Swedish Newspaper Publishes Allegations of IDF Harvesting Palestinians' Organs

It's hard to know what to make of this, and I see a few possibilities. First, it could be true--this would not be very shocking given that we already have evidence that there are Rabbis involved in organ brokering, and Palestinians are widely considered worse than vermin by many Israelis. Second possibility, it is not true and either represents a real attempt to defame Jews (less likely imo) or a deliberate distraction from the real issue of organ trafficking generally, one which allows for people to dismiss any talk of Rabbis and organs as "classic blood libel" material.

"Our sons plundered in their bodies'

Young Palestinian men throwing stones and bottles against israel soldiers in the northern West Bank.

This area was Bilal Ahmed GHANAIAN and scratching were up in hospital. "Our sons are used as body parts", says the Palestinians.

Photo: Donald Bostrom
GHANAIAN Bilal Ahmed, 19, was shot and taken away by israel soldiers. The body was sewn back from the stomach to the neck.

Photo: Donald Bostrom
Levy Izhak Rosenbaum abducted by FBI agents. Rosenbaum should have acted as a middleman in the illegal organ trade.

Photo: AP Palestinians accuse the Israeli army to steal body parts from his victims.

Here, says Donald Bostrom of the international transplant scandal - and how he witnessed the assault on a 19-year-old boy.

I'm what you might call a "matchmaker," said Levy Izhak Rosenbaum from Brooklyn, USA, in a secret recording of an FBI agent who he thought was a customer. Ten days later, at the end of July this year, Rosenbaum was arrested in connection with a large tangle of corruption uncovered in New Jersey: rabbis, elected and trusted officials had for years been involved with money laundering and the illegal organ trade, which now was rolled up like a Sopranos network. Rosenbaum allltså matchmaking was not about romance but about buying and selling kidneys from Israel on the black market. According to their own admission, he buys bodies from the needy people in Israel for 10 $ 000 and sells them to desperate patients in the U.S. for 160 $ 000. The legal waiting time for kidneys is an average of nine years.

The accusations have shaken the American transplant industry. If this is true, is the first documented organ trafficking in the U.S., say experts in the New Jersey Real-Time News.

When asked how many bodies he sold Rosenbaum responds: Quite a lot. Many. And I have never failed, he boasts on. His work has been going on for a very long time.

Francis Delmonici, Harvard Professor of Transplantation Surgery, and board member of the National Kidney Foundation's Board of Directors, said in the same newspaper that similar organs trafficking in Israel is also under way elsewhere in the world. It is estimated that 10 percent of the 63 000 kidney transplant in the world that are illegal, says Delmonici.

Hot countries for this illegal activity is Pakistan, the Philippines and China, where it is believed that organs taken from executed prisoners. But there are also strong suspicions among Palestinians that their young men were taken, and that China and Pakistan involuntary act had spare bodies before they were killed. A very serious suspicions that have enough question marks for the ICJ, International Court of Justice, should definitely open an investigation into whether it is about israel's war crimes.

Israel has recurrent got in trouble for their unethical way of dealing with organs and transplantation. Countries including France cut the body cooperation with Israel as early as the nineties, and the Jerusalem Post wrote, "to other countries in Europe expected to follow France's example soon."

Half of the kidneys, which the Israelis had implanted since the early 2000s has been purchased illegally from Turkey, Eastern Europe or Latin America. Israel Swiss health authorities have full knowledge of the business, but do nothing to stop it. 2003 revealed at a conference that Israel is the only Western country whose medical community does not condemn the illegal organ trade or take any legal action against the doctors involved in the criminal management. On the contrary, is chief medical officer at the major hospitals involved in most illegal transplants, according to Dagens Nyheter (5 December 2003).

In an attempt to overcome the organ shortage in the country joined the then health minister of Israel, Ehud Olmert, out of a big campaign in summer 1992 to get the by-israel people to set up as organ donors. Half a million pamphlets were distributed in local newspapers where citizens were invited to write in to donate their organs after their death. Ehud Olmert himself was the first to write on.

Already a few weeks after the Jerusalem Post said that the campaign produced a successful outcome. No less is 35 000 people had signed up, usually it is 500 a month. The same article said the journalist Judy Siegel that the gap between supply and demand was still high. Gender of kidney transplants was 500 people, but only 124 people could have surgery. Of 45 persons in need of a new liver had only three people being able to undergo surgery in Israel.

While this body campaign lasted disappeared young Palestinian men who came back at night to their villages five days later, kill and split open.

Most of the cut open the bodies terrified population in the West Bank and Gaza. There was talk of a dramatic increase in young men who disappeared with subsequent nocturnal funerals of young men autopsy.

I was in the area and worked with a book when a number of times I was contacted by UN staff who were concerned about the development. Those who contacted me felt that organ theft actually took place, but they were unable to act. On behalf of a television company, I then went around and spoke to a large number of Palestinian families in the West Bank and Gaza, which meant that their sons have been robbed of bodies before they were killed. One of the examples I came across during this spooky trip was the young stone author Bilal Ahmed GHANAIAN.

The clock was approaching midnight when the engine sounds from israel Kingdom miltärkolonnen heard on the outskirts of the village Imatin the northern West Bank. The village's two thousand inhabitants remained a man wake up and stood as silent shadows in the dark. Some lay on rooftops, others stood behind their curtains, house or tree that gave protection in the dark over the curfew but still offered a clear view of what would become the village's first graveyard martyr. The military had broken all the electricity around the village and the area was closed military zone - a cat could not move outdoors without risking lives. Darkness stunned silence was broken only by quiet sobs and I can not remember if it was the cold or excitement we shivered. Five days earlier, on 13 May 1992, was an Israeli special forces put themselves in ambush in the village craftsmen. The person that special forces had been instructed to disarm was 19-year-old Bilal Ahmed GHANAIAN, one of the most active Palestinian stone-throwing youths who made life difficult for the Israeli occupiers.

GHANAIAN Bilal was one of the leading stone were called a couple of years. It meant that he and others wanted stone throw guys lived under the sky up in Nablusbergen. To be caught meant death, and all the previous stories about the torture did not make things better. Thus did they in the mountains. But for some reason took Bilal himself down from the mountains one days and wandered unchecked through the village past the carpenter's house this unfortunate day in mid-May. Why he came down on this particular day was not even Talal, his older brother answer, perhaps the food was final and supplies needed to be replenished.

Everything went according to plan for the israel special forces missions. The cigarette butts, put down the Coca-Cola cans and aimed at leisure through the broken window. When Bilal was close enough, only to pull the trigger. The first shot struck in the chest. According to villagers who witnessed the event, he then shot with a shot in each leg. Then two soldiers jumped down from the carpentry shop and shot him once in the stomach. Finally, they took Bilal at his feet and dragged him to the 20 steps up the carpentry shop stone staircase. The villagers then tells the people from both the UN and Red Crescent who were nearby and heard the shooting had gone to the scene to take care of the injured. The argument about who would take care of the victim ended up on israel by force loaded in the severely injured Bilal in a jeep and drove off to the village's outskirts. There expecting a military helicopter that whisked away Bilal against one of his relatives unknown destination.

Five days later he came back in the dark, dead and wrapped in green hospital fabrics. When a military column that recovered from the autopsy center Bilal Abu Kabir outside Tel Aviv stop at the place of Bilal last resting knew someone again, the Israeli military leader of the group as a captain Yahya. "The most difficult of them all," he whispered in the darkness in my ear. When Captain Yahya men loaded the body and changed the green fabric against a light cotton fabric, were no male relatives to perform the job - to dig soil and mix cement.

Together with the sharp sounds of the spades could hear occasional laughter from the soldiers who were in waiting to go home came a few jokes to each other. When Bilal put into the grave was only his chest and suddenly it was clear to the few present who abuse he suffered. Bilal was far from the first person buried incised from the abdomen up to her chin and speculation about the intention had been taken off.

The stricken Palestinian families in the West Bank and Gaza were sure what happened to their sons. Our sons are used as involuntary organ donors, said relatives of Khaled from Nablus to me, as the mother of Raed from Jenin and my uncles to Machmod and Nafes from Gaza, all of which were missing a number of days and come back at night, kill and autopsy.

- Why secure the otherwise cells up to five days before we bury them? What happened to the bodies in the meantime? And why does the autopsy when the cause of death is obvious, and in all cases against our will? And why will the bodies back at night? And why under military escort? And why closed areas of the funeral? And why break the electricity? The questions were many and outraged by Nafes uncle.

The families of the killed Palestinian men had no longer any doubt.

The spokesman for the israel army said contrary to allegations of organ theft were fabrications by the Palestinians. All Palestinians are killed routinely autopsy, he said.

Bilal Ahmed Ghanem was one of 133 Palestinians were killed in various ways that year. According to Palestinian statistics, dödorsakerna following: shot in the street, explosions, beatings, tear gas, intentionally hit, hanged in prison, shot in the school, killed at home, etc.. Of the 133 killed persons aged four months to 88 years were 69 pieces of autopsy, ie only half of the dead. The routine autopsy of killed Palestinians, the army spokesman told is not true in reality in the occupied territories. The questions remain.

We know that the need for organs in Israel is large, that a substantial illegal trade in organs is in progress, that there has been a long time, it is the authorities' blessing, the senior doctor at the major hospitals involved, as well as officials at various levels. And we know that the Palestinian young men disappeared, they brought home five days later in secrecy at night, cut open and sewn.

Time to shed light on this macabre business of what is happening and what was happening in the territories occupied by Israel since the intifada started.

Donald Bostrom

Donald Bostrom is a journalist, photographer and author of, among other things reportageboken Inshallah (Ordfront publishers 2003).

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