UK accuses Israel of ‘unlawfully killing’ activist
LONDON, April 10: A British peace activist who was shot in the Gaza Strip by an Israeli army marksman was unlawfully killed, a coroner’s inquest jury said on Monday. Tom Hurndall, 22, was fatally wounded on April 11, 2003, after going to the Rafah refugee camp, near the Egyptian border, as a human shield with the International Solidarity Movement.
He died in a London hospital in Jan 2004 after spending nine months in a persistent vegetative state.
The 10-member panel, sitting at St Pancras Coroner’s Court, London, said Hurndall “was shot intentionally with the intention of killing him”.
“The jury would like to express its dismay with the lack of cooperation from the Israeli authorities.”
The verdict comes after an identical ruling by a jury at the same court last Thursday on James Miller, who was also killed in Rafah in May 2003 as he made a documentary about the Israeli destruction of Palestinian homes.
Returning their verdict of unlawful killing on the cameraman, whose subsequent film “Death In Gaza” won three Emmy awards, the jury said: “We can come to no other conclusion than that Mr Miller was indeed murdered.”
Israeli army sergeant Taysir Wahid was convicted at a military court of Hurndall’s manslaughter last June.
But Mr Hurndall’s parents, Anthony and Jocelyn Hurndall, said after the verdict they believed other officers up the chain of command were implicated and called on the British government to fulfil its obligations to protect its citizens.
They also urged the Israeli authorities to overhaul the way shootings by their army are investigated.
“If there’s a wilful killing, that in itself is a serious war crime under the Geneva Convention. Anyone responsible... is guilty of a war crime and by their responsibility they should be prosecuted,” said Anthony Hurndall.
The family’s lawyer, Michael Mansfield, told reporters if the Israeli government was not willing to bring all the perpetrators to justice there, then Britain should try to do itself in this country.
He said the verdict vindicated the Hurndalls’ ‘harrowing struggle in the search for the truth’.
“Make no mistake about it: the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) has today been found culpable by this jury of murder,” he said.
“This is the second case that has been considered by this court within the period of a week and a half... Mr Miller, who was another British citizen doing his job in Israel, (was) also murdered.”
Mansfield also criticised attempts by the IDF after both shootings to blame Palestinians, accusing them of a “cover up that lasted for many, many months”.
Coroner Andrew Reid told the court he would be writing to the attorney general to see if there was any further legal action that could be taken.—AFP
