Kristin Foss
Kristin Foss
"We don't shoot women", a Lieutenant in the Israeli army said yesterday, when asked why they shot a Norwegian activist in Kafr Qaddum Saturday last week, shortly before shooting her again.
Israeli activist Matan Cohen posted this exchange and occurrence yesterday on his Facebook with photos from the scene.

This time Kristin was not shot in the abdomen, but in the foot, by a rubber-coated steel bullet. I was alerted to Kristin's injury by her Facebook update from the clinic:
"Went back to Kufur Quaddum to show that solidarity, is stronger than fear! Very nervous though, so kept right at the back, up against the wall. Thought I was safe-ish. But they shot me again!! The protest has been on for 2 minutes. Israeli activists at the front talking to the soldiers earlier... so yeah... I just go shot twice in a week..."
It was deja-vu. Again I called Kristin, again we talked on Messenger while she was in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, on that long and winding bypass road which the Kafr Qaddum residents are forced to drive on, because their access to the main road leading to Nablus had been barred, to serve the Jewish settlement of Kedumim (typical Hebrewization of the Arabic name) and other settlers.

The settlement is the cause of the regular demonstrations in the village since 2011. Kristin was sitting in front of a man who had been shot in the back of the head by a rubber-coated bullet. This ammunition can be lethal. Ahed Tamimi's cousin, 15-year-old Mohammed, was struck in the head by one of these bullets in December, and only miraculously survived. Kristin tells me that the man who brought her to the clinic was himself shot in the head by a rubber-coated steel bullet a few months ago, which caused him blindness in one eye and made him unable to shut his jaw.

But the lieutenant said that "we don't shoot women", and we already know that to be a brazen lie, if it were only for Kristin's own video from last week, where she was clearly targeted while posing no danger whatsoever and with hands in the air.

Kristin's story from yesterday was voiced in Norwegian press (here, here), and here the Israeli Ambassador to Norway, Dan Poraz, was continuing the hasbara shamelessly:
"I don't know the details in this case. I must say that it is impressive to be shot for a second time within few days. What we know is that the first time she was shot, she was part of a violent demonstration. She has no doubt provoked. Soldiers do not shoot without a reason, even if Kristin Foss tries to say they do".
Let's just try to dissect that, shall we?

"I don't know the details in this case" - Poraz doesn't actually know what he's talking about, but that doesn't bar you from disseminating boilerplate hasbara, just press the 'on' button and you're good.

"I must say that it is impressive to be shot for a second time within few days" - oh, it's "impressive", huh? Is it impressive that soldiers do that? It's not like she was threatening them in any way. It's not impressive - it's shameful.

"What we know is that the first time she was shot, she was part of a violent demonstration." No, what we know is that the first time she was shot, she was violently and deliberately targeted by an Israeli soldier, while posing absolutely no danger - as we saw in the video.

"She has no doubt provoked" - and how do you know this, Poraz? After all, you do not know the details of the case, and we have no evidence of it. But you assume it, it's safe to assume. After all, solidarity with Palestinians is in itself provocative...

"Soldiers do not shoot without a reason, even if Kristin Foss tries to say they do." Well, this is really taking things far. I mean, I know Netanyahu said that "our soldiers are not murderers" just before and just after Elor Azarya shot Abdel Fattah al Sharif in the head at point-blank range in 2016, when the reason was that "he needed to die". And I know it's not always a lethal shot, like when the Israeli snipers shot the motionless unarmed Palestinian protester across the Gaza fence, filmed it and celebrated, on which occasion Defense Minister Lieberman thought they should get a medal for their military action. But still, to assume that Israeli soldiers never shoot without a reason? Oh, sure, there's always a reason, but what kind of reason? Have you seen Kristin's video of last week?

As she wrote on Facebook yesterday:
when in Palestine, you get shot, it fuxking hurts, but you get up again... everyone has been shot at some point .... And 9 people got shot today. Including an 8 year old. And a man to his head. They are ok too. Hope they are also with friends!
Foss has begun posting some of the videos from the scene. In this one, filmed just a few minutes before she was shot the second time, she is standing at the spot where she was shot. She notes how the demonstration hadn't even begun, and the Israeli soldiers had already invaded the village. An Israeli activist, Shaul Hanuka, goes up to speak with the soldiers. She notes that the Israeli activists are "somewhat protected by their nationality", but that a few weeks ago an Israeli activist got shot in the buttocks. "Nothing is sacred, nothing is sacred if you oppose the occupation of Palestine," she concluded - and then got shot.

Indeed, Foss's nationality is not helping her either. It has been part of the point of the International Solidarity Movement of which Kristin is a part, to provide some protection for Palestinian people who are otherwise hardly shielded from Israeli criminality. But the Norwegian Government has been very quiet and is apparently fine with the Israeli "explanations", which hasbara literally is.