’t lose soldiers almost at all. We lost something like 12 soldiers to Hamas killing, and most of them was from our friendly fire. So we killed most of our soldiers. And the idea that soldiers are being killed in Gaza, it’s something new for the Israeli army.
And so, the Israeli army going in and losing almost immediately 13 soldiers in one day, that day will become the night of the Shejaiya massacre, the neighborhood massacre that killed more than 90 people in one night. After a hard night of bombing in Shejaiya, the infantry soldiers are going into the neighborhood and catching houses as bases and waiting for other commands. And in that time, they’re getting orders from their officers inside those houses to get ready inside the house for an extended killing. When they ask why, they’re explained to them that they understand they’re confused, they understand that they’re hurting, the killing of their friends from their unit—I’m talking about two specific unit, the Golani unit and the Nahal Brigade. And they’re telling them that they understand their frustration, and they will have a chance to get out to take out their frustration on Palestinians. They’re waiting until the morning.
And in the morning, families are starting to come back into their neighborhood, civilians looking for family members they left behind and looking for them under the rubbles. We can see in the video uploaded to YouTube and other videos that people going around the neighborhood and screaming names of family members, looking for them—obviously unarmed civilians. The soldiers are in the house, looking ahead. At that time, they decide to do an imaginary red line in the sand. Our officers tell them they had to do an imaginary red line to determine if they’re in risk or not. And whoever will cross this red line will be a risk for them, and so far, they can kill him. Of course, that’s not something new. It happened in 2009 and in 2012. But this time, this imaginary red line was drawn very, very far from the house. Snipers were sitting on the windows waiting for orders.
And when Salem Shamaly came back with international activists and other Palestinians looking for their family member, he crossed one of these red lines. The sniper on the window is asking his commander, is he have approve to shoot? His commander is telling him, "Wait," two times, and then he’s giving him the first approve. He’s shooting the first shot to the left side of his body and his hand. Salem Shamaly is falling down. And then the sniper is asking another approval to shoot again to finish him off. The officer is telling him, "Wait, wait," and then he’s giving him approve to finish Salem Shamaly out. This is not the only case we know of, but this is the only case documented by international activists in Shejaiya.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, I wanted to ask you—you say that there were soldiers who you knew who talked to you. You, yourself, were a combat soldier in the Israeli army. Talk about your—why you decided to do this, the transformation that you went through.
ERAN EFRATI: Right. Well, I grew up in a very Zionist, militaristic home. My father was the head of investigation of the Israeli police. My mother was an officer in the army. My brother was a special—an officer in a special unit in the Israeli army. So I’m coming from a good background in Israel. And I was waiting all of my youth to join the army. It was obvious to me that this is the place I need to be. In the 11th grade, I went to Poland into the trip to the camps with my classmates and saw Auschwitz, the same camp that my grandma survived, and all of our family were killed there. And there, I got the message that if I want to stop a second Holocaust from happening, I have to go back home, join the best unit I can in the military and stop a second Holocaust from happening.
I joined the IDF. I went through seven months of boot camp, getting ready for a war, getting ready to stop the second Holocaust from happening. But in the end of these seven months, I’m not finding myself in a war; I’m finding myself in al-Khalil, or Hebron, in the middle of the West Bank, a city counting 180,000 Palestinians, and in the middle of the city a Jewish settlement of 800 settlers, Jewish settlers, that I need to protect. And very fast, I will understand that my job here is to control the Palestinian lives. My job here is to control their life for the arm trade that’s going on, for testing weapons on the ground, for workers’ rights in Israel, for Palestinian workers that we need for mines, for fuel. All of this stuff, I’m doing daily, not for protection of anybody, but for protection of the rich government in Israel.
AMY GOODMAN: And so, talk about what happened then. And what was the Israeli military’s response to your transformation?
ERAN EFRATI: Well, I think, you know, very fast during my service, I understand what’s going on. I started giving stories outside, from Hebron, into Breaking the Silence. When I’m losing—I’m sorry, when I’m leaving the army almost after four years, I was a sergeant in the Israeli army. When I’m leaving the army, I’m joining Breaking the Silence and started taking testimonies and trying to publish them out. Very soon I will find out, after Operation Cast Lead, that we cannot publish everything that we want, because even Breaking the Silence is going underneath the army censorship.
AMY GOODMAN: Breaking the Silence is the organization, and Operation Cast Lead was the attack in 2008 on Gaza.
ERAN EFRATI: Right. So it’s an organization that collect testimonies from soldiers all across the West Bank and Gaza, and trying to publish them to the Israeli public and to the world. The problem is that even Breaking the Silence is under the military censorship, so Breaking the Silence is actually only breaking the silence that the Israeli government let them.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: When you say that they’re under military censorship, that they clear their material with the Israeli army?
ERAN EFRATI: Exactly. They’re giving every booklet they’re taking out, they have to give to the Israeli—to the army censorship before it’s letting out to the public.
AMY GOODMAN: As we end on the young man, Shamaly, in Shejaiya—and we’re going to show the video, and you’ll hear him—possibly, you’ll hear him as he is laying there shot, and then shot again, and shot again, as we’re showing this now. Let’s listen. He has been shot once now. He is reaching up. He’s with other activists.
SALEM KHALEEL SHAMALY: [speaking in Arabic]
AMY GOODMAN: His family saw this on YouTube?
ERAN EFRATI: Yes. His family—we need to understand that there was hundreds of thousands refugees in Gaza during this operation running away, trying to save their life, leaving family members behind. They didn’t know—until today, not everybody’s sure who was killed and who was not. People are still looking for their relatives. And then, his family is watching YouTube and seeing their son being killed by a sniper in Shejaiya. And this is how they found out he’s dead.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, we will leave it there. And for our listeners, we are showing the video on television, the horror that his parents discovered afterwards, his family. Eran Efrati, we want to thank you for being with us, former Israeli combat soldier turned anti-occupation activist and investigative researcher, recently interviewed a number of Israeli soldiers who participated in the Shejaiya massacre in Gaza. Later this month, Eran Efrati will testify at the Russell Tribunal on Palestine in Brussels.
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Headlines:
•Kerry Visits Saudi Arabia, Turkey to Push for Support Against ISIS
Secretary of State John Kerry is in Turkey today in an ongoing effort to drum up support for a U.S.-led military campaign against militants with the Islamic State. On Thursday, Kerry was in Saudi Arabia, where 10 Arab countries, including Egypt, Jordan and Qatar, agreed to help the United States fight the militants, who have seized swaths of Iraq and Syria. Turkey has not signed on. Kerry praised the support of Arab nations, calling it "critical" to the U.S.-led effort.
Secretary of State John Kerry: "Arab nations play a critical role in that coalition, the leading role, really, across all lines of effort: military support, humanitarian aid, our work to stop the flow of illegal funds and foreign fighters, which ISIL requires in order to thrive, and certainly the effort to repudiate once and for all the dangerous, the offensive, the insulting distortion of Islam that ISIL propaganda attempts to spread throughout the region and the world."
Retired Marine General John Allen has been tapped to oversee the campaign against the Islamic State. Allen previously served at the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan. The Pentagon has announced it will soon start flying bombing missions out of the Kurdish region of northern Iraq as part of its expanded campaign against ISIL, but it remains unclear when the United States will begin launching airstrikes in Syria. Obama is facing key questions over his claim of authority to strike Syria without congressional approval. White House officials have cited the 2001 authorization of force passed after 9/11, but critics note that resolution applies only to nations and groups that "planned, authorized, committed, or aided" the 9/11 attacks.
•James Foley’s Mother: U.S. Response to ISIS Has "Increased the Hate"
The mother of slain U.S. journalist James Foley says she is "appalled" by the U.S. government’s handling of her son’s imprisonment by ISIL militants. Diane Foley told CNN the government threatened her family with prosecution if they tried to raise money for Foley’s ransom. She also criticized the broader U.S. response toward ISIL, also known as ISIS.
Diane Foley: "We’re dealing with very difficult people when we talk about ISIS. Their hate for us is great. And yet, some of our response to them has only increased the hate."
We’ll hear from James Foley speaking in a 2012 interview later in the broadcast. Click here to watch.
•Syrian Rebels Release 45 Fijian Peacekeepers
Syrian rebels with the al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front have released 45 Fijian peacekeepers held captive for two weeks. The Fijians were part of a United Nations force serving in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
•Chile Marks Anniversary of Its Own 9/11
The United States marked the 13th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks on Thursday with solemn ceremonies in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Chile, meanwhile, marked the 41st anniversary of its own 9/11. On September 11, 1973, democratically elected President Salvador Allende died in the palace in a U.S.-backed coup, ushering in 17 years of brutal dictatorship under Augusto Pinochet. Chilean President Michelle Bachelet urged people to come forward if they have information on the more than 1,000 "disappeared" people still missing after the Pinochet era.
Chilean President Michelle Bachelet: "I have already said this the past few days, and I will repeat it again today: This is the time for us to join together in truth, and it is essential that those who have relevant information come forward, whether they are citizens or military."
•AP: More Than 5,000 Killed in Central African Republic
A new tally by the Associated Press finds more than 5,000 people have died in Central African Republic since December, when fighting erupted between Muslims and Christians. The clashes have sparked fears of genocide. The tally is more than twice the number cited by the United Nations in April when it approved a peacekeeping force due to arrive next week. The AP said there has been no official record of the steady rise in deaths since then.
•Hundreds of Thousands Rally for Catalan Independence from Spain
Hundreds of thousands of Catalans have flooded the streets of Barcelona to demand a vote on independence from Spain. Turnout estimates ranged from half a million to nearly two million people. The call for secession was bolstered by next week’s referendum in Scotland on independence from the United Kingdom. Ahead of the march, Catalan President Artur Mas said European leaders should accept a referendum on Catalan independence scheduled for November.
Catalan President Artur Mas: "There are European leaders that accept the referendum in Scotland, but don’t accept at the same level the referendum in Catalonia. And my question is: Is Catalonia a different nation? It is a different nation, but it is also a nation. So if the Scottish people have the right to decide their political future, why not the Catalan people?"
•Banks Threaten to Leave Scotland if Independence Approved
Scotland’s top banks have threatened to move to England if Scottish voters choose independence in next Thursday’s referendum. Polls show Scots are about equally divided.
•Floods Displace 1 Million in India, Pakistan
Historic monsoon floods in India and Pakistan have killed more than 400 people and displaced nearly a million. The flooding is the worst to hit the Kashmir region in half a century.
•Hewlett-Packard Fined for Bribing Russian Officials; U.S., EU Impose New Russian Sanctions
Hewlett-Packard has pleaded guilty to charges that former employees bribed officials at Russia’s top prosecutor’s office for a technology contract. In total, the firm has agreed to pay $108 million for bribing officials in Mexico, Poland and Russia -– that’s a tiny fraction of HP’s net revenue, which totaled $27.6 billion in the last quarter alone. The news came as the Obama administration announced it would implement new economic sanctions on Russia over its handling of Ukraine. A new round of European sanctions on Russia takes effect today.
•HRW: Israel Committed War Crimes by Attacking Gaza Schools
Human Rights Watch has found Israel committed war crimes by attacking schools where displaced residents were sheltering in Gaza. The report looked at three attacks on U.N.-run shelters this summer which killed at least 45 people, 17 of them children. It came a day after Israel said it had opened criminal probes into two of the most publicized killings of Palestinian civilians during this summer’s assault, including one of the school attacks. But Human Rights Watch noted "Israel has a long record of failing to undertake credible investigations into alleged war crimes."
•Oscar Pistorius Guilty of Manslaughter, Not Murder, for Killing Girlfriend
South African Olympian and double-amputee Oscar Pistorius, known around the world as "the Blade Runner," has been found guilty of culpable homicide, the equivalent of manslaughter, for killing his girlfriend. Pistorius was acquitted of murder. Judge Thokozile Masipa accepted Pistorius’ claim he mistook Reeva Steenkamp for an intruder when he fired four shots at her through a locked bathroom door last Valentine’s Day. But the judge deemed his behavior "negligent."
Judge Thokozile Masipa: "I am of the view that the accused acted too hastily and used excessive force. In the circumstances, it is clear that his conduct was negligent."
•Argentina Adopts Law to Repay Debts Outside of U.S. Court Ruling
Argentina has enacted legislation to repay its debts domestically in a bid to skirt the ruling of a U.S. judge which sent the country into default. The judge blocked Argentina from making any repayments without also repaying U.S. hedge funds led by billionaire Paul Singer. Argentina has refused to pay the so-called vulture funds, which bought the country’s debt for bargain prices after its financial crisis, then demanded full repayment. Argentina has vowed to meet its other debts.
•U.S. Threatened to Fine Yahoo $250,000 Per Day for Guarding User Data
Newly unsealed documents have revealed how much pressure the U.S. government exerted on Yahoo after the tech company opposed its demands for user communications. In 2008, the government threatened to fine Yahoo $250,000 per day if it did not comply with a secret court order which Yahoo believed was unconstitutional. Yahoo ultimately lost its legal battle and ended up providing user communications to the National Security Agency under the secret PRISM program, as did other tech companies.
•Missouri Enacts 72-Hour Waiting Period for Abortion
Missouri has enacted one of the longest waiting periods for abortion in the country. The legislation extends Missouri’s waiting period from 24 to 72 hours with no exception for victims of rape or incest. Missouri lawmakers overrode a veto of the measure by Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon, who said it would "jeopardize the health and wellbeing of women." About half of U.S. states impose a waiting period between counseling and an abortion; most commonly the wait is 24 hours. Utah and South Dakota have also enacted 72-hour waiting periods.
•Columbia Students Help Survivor Carry Mattress in Sexual Assault Protest
In New York City, students at Columbia University are holding a rally today in solidarity with Emma Sulkowicz, a Columbia senior who has been lugging a dorm room mattress around campus to protest the university’s handling of sexual assault. Sulkowicz says she will continue carrying the mattress until the student who raped her two years ago is expelled. On Wednesday, students gathered to support Sulkowicz by helping her carry her mattress to class.
•University of Illinois Trustees Vote Against Salaita over Gaza Tweets
Trustees at the University of Illinois have voted nearly unanimously not to reinstate Steven Salaita, a professor whose job offer was withdrawn after he posted tweets harshly critical of the Israeli assault on Gaza. Students, faculty and a number of academic associations had urged the trustees to reinstate Salaita, saying his academic freedom had been violated. Salaita said he is consulting with his attorneys about future options.
•Study: Residents Near Fracking Sites More Likely to Become Ill
A new study has found people living near fracking wells are more than twice as likely to report certain health issues. A former Yale University School of Medicine professor surveyed residents in southwestern Pennsylvania. He found 39 percent of people living within about half a mile of gas wells reported upper respiratory health problems, compared to 18 percent for those who lived more than 1.2 miles away from wells.
•FCC Receives Record Number of Comments over Net Neutrality
The Federal Communications Commission says it has received a record number of comments about its proposal to effectively end net neutrality. On Wednesday, thousands of websites joined the "Internet Slowdown," a day of action against the FCC’s plans, which would let corporate ISPs create fast and slow lanes for Internet service. The protest helped bring in nearly 1.5 million comments. That beats the previous record set in 2004 when the FCC was flooded with complaints over a wardrobe malfunction that revealed Janet Jackson’s breast on live television during the Super Bowl halftime show.
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