The day the Israeli army came to the Gaza Zoo

[DogPoundPup]

A month ago, it was attracting families - he says the zoo drew up to 1,000 visitors each day. He points at the foot-long hole in the camel in one of the enclosures.

'This camel was pregnant, a missile went into her back,' he tells us. 'Look, look at her face. She was in pain when she died.'

Around every corner, inside almost every cage are dead animals, who have been lying in their cages since the Israeli incursion.

Qasim doesn't understand why they chose to destroy his zoo. And it's difficult to disagree with him. Most of them have been shot at point blank range.

read more: http://story.irishsun.com/index.php/ct/9/cid/2411cd3571b4f088/id/458766/cs/1/

[alstephenson]

1. OMG. I should have known not to read this post.

How sad and unnecessary. Why??? Just why???

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. Can anyone say that animals are terrorists?

This shows wantonness.

[GoesTo11]

3. Doesn't make sense

With so many things booby trapped, etc., why would Israel endanger its soldiers just to kill zoo animals? I guess they are just that sadistic.

[Shaktimaan]

4. While there's no way to be certain, this story seems a little suspicious to me.

I understand that it's entirely possible that the zoo was hit by artillery or bombs. Though I disagree that the IDF would target it purposefully. (Primarily because the IDF tends to take its PR needs into serious consideration and there would be no reason whatsoever to actually do such a thing. I also understand that many of the animals could have starved or dehydrated to death because the zoo's workers had fled, which seems pretty likely to have happened to at least some of the animals. My mother works at a preservation trust for large carnivores, (mostly tigers but they have all kinds of large and medium cats), and the amount of care and food that these animals require is truly astounding.

But the idea that troops just wandered around the zoo shooting the animals at point blank range for fun is more doubtful. If true it would be extremely disturbing, to say the least. Actually it would be psychotic, which is why I have trouble believing that the officers in command of their squads would encourage behavior like that. Also, Israelis are pretty westernized. Most of the ones that I know own and love animals themselves. So if this were true I would really expect that someone would have leaked it to the Israeli press. I don't care what army you belong to, if you take twenty random people at least a few of them would take issue with behavior like this. There are certainly more than a few reserve soldiers who have spoken out publicly against the abuses and oppression they've witness and even participated in against the Palestinians. A movie about a soldier's participation in the Sabra and Shatila massacres was out last year, I think it was called "Walk with Bashir." So I have a little trouble buying into a single account of this as gospel truth. If it is true though then it is truly psychotic behavior.

Lastly, I question the source a little bit. The photo of the camel that died does not look like she was hit by a missile. Not at all. Do you have any idea of the kind of damage that a missile does? That camel looks scorched. There's no way she was hit by a missile.

And I'm just going to say this first, since other people will surely bring it up as well. If the people in Gaza were truly starving to death, as many, many people here have repeatedly intimated, then they would not have had a zoo. Not one with animals in it, at any rate. And certainly not one with animals like lions, who eat a tremendous amount of meat, something that starving people are known to value highly. If anyone in Gaza were truly starving to death while Hamas allocated meat to feed the lions, then they hold the welfare of their citizens in even lower regard than I had ever imagined possible. The Warsaw Ghetto, it bears mentioning, did not have a zoo.

[iconicgnom]

5. "If the people in Gaza were truly starving to death,

as many, many people here have repeatedly intimated, then they would not have had a zoo."

Congratulations on writing the most awe inspiring sentence I've read all week!

[cali]

7. oh for the love of reason.

No Gaza isn't the Warsaw Ghetto, but people are severely food insecure and there's widespread hunger an malnutrition, and yes, they had a zoo. had being the key word here.

[Scurrilous]

6. From the archives:

The day the tanks arrived at Rafah zoo (May-23-04)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=124&topic_id=70154


Tension rises as bulldozers tear down zoo in Rafah (Sat May-22-04)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=124&topic_id=69853

[oberliner]

8. Most of them have been shot at point blank range?

That particular statement is a ridiculous piece of propaganda to make the Israeli soldiers appear to be psychopaths.

This story can be found at your link with no byline, as well as on the website for the Karachi News, and the Malaysia Sun also with no byline.

It actually originated on Gulf News out of Dubai.

The same zookeeper was interviewed for a story about the damage to the zoo by The Times of London.

In that report the claim is that most of the animals died of starvation or due to missile strikes.

And there is an Israeli news story that claims that Hamas had planted explosives in the zoo - you can see video of that report on Youtube if you are interested.

[cali]

9. thanks. more and more in I/P

I'm reminded of the Iraqi soldiers/Kuwaiti babies in incubators story. People are eager to believe the most heinous stories about those that they perceive are there enemies.

[oberliner]

10. Here is a link to the Times article

Zoo’s pride as lions that dodged missiles prepare for parenthood

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article5570052.ece

And here's the IDF video claiming the zoo (and a nearby school) were rigged with explosives by Hamas:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHhs9ihSmbU

And here is the original article from the OP as originally published on Gulf News (with byline):

http://www.gulfnews.com/region/Middle_East/10278858.html

[iconicgnom]

11. Yes well, y'know, let's not talk about how Hamas uses civilians as "human shields"

because the Palastinian army is inhuman and grotesque. But how grotesque is it that in some threads I've seen it suggested that because Israel hasn't used a nuke yet, or some other overtly genocidal weapon, so it is "more -civilized" in comparison to those self-same Hamas monsters.

One thing that's the same, Israel vastly overwhelms the remnants of what was "Palestine" in terms of firepower, and alliances carrying firepower. So, in that sense, the onus is on Israel to prove good faith.

[cali]

12. I said from both sides

if you could stop fulminating for a minute, you might have caught that.