STATE DEPARTMENT ACCUSES ISRAEL OF USING EXCESSIVE FORCE

Israeli security forces, apparently to the dismay of the U.S. State Department, have been shooting young Palestinian ‘lone wolf’ terrorists who have been attacking Jewish civilians and shooting young stone throwers in the West Bank

In recent weeks there has been a significant escalation in clashes between Israeli Security forces and Palestinians. And lately, there have been a number of attacks inside Israel against Jewish civilians by young Palestinian ‘lone wolf’ terrorists wielding knives, and hatchets. In the West Bank young Palestinians have returned to hurling stones or shooting rocks with slingshots at Israeli security forces.

Inside Israel, the police have been killing the young Palestinian knife wielders. And in the West Bank, Israeli security forces defend themselves against the stone throwers and sling shooters with gunfire, killing and wounding scores of the attackers, many of them teenagers.

Apparently the shooting of young Palestinians pisses off John Kerry’s State Department. This serves as another example of the frosty relationship between the Obama and Netanyahu administrations.

Here is an excerpt from a Reuters report:

At a daily press briefing on Wednesday, U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said Israel, which has set up roadblocks in East Jerusalem, where many of the Palestinian attackers resided, has a right and responsibility to protect its citizens.

He added: "Now, we have seen some – I wouldn’t call the checkpoints this - but we’ve certainly seen some reports of what many would consider excessive use of force.

"Obviously, we don’t like to see that, and we want to see restrictions that are elevated in this time of violence to be as temporary as possible if they have to be enacted," Kirby said, without citing specific incidents.

Asked at a news conference for the foreign media in Jerusalem about those remarks, Netanyahu said:

"What do you think would happen in New York if you saw people rushing into crowds trying to murder people? What do you think they would do? Do you think they would do anything differently than we are doing?"

But on Thursday, Kirby insisted there had been no U.S. fingerpointing at Israel.

“I want to be very clear that we have never accused Israeli security forces of excessive force with respect to these terrorist attacks," he said.

Can you believe that? Kirby does one of those “I was for it before I was against it” flip flops employed by his boss John Kerry and by Hillary Clinton. First he accuses Israel of using excessive force, then he says we (the U.S. government) have never accused Israeli security forces of using excessive force.

Kirby must think we are all a bunch of imbeciles.