RE: POLITICS: US Citizen Killed by Israelis

From: Andrew Clough (aclough@mit.edu)
Date: Mon Mar 17 2003 - 23:59:36 MST

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    At 10:19 AM 3/17/2003 -0800, you wrote:
    >From: Michael Wiik [mailto:mwiik@messagenet.com]
    > > That's interesting, as the Israeli army has admitted it was
    > > an accident. Apparently this was an armored bulldozer with
    > > restricted vision.
    >
    >When I heard about this I assumed it was an accident too. However,
    >below is a link to a site with pictures of the incident. You can see
    >Rachel Corrie standing on a mound with what appears to be a direct
    >line of sight to the driver. She's wearing a bright safety-orange
    >jacket and has a megaphone pointed at the driver.
    >
    >After seeing this, and hearing eye witness reports, I believe this was
    >an act of murder. Possibly the bulldozer driver thought she was
    >"just" a palestinian, and who would really notice or care if he killed
    >one of those in the course of his job?
    >
    >Here's the site with the pictures. Warning: there are a couple shots
    >of her after being run over. Also, this is clearly a biased site, but
    >the pictures speak for themselves.
    >
    >http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article1248.shtml
    >
    >mez

    When I first visited the sight, I too was appalled that the Israeli driver
    would claim not be ignorant of someone who was clearly standing and
    shouting at him through a microphone. Also, she is shown to be standing
    off to the side and the bulldozer driver would clearly have had to swerve
    to hit her. However, I later read through several news sources that said a
    variety of things and tried to piece together exactly what happened

    http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=273498&contrassID=2&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0
    says that she had climbed up onto the bulldozer blade before falling
    underneath it.

    CNN says that some witnesses claim she was in plain view, while other
    witnesses say that she had fallen behind a pile of rubble, out of sight,
    beforehand.

    http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/134654821_protester17m.html
    says that she had climbed up onto a pile of rubble in front of the
    bulldozer, and semi-implies that she was still there when she was
    hit. This would be in accordance with the pictures Electronic Intifada,
    but checking back the pictures of her on the rubble aren't labeled as
    having been taken right before her death, and on examination (at least of
    the uncropped versions available elsewhere) show that they were taken in a
    slightly different location.

    In summary, I now believe that she died...somehow...under an Israeli
    bulldozer while trying to stop it from demolishing a house for some
    reason. Anything else would be pure speculation on my part, and in any
    event people have notoriously horrible memories of things that happen in
    situations like this; if five people witness an assassin walk up to his
    target, shoot him, and walk away they are likely to get five different
    discriptions.

    Never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity. Don't assign
    to stupidity what might be due to ignorance. And try not to assume you
    opponent is the ignorant one-until you can show it isn't you.
    -M.N. Plano



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