The destruction also targets condoms, a move that human rights groups characterize as an Israeli effort to spread sexually-transmitted diseases in Gaza.
Credit: MinoZig via Wikipedia
Gaza Envelope, August 24 – Israel’s military keeps taking aim at Palestinian toys for children and using either bullets or lasers to destroy them, observers report.
Eyewitnesses on both sides of Israel’s frontier with the Gaza Strip confirmed to reporters that the military has been shooting at balloons, kites, and other children’s toys for more than a week that have been lofted into the air on the Palestinian side. Instead of leaving the toys alone, or retrieving them and arranging for their return to whatever children in Gaza may have lost them, observers note, Israel tries to bring down as many of the items as it can before any of the objects land on its side of the barrier.
Experts estimate the number of balloons thus destroyed in the thousands, with kites in the hundreds. “There are that many fewer such toys in Gaza for the children of that territory, and Lord knows they are deprived enough already,” remarked Human Rights Watch coordinator Omar Shakir. “The vindictiveness of Israeli policy is on full display, and they have gotten away with it for so long that they no longer even attempt to conceal this behavior.”
“They even have special units assigned to the task,” he continued in disbelief. “Entire platoons who spread out not far from the border and just start shooting at balloons and kites. It’s a sickening sight that you won’t see anywhere else in the world. But not a peep from the international media. They just don’t want to talk about the balloons. Just the Israeli airstrikes that hit empty facilities and buildings when a new bunch of balloons floats east.”
On occasion the destruction also targets condoms, a move that human rights groups characterize as an Israeli effort to spread sexually-transmitted diseases in Gaza.
In one undisclosed location, a team of Israeli operators use a special laser to destroy airborne balloons, as if popping children’s inflatable toys is an activity in which trained soldiers normally engage. “This device allows us to get to the balloons without endangering anyone with bullets overhead,” explained a colonel who identified himself only as C. “At this stage the equipment is still undergoing field trials, but we do have no shortage of actual targets.” Journalists noticed no apparent relish or pleasure in the officer’s voice, lending credence to rumors that the IDF, or Israeli society in general, produces emotionless automatons incapable of feeling remorse at the number of children’s toys they destroy.
Official IDF materials on the subject make reference to “incendiary devices” in connection with the balloons and kites, though it remains unclear what helium, a non-flammable gas inside the balloons, has to do with such claims.
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