{"id":274613,"date":"2023-10-17T06:59:14","date_gmt":"2023-10-17T06:59:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=274613"},"modified":"2023-10-25T19:28:28","modified_gmt":"2023-10-25T19:28:28","slug":"israeli-forces-shot-their-own-civilians-kibbutz-survivor-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=274613","title":{"rendered":"Israeli forces shot their own civilians, kibbutz survivor says"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center;\">Yasmin Porat, a survivor of the bloodshed at Kibbutz Be\u2019eri, near the boundary with Gaza, says many Israeli civilians were killed by Israeli forces.<\/p>\n<h1 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Ali Abuminah and David Sheen \u2013 The Electronic Intifada Oct 16, 2023<\/strong><\/h1>\n<p>An Israeli woman who survived the Hamas assault on settlements near the Gaza boundary on 7 October says Israeli civilians were \u201cundoubtedly\u201d killed by their own security forces.<\/p>\n<p>It happened when Israeli forces engaged in fierce gun battles with Palestinian fighters in Kibbutz Be\u2019eri and fired indiscriminately at both the fighters and their Israeli prisoners.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey eliminated everyone, including the hostages,\u201d she told Israeli radio. \u201cThere was very, very heavy crossfire\u201d and even tank shelling.<\/p>\n<p>The woman, 44-year-old mother of three Yasmin Porat, said that prior to that, she and other civilians had been held by the Palestinians for several hours and treated \u201chumanely.\u201d She had fled the nearby \u201cNova\u201d rave.<\/p>\n<p>A recording of her interview, from the radio program <em>Haboker Hazeh<\/em> (\u201cThis Morning\u201d) hosted by Aryeh Golan on state broadcaster Kan, has been circulating on social media.<\/p>\n<p>The interview has been translated by The Electronic Intifada. You can listen to it with English subtitles in this video and a transcript is at the end of this article:<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/3cPeRSVgUpQ?si=M1aihR_XdCL5AWyv\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n&#8212;<\/div>\n<p>Notably, the interview is not included in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kan.org.il\/content\/kan\/kan-b\/p-9969\/\">online version<\/a> of <em>Haboker Hazeh<\/em> for 15 October, the episode in which it apparently aired.<\/p>\n<p>It may well have been censored due to its explosive nature.<\/p>\n<p>Porat, who is from Kabri, a settlement near the Lebanese border, undoubtedly experienced terrible things and saw many noncombatants killed. Her own partner, Tal Katz, is among the dead.<\/p>\n<p>However, her account undermines Israel\u2019s official story of deliberate, wanton murder by the Palestinian fighters.<\/p>\n<p>Although it no longer appears on the Kan website, there can be little doubt about the recording\u2019s authenticity.<\/p>\n<p>At least one Hebrew-language account <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.ph\/CLHdh\">posted<\/a> part of the interview on Twitter, now officially called X, and accused Kan of functioning as \u201cmedia in the service of Hamas.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Porat also <a href=\"https:\/\/www.maariv.co.il\/news\/israel\/Article-1043723\">gave her account<\/a> to the Israeli newspaper <em>Maariv<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>However, the <em>Maariv<\/em> story, published on 9 October, makes no specific mention of civilians being killed by Israeli forces.<\/p>\n<p>And in a half-hour interview with Israel\u2019s Channel 12 on Thursday, Porat speaks of intense gunfire after Israeli forces arrived. Porat herself received a bullet in the thigh.<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fghF54maONw?si=QgKKqwPA2XoMtFMS\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n&#8212;<\/div>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Treated \u201chumanely\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Not only does Porat tell Kan that Israelis were killed in the heavy counterattack by Israeli security forces, but she says she and other captive civilians were well treated by the Palestinian fighters.<\/p>\n<p>Porat had been attending the \u201cNova\u201d rave when the Hamas assault began with missiles and motorized paragliders. She and her partner Tal Katz escaped by car to nearby Kibbutz Be\u2019eri where many of the events she describes in her media interviews took place.<\/p>\n<p>According to Porat speaking to <em>Maariv<\/em>, she and Katz initially sought refuge in the house of a couple called Adi and Hadas Dagan. After the Palestinian fighters found them they were all taken to another house, where eight people were already being held captive and one person was dead.<\/p>\n<p>Porat said that the wife of the dead man \u201ctold us that when they [the Hamas fighters] tried to enter, the guy tried to prevent them from entering and grabbed the door. They shot at the door and he was killed. They did not execute them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey did not abuse us. They treated us very humanely,\u201d Porat explained to a surprised Golan in the Kan radio interview.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBy that I mean they guard us,\u201d she said. \u201cThey give us something to drink here and there. When they see we are nervous they calm us down. It was very frightening but no one treated us violently. Luckily nothing happened to me like what I heard in the media.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey were very humane towards us,\u201d Porat said in her Channel 12 interview. She recalled that one Palestinian fighter who spoke Hebrew, \u201ctold me, \u2018Look at me well, were not going to kill you. We want to take you to Gaza. We are not going to kill you. So be calm, you\u2019re not going to die.\u2019 Thats what he told me, in those words.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was calm because I knew nothing would happen to me,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey told us that we would not die, that they wanted to take us to Gaza and that the next day they would return us to the border,\u201d Porat told <em>Maariv<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>In the Channel 12 interview, Porat elaborates that although the Palestinian fighters all had loaded weapons, she never saw them shoot captives or threaten them with their guns.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to providing the captives with drinking water, she said the fighters let them go outside to the lawn because it was hot, especially as the electricity was cut.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Young and scared<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>About eight hours after the start of the Hamas attack and about half an hour after Porat\u2019s calls to the police, Israeli forces arrived and chaos ensued, Porat told Kan.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAt first there was no [Israeli] security force with us,\u201d Porat recalled, noting that her first call to the Israeli police went unanswered. \u201cWe were the ones who called the police, together with the abductors because the abductors wanted the police to arrive. Because their objective was to kidnap us to Gaza.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey understand that soldiers will not kill hostages. So they want to come out with us alive and for the police to permit it,\u201d Porat told Channel 12.<\/p>\n<p>Though the Israeli captives numbered only a dozen, Porat was instructed to tell Israeli police that 40 of them were being held by the Hamas fighters, who themselves numbered between 40 and 50 men mostly in their 20s, by Porat\u2019s estimate. They themselves were young and scared, she told Channel 12.<\/p>\n<p>A fighter Porat described as a commander in his 30s asked to speak to the police and was put on with an Arabic-speaking Israeli officer.<\/p>\n<p>After their brief conversation, the four dozen or so Palestinian fighters and their dozen Israeli prisoners awaited the arrival of the army, with some of the group spilling outside to the garden for relief from the afternoon heat.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Hails of bullets, mortars and tank shells<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Israeli forces announced their arrival with a hail of gunfire, catching the fighters and their Israeli captives by surprise.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were outside and suddenly there was a volley of bullets at us from the [Israeli unit] YAMAM. We all started running to find cover, Porat told Channel 12.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Porat said she surrendered to the Israeli soldiers half an hour into the fierce gun battle that consisted of \u201ctens and hundreds and thousands of bullets and mortars flying in the air,\u201d and that one of the Palestinian fighters, a commander, decided to surrender and used her in effect as a human shield.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe starts to disrobe,\u201d Porat recalled to Kan\u2019s Aryeh Golan. \u201cHe calls to me and he starts to leave the house with me, under fire. At that time I yell to the [Israeli commandos] \u2026 when they can hear me, to stop firing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd then they heard me and stopped firing,\u201d she added. \u201cI see people from the kibbutz on the lawn. There are five or six hostages lying on the ground outside. Just like sheep to the slaughter, between the shooting of our commandos and the terrorists.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe terrorists shot them?\u201d Golan asks.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo, they were killed by the crossfire,\u201d Porat responds. \u201cUnderstand there was very, very heavy crossfire.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Golan presses: \u201cSo our forces may have shot them?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUndoubtedly,\u201d the former captive responds, and adds, \u201cThey eliminated everyone, including the hostages because there was very, very heavy crossfire.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAfter insane crossfire, two tank shells were shot into the house. It\u2019s a small kibbutz house, nothing big,\u201d Porat explains.<\/p>\n<p>Porat and the man who took her captive both survived. The Palestinian was taken prisoner by Israeli forces. But according to Porat, almost everyone else in the settlement was killed, wounded or missing, believed to have been taken to Gaza.<\/p>\n<p>Porat told Kan she lost dozens of friends who had been at the rave \u2013 people she would regularly see at parties in Israel\u2019s trance scene.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m angry at the state, I\u2019m angry at the army,\u201d Porat told <em>Maariv<\/em>. \u201cFor 10 hours the kibbutz was abandoned.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The joint American-Israeli effort to paint Hamas as worse than ISIS in order to justify Israel\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/electronicintifada.net\/blogs\/maureen-clare-murphy\/humanity-failing-palestinians-gaza\">unfolding genocide<\/a> against the civilian population in Gaza depends on the international public not seeing or hearing accounts like Porat\u2019s.<\/p>\n<p>Israeli leaders, already under intense criticism for failing to anticipate and prevent the Hamas offensive, will also not want their catastrophic failures to be compounded by knowledge that many of the Israelis who died may well have been killed by \u201cfriendly fire\u201d in a disastrous Israeli counterattack.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Hannibal Directive?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Saleh al-Arouri, a senior Hamas military commander, has directly addressed Israel\u2019s claims that his fighters set out to deliberately kill as many civilians as possible.<\/p>\n<p>The Israeli propaganda campaign has included <a href=\"https:\/\/electronicintifada.net\/blogs\/ali-abunimah\/biden-lied-about-seeing-photos-beheaded-israeli-children\">lurid atrocity tales<\/a> \u2013 for which no evidence has been produced whatsoever \u2013 that Palestinians beheaded dozens of Israeli babies and that women were raped.<\/p>\n<p>Al-Arouri said in an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.net\/news\/2023\/10\/12\/----\">interview<\/a> with Al Jazeera on Thursday that fighters of his organization\u2019s military force, the Qassam Brigades, were under strict protocol to not harm civilians.<\/p>\n<p>But al-Arouri said that after Israel\u2019s Gaza division \u2013 the army unit that surrounds the Gaza Strip \u2013 collapsed much more quickly than expected, people in Gaza rushed to the boundary area after learning it had been opened, causing chaos. He said this may have included other armed persons who were not part of Qassam.<\/p>\n<p>Al-Arouri <a href=\"https:\/\/electronicintifada.net\/blogs\/maureen-clare-murphy\/israeli-attacks-wipe-out-44-gaza-families\">said<\/a> that this caused Qassam fighters to engage with soldiers, settlement guards and armed residents, which led to civilian deaths.<\/p>\n<p>Al-Arouri also invoked the possibility Israel used the so-called <a href=\"https:\/\/electronicintifada.net\/tags\/hannibal-directive\">Hannibal Directive<\/a> \u2013 a protocol that allows Israeli forces to use overwhelming force to kill one of their own captured soldiers rather than allow them to be taken prisoner.<\/p>\n<p>The rationale for the Hannibal Directive is to avoid allowing an enemy to have captives that can be used in prisoner exchange negotiations.<\/p>\n<p>However in this case, if the directive was implemented by Israeli forces, it would have been used against civilians.<\/p>\n<p>Al-Arouri told Al Jazeera, \u201cWe are certain that young men [fighters] were bombed along with the prisoners who were with them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Porat\u2019s account, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.middleeastmonitor.com\/20231010-dont-worry-im-a-muslim-israeli-recounts-experience-with-hamas-fighter\/\">among others<\/a>, underscores the need for an independent investigation, one which Israel is unlikely ever to permit.<\/p>\n<p>The current propaganda narrative is simply too valuable to the genocidaires in Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n<p><em>Ali Abunimah is executive director of The Electronic Intifada.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>David Sheen is the author of<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.palestine-studies.org\/en\/node\/1654274\">Kahanism and American Politics: The Democratic Party\u2019s Decades-Long Courtship of Racist Fanatics<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Transcript of the Kan interview with Yasmin Porat<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> For an hour they were banging about 10 terrorists on the reinforced safe room. There were screams in Arabic and it was a very tense hour. And we felt great fear thats indescribable. After an hour they managed to break in and they removed the four of us to a nearby house where there were already eight other additional hostages. We joined those eight and we were about 12 hostages with 40 terrorists that were guarding us. Im keeping the story short.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Did they abuse you?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> They did not abuse us. They treated us very humanely, meaning \u2026<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Humanely? Really?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Yes, by that I mean they guard us. They give us something to drink here and there. When they see we are nervous, they calm us down. It was very frightening but no one treated us violently. Luckily nothing happened to me like what I heard in the media.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Horrible, horrific things occurred.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> True. But after two hours briefly at first there was no [Israeli] security force with us. We were the ones who called the police together with the abductors because the abductors wanted the police to arrive. Because their objective was to kidnap us to Gaza.<\/p>\n<p>[SKIP OR CUT IN AUDIO]<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Meanwhile one of the terrorists decides to surrender, the terrorist I made a connection with. Over the course of those two hours I connected with some of the abductors, those that guarded the hostages.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Yes<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> And he decides to use me as a human shield. He decides to surrender. I am not aware of it in those moments its in retrospect. He starts to disrobe, he takes he calls to me and he starts to leave the house with me, under fire. At that time I yelled to the YAMAM [Israeli commandos] when we were already when they can hear me, to stop firing.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Yes<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> And then they hear me and stop firing. I see on the lawn, in the garden of the people from the kibbutz. There are five or six hostages lying on the ground outside, just like sheep to the slaughter, between the shooting of our [fighters] and the terrorists.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> The terrorists shot them?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> No, they were killed by the crossfire. Understand there was very, very heavy crossfire.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> So our forces may have shot them?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Undoubtedly.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> When they tried to eliminate the abductors, Hamas?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> They eliminated everyone, including the hostages. Because there was very, very heavy crossfire. I was freed at approximately 5:30. The fighting apparently ended at 8:30. After insane crossfire, two tank shells were shot into the house. Its a small kibbutz house, nothing big. You saw it on the news.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Yes<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Not a large place. And at that moment everyone was killed. There was quiet, except for one person limping, Hadas [Dagan], in the garden.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> How were they all killed?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> From the crossfire.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Crossfire, so it could also be from our forces?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Undoubtedly.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Really?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Thats what I believe.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Oy it sounds so bad.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Yes. And everyone died.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> And you, thanks to that terrorist who decided to give himself up \u2026<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Exactly.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> And you survived and all the rest were killed there.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Except for one other woman who survived, they found her later [trails off]. The person who dealt with the event checked her or something. They found her when she lifted her head, amongst all the bodies. And then, simply \u2026<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> And your partner, who was with you?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Killed.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> He was killed too?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Yes. Everyone was killed there. Just horrible.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Have you returned to Kabri?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> I returned to Kabri and then the chaos started there.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> In the north?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Yes. So now Im a guest. Im being hosted in a lovely way in Kibbutz Ein Harod. And Im here for now.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> Youre in the [Jezreel] Valley now. Alright, Yasmin, youve undergone a horrific experience.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> True.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> You lost your partner, you saw people killed alongside you.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> And I \u2026<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> [INTERRUPTS] What happened to that terrorist who gave himself up?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> He is still arrested, and he was just called in for interrogation to help \u2026 You know, he will be interrogated about the accused. And sadly dozens more of my friends were killed because \u2026<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aryeh Golan:<\/strong> [INTERRUPTS] Dozens of friends?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yasmin Porat:<\/strong> Yes because its a community, the trance scene, we go to the same parties. It means that besides my partner, I knew dozens and hundreds [CUT OFF]<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/electronicintifada.net\/content\/israeli-forces-shot-their-own-civilians-kibbutz-survivor-says\/38861\">Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Firsthand account from a woman who was held hostage by Hamas gunmen differs markedly from the official version of events. Yasmin Porat says her captors treated her \u2018humanely\u2019 and that they did not execute hostages. They were only killed when the IDF opened fire <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":274615,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[118,19,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-274613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-7-10-gaza-war","category-Behind_The_News","category-Israel_Anti-Semitism_Zionism_and_US-UK_allies"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=274613"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274613\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":274626,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274613\/revisions\/274626"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/274615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=274613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=274613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=274613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}