“I don’t remember a white flag…” – Testimony from the soldier, S., a member of the IDF’s Givati Brigade, who shot at a group of Gazan civilians fleeing the war that had suddenly erupted near the home they had been sheltering it, as reported in Haaretz today.
A woman, head of a family, died on the spot.
The Haaretz report, today, does not say who she was, or where she was killed — perhaps it may be reported later on Israeli TV (see below), perhaps not.
Equality of respect for victims in this conflict is rare to the point of non-existence. The Haaretz story is like the maps of this place: just as, in order to understand the geography and history here, you need to have one map with the Israeli place names next to one with Arabic place names, you likewise need to look at this account and then open other internet pages or pull out other documents prepared by Israeli human rights groups and by the UN, in order to find out who the woman was, and to learn from survivors what was happening to her and to them at the time.
According to details of information collected by Human Rights Watch, it seems that this woman may have been Ibtisam al-Qanu’, 40, mother of seven children, killed in ‘Atatra [in northern Gaza] as an IDF bulldozer [a D-9?] was demolishing the house that also under fire as it was sheltering her and 39 other members of her family.
Haaretz reports today that “The evidence collected in the case, as well as exclusive interviews with S. and other soldiers indicted over Cast Lead, will be broadcast on television tonight on Ilana Dayan’s program ‘Uvda’ (‘Fact’ ), which airs at 9 P.M. on Channel 2. Based on evidence collected thus far, it seems the incident raises much larger questions than merely who fired and at what”.