Ras Burqa massacre

The Ras Burqa massacre was the killing of twelve Israeli tourists, including nine children, by an Egyptian policeman near the town Ras Burqa, in the district of Nuwaiba in Sinai.

Massacre

On October 5, 1985, in Ras Burqa, Egyptian policeman Sulayman Khatir machine-gunned a group of twelve Israeli campers near a beach resort on the Red Sea. Nine of the campers were young children and three were adults: two women and one man, a retired judge. The only survivor was 5-year old Tali Griffel, whose mother shielded her with her body. [ [http://www.peacenow.org/resources/publications.asp?rid=&cid=228 :: APN :: Publications ] ] According to eye witnesses, the Egyptian policemen who were nearby refused to help the wounded; furthermore, they stopped an Israeli doctor and other tourists at gunpoint from administering any aid to the victims of the shooting, and the wounded Israelis were left to bleed to death.Lewis 233] Egyptian authorities countered that the Israelis bled to death "because this crazy soldier refused to let anyone near the area that some of the victims lay". [Israeli Officials Criticize Egyptian Reaction To Sinai Killings, "Associated Press", 9 October 1985.] The gunman killed one of the Egyptian policeman who tried to arrest him."Attack Threatens Israeli-Egyptian Ties Aid to Victims of Sinai Shooting Was Delayed, Some Witnesses Say. "The Washington Post", 7 October 1985.]

Trial and conviction

After the shootings, Egyptian authorities claimed that the perpetrator Sulayman Khatir was mentally ill. [Ten Years After Camp David, New Reasons for Celebration, "Wall Street Journal", 29 March 1989.] During the initial interrogations, Khatir claimed that he had been unaware of the identity or nationality of the people he had shot and that they had made no offense or provocation toward him. The only reason why he had opened fire was that, as Khatir said, they had trespassed on a prohibited territory. He was tried by a closed military tribunal and on December 28, 1985 sentenced to a life in prison at hard labor. On January 8, 1986, Khatir was found dead in his prison hospital room hanging by a strip torn from a sheet of plastic. The authorities declared his death a suicide.No byline. " [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A0DE3DF1531F93BA35752C0A960948260&sec=health&pagewanted=print Egyptian Who Shot 7 Is Dead] ". "The New York Times". January 8, 1986. URL accessed on December 31, 2006.]

Reactions in Egypt

Egyptian opposition politicians hailed Khatir as "hero of Sinai" for committing the massacre of Israelis. The glorification of Khatir as a national hero in the Egyptian opposition press was echoed in some other Arab countries, and mass demonstrations were held in his support. Attempting to justify his actions, the opposition press did not report that all but one of the victims were women or children, but instead invented miscellaneous pretexts for the shootings. The press claimed that the Israeli tourists were spies caught photographing secret military installations, that they spat upon and tore up an Egyptian flag, that half-naked Israeli women offended Khatir's Muslim conscience, or that the tourists attacked him. The pro-governmental press remained silent regarding the facts of the massacre, leaving the claims of the opposition journalists unchallenged. As a result, many Egyptian intellectuals and religious leaders joined in acclaiming Khatir and the massacre. Umar al-Tilimsani, the leader of Muslim Brotherhood, said that "if every Muslim would do what Sulayman did, Israel would no longer exist". Farid Abd al-Karim, one of the leaders of the Arab Socialist Party, called Khatir "the conscience of this nation", whose bullets "washed away the shame" of the Camp David Peace Accords between Israel and Egypt. Ahmad Nasir of the Egyptian Bar Association claimed that history would always honor Khatir as "a living model of a noble Egyptian who refused to be lead astray by the treaties of betrayal and surrender".Lewis 234]

Many prominent Egyptians expressed doubt that Khatir was indeed insane. Farid Abd al-Karim wished that the whole Egypt "would be struck with this same mighty madness". Ali Hillal Dessouki, a professor at the University of Cairo, said he was astonished that such men as Khatir could be accused of madness and expressed his sadness for the "so-called sane". Nur al-Sharif, an actor, told Khatir: "You are the sanest among us, for you did what we all want."

The beginning of Khatir's trial sparked a wave of protest rallies, which the Egyptian government saw as threat to itself. More than 140 people were arrested in such demonstrations, most of them at Zagazig University in the Nile Delta where Khatir had been enrolled as a law student. For the first time, the progovernmental press published the real story behind the massacre, revealing the fact that most victims were women and children. The revelations led to a shift in opinions among the opposition press, too. The editor of "Al-Musawwar" journal criticized the opposition press for its handling of the story. [Lewis 234–235]

In early 1989, a special Egyptian legal committee awarded compensation to the victims. The Wall Street Journal said that the amounts were "well within the norms of established international standards". Egypt also made a formal statement to the family of each victim "expressing its acceptance of responsibility, its regret, and its condolences". [Ten Years After Camp David, New Reasons for Celebration, "Wall Street Journal", 29 March 1989; also US Department of State Dispatch, 1 May 1989.]

ee also

*Arabs and antisemitism
*Islam and antisemitism

Notes

References

* Lewis, Bernard. "Semites and Anti-Semites: An Inquiry into Conflict and Prejudice". W. W. Norton & Co., 1999. ISBN 0-393-31839-7