Horrible News! And Yet, This is Not the First Time.

On the front headlines of Fox news today, Feb 17th; shocking evidence is revealed that an Afghan Official publically accounced: Taliban Using Human Shields.

This article goes on to state ”insurgents are firing at Afghan troops from inside or next to compounds where women and children appear to have been ordered to stand on a roof or in a window.’ 

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,586263,00.html

I am sure you will agree with me that this act of disrespect to life that the Taliban is demonstrating goes against all moral dignity.  So much so that it appears on the front page of the most watched news agency in the United States.

In addition to this news today, CNN Reports that; “One of the biggest challenges facing the NATO mission in Afghanistan is attacking the Taliban while limiting civilian casualties. On Sunday, 12 civilians died in a rocket attack by coalition troops. Three other Afghan civilians were killed by NATO in separate incidents on Sunday and Monday.”

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/02/16/afghanistan.offensive/index.html?iref=allsearch

But what baffles me is that the media does not remember or mention that this is not the first time that human shields were used in battle by terrorists.  In 2008 and 2009, this same tactic was used by Hamas against Israel in “Operation Cast Lead”.  It was announced by the Hamas leaders themselves:

“The enemies of Allah do not know that the Palestinian people developed its [methods] of death and death-seeking. For the Palestinian people, death has become an industry, at which women excel, and so do all the people living on this land. The elderly excel at this, and so do the mujahideen and the children. This is why they have formed human shields of the women, the children, the elderly, and the mujahideen, in order to challenge the Zionist bombing machine. It is as if they were saying to the Zionist enemy: "We desire death like you desire life."

-Feb 29, 2008 -, Fathi Ahmad Hammad,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0wJXf2nt4Y

Nor do I see any condemnation from the EU or any country for that matter of the innocent civilians whose lives are lost as collateral damage to the current insurgence in Afghanistan.

Most of the world condemned Israel for the lives lost during that war and even went so far as to falsely accuse Israelis! Such as in the Goldstone Commission Report; for using human shields to gain access to buildings;

“The [Goldstone] Mission investigated several incidents in which the Israeli armed forces used local Palestinian residents to enter houses which might be booby-trapped or harbour enemy combatants…

“The Mission found that the practice constitutes the use of human shields prohibited by international humanitarian law. It further constitutes a violation of the right to life, protected in article 6 of ICCPR, and of the prohibition against cruel and inhuman treatment in its article 7.”

 

Yet at the same time, even though Hamas admits to the practice of human shields;

 

“The Mission found no evidence to suggest that Palestinian armed groups either directed civilians to areas where attacks were being launched or that

they forced civilians to remain within the vicinity of the attacks. The Mission also found no evidence that members of Palestinian armed groups engaged in combat in civilian dress.

Although in the one incident of an Israeli attack on a mosque it investigated, the Mission found that there was no indication that that mosque was used for military purposes or to shield military activities.”

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBYtij4Q7sE&feature=related

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TejVJWSTTpY&feature=related

 

 

Yet with respect to my own native country, not one country has even raised an eyebrow to the very same acts being done in Gaza by Hamas insurgents.

Why the double standard?

Why is one country accused of crimes against humanity, and another country given the green light to continue?

The fact of the matter is that it is impossible to fight a war against a terrorist organization – whether Hamas or the Taliban – without killing some civilians if they purposely fight behind the skirts of women and children.  The Western world is learning this in Afghanistan just as Israel learned it in Gaza.