Shocking news

I just heard from Huda Rashed, the Lebanese second cousin of two of my children, that her mother Colette Rashed was one of those killed when the Israeli Air Force bombed a convoy of civilians (and departing Lebanese Army people) from Marjayoun on Friday, August 11.
I am still devastated.
You can read here my account of the visit Bill and I made in October 2004 to Colette’s family home in Marjayoun.
Colette was a warm and talented woman. She worked as a teacher while raising and supporting her family under all the terrible conditions of life the people of Marjayoun have known since 1978. For a long while, that also involved the family living in exile in Dubai. Her older daughter became part of the Lebanese diaspora in Ivory Coast, which of course was also badly affected by the fighting there some months ago.
I gather that Colette’s family and also the families of other convoy participants murdered in this way are determined to get to the bottom of how the order to fire on the convoy was given, and by whom. Prior to the convoy setting out, UNIFIL had received explicit permission from the IDF for it to do so, with its route all well signaled and agreed with the Israelis.
So many civilians were killed in this war! Some 800 in Lebanon and 39 in Israel. Each and every one had a tragic story like this one… but this one strikes home for me in a special way.
I will just underline, though this does not need doing, that Colette and her family are all Christian Lebanese. They had no particular sympathy for Hizbullah– indeed, quite possibly some remaining feelings of resentment against them… But the most important thing is that they were Lebanese citizens who loved their hometown and their country, and wanted to be left simply to live at peace in it. In Colette’s case, Israel didn’t even let her live.

28 thoughts on “Shocking news”

  1. I am sorry to hear about the personal dimension of the loss. This should dramatize the wisdom of having returned the two abducted soldiers early on. I know there are innocent losses on both sides, and I knwo who to thank, as much as I know who to thank for the Pakistani London plot (with six martyr tapes it is getting easier to know who to thank regardless of the FUD diseminated on this site).

  3. Helena, is this one also a bogus plot involving the Brits, the Pakistanis, the US, and now the Germans? Maybe Rumsfeld planted the bombs, not some angry Arab.
    ——-
    A Lebanese student has been arrested in Germany on suspicion of planting bombs on trains last month which are believed to have been a failed terror attack.
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5266752.stm

  4. Sorry to hear of Colette’s death. The archibiship of jerusalem has condemned isreali attrocities on many occasion. After the muslims are removed from ‘greater israel’ be sure the christians are the next target.

  5. Helens, sorry for the Colette’s death (انا لله وانا إليه راجعون)
    My sympathy to Huda Rashed and to all Lebanon people and hope God will bless them and their country.
    Helena, I heard that Marjayoun town it’s a Christian town I wounder why Israelis targeting this town, I know they did all damage to all around Lebanon.

  6. “Who loved their hometown and their country, and wanted to be left simply to live at peace in it. In Colette’s case, Israel didn’t even let her live.”
    Same as the Iraqis who loved their country and they just like to live at peace in it, and the occupier should leave their country…if there are justices in this world in our time

  7. Haram `aleiki, ya Vida! Shame, shame on you!
    You know, some people are so crass that they will never, EVER miss an opportunity, no matter how inappropriate, to blame Arabs for Israel’s crimes and atrocities.
    Allah yerhamha, Colette. Allah yerhamhum, all of those innocent so brutally and ruthlessly murdered and maimed in this wanton and completely pointless atrocity.

  8. مرة جديدة احتضنت قانا الشهداء الذين سحقتهم آلة القتل الاسرائيلية، اطفالا ونساء وشيوخا. انغرسوا في ارضها اجسادا سبق لها ان انبتت ابطالا ومجاهدين رووا بدمائهم الزكية تراب الوطن ليبقى الجنوب شامخا، موفور الكرامة، عصيا على الذل والمهانة، رافعا رأس لبنان والأمة في زمن عز فيه رفع الرؤوس
    http://www.assafir.com/iso/today/front/2256.html
    Qanna lost, look to the photo those pre digged graves prepared for those killed, with waves of peoples lifts the bodies to the last destination of the our live on this un-peaceful Earth….

  9. Condolences to you and your extended family. The killing of one human being is like the loss of all humanity.
    War is such a foolish form of violence. It numbs the mind to think how state leaders continue to advocate warfare as “effective” governing policy, and how our corporate economy is built around it.

  11. Helena please can I add my sincere condolances to the many others in this shocking loss of your friend.
    ” despite the relentless bombardment in the latest conflict, Kiryat Shmona did not suffer a single casualty.” That’s a remarkably thoughtless comparison link when Helena is informing us she has lost a personal friend. “FUD?” who is relying on promulgating fear uncertainty and doubt? The eyes of the world are on all this year’s dutifully reported bomb plot concoctions as they unravel, and adding more “revelations” to this particular old pile of information can no longer can be expected to change the smell. ” I knwo who to thank, as much as I know who to thank for the Pakistani London plot”…. “is this one also a bogus plot…?” No, irrelevant. Barging into this announcement that a real friend has been killed by a real bomb to scaremonger about plots seems no better to me than a drunk gatecrashing a wake searching for booze. Whatever the myriad internal causes of ME conflict are, the external one and the one that is the greatest threat to civilisation is the rebirth of such inhuman, unreasoning xenophobic militarism in The West. And the greatest danger so far is right now, when the scales are falling from so many eyes and US elections loom. Have no doubt about the size of that danger to lives everywhere.

  15. I’m very sorry to hear this, Helena. May Colette and all the victims of this war rest in peace.
    And can people on _both_ sides please lay off the political argument for this one thread?

  16. Vida’s comment is awful, sounds like inspired by or written by the israeli department of blog-warfare – they have nothing else to do but scanning through internet and fish for information which may be negative for the zionist cause of Greater Israel from Nile to Euphrates… and than putting their spin – with senseless chutzpah

  17. Condolence, sorrow with you.
    I don’t know what Jonathan means by both sides.
    Let the killers be found out.

  18. Dominic, what Jonathan means is that people should have enough respect to reserve this thread for condolences and expressions of regret for the loss of the life of Colette and the other innocents, and post their political arguments and racist/bigotted diatribes elsewhere.

  19. Dominic,
    PS We KNOW who Colette’s killers are, by the way. There is absolutely no question about what happened or who did it. It was, in fact, even publicized in the mainstream US press as I recall.

  20. Helena,
    I’m sorry to hear that you lost a parent in the Lebanon war. The conditions in which she died are especially sad, this death should never had occurred if the Geneva Conventions had been respected. My condolences and sympathies to you and your family.

  21. Christiane,
    Yes, this and most of the other deaths would never have occurred had the Geneva Convention, and the rules of common decency, had been respected. It also would not have occurred had Israel respected its own agreement to allow the people of Marji`yun to flee their village in safety.

  22. سويس إنفو: الانطباع الذي تكون لدينا عن هذه الحرب، هو أنها حرب كانت مودهة بالدرجة الأولى ضد المدنيين . بحكم ماضيكم على رأس اللجنة الدولية للصليب الأحمر هل هي المرة الأولى التي يتم فيها استهداف المدنيين بهذا الشكل؟
    كورنيوليو صوماروغا: أعتقد اننا رأينا ذلك في حالات وصراعات أخرى، ولكن ما شاهدناه هذه المرة كان خطيرا للغاية لأنه حتى ولو لم يكن المدنيون هم المستهدفين مباشرة ، فإنه لمتتم إعارة أي اهتمام لمبادئ القانون الإنساني الدولي التي تحث على التفريق بين المدني والعسكري. لأنه إذا كان استهداف الأهداف العسكرية أمرا مشروعا فإن استهداف الأهداف المدنية ليس كذلك في أي ظرف من الظروف. وما حدث يعد خطيرا من منظور القانون الانساني الدولي
    http://www2.swissinfo.org/sar/swissinfo.html?siteSect=105&sid=6986124&cKey=1155999154000

  23. Shirin, Helena wrote: “Colette’s family and also the families of other convoy participants murdered in this way are determined to get to the bottom of how the order to fire on the convoy was given, and by whom.”
    I think you are missing something, Shirin. It is one thing to say that Colette Rashed was killed by the war. It is more accurate to say that Israeli colonialist aggressors murdered Colette Rashed. Perhaps the latter is what the US media are saying.
    But the story can only be called complete and accurate when the individual names of the people who did the crime and the names of those who gave the orders are known.
    Just by raising this expectation, the Rashed family have marked the movement of the struggle into a new and final phase.
    In this phase, the deeds of the aggressors will be numbered and the individual names of the criminals will be listed.
    This is how it was in South Africa with the de Kocks and the Niewoudts of this world.
    The monsters are going to be known by name. They are going to pay.

  24. Dominic,
    Come on! There is a big difference between what we know now and “they were killed by the war”. There is also a big difference between “the monsters will be known by name” and “they will pay”. Their names are already a matter of record, and if anything they are privately hailed as heroes. Assuming that those names will ever be made public, just who, exactly, do think will make them pay? Their Israeli commanders? The Israeli government? The Israeli people? You? Colette’s family? The Lebanese government? The Lebanese people?

  25. Shirin,
    Yesterday Fouad Siniora visited the Shiite South of Beirouth and he declared that what the Israeli had done to Lebanon was a war crime, that they wanted to destroy Lebanon and its unity out of revenge. The way it was said, I assume he may brought it in front of an international court. I hope that they will do it and that Israel will be condemned to pay war compensations in order to rebuild Lebanon and to the orphans and widows. The compensations should be proportionate. But the shame should be on the Israeli for their crimes.

  26. Shirin,
    You are right that there are big differences. I don’t know what you know. Do you know who ordered the pilot to fire on the column of refugees containing Colette Rashed on that certain day and time? Do you know the name of the pilot, what kind of aeroplane it was and who supplied the rocket? Who supplied the target selection and guidance, and according to what precise text of “rules of engagement” the act was done?
    This is the information the Rashed family wants, and more. Names, dates, places, times, photographs, documents, eye-witnesses.
    Of the two monsters I mentioned, Eugene de Kock and Gideon Niewoudt, one is in a maximum security prison and the other died while still undergoing trial. Of course these were the exception, insofar as they “paid” by actual trial and pounishment in a legal process.
    Bur what has to be paid is the pride and the arrogance of the Israelis. In the process of the trial of de Kock, and the whole liberation movement, and including the TRC, what was paid once and for all by the Afrikaners was their arrogance. Without it there was no possibility of carrying on as before, or doing the same again.
    Christiane says the shame should be on the Israelis. This is true. But this shame will be revealed in full when names are connected with crimes, so that no Israeli ever again will care to admit to taking part, or dare to think of such things again. That is the price that must be paid. It is not about money.

  27. “This is the information the Rashed family wants, and more. Names, dates, places, times, photographs, documents, eye-witnesses.”
    Is that information will make difference?
    We saw with the rape and killing crimes in Mahmodiya of Abeer Qassim Hamza those solders in Iraq, what happen to them? Can some one tell me?
    Their lawyers defending them by saying they mixing their drink with Iraqi Alcohols “Arak, very strong” then they went wield!!! So some thing will come here to find excuses to this or those polites that bomb the column of refugees.
    It might useful to remind you the incident that killed (Grilled because they used Laser guided Bombs inside a close and protected Shelter designed of standing nuclear case) 400 Iraqis in a shelter in Al-Amryia what happening to those who pilots and the commanders?
    They got Rank raise and Blue Medals of bravery for killing civilians, isn’t?
    The point here when its comes to the crimes against US/UK or other EU citizens the prices so heavy and costly in matter of compensations and sentencing, like what we saw with Lockerby act when Al Qadafi paid US$3.2 Billons compensations when should in fact AlQadafi should be put in jail for his command and his crime not wasting Libyan’s people money for his adventure.
    Or that US woman US judge gave here US$40.0 Millions from Iraqi Money (Iraqi freezing money in US) as she lost one family member in 9/11 attack which all know Iraq have nothing to do with that crimes.
    Same as Iraqi crimes those who caused the death of Iraqis in 1991 and in 2003 they should punished from the small criminals to the higher commanders in the chain for those 200,000 death in 2003 and still till now the death happening due to the continuing occupations of Iraq.

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