IDF Attacked in Jenin

Nadene Goldfoot                                                                    

                  
The IDF (Israel Defense Force)  went into Jenin today on a mission jointly with the Israel Border Police to find a wanted terrorist, Bassam Saadi,  and was met with rioting which resulted in them coming under heavy fire shot by the Palestinians from behind cover and from rooftops.

The IDF returned fire and one was killed and 2  were injured who were evacuated by the Red Crescent.

Jenin, in the northern section of ancient Israel, later called Samaria because the city of Samaria had become the capital of Israel.  This also included the land surrounding it.  Today non-Israelis refer to it as the West Bank, the name Jordan gave it.  It  is a Palestinian town today,  It is probably the biblical En Gannim found in Joshua 19:21.  In Roman times it was renamed as Ginaea.  It had a small Jewish community in the 17th century.

In the 1930's it was the center of Arab nationalist fanaticism and became part of Jordan in 1948 till 1967 by Jordan's illegal taking of the land that was part of the Jewish Homeland Agreement through the League of Nations.  The population in 1967 was 8,346 Arabs which was apart from 5,019 Arab refugees in the vicinity.  In 1997 the population had risen to 26,650 of which 50% of that number was of refugees.

I searched for an up to date  population figure and was met with some sites saying 39,004 to 120,004, both for 2007.

Resource: http://www.algemeiner.com/2013/08/20/terrorist-killed-after-idf-fired-upon-in-very-violent-jenin-riot-video/
http://inagist.com/all/369866513571790851/?utm_source=inagist&utm_medium=rss
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysVajFhmMQk&feature=youtu.be
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenin
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia : Jenin
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/judaica/ejud_0002_0011_0_10072.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Border_Police
Update: 7:13pm  http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/171100#.UhQiBdKOTqF

The Problems of Verifying Facts From Gaza

Gaza Doctor: Hamas Exaggerated Gaza Death Toll

Nadene Goldfoot
- 600 Killed, Mostly Fighters, Not 1,300 - Yossi Bar (Maariv-Hebrew)

The Italian newspaper Corriere della Serra Thursday quoted a doctor at Shifa Hospital in Gaza City saying that, despite Hamas and UN claims, most of those killed in Gaza were young men who were members of terror groups. “The number of deaths was between 500-600...most were young men between 17 and 23 who were recruited into the ranks of Hamas, which sent them to be slaughtered,” he said. Journalist Lorenzo Cremonesi confirmed that only 600 people were killed, and not 1,300 as was widely reported, based on hospital visits and discussions with families of the victims.

“It was strange that the non-governmental organizations, including Western ones, repeated the number without checking, but the truth will come to light in the end,” said the doctor. “It's like what happened in Jenin in 2002,” he said. “At the beginning they spoke of 500 dead; afterwards it was clear there were only 54 dead, at least 45 of them fighters.”

Hamas Doesn't Always Wear A Uniform: 750 Killed

Jan. 22, 2009YAAKOV KATZ and JPost.com staff , THE JERUSALEM POST
Despite a report by Lorenzo Cremonesi, a correspondent for Italy's Corriere della sera, that the number of Palestinians killed in Operation Cast Lead did not exceed five or six hundred, Israeli defense officials on Thursday said there were around 1,300 Palestinians killed during the fighting in Gaza and that a majority of them were Hamas operatives.

The IDF's Gaza Coordination and Liaison Administration has already compiled a list with 900 names of Palestinians killed during the operation, out of which 750 are believed to be Hamas operatives.
The IDF estimated that two-thirds of those killed were gunmen affiliated with Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian terror factions. At least 500 are believed to have been members of Hamas's military wing.
Hamas, defense officials said, purposely covered up the number of dead and on Sunday claimed that only 48 members of its military wing had been killed. Many bodies belonging to Hamas operatives were being stored - officials said - in the morgue in Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.

The vast majority of the Hamas operatives killed were not wearing uniforms to disguise their affiliation, another reason for the exaggerated estimate of civilian casualties by the United Nations.
The IDF's Military Intelligence has set up a team to come up with a comprehensive list including the names and affiliation of all of the Palestinians killed during Operation Cast Lead. The list, officials said, would be completed in the coming two weeks.

In addition to reporting that no more than 500 or 600 Palestinians were killed in Gaza during the IDF operation, Cremonesi, who based his report on tours of hospitals in the Gaza Strip and on interviews with families of casualties, assessed the number of wounded to be far lower than 5,000, the number quoted by Hamas and repeated by the UN and the Red Cross in Gaza.

"It is sufficient to visit several hospitals [in the Gaza Strip] to understand that the numbers don't add up," he wrote.

In the European hospital in Rafah, one of the facilities which would presumably be filled with wounded from the "war of the tunnels," many beds were empty, according to Cremonesi. A similar situation was noted in the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, and in the privately-run Amal Hospital Cremonesi reported that only five out 150 beds were occupied.

Cremonesi interviewed Gazans who echoed Israel's insistence of how Hamas gunmen used civilians as human shields. One Gazan recalled civilians in Gaza shouting at Hamas and Islamic Jihad men, "Go away, go away from here! Do you want the Israelis to kill us all? Do you want our children to die under their bombs? Take your guns and missiles with you."

"Traitors, collaborators with Israel, spies of Fatah, cowards! The soldiers of the holy war will punish you. And in any case you will all die, like us. Fighting the Zionist Jews we are all destined for paradise. Do you not wish to die with us?" the religious fanatics of Hamas reportedly responded.

Other Palestinians told Cremonesi of Hamas operatives donning paramedic uniforms and commandeering ambulances. A woman identified as Um Abdullah, 48, spoke of Hamas using UN buildings as launch pads for rockets.

Cremonesi reported that he had difficultly gathering evidence as the local population was terrified of Hamas.