The following was written in May 2002 by Gary Heiman, President and CEO of Standard Textile, Cincinnati, Ohio. It is a "first person" account based upon his visit to Jenin in April. Standard Textile has a subsidiary in Israel, Arad Towels Ltd. which is described here:
Stories of Success: Arad Towels Ltd.Heiman's position in the business world and his long experience in Israel makes him a very credible observer.
On Monday, April 15th, following Israel's three-week campaign against terrorism, I was the first civilian to enter the town of Jenin and the refugee camp adjacent to the town. I entered the camp with the 5th infantry unit of the Israel Defense Forces to assess for myself what had occurred there. My perspective is that of an individual firmly committed to the ideals of peaceful co-existence of the Israeli and Palestinian peoples. I have attempted to foster peace through economic cooperation and own businesses in both Israel and Jordan employing close to 1,000 Palestinian and Israeli workers. The following is what I saw, what I heard, and what I experienced.
Before I entered the refugee camp, I passed through the town of Jenin and onto an adjacent street off the town's main road only some 100 yards from the rest of the town. It is a primarily residential area which appears to be very middle class. There are very nice family homes, apartments, and businesses. Not one of these buildings appeared to have been touched; no bullet holes, no bulldozed houses, not even a broken window. This was the scene only 100 yards from the site of the intense fighting and the fierce battle in the Jenin refugee camp. The army reservists with whom I entered the area told me that the reason that there was no devastation was simply because no one shot at or attacked the Israeli reservists from these buildings and, therefore, there was no reason to shoot back.
As we entered the refugee camp, the reservists told me that they had been called up on the first day of Passover, after the horrific suicide bombing the night before in the Park Hotel in Netanya killing 28 innocent people at the beginning of Passover, young and old, men and women alike. In the first 3 months of 2002 alone, 28 suicide bombers, almost half of them from Jenin, killed 78 innocent civilians; toddlers in their strollers, young children in school buses, teenagers in coffee shops and discotheques, families in restaurants, and shoppers at supermarkets and malls. These reservists told me that they had left their young children and wives at home in order, they said, to defend their families and their homes and to make the streets of their cities safe again.
One of these reserve officers, Dr. David Zangen, the reserve unit's medical officer, works in the trauma unit of Hadassah Hospital and had attended to many of the suicide bombing victims in Jerusalem. He related to me that his head nurse's fifteen year old daughter had been blown to bits at the Sbarro Pizza restaurant in the middle of the city. He told me that while he was a doctor, not a soldier, a reservist who left his young family in Jerusalem, he knew exactly why he was in Jenin. He was convinced that Israel was fighting a war against the slow massacre of its women and children; nothing more and nothing less.
As I entered the Jenin refugee camp, it became immediately apparent that the entire camp had been booby-trapped. Every alley, home, store, building, stairwell, and edifice was a potential bombsite. I estimated that the total area of the camp was about one square kilometer and that the actually area of fierce fighting was about 15%-20% of that. It appeared that, in this small area, there were or had been countless explosive devices, and according to soldiers, even the dead bodies of people had explosives placed on them. The walls of the alleys and streets were plastered with posters of the Palestinian suicide bomber "martyrs", as were the interiors of virtually each and every shop along the streets.
The battalion commander, Brigadier General Eytan Schlein, told me that once he realized the extent of the "terrorist fortress" that the camp had become, he had two choices. He could either call in the air force with precise guided bombs, together with heavy artillery, and level the area in a quick and low risk operation for his soldiers, or capture the town and destroy the terrorist infrastructure, foot by foot, yard by yard, alley by alley, and house by house. This, he explained, would minimize civilian casualties even though it would maximize Israeli casualties and extract a terrible toll on his soldiers. He told me that war teaches us not only "who are they" but, more importantly, "who are we".
As horrific as war is, he told me, "we must fight it in the most humane way possible.We did and it cost us 23 soldiers dead and 64 wounded, many of them severely". He also told me the fighting was continuously halted, sometimes for hours at a time, so that civilians could be called out, with bullhorns, to allow them to leave their homes before the Israeli army continued the battle against the terrorists.
The reservists related many stories of the fierce battle and heavy house-to-house fighting that went on for several days. Amongst them:
<UL>
<LI>Some Palestinian civilians, after repeated warnings, refused to leave their homes. Instead of moving forward with armored bulldozers or artillery, the Israeli commander entered one home with 12 of his soldiers to remove the civilians. Once inside, a bomb was detonated killing all 13 soldiers and all of the inhabitants.</li>
<LI>Also after being called out of their home, two Palestinian women, arm in arm and wearing long traditional dresses, walked out of the dwelling towards the Israeli soldiers. A gunman, crouching in back of them, suddenly shot from between the two women and killed several soldiers. Medics, who raced to assist the soldiers, were ambushed by Palestinian snipers from the surrounding buildings.</li>
<LI>A six-year-old boy was stopped by soldiers and asked what he was carrying in his bag. He dropped his bag and tried to run away. The bag contained 3 booby-trap bombs which, fortunately, were safely detonated.</li>
<LI>Several dead women were found with AK-47 assault rifles at their sides. I was asked whether I thought they were "civilians" or terrorists?</li>
</ul>
I saw that the hospital had not been touched. I saw the insides of stores, whose façades had been blown open, but with shelves of merchandise which had not been touched. I saw the central water tower untouched. I saw women and children, walking down the street, without fear, with bags full of food and supplies. I saw Israeli soldiers, who had received packages with food and candy give their packages to Palestinian children. I saw factories and warehouses where bombs and suicide belts were produced and massive quantities of weapons were stored and hidden.
Many "conclusions" have already been drawn about what happened in Jenin. After my visit, I have drawn my conclusions. The Palestinian Authority had turned Jenin into its capital of terrorism and the base of the Palestinian human bomb industry. Jenin was a terrorist fortress. A fierce and intense urban battle transpired there and tremendous destruction occurred in the small area where the fighting took place. Did a massacre take place in Jenin? No.
In the past three weeks, the facts about Jenin have become more apparent to any independent observer. Not a shred of solid evidence has surfaced to support the claim of a massacre in Jenin. What we know definitely is that Israeli soldiers and armed Palestinian gunmen died in the fighting. We also know that a number of other Palestinian civilians were also killed in the fighting. This loss of life is the unfortunate and inevitable result of an armed conflict in an area where gunmen position themselves and where people reside, particularly where the distinction between fighters and civilians is intentionally made murky. The only massacre in Jenin was the annihilation of the truth about what happened there. The real massacre occurred at the Park Hotel in Netanya at a Passover celebration and in the carnage wrought by the suicide bombers during the last nineteen months. The real massacre was one in which the victims were Israeli civilians throughout Israel. It required no investigation. It has been plainly evident for the world to see.