Oh for Christ's Sake

Sometimes I am sickened when I'm reminded how deeply racism is embedded in a country that is supposed to be a democracy equally serving all of its residents. And that's saying something, because generally I don't care about other people at all.

This article from today's ynet reveals a clear incident of violent racism within its own culture, all the while attempting to dress it up as justified violence.

Four Border Guard officers were lightly injured Friday after being run over by a Palestinian driving a pickup truck in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Joz. The driver was shot, and quickly died of his wounds. His body was later snatched from the hospital and he was buried at a cemetery near the Temple Mount.

There are just so many things wrong with this one little paragraph. Firstly, the officers were "lightly injured" after being "run over." Really? I feel like one or the other of those phrases might be misleading. Normally people aren't just lightly injured when they are run over. So I'm thinking that most likely they weren't run over. Probably a car passed by them rather quickly and gave them quite a fright. Secondly, the driver "was shot, and quickly died of his wounds." A little trigger-happy are we? I might give the border guards the benefit of the doubt if I didn't already know that if a Jewish citizen had committed the same crime, he would absolutely not be shot at. Lastly, his body was "snatched" in order to be buried. A little misrepresentation-happy are we? Not only are these fiendish Palestinians driving too fast, they are stealing and burying their family members in accordance with their religious beliefs. Where will it end????

Let's move on:

After the incident, the assailant attempted to escape by foot and was shot by a Border Guard force stationed in the area. He was critically wounded and died shortly afterwards. Police suspect the incident was nationalistically motivated....The company commander began chasing the assailant, who tried to flee the scene. According to the police, he was shot after failing to obey the police's call to stop.

So he was shot in the back while running away. Because the police officer probably yelled "stop" in a language he may or may not have understood. I'm not an expert but usually in situations like this, lethal force is only authorized if the suspect presents imminent danger to someone else's life. But I don't know, maybe running away, even though he had left his "weapon" (ie his car) behind, might have seemed like it presents an imminent threat. And then, "police suspect the incident was nationalistically motivated." What does that even mean? How on earth did they come to that conclusion? Absolutely no evidence whatsoever has been presented for such a claim. Whatever. It doesn't matter. The "assailant" was Palestinian and his "victims" were Israeli, so naturally it was a terror attack. Obviously.

We have DWB in the U.S.- driving while black. Here in Israel, I guess its DWA- driving while Arab.

And the end of the story reveals that

Another passenger who was in the car with him was apparently injured by stones hurled at the road earlier and was evacuated to the Hadassah Mount Scopus Hospital. The police are looking into his version that the driver who run over the officers was trying to evacuate him to receive medical treatment.

So in reality, he might have just been rushing his friend to the hospital and in his haste was not driving very carefully. Maybe. But now his life has been ended, so what difference does it make.

Finally, I would like the point out that the article includes a photo of the bulldozer from the "bulldozer attack" of two years ago. As if it is related in any way.

The first intifada started when a car accident was at first thought to be an intentional act of violent racism, by the way.