Rachel Corrie contributed to her own (regrettable) death: the judge says so

From the Tablet, and an extremely useful counterweight to the inevitable Guardian whitewash, although, of course, because the article attempts to be balanced, it will, regrettably, be dismissed by many as irredeemably pro-Israel and therefore of little worth.

However, there is this fascinating paragraph from The Tablet on this issue: "Despite the warning by her own country’s state department against travel to Gaza, Rachel Corrie went anyway, entered a closed military zone where the IDF had been attacked hours before, and evaded prior efforts by the Israeli army to move her and other activists from the area. Judge Oded Gershon said as much in his 62-page decision: Corrie had put herself in danger. He also did not see evidence that proved Corrie had been in the line of sight of the driver of the bulldozer that struck her.*"

In British legal terms (thank you, better half), this is known as "contributory negligence" and often results in (in civil cases for damages) reduced damages or even the dismissal of a case.

Just what happened here.

Of course, both the Israeli legal system and the whole of Israel (not just the IDF) is in a no-win situation here: had the Corrie family won, both the bulldozer driver and the whole of the IDF/Israeli society would have been condemned as mindless brutes who care nothing for anyone who isn't an Israeli (or, in the worst cases, Jewish). In the actual situation, no doubt the whole Israeli legal system will be dismissed as biased in favour of the same group.

No-one in the (broadly defined) BDS camp will bother to remind us that the self-same Israeli legal system has sent numerous Israeli soldiers, border policemen and even civilians to prison for carrying out unlawful acts of violence against non-Israelis. Of course not, the truth would terminally undermine their case.

While I'm here, there is this further paragraph from this article that I thinks sums up the whole issue for those of us who believe in Israel's right to exist in peace and security (wherever we are on the conventional political spectrum): "Meanwhile, the Israel that traded 1,000 prisoners for Shalit’s life is the same Israel that still lamented Corrie’s death even while deciding that it was not at fault. It is also the same Israel that, while extremely flawed, investigated the circumstances of Corrie’s death and carried out a long and painful trial that less moral countries wouldn’t have bothered with."

By the way, today's Times (of London) reports that gorgeous George Galloway has accepted a tainted fee from a pro-Assad tv station. You'll have to take my word for it (given that The Times is behind an on-line pay-wall) and I am relying on a brief glimpse of the paper while my wife showed me the article - she's still out and has the paper.

By Brian Goldfarb.

(*) By the editor: not only there was no evidence that proved Corrie had been in the line of sight of the driver of the bulldozer, "four experts — including an expert on the behalf of the Corrie family — concluded that the bulldozer driver could not see Corrie."