2 X

Israeli soldier: Some take it like this and some like that. There are people who...OK, I killed a kid, OK. They laugh. Yes, now I can draw a balloon on my weapon. A balloon instead of an X. Or a smiley. Some people take it hard. I remember that during squad commander training I was in Jenin, let's say, we were in an "Almanat Kash" procedure, and everyone who climbs on Israeli APC's or armoured vehicles - shoot to kill. And the aim of all this was to have people climb. Because you have APC's under the house all the time. They tell us of course that the aim is to make the wanted men come out. But what wanted man would shoot just like that at an APC?

They also say that if they jump on the APC and take the machine guns...shoot to kill. And then a friend of mine came with his M29, sniper's weapon, and a kid just climbed. He shot, all happy - I took someone down. And then they told him he took down an 11 year old kid or something like that. He took it very hard.

Interviewer: Killed someone, so he was happy. Why?

Israeli soldier: Yes, because you prove yourself. You're a man.

Interviewer: It is known he is unarmed.

Israeli soldier: He's unarmed for sure and he climbs it... No one asks you why you have 2 X's on your weapon and if they were armed and this was done by procedure. It can be two Molotov throwers and it's still 2 X's.

Dall'intervista a un soldato dell'Esercito di Difesa Israeliano in servizio a Nablus, pubblicata integralmente da electronicintifada.