Protecting the Palestinians

In this Reuters article about Israeli settler violence against the Palestinians, Nahla Makhlouf, a Palestinian residing in the West Bank, was given a video camera by the Israeli Rights Group B'Tselem to record vigilante settler violence. During an encounter, the camera lens broke, but the audio kept recording.

Yoav Gross of B'Tselem said the settlers can be heard giving the army a one-minute ultimatum to act against the Palestinians or they would do the job themselves.

"They started counting one, two, three...," he said. "They were giving orders to the soldiers, not the other way around."

One Israeli human rights lawyer, Michael Sfard, says most soldiers do not realize they have not only the right but also the duty, as the occupying power, to defend Palestinians.

It's sad that the IDF doesn't realize what they're supposed to do as soldiers.