Israel Matzav

'Palestinians' 'confirm' organ harvesting

Well, this just must prove it.

JPost's Khaled Abu Toameh reports that the 'Palestinian' web site Maan (presumably in its Arabic section, because I could not find it in the English section) 'confirms' the blood libel that the IDF harvested 'Palestinian' organs for resale abroad as reported last week by the Swedish tabloid Aftonbladet.

Ma'an, which is funded by Denmark and the Netherlands, headlined its feature: "Disappearances, Holding Bodies, Organ Theft - Intertwined Crimes."

The feature is based on an interview with Abdel Nasser Farwaneh, a former security prisoner in Israel who is described by the news agency as an "expert on prisoners' affairs."

Farwaneh is quoted as saying that the "findings" published by the Swedish newspaper are true.

"All the facts, evidence and testimonies over the past few decades regarding the way the occupation forces were treating and killing innocent civilians don't leave room for doubt about the credibility of the report in the Swedish newspaper," he said.

The "expert" claimed that hundreds of Palestinian and Arab prisoners have disappeared in Israeli detention centers and prisons.

"This policy of hiding prisoners is surely connected to what the Swedish newspaper published," Farwaneh said. "It's possible that all those missing prisoners, or a large number of them, were deliberately killed so that their organs could be stolen and used illegally. The remains of these prisoners are then hidden in secret cemeteries known as the Cemeteries of Numbers."

Farwaneh told the agency that there was also good reason to believe that the allegations were true because many bodies of Hizbullah gunmen that were returned by Israel were missing organs.

He also claimed that IDF soldiers had "executed" more than 50 civilians after arresting them during the second intifada, which began in September 2000. "This could be related to what the Swedish newspaper reported about organ harvesting," he said.

Farwaneh expressed deep admiration for the Swedish newspaper and the journalist who reported the allegations, Donald Bostrom, and called on the international media to follow suit and expose Israeli "atrocities and war crimes" against Palestinians.

Anyone still think we shouldn't hold the Swedish government's relations with us hostage to this story? And now they're adding claims about executing civilians and about bodies returned to Hezbullah. For those who have forgotten, let's remind you how Hezbullah returns bodies to Israel.

Former IDF Medical Corps and Chief Military Rabbinate officials have noted the tragic expertise Israel has gathered in years of conflict, but remained shocked by what they saw yesterday at the Rosh HaNikra border crossing.

Rabbi Yisrael Weiss, former Chief Rabbi of the IDF, who was present during the transfer of the fallen soldiers yesterday, said that "the verification process yesterday was very slow, because, if we thought the enemy was cruel to the living and the dead, we were surprised, when we opened the caskets, to discover just how cruel. And I'll leave it at that."

Former IDF Chief Medical Officer Brig. Gen. (reserve) Dr. Hezi Levi noted this morning that only extensive procedures could verify the exact series of events following the soldier's capture, including whether or not a gunshot wound Regev received to the head was caused by terrorists' "confirming the kill" of the fallen IDF soldier.

I trust that somewhere there are pictures documenting the state of those bodies, which the IDF would prefer not to release.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:36 PM