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Monday, September 15, 2014

Hamas, Islamic Jihad stress importance of using media as "resistance"

Ismail Haniyeh gave a speech on May 25 (translation from BBC Monitoring, received via email) describing Hamas' views of the media:

We have to develop a media strategy that supports resistance and jihad on the land of Palestine. The resistance person who carries a rifle must have another resistance person standing behind him and carrying a pen so as to provide the media and political cover for this resistance and to embrace this blessed jihad. This is the necessary integration between the resistance of the bullet and the resistance of the word. This is essential and necessary so that we can accomplish the project of national liberation, God willing.”
(Al-Aqsa Satellite TV, Gaza)
This makes his words after the war that I had noted a bit more understandable:

[T]he Palestinian people has won the war on the military front, the political front, and the media front. Our narrative has gained the upper hand in the media and was the more credible. Our image in the media was the more effective.

The media analysis and the men of the [Palestinian] media everywhere constituted the river from which the global media quenched its thirst for information about what was happening on the ground.
In a similar vein, the Islamic Jihad terror group just gave out awards for the reporters from satellite channels and media agencies who were the best at spouting jihadist propaganda during the war.
[An Islamic Jihad delegation praised the reporters for] their generosity in giving over the image of the resistance, and to highlight the sacrifices of the Palestinian people, and expose the crimes of the Zionist enemy during the battle.

..The journalists stood side by side next to the gun battle in the operation, and achieved a great victory over the Zionist media machine.

The delegation said that the media battle with the enemy isno less important than the battle in the battlefields, and that both complement each other.
They also praised the media members who died, calling them "mujahadin."

(h/t Asher)