[lit-ideas] Re: Do You Have a Moral Urgency?
- From: "Judith Evans" <judithevans1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2006 23:23:59 +0100
> Judy Evans corrects me:
>
> "I imagine we can count MOST Of the women and children as
civilians."
>
> Mea Culpa. I missed the qualifier.
You missed it *twice*.
> However, the criterion is still inadequate. If one cannot
distinguish
> between combatant and non-combatant, and any person could be a
> combatant, then one cannot assume that most of the women and
children
> are civilians
In theory, yes. In practice, armies, militias, resistance
movements,
terrorist groupings, rebel groups, tend to be led by men and to
recruit mainly men. (And see my next point.)
I wish we could, but Hezbollah has made that impossible.
> This is much like Iraq where people must always be on guard
because
> anyone, even a woman or child, could be a suicide bomber.
I wasn't thinking about suicide bombers as a) to my knowledge,
Hezbollah has not deployed them in the recent war b) IDF
operations
were not aimed at executing suicide bombers. NB: Israel, unlike
the UK, has no "shoot to kill (a person who could be a suicide
bomber)"
policy.
Incidentally, would you charge Hezbollah with using civilians
as human shields? If so, how could you justify that charge given
your views.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Phil Enns" <phil.enns@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, August 17, 2006 10:45 PM
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Do You Have a Moral Urgency?
> Judy Evans corrects me:
>
> "I imagine we can count MOST Of the women and children as
civilians."
>
> Mea Culpa. I missed the qualifier. I apologize.
>
> However, the criterion is still inadequate. If one cannot
distinguish
> between combatant and non-combatant, and any person could be a
> combatant, then one cannot assume that most of the women and
children
> are civilians. I wish we could, but Hezbollah has made that
impossible.
> This is much like Iraq where people must always be on guard
because
> anyone, even a woman or child, could be a suicide bomber.
>
> Ideally one would like to be able to distinguish combatants,
and one
> could assume that most women and children are not combatants.
Sadly,
> some people blur the lines to further their own ends.
>
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Phil Enns
> Toronto, ON
>
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