Belgium Court Considers Sharon Indictment for War Crimes

Twenty-eight victims of the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacre of Palestinian refugees officially opened their legal hearings in Belgium against Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on 18 June. The survivors of the massacre are charging Sharon with committing crimes against humanity for his involvement in the massacre.

A 1993 Belgian law allows local courts to try any person accused of war crimes, regardless of his nationality, position, or where the crime took place. The law allows victims to seek cases against suspected war criminals, and the local Belgian courts would look into their breach of the Geneva War Crimes Convention.

Earlier this month, a Belgian court convicted four Rwandans, including two nuns, for their role in Rwanda’s genocide of the Tutsi minority. The sentences ranged between 12 and 20 years.

In 1982, Ariel Sharon, then Israeli “Defense” Minister invaded Lebanon and occupied its capital Beirut. After the Palestine Liberation Organization left Lebanon, Palestinian refugees throughout Lebanon were left under the protection of the Israeli-allied Lebanese government.

On 16 September 1982, Lebanese militias allied with Israel entered the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian Refugee Camp and murdered over 2,000 unarmed Palestinians, mostly women and children. The massacre unfolded over three days, under the watchful eyes of the Israeli forces who had occupied Beirut and surrounded the camps by then. “Mr. Sharon had earlier claimed that there were 2,000 ‘terrorists’ in the camps; Israel later claimed that the Phalange [Israeli allied militias] were sent into Sabra and Shatila to ‘mop out’ the armed guerrillas supposedly still there after the Palestine Liberation Organization’s withdrawal from Beirut the previous month”, the Independent wrote today.

If the Belgian investigating court decides to indict Sharon, he would be arrested and tried if he enters Belgium. According to the “Independent”, the Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres “has told the Belgian government that none of his fellow ministers will risk visiting Brussels if the action proceeds”.

Sharon had cancelled a trip to Belgium, scheduled for early June. After fierce debate, the Belgian Parliament had refused to receive Sharon because of his involvement in the Sabra and Shatila 1982 massacre.

Hundreds of the victims were stabbed to death. Survivors of the massacre report that hundreds of women were gang raped and then left for dead. More than 400 of the victims were buried at the camps’ entrances while hundreds others were secretly buried during the massacre.

The case has caused a serious diplomatic riff between Belgium and Israel. Vincent Van Quickenborne, a Belgian senator who sponsored the case against Ariel Sharon defended the law allowing for this case and brushed aside Israel’s criticism. Michael Venhaeghe, the lawyer representing the survivors stated that there was “sufficient evidence” to convict those responsible for the massacre. Judge Richard Goldstone, a former prosecutor of the UN Criminal Tribunals of Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda said that he had “no doubt” that Sharon could be indicted.

Following public outcries in Israel, the Israeli government set up the Kahan commission to investigate the massacre. The Commission found that Sharon, having been in overall command of the Israeli forces surrounding the camp at the time of the massacre, was “indirectly responsible for the massacre”. The Kahan Commission concluded that the Israeli forces present around the camps knew of the atrocities that were being committed but did not act to prevent them. The Commission also found that he was “unfit” to be “Defense” Minister. Following the Commission’s conclusions, Ariel Sharon resigned from his post.

The controversy comes only a day after BBC’s Panorama program aired an episode about Sabra and Shatila, detailing the bloody events that took place almost 20 years ago. The program discussed whether Ariel Sharon should be tried for war crimes because of his involvement in the said massacre. Ron Ben Yishai, an Israeli journalist covering Israel’s invasion of Lebanon stated that he had contacted Sharon on 17 September 1982 to warn him that there were “stories of killings and massacres in the camps”. “I said ‘you can stop it,’ I didn’t know the massacre actually started 24 hours earlier. ‘Do something about it,’ I said. He didn’t react”, Yishai recalled.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry responded to the BBC program harshly, “Israel views with utmost gravity the distorted, unfair and intentionally hostile nature of the Panorama program.”

Palestine Affairs Council