BBC's shameless 'apology' for its biased reporting
I know - it's been a long time since I posted anything. I've been working - pays much better than blogging. But I don't want to let the blog die entirely, and I wanted to share with you what has to be one of the worst media bias stories from Western media in recent years.
I am sure that many of you saw the headline above. On Friday night, an Israeli policewoman, 23-year old Hadas Malka HY"D (May God Avenge her blood) was murdered by three 'Palestinian' terrorists who conducted coordinated attacks in two places along the outside of the Old City's wall. The headline above sat on the BBC's website and in its Twitter feed for many hours. The bias in the headline is obvious - the 'deadly stabbing' didn't happen itself. It was perpetrated by the three 'Palestinians' who were shot. A more appropriate headline would have been 'Israeli policewoman murdered by three Palestinians.' Even Maan's headline was less biased.
This morning, the Beeb 'apologized' for its headline. No, not really, but they posted a response to outrage in the virtual world that included Donald Trump Jr., the US President's son. Here's the Beeb's entire 'apology.'
BBC Response: We accept that our original headline did not
appropriately reflect the nature of the events and subsequently changed
it. Whilst there was no intention to mislead our audiences, we regret
any offence caused.
They don't regret the headline. They regret the 'offence caused.' They accept that it didn't appropriately reflect the nature of the events, but they don't apologize for writing it, nor for leaving it up for many hours.
Makes it sound like there's no connection between the Israeli's death and the 'Palestinian' attackers' assault - they just happened to occur around the same time.
And you wonder about the origins of the #FakeNews epidemic?
NY Times publishes op-ed by terrorist, 'forgets' to mention his five murder convictions
A group of 'Palestinian' terrorists in Israeli prisons started a hunger strike on Monday. The group is led by mass murderer Marwan Barghouti, the former leader of the Fatah Tanzim terror group, who has been in an Israeli prison for the last 15 years, and who was considered toxic enough not to be released as part of the 'terrorists for Gilad' trade of 2011.
The New York Times considers this such important news that on Saturday - in the middle of the Passover holiday - it posted an op-ed by Barghouti on its web site, which made the print editions on Sunday. Barghouti refers to Israel's 'system of mass arbitrary arrests' as if there was no reason to arrest him. He complains that Israel has 'violated international law' for nearly 70 years, a period which goes back to independence and is clearly not meant to be limited to the post-Six Day War era. He refers to himself and his fellow terrorists as political prisoners.
There's one small part he left out, and which the New York Times did not bother to correct until late Monday, long after almost everyone who wanted to read the op-ed had (except for those who are keeping two days of Passover who would probably not find Barghouti persuasive anyway). On Monday, the Times posted this on its web site to correct the record.
Yes, that would be the same trial that Barghouti refers to in the editorial as a 'political show trial.'
I'm reminded of Gilda Radner's famous line upon being caught in a semantic mistake on Saturday Night Live.... "Never mind...." Too bad the Times took two days to fix the 'mistake.' But then, who would expect any better of them?
Eyeless in Gaza: How Hamas controls the media in Gaza
For those of you who are in London on Monday night, here's a film you don't want to miss. It's called Eyeless in Gaza, and as the title of this post indicates, it shows how Hamas controls what's reported out of Gaza through intimidation. But that's only half the story. Here's a preview.
“It’s something I call ‘group think’,”
explains Himel. “Group think isn’t a malicious attempt to lie or
distort the truth, but there is a strong herd instinct of what is
allowable and what is not.
“When you look at reporting on the Middle East
in general, the same model is used. The Syrian conflict was described
as a fight for human rights and the Arab Spring was hailed as a revolt
against brutal dictators.
“What often happens is the group think will
significantly distort what’s really going on when you are reporting
something – and if you violate group think you can be in a lot of
trouble.”
As a case in point, the film highlights the
naval blockade and subsequent raid by Israeli forces on a Palestinian
freighter named Karine A in 2007. The vessel was found to be carrying 50
tons of weapons, including short-range Katyusha rockets, anti-tank
missiles and explosives.
But as the documentary notes: “Very little of
the weapons found…made it to the media. Instead, the news focused on
flotillas trying to break the naval blockade.”
Why, then, did journalists focus more on the flotillas than the success of the Karine A operation?
Himel explains: “The group think is that an
unjustified blockade is causing hardship for the people of Gaza. They
can’t get basic food, they can’t move around, they can’t get to family
in other places. The media will be attracted to things that strengthen
that assumption.
“So a flotilla coming in trying to save the
besieged people of Gaza, like those besieged in Leningrad in 1942, is
appropriate, whereas if you are talking about a naval blockade that’s
stopping arms getting in, you are instantly making the picture more
complex – and that doesn’t sit well with editors.”
The consequences for journalists who veered away from the accepted narrative can be extreme.
When RTV reporter Harry Fear tweeted that Gaza
rockets had fired into Israel, he was immediately expelled from the
area by Hamas officials, while Palestinian journalist Ayman al-Aloul was
imprisoned and tortured for being critical about the governing
authority in Gaza.
“You pay the price,” says Himel.
There is, however, also another element, which
Himel believes underscores the very reasons why the Israel-Gaza
conflict is reported in the way it is.
“The real story is there’s a really serious war of beliefs going on, that’s the basis for all of it.
“But editors don’t want to say it, because
that means it’s a religious war and you begin to realise how sensitive
and complex the whole issue is.”
That decision not to report the conflict as one based on religion has
also effectively blocked out mention of Hamas and its anti-Semitic
ethos.
I would say it's much more malicious than Himel thinks it is. Let's start with the Karine A. The Karine A happened in January 2002 before this blog existed, not in 2007 as Himel has it. But the 2007 date is convenient. The so-called 'blockade' of Gaza started after Hamas gained control of the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007. In January 2002, Israel actually controlled Gaza.
The 'flotillas' have nothing to do with the Karine A and everything to do with the anti-Semitic Europeans (who stand behind the flotillas), who promote the most pernicious lies about Israel and Jews. In fact, it is the Europeans who have done more to keep the dream of 'Palestine' replacing Israel God Forbid than even the Arab states. The Arab states have tired of the 'Palestinian' lies.
But like the inconvenient fact that our war with Hamas is a religious war, the media also prefers to ignore the inconvenient fact that Europe still dreams of finishing what Hitler started.
I would still go see Himel's movie, because it's important that someone is at least raising the issue (although Matti Friedman is the guy who really brought the issue up), but given his sloppy reporting on the Karine A, I have to wonder what the movie is really going to say.
To get you thinking, I want to show you the full video from 2014 by an Indian television crew - a video that is quite rare - of which you saw a small clip in the preview above.
During live MSNBC coverage of a terrorist attack in Tel Aviv in the 3
p.m. ET hour on Wednesday, NBC correspondents Ayman Mohyeldin and Martin
Fletcher took turns blaming Israel’s “right-wing” government for
Palestinian “frustration.” Mohyeldin ranted: “...in terms of the context
of what has been happening in the occupied Palestinian territories, the
occupation, the shift of Israeli politics, including now the current
government, more to the right, to what has been described by Israelis as
even more of an extreme right-wing government, some of the measures
that have taken place in the West Bank, the siege that continues in
Gaza, all of those continue to fester.”
Ezra Nawi, an Israeli Jewish plumber, has a long history as a left-wing activist helping Palestinians in their struggle against Israel’s occupation of the West Bank. Now he is under arrest in Israel, after a right-wing activist surreptitiously filmed him bragging about exposing Arab brokers who tried to sell Palestinian land to Jewish settlers. Such sales are a capital crime under Palestinian law.
Considered
variously as a big-mouthed provocateur and a colorful human-rights
adventurer, Mr. Nawi has become the latest symbol in the battle between
advocacy groups on opposite sides of Israel’s political spectrum, and
the increasingly fierce debate here over the nature of Israeli society
and democracy.
The debate has heated up as Israel’s conservative government is pushing
forward contentious legislation that would require nongovernmental
organizations to disclose funding they receive from foreign governments
in their publications, advertising and meetings with public officials.
The proposed bill, which supporters say is meant to increase
transparency, would apply mainly to leftist groups critical of Israel’s
policy toward the Palestinians, since rightist groups mostly receive
private funding from abroad, and it has already drawn harsh criticism
from the Obama administration and European diplomats.
No, this story is not about the NGO law, which the Times so hates. It's about yet another Leftist fascist who thinks he has the right to endanger other people's lives.
It
is an odd case. Mr. Nawi, described in a 2009 New York Times profile as
“the Robin Hood of the South Hebron Hills,” helping Palestinians who
love him and “thwarting settlers and soldiers who view him with
contempt,” is now accused of endangering the lives of Palestinians. That
is because selling land to Israeli Jews is punishable by death
according to the Palestinian Authority. Although the authority is not
known to have carried out any executions for any offense in more than a
decade, there have been reports of torture in its prisons.
The
Ad Kan video, from about a year ago, shows Mr. Nawi behind the wheel of
his jeep, bragging about what appeared to be a dubious sideline to his
activist work in the West Bank.
He told the man sitting next to him, whom he believed to be a fellow
sympathizer, that he sometimes posed as a land broker and engaged with
other land dealers mediating sales of Palestinian-owned land to Jewish
settlers, then handed over their details to the Palestinian Authority
security services.
Asked what the Authority did with such people, Mr. Nawi said it “catches them and kills them.”
Days later, he was arrested at the airport as he was about to leave the country.
Odd? Not to anyone who knows the history of Israel's prosecutorial regime burying charges against the Left. Only by gathering evidence so convincing that even the Left-leaning Uvda had to run with it or lose all credibility could Nawi's disgusting behavior be exposed.
There is a story here. Too bad it's not the one the Times chose to tell.
If only the NY TImes used the sports headline writers for the news
Shavua tov, a good week to everyone.
Saturday's New York Times sports section features an article blasting the NFL for its treatment of Israel's football team (which plays for the AFC title and a trip to the Super Bowl tomorrow) and team quarterback Tom Brady (Hat Tip: Memeorandum). The headline is titled True Scandal of Deflategate Lies in the N.F.L.’s Behavior.
In
May, the data arrived. The prominent lawyer Theodore V. Wells Jr., who
was hired to investigate Deflategate for the league, delivered a
devastating indictment of the Patriots. The Wells report
concluded that “it was more probable than not” that two members of the
Patriots’ locker room staff had “participated in a deliberate effort to
release air from Patriots game balls,” and that “it was more probable
than not” that Brady was “at least generally aware” of the impropriety.
Although
the evidence was circumstantial — based on ambiguous text messages;
Brady’s discarding of a cellphone; and a trip to the bathroom by one of
the staff members, who took the balls in with him — it was also
buttressed by a lengthy scientific report prepared by Exponent, a consulting firm with dubious bona fides, having disputed the dangers of secondhand smoke and asbestos. Exponent was a hired gun, and its conclusions backed Wells’s narrative.
Brady
liked his footballs at the lowest p.s.i. in the range — 12.5. The
consultants concluded that the drop in the p.s.i. of the Patriots’
footballs — the average was 11.3 p.s.i. — could not be fully explained
by the Ideal Gas Law; it was too steep. But the smaller drop in the
p.s.i. of the Colts’ footballs could indeed be explained by the laws of
physics.
Numbers
in hand, Leonard went to work. He bought the same gauges the N.F.L.
used to measure p.s.i. levels. He bought N.F.L.-quality footballs. He
replicated the temperatures of the locker room, and the colder field.
And so on. When he was done, he concluded that Exponent had made a
series of basic errors. Leonard’s work showed the exact opposite of
Exponent’s conclusions: The drop in the Patriots’ footballs’ p.s.i was
consistent with the Ideal Gas Law; the smaller drop in pressure in the
Colts’ balls was not. (Leonard surmises that because the Colts’ balls
were tested after the Patriots’ balls, they had warmed up again.)
By
early November, he had a PowerPoint presentation with more than 140
slides. By the end of the month, he had given two lectures about
Deflategate, the second of which he had videotaped and posted on
YouTube. A viewer who watched the lengthy lecture edited it down to a
crisp 15 minutes; Leonard agreed to let him post the edited version.
The edited lecture
went up on YouTube on Dec. 1 and has been viewed more than 17,000
times. It is utterly convincing. Leonard told me that if an M.I.T.
undergraduate made the kinds of mistakes that Exponent made, “I would
force them to repeat the experiment and correct the analysis.” Based on
his study of the data, Leonard now says: “I am convinced that no
deflation occurred and that the Patriots are innocent. It never
happened.”
He is hardly the only scientist to take that position. As Dan Wetzel pointed out in a recent Yahoo Sports column,
scientists at Carnegie Mellon, the University of Chicago, Boston
College, Rockefeller University, the University of Illinois and Bowdoin
College — and others — have all come to the same conclusion.
Fair headline? I think so. Now compare it with this headline and the accompanying article's content.
Palestinian Girl with Knife Killed by Israeli Guard, Police Say
A 13-year-old Palestinian girl was fatally shot by an Israeli security
guard at the entrance to a West Bank settlement on Saturday after she ran at him
with a knife, according to the Israeli police.
The girl was identified by the official Palestinian news agency Wafa as Ruqayya
Eid Abu Eid, a resident of the Palestinian village of Anata. The village is about a mile
from the settlement of Anatot, where the episode occurred.
According to the Israeli police, Ms. Abu Eid quarreled with her family on
Saturday morning and then left her home with a knife “intending to die.” She arrived
at the settlement about 8 a.m., the police said in a statement, and ran toward the
civilian guard at the entrance, who opened fire. Grainy security camera footage from
the scene appeared to show a girl with a knife in her hand chasing a guard.
The girl’s father, who was looking for her, arrived at the settlement soon after
she had been shot. The police detained him for questioning.
Sure glad I read the article for the context. I wonder how many other people didn't/
Reuters calls Kuntar a 'martyr' (without the scare quotes)
Reporting on the liquidation of terrorist Samir al-Kuntar, Reuters has called the murderer of the two little girls pictured above a 'martyr' (without the scare quotes) (Hat Tip: Elder of Ziyon).
A later version of the story puts the word 'martyred' in scare quotes:
But the revised story includes this line:
Qantar was jailed in Israel for his part in a
1979 raid that killed four people, including a girl he was convicted of
bludgeoning.
As
police began to arrive, the terrorists took Danny and Einat down to the
beach. There, according to eyewitnesses, one of them shot Danny in
front of Einat so that his death would be the last sight she would ever
see. Then he smashed my little girl's skull in against a rock with his
rifle butt. That terrorist was Samir Kuntar.
Einat was four-years old at the time. She is the bigger girl in the picture above. Here's what happened to two-year old Yael.
By
the time we were rescued from the crawl space, hours later, Yael, too,
was dead. In trying to save all our lives, I had smothered her.
Shame on Reuters. Shame on them for covering up for terrorists even 36 years after the fact.
I heard this story yesterday, but I've been (and continue to be) totally swamped with work, so I didn't take the time to click on it. I assumed - as I am sure others did on reading the headline - that the reference was to the rare alleged attacks by Jews on Arabs in Israel like Baruch Goldstein at the Machpela Cave and Eden Natan-Zada in Shfaram (none of whom was ever tried - the Arabs lynched them immediately, hence the 'alleged'), or the current still under wraps situation involving the alleged arson murder of three members of an Arab family in Samaria.
But no, the CNN anchor (one Ashleigh Banfield interviewing former Reagan White House administrator Jeffrey Lord) had none of those in mind.
Let's go to the videotape.
It goes without saying that this is not the first craziness to come out of CNN.... Where do they find these ditzes? Arutz Sheva has a reminder.
CNN is notorious for its anti-Israel coverage, most recently
two weeks ago when the network posted a news article on its website in
which Israel was literally wiped off the map.
The article, titled, "Beyond ISIS: 2016's scariest geopolitical hot
spots," featured a graphic of the Middle East in which Israel is
replaced with a red square marking the country of "Palestina."
CNN also faced an online backlash
last May after issuing a report claiming that "settlers" had uprooted
800 Palestinian-owned olive trees near Hevron - based purely on
unverified allegations by Palestinian Authority-based outlets with
questionable records on fact-checking themselves.
One of the cable operators allegedly replaced CNN with Fox three years ago. Since I don't have cable (or television for that matter), I cannot confirm whether that it still correct.
A good morning to all of you from Boston Logan Airport where today is a travel day for me. I won't tell you yet where I'm going, but I'm going to be spending much of today over 'flyover country' and I am not heading to the West Coast. Hmmm. PS I should have WiFi.
I thought you'd all want to see the tweet above. First, because it shows just how out of control the situation with 'refugees' is in Europe. My fear now is that trying to stop it may be closing the barn door after the cow has escaped.
And second, the comment (which may have been inserted by Honest Reporting) is spot-on. What happened in Paris on Friday night is no different than what we're wary of 24/7 in Israel... except that in Israel the victims are (God Forbid) Jews, so CNN and the rest of the liberal media fall all over themselves to avoid calling it terrorism.
After days of silence amid a string of terror attacks and skyrocketing
tensions in Jerusalem and the West Bank, the Palestinian Authority on
Sunday condemned Israel for its “policy of escalation,” after two
Palestinian assailants were killed as they carried out terror attacks.
In a written communique published on the
official news agency Wafa, PA government spokesman Ihab Bseiso called on
the international community to intervene following “the killing of two
young men in occupied Jerusalem and the series of incursions into cities
and villages in the West Bank.”
The statement made no mention of the fact that
the two dead Palestinians had been killed while carrying out stabbing
attacks against Israeli civilians.
On Saturday night Palestinian Mohammad Halabi
carried out a stabbing spree in Jerusalem’s Old City, killing Nehemia
Lavi, 41, and Aharon Banito, 21, and wounding Banito’s wife and
2-year-old baby, police said.
Hours later, Palestinian Fadi Aloon stabbed an Israeli teen near the Old City’ Damascus gate.
Both Halabi and Aloon were shot and killed at the scene.
“The only solution is the end of the Israeli
occupation of our occupied Palestinian land and the establishment of our
independent state on the 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital,”
Bseiso wrote.
The statement did not condemn or mention the killings of Naama and Eitam
Henkin, who were shot to death in a Palestinian terror attack on
Thursday in the West Bank.
'Palestinian' gall knows no limits.
The police have restricted access to Jerusalem's Old City.
The Israel Police announced Sunday it would
limit access to Jerusalem’s Old City and the Temple Mount compound,
known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary, over the next two days.
Only Israeli citizens, local residents,
students, employees who work in the area and tourists will be allowed
entry into the Old City through Tuesday, police said.
On the Temple Mount compound, “Muslim prayer
will be limited to males aged 50 and above while there will be no age
limitation on female Muslim worshipers,” police said in a statement.
The Muslim worshipers will only be allowed in through the Old City’s Lions Gate.
For some reason, much of the media is making it sound like police have banned all access to the 'Palestinians' to the Old City. If only... In fact, if only we had expelled them in 1967 when we had the chance.
Chag Sameyach, a happy holiday to all of you. Because the holiday is only one day in Israel, I hope to be back online Monday night.
Shavua tov u'moadim l'simcha, a happy holiday to all of you. Yes, that screen cap really was the BBC's headline of a terror attack in Jerusalem's Old City this evening in which two Israelis were murdered, and two other Israelis - one of them a toddler - were wounded.
And the Beeb wasn't the only one as some of the tweets below will show you. They were just the most blatant non-Arab example.
The biased headlines have almost caused social media to ignore the event itself.
Rabbi Nehemia Lavi, 41, and Aharon Banita Bennett, 21, have been named as the two Israelis murdered in a stabbing attack on Saturday night, which took place in Jerusalem's Old City and left two others wounded.
Bennett, along with his wife and two-year-old son, were attacked by
the terrorist; his wife was seriously wounded and the child lightly
wounded.
Rabbi Lavi, a father of seven, is originally from Beit El in Binyamin
north of Jerusalem, but has lived in the Old City for the past 23
years. He is a rabbi at Yeshivat Ateret Kohanim.
According to the rabbi's friends, he went down with his gun to try
and save those wounded by the Arab terrorist in the attack, but the
terrorist stabbed him and took his weapon.
The rabbi's funeral will take place on Sunday at 12 p.m., at the Har Hamenuchot Cemetery in Jerusalem.
Rabbi Lavi volunteered last summer to take an officer's course as
part of his IDF reserve duty, so as to become an officer in the army and
stay on longer.
May God Have mercy on and console the families and may they know of no more sorrow. And may God Avenge their blood.
Four 'Palestinian' teens arrested for fatal Rosh HaShanna rock attack
Four 'Palestinians' have been arrested for carrying out a rock attack on the first night of Rosh HaShanna in which a 64-year old man was murdered and his two daughters seriously wounded.
An investigation determined the rock was thrown by youths from the
neighboring Arab village of Sur Bahir. In a joint statement with the
Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), police said on Saturday that the
four suspects from the neighborhood confessed to carrying out the
deadly attack shortly after their arrests.
“During interrogation
by the Shin Bet, the four admitted that they planned to carry out
terrorist acts, especially on Rosh Hashanah, and positioned themselves
so that they could throw stones at passing Israeli vehicles,” police
said.
The four suspects, police added, are between the ages of
16-19, and have Israeli residential status. Three of the four suspects
have been identified as Mohammed Abu Salah, born in 1997; Fares Mostafa
Walid Atrash, born in 1997; Mahmoud Abed Rabbo Doiat, born in 1996. The
identity of the fourth suspect was barred from publication due to his
age, police said.
Doiat, who confessed to throwing the large
rock that killed Levlovitz, said he wore a Hamas flag which he received
earlier in the month at a “Al-Aksa Is in Danger” demonstration
condemning the Ministry of Defense’s ban of two radical Muslim groups
from the Temple Mount. The rally was organized by Hamas and the Islamic
Movement, according to security forces.
Levlovitz was
critically wounded after striking a tree upon losing control of the car.
His two daughters were also seriously wounded.
Police said that after observing the crash, the four suspects fled the scene, and subsequently met again to coordinate their alibis if arrested. Despite their arrests, police said that the investigation into the attack is ongoing, and that the Jerusalem District Attorney will file formal charges against the four upon reviewing the evidence against them.
This was the attack in which the New York Times' Diaa Hadid reported that rocks pelted the road and Levlovitz just happened to be there.
A Jewish man died early Monday morning after attackers pelted the road
he was driving on with rocks as he was returning home from a dinner
celebrating Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, the Israeli authorities
said.
Can't wait to see how the Slimes reports the arrests.
Israel's Foreign Ministry urges foreign correspondents to open their eyes to terror rule in Gaza, correspondents not amused
In a marked departure from previous regimes, Israel's Foreign Ministry on Monday released this animated video showing a clueless foreign correspondent, oblivious to Hamas terrorism in Gaza.
The Foreign Press Association is surprised and alarmed by
the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s decision to produce a cartoon mocking
the foreign media’s coverage of last year’s war in Gaza.
At a time when Israel has serious issues to deal with in Iran and
Syria, it is disconcerting that the ministry would spend its time
producing a 50-second video that attempts to ridicule journalists
reporting on a conflict in which 2,100 Palestinians and 72 Israelis were
killed.
Israel’s diplomatic corps wants to be taken seriously in the world.
Posting misleading and poorly conceived videos on YouTube is
inappropriate, unhelpful and undermines the ministry, which says it
respects the foreign press and its freedom to work in Gaza.
The foreign ministry was actually responding to the priorities being set by the media and their European and American rulers. While we understand the gravity of what is going on in Iran and Syria (and Iraq and Yemen and Libya), the 'international community' continues to focus solely on the 'Palestinians' as if a 'Palestinian state right now' is the panacea for all of the region's problems. Hence the necessity for the foreign ministry to respond.
Only a few years ago, Israelis were concerned about the question of
how they could continue to grow their first world economy with a growing
population in a country where there simply wasn’t enough water. What
followed was a major investment in technology and enactment of sensible
policies about water use that led to this startling fact. As the Times
states, “More than 50 percent of the water for Israeli households,
agriculture and industry is now artificially produced.” Though water is
expensive, the prospect that the country will run out is gone. In a
region that is in desperate need of Israel’s expertise, you would think
this development would lead to better relations with the Palestinians
and the Arab world. But what is missing from the Times’ story
is the fact that there is little sign of any interest in cooperation on
the part of Israel’s antagonists. As much as they ought to take
advantage of the Jewish state’s advances, such concerns are always
secondary to their main priority: fighting Israel.
The story of how Israel revolutionized its production and use of
water is another proud chapter in the country’s history. In the past
couple of decades as attacks on Israel’s legitimacy have multiplied, we
haven’t heard much about Jews making the desert bloom. That old line
about the rebirth of this old land under the care of a returned people
has been treated as an outdated cliché by biased journalists who
preferred story lines that reinforced the libels about Israel being an
apartheid state. That theme was also part of the narrative about water.
To the extent that water has been mentioned much in the news, it
generally served as another point of attack as Palestinian claims that
Israel was “stealing” their water in the West Bank was often reported as
fact rather than a political talking point. As even the Times notes in
its feature, Israel continues to supply the Palestinians with more water
than it is required to do under the Oslo Accords. Israel shares the
mountain aquifer that runs through the West Bank with the Palestinians.
But the Palestinians position is that they are entitled to all of it,
not just their share.
The underlying problem of that discussion has
always been the assumption that all of the territory is “Palestinian
land’ to which Israel has no legitimate claim. But even if you think
Israel ought to cede much of that territory if the Palestinians are ever
willing to make peace, the problem with this argument is that the Arabs
still don’t recognize Israeli rights to any water except the sea into
which they have been trying to push the Jews ever since they began
returning to their ancient homeland.
It might make sense for Israelis and Arabs to cooperate about water.
But if water remains an issue that exacerbates the conflict rather than
solving it, it’s not because the Israelis aren’t willing to share their
expertise or even some of the water they are desalinizing or treating
for further use. It’s because water, like economic development, has
always been beside the point to Palestinians and other Arabs and
Muslims.
Hezbullah grabs human shields in southern Lebanon, NY Times says 'Israel says'
Greetings from... Silver Spring, Maryland. I have meetings in Washington for the next couple of days, and then will be moving on to someplace else in the US.
Hezbullah is once again grabbing human shields in southern Lebanon. But to the New York Times it's only 'Israel says.'
But when the Israeli military trains its lens on that hilltop Shiite
village close to the border, it sees nine arms depots, five
rocket-launching sites, four infantry positions, signs of three
underground tunnels, three antitank positions and, in the very center of
the village, a Hezbollah command post.
...
Maps and aerial photography provided to The New York Times by Israeli
military officials this week illustrate, they say, that Hezbollah has
moved most of its military infrastructure into the Shiite villages of
southern Lebanon and around their perimeters. Israel says this amounts to using the civilians as a human shield.
Without
knowing when the next war will break out, or what might precipitate it,
the Israelis are blunt about the implications: They will not hesitate
to strike at those targets, so southern Lebanon will most likely be the scene of widespread destruction.
Effectively,
the Israelis are warning that in the event of another conflict with
Hezbollah, many Lebanese civilians will probably be killed, and that it
should not be considered Israel’s fault.
“The
civilians are living in a military compound,” a senior Israeli military
official said at military headquarters in Tel Aviv, speaking on the
condition of anonymity because he was discussing delicate intelligence
matters.
“We
will hit Hezbollah hard, while making every effort to limit civilian
casualties as much as we can,” the official said, but “we do not intend
to stand by helplessly in the face of rocket attacks.”
Glad to hear we're not going to adopt the Gaza model in southern Lebanon. I'll believe that when I see it.
The
Israeli military says that a few miles northwest of Muhaybib, in the
larger village of Shaqra, with a population of about 4,000, it has
identified about 400 military sites and facilities belonging to
Hezbollah, which Israel says has been armed by Iran and Syria.
Zooming
out over a wider section of southern Lebanon, the Israeli military says
the number of potential targets for Israel in and around villages runs
into the thousands.
Israeli
military officials said they were publicizing the Hezbollah buildup to
put the problem on the international agenda in case there is another
conflict — and to possibly decrease the chances of one breaking out.
The Israeli claims could not be independently verified.
Because the Times can't send a reporter in there to actually see what's going on without a Hezbullah 'guide' and no 'guides' were conveniently available? Just asking....
Here's an example of an IDF slide that the Times didn't consider to be 'independently verified.'
A lot has changed since 2006.
Hezbollah’s
leader, Hassan Nasrallah, has said in public statements and interviews
that the group is far stronger now than at the end of the 2006 war.
“These abilities have multiplied with time,” the official with knowledge of Hezbollah’s forces added, declining to give details.
Hezbollah
has sheltered in villages to some extent for many years. But Israel
says the group has increasingly moved into built-up areas and out of the
open ground where much of the 2006 fighting took place.
“At
the end of the day, it means that many, many Lebanese will be killed,”
said Yaakov Amidror, a former national security adviser now at the
Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University near Tel
Aviv. “Where is the world? Why does it not stop the buildup?”
Here's what's ahead:
An Israeli expert familiar with military planning said that if Israel
attacked Lebanon again, it would probably do so in three phases. First,
it would strike without warning at targets that pose the greatest
threat, he said; then it would call for civilians to evacuate southern
Lebanon. Once a critical mass of people had left, ground troops would
move in.
Something tells me that, as in Gaza, the civilians can't or won't leave. Will Israel attack anyway? We can only hope so. Somehow, I doubt the scenario outlined above will play out so neatly.
When I made aliya (immigrated to Israel), I used to tell people that the difference between the media in the US and the media in Israel was that in the US you could tell the difference between the news pages and the op-ed pages.
Those days are long since gone. As further proof, I present this unthinking editorial from the New York Times, which dismisses Israeli concerns over being turned into 1938's Czechoslovakia (Hat Tip: Eli Tabori).
As outlined on Monday by Yuval Steinitz, Israel’s minister of
intelligence and strategic affairs, the Israelis are now insisting that
Iran end all research and development on advanced centrifuges, which are
used to enrich uranium; reduce the number of operating centrifuges at
its Natanz plant beyond what was agreed to in the framework; and close
its underground enrichment facility at Fordo. Also, Israel has demanded
that Iran allow inspections “anywhere, anytime” by international
monitors, ship its stockpile of enriched uranium out of the country and
disclose past nuclear-related activities that might involve military
uses.
Funny, but every one of those demands, which the Times now calls 'unreasonable,' was part of the original Western negotiating position at the beginning of the JCPOA talks.
In any negotiation, there could never be a deal without compromise. It
would be preferable if every vestige of Iran’s nuclear program were
eradicated. But that was never going to happen, not least because Iran’s
know-how could never be erased.
What a load of bunk. The know-how may always exist but if you can't fire up a centrifuge, you can't enrich uranium. It's that simple.
Iran’s leaders would not accept a deal in which they did not maintain
some elements of a nuclear program tailored for energy and medical
purposes — not weapons.
But Iran's program is not 'tailored for energy and medical purposes.' For example, consider this regarding Fordo:
Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility, a clandestine underground site near the
city of Qom, is “unnecessary for its civilian nuclear program” and
unneeded unless Iran wants nuclear weapons, according to the Institute
for Science and International Security (ISIS).
“Iran’s decision
to build a relatively small, deeply buried enrichment facility without
first informing the IAEA suggests that Fordow was intended to be used to
make weapon-grade uranium (enriched to over 90 percent) for nuclear
weapons, or to provide Iran with that option,” the Fordow report said,
citing International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) evidence.
Since
the plant was discovered in 2009, Iran has changed its stated purpose
multiple times in official IAEA documents and correspondence, adding
“credence to the assessment that after realizing it was caught in 2009
building the facility in secret, Iran rushed to proclaim a civilian
purpose for it with the IAEA.”
Now, how exactly is that tailored for 'energy and medical purposes'?
While the deal does not grant international monitors the right to go
anywhere, anytime, it does impose a tough inspection regime and
establishes a commission to resolve disputes if Iran blocks access to a
suspected site.
Given Iran's history of hiding its nuclear activities, how 'tough' could any inspection regime that requires giving notice to Iran be?
It allows research on advanced centrifuges, but the machines can’t be used for enrichment for 10 years.
Why would they 'research' them if they weren't planning to use them? 10 years is not a long time - it's less than the age of Iran's nuclear program and less than the amount of time since the IAEA caught on to it. Do you have a reasonable expectation of being alive in ten years? All this deal does is kick the can down the road and leave us to face a much stronger Iran with a more advanced nuclear weapons program ten years hence. Some accomplishment.
There is confusion about how the deal addresses Iran’s willingness to
come clean on its past military activities, but experts have said that a
final agreement would require Iran to answer all questions before
sanctions are lifted.
Who are those 'experts' and what is the basis for their opinion?
The Times had made up its editorial mind to support whatever deal Obama presented before the deal was ever presented. It will only read the fine print after its opinion is out there. That's not the job of a critical media in a Western country. It's no longer 'all the news that's fit to print.' But then, that slogan was always a sham anyway.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
