Warning: Prepare to be outraged and possibly sickened.
100 Survivors Rescued in Gaza From Ruins Blocked by Israelis
Relief Agencies Fear More Are Trapped, Days After Neighborhood Was Shelled
By Craig Whitlock and Reyham Abdel Kareem
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, January 9, 2009; Page A01
JERUSALEM, Jan. 8 -- Emergency workers said they rescued 100 more trapped survivors Thursday and found between 40 and 50 corpses in a devastated residential block south of Gaza City that the Israeli military had kept off-limits to the International Committee of the Red Cross for four days.
Relief agencies said they feared more people remained in the rubble of several shattered houses in the Zaytoun neighborhood. Red Cross officials said that they began receiving distress calls from people in the houses late Saturday but that they were blocked by the Israeli military from reaching the area until Wednesday.
In an interview at al-Quds Hospital, a Red Cross medical center in Gaza, Abuzaid said rescue workers found 16 bodies Wednesday in a large room of a house in Zaytoun: seven women, six children and three men, all members of the al-Samuni family.
Most had sustained trauma injuries from shelling, but many had gunshot wounds as well, he said. Four children, weak but alive, were found lying under blankets, nestled next to their dead mothers, Abuzaid said. Red Cross officials had said earlier that 12 adult bodies had been found in the house but otherwise corroborated Abuzaid's account.
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The Red Cross has accused the Israeli military of repeatedly refusing to grant permission for ambulances to go to Zaytoun, even though soldiers were stationed outside the damaged houses and were aware people were wounded inside. In a statement issued early Thursday, the agency called the episode "unacceptable" and said the Israeli military had "failed to meet its obligation under international humanitarian law to care for and evacuate the wounded."...
More:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/08/AR2009010804118.html?sid=ST2009010900270&s_pos=This is by far the worst account I've heard of this incident. This is unbelievable. I don't know what else to say other than,
this is self-defense?