Indicting Sharon, again

Prosecutors are investigating a complaint which charges Ariel Sharon of killing Egyptian POWs in the 1956 and 1967 wars. Is there more to this than political posturing, asks Amira Howeidy
It came as quite a surprise when, on 27 February, prosecutors summoned Hafez Abu Se'da, secretary-general of the Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights (EOHR).
Abu Se'da was informed that Cairo Appeals prosecutors wanted to interrogate him about a complaint he filed in August 2001, against eight Israeli officers and army generals whom he accuses of killing Egyptian Prisoners Of War (POWs) in Sinai during the 1956 and 1967 wars.
At the top of Abu Se'da's list is current Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who was head of the 9th brigade of the Israeli army in the 1967 war.
The prosecutor interrogated Abu Se'da for around two hours on Tuesday and asked him to present detailed facts on each of the eight defendants.
This is not the first time that Egyptian prosecutors have considered an investigation into war crimes committed by Israelis against Egyptian POWs. In 1995, both the EOHR and the Legal Research and Resource Centre for Human Rights (LRRCHR) filed lawsuits with Egyptian courts demanding that the government take action, suggesting in particular that it take the case to the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
Just under two years ago, the so-called Egyptian Committee for the Unity of the Arab Nation presented yet another complaint to the prosecutor-general, whose office later announced that he had opened an investigation. That investigation never materialised, and was widely considered frozen for unannounced reasons.
About 550 POWs and civil workers in Sinai were killed during the wars, according to the testimonies of several Israeli commanders.
Nevertheless, the POW issue was never discussed by the two countries despite hostile relations from 1948 until the peace agreement in 1979. But in 1995 the Israeli press published never-before-seen testimonies of Israeli officers, who confessed to carrying out collective massacres of Egyptian POWs in cold blood in the 1957 and 1967 wars.
The Israeli newspaper Maariv published accounts given by two Israeli officers, Arye Biro and Mordechai Brown. They confessed, giving facts and figures, that they and other officers had carried out collective massacres of Egyptian POWs during both wars. Biro and his unit killed 49 unarmed POWs in Sinai during the 1956 war, and Brown, commander of battalion 890, was responsible for the deaths of more than 500 POWs, including civil workers, during the 1967 war.
The pair also revealed that the murdered POWs were forced to dig their own graves using only their hands. They were then shot in the back.
Although these confessions sent shock waves through Egypt once the Arabic-language press published translations of the confessions, the Egyptian government refrained from taking any practical steps. The initiatives taken by rights groups to bring the perpetrators to justice -- usually by filing complaints and law suits with Egyptian courts -- also failed to yield results. Many believe these efforts failed to get off the ground because Egypt did not want its diplomatic ties with Israel to be affected.
So it was a natural step for observers to consider the sudden revival of the POWs file as a direct result of Egypt's criticism of Sharon's policy. Israel's escalation of daily military attacks on the Palestinians has been strongly opposed by Cairo.
Last year, following the eruption of the Intifada, Egypt recalled its ambassador to Israel. The post remains vacant.
"I would consider it harmful if there are political motivations behind the revival of the case," Abu Se'da told Al-Ahram Weekly. "We're dealing with the issue of POWs from a purely legal and human rights perspective, and we expect the government to treat it as such." Egypt's murdered POWs, he argued, "should be considered a national and legal issue and should not, under any circumstances, be affected by political considerations."
EOHR's complaint demands that the perpetrators be tried, that compensation be paid by Israel to the families of the murdered POWs and that there be an apology.
Abu Se'da explained that if the investigations find sufficient evidence to prosecute the Israeli officers accused of committing war crimes, "a court should try the perpetrators." He also hoped that Egypt would take up the file with the UN and demand the formation of an ad hoc war tribunal similar to the Milosevic court currently in progress at The Hague.
The complaint made three demands of the prosecutor: to hear the testimonies of witnesses, to examine the mass graves in Sinai and to approach the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Ministry of Defence, asking them to present the information they posses relating to the POWs.
Legal experts argue that the available evidence -- the testimonies of Israeli soldiers themselves -- is strong enough for any court to indict the perpetrators. How far Egypt is willing to go ahead with the case in legal terms, and put aside political considerations, remains an open question.
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