August 28, 2005
Palestinian suicide bomber wounds two in Israel in first such attack since Gaza pullout Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas condemned the attack as terrorism and urged Israel to show restraint.
August 19, 2003
Suicide bomber blows himself up on Jerusalem bus,at least 20 dead
Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas condemned the bombing as a "terrible act."
June 20, 2005
Violence escalates on eve of Israeli-Palestinian summit
Palestinian gunmen killed an Israeli motorist Monday in a West Bank ambush and Israeli troops nabbed an alleged female suicide bomber with explosives hidden in her pants, escalating a wave of violence that has strained an already shaky cease-fire. Palestinian officials condemned the violence.
No editorializing, no details about how Abbas' condemnations are never made from a moral perspective but from the perspective that it is "against Palestinian interests." No, Ap simply reports the condemnations.
However, when an Israeli leader condemns something, AP knows exactly why:
West Bank Arsonists torched a mosque in a West Bank village yesterday, scrawled "revenge" on a wall in Hebrew, and charred copies of the Muslim holy book in an attack that threatened to stoke tensions over deadlocked Mideast peacemaking.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior Israeli officials condemned the arson attack in an apparent attempt to limit the political fallout.
I don't have the text of Netanyahu's condemnation, but Ehud Barak said "Whoever did this is a terrorist in every sense of the word, and intended to hurt the chances for peace and dialogue with the Palestinians. This was a shameful act that besmirched the state of Israel and its values." These were unequivocal and visceral condemnations; in fact I think that calling an act of arson a "terrorist" act is way over the top.
But AP and its writer Mohammed Daraghmeh know that Israeli condemnations are mere facades, political ploys that don't reflect the inherent evil lurking in the souls of all Zionists.
Palestinian Arab condemnations, on the other hand, are to be taken at face value.
(h/t Meryl Yourish)