Isreali captain acquitted of charges

In 2004, an Israeli officer emptied his rifle into a 13-year-old Palestinian girl. He was later charged on several accounts, including the "illegal use of his weapon, conduct unbecoming an officer and perverting the course of justice by asking soldiers under his command to alter their accounts of the incident" (see link below). In late 2005, the officer, codenamed Capt. R, was acquitted of all charges. He has since, in addition to being reinstated to the military and receiving a promotion (to compensate for the loss of pay during the hearings and other factors such as defamation of his name), won a libel lawsuit against an Israeli investigative journalist.

Here's the article where I first heard about the acquittal:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/nov/16/israel2?CMP=twt_gu

Yes, I realize that this happened several years ago, but I just found out about it, and since I spent the last couple of hours looking into the case and trying to find all the different sides of the story, it seems to be a dilemma worth discussing.

The main points of contention, it seems lie not in the killing of a 13-year-old girl. (Which sounds like it would be the main point in contention to me, but apparently it has been fairly common for Palestinian militant organizations to recruit children. A good source of links of examples of this can be found here. Feel free to ignore the Wikipedia article, but there are several links to reputable news sources at the bottom of the page.) According to an article in Haaretz (one of the major Israeli media sources), it is against IDF policies to "confirm a kill," which Capt. R is quoted to have said. Further viewpoints and details of the situation can be found at www.israelmilitary.net/, news.bbc.co.uk, and www.guardian.co.uk. In particular, I found the thread (note that there are two pages of it) at israelmilitary.net interesting to read. 

Based on the situation as described by witnesses, it seems very unethical, even if one believes that a scared-looking child who is running away from a militarized zone is a potential threat (which is possible, since according to the above articles, it has happened before, although several of the soldiers stated that they didn't agree with the Captain that the girl was in a threatening position). Additionally, the backpack she had been carrying, which was the original cause for firing on her as the soldiers thought it could contain a bomb, had been dropped and fired on, proving that it contained no explosives, before the soldier went to where the girl was hiding, shot her in the head twice, then emptied the rest of his shots into the girl's body. Doctors at the hospital where the girl was taken reported that there were at least 17 bullet wounds in the girl's body.

Although one may argue that the initial warning shots at the girl were necessary, once the girl fled, it seems unlikely to me that one can justify exiting the base, walking more than 100 yards, and putting two bullets into this girl's head, while she lies cowering behind an embankment. It is even harder for me to justify to myself that it is necessary to not only put the gun to the side of the girl's head and pull the trigger again, but also to empty the rest of the clip throughout the girl's body. Regardless of the ethics of the rest of what Capt. R did, that action alone seems unethical enough to indict him.

Chilean miners

Three weeks ago, 33 miners became trapped in a mine cave-in in Chile. They've been found, but unfortunately, they currently don't have any way of escaping their subterranean dungeon. Recently, rescuers have estimated that boring a rescue shaft will take until Christmas. They told the trapped miners, who seemed to take the news well, but there are still concerns for their long-term well-being in the meantime. Here's an article further detailing the situation:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/26/trapped-chilean-miners-wait-rescue

At first, when this event was brought to my attention, my mind didn't even skip a beat. Of course, the miners should be told how long it would take to get them out. Who wouldn't want to be told? After hearing a few of my friends' opinions on the matter, though, I was surprised that a few of them said that they would go crazy, knowingly trapped inside a cramped tomb with over two and a half-dozen other people. Reading the above article, which states that the health minister was issuing antidepressants with the hope that the miners don't break down under the psychological pressure, makes me re-think my original position. Would it have been better if the rescuers hadn't told the trapped miners how long it would take to get them out? 

Would not knowing the date of their eventual rescue be more beneficial than knowing it? Our main source of support in ethical dilemmas in this course, the Bible, is very clear on the importance of truthfulness, that  

"The Lord detests lying lips, but he delights in men who are truthful."  

- Pro. 12:22 (NIV)

 However, reading farther up in that same chapter, one finds:

"Reckless words pierce like a sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing."

- Pro. 12:18 (NIV)

Would it have been more wise to wait until rescuers had a bigger head start on boring the rescue hole, and thereby gaining a more accurate estimate of when the rescue shaft would be completed? Telling the trapped miners of a later rescue date, while it may have truthfully been the estimated rescue date at the beginning of the rescue, may cause more despair than if the rescuers had waited a little longer and delayed telling the trapped miners what they knew until they were more sure of the rescue date. The article above suggests that the rescuers now expect the miners to be out of the collapsed mine before Christmas. Or, would waiting to tell the trapped workers be considered as not telling the truth, lying by omission?

Personally, although I recognize that it is too late to wait to tell the miners a more accurate rescue date. In the future, however, after looking at the situation (and with my very limited knowledge of ethics, psychology, and mine-rescue techniques :)  ), I would wait to tell the workers until I was fairly sure, disregarding pitfalls in the rescuing process, of the date when the miners would be able to be with their families again. In my experience, hasty time estimates are not always the best way to handle a situation. (Recall the BP oil spill, which BP originally said would only take three weeks to plug. It eventually took several months to plug, and the cleanup of the Gulf of Mexico is going to take months more. If they had originally said that they had to examine the issue more instead of appeasing the media and trying methods that everyone, including all of the petroleum engineers I knew, was fairly certain would not work, they might have received worse media attention, but wasted less time trying fast and easy methods rather than ones they were sure would work. However, this is merely my opinion and is only as accurate as my knowledge of the situation, which is admittedly limited to what I have been told by the media.) 

Well, sorry about that rant, but going back to the miner story, I am honestly on the edge about which path I think would be the best. Would it be be still telling the truth to wait until the rescuers were more sure about a rescue date? Is it harmful to tell the miners a later date than the one they will probably be rescued by? Is there even a dilemma here? The more I think about it, the more I would encourage waiting to tell the miners. 

Introduction

I believe introductions are in order. 

Je m'excuse, I would wait for you, but I'm afraid I can't really hear you. So I'll start, and maybe you can introduce yourself, if you would like, in the comments section :) . I am a student, both in fact and as a way of life. If I could stay in school, learning until the day I die, I would gladly do so. But life catches up to you, and I realize it is impossible to sit in a classroom every year for fifty years, so I'm trying to make the switch from learning in school to finding more knowledge outside of the classroom. I hope this blog, which I plan to gear towards discussing the ethical implications of controversial news items, will assist in these efforts.

For more background information, the title to this blog has rather significant meaning to me. It is an excerpt from a quote by Hans Christian Anderson:

"Just living is not enough. One must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower."

I feel this reflects a common theme seen throughout both the Baylor Interdisciplinary Core (BIC) curriculum and aspects of Christian life. Christians, to quote a well-known book and lecture series, are called to live a purpose-driven life. In Examined Life, well, the application of this quote should be evident from the title of the course, to not only live, but to inspect every aspect of one's life to ensure that one is leading the life one would like to live. This, I feel, will also be a major theme in Biblical Heritage: to be aware of one's everyday life decisions and how they correspond to what the Bible and common sense dictates as ethical. As I have learned about life, I have realized that it is not enough to merely live, but that life must be lived well. I hope that you will travel with me on this path of living the examined life, and that the experience will be instructive and enjoyable to everyone involved. :)