Following the summary is a link to the complete translated text of the Jenin bulldozer driver's testimony:
Last Friday (May 31), the weekend supplements of the two largest newspapers in Israel devoted their cover interviews to two soldiers who played a key role in the repression of resistance at the Jenin Refugee Camp. Ma’ariv’s “Weekend” hosted Lt.Col. Ofek Bukhris, a Golani battalion commander, who fought bravely and sustained a leg injury.
Yediot’s “7 Days” found a much spicier hero from these tragic days. Moshe Nissim is a 40-year-old reserve soldier from Jerusalem, a proud member of Beitar’s “Small Bunch of Fans” [Beitar is the most politically-oriented soccer team in Israel, associated with right-wing and anti-Arab sentiments. Their “small bunch” is notorious for acts of hooliganism]. Nissim became known at Jenin as “Kurdish Teddy-Bear”. First Tip of the Week: I recommend to whoever can, to find a copy of this amazing interview or get someone to translate it for them (“I made them a stadium in the middle of the camp”, by Z. Yehezkieli). Here is a short summary.
The invasion found Moshe Nissim fired from his job at Jerusalem’s Municipality, and under investigation for charges of bribe taking. Nissim has not performed many reserve duties in his life (he admits to having evaded them), so much so, that his unit did not even bother to recruit him for the invasion. When he heard that all his unit is being called except him, he raised hell until they agreed to take him. His military profession is automotive electrician; but he insisted on manning a (US-made) D-9 mega-bulldozer. Usually, the army allows one to operate such a monster only after a lengthy course, but for Nissim it took two hours, and away we go. He and his unit found themselves at the last scene of genuine resistance: the Jenin Refugee Camp – just after a bomb ambush killed 13 Israeli soldiers.
Nissim placed a Beitar flag on the D-9 and started destroying houses. The interviewed asked whether it was hard for him. “Hard? You must be joking. I wanted to erase everything. I would wail to the officers over the radio, so they’ll let me tear it all down…. When they told me to destroy a house, I took advantage of it and ruined a few more…. Believe me, we did not destroy enough…”
“For three days I just erased and erased. The entire area. I took down any house from which there was shooting. To take it down, I would take down several more. The soldiers warned with a speaker, that the tenants must leave before I come in, but I did not give anyone a chance. I did not wait…. I would give a house the hardest push, so it would fall as fast as possible… Others may have been more restrained. Or they say the have. Don’t believe their stories… There were many people in the houses we started to destroy… I did not see a house fall on a live person. But if there was such a case, I don’t give a damn. I’m sure that people died in these houses, but it was hard to see, there were tons of dust and we worked a lot at night. I enjoyed seeing each house fall, because I knew that they don’t mind dying, but a house hurts them more… If something hurts me, it’s that we did not erase the entire camp.”...
For the whole translated interview with the Jenin Bulldozer Driver:
http://www.indymedia.org.il/imc/israel/webcast/29761.html
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