Israeli army chief admits discrimination against Palestinians in the West Bank

The Israeli army chief in the West Bank has said his troops were “killing like we haven’t killed since 1967”, including fatally shooting Palestinian stone-throwers, according to an Israeli report of his comments.

The remarks by Maj Gen Avi Bluth, head of the army’s central command, were made in a recent closed forum but were leaked to Israel’s Haaretz newspaper. Bluth has so far not denied the authenticity of the Haaretz account. The Israel Defense Forces did not respond to a request for comment.

Bluth, who was born in a West Bank settlement and educated in a religious military academy in the occupied territory, spoke bluntly about the discriminatory military justice his soldiers administer.

He said they had shot 42 Palestinian stone-throwers on West Bank roads last year, insisting that such acts amounted to terrorism. Bluth said the army does not shoot Jewish settler militants for doing the same thing, noting that on one occasion when a settler throwing stones at motorists had been wounded by army gunfire, there was a public “ruckus”.

“Any such incident has very serious consequences from a societal perspective,” Bluth said, according to the reported remarks, openly admitting: “Yes, it involves discrimination.” Palestinians are subjected to military law in the West Bank and to extended detention without trial, while Israelis are judged by civilian courts.

Bluth said another way he had loosened legal constraints on Israeli soldiers in the West Bank was to allow the maiming of Palestinians caught trying to cross the separation barrier into Israel in search of work.

“At the [separation barrier], it is currently permitted to detain a suspect by shooting him at the knee or below to create ‘barrier awareness’,” Bluth said, adding that it served as a deterrent.

“There are a lot of ‘limping monuments’ in Palestinian villages of those who tried to [cross the barrier], so there is a price being paid,” he said.

As with stone-throwers, Bluth justified his rules of engagement on the grounds that each illegal Palestinian worker was a “potential terrorist”. The general also portrayed his actions as part of a “survival of the fittest” struggle.

“If someone comes to kill you, kill them first is the norm in the Middle East, so we’re killing like we haven’t killed since 1967,” Bluth said, in reference to the war against Arab states that resulted in the permanent occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. Thousands of Palestinians were killed in the second intifada from 2000 to 2005.

“His apartheidist approach, under which the army shoots only Palestinian stone-throwers, not Jewish ones, was justified on the grounds of the ‘sociological consequences’ of shooting at the latter,” Haaretz said in an editorial, asking: “Did he take into account the ‘sociological consequences’ of these ‘lame monuments’ on the Palestinians?”