A picture is worth a thousand words

[MKSheppard]

http://www1.idf.il/DOVER/site/mainpage. ... d=31540.EN

Israel channel 10 aired yesterday Inon Maga'l item showing armed Palestinians using UNRWA ambulances to flee undercover.

Photographs taken at the Gaza Zeintun neighborhood about two weeks ago, on the same night the first APC was exploded, clearly show armed Palestinians boarding a UN-marked ambulance with a UN flag, and flee the scene.

The reporter stressed that this was not a Palestinian Red Cross ambulance, known to have transported armored Palestinians since the outbreak of events, but rather a supposedly neutral ambulance of the UN.

[Joe]

Why are we still giving money to the UNRWA?

[MKSheppard]

Why are we still giving money to the UNRWA?

Gee I don't know, because it helps the poor developing countries

Seriously, this now gives Israel carte blanche to rip apart every Ambulance
in the West bank with cannonfire from MICVs or Apaches. There is
a god damned good reason why you are not allowed to use ambulances
as military transports according to the Geneva Convention; so that
they are granted free unfettered access, and are NOT fired on because
they have the Red Cross on their sides.

The Palestinian leadership doesn't give a fuck, and so the palestinian
people are now going to pay the price .......

[MKSheppard]

Those UN-marked ambulances were the last resort of hope for the Palestinian people if they were critically wounded or injured, because
Israel routinely stops, delays, and searches Palestinian Authority
Red Crescent Ambulances ever since it was discovered that they
were using them to transport "sick" people into Israel who would
on the other side, undergo a miraculous "recovery" and step outside,
along with transporting various sundry shit, such as Suicide belts.

Well, now that they've decided to use UN ambulances, expect those
to be shot at, and stopped at checkpoints; no matter who's inside now.

[Darth Wong]

Tim McVeigh used a rental van. If Americans were Israelis, all rental vans would now be fair game to be shot at from helicopters.

[MKSheppard]

Tim McVeigh used a rental van. If Americans were Israelis, all rental vans would now be fair game to be shot at from helicopters.

Are rental vans protected by the Geneva convention?

[Darth Wong]

Tim McVeigh used a rental van. If Americans were Israelis, all rental vans would now be fair game to be shot at from helicopters.

Are rental vans protected by the Geneva convention?

No, they're protected by various civil laws, as are all targets which cannot be determined to be hostile and armed from a distance.

[MKSheppard]

No, they're protected by various civil laws, as are all targets which cannot be determined to be hostile and armed from a distance.

Okay then. Here's a challenge for you. Try parking a Ryder Truck
in front of a major government building. I gurantee you a weekend
of fun (TM) that never ends.

[The Kernel]

No, they're protected by various civil laws, as are all targets which cannot be determined to be hostile and armed from a distance.

Okay then. Here's a challenge for you. Try parking a Ryder Truck
in front of a major government building. I gurantee you a weekend
of fun (TM) that never ends.

I think his point is that you will NOT however recieve a bombarment of missiles from an Apache if you decide to park your truck in front of the White House.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

No, they're protected by various civil laws, as are all targets which cannot be determined to be hostile and armed from a distance.

Okay then. Here's a challenge for you. Try parking a Ryder Truck
in front of a major government building. I gurantee you a weekend
of fun (TM) that never ends.

In a related note, my wife snuck a 7 inch blade into an Oakland courthouse once. It was a letter-opener that I gave her to carry for self defense, and it was in her bag. No one said anything.

After lunch we returned to the courthouse and the X-ray operator went ape-shit. He pulled his gun and everything. I'm just glad that I managed not to say "But you didn't get upset the last time we walked in here with the knife."

If they go ape-shit over a letter-opener, imagine the aortic rupture they'd have over a suspicious van.

[MKSheppard]

I think his point is that you will NOT however recieve a bombarment of missiles from an Apache if you decide to park your truck in front of the White House.

Funny thing this, the Geneva convention says you can legally open fire
on ambulances AND hospitals

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/EUgeneva.htm

Article 19. The protection to which civilian hospitals are entitled shall not cease unless they are used to commit, outside their humanitarian duties, acts harmful to the enemy. Protection may, however, cease only after due warning has been given, naming, in all appropriate cases, a reasonable time limit and after such warning has remained unheeded.

The fact that sick or wounded members of the armed forces are nursed in these hospitals, or the presence of small arms and ammunition taken from such combatants and not yet been handed to the proper service, shall not be considered to be acts harmful to the enemy.

...


Article 21. Convoys of vehicles or hospital trains on land or specially provided vessels on sea, conveying wounded and sick civilians, the infirm and maternity cases, shall be respected and protected in the same manner as the hospitals provided for in Article 18, and shall be marked, with the consent of the State, by the display of the distinctive emblem provided for in Article 38 of the Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field of 12 August 1949.

So basically, Israel can just say: "Hey, we're tired of you using ambulances for military uses, blah blah, stop in about five days or
else we open fire on them." essentially. And if there's no real
movement by the PA, then they could legally open fire on
said ambulances.

Of course, they wouldn't do this, no more than we'd do summary executions of captured insurgents in Iraq, even though we could
do it legally under Geneva.

[The Kernel]

Funny thing this, the Geneva convention says you can legally open fire
on ambulances AND hospitals

Great, but I don't think that matters when you are dealing with your own fucking citizens. Geneva says that the Palestinians are citizens of Israel remember? It is the local laws that are the issue here, and I don't know about Israel, but in the US no person can be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process. That means NO Hellfire missiles for parking violations.

[MKSheppard]

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/431841.html

Police: Ambulance network smuggled PA officers into Israel
By Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondent, and Haaretz Service

Police have uncovered a network that smuggled Palestinian Authority officers, including members of PA Chairman Yasser Arafat's elite Force 17 personal protection unit, into Israel in fake ambulances.
Police said it is possible the ring has also smuggled terrorists into Israel using the same method.

Palestinian cabinet minister Saeb Erekat called the accusations "another attempt to undermine the Palestinian Red Cross and Red Crescent" and noted that Israel stops and thoroughly checks every ambulance that goes through a checkpoint.

"I don't know why such accusations are being leveled at this time, when they are not even allowing patients to reach medical institutions," Erekat said.

Ma'aleh Adumim police recently arrested a man suspected of posing as an ambulance driver and illegally bringing into Israel dozens of Palestinians disguised as sick patients. The man, who holds Israeli citizenship, is a resident of Azzariyeh, a Palestinian village just east of Jerusalem. Police said additional arrests are expected.

The "patients" were hooked up to medical devices inside the ambulances and presented soldiers or police officers with forged documents at Israeli checkpoints.

Police believe that in one case, the Force 17 commander was smuggled from Azzariyeh into Israeli territory for a work meeting in East Jerusalem.

The arrested man was employed by an ambulance company controlled by Force 17 that operates three ambulances.

A police probe revealed the detainee does not hold an ambulance driver's license and that the license plates of his vehicle were forged. The vehicle itself was likely stolen.

Police recently raided an Azzariyeh warehouse in which commercial vehicles were transformed into ambulances.

[Elfdart]

I think his point is that you will NOT however recieve a bombarment of missiles from an Apache if you decide to park your truck in front of the White House.

Of course, they wouldn't do this, no more than we'd do summary executions of captured insurgents in Iraq, even though we could
do it legally under Geneva.

Would you be so kind as to quote the exact parts of the Third or Fourth Geneva Conventions that allow the summary shooting of anyone let alone "insurgents"?

[MKSheppard]

Would you be so kind as to quote the exact parts of the Third or Fourth Geneva Conventions that allow the summary shooting of anyone let alone "insurgents"?

Article 4 of 3rd Geneva lays out WHO is considered a POW.

A. Prisoners of war, in the sense of the present Convention, are persons belonging to one of the following categories, who have fallen into the power of the enemy:

1. Members of the armed forces of a Party to the conflict as well as members of militias or volunteer corps forming part of such armed forces.

2. Members of other militias and members of other volunteer corps, including those of organized resistance movements, belonging to a Party to the conflict and operating in or outside their own territory, even if this territory is occupied, provided that such militias or volunteer corps, including such organized resistance movements, fulfil the following conditions:

(a) That of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates;

(b) That of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance;

(c) That of carrying arms openly;

(d) That of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.

3. Members of regular armed forces who profess allegiance to a government or an authority not recognized by the Detaining Power.

4. Persons who accompany the armed forces without actually being members thereof, such as civilian members of military aircraft crews, war correspondents, supply contractors, members of labour units or of services responsible for the welfare of the armed forces, provided that they have received authorization from the armed forces which they accompany, who shall provide them for that purpose with an identity card similar to the annexed model.

5. Members of crews, including masters, pilots and apprentices, of the merchant marine and the crews of civil aircraft of the Parties to the conflict, who do not benefit by more favourable treatment under any other provisions of international law.

6. Inhabitants of a non-occupied territory, who on the approach of the enemy spontaneously take up arms to resist the invading forces, without having had time to form themselves into regular armed units, provided they carry arms openly and respect the laws and customs of war.

Our enemies do not obey sections b and d, so by Geneva they aren't
POWs, so aren't protected by Geneva, and we can do what we want
with them.

[MKSheppard]

Geneva was designed to be self-enforcing through carrot and stick
treatment.

If you follow the convention rules, you will be treated humanely, and
you'll be able to complain about mistreatment, and get IRC visits,
etc.

If you however, do not follow the convention rules, Uhm, you're
not a POW or protected person, and can legally be fucked over
by whoever you were shooting at a moment ago.

[Kamakazie Sith]

No, they're protected by various civil laws, as are all targets which cannot be determined to be hostile and armed from a distance.

Okay then. Here's a challenge for you. Try parking a Ryder Truck
in front of a major government building. I gurantee you a weekend
of fun (TM) that never ends.

I think his point is that you will NOT however recieve a bombarment of missiles from an Apache if you decide to park your truck in front of the White House.

Turn DC into a war zone and wait a couple months.

[Axis Kast]

Why is this simply a problem for the Palestinian Authority?

How the fuck are terrorists able to commandeer U.N. vehicles in the first place? The organization has some 'splaining to do ...

[Pu-239]

Why is this simply a problem for the Palestinian Authority?

How the fuck are terrorists able to commandeer U.N. vehicles in the first place? The organization has some 'splaining to do ...

READ

fake ambulances.

[Vympel]

Also, even if they were real ambulances, I doubt the ambulance crews were armed/trained to resist a pair of assholes with AKs car-jacking them.

[Master of Ossus]

Also, even if they were real ambulances, I doubt the ambulance crews were armed/trained to resist a pair of assholes with AKs car-jacking them.

True, but even then I imagine that they'd be the first to file complaints when they were let go. And if they were killed by the insurgents (or, whatever), then I imagine that there would be an immediate investigation.