What a surprise: Given half a chance, Arabs accuse Israelis of another massacre. Only this one is utterly false.
Ben Eliezer provided a detailed explanation to Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram of why the reports were erroneous.
“In the past few days the Arab press, and in particular the Egyptian press, has reported information claimed in a (Israeli) film that the Shaked commando unit under Fuad Ben Eliezer killed 250 Egyptian soldiers in the Six Day War 40 years ago.
“It is true that in one battle in that war, there was a confrontation between soldiers from the Palestinian fedayeen regiment, which operated in the Gaza Strip against Israel, and the unit which I commanded. They were not ‘murdered’, as was claimed, but were killed in battle.
“The order I got was to wage battle against the Palestinian fedayeen regiment that was operating from the Strip, paralyzing southern Israel and causing dozens of casualties among the soldiers in my unit and in the IDF.
“To remove any doubt, an examination of the Southern Command’s intelligence document, dated June 4, 1967, which by my request was transferred from the IDF’s historical archive and details the deployment of enemy forces in the Strip, proves that the forces were the Palestinian Fedayeen battalion and not Egyptian troops.
Ha’aretz has more:
Edelist said in remarks broadcast Monday that the media reports misrepresented the material in the film. He said the dead were not Egyptian POWs, but Palestinian fedayoun fighters, and that they were killed in battle, not executed.
“The Egyptians are speaking of murder, of 250 of their soldiers.” In fact, Edelist told Army Radio, “This was not murder, this was in the course of a battle.”
Edelist said the Shaked commandos were fighting a Palestinian commando battalion, with which the Shaked unit had fought a number of gun battles prior to the war.
“What happened was that there were (Israeli) fighters waging battle against a retreating (Palestinian) commando battalion,” Edelist said. “During this battle, you could say there was excessive use of force, (but) it was all in the context of war: Not prisoners,
not prisoner-of-war camps, not people who put their hands up.”According to Edelist, hardline opposition elements in Egypt had misrepresented the facts and the message of the film in order to attack Israel’s peace with Egypt.
And one Egyptian lawmaker is calling for war with Israel. Yes, that peace treaty is still working out very well, isn’t it?
On Sunday, Egypt’s deputy foreign minister for legal affairs, Abdel Aziz Seif al-Nasr, said Egypt had summoned Israeli ambassador Shalom Cohen to demand an explanation for the contents of the documentary. Two ruling party lawmakers demanded the ambassador’s expulsion, calling him a dog and an apostate. Another called in a special parliamentary session for a declaration of war on Israel.
Funny how when a terrorist blows himself up in a crowded market, the anti-Israel crowd is quick to leap on the term “resistance.” But when Egyptians and palestinians are killed in battle, those selfsame people are quick to scream “MURDER!”
What time is it, kiddies? That’s right. It’s Israeli Double Standard Time.
Meryl
Stop your whining. We all know the Zionist mind control are making the Egyptians make fools out of themselves.
Anyway you slice it, it’s our fault.
I wonder if anyone will point out to these Egyptians that, in the broader context of bad things that happen in wars, that maybe it really wasn’t a good idea to mass their army on the border with Israel, kick out the UN Sinai forces, blockade the Straits of Tiran, and broadcast their explicit intentions of committing genocide against the Jewish nation?
How do you say “be careful what you wish for” in Arabic?