I think the silly overriding presumption there is that this was to be a “false-flag” operation, designed to draw in the US on the side of the Israelis by blaming the attack on the Arab air forces - however, they failed to sink the ship. I think this is a bit silly, however, if the IDF air force had sunk the Liberty, no doubt they certainly would have denied any involvement…
I have an old (1995) newspaper article on the massacre. IIRC, it took place in the Gaza Strip and involved about 1,000 prisoners. Mass graves were uncovered decades later. I would have to read the article again. I could scan and post it (probably tomorrow).
My inclination is that it happened, despite predictable Israeli denials.
The figure is probably in the hundreds for Al Arish.
As you rightly surmise, the websites tend to be partisan one way or the other.
This one, although partisan, at least has some eyewitness testimony (unless it’s manufactured) in the link at the bottom. http://egyptianpows.net/1967/al-arish/
It’s been a festering sore between Israel and Egypt for quite some time.
Unfortunately a mass grave is only evidence that a lot of people died. In wartime, particularly in mobile wars, enemy dead tend to be buried in mass graves simply due to time constraints. For instance, the Paras killed in the attack on Goose Green were initially buried in a single mass grave. They were later reburied with most bodies being repatriated, but it isn’t exactly unusual.
Mistreatment of prisoners is usually evidence of one of two things. Either the side doing the mistreating is frankly barbaric with little or no respect for the conventions the west has developed to regulate warfare, or command & control has started to break down as at Abu Ghraib. My low opinion of the Israeli armed forces is well known, and it wouldn’t surprise me if C2 had broken down far enough for isolated, small scale mistreatment of prisoners to happen. I do not however believe that there was ever a political decision in Israel to massacre prisoners.
For purposes of clarity, I believe the number alleged is around 1000. Including a number of about 250 that may have been killed by a current senior Labor politicians elite commando unit in 1967…
I’m not sure that it was the case that every event was an execution of a POW. There’s something at the back of my mind about a good number of bottled up Egyptians being killed rather than the IDF accepting their surrender, which I seem to recall was happening at the time Liberty was hit with radio traffic between field commanders exposing what was going on. I’ll post if I can track it down.
I re-read the article this evening (got home late). Apparently it involved about 1,000 prisoners in separate incidents in Sinai - not over 10,000 as I originally posted. The article was from The Times-Union, Jacksonville, Florida, August 17, 1995.
I will try to post it tomorrow.
The mass grave part was from a different article that I read somewhere else.
It may not have been a strategic “political decision” but merely a tactical decision taken by local commanders as one of localized “military expediency.” Also, there’s a recent article printed in the Jerusalem Post that stated that some of the dead were actually members of an independent Palestinian battalion sized element (about 250 of them), but that they were “killed in combat,” not after surrendering.
When I was in the US Army, I recall attending a “Laws of Land Warfare” class given by this beautiful blond JAG lieutenant that had very large breasts. As she went through the standard “no killing of prisoners” spiel, of the officers, a captain, that I worked with stood up (probably trying to impress her and give her a hard time since she was hot) said his grandfather was a Marine in the PTO during WWII who had often given, and received, orders to take Japanese prisoners “out for a five-mile forced march, and (to) be back in five minutes!” This of course was euphemistic code for: kill them out of sight.
The JAG lieutenant looked at him and said, “there’s no statue of limitations on war crimes.” And he just smiled meekly, and sat back down and shut up for the rest of the class.
Hmmm… “some of the prisoners opened fire after surrendering” - note that this is a war crime under the Geneva and Hague conventions (“perfidy”). If true, this is enough to almost justify the Israeli actions (not quite). But it’s entirely possible the early killings were quite legitimate, if not the later ones.
Prisoners opening fire after surrendering doesn’t make sense.
When does a POW retain his arms?
On the most charitable view to the Israelis, perhaps some Egyptian commanders surrendered their unit but some members of the unit continued to fight before becoming prisoners. That could just be down to poor communications.
I think mate is to understand the why Isreal did it we need to watch the situationon and publis oppinion in the USA in the 1967.
For the first time i 've learned about Liberti was ehn i/ve read the book of former us congressmen David Duke “The jewish supermasism”.( resently this book was published in russsian).
So as he read he was in shok when first time knew about “Eguptian” attack of Liberty. He wrote thet the FIRST AMERICAN PUBLIC reaction was the the ANGER for the Egupt. This quite amazing ( and INTERESTING) but when the US mass media firstly told this new - they KEEP THE SILENCE that it was the Isreal attak;)
Thus the americans were sure it was the Egiuptians or may be the Soviets.
Now do you see where the answer?
The zionist SIMPLY had NO TIME to planned it carefully.
Remember the could lost the Isreal for the six days- in this situation they decided to make the PROVOCATION and what should be later - does not matter;)
The first aim of attack was the PURE EMOTIONAL - to inspire the american public oppinion that the Liberty was the victims of the Arabs.
Later as we CLEARLY saw the all pro-Zionist mass mediam MADE ALL POSSIBLE to keep the silence about this provocatoion. And they succesfully did it
And what was the reason of the mass killing the refugees in the camps of Lebanon in 1982 by the isreal army under command of Ariel Sharon?
were those peoples perfidious too?
Maybe some of our American members can flesh this out, but I don’t think Duke was ever a member of the US Congress, only the Louisiana house.
He’s a total racist arsehole of the worst kind, with KKK, white supremacist, and neo-Nazi affiliations.
He makes David Irving look like a saint. At least Irving was a bloody good historian who also made complex issues accessible to the wider public through some very readable books, before he went nuts.
I don’t know the book you’re referring to, but if this is the same DD, he’s a turd.
This is drifting the topic to something that should be a topic in its own right if a separate section on Arab-Israeli wars is started, but it’d be interesting to contrast the established and alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity by Israel with other Western nations sharing the same “moral” views during the same period.
Lt Calley in Vietnam was a bit of an unavoidable “hand caught in the naughty cookie jar” public relations exercise when other US,SV and allied troops did similar things, although usually under closer control for, sometimes, better defined military purposes, but on a per capita basis I’d be inclined to say that Israel did a lot more damage than America and some other much larger countries and, worse, from a purportedly higher moral ground from the end of WWII until now.
Bombing the King David Hotel in 1946 was, after all, the Twin Towers of its day and had a similar effect on the world.
It pretty much set the tone for what I regard as the arrogant self-justification of many bad Israeli actions since then.
I’m not sure the Americans would have ever believed the Egyptian pre-war Air Force capable of attacking US shipping, much less it’s wartime air force that was mostly smoldering on the ground…
I am not trying to defend or justify the killing of POW’s, but the exact conditions were not described when the prisoners allegedly opened fire after surrendering. Also, I am not denying the possibility that some or most of the killings might have been unprovoked.
I recall seeing a documentary on the History Channel or Military Channel a couple weeks ago in which a US Marine veteran of WWII described an incident where a Japanese prisoner had a grenade hidden in his jacket sleeve. The prisoner blew himself up along with some Marines as they approached him. They had a policy after that for Japanese POW’s to strip their uniforms off after capture to prevent them from hiding weapons in their clothing (I guess this would explain why I’ve seen photographs of Japanese prisoners stripped down to their loincloths). And sometimes they just didn’t take prisoners.
I also seem to remember seeing a photograph taken in Europe where a group of German soldiers were emerging from a doorway under a white flag. The caption said something to the effect that moments later the group hit the dirt and a soldier behind them opened fire - killing several Americans, including the photographer.
Also some quotes from HOW TO MAKE WAR: A Comprehensive Guide To Modern Warfare, First Revised Edition, by James F. Dunnigan, William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1988, pp 33, 472
Surrender is always a possibility, assuming the battered attacker is in a compassionate mood. Given the fact that 70 percent of attacking troops in destroyed APC’s are killed or injured, however, the enemy might be bloody minded. Although it is not often written about, prisoners are usually not taken during opposed attacks, especially if individuals or small groups are trying to give up. The attacker doesn’t want to spare any troops to guard prisoners, particularly since he needs all the help he can get to complete the attack successfully. And then we have all those troops that are wounded and are in more need of attention than enemy prisoners. This is why defeated defenders attempt to hide or sneak away rather than test the questionable mercies of attacker through surrender. Veteran troops know this, otherwise they wouldn’t be veterans. ( p 33 )
Prisoners And Deserters
Losses are not always the result of death or injury. Soldiers are taken prisoner and others decide to pursue more peaceful endeavors. The number of prisoners and deserters varies considerably depending on how badly you are losing. Even a victorious force lists a few percent of its total losses as MIA (Missing In Action). About 50 percent of MIA’s are KIA (Killed In Action) or badly wounded and die before they can be identified. Many of the rest turn out to be deserters or prisoners who die in captivity. Historically, all men who surrender are not captured alive by the enemy. As many as 50 percent of those who surrender do not survive the process. They are either killed on the spot or die in captivity. Troops in combat quickly learn this, which explains why surrender is not more common. When survivable surrenders do occur, they tend to be in large numbers or by negotiation. ( p 472 )
FWIW, I’ve “killed” a prisoner on exercise. I was covering them while someone else searched them, the searcher had already pulled several weapons out from their pockets (12 inch knife, etc.). When the searcher got down to the boot tops the prisoner suddenly turned around and started trying to strangle him. I had about a second to decide if my searcher was in danger, decided he was (at the time I thought the prisoner still had a weapon) so shot him.
Unfortunately it turned out the guy was unarmed, so I got my head ripped off somewhat by the directing staff. Still, that’s why you do it in training - had I done it in Iraq, I’d have been facing a murder charge.
