Amnesty accuses IDF troops of human rights abuse

In its annual 2007 global report, Amnesty International accused the IDF Wednesday of killing more than 650 Palestinians last year. According to the human rights group, half of them were unarmed civilians and included some 120 children - a threefold increase from 2005. The group accused soldiers and settlers of committing "serious human rights abuses, including unlawful killings, against Palestinians, mostly with impunity." No such killings were documented in the report. Amnesty reported a "significant increase" in the launching of homemade rockets by Palestinian armed groups from Gaza into southern Israel, in which two Israeli civilians were killed. But the report gave no number for rockets fired and did not quantify the increase.