Amnesty "Debate": Yes, Israel Controls The Media

The Amnesty-MEMO event on "Complicity in Oppression: Does the Media Aid Israel" that took place on Monday sounds as bad as expected, and it can't really be called a debate when only one point of view is aired. All of the speakers believe that Israel controls the media, and Jonathan Hoffman and Richard Millet, who attended said that no pro-Israel questions were taken.

Millet points out that Amnesty's defence of the event doesn't really stand, that “Those who disagree with MEMO, or indeed any apsect of the event, are of course welcome to attend and make their point in a reasonable way.”

Millet quotes Greg Philo (the author of the book that Tim Llewellyn, another speaker, endorsed in the Guardian) complaining that the BBC would say things like "Israel's attack on Hamas enters its second week" when it should say "Israel's attack on the Palestinians". Well, perhaps you could call that bias if Israel did deliberately target civilians. But, as all the evidence proves, Israel did not deliberately target civilians.

Philo also complains that:

"As a consequence [of the pro-Israel media bias] although the public had sympathy for the Palestinians, they wanted the Palestinians to stop firing rockets at Israel. He quoted a woman in one of his focus groups who said: 'When I saw the pictures of the dead children, it was dreadful. I was in tears. But it didn’t make me feel that the Palestinians and Hamas were right. I think the Palestinians haven’t taken the chance to work towards a peaceful solution.'"

So first Philo whines that people want the Palestinians to stop firing rockets at Israel, and then he whines that people think the Palestinians aren't doing enough to advance peace! Because in his mind firing rockets is advancing peace?!
Hoffman relays that when Abdel Bari Atwan spoke:

"The first thing he did – to prove that 'the Israel Lobby' was out to silence him – was to hold up the JC’s front page: 'How Was This Hatefest Allowed on Campus?' Atwan is convinced that the 'Israel Lobby' is to blame for the fact that he is not invited as a guest on TV shows, and he thinks he gets 'worse coverage than Adolf Hitler'."

Hoffman points out "Has he considered that it might just have something to do with the fact that he is an extremist who says that he will 'dance in Trafalgar Square' if Iranian missiles hit Israel?".

On BBC Bias

The Guardian really plugged the Israel haters yesterday; as well as publishing a letter from the senior editor of the pro-Hamas MEMO, they also published an article alleging that the BBC is biased towards Israel, by Tim Llewellyn, another of the speakers at MEMO's debate yesterday on the same subject.

Llewellyn's agenda is evident from the beginning. In the second paragraph he claims:

"The BBC coverage of Israel and Palestine, where another state continually kills and oppresses Arabs, is replete with imbalance and distortion".

His summing up of the conflict, as Israel intentionally and maliciously oppressing the Palestinians for no apparent reason is simply absurd and the fact that he follows this by lecturing the BBC on "imbalance and distortion" renders his entire article a joke.

He lists ways the media is supposedly biased towards Israel, according to a book co-written by Greg Philo, also a speaker at the debate:

"They find that the Israeli explanation of why it went to war on a mainly defenceless Gazan population is the one broadly accepted by the BBC. It was a 'response' to Palestinian rockets. The Palestinian case, that the Israelis violated a ceasefire that had held for nearly five months in November 2008, and that the Gazans had endured many years of intensifying siege and blockade, which had reduced them to stagnation and penury, was rarely put, if at all... The BBC repeatedly stressed the word [Israeli] 'retaliation'". 

But Israel didn't go to war on the "defenceless Gazan population", it targetted Hamas and the evidence is in the ratio of civilians to terrorists killed; much lower than in other conflicts, with Hamas confessing to over 700 terrorists being killed, all this bearing in mind all the precautions Israel took to minimize civilian casualties, and the fact that Hamas used the Palestinians as human shields. Also it is undeniable that the war was a response - Hamas fired about 200 rockets into Israel in November 2008. They are entirely to blame for the plight of the Palestinians in Gaza, so Llewellyn's complaints are void.

"They cite a BBC reporter saying: 'Israel feels itself surrounded by enemies, with reason.' They add: 'We have not found a commentary noting that 'Palestinians feel themselves to be subject to a brutal military occupation, with reason.' Israel's official view is given as fact, they say, but the Palestinian view, on the rare occasions it is found at all, is not. Israelis 'state', Palestinians 'claim'."

The first point above is true, the media hardly ever cite the real reasons for the conflict, how aside from the fact that Hamas want to destroy Israel, they also constantly act directly against the Palestinians' best interests. As for the second point, it's just not true - Palestinians' lies are constantly repeated as fact (eg. Israel murdered a peaceful protestor with tear gas), and when the truth comes out (she wasn't even at the protest, she died of medical issues), the media never report what actually happened. On the rare occasion that they do say the Palestinians "claim", well, it might be because it's not unheard of for Palestinians to tell outright lies. (eg. Palestinians "claim" Israel eats Palestinian babies; Palestinians "claim" there is no Jewish connection to the land of Israel etc etc).

"Israeli attacks are always reported as retaliation to Palestinian violence or rockets, and the idea that Palestinian rockets, however ineffective, are armed resistance to Israel's hammering from land, sea and air is rarely broadcast. The daily indignities and brutalities of the siege and the occupation and the shelling and shooting of civilians are virtually absent from BBC consciousness unless an attack on Israel sparks interest."

Here Llewellyn shows that he views rockets targetted at innocent civilians as a justified "response" ("resistance") to Israel killing the terrorists who fire the rockets. That and the fact that he calls the rockets "ineffective" when just last month an Israeli schoolboy was killed, is insane and obscene. And whilst it is constantly reported when Palestinians are killed, whether they are terrorists, or civilians where terrorists had just fired rockets from their back garden, the most common, almost daily, Palestinian attacks deliberately targetted at Israeli civilians (whether by rocks or rockets, both can be fatal) are rarely reported, much less when they celebrate and boast about it.

"what is missing from the coverage is the view that the Palestinians are engaged in a war of national liberation, trying to throw off an occupying force. Any Israeli casualty is headline news, shown in high quality images. BBC teams are based in West Jerusalem, de facto Israeli territory, and are on hand. Arab casualties may be shown in reports of a funeral, usually agency film, the victim anonymous"

This is just so untrue I really wonder where they get their "evidence" for this. Again Llewellyn demonstrates that he views Israeli citizens, whether a three month old baby or a 16 year old schoolboy or a pregnant woman, as legitimate targets because they are "an occupying force". And again, his second point is a blatant lie. Not only are Palestinian deaths reported in great detail - both visually and in words - and often out of context (if it's civilians ignoring how they are used as human shields, if it's terrorists showing their families mourning), but Israeli deaths are reported with much of the focus on how it would be considered Israel's fault, for example where the victims are called "hardline" settlers as though it's ok to kill a baby just because she lives on land that the Palestinians claim is theirs.

When Philo and Berry interviewed students, they found that they:

"were largely unaware of the Israeli occupation, often believing the Palestinians are the occupiers. Few knew that Hamas had been democratically elected in January 2006. 'I had the impression they were a terrorist group from watching the BBC' said one respondent."

Which is a bizarre quote to use to try to back up their claims of BBC bias, because everyone know Hamas is a terrorist organistaion, even they don't try to hide it - and just because they were "elected" doesn't change that fact. Just Journalism "recently addressed how a BBC profile of Hamas downplayed the Islamist group’s targeting of civilians and its extremist ideology."
 
If all that wasn't bad enough so far, Llewellyn ends the article by claiming that after 9/11:

"Israel and its friends were quick to capitalise on 'terror' and 'Arabs' and massively enhanced their propaganda here, gaining access to BBC staff at all levels".

So not only is he accusing Israel (or the "Zionist/Jewish lobby") of forcing the media to report what they tell them; he also accuses Israel of exploiting "terror" in quote marks, as if it doesn't exist and Israel's never experienced the consequences of terrorism. It's more than just ironic that Llewellyn's antisemitic implication of Jewish control over the media claims that the media is afraid of being called antisemitic, because this very claim seeks to undermine defenders of Israel and balanced reporting as "playing the antisemite card".

I've found fisking this article to be totally surreal, I can't quite believe the lies I've read. And it's even more surreal that I'm having to write in defence of the BBC's reporting, especially considering that there are so many instances where they clearly are biased against Israel.

For example, Just Journalism found Wyre Davies' BBC:

"analysis of Israel’s negative response to the Fatah-Hamas unity deal declines to engage directly with the reasons why Israel might be perturbed by Hamas being brought into the process, alternatively choosing to portray a gleeful Netanyahu with a new ‘message’ to ‘take to the wider world...

Davies denigrates any treatment of Hamas as a terrorist group, making absolutely no reference to the organisation’s long history of killing and maiming Israeli civilians in targeted attacks, which is the basis for the application of the terrorist label. He makes no reference to, nor takes account of, high profile recent statements by Hamas leaders that they will never accept Israel and want to see it expunged from the Middle East."

Meanwhile I look forward to Philo. Berry and Llewellyn's defence of Press TV.

Judge Goldstone's Guilt

Two years after the Goldstone report accused Israel of committing war crimes in a “deliberately disproportionate attack designed to punish, humiliate and terrorise a civilian population”, Goldstone has confessed that his conclusions were wrong.

Of course, all of his accusations against Israel were disproved both at that time and even before his investigation, by research undertaken by Israel supporters and truth-seekers all over.

The report was widely accepted, and used to further delegitimise Israel and deny its right to self-defence. I look forward to Robert Fisk’s reaction to this, as at the time he referred to Goldstone as “the eminent lawyer who so bravely… inspires…” etc. The self-hating Jews will also be quite upset about Goldstone’s retraction.

Significantly, The Times had observed that it was imbalanced for equating Israel and Hamas and not acknowledging Israel’s right to self-defence, and that the UN, who facilitated the investigation, is undeniably biased against Israel.

As Michael Weiss points out in the Telegraph, the report didn’t acknowledge Hamas’ use of civilians as human shields, and storage of weapons in schools, mosques and hospitals, when even last week the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights criticised Hamas for violating international law by continuing to “store explosives or to treat such explosives in locations close to populated areas” (not for firing them at Israeli civilians though).

Now Goldstone acknowledges that: “The allegations of intentionality by Israel were based on the deaths of and injuries to civilians in situations where our fact-finding mission had no evidence on which to draw any other reasonable conclusion”, and that Israel’s investigations into 400 alleged incidents of misconduct “indicate[s] that civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy”.

He admits, “If I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document”, but then blames this on Israel’s “lack of cooperation”. Bizarrely, he expresses disappointment that Hamas never investigated their own war crimes, even though he acknowledges that it is their “policy to destroy the state of Israel”.

Goldstone’s admission is brave but he demonstrates cowardice as well because instead of taking responsibility, he is blaming Israel for withholding information. But that evidence was available at the time for anyone who looked for it – either Goldstone is very stupid, or he deliberately chose to ignore the evidence and has only now realized how absurdly untruthful and damaging his report is.

It was not very difficult for supporters of Israel to learn the truth about everything that happened, so it is beyond me why so-called “amateur” bloggers like the great Elder of Ziyon and others are seen as irrelevant, whilst people like Goldstone who choose to ignore the facts receive worldwide recognition for their work. We are not detectives, but I and ever other pro-Israel blogger out there are more qualified than Goldstone to comment on the truth about Cast Lead and the general situation in Israel and the territories.

The reason why Goldstone wrote his retraction is evident from this quote: “the Human Rights Council should condemn the inexcusable and cold-blooded recent slaughter of a young Israeli couple and three of their small children in their beds.”

Recently Interior minister Eli Yishai wrote to Goldstone telling him to condemn Palestinian attacks on Israelis, because his report on Cast Lead legitimises the attacks by not holding the terrorists accountable and instead condemning Israel for acting in self-defence.

When Goldstone sees all the attacks on Israelis, and the absurd restraint Israel shows in its retaliations, and then hears and sees how the world still demonizes Israel, it would be impossible for him not to feel guilty. Yishai’s letter would merely have been the trigger for the article, written out of the guilt that Goldstone already feels.

The Promise: The Ultimate Defence Of Antisemitism

Amir Ofek of the Israeli embassy said that with regards to the anti-Israel Western media, The Promise is "worse than anything I've seen" and has "created a new category of hostility towards Israel".

I would go further, and say that of anything I've ever read or seen, The Promise is the most antisemitic and antisemitic-inducing of all. Whatever comes out of the Arab media is only to be expected and I haven't seen any Nazi propaganda films, but for Western media standards, The Promise is pretty shocking, and I am not easily shocked.

We meet a lot of Jews and Israelis in The Promise, and pretty much all of them are evil or portrayed as evil, barring the self-hating lefty Israeli brother, whose Christian-Arab terrorist-turned-"peace"-activist friend is, for a Christian, surprisingly hostile to Israel. Also I didn't know that the Al Aqsa Martyrs employed Christians, I thought it was just an Islamic thing.

Anyway Channel 4 defended The Promise saying that the characters

"'consistently and sympathetically present a contemporary Israeli perspective' and the Holocaust was 'powerfully evoked' to explain the longing for a Jewish homeland... 'Nobody escapes scrutiny in this film; different parts of the story reflect well and badly on the Palestinians, the Israelis and the British'."

Uh, really? Let's first count the ways the Israelis are reflected well:

1. Jews died and suffered in the Holocaust.

A round of applause for The Promise and Channel 4 for not being Holocaust deniers (even though Channel 4 have given a platform to Ahmadinejad The Holocaust Denier).

2. Some Israelis (namely Lefty Israeli Brother) hate Israel, which makes them good and peace loving, even though they think Israeli civilians deserve to be blown up by Palestinian suicide bombers.

Ok, now let's count the way the Palestinians are reflected badly (because the ways they're reflected well are too many to count):

1.

Yeah, there are none. There was a Palestinian suicide bombing which was just because, according to the self-hating brother "they can't make their point any other way" - but it definitely wasn't animalistic, as the 'Racist' Israeli Mother called it - and even though suicide bombings decreased by over 90% after the security fence was built, this fact is ignored in The Promise, and the fence is cited as having nothing to do with preventing terrorism; instead it is just to humiliate the Palestinians, so really the suicide bombings are the Israelis' own fault.

Despite this, Christina Patterson of the Independent (who has an issue with Jews) calls The Promise "extremely balanced".

The programme according to which typical Israeli children scream and throw stones at Palestinian girls whilst Israeli soldiers watch. In The Promise, Palestinians don't do these things, but they are "held and humiliated for the hell of it" by the IDF, not because Palestinians have ever been known to be violent towards Israelis or anything like that.

Patterson of course ignores Jewish history and links to Israel and sees the Holocaust as the only reason Jews wanted Israel as a homeland. She then ignores all the Palestinian persecution of Jews and pogroms against them before the Holocaust and claims that "you can see why their [the Palestinians'] sympathy for their newish neighbours might have worn a bit thin". Sympathy 'worn a bit thin' possibly being the biggest understatement ever made on Palestinian terrorism.

Patterson then seems to equate Palestinian terrorists with settlers and thinks that all that needs to be done for peace is for Israel to acknowledge "what Arabs around the world are reminding us: that there comes a time when bullying backfires."

Can Christina Patterson do simple maths?

If security fence = 90% decrease in suicide bombings

and giving away land (i.e. Gaza) = increased rockets on Israeli towns,

then what the hell is she talking about?

The Promise: Demonising Jews And Israel Since The 1940s

Most people reading this will be aware of Channel 4’s 4-part drama The Promise, of which two episodes have been aired so far. The programme is set in two eras: it follows a British teen who spends the summer in Israel in 2005, whilst reading her grandfather’s diary who was a soldier in the Palestinian Mandate in the 1940s.

As a drama, it’s effective, yet it will be hard for some people to remember that although it is based on true events, it’s actually fiction – and of course, biased against Israel and full of distortions and omissions.

And I’m not going to not say that just because there’s a risk I might be told I’m imagining it, there is no anti-Israel bias, Israel really is all-evil.

Which seems to be the view of the New Statesman’s Laurie Penny, who mocks Julie Burchill’s criticism of The Promise as “bonkers”, exaggerating and at the same time condensing her concerns as accusing the programme of “foaming anti-Semitism, borne out of Gentile resentment that Jewish people are good at science”.

There is no known reason for antisemitism but now that Burchill mentions it, it’s hardly implausible that antisemites would feel resentment that the Jews as “such a small, persecuted tribe can keep surviving, thriving and achieving”.

Penny throws in an “as a Jew I’m offended” remark, calls the programme “a reflective and excruciatingly well-researched series”, and then gives her laughable defence of why this is the case and it can’t possibly be biased: because it “opens with five gruelling minutes set in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, cutting in segments of real footage from the mass graves”.

Done with the Jews-as-victims part, Penny finally reveals her true agenda as she turns to the Palestinians and describes the IDF “penning your family behind gun-bristling checkpoints, cramming your friends and neighbors behind apartheid walls, bombing your home, machine-gunning your grandchildren.”

Because Israel does that all the time of course, and all just for fun with no reason. Because even though the Jews were victims in the Holocaust, now they’re not allowed to defend themselves.

And that pretty much sums up the message of The Promise. Jews are no longer victims, in fact Jews are the oppressors, and any time you might think a Jew is a victim, it’s their own fault.

For example, at the end of Part 1, Lefty-Israeli-Brother tells impressionable British girl Erin that the fence is not to prevent terrorism; it’s just to humiliate the Palestinians. Two minutes later there is a suicide bombing, the implication being that the brother is right. But there is no counter-argument that suicide bombings decreased by over 90% after the fence was built.

In Part 2 the brother (who was injured in the bombing) discovers that Erin’s grandfather was in the 1946 bombing of the King David hotel by the Irgun. He states that the two cases are “exactly the same; people blowing up buildings because they can’t make their point any other way”. It’s amazing that he can call it exactly the same, yet on the one hand the programme seems to defend suicide bombings and blame them on Israel; and at the same time leave out all the context of the King David hotel bombing – such as that the Irgun gave three warnings for the hotel to be evacuated, which were ignored, and that Jewish groups condemned the Irgun, Ben Gurion calling them “the enemy of the Jewish people”. Suicide bombers, on the other hand, don’t give warnings because their aim is to cause maximum civilian casualties, and in the Arab world, rather than condemnation, people who kill Israeli civilians are usually considered heroes.

It is made clear in The Promise by the exaggerations and lack of context of the Irgun that it is not just what they did but also why they did it that is the director’s problem. As the Israeli grandfather explained, after the horrors of the Holocaust in which his whole family had been killed, the Irgun aimed to ensure nothing like that would ever happen again by securing Israel as the Jewish homeland. The means were wrong, but that does not take away the right of Jews and Israel to self-defence.

Palestinian "Justice"

- A young Palestinian has been jailed for criticising and mocking Islam on his blog and on Facebook groups that he created, claiming to be G-d. The blogger faces a potential life prison sentence, whilst residents of his West Bank town say he should be publicly executed. Somehow I don't think any of this will change his opinions on Islam.

- Meanwhile on Gaza's new "five-star" prison, the director said "We do not practice any torture here. That takes place at the interrogation centre, before people are convicted." Once convicted though, those accused of collaborating with Israel are hanged in the basement. But before that, they can enjoy tv and radio in their rooms, and to visit and be visited by their families.

- In other news, last month the Working Group Against the Trafficking of Women set up a window display in Tel Aviv's Dizengoff mall, where real women posed with price tags attached, under a banner saying "Women for Sale". The aim was obviously to create awareness of the issue, and to gather signatures for their petition, but Iranian media reported it as "Prostitution in Israel", describing it as a "slavery mall". Thankfully the Western mainstream media isn't quite at that stage yet, although there have been instances where it's not very far off.

The Times' Narrative-In-Brief

On his visit to Israel, Germany's foreign minister called for Israel to end the Gaza blockade, the Times reported yesterday in a news brief.

What they forgot to mention was that:

he also called on Hamas to release Gilad Shalit: "it is very important that we help the family, that we help this poor young man and that we see him as soon as possible, safe and healthy, back in the arms of his family"

and he also "said his decision to not meet with Hamas stemmed from the Gaza leadership's refusal to renounce violence and recognize Israel".

But of course if the Times had reported that, it might have ruined the Israel = oppressors, Palestinians = victims narrative.

Fight The Media? BE The Media!

I’ve always been a proud supporter of Israel and interested in media and journalism, so it was inevitable that I eventually started this blog in June 2009 – just about the time I’d finally had enough of the continuous and absurdly biased and inaccurate coverage of Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza.

My main motivation for this blog was as an outlet for myself, to record the media’s hypocrisy and express my feelings on the subject. This was after spending much time getting into pointless and frustrating online arguments with Israel-hating lefties and terrorist supporters who repeatedly accuse Israel of genocide and ethnic cleansing and Naziism, and ignore all the facts, logic, and evidence you throw at them.

It feels like the media and internet are so vast, how can we possibly counter all the hate and lies? - but it works to our advantage as well. There are so many outlets for expression that anyone and everyone can get involved in fighting Israel’s media war, and make a difference even by doing something as small as clicking ‘play’ on a YouTube video. Within a day of the notorious flotilla incident in May, Israel’s footage of their soldiers being stabbed and attacked on the Mavi Marmara was on the front page of YouTube, which then generated hundreds of thousands more views. The footage was later used in a BBC documentary of the incident, so informative and balanced that Israel’s critics were incensed. All of this was achieved simply by people watching the video and sharing it online.

Some of the most powerful online videos are only 30 seconds long, such as those by Free Middle East, or “What makes a hero?” by YouTube member aussievideodude. The IDF itself records footage and posts clips on its YouTube channel, and Honest Reporting do educational videos and podcasts. Just as effective – if not more so – is the use of humour in videos, such as No Laughing Matter’s mock interviews, Latma’s satirical news channel, and Elder of Ziyon’s ironic videos, like “The Humanitarian Crisis of the Gaza Mall”. Sometimes ridicule is the only way to get people to take another look at themselves.

Twitter is a great website for posting information as it happens and sharing it fast. When Israel was helping in Haiti after the earthquake there, they used Twitter not only to update followers of their efforts, but also to communicate with people who required aid. And last year on the third anniversary of Gilad Shalit’s capture, there was a campaign to create awareness of his plight that succeeded in getting his name as one of the top trends that day (until Michael Jackson died). If you have an important link related to Israel, post it with a related tag like #Israel or #IDF so it can be found easily. On the other hand, Twitter can also be used to directly fight back against anti-Israel bias. Chas Newkey-Burden has described how on his blog he fisked an article that a journalist had tweeted, and then sent his post to the journalists’ followers – succeeding in getting some of them to rethink and even retweet his blog.

On Facebook you can share news stories and videos, and discuss the Middle East conflict with other members – on both pro and anti-Israel groups. In one of my more enjoyable exchanges on a Facebook group, I simply responded to my opposition’s ranting with links to pictures and videos clearly in Israel’s favour; I didn’t even have to write anything, and he was so livid he could barely type (or maybe he just had a bad education). The key is not to emote, but to remain calm and polite (however painful it is). Remember that it is the Palestinian leadership who act against the interests of both sides, and so demonizing and boycotting Israel does nothing to help the Palestinian people.

Another essential way to fight Israel’s media war is to submit complaints and letters in instances of media bias or inaccuracy – you are likely to find plenty of cases yourself, or just follow media monitoring sites like Honest Reporting, Just Journalism, CiF Watch and Reuters-Middle East Watch.

And finally, there are the blogs, where you can choose to either get into heated debates with leftist, Israel-bashing bloggers, or else keep up to date on the latest news from Israel and the Middle East that you’d never otherwise find in the mainstream media, and share your own thoughts and frustrations with fellow Zionists and bloggers.

My blog is not in the league of must-reads like Elder of Ziyon, Chas Newkey-Burden’s Oy Va Goy, Robin Shepherd, Honest Reporting and CiF Watch, but I recently had a reader post this very humbling comment that makes it all worthwhile:

“I just found your blog during an angry debate with my viciously anti-Semitic, pro-Palestine aunt, during which she called me a Zionist and sneered that I might have Jewish blood. I just wanted to let you know you're doing a bang up job and I'm glad there are people like you out there. Sometimes I swear it feels like I'm the only pro-Israel person in the world.”

So whilst I started the blog for myself, never thinking it would have an impact on anyone else, it was extremely rewarding to find that it is actually making a bit of a difference, at least for one person in their fight for Israel.

Everyone can do something. And even when you feel like banging your head against a wall – maybe the brick wall that’s ignoring you – don’t give up. You are definitely making a difference.

For more advice and ways to fight Israel's media war, join http://www.facebook.com/israelonline.

Israel's New "Collective Punishment" Of The Palestinians

So what is this new new method that the evil Israelis have thought of to punish the Palestinians?

To impose "house arrest on stone-throwing youths in east Jerusalem and hold their parents legally responsible for their actions".

An East-Jerusalem activist, Fakhri Abu Diab, called it "collective punishment". It would be interesting to see the rest of the world and media's reaction to this, considering it's essentially the equivalent of ASBOs for Palestinian 'chavs'.

AFP observes that:

"the tensions stem from an urban development plan pushed by the Israeli-run municipality that would see the destruction of 22 out of 88 homes that were built without legal permits... The presence of dozens of families of Jewish settlers living in and around an archaeological site in the crowded Arab neighbourhood just outside the walls of the Old City has further inflamed the situation."

When will we learn? Jews must not live and Palestinians must not be held to the law.

Abu Diab reinforces this point, saying that the children "need to feel a sense of security in their [illegal] homes" and that "the daily clashes in Silwan need a political solution" - by which he surely means "Jews: get out", and not that Palestinians should teach their children that stoning isn't really acceptable in the 21st Century and that Jews are human beings, not pigs and apes (not that they should be stoned either).

Meanwhile Hamas continue to demolish Palestinians' houses in Gaza, as previously reported in May, claiming they are illegal even though the Gazans hold legal documents proving their ownership, forcefully dragging them out of their homes and beating them.

At that time, one Palestinian observed "At least when the Jews destroy your house they tell you first", whereas now a Fatah spokesman claims that "Hamas has proven to be identical to the Israeli occupation" - except they're not so identical really, one reason being that the only media that reports Hamas' demolition of houses is the Palestinian media that is daring enough to do so, whilst Israel's actions are continuously and disproportionately condemned by the international community.

Double Standards And Double Standards

A few stories to catch up on from the last month or so...

- First there’s the Silwan incident where Palestinian youths threw rocks at an Israeli in his car, forcing him to swerve to try and escape, in the process accidentally hitting two of the kids with his car. The MSM angle was of course something along the lines of “Jew Runs Over Innocent Palestinian Babies”. But Honest Reporting explain why the whole thing was almost certainly a set-up, with photographers from at least five different news agencies ready and waiting for an incident that they would then twist to fit their own agenda of Israelis = oppressors, Palestinians = victims.

- Another big October story was Israel’s new bill requiring candidates for citizenship to pledge allegiance to “the state of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state”, and the proposition to the Palestinians that they recognise Israel as a Jewish state (gasp!) in return for a settlement freeze. Abbas refused, of course, claiming that “the issue of the Jewishness of the state has nothing to do with the matter [of negotiations]”. Which is a very strange comment to make. Who does he think he’s negotiating with, if not the Jewish state of Israel? How can there be negotiations if we don’t exist?

Just Journalism highlight the media’s hypocrisy in dismissing the loyalty oath as discriminatory, whilst at the same time supporting a state exclusively for Palestinian Arabs. In Israel’s declaration of independence, it is “abundantly clear that Israel viewed itself as the homeland for the Jewish people from its inception. The international community recognised the country on that basis. Should Israel’s desire in 2010 to retain its Jewish character be portrayed as so controversial?” After all, if we can’t be Jewish in Israel then where can we?

Just Journalism give the example of the Independent’s Adrian Hamilton, who claimed that the oath is an indication of Israel’s “fundamentalism”, identifying the problem as that “the more closely you define Israel as a uniquely ‘Jewish’ state, the less room there is for it to act as a co-operative member of a Muslim majority Middle East.” If that statement wasn’t outrageously contradictory and hypocritical enough in itself, then just a week after that he wrote about how “Multiculturalism needs defenders”, criticising that “as societies have turned inwards so they have also turned against the outsiders”, and that the debate about immigration in Europe is inherently racist. JJ observe that according to Hamilton’s typical leftist viewpoint, “while Europeans should be more tolerant of non-white Christians in their midst, the Muslim Middle East must be supported in its rejection of a Jewish entity in theirs.”

- Islamic Jihad have published photos on their website of when they were visited in Gaza by Turks. These were “peace activists” though, who had journeyed on board the recent “Viva Palestina” flotilla. “Peace acitivists”, remember. Who visited terrorists and then posed with them for pictures whilst holding machine guns and rocket launchers. EoZ publishes assurances from Islamic Jihad, wondering what all the fuss is about, that the activists were in no danger during the photo shoot, and that they were simply “photos of solidarity” with the Palestinians and their right to “resistance”.

Guest Post: In Defence Of Eden

This story kicked up a major firestorm when former IDF Soldier Eden left the photo gallery from her time in the IDF accessible to the public on Facebook. Two photos have led to condemnation by Israelis, the IDF, Palestinians and foreign press and commentators from all around the world.

The coverage has led to four main talking points:

1. Eden has been effectively crucified by the foreign press and media and her photos have brought forth accusations of ‘Israel’s Abu Grhaib’
2. Eden has been compared to Lynndie England, the US marine who posed with horribly abused Iraqi prisoners at Abu Grhaib
3. The IDF has condemned Eden and called the photos ‘shameful’ and ‘repulsive’ and also excluded her from reserve duty
4. The photos have had a domino effect and proved to be the trigger for leftist anti Israel NGO Breaking The Silence to release more photos of supposed IDF brutality and prisoner abuses with the statements that they hold thousands of similar images

These are the photos:

As you can clearly see Eden is posing, but she is not doing anything that could be considered as abusive. The reason these detainees are bound and blindfolded is that they are likely suspects with links to crime, terror or other illegal activities. They may be blindfolded so as not to be able to disclose their whereabouts or identify the soldiers who arrested them. Aside from the restraints, they have been treated in a humane and dignified manner. There are no visible marks or bruises, their clothes are not removed, their religious symbols (skullcap on the third detainee on the right) have been respected and they are seated on blocks and able to rest their backs rather than being face down or sitting on the floor.

In my opinion these images are definitely inappropriate and disrespectful towards the detainees. Even if Eden is only making a slight smirk and not doing anything wildly offensive, the simple fact is that human rights have to be held to the highest standards in all situations. Although there is a high possibility that the detainees may be guilty of a crime, it still doesn’t give us the right to treat them in a degrading manner, no matter how much we think they deserve it. And that’s where Eden went wrong - to her, she isn’t doing anything wrong, and although I believe she probably did take care of them, allowing herself to have her photo taken with them was inappropriate.

Eden might be disappointed at the perceived lack of support and overly harsh criticism from the IDF but she needs to realise that the moral and ethical conduct in the IDF is held to the highest levels and any break in that conduct will lead to serious repercussions. In any profession where a person is placed in your custody, you have to be extra sensitive and careful not to breach the human rights of your patient or client. That means doctors and medical personnel do not pose with their patients, law enforcement should not pose with their criminals and soldiers should not pose with their detainees.

In defence of Eden, the situation for Israeli teenagers is very different from those in western countries. At 18, both boys and girls have to enter either the army or for girls the option of national service which can include serving as a medic. That means that 18 year old boys and girls have to face potentially life threatening circumstances on a daily basis. From treating terror victims and watching their friends suffer in wars and operations to protect the citizens of Israel, the stress and pressure on these teenagers are often unbearable and traumatic. Operations of arresting terror suspects or treating patients eventually become the daily norm and teenagers can easily lose their moral perspective. The situation that is documented in the photo of Eden with the detainees is probably a daily occurrence for many soldiers, the only difference in most cases being that photos are not taken. There is no abuse but the fact that a photo of the detainees was taken is a breach of ethical conduct and nothing more than that. This is what the foreign press choose to ignore and decided to twist into a story of regular Israeli abuse of ‘innocent’ Palestinians.

But to compare this to other famous abuse claims? You can see that the prisoners have not been mistreated, certainly not to the extent that detainees have been treated in Iraq (warning - photo extremely distressing), Afghanistan, Iran, even the West Bank and Gaza where Hamas decides that the most humane treatment for a detainee would be to throw them off a tall building to their gruesome deaths.

The comparisons with Abu Ghraib are absurd and only an ignorant fool would ever think of drawing parallels between the two. But here those fools are:

From the Daily Mail article, “The photographs have echoes of those taken in 2003 by U.S. soldiers in Baghdad's notorious Abu Ghraib prison showing Iraqi detainees being humiliated by their captors.”

They also compare Eden’s photo to one with the notorious Lynndie England who is pictured holding a dog’s leash tied round the neck of a naked and bruised Iraqi prisoner lying on the floor! You want to compare these photos? Eden is Mother Teresa compared to Mrs Hitler (sorry I meant Lynndie England).

“Flashback: The Facebook photos are reminiscent of this undated image of U.S. Army Spc. Lynndie England with a naked detainee at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad date unknown. Th

e Abu Ghraib scandal erupted in 2004”.

The Daily Telegraph mentions that the photos bring a reminder of Abu Ghraib but then makes two very important points: “The photographs of the Israeli soldier and the Palestinians, by contrast, show no overt physical abuse or coercion of the prisoners” and “Palestinians are routinely handcuffed and blindfolded when they are arrested to stop them from trying to flee.”

Huffington Post have their own interpretation of the images: “she is sitting legs crossed beside a blindfolded Palestinian man who is slumped against a concrete barrier. His face is turned downwards, while she leans toward him with her face upturned.” They also mention Abu Ghraib: “The photographs were a reminder of snapshots taken in 2003 by American soldiers at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq that showed Iraqi detainees naked, humiliated and terrified. In that case, some soldiers went to prison after the photos came to light.”

Mondoweiss a leftist Jewish blog signs off his article with this quote: “The picture I see in Eden's photos? An army that has forgotten the other's humanity--and has lost its own humanity in the process.” So Eden represents the entire IDF does she? This is what we call ignorant.

And of course The Guardian just couldn’t help itself: “The images were reminiscent of the Abu Ghraib scandal in Iraq.”

After the initial story broke, it gave the ammunition to the anti-Israel Israeli NGO called Breaking the Silence to add fuel to the fire. They added one of Eden’s photos to a facebook gallery showing more apparent IDF detainee abuse photos. These photos were then lapped up by the foreign press in particular by the Guardian who produced a photo gallery replicating the photos with their own captions. They also interviewed members of Breaking the Silence.

One of the photos that stood out is shown below. In the original caption, it stated that the body of the man was all but ignored by the soldiers, but on 19^th August this was amended to: “Israeli soldiers stand by the bloodied and broken body of a man.”

How could the Guardian say the soldiers “all but ignored the man”? The soldier on the right is looking at the IV drip which he has attached to the man to ensure he is giving the right amount of saline! This soldier is treating a potential Palestinian terrorist but if you look away for one second it must mean you have ignored an injured innocent Palestinian? Give me a break, it’s a pathetic quote and the Guardian have obviously taken their slice of humble pie and spat it back out by amending the quote to basically accuse the IDF soldiers of causing the man to be ‘bloodied’ and ‘broken’. Is this Palestinian just a ‘man’ or is he a serious criminal, a terrorist, maybe even a potential martyr. Maybe he started shooting at the soldiers who came to arrest him? We don’t know for sure, but the IDF doesn’t just go and batter innocent people. Nice emphasis by the Guardian though which gives the impression that the IDF brutally abused this ‘innocent’ Palestinian.

Their reporting is a complete joke and these publications should be ashamed of themselves for allowing their reporting to be so amateur – when even Al Jazeera didn’t compare Eden’s photos to Abu Grahaib or make their own personal comments on a photos. In fact the Al Jazeera caption simply states “Eden Abergil's pictures of Palestinian prisoners have sparked controversy in Israel”.

In short, this was another case of a relatively minor blunder being completely blown out of proportion and used to slander and criticize Israel and its defenders the IDF, but this happens everyday.

Since I started writing this report, a youtube video of a male IDF soldier dancing inappropriately around a blindfolded female Palestinian has been making the rounds. Now this is something that the press have a right to strongly condemn and you can probably judge for yourself which incident deserves the most attention. But when something apparently newsworthy occurs in Israel, the media need to ensure they conduct the necessary research so they understand the background and context and can make an objective and informative report that looks at the whole story, keeping it in perspective.

No one is perfect and the IDF like every other army has its flaws. But I can safely say that thee IDF are the most humane army working in the most extreme and challenging conditions, which means that when these incidents occur, it is big news in Israel and the world. And rest assured there will be no one more disgusted and ashamed at these incidents than the IDF itself.

Terrorism And Bias

In the third shooting attack in Israel in less than a month, a nine-month pregnant Israeli woman was shot at in her car today by Palestinian terrorists. Miraculously only wounded in her leg, the woman was taken to hospital where she had to undergo an emergency caesarian section, with her baby delivered in good condition.

The media continues to report on the situation in the Middle East by ignoring the continuous terrorist attacks and writing about how Israel is the object to peace, such as in today's Oberver editorial, which Chas Newkey-Burden nicely fisks.

Also big news is UNHRC's accusation of Israel committing "war crimes" in it's soldiers defending themselves from almost certain death at the hands of the lynch mob in May's flotilla incident.

Robin Shepherd tackles the BBC's standard bias in it's coverage of the UNHRC report; Just Journalism look at the other media coverage; and Elder of Ziyon exposes the omission and twisting of evidence in the UNHRC's biased report.

The Trouble Started When Israel...

Early this morning an Israeli security guard was driving through East Jerusalem when a mob of Palestinians surrounded his car, blocked the road, and started hurling rocks at the car.

And then the trouble started, according to the BBC. The above has absolutely no relation to what happened next...

Fearing that he would be killed or abducted, the guard opened fire, killing one Palestinian - who had a criminal record and was armed with a knife.

This led to the Palestinians rioting in East Jerusalem and the Temple Mount, with several Israeli bystanders injured, one stabbed, and three more injured when Palestinians overturned their car.

And it all started when an Israeli once again dared to defend himself when being attacked by Palestinians. Why do we keep provoking the Palestinians by living?!

More from Just Journalism on the BBC's inaccurate reporting of this story. Maybe they did it to try and appease the people who were upset by their balanced documentary on the flotilla incident.

More Gaza Violence And Media Bias

It turns out that the two Palestinians killed on Sunday were not "armed" with the weapons; they had just picked them up after seeing them lying on the ground - but they were standing near the terrorists who did fire at the IDF. The Telegraph for some reason illustrates this with a picture of Palestinian children posing behind a hospital's metal gate. I think the picture is supposed to reflect badly on Israel and make the Palestinians look "caged in", but I'm not quite clear how it's significant that whoever built the hospital in Gaza gave it a gate.

The BBC also reports the story in a strange way, early on in the article saying "The Israeli army said it had returned fire after militants approached the border and fired a rocket propelled grenade at a patrol", but only affirming later on in the piece that this wasn't a Jewish lie and actually did happen: "The incident occurred shortly after militants in Gaza fired several rockets and mortar rounds across the border into southern Israel."

Also notable is the statement the BBC make at the end of the article - and which they add at the end of most articles on the subject - that: "One Thai farm worker in Israel has been killed by rocket fire from Gaza in the past 18 months, while scores of Palestinians in Gaza have been killed over the same period."

See how "disproportionate" Israel is! Never mind how many rockets have been fired in that period (about 2000), if it only killed one person, Israel isn't allowed to retaliate. Meanwhile scores (in other words, so many it's impossible to count, not like Grandma's home-knitted rockets) of Palestinians have been killed. It doesn't matter if they were killed accidentally blowing themselves up, or whilst they were in the middle of trying to murder Israelis - either by knife, gun, or rockets - the important thing is to imbed it in your mind that Israel-Is-Disproportionate-And-Bad.

A near-identical incident occurred today when Palestinian terrorists again fired missiles at the IDF, who retaliated, reportedly killing one Palestinian. Make that 'scores of Palestinians, plus one', and, to the BBC's disappointment, still only the one Thai farm worker.

Over on the Sky website though, Dominic Waghorn blogs one of Hamas' propaganda videos, depicting the Palestinians destroying and taking over Israel. Of course this is only the dream of the select members of the Hamas "military wing". No other Palestinians share that dream of killing Jews and taking over Israel. They want to share the land and live in peace, like what happened when we gave them Gaza.

UPDATE: At least 11 rockets and mortars were fired into Israel today, Wednesday, two of which were phosphorous bombs, luckily landing in open areas. Israel responded by striking the tunnels used to smuggle in weapons, and tunnels being dug to send terrorists into Israel, killing one Palestinian.

Hider: Rockets Are Minor Annoyance

Just Journalism look at the Times' latest editorial, that is "the first since the start of the peace talks to focus on Hamas’ refusal to accept either the legitimacy of the peace talks, or the existence of the Jewish state." (Which the Times, unlike the other papers, have acknowledged previously). The editorial refers to Hamas' recent murder of four innocent Israelis and states that although some settlers and ultra-Orthodox Jews might oppose Israel giving away land (for religious and security reasons), "any equation between such groups and Hamas is crass, mistaken and grossly offensive." It is in its editorials that the Times shows its journalistic integrity, in stark contrast to papers like the Guardian and Independent, who seem to view the settlers as a bigger obstacle to peace than Hamas terrorists.

In it's reporting though, The Times often demonstrates an anti-Israel slant that is common in the rest of the media. The culprit is their Middle East correspondent, James Hider. Last week he wrote an opinion piece that gives more of an insight into his anti-Israel attitudes than is already evident in his news reporting. To be fair - as I always am! - Hider does not seem to be an extremist left-wing Hamas and terror supporter. He occasionally acknowledges Hamas' murderous intent, but does tend to follow the rest of the media in focusing more on the settlers.

The op-ed opens with a ridiculous exchange with a Tel Aviv waiter, who learns that Hider lives in Jerusalem: "'Jerusalem?' he gasped. 'It's full of violence and police checkpoints. I never go there. What's it like now?'" I know people say Tel Aviv is a bubble, but I don't believe a typical citizen there is that ignorant. This must be the only Tel Aviv-ian who is, and trust Hider to find him. There are violence and checkpoints in and around both Jerusalem and Tel Aviv - but neither city is "full of" them. Jerusalem is not what you'd call a war zone, and nor is it the hole that Hider tries to imply it is. It is a thriving, bustling, modern town, with residents of all religions and backgrounds - and richer and poorer areas, just like every city in the world has.

Hider describes the divisions and differences between on the one hand Fatah in the West bank and Hamas in Gaza, and on the other hand the secular Israelis and the "rising influence of the ultra-Orthodox" in Jerusalem. But he claims that "what unites most Israelis is a sense of indifference":

"Most Israelis don't think about the millions of Palestinians on the other side of the walls and fences, unless Hamas is firing its rockets into the communities in the south. But since Israel's devastating offensive into Gaza in late 2008, even those have slowed to a minor annoyance."

10,000 rockets is a "minor annoyance"? Bomb shelters, trauma, damages, injuries, deaths, a minor annoyance? Is that what Hider would call it if a kassam fell on him?

Following that article, Hider was back to news reporting on Tuesday, with a piece on, yes, the settlers, and the "Countdown to construction that could doom peace".

Meanwhile, there have been more Palestinian terror incidents that didn't make the news. On Monday Palestinians shot at two plain-clothed Israeli policemen, lightly wounding them. A two year old baby was hospitalised after Palestinians threw rocks at the car her family was driving. In another Palestinian rock-throwing incident, an Israeli vehicle was damaged but no one was injured.

Hamas continue to fire rockets into Southern Israel on an almost daily basis, including two today, miraculously causing no injuries. An eight year old Israeli boy was injured when Palestinians threw rocks at his face. Also today, Palestinians armed with guns and a rocket launcher were killed by the IDF after approaching the Gaza fence despite warning shots from the IDF.

The twelve year old girl wounded by Palestinians last Thursday is in intensive care following head surgery - her family request that people pray for Herut bat Timor.