Israel denounces soldiers’ T-shirts

Jerusalem —- Israel’s military condemned soldiers for wearing T-shirts showing a pregnant woman in a rifle’s cross-hairs with the slogan “1 Shot 2 Kills,” and another showing a gun-toting child with the words, “The smaller they are, the harder it is.”

The T-shirts were worn by some Israeli Defense Force soldiers to mark the end of basic training and other military courses, the newspaper Haaretz said.

The appearance of the T-shirts followed allegations of misconduct by Israeli troops during the three-week Gaza war in which Palestinian officials say about 1,400 Palestinians were killed, most of them civilians. Thirteen Israelis died, three of them civilians.

The army said it would not tolerate the T-shirts and would take disciplinary action against the soldiers involved, although it was not clear how many wore the shirts or how widely they were distributed.

The military sought to portray the T-shirts as “tasteless” humor and condemned the soldiers involved, and said the shirts were not manufactured or sanctioned by the military.

Few in the Palestinian territories appeared to be aware of the T-shirts. In Gaza, Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said it “reflects the brutal mentality among the Zionist soldiers and the Zionist society.”

But Hamas-controlled media consistently glorify attacks on Israelis, and cartoons in Palestinian newspapers frequently use anti-Semitic images of Jews.

Israel’s military has come under increasing scrutiny after soldiers alleged that some troops opened fire hastily and killed Palestinian civilians during the Gaza war, including children, possibly because they believed they would not be held accountable under relaxed open-fire regulations. The military has ordered a criminal inquiry into the soldiers’ accounts, published in a military institute’s newsletter.

On Monday, the military chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, defended his troops.

“I tell you that this is a moral and ideological army. I have no doubt that exceptional events will be dealt with,” Ashkenazi told new recruits. Gaza “is a complex atmosphere that includes civilians, and we took every measure possible to reduce harm to the innocent.”

The Gaza offensive, launched to end years of rocket fire at Israeli towns, ended Jan. 18.