A pilot refusing
The pilot of an Israeli helicopter gunship reportedly refused an order to
shoot a missile at a Palestinian home. It happened on the early hours of
Tuesday, April 9 – when an Israeli army regiment, supported by tanks and
helicopter gunships, captured the Palestinian town of Dura, near Hebron in the
southern West Bank. During several hours of fighting when the army overcame the
resistance of local Palestinian militias, the regimental commander ordered the
pilot of a helicopter gunship to shoot a missile at a Palestinian home, in
which five alleged terrorists were hiding, in order to “liquidate them” (sic).
The pilot refused, telling the regimental commander there might be civilians in
the house. The radio debate continued for a long time, with the helicopter
hovering over the house. The commander told the pilot that the five terrorists
could be exactly pin-pointed in the house and again ordered him to shoot. The
pilot again refused, and at a certain point left the vicinity of the house and
cycled the town. When he got back to the point above the house, the
commander told him that the terrorists had disappeared, but ordered him to
shoot at the house nevertheless. The pilot again refused. After two hours, he
finally shot one burst from the helicopter’s cannon, but near the house rather
than at it. Soldiers nearby on the ground described the shot as “perfunctory,
meant to hit nothing”.
The story is published today (Monday, April 15) by Haggai Huberman of the
extreme-right paper Hatzofeh. Huberman’s account is clearly the regiment
commander’s version, accusing the pilot of “helping five terrorists escape” and
dismissing the possibility that there had been civilians inside the house in
question; the pilot’s viewpoint is not given.