# Posted 7:29 PM by Ariel David Adesnik  

HUMAN SHIELD EXPOSED: Before heading off to Israel last week, I mentioned that I was on a mission as a human shield. I probably wouldn't have said that if I'd known that an actual human shield was about to die in the Gaza Strip.

Her name was Rachel Corrie. She died after being run over by an Israeli bulldozer. But was it murder, negligence, or an accident provoked by Corrie's own recklessness? The more newspapers you read, the more confused you get.

In a relatively balanced account, the WaPo quotes both Corrie's fellow human shields as well as Israeli military officials responsible for investigating her death. Each one says exactly what one would expect him or her to say. (There's a similar article in the LA Times.)

While in Israel, I didn't have a chance to read the Post, but instead relied on the Herald Tribune, which my hotel distributed to guests every morning. It's account, borrowed from the NYT, suggests that Corrie's resistance was much more passive than other articles made it out to be. According to its first sentence,

An Israeli Army bulldozer crushed to death an American woman Sunday who had knelt in the dirt to discourage the armored vehicle from destroying a Palestinian home in the southern Gaza Strip, witnesses and hospital officials said. [Sorry, no permalink.]

The key word, of course, is 'knelt', which suggests that Corrie had deliberately placed herself in the bulldozer's path and then stopped moving. The word 'knelt' also has religious connotations, which bring to mind the passive resistance of Mahatma Gandhi.

The WaPo's opening sentence describes Corrie as 'crouching', but also quotes a protester who describes her as 'kneeling'. In contrast, the LA Times quotes witnesses who say that Corrie was standing.

The accounts I read in Israel, from the Jerusalem Post and Ha'aretz, were entirely different however. According to the J-Post,

Richard Summers, 31, from England, told The Jerusalem Post that Corrie confronted the D-9 as it slowly rumbled toward the Masri home. Trying to stop the machine, she scaled a steep pile of earth that the bulldozer had plowed up with its blade.
"She was level with the cabin and she was wearing an orange florescent vest," Summers said. "There's no way the driver could have missed her."

Corrie then fell backward, tumbling down the mound and out of sight, but instead of stopping, the driver kept going forward for another 15 meters. The pile of earth enveloped her and she was crushed. All the while, Summers said, "we were yelling over the megaphone for the driver to stop."

According to Ha'aretz,

Rachel Corey [sic], 23, from Olympia, Washington, was killed when she ran in front of the bulldozer to try to prevent it from destroying a house, doctors in Gaza said...

Greg Schnabel, 28, from Chicago, said the protesters were in the house of Dr. Samir Masri.

"Rachel was alone in front of the house as we were trying to get them to stop," he said. "She waved for bulldozer to stop and waved. She fell down and the bulldozer kept going. We yelled 'stop, stop,' and the bulldozer didn't stop at all. It had completely run over her and then it reversed and ran back over her."

Three different protesters, three different accounts. Strange how only one of them -- the most damaging one -- made it into the American papers.

I really have no idea what happened to Rachel Corrie. The most plausible speculation I've read is from No Cameras, a blog run out of Corrie's hometown, Olympia, Wa. NC observes that

Having spent a fair amount of time around armoured vehicles, however, I'm not convinced [Corrie's megaphone] would have made much difference. IDF bulldozers--in this case a Caterpillar D9--are large, noisy and heavily armoured, and the driver is probably wearing hearing protection against the engine noise; you'd probably need Nigel Tufnel's custom amps to make yourself heard inside the cab from outside. Moreover, the view from the cab is severely restricted...The most plausible scenario, to my mind, is that the driver advanced slowly, expecting Ms. Corrie to chicken out in time; she lost her footing and in doing so was lost to the driver's view. Assuming she'd gotten out of the way, he continued moving forward, with fatal results.

Regardless of the uncertaintly surroudning Corrie's death, what we do know for sure is that the Western media have given it a distinct anti-Israel spin. For example, the Christian Science Monitor has described Corrie as a "peace activist" even though she has a habit of burning American flags while participating in rallies in the Gaza strip. (See Tal G. for more links.)

Of course, one can burn American flags and still be a peace activist. But when one marches with Hamas and PA supporters in the Gaza Strip while burning an American flag, that's a little different.

Far worse than descriptions of Corrie as a peace activist, however, is the misuse and mislabeling of photographs in a way that suggests her death was the product of Israeli intentions. For details, click here and here.

But why am I getting so worked up about all of this? After all, anti-Israel bias in the media (not to mention outright anti-Semitism on the left) is hardly news. But it happened while I was there. And people have asked me what I know about it, or what Israelis thought about it. When I respond to such questions, I don't want to profess ignorance. I want to say something that makes a difference.

UPDATE: Hmm. Even Atrios thinks Corrie was no victim. (0) opinions -- Add your opinion