Israel "ALWAYS" Acknowledges Its Atrocities

[From Noam Chomsky's FATEFUL TRIANGLE on Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon. Thanks to Jamie Stern-Weiner for his research]

Israel’s first response to the reports of atrocities by journalists on Saturday September 18 was that “we do not know anything of these alleged massacres” (IDF spokesman). The expression of anger by the U.S. over the killings in the camps was denounced in Jerusalem as “hypocrisy.” Subsequently a variety of excuses were attempted (the Phalangists entered through an area not under Israeli control, etc.), but these were soon dropped as it became evident that there were simply too many credible eyewitnesses.

[...]

When the reports of the massacre reached the outside world, Israel denied any knowledge of what had happened. This pretense was quickly dropped in favor of outraged denial of any responsibility. The official reaction of the government was announced on September 19, and appeared in a full page advertisement in several American newspapers. The heading was “BLOOD LIBEL,” a reference to traditional anti-Semitic incitement. It is a reflex reaction to accuse critics of Israel of anti-Semitism, a device of proven effectiveness to deflect any rational discussion of the issues...

The official government statement then went on to assert that “there was no position of the Israeli army” in the area where “a Lebanese unit entered a refugee camp in order to apprehend terrorists hiding there.” It claimed further that “As soon as the IDF learned of the tragic events, Israeli soldiers put an end to the slaughter and forced the Lebanese unit to evacuate the camp.” These shameful lies were silently abandoned later on. The second is not only contradicted by the eyewitness reports of numerous journalists, but also by General [Ariel] Sharon’s direct testimony in the Knesset a few days later... As for the claim that there was no position of the Israeli army in the area completely surrounded by IDF soldiers who could not only observe what was happening but were so close by that they “must have heard the screams of the massacred all night,” no comment is necessary. 

Subsequently, there was a temporary pretense that the camps had been only partially encircled by the IDF and that the militiamen must have entered, unknown to the IDF, through the unguarded eastern sector, but this too was dropped as the press, including the Israeli press, reported the opposite, even citing earlier official IDF statements that the camps were completely encircled. Shortly after, the full range of pretenses was dropped, as unsustainable in the face of massive counter-evidence.

[...]

[T]his is not the first time that an Israeli government has been forced to resort to such deceit to cover up the terrorist violence of Ariel Sharon. The first well-known occasion was in October 1953, when Unit 101 commanded by Sharon attacked the Jordanian village of Qibya in alleged “reprisal” for the killing of a mother and two children in an Israeli village. Jordan had condemned the murders and offered its cooperation to track down the criminals; the murderers had no known or suspected connection with Qibya. UN military observers who reached the scene two hours after Sharon’s commandos had finished their work described what they found: “Bullet-riddled bodies near the doorways and multiple bullet hits on the doors of the demolished houses indicated that the inhabitants had been forced to remain inside until their homes were blown up over them… Witnesses were uniform in describing their experience as a night of horror, during which Israeli soldiers moved about in their village blowing up buildings, firing into doorways and windows with automatic weapons and throwing hand grenades.”

The Qibya attack evoked harsh condemnation, with even the American Jewish and strongly pro-Israel press comparing it to the Nazi massacre at Lidice; in contrast, the massacre is lauded as a major achievement in the official Israeli history of the paratroopers, which states that “it washed away the stain” of earlier defeats that the IDF had sustained in “reprisal operations.” The public stance was different. Concerned over the international reaction, Ben-Gurion, speaking in the name of the Government of Israel, rejected “the ridiculous and fantastic” claim that Israeli military units were involved in the raid; it was, he claimed, a spontaneous retaliation by “border settlers in Israel, mostly refugees, people from Arab countries and survivors from the Nazi concentration camps,” who attacked the village of Qibya “that was one of the main centers of the murderers’ gangs,” the kind of reprisal that Israel had “feared.” Foreign Minister Sharett was opposed to the deception, feeling that “no one in the world will believe such a story and we shall only expose ourselves as liars.” He felt that “the stain would stick to us and will not be washed away for many years to come.” “Seventy corpses were found in the rubble,” according to Ben-Gurion’s biographer Bar-Zohar, “including dozens of women and children.” Ben-Gurion later “confess[ed] to one of his confidants that he had lied,” Bar-Zohar continues, but justified this act with a literary reference (Victor Hugo) to a nun who had lied to protect a hunted prisoner.