[When all else fails - lie more] The Account of the Palestinian Victim
Hussam Abdo from Nablus
www.ipc.gov.ps/ipc_e/ipc_e-1/e_News/news2004/2004_03/140.html

NABLUS, Palestine, March 28, 2004 (IPC + Arab48)-- [Official PA website]
Many of the Palestinian officials, locals and eyewitnesses along with senior
sources of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a military wing of Fateh,
emphasized that arresting the teen boy Hussam Abdo from Nablus was a
fabricated story weaved by the Israeli intelligence to misinform the world
purportedly that the Palestinians send their children to cynically kill
themselves that is adversely to downgrade the morale of the Palestinian
people and waning the world's sympathy towards the just Palestinian cause.

It is hard to understand such Israeli fabrications due to their secrecy, but
a quick glance at the details of the scene of the boy with the belt assured
that the intelligence services of the occupying authorities were the
authors, directors and the organizers of the script.

An outright correspondence to the incidents took place with other
Palestinian children such as the boy Abed Allah Al Qar'an from Balata
refugee camp of Nablus, whom the Israeli occupying forces pretended that he
was transferring explosives through IOF military checkpoint of Hewara a
couple of weeks ago. Likely the same, the child Ahmed Abu Markhyia from
Hebron was arrested by the Israeli soldiers, who placed a grenade in his
schoolbag after which they filmed the fictitious story.

Hussam's brother, Belal Abdo, said that he was fully convinced that his
brother was victimized by such a tainted game perpetrated by the Israeli
intelligence services. He added that his brother was suffering growth
problems.

"I believe that one of the Israeli intelligence collaborators played with my
brother's mind to carry an explosive belt and to blow himself up on the
purpose of being timely invested by Israel," Belal said.

He wondered what made the Israelis to say his brother was 14 years old, even
though his actual age was 16, explaining that was an extra evidence that the
whole story was made up by the Israelis.

For further assurance, eyewitness asserted that the Israeli soldiers at the
checkpoint usually ban journalists from staying long hours there for footage
but on that day a senior commander of the IOF asked the journalists to stay
longer for filming, as well as a number of the Israeli journalists were seen
in the scene before the arrival of the boy.

As reported by the online edition of Arab 48 website, the Israeli occupying
soldiers put pressure on the foreign journalists to focus on the incident,
one of the well-known world news agencies took 18 photos in a row of the
boy, in a way that proved the ill-intentions of the fabricators.

So far, Scores of the international news agencies have reached Nablus City
of the West Bank last Thursday, passing nearby a massive rally of the
Palestinian handicapped protesting the assassination of the wheelchair-bound
Sheikh Ahamd Yassin, spiritual leader and founder of Hamas last Sunday, but
no attention was paid by those journalists because they were preoccupied
interviewing the relatives of the boy Hussam Abdo.

According to the accounts of eyewitnesses who happened to be at the scene,
Hussam was wearing a bright red colored jacket, explaining that those who
sent him deliberately meant Hussam to be featured by his clothes for easy
recognition by the IOF soldiers.

The eyewitnesses asserted that the Israeli soldiers were in biding with time
for the coming of the victim. They ordered the passersby at the checkpoint
not to move and instructed all to raise up their upper dresses until they
caught up the target. The soldiers then called the boy by his name that
categorically turned out their in-advance knowledge of the script of the
"play".

But in the city, the affair inspired heated debate. Most of the Palestinian
factions, including the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which was allegedly
accused by the Israelis of being behind the incident, condemned the use of
children and denied they had anything to do with it.

Esam Abdul Hadi, known in Nablus as chairman of the coordination committee
between the Palestinian factions, said, "a person is considered an adult in
the Palestinian society when he/she is capable of analyzing the situation
and drawing conclusions, and this boy (Abdo) is not an adult by any stretch
of that definition."

"This is forbidden and all the factions know it. We are against the use of
children even if the occupation takes away their childhood and even if they
were educated to sacrifice their lives to achieve the national goals of the
Palestinian people. This is most damaging to the Palestinian cause because
it legitimizes the occupiers harming children," He added.

On his turn, a senior of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade of Balata refugee camp
of Nablus made clear that the Brigades has no knowledge of this boy, denying
they had any thing to do with them. He believed that the Israeli
intelligence was responsible for such "fabrication".

He added that the "occupying army, particularly the Israeli intelligence,
which is familiar with its immoral and inhumane repute, is not far from
using children and involve them in the conflict."