UN Watch: Test: Are you pro-human rights, or anti-Israel?
If in the past year you didn’t CRY OUT when thousands of protesters were killed and injured by Turkey, Egypt and Libya, when more victims than ever were hanged by Iran, women and children in Afghanistan were bombed, whole communities were massacred in South Sudan, 1800 Palestinians were starved and murdered by Assad in Syria, hundreds in Pakistan were killed by jihadist terror attacks, 10,000 Iraqis were killed by terrorists, villagers were slaughtered in Nigeria, but you ONLY cry out for GAZA, then you are not pro HUMAN RIGHTS, you are only ANTI-ISRAEL.Pro-Palestinian and Pro-Hamas Have Become Oxymorons
Over the years, we at the Investigative Project on Terrorism and many others have called on American Islamists to condemn Hamas as a terrorist organization. They have steadfastly refused.Douglas Murray: The West has drifted away from Israel — and itself
Fine. But if Palestinian advocates really want a better life for the people of Gaza, today's events make it clear they must condemn Hamas for making the plight of the people there demonstrably worse.
For six hours, Israel stopped bombing Gaza, accepting a cease-fire put forth by Egypt. All Hamas had to do was stop firing rockets at Israeli civilians and the people of Gaza could start trying to resume their lives, confident that the latest conflict had ended.
What I am coming to is that it seems to me — from many visits there, and seeing the country in peace and war — that it is Israel that remains the truly western country. It is Israel which takes its history seriously, thinks deeply about where it is going and what it exists for. It is Israel which takes western values seriously and fights for the survival of those values rather than sitting back and assuming they are simply part of some birthright. Israel’s questions and dilemmas are not the stuff of North London or other parts of western Europe these days, though they remain febrile in much of the US. In conclusion, and despite my admiration for his frankness, I cannot help thinking that Hugo has got this wholly wrong and upside-down. Geography aside, it is Israel that is still truly a western country. Far more than many parts of western Europe now are.Analysis of the latest developments in the Israel-Gaza conflict
A gap may well be emerging. But not because Israel has drifted away from the West. Rather because today in much of the West, as we bask in the afterglow of our achievements — eager to enjoy our rights, but unwilling to defend them — it is the West that is, slowly but surely, drifting away from itself.
Premature Palestinian Empathy Syndrome
A Washington Post foreign affairs blogger, Ishaan Tharoor, listed the names, ages, and places of death of the 83 Palestinian Arabs killed in the first three days of Israel’s Operation Protective Edge (“These are the names of 21 children killed in Gaza,” July 10, 2014), with the children identified by boldface type.French Jewry’s Moment of Truth
Tharoor noted that Israel said it was trying to minimize civilian casualties, but nevertheless, “civilians are dying.”
In a quick check of the first 24 names, the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America’s (CAMERA) Israel office found that one through three were Hamas members. Numbers five through 12 were individuals who rushed into a house previously evacuated after an Israeli warning. (In violation of the laws of war, Hamas uses Gazans as “human shields.”)
Number 17 was a member of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, like Hamas a U.S.-designated international terrorist organization. The fatalities listed 18 through 22 were family members of his. And number 24 apparently was another terrorist, affiliation not confirmed.
About one hundred Muslim thugs had gathered in front of the Don Isaac Abravanel synagogue in Central Paris, a few blocks away from Place de la Bastille (Bastille Circle), and threatened to storm it. Two to three hundred worshipers, who had gathered for a pro-Israel religious service, were locked inside. There were five police officers to protect them–and two dozen Jewish youths trained in martial arts who were members of the Jewish community sponsored Security Organization or of the more militant Jewish Defense League.Islamist Jew-haters and their leftist enablers: “The Jews are Beasts”
For Abouaf, whose family is of Tunisian Jewish descent, the whole scene looked like a reenactment of the storming and torching of the Great Synagogue in Tunis during the Six-Day War in 1967: a traumatic event that accelerated the flight of Tunisian Jews to France or to Israel.
“What I have seen today,” he remarked, “is Arab hatred against Jews. Pure hatred. Right in the middle of Paris. Don’t try to ‘explain’ or ‘understand’, it was hatred, period.” Irving Kristol famously said that a neoconservative was a liberal mugged by reality. Something similar was befalling Abouaf. This was the “truth” he was so eager to share.
This week we have seen a rise in open anti-Semitism throughout the world as protests against Israel spread in reaction to the Gaza conflict.Today in London my best friend's wife was assaulted by Muslim anti-Israel demonstrators
It is expected in places like Pakistan and some Arab countries, where hatred and demonization of Jews always is in the open.
But what is remarkable is that it is in the open in Europe and to a lesser extent in the United States. And the heart of the hate is a coalition of leftists and Islamists — a coalition we have written about for years regarding places such as Malmö, Sweden, and British universities.
The UK's anti-Israel frenzy knows no bounds. My best friend's wife "Charlotte" (a 5 feet tall 57-year old lady who wants this story publicised but wishes to remain anonymous) was surrounded and assaulted by several Muslim anti-Israel fanatics in the middle of Oxford Street in broad daylight. She was shopping there when the demonstrators came marching down the road shouting "Free Free Palestine and Zionists murderers". The photos she took here are from just before the assault (next bit is an update to the original posting). Charlotte (who is a proud Jew) said:Antwerp rally features call to ‘slaughter the Jews’
"As they passed by with their disgusting chants I said 'Why are the Palestinians firing rockets at my daughter in Tel Aviv?' At that point they cried out "get her" and several of them left the march and came on to the pavement. They surrounded me, pushing and yelling Jew/Zionist/murderer/thief. One of them stole my phone, but a steward who witnessed what happened was able to recover it 5 minutes later. I was shaking and my neck now hurts. It was awful for me - how is this possible in Oxford Street in 2014?"
Approximately 500 people attended Saturday’s protest in the capital of Belgium’s Flemish region, where one of the speakers used a loudspeaker to chant a call in Arabic that means “slaughter the Jews.”Analysis of NGO Agendas and Distortions on the Gaza Conflict
The demonstration against Israel’s assault on Hamas in Gaza happened amid a wave of anti-Semitic attacks in Western Europe that coincided with the Israeli actions, and one day before a similar demonstration in Paris escalated into what European Jewish Congress President Moshe Kantor called an “attempted lynch” outside a local synagogue.
As in previous rounds of the Arab-Israeli conflict, political NGOs have issued numerous unfound statements condemning Israel.NGO Monitor: B’Tselem’s Expanding Credibility Gap
These statements make unverifiable claims, distort international law, and in at least one of the cases (see below) include language of blood libel. They are repeated by journalists, diplomats, and UN officials.
In the first 8 days of the Gaza conflict (beginning July 8), B’Tselem published 9 statements:Another open letter to B’Tselem spokesperson Sarit Michaeli
2 present unverifiable statistics citing Palestinian sources regarding civilians in Gaza allegedly killed in Israeli attacks, with unsupported statements claiming that the Israeli responses violate international law.
3 others allege “unlawful” Israeli military actions and emphasize B’Tselem’s self-proclaimed role in “voicing dissent.”
3 emotive “testimonies,” which highlight the human suffering of Palestinians and Israelis, but are largely irrelevant for analyzing the legal dimensions.
1 statement solely focused on violations of the rights of Israelis (a unique action among the numerous NGOs claiming human rights agendas).
Overall, B’Tselem’s publications reflect its political agenda – “dissent” and opposition to Israeli policy – in contrast to fact-based documentation of human rights violations and sound legal analysis.
By its own admission B’Tselem is not in the least concerned with universal human rights but only on what , B’Tselem, in its sole judgement, considers Palestinian rights. Certainly Israeli rights are not even considered and in pursuit of its PUBLICLY stated PRIMARY objective of changing Israeli policy, B’Tselem doesn’t hesitate to resort to exaggerations and misinformation. In focusing on its objective B’Tselem shuts its organizational eyes to even the most blatant human rights violations by Palestinians.NGO Monitor: Dr. Mads Gilbert: Exploiting Medicine for Propaganda and Hate
The sheer arrogance of the manner in which B’Tselem pronounces its immediate verdict about events on which experts reserve judgment is astonishing. When, during the interview, Ms. Michaeli defined a legitimate military target as one that makes a concrete contribution to the hostilities, the interviewer responded that the army says these homes are also used as command and control centers and in any event sufficient warning has been given in advance so that family members could be evacuated.
Highlighting Mads Gilbert's background of ideological extremism, NGO Monitor reminds journalists and others of his radical political and ideological biases. Gilbert is currently in Gaza promoting anti-Israel propaganda.A Maoist in Gaza
"We urge media outlets and human rights organizations to treat Dr. Gilbert's comments and assessments from Gaza with great caution," said NGO Monitor' president, Prof. Gerald Steinberg. "By justifying terror, supporting Hamas and fueling the conflict, NORWAC and Mads Gilbert have violated the Hippocratic Oath - 'first, do not harm'."
Over the last couple of days, Gilbert has become an unofficial spokesman for the Hamas regime, giving interviews like this one in which he accused Israel of “deliberately” targeting civilians, “particularly women and children.” Pro-Palestinian activists on social media platforms have been eagerly reporting Gilbert’s every move, lauding him with such terms as “hero” and “great humanitarian.” Among Gilbert’s admirers is Chris Gunness, the spokesman for UNRWA, the UN agency devoted exclusively to Palestinian refugees, who repeatedly tweeted the doctor’s email address and cell phone number, describing him as a “brilliant interviewee” on the “impact of the conflict on civilians.”NGOs’ immoral tunnel vision
One does not, however, have to dig very deep to discover that the halo effect around Gilbert masks some very disturbing affiliations. To begin with, Gilbert is an active member of Norway’s Red Party, a Maoist organization formed in 2007, which begs the question as to how someone who perpetuates the ideology of a tyrant who murdered 45 million of his own people over four years can be described as a “humanitarian.” Nor does Gilbert have a track record of helping anyone other than the Palestinians; as the journalist Benjamin Weinthal revealed on Twitter, his emails and phone calls to Gilbert asking the doctor why he wasn’t treating victims of the slaughter in Syria were met with silence.
In 2014, flak jacket-wearing ‘war’ correspondents on the ground and talking heads back in TV studios from London to Los Angeles repeatedly ask: why don’t Palestinian civilians have bomb shelters? There are two discomfiting reasons: First–Bomb shelters might actually minimize civilian casualties among Gaza’s hapless populace, something that would negatively impact Hamas’ core-strategy in its asymmetrical war against Israel. Hamas counts on spawning martyrs-on demand for the 24-hour, internet-driven news cycles to depict Israel as a Nazi-like monolith bent on murdering innocent babies and their mothers. The second reason is that there is a desperate shortage of cement, but no one ever demands to know why. That’s because a series of new tunnels diverted thousands of tons from 24,000 concrete slabs Israel was pressured into allowing into Gaza to ease a so-called crisis in the civilian construction center. Those slabs were used to build sophisticated tunnels extending into Israeli territory to wreak havoc through more kidnappings and suicide bombings targeting Israelis civilians.Shaked: Gideon Resnick's hatred renders him useless to his readers.
One such “terror tunnel” discovered earlier this year — thirty meters deep, equipped with power generators that extended into southern Israel being readied for “a quality terrorist attack” on peaceful kibbutz residents.
Sadly, the militant, leftist propaganda machine has not changed its tune, looking for every opportunity to make Israel the culprit in a war she did not desire and which she entered reluctantly, after days of increasing provocation.Crude Anti-Israel Animation in the Washington Post
I refer specifically to “Daily Beast” writer Gideon Resnick, who so misrepresented the facts in one of my recent Facebook posts, one has to wonder if his hatred for my country hasn’t rendered him outright useless to his website and his readers.
In a story headlined “Israeli Politician Declares War on the Palestinian People,” Resnick actually suggested I compared Palestinian children to “little snakes,” and accused me of fomenting Palestinian genocide. This vilification was later picked up by several bloggers and reporters, all of whom were convinced of this frightening notion, without even a scrap of fact or truth.
The Washington Post’s reporting and editorials on the conflict in Gaza have been generally fair and balanced. Which makes it all the more disappointing that the paper considered this crude cartoon animation to be acceptable on its website:Irish Times cartoon likens Israeli ‘slaughter’ to shooting fish in a barrel
The implication that Israel is deliberately pummeling Palestinian babies rather than Hamas terrorists is grossly offensive. Indeed the imagery of innocent babies in anti-Israel cartoons is not new.
Cartoons play a significant role in the demonization of Israel.
We recently commented on a political cartoon in the Guardian highlighting the perceived asymmetrical nature of the conflict between Israel and Hamas, and another cartoon decrying what was perceived to be the greater value placed on Israeli lives over that of Palestinians. We also posted about a cartoon in the Independent which suggested that Israeli reaction to Hamas rocket attacks was not only ‘disproportional‘ but arguably inconsistent with Jewish values.As Cease-fire Fails, Some Headlines Fail to Explain Why
However, a cartoon by Martyn Turner at the Irish Times goes a step further, imputing to Israel a blind malevolence in slaughtering helpless Palestinians.
Fighting continues in Gaza and Israel today, despite attempts to put into place a cease-fire. Here are the facts, which are known to every journalist covering the conflict: Egypt proposed a cease-fire yesterday that called for an end to "all hostilities" between Hamas and Israel. Israel's security cabinet formally accepted the cease-fire at 9 AM this morning in Jerusalem, and completely halted its military operation. Hamas, on the other hand, continued to fire nearly 50 rockets at Israel during this hiatus, while its officials Sami Abu Zuhri and Fawzi Barhum and the terror group's armed Al Qassam Brigades announced they rejected calls to stop the attacks. After six hours of continued attacks against its population centers, Israel announced that it would be resuming its military operation, and hit Hamas-affiliated targets in the Gaza Strip.CBS Report Comes Up Empty on Fuel Claim
It was a straightforward series of events that made up the building blocks of the story this morning. But not every headline writer could figure out how to convey the news to readers. Here we'll look at some examples of headlines that range from clear and informative to opaque and unhelpful.
On CBS This Morning, Holly Williams reported today from Gaza City that Hamas appeared to reject an Egyptian-proposed ceasefire agreement because it did not include the removal of the security-based naval blockade imposed on Gaza since 2007. She says (at around 1:40 into the video, posted above) that the blockade has disrupted the economy “and deprived Palestinians of necessities like fuel and medical supplies.” (The text of the segment can be found here.)My Letter of Apology to the world media
However, it is Williams’ assertion that is deprived of accuracy. According to a recent report from COGAT, the Israeli authority responsible for the coordination of humanitarian affairs with Gaza, in the first several days of Operation Protective Edge, “some two hundred truckloads of food and essential supplies were delivered into the Gaza Strip” through the Kerem Shalom crossing, including 187,000 liters of gasoline, 526 tons of gas and 12 medical equipment trucks. And on Sunday and Monday, approximately 140 truckloads of general supplies and over 240 tons of gas were delivered into Gaza. While Hamas and other groups sent thousands of rockets into Israel, including the crossing itself, Israel continued to send goods into the coastal territory.
Please allow me to apologise on behalf of all the citizens of the State of Israel. I humbly apologise to you and your readers and to the world for our leaders defending our right to live. Here in Israel, we consider living a basic human right.NYT: “A Palestinian Mother’s Fear in East Jerusalem” draws unfavourable letters to the editor
The indignation of journalists, commentators and your readership has prompted them to spew forth some of the most vile invective we have seen other than that of Der Sturmer circa 1940’s and the letters and op-eds posted in your publication have educated me in a new level of hatred.
I apologise that it is left up to our army to make sure that the citizens of Gaza are evacuated from dangerous zones safely through pamphlets, text messages and roof knocking. I guess my text message and pamphlet were lost due to Hamas being on strike. Literally.
Re “A mother’s fear” (Opinion, July 11): Rula Salameh’s article raises anti-Zionist rhetoric to new levels. Never mind her claim that the Arab-Israeli conflict destroyed her marriage. Never mind that the Israeli police immediately apprehended the Jewish murderers of the Palestinian teen in her neighborhood and that Israel’s leadership emphatically repudiated that heinous act.Roger Cohen Distorts Israel Hayom 'Stone Age' Comment
Ms. Salameh says she won’t take her son to a bomb shelter because she is afraid of the Jewish residents of Pisgat Ze’ev and Neve Yaakov, which she identifies as “settlements.” In fact, Pisgat Ze’ev is the largest neighborhood in Jerusalem, and Neve Yaakov is not far behind. And, of course, not a word about who is shooting rockets at her neighbourhood.
Instead, she criticizes Israel for failing to build bomb shelters in her Palestinian neighborhood to protect her from Palestinian rocket attacks.
Days after a New York Times editorial completely distorted a Hebrew poem cited by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – the Chaim Nahman Bialik was a rejection of human revenge, not an endorsement of it – columnist Roger Cohen similarly distorts another Israeli source.New York Times Public Editor Reports 1,000 Emails Critical of Israel-Hamas Coverage
In other words, Regev is not talking about "flattening" Gaza, as Cohen would have readers believe. Rather, Regev's reference to the "Stone Age" refers to the demilitarization of Gaza, in which Hamas, stripped of its rocket arsenal, would be armed only with stones.
Margaret Sullivan, Public Editor of The New York Times, said she had been away last week as the Israel Defense Forces retaliated against Hamas’s rocket attacks on civilians across nearly all of Israel, but she wrote on Monday that she had received “a deluge of reader complaints” in more than 1,000 emails.A Dictionary for Defining Terrorism
Over the past week, Blogger Elder of Ziyon, along with many other media watchers, have written scores of long articles to unpack the mistakes in coverage by The Times, but one example, the first that Sullivan mentions, seems to have been the most blatant case of bad reporting, as judged by the many comments posted by readers to her explanatory piece on Monday.
Westerners often flail away at dangerous enemies or situations because they cannot describe or name them accurately, especially Arab-Islamic terror groups."BBC, Shame On You! BBC, Tell The Truth!" (video)
Here are some words to remove from usage or to save for very special occasions.
Militants: This is a term frequently used by CNN, Reuters, the Associated Press, The New York Times, and other media, even Fox News. It is a nice way to avoid using “terrorist” for someone who has just blown himself up in a shopping mall or bus or whose organization has unleashed indiscriminate rocket attacks against cities. Reuters, for example, has a policy against using the word “terrorist” because it believes it is opinionated or judgmental. Soon, Reuters will replace “bank robbery” with “large withdrawal.” CNN often uses the term “militants,” as in: “Israel launched an offensive against militants in Gaza, killing scores of militants who responded by shooting primitive rockets at Israel.” This is also a classic example of getting who, what, when, where, why, and how all wrong in one sentence.
Observers could be forgiven for thinking that Al Beeb deliberately resorts to the proverbial Rent-a-Crowd industry to ensure that mobs like this rant and rave against – wait for it! – BBC bias towards Israel in order to be able to tell pesky Zionist complainants (as indeed it does) that since complaints also come in from the other side, the Corporation must be getting its reportage of theGuardian logic used to blame Israel for ceasefire violation in one tweetIsrael-Islamist ConflictArab-Israeli Conflict "just about right".
But Al Beeb is paying its fat cats such unwarrantably inflated salaries (at the expense of the hapless licence payer, of course) and wasting licence payers' money on all sorts of gimmicks and initiatives well beyond its remit that it couldn't possible have money left over to fund a mob like as big as this one, outside the BBC's Broadcasting House headquarters in London's Portland Place yesterday evening.
Needless to say, directing this mob to BBCWatch (which comprehensively exposes Al Beeb's sins against Israel day after day after day, including of course during the present Operation Protective Edge) and other sites that highlight the many and varied ways in which the BBC propagandises against Israel by sins of commission and omission (see my blogroll) would not open the hate-filled protesters' eyes.
As one commentator suggested, Greenwood’s argument goes something like this.BBC films Hamas human shields policy in action: fails to explain to audiences
1. Israel accepted the ceasefire and held its fire for six hours, hoping Hamas would do the same.
2. Hamas ignored the ceasefire and continued firing dozens of rockets at Israeli towns.
3. Israel finally retaliated against Hamas rocket attacks which showed no signs of winding down.
4. Ergo, Israel violated the ceasefire.
This is of course the time when we typically employ a rhetorical flourish, encapsulating the substance of the post in a few pithy lines.
However, on this occasion, given the jaw-dropping nature of the logic used by Greenwood, we find ourselves for once truly speechless.
Yolande Knell’s filmed report from July 15th was broadcast on BBC television news programmes as well as being posted on the BBC News website’s Middle East page under the title “Palestinians reject Gaza ceasefire proposal“.BBC’s Bowen promotes accusations of Israeli ‘war crimes’
That report includes some interesting items, one of which is the image below which clearly shows missiles being fired by terrorists from built-up residential areas in the Gaza Strip.
Bowen makes no effort to inform viewers that Sourani’s interpretation of Article 52 is less than “clear-cut” with regard to buildings used, for example, as weapons stores or missile launching sites.BBC continues to promote theme of “homemade” rockets
Seeing as this report is the fourth item of BBC content in less than a week which has promoted assorted unproven accusations made by Raji Sourani of the PCHR and seeing as the BBC does not apparently consider it necessary to wait for any kind of investigation or proof before broadcasting and amplifying Sourani’s grave accusations concerning the ‘deliberate targeting of civilians’, ‘war crimes’ or ‘crimes against humanity’, it is obviously imperative to take a closer look at the record of Mr Sourani and his organization.
That necessity is further compounded by the fact that as was recently revealed here, the UN OCHA civilian casualty figures which the BBC is currently quoting across the board are based on information coming from three primary sources, one of which is Mr Sourani’s PCHR.
The remarkably uniform description of missiles with warheads of up to 60 kg as “homemade” is clearly not a matter of chance. The obvious intention is to steer audiences towards a view of these weapons as being crudely and simply made, with the implication that they are ineffective and do not present such a dangerous threat to Israeli civilians. Notably too, whilst BBC reporters take pains to promote the “homemade” theme, they have little if anything to say about the weaponry of Hamas and other terrorist organisations which is not locally produced and the fact that several terrorist organisations in the Gaza Strip are supplied, funded and supported by Iran.Shocker: MSNBC Panel Blames Bush For Current Middle East Crisis
So what are the facts with regard to the missile stocks of terrorist organisations in the Gaza Strip?
According to Israeli military intelligence, of some 10,000 missiles located in the Gaza Strip, approximately 6,000 are in Hamas’ possession. The important fact that other armed terrorist groups are also in possession of military-grade weaponry is rarely adequately reported by the BBC.
Herman went on to essentially pass off any foreign policies woes of the Obama administration on George W. Bush and his years in the White House, placing an emphasis on the crisis in Iraq. But despite these previous leadership woes, the foreign policy expert believes that Obama is still to blame for a few policy errors.Dr. Rachel Suissa on the allegations of genocide circulating in Norwegian media
“Anyway, you can’t roll back the videotape. He inherited a very dangerous world and I think there’s more we can do,” Herman said. “Let me not say this is static and we can blame everybody else. he’s the president. He’s the commander in chief and he’s been there 5 1/2 years. i don’t think we have a good foreign policy narrative.”
But do not be fooled, this foreign policy narrative only appears flawed. According to Herman, those in the Middle East do not like the United States’ polices in the region due to the overuse of force and drones. In order to fix this flaw, the Obama administration should outline clearer goals for their pursuits abroad.
In a late evening news report on Wednesday 9 July from the Norwegian state owned broadcaster NRK, summarizing earlier news reports, the NRK had only one message for the Norwegian people: Israel is perpetrating genocide! The ”witness” and source of this message was the leader of the terrorist organization Al-Fatah, Mr. Mahmoud Abbas. Despite the fact that the NRK does report and inform about the Palestinian rocket fire against civilian targets in Israel, the unconditional conclusion without any remonstrance whatsoever is that Israel commits genocide whenever the country defends its civil population against a widening attack from Palestinian terrorists.NRK and Aftenbladet: neck and neck in who can smear Israel the most
There is nothing new or unexpected about this behaviour of the NRK. We have heard the same NRK-lies earlier when Israeli authorities have found it necessary to act in order to stop the barrage against its civil population. Then the NRK predictably mobilizes a panel of selected ”Middle East Experts” telling us that Israel ”occupies Palestinian areas,” ”violates international law,” ”builds illegal settlements,” ”confiscates Palestinian land,” ”commits war crimes,” ”bombs innocent women and children,” ”shuts Palestinians in a ghetto by means of a blockade,” ”destroy the peace process” and ”perpetrates genocide.” Sometimes these ”experts” even seem to believe what they say.
My ears are about to fall off and my eyes have shrunk to tiny raisins in disbelief about the one-sided and dangerous allegations served in the NRK and regurgitated with not a small amount of toxicity in Aftenbladet…MSNBC's Matthews: 'True Peace' in Middle East Won't Happen Until Palestinians Respect Israelis' Right to Life
Now the two institutions are working in concert to create an impression of Israel’s inherent evil, while completely white washing the Hamas.
Senator Schumer, you said it right. These killings and how they're being handled tells us all we need to know about what is right about the Middle East and what is wrong. And in this case, the right, even in this horror, is tilting toward the government in Jerusalem. (h/t MtTB)NBC Reporter Acts As Hamas Spokesman, Denies Terror Group Uses Civilians As Human Shields
Reporting from the Gaza Strip during MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell Reports on July 14, NBC foreign correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin, formerly of Al Jazerra and CNN, parroted Hamas denials that it deliberately placed missile batteries in civilian buildings in Gaza [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]:Jewish human rights group slams Twitter for allowing Hamas supporters to broadcast ‘HitlerWasRight’ hashtag
"They definitely reject the labeling of using civilians as human shields....Hamas military wing people that we've been speaking to and others – not just on these past few days, but in the past several years, because this is an issue that always comes up against Hamas – they will say that this is the nature of the battlefield that they have to fight in. That this is not an issue by design, but as a reality of what Gaza is like because it's so densely populated."
Jewish human rights group the Simon Wiesenthal Center on Monday demanded that social media platform Twitter do more to stem anti-Semitic hate from supporters of Hamas, after online magazine BuzzFeed reported on Sunday how the #HitlerWasRight hashtag was gaining widespread usage on the site.Rihanna Twitter flitter on Palestine
“Twitter needs to articulate a coherent policy in dealing with hate and terrorism and live up to those standards,” SWC dean Rabbi Abraham Cooper told The Algemeiner. “The freedom of speech fig leaf doesn’t cover such hatred in the private domain.”
Cooper said that as part of the SWC’s Digital Terrorism and Hate Project, the organization grades social networking platforms for their responsiveness in dealing with digital terrorism and hate.
Pop star Rihanna didn’t know what was going on when she posted a Twitter message with the hashtag #FreePalestine.
A source close to the Barbados singer said the 26-year-old, who has twice performed in Israel, never intended to make a statement about the Middle East conflict, TMZ reported.
The controversial post showed up on Rihanna’s Twitter feed on Tuesday and was deleted just eight minutes later — but not before it was re-tweeted some 7,000 times by her fans. However, the Internet can be unforgiving and although removed from her own Twitter feed Rihanna’s message can still be seen in online archives.
According to the source, Rihanna, who is only “pro-peace,” was reading online about the conflict in the Middle East, she clicked on a link, and the next thing she knew her fans began asking why she was pro-Palestinian.