A silent correction to paper over the bigger problem

The clueless op-ed written by Catherine Ashton for the New York Times has received a silent correction.

It used to say,

This is where the industrial center of Gaza used to be, before the shelling just over a year ago.

Now it just says

This is where the industrial center of Gaza used to be.

Obviously, this was corrected by the New York Times/International Herald Tribune. But just as obviously, Catherine Ashton really thought that the Erez industrial zone was destroyed by Israeli, and not Hamas, actions.

The problem is not primarily with the Times' fact-checker - it is with the vast majority of EU and other officials who believe the lies they have been fed by the Arabs and their supporters over the years. They believe that the settlements are the main obstacle to peace. They believe that the Palestinians' demand to make Jerusalem Judenrein is an expression of nationalism, not bigotry. They believe that another Arab state will solve the problems and that terror will cease as long as Israel gives up everything being demanded from them. They believe that most of the victims in Gaza were women and children and that Israel is more reckless with civilian lives than other democracies have been in other wars. They believe that people are dying in Iraq because of Palestine. They believe that the Old City of Jerusalem is an historic Arab capital and that it wasn't all but ignored by the Muslim between the Crusades and Zionism. They believe that "historic Palestine" adhered to the borders of the British Mandate. They believe that there has been a unique "Palestinian" people and culture that are much more than a mere hundred years old.

Israel has failed, miserably, for allowing such lies to become accepted truths among these intelligentsia. Ashton is just a symptom of a much greater illness.

Here's the original version of the first paragraph of the op-ed as reproduced on the Real Clear World page.

(h/t Lily)