Israeli army behaved like “Russian army” in West Bank, newly released British files show

London (Quds News Network)- Newly released official files show that Britain warned the Israeli occupation government that Israeli army behavior in the West Bank was “more worthy of the Russian army than that of a civilized country” over 20 years ago.

“If some of the reports we were receiving were credible, the IDF’s behavior was more worthy of the Russian army than that of a supposedly civilized country. I was not suggesting that such behavior was a matter of policy,” British ambassador Sherard Cowper-Coles reported back after his meeting with then-Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s foreign policy adviser in 2002, according to The Guardian.

“But there was no doubt that individual soldiers were out of control and committing acts which were outraging international opinion.”

As an example, he cited the case of Israeli troops broadcasting a pornographic video on Palestinian television, knowing it would be deeply offensive to devout Muslims. “Ayalon had no real answer to any of this, pleading only ignorance and Arab lies,” Cowper-Coles wrote.

The meeting notes are among documents released by the National Archives on Tuesday which reveal British and American frustration during a major military raid into the West Bank in 2002.

In addition to suggesting the Israeli military was behaving like the Russian military, likely a reference to Moscow’s forces’ brutal tactics in Chechnya a few years earlier, Coles warned Danny Ayalon, Sharon’s adviser, that the Sharon’s Operation Defensive Shield was “a major strategic mistake”.

The files show that US President George W Bush was similarly perturbed, complaining in a private call with UK Prime Minister Tony Blair that Sharon’s policies were turning Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat into a martyr similar to Osama bin Laden.

“While Arafat had effectively been marginalizing himself, Sharon had succeeded in making a martyr of him – building him up to the point where he was becoming the new bin Laden,” Bush complained, according to a note of the call by the then-UK leader’s office.

“The Israelis were trying to fight a 21st century war with 20th century techniques. Sending tanks into alleyways was simply a PR disaster. The US had tried to persuade Sharon privately, but he just would not listen. The bottom line was that Sharon was undermining the US’s ability to pursue the war on terrorism. That was not the action of a good ally.”

A British officer who had observed IDF operations in the occupied territories before Operation Defensive Shield said that, despite its reputation as a “competent and effective” force, the reality was very different. “A second-rate, ill-disciplined, swaggering and bullying force,” was his scathing verdict.

“They routinely use excessive force such as firing at the ‘legs’ of stone throwers or at ‘car tyres’ with the inevitable steady stream of ambulances ferrying youths to hospital with fatal bullet wounds to the head and body.”

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