Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: media silence

Showing posts with label media silence. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 05, 2023

What the @NYTimes left out from their story on Palestinian kids wanting to be "martyrs"

Raja Abdulrahim continues in her tradition of using her platform as a New York Times reporter to shade the facts away from the reality.

She has a tragic story about how teenagers in the West Bank are writing out "wills" in the expectations of being killed by Israeli troops.

The farewell testaments reflect a prevailing sense among many young men that death is heroic, meaningful and inevitable during what is now the deadliest period for Palestinians in nearly two decades in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

With the intensifying violence, many young Palestinians feel added pressure that they themselves must become involved in the struggle against Israel and act.

Palestinian society has long lionized “martyrs” — anyone killed by Israeli forces — with many of their images displayed on walls and banners in Palestinian cities and, more recently, on social media platforms like Instagram.

Farewell messages are often published by the Palestinian news media and shared widely on social media, inspiring more young Palestinians to write their own.

Dr. Samah Jabr, the head of the mental health unit for the Palestinian Authority, said the writing of such wills was wrapped up with generational traumas for Palestinians living in the occupied territories, dealing with checkpoints and near daily raids by Israeli troops. Many young people feel a duty to take on adult roles, including confronting Israeli troops.

“It’s not that they want to die, but it’s that they feel like there’s nothing else to give to Palestine except martyrdom,” [writer Jalal] Abukhater said.

Abdulrahim buried the lede.

Palestinian society is suffused with turning all those killed by Israel into heroes. Just calling them "martyrs" is a powerful incentive. TV programs celebrate "martyrs," schools and camps and sports tournaments are named after "martyrs," the Palestinian Authority and Hamas pay families of "martyrs" - it is a death cult where being killed is the surest way of being honored. And this is a society that craves honor.

Yet outside the half sentence on how Palestinian society lionizes "martyrs," Abdulrahim doesn't describe this fundamental part of Palestinian society. She tries to make this sick mindset relatable to the West, pretending that the kids have no choice in a place where they have no future.

Think about it. There are about two million Palestinians under 20. The number who are killed is a tiny percentage of that number, while many more go on to live dignified and successful lives. But there are few if any TV shows and music videos about them.

When a child gets killed by Israel, he (or she) is instantly hailed as a hero by their media, social media and role models. That is the reason so many choose to go that route - not desperation, not because of "no choice." They are not being given any mainstream messages that getting killed while attacking Jews is stupid or counterproductive or evil. They do it because they want to, not because they are forced to, and their entire culture supports this goal, implicitly or explicitly.

That's the story the article is purposefully ignoring. Instead of blaming the Palestinian leaders - teachers, actors, musicians, poets, and other role models - for creating a death-centered culture, it pretends that somehow the Israelis have given them no choice but to want to get killed.

“We can counsel the students, but we can’t prevent the army from raiding the camp,” [a school counselor] said. “The occupation is the biggest driver among the youth who ask why they should stop when they are subjected to war and death.”

Is anyone - anyone at all - telling the kids to stay off the streets when there is an IDF raid? They aren't shooting at innocent people's houses. Only the ones who want to act macho and throw firebombs or shoot guns are the ones getting killed. It isn't a difficult concept to stay away from the fighting, but one that is apparently too difficult for adults and other role models to tell the kids.

The solution is obvious: to shame the people who commit suicide by IDF instead of honoring them. If the message in the Palestinian media is to teach kids to grow up and to try to build a decent society, instead of turning terrorists into heroes, things would change in weeks.

But no one wants to talk about solutions (unless it is the State of Israel committing collective suicide.)

This is a systemic failure of Palestinian society - and that is something the New York Times will never, ever discuss.

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Amnesty and HRW won't say a word about this Jenin war crime

Times of Israel reported on Monday:

The Israel Defense Forces says troops located hidden underground storage sites with weapons and explosives inside a mosque in the West Bank city of Jenin.

After lengthy gun battles with armed Palestinians who were holed up inside the mosque, Israeli forces managed to break in, the IDF says.

The IDF says that on the ground floor, troops found two underground storage sites containing explosives, weapons, and other military equipment.

Using a mosque as a military site is a war crime.

Article 53 of the 1977 Additional Protocol I says:

Without prejudice to the provisions of the Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict of 14 May 1954, and of other relevant international instruments, it is prohibited:
…
(b) to use such objects [historic monuments, works of art or places of worship which constitute the cultural or spiritual heritage of peoples] in support of the military effort

Additional Protocol II has identical language.

It was Hamas and Islamic Jihad that turned a mosque into a military target by firing from it and storing weapons within.

The fact that most Muslims are not upset at Palestinian terror groups for treating their mosques that way indicates that hate for Israel is more important to most Muslims than the sanctity of the mosque.

I don't see any fatwas on the topic, but my guess is that the Islamists pretend that this is a case of "defensive jihad" - defending Islam as a whole from destruction - which gives them wide latitude to even violate normative Islamic principles of war. It appears to be the justification for suicide bombings, and female suicide bombers, for example. Under that mindset, using mosques for war transforms from something reprehensible into an obligation.

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Why is there a "refugee camp" in Jenin to begin with, anyway?

Today's raid by the IDF on terror targets in Jenin is revealing a huge terrorist infrastructure, with large arms caches and command and control centers, in the heart of the Jenin "refugee camp."

Why is there a "refugee camp" in Jenin?

The city has been under Palestinian Authority control for nearly three decades. The residents live in "Palestine, so they aren't refugees or even the grandchildren of refugees. They live in the land they claim as their own, under Palestinian rule. There is no definition of "refugee" in the world that would call these people refugees.

Yet they live, rent free, in a cramped "refugee camp" and the world pays for their housing, as well as their schooling and their medical care - all services way beyond what real refugees receive.

One can see from a satellite image the clear outlines of the Jenin camp. The structures are much smaller than in the surrounding town and the roads, such as they are, are narrow.

In 2002, after the IDF went into Jenin and destroyed the terrorist infrastructure in fierce fighting with heavy casualties on both sides, the Israeli housing minister offered to rebuild the camp elsewhere where residents could have larger houses and wider roads - to live like normal people in their land.

The idea was vehemently rejected.

One of the self-appointed leaders of the camp said that the Israeli offer to rebuild everything better was really a plot "to erase the camps from existence, because these camps as a political reality constitute living testaments to the Nakba of the Palestinian people." (source, page 128)

That's exactly it. The camps are considered an important symbol of "resistance," not a place where human beings actually live. When UNRWA wanted to rebuild the camps and widen the roads, the same self-appointed leaders again opposed the plan, because wider roads meant the IDF could more easily enter. UNRWA and the committee remained at an impasse for months before the actual camp residents got their own committee together and said they wanted the UNRWA plan. The residents committee head said:

If we left it to debate we would have needed another five years. We agreed with the UNRWA plan. The families I meet now are happier and they are happy with the roads. If the Israeli army uses the road once (a day), we use it 100 times a day.

This is the way things have been since 1948. Ordinary Palestinians are stuck with leaders who actively want to use them as "symbols" of misery - by keeping them miserable.

These leaders choose to keep hundreds of thousands of people in "camps" - places that are ideal for terrorists to flourish, where the leaders can cry to the TV cameras about how Israel is bombing these densely populated areas and where they really, really hope that civilians die.

Real leaders would have demolished these camps decades ago and told UNRWA that their services are no longer needed because Palestinians are a proud people who take care of their own. Leaders whose main goal is the end of Israel would grasp any opportunity to make Israel look bad - and therefore they keep so many residents miserable in camps where terrorists build huge caches of explosives near children's bedrooms.

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What are Israel's options on Hezbollah's clear aggression on Israeli territory?

From The Cradle:

Washington is urging the Lebanese government to pressure Hezbollah into removing an outpost erected in the occupied Shebaa Farms, Israeli media reported on 29 June.

Walla news outlet cited anonymous Israeli and US officials as saying that the outpost represents a “miscalculation on Hezbollah’s part, which does not take into account the potential Israeli response. Therefore, this incident has the potential for serious escalation.”

“Our goal is for the outpost not to be there. We prefer Hezbollah evacuate its people itself over us bombing them. We have made this clear to the US, and the Americans made it clear to the Lebanese,” the report cites an Israeli official as saying.

According to Walla, Hezbollah began erecting the first tent in April. The Israeli army reportedly did not realize this until a second tent had been set up.

Israel tried to handle the situation “under the radar in quiet talks” with UNIFIL for weeks.

Other Israeli media outlets say Tel Aviv set a deadline to remove the tents, and that it would deal with the resistance group “on its own,” sparking fears of a wider confrontation.

Beirut has acknowledged that the outpost is south of the UN-recognized Blue Line, separating Lebanese and Israeli territories.

Last week I wrote, "Israeli territory is being stolen by a terrorist group. It seems unbelievable that Israel would outsource the solution to the impotent UN."

It appears that Israel is treading carefully, not wanting to start a war over this but not willing to back down.

It first gave UNIFIL a chance to get involved and do its job to ensure that all of Southern Lebanon, let alone Israeli territory, is not occupied by an Iranian militia. Israel informed UNIFIL of the tents in April, but they have proven to be worthless:

According to Kan news, which originally reported on the Iranian proxy’s armed presence inside Israel proper, the IDF approached UNIFIL regarding the matter some time ago, but the watchdog only came to the site following diplomatic pressure from Israel at UN Headquarters.
Upon inspection, UNIFIL confirmed that tents set up and manned by Hezbollah have indeed been established on the Israeli side of the internationally recognized Blue Line in the contested Mount Dov region, an area claimed by Israel, Lebanon and Syria and also known as the Shebaa Farms.
In a letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the UN Security Council, Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan wrote that Hezbollah’s actions constitute a violation of UN Resolution 1701, enacted following the end of the Second Lebanon War in 2006 and ratified by both countries. The resolution calls for armed groups besides the official Lebanese military and UNIFIL to remain north of the country’s Litani River.
The letter also contained photographs of the Lebanese position in Israel.
Furthermore, the former public security minister noted that Hezbollah has built 27 outposts along the Blue Line over the past year, and that he expects the UN to take action on the matter, as these positions also violate Resolution 1701.

So now Israel is asking France and the US demand that the Lebanese government get involved.

Israel is trying to allow Hezbollah to "climb down the tree" quietly without being shamed, but patience is running out:

“Our goal is for the outpost not to be there,” an Israeli official was quoted as saying. “We prefer Hezbollah evacuate its people itself over us bombing them. We have made this clear to the US and the Americans made it clear to the Lebanese.”

According to the Ynet news site, Israeli officials believe UN peacekeepers will not be able to act against the post and are looking to the US and France instead. The outlet claimed Israeli officials had set a deadline for the position to be removed, after which it will get rid of the tents itself, a move that could spark a wider conflagration.

Alma Research, which watches Hezbollah closely, believes that the terror group wants a war.

In our assessment, Hezbollah intends to reach an escalation that will lead to a broad military conflict with Israel, out of an internal interest in strengthening its power in Lebanon. Hezbollah is trying to escalate with a defiant presence on the border, the Megiddo attack, firing rockets, and now the placing of tents on Israeli territory. Israel for the time being is not dragged in. Last summer, Nasrallah gave ideological and religious approval for a military conflict and as far as Hezbollah is concerned, he has carried out significant power-building in recent years and is ready for a conflict. Continued provocations or a broad conflict is a win-win for Hezbollah.

The strategy is Iranian, not Lebanese

I believe that Israel's best card to play is the Lebanese people itself. While they hate Israel, they hate Hezbollah and Iran as well, and they do not want to be dragged into a new conflict that only benefits Iran.

The Lebanese media has been muted in this issue. I believe that unless Hezbollah dismantles the tents quickly, Israel should publicly say - but with the intent that the Lebanese hear - that the situation is intolerable and that Israel will bomb the tents on Israeli territory.

Israel should make a public deadline, announce the date that the tents would be bombed, emphasize that these are on Israeli territory, and then bomb them if they are not removed.

Israel must emphasize that it has no intention of attacking Lebanon - unless attacked first. If Hezbollah responds with rockets, the gloves will come off.

The UN agrees where the Blue Line is so Hezbollah's claim that the territory is Lebanese will not impress more residents.

If the Lebanese people publicly call for Hezbollah to withdraw, it would have a hard time pretending that it is defending Lebanese interests.

The entire Shebaa Farms issue is just an excuse by Hezbollah to maintain its massive arsenal for the pretense of "defending Lebanon." Everyone knows it is a joke. But Lebanese lives are in the balance, and it must be made clear to the world that Iran and its Hezbollah proxy are trying to start a war that would only hurt the Lebanese people.

It is clear that Israel cannot allow an enemy to wantonly grab its land. No state would. Israel's patience so far has been somewhere between heroic and foolhardy.

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Thoughts on the burning of the Quran in Sweden

On Wednesday, an Iraqi immigrant to Sweden tore up and burned a Quran after receiving permission to do so as an act of protest, A Swedish court ruled that burning the Quran was a legal expression of free speech and the police gave a permit for the action.

In response, the Muslim world is seething. Many Muslim-majority countries lodged protests against Sweden, and there were riots in Iraq as protesters attempted to break into the Swedish embassy.

In 1976, on Yom Kippur eve, a group of Arab youths - fueled by a false rumor that Jews had torn Qurans - stormed through the synagogue at the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron and tore up numerous Hebrew holy books as well as several handwritten Torahs which were ripped to shreds.

The desecration of the Torah is much, much worse than tearing or ripping a printed Quran. The best analogy to a ripped Quran would be to a torn up Chumash, a mass printed version of the Torah; tearing up a Torah is more like tearing up a handwritten Quran manuscript.

And Jewish prayer books, chumashim and other holy books are desecrated by Palestinian Arabs much more often than you know.

In 2007, I visited Samuel's Tomb in Israel, unaware that Arabs had rampaged through there the previous Friday night, tearing prayer books, heavily damaging the Torah ark and stealing a Torah.

Nearly all Israeli media ignored this incident. Because Arabs desecrating Jewish holy books and sites is simply not worth mentioning.

It was hardly a unique occurrence.

Also in 2007, Arabs burned down a synagogue near Doled, destroying Torah scrolls.

In 2009, Arabs raided a yeshiva in Homesh and destroyed many volumes of Chumash and Talmud.

In 2012, Arab youths were caught trying to burn books of Psalms at the Mount of Olives.

Holy books at the Tomb of Joseph have been destroyed by Arabs more than once.

Prayer books were burned in an attack at a Gush Etzion synagogue in 2016.

In May, 2021, Arabs torched synagogues in Lod.

In 2022, Arabs burned a Jewish center in Harasha and destroyed many holy books.

When has the Muslim world condemned these incidents against holy Jewish books - equivalent or far worse than the desecration of one of hundreds of millions of printed Qurans?

They haven't, and this weakens their pretense of outrage. If you demand that people respect your holy objects, then at a minimum you should do the same.

The Muslim outrage over Sweden is not about their disgust at a holy book being desecrated. It is an expression of Islamic supremacy.

They want the entire world to adhere to Muslim laws against blasphemy and that everyone should enshrine Islamic laws against destroying the Quran. These protests are just as much political as they are expressions of popular anger: they send a message that unless the West acts as Muslims demand, they can expect violence.

Any attempts to impose Muslim mores or beliefs on the world must be opposed wholeheartedly. It is an attack on everyone's freedom.

_____________________________________

That being said, Sweden's legal ruling allowing the burning was wrong.

From the narrow perspective of freedom of expression, yes, burning a Quran - just like burning a flag - is valid and should not be illegal. But there is another, far more important issue here.

The deliberate burning of the Quran is a hate crime. It was meant not as a message of freedom but as a direct attack on the sensibilities of Muslims worldwide. It was not an expression of criticism of Islam but an expression of hate against Islam and Muslims, by an apparent ex-Muslim.

And Sweden does have hate crime laws.

The Swedish Penal Code, chapter 16, section 8, says:

A person who, in a disseminated statement or communication, threatens or expresses contempt for a national, ethnic or other such group of persons with allusion to race, colour, national or ethnic origin or religious belief shall, be sentenced for agitation against a national or ethnic group to imprisonment for at most two years or, if the crime is petty, to a fine. (Law 1988:835)

The deliberate burning of a Quran is an expression of contempt for believing Muslims. As such, it should be illegal - and so should the deliberate burning of Jewish holy books.

The protester could make the same point by burning a photo of a Quran. Destroying symbols of a religion or other protected group is criticism; destroying actual objects of importance to those groups is hate.

That is where the line should be drawn between freedom of expression and purposeful hate.

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The Palestinian Authority has its own law to severely restrict all NGOs - and no one reports about it

Cover of PCHR's "Annual Reprot" [sic]

Remember the huge amount of outrage last year when Israel shut down the offices of seven PFLP-linked NGOs? It was condemned by the UN, political leaders and human rights groups.

Well, buried in the Palestinian Center of Human Rights 2022 annual report we see something that didn't generate a single headline in the West.

This year witnessed further restrictions, including the amendment to the non-profit companies’ regulation upon a decision issued by the Palestinian Cabinet, which imposed excessive restrictions on the work and funding of non-profit companies, under the pretext of fighting terrorism.

Issuance of the Non-Profit Companies Regulation No. (20) of 2022

The Palestinian Cabinet issued a new regulation on non-profit companies, which includes many restrictions on the work and funding of these companies, which is one of the forms of the right to freedom of association in Palestine. This regulation, which was published in the issue 194 of the Palestinian Gazette on 25 September 2022, included serious restrictions that threaten the existence of CSOs registered as non-profit companies.

The new regulation, which has replaced the old one in force since 2010 and the cabinet’s decision attached to it in 2016 concerning the funding of non-profit companies, came to add more restrictions on the right to form non-profit companies, as the old regulation included many restrictions. The regulation was issued under the pretext of fighting terrorism and money laundering.

More arbitrary measures were imposed by the authorities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip on associations, threatening the associations’ right to exist, practice its activities freely, and obtain funding. Most of them fully violate the fundamental rights relevant to the freedom of association, including their right to existence, free performance of activities, receipt of funds and the right to privacy and independence. Also, increased restrictive measures are imposed on the associations in the Gaza Strip due to the double restrictions imposed by the two authorities in Gaza and the West Bank.

So the PA and Hamas are also restricting NGO activity. They are also claiming that they are doing this to fight "terrorism" which is as ironic as it gets.

The Palestinian law includes a provision that the NGOs must operate in line with the plan of action of the relevant Palestinian government ministries, meaning that the takes away all independence for the NGOs. There are many other onerous provisions.

But no one has a problem with this. I couldn't find any article in Western news media that discussed this topic exclusively.

Palestinian human rights violations are simply not reported. Because if they would be, then the entire lucrative industry of anti-Israel reporting would collapse.

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Document at UNRWA site admits UNRWA's definition of "refugee" is not valid in international law

The UN Human Rights Council issued a document last week by its reliably anti-Isrsel team of "experts" demanding that Palestinian "refugees" have the right to "return" under international law.

Right of return of Palestinian refugees must be prioritised over political considerations: UN experts

2022 marked the largest ever increase in the number of forcibly displaced persons worldwide, with over 108 million people across the globe uprooted from their homes, more than half are women and girls....

This reality is all too familiar for the Palestinian people, 75 years since the Nakba - the event that shattered Palestinian lives and severed their ancestral connection to their land during the establishment of the State of Israel. Since then, they have endured forced displacement, dispossession, and disenfranchisement, with their rights to self-determination, restitution, and compensation repeatedly denied. For 75 years, their cry for justice, embodied in the demand for the right to return, has resounded with unwavering determination.

For Palestinians, forced displacement has become part of their life for generations, tracing back to 1947-1949 when over 750,000 Palestinians were forced to flee massacres and mass expulsions and forcible transfers during the birth of the State of Israel. The majority, along with their descendants, are still in neighbouring Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, while 40 per cent of them remain under occupation in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, since 1967. Progressively, Palestinian exile has scattered them across various nations globally.

Since 1948, both the General Assembly and the Security Council have consistently called upon Israel to facilitate the return of Palestinian refugees and provide reparations. Despite these repeated appeals, Palestinian refugees have been systematically denied of their right to return and forced to live in exile under precarious and vulnerable conditions outside the borders of Palestine.

The thing is, even the UN admits that these Palestinian Arabs are not legally considered refugees.

The UNHCR's Refugee Survey Quarterly in 2010 has an article by Riccardo Bocco, a professor at the University of Geneva, looking at the history of UNRWA. It is hosted at the UNRWA website, today. ASnd it admits what we have been writing here for years: the UNRWA working definition of "Palestine refugee" has nothing to do with international law.

In looking at who is a Palestinian refugee, there is no definitive response. The definition and the number of Palestinian refugees can differ according to the approach (administrative, juridical, political) used to define Palestinian refugees and also according to the social context of interaction between Palestinians (registered refugees or not) and others and the actors defining them. UNRWA, particularly at the beginning of its mandate, lacked a fixed definition; this changed mainly due to a need to delimit the number of relief recipients. When the Agency began its activities, it inherited a legacy of inflated registration: the United Nations Economic Survey Mission recorded approximately 720,000 people, while the number of recipients on the ration rolls of the United Nations Relief for Palestine Refugees (UNRPR) surpassed 950,000. It is the 1952 definition that has become the accepted one and has remained virtually unchanged: “a Palestine refugee shall mean any person whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the period June 1, 1946 to May 15, 1948, and who lost both home and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 conflict”.

Some remarks should be noted.... [T]he descendants of original registered refugees inherited UNRWA’s administrative title independently of the fact that they may have obtained a nationality and/or left the Agency’s fields of operation.

It is important to emphasize that the UNRWA definition of a Palestine refugee is an administrative one and does not translate directly into recognition by international law. Furthermore, a tacit understanding seems to prevail: UNRWA’s continued existence (and the associated Palestine refugee status) is directly linked to the realization of a permanent resolution to the Palestine refugee issue.

Four crucial facts are listed here:

1. Over 30% of the original "refugee" population UNRWA registered were not refugees, and took that status illicitly. They have never been purged.

2. The UNRWA definition of "refugee" is administrative, not legal, and has nothing to do with the legal definition of refugee under international law and the Refugee Convention.

3. UNRWA "refugees" and their descendants are still considered "registered refugees" even if they move away from UNRWA areas, even if they obtain citizenship elsewhere - not only Jordan but also EU countries and the US. This is a truly absurd situation that is impossible for any real refugee; it is axiomatic that one cannot be a refugee while simultaneously being a citizen of a state. But millions of Palestinians are. So we have an absurd situation where American multi-millionaire supermodels (whose father's family voluntarily walked away from their home in Safed in 1948) are still considered "Palestine refugees."

4. UNRWA has a conflict of interest between staying in business and a sane definition of "refugee." . This is a major reason why it does not have any cessation clauses as UNHCR does. "Palestine refugees" are forever.

All of these facts are damning,. And they are on UNRWA's own website, today.

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The horrors of Ramallah's and Gaza's "occupation" in TikTok videos

Here is a TikTok video, via the incomparable Imshin, unfortunately not translated, from an Egyptian tourist visiting Ramallah. He's mostly complaining about the high prices of everything from groceries to gasoline, claiming it is the most expensive Arab city in the world, even more than cities in the Gulf.

But the luxury he shows is commensurate with the expenses.

He features luxury mansions and apartments, the construction constantly going on, and the gorgeous Birzeit University (2:50) as well as the large amount of empty space and breathtaking scenes of the hills surrounding Ramallah.

This is luxury that Egyptians only see on TV. And it is all under "occupation."

This is a slight detour from Imshin's usual beat of showing "The Gaza You Don't See" such as this video posted also today of a luxury Gaza holiday chalet that can be rented .

Somehow, these parts of Ramallah and Gaza City have escaped the attention of the hundreds of western reporters on the scene. You never see these scenes from Reuters, CNN and the New York Times.

(h/t Yoel)

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Islamic Jihad military camp for kids: "Fighting the Jews is an act of worship"

It is summer, and that means that Hamas and Islamic Jihad are proudly parading photos of their violating the war crime of recruiting child soldiers, calling it "summer camp."

These pictures from an Islamic Jihad "Revenge of the Free" training camp are not ambiguous.

This is a war crime.

As the ICRC says,

The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child differentiates between States and non-State armed groups in setting the age-limit for recruitment and use in hostilities. For States, the age limit for direct participation in hostilities and for compulsory recruitment is 18. This means they can accept voluntary enlistment of persons between the ages of 15 and 18. Armed groups, on the other hand, are bound by a stricter prohibition, affecting both voluntary and compulsory recruitment of under-18s.

There are no photos of the kids engaging in sports, playing games or otherwise having fun. Calling this a "summer camp" is a joke. It is a military training camp for kids. And Islamic Jihad makes this clear in their recruitment video:

Not only that, but Islamic Jihad freely admits that the targets of the weapons the children learn to use are Jews. Islamic Jihad official Darwish al-Gharabli said, "These camps qualify the generation to carry the banner after this generation, part of which has been martyred; it also establishes a generation that is aligned with the path of jihad and resistance; believing in this option and that Palestine is the central issue and fighting the Jews is an act of worship."

The UN and its agencies, and Defense for Children International Palestine, and other "human rights" NGOs are curiously uninterested in this incitement to violence and these violations of children's human rights and international law

It's just another "Palestine exception" where Palestinians are exempt from the laws and rules for the rest of the world.

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The double standard: Only Palestinians are allowed to be angry

There is a subtext behind all reporting out of Israel. This subtext is both bigoted against Arabs and antisemitic at its core - at the same time. And it is a subtext that is accepted not only by the media but by many Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs as well.

The unwritten rule of all media coverage is that only Arabs are allowed to be angry. Only Arabs are allowed to act irrationally. Only Arabs gain sympathy for reacting to things that upset them with violence.

After every terror attack, without fail, the terror groups and Palestinian apologists say as a chorus, "This attack was a natural reaction to their suffering at the hands of Israelis."

Yet when Jews act with 10% of the irrationality and anger that the Palestinians are expected to act with all the time, it is proof that there is something deeply wrong with the Jews.

From Times of Israel:

Israeli settler vigilantes tore through several Palestinian towns in the West Bank following a deadly shooting attack on a nearby settlement Tuesday night, setting cars and fields on fire, vandalizing homes and terrorizing residents in a grim repeat of an incident some termed a pogrom earlier this year.

Palestinians in Luban a-Sharqiya, Huwara, Beit Furik, Burin and other towns south of Nablus in the northern West Bank said carloads of settlers rampaged through the villages Tuesday night, hurling stones and setting cars, fields, homes and other property ablaze.

Three Israelis were arrested over the attacks, Israel’s Ynet news reported.

The rampage was set off by an attack hours earlier in which two Palestinian gunmen opened fire on a hummus restaurant and gas station in the settlement of Eli, killing four people, including two 17-year-old boys, and injuring four others.

I want to be crystal clear: these vigilante actions are wrong and should be condemned.

But both Jews and Palestinian Arabs should be judged the same way. When Palestinians riot, it is just as wrong as when Jews riot. When Palestinians attack civilians, it is just as wrong as when Jews attack civilians. While Jews are expected to hold themselves to a higher standard and not attack random Palestinians, Palestinians should be held to the exact same standard and not excused when they attack random Jews.

Anything else is bigotry - bigotry that says that Arabs are naturally violent, and bigotry that says Jews must not show anger when their friends are murdered.

When Jews get targeted and murdered by Palestinians, the media shows lots of photos of crying Jews at the funeral. When a Palestinian dies and Jews are blamed, it shows angry crowds. Jews are expected to rise above such base emotions as anger and vengeance while Arabs are not.

Double standards for Jews and for Palestinians is bigotry, by definition. It is a bigotry that is embraced by the media as well as by Palestinians and terror supporters who justify every terror act, no matter how heinous, as natural and acceptable and part of a "cycle of violence." . And to an extent Israelis are guilty of it as well, priding themselves on being on a different moral plane than Palestinians are. For the most part, that is true, but that attitude also helps keep the status quo of Palestinians being expected to act like animals.

Both sides should be expected to act morally and according to the law. Neither side should target civilians, ever. Neither side should celebrate the deaths of innocents on the other side (and only one side ever does that.) And each side should strive to always be better, to improve, to be more moral.

It is up to the players themselves to choose to act morally, to rise above the desire for blind vengeance. It is not for the world to impose one set of morality on one side and a completely different set of standards, or no standards whatsoever, on the other.

By the same token, it is human to get angry when something truly outrageous occurs, and Jews have that right as much as Palestinians do. Chanting "Death to Arabs" is unacceptable, but "Death to Hamas" is appropriate. It is antisemitic to insist that Jews react to Palestinian atrocities with nothing but coolness, logic and restraint.

All of this should be obvious. But the reality is that expectations are very different for the two sides. The world tolerates and encourages this bigotry, and the violence is partially a result of these double standards. The Western world, by accepting Palestinian irrationality as normal, encourages more terror.

Judge everyone equally. Be more critical of the side that acts with less regard for human life and that literally celebrates death.

Why is that such a difficult concept?

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Antisemitic Grand imam of Al-Azhar tells UN Security Council how to be tolerant

Egypt’s Grand Imam of Al-Azhar mosque, Sheikh Ahmed Al-Tayeb, spoke at the UN Security Council Wednesday about the importance of "human fraternity," tolerance and mutual respect in achieving world peace.

The UN summarizes his statement:

Ahmed Al-Tayeb, Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Al-Sharif and Chairman of the Muslim Council of Elders, rejected claims that Islam is a religion of the sword or war, insisting that war is only acceptable for self-defence. Urging the international community to move away from pointless conflicts, he noted tragedies caused by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In Syria, Libya and Yemen, ancient civilizations have been destroyed, and these lands have become battlegrounds forcing their people to flee. Highlighting efforts made by religious leaders to promote human fraternity, he said Al-Azhar Al-Sharif aims to identify shared responsibilities in addressing climate change and the escalating wars.

Tayeb actually spoke for about 12 minutes, and even when addressing the UN on tolerance, he proved his own intolerance. As he railed against wars in Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan, he added, "I am talking about my sanctities and your sanctities in Palestine, and the arrogance of power and the cruelty of the tyrant" - implying that Israel is violating Muslim and Christian holy places in Jerusalem. He deliberately excluded Jews when he said "your sanctities" in Jerusalem, saying - for those willing to listen to his words carefully - that Jews walking on their holiest site are "tyrants."

To this UN icon of tolerance, Jews do not have any rights to their holy places in Jerusalem - only Muslims and Christians.

Tayeb also insisted that violence is the exception and not the rule in Islam, and that Muslims only wage war for good reasons - self defense, land, and honor. No one will dare point out that waging a war for "honor" goes against what the UN stands for. And no one will point out that every Arab war waged on Israel was for "honor" far more than for "defending Palestinians" or "land."

This is only the hypocrisy within his speech. Tayeb has, in the past, shown his intolerance and rabid antisemitism in other contexts. You can trace over the past ten years how he switched from publicly railing against Jews to changing the term to "Zionists."

In 2013, Tayeb was not so careful to distinguish between Zionists and Jews. He said, "See how we suffer today from global Zionism and Judaism, whereas our peaceful coexistence with the Christians has withstood the test of history. Since the inception of Islam 1,400 years ago, we have been suffering from Jewish and Zionist interference in Muslim affairs. " He then went on to justify antisemitism with Quranic verses, and then said that people were justified in hating Jews because of their arrogance and behavior.

Tayeb soon changed his lyrics, but not his tune. In 2018, while claiming that there is no antisemitism in the Muslim world, he blamed all intra-Arab fighting and violence on the "Zionists," saying that they were behind all Muslim strife, and that if it wasn't for them the Arab world would be progressing. He then added that the Jews - sorry, "Zionists" - intended to march into Mecca and Medina and take over the holy mosques there.

This is classic antisemitism with a word switch.

The hypocrisy doesn't end there.

And while he emphasized to the UN Wednesday that the Quran says "there is no compulsion in religion," in 2016 he emphasized that Islamic apostates who refuse to repent should be killed.

This is who the UN chose as the Muslim representative of tolerance and fraternity.

If he was Christian or Jewish, the media would be digging under rocks to find anything negative to say about him, and any hypocrisy would be gleefully reported. But the media that saw this broadcast is still hiding the antisemitism and intolerance he said within his speech at a UN Security Council meeting on...tolerance and fraternity.

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Demolitions of thousands of Arab family homes aren't reported on @CNN or the @NYTimes

From The New Arab, May 26:

Residents in the Egyptian town of Al-Arish have expressed anger over security forces demolishing their homes to make way for a new port in the Suez Canal.

In videos shared by activists online, men, women and children can be seen visibly distressed while protesting against the destruction of their homes in the city's Al-Mina district.

The Sinai Foundation for Human Rights NGO said that Egyptian security forces launched a campaign to demolish homes in Arish in March this year despite residents' protests, according to Al-Jazeera Mubasher.

The group's director, Ahmed Salem, also stated that at least 20,000 people are impacted by the ongoing home demolitions.

Many residents who gave up their homes had complained that they were not adequately compensated despite promises, while others were at risk of homelessness due to insufficient funds to rent other properties, the NGO added.

Additionally, many handed over ownership of their homes due to pressure from security forces, while a number of homes were destroyed before compensation was even offered, leaving many homeless.

It is truly a shame that these people don't have the fortune of having their homes bulldozed by Israel. If they had, there would be crowds of reporters, dozens of NGOs interviewing them, and UN resolutions condemning the destruction.

But their homes are being destroyed by Egypt, so the world doesn't really care.

Egypt has been destroying thousands of homes for years - and given lots of different reasons.

These are said to be so Egypt can build new ports. In 2022, the reason was for Egypt to build new shopping malls and entertainment centers. From 2013-2021 the official reason was for security in the North Sinai.

No one is questioning those reasons. After all.....the Egyptian government isn't Jewish.

(h/t Andrew)

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This two year old Palestinian boy was brutally murdered. There will be no mention of it in the NYT or by NGOs.

There was a heinous crime in Gaza this weekend.

A two and a half year old child, Mustafa Nahed Muhammad Saqr, was drowned in a barrel of water.

His stepmother admitted to the murder. She was jealous that she couldn't have children of her own so she decided to murder her husband's child to avoid that feeling of shame. It was a twist on honor killing.

There were reports in Gaza media on Friday when it appeared to be an accidental drowning, but now that the mother has confessed, instead of showing more interest in the story, Palestinian media has become mostly silent. I only saw this mentioned in a couple of relatively independent but obscure sites.

Which makes this a double honor crime - one the murder itself, and the other by Palestinian media not wanting to cover a horrific murder because it makes them look bad, and it detracts from the narrative that Israel is the only source of evil in the region.

As of this writing, Defence for Children International Palestine has not mentioned this murder. Chances are they won't. Because they aren't trying to defend Palestinian children's lives - their entire purpose is to demonize Israel.

Western media showed intense interest in the accidental killing of Mohammed Tamimi, who was about the same age as Mustafa when he died last week. Social media erupted with memes and photos of the child, alive and dead. But only the most extreme anti-Israel activists accused Israel of deliberate murder.

Here we have a deliberate murder of a Palestinian child, and Western media will shun the story, a week after they eagerly embraced a story of a Palestinian child tragically but mistakenly killed by Israel.

By any objective standard, the murder of Mustafa is a much more important story.

But there are no objective standards when it comes to media coverage of Palestinians.

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Fatah reiterates support for terror and destroying Israel on anniversary of "naksa"

Palestinians are marking today the 56th anniversary of the "naksa," or "setback" of the Six Day War.

The official Palestinian Wafa news agency published a statement from Fatah for the occasion that showed, yet again, that dominant political party of the PA government and the one led by Mahmoud Abbas officially supports terrorism and the destruction of all of Israel.

The Palestinian National Liberation Movement Fatah affirmed that it will continue the struggle with greater persistence and determination until we sweep away the abhorrent Israeli occupation from our pure land, and from our great Palestinian people.

In a statement issued by the Commission for Information, Culture and Intellectual Mobilization, on the 56th anniversary of the setback, Fatah confirmed that international law and the United Nations Charter give our people every right to resist the occupation army, settlements, and all policies of expansion and Judaization.

She explained that the response to this aggression paved the way for the launch of the second Palestinian revolution, as a response to the defeat, and an affirmation of the Palestinian people’s insistence that they will not kneel, will not surrender, and will continue their struggle until the end of the occupation.

She pointed out that all forms of Judaization, settlement, and changing the geographical and historical features of Palestine, and the Judaization of Jerusalem and the Islamic and Christian sanctities, are illegal acts, and our people will confront them with all forms of resistance until the occupation and its repercussions leave our land, stressing that everything that resulted from this occupation is void and illegitimate. demise.....

Fatah pledged to the masses of our people, our Arab nation, and all the free people of the world that it will continue to follow the path of the righteous martyrs and heroic prisoners, and its resolve will not soften, no matter the sacrifices, until the great Palestinian people achieve their freedom and independence on their entire national territory.

When Fatah uses the word "occupation" they are referring to all of Israel. That last sentence makes this clear - the goal is not and never was a state in the territories but to destroy Israel. And the means to do that includes "all forms of resistance" which includes terror, which they honor by calling terrorists "righteous martyrs and heroic prisoners."

Notably, the 1964 PLO charter - the one that says that they have no territorial designs on the West Bank and Gaza - refers to all of Israel before 1967 as "occupation."

And I again urge you to read the official current Fatah platform of 2009 - after Oslo - that explicitly supports terror and "liberating the homeland" which it defines as including all of Israel.

Western media, pundits and politicians simply refuse to accept that when the Palestinians say "resistance" they mean terror, when they say "occupation" they mean all of Israel, and when they say "liberate the homeland" they mean destroy the Jewish state. They continue to cling to the myth of a moderate Palestinian leadership that accepts Israel's right to exist when their doubletalk is obvious in Arabic.

Their logo includes a map of all of Israel, a hand grenade, a bayonet and a machine gun. They are telling the world their goal and their preferred means to that goal. It is nothing less than willful blindness to pretend that they want peace and that they accept the existence of Israel in any borders.

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As Arabs celebrate, Egyptian media completely silent on their policeman murdering three IDF soldiers yesterday

On Saturday, in a well-planned attack, an Egyptian policeman crossed over the border to Israel and murdered three IDF soldiers before being killed himself.

While Arabic-language media is reporting widely on this incident, and Palestinian media and social media is jubilant over the attack, there is not a word about it in any major Egyptian media.

The only passing mention I could find is in the English-language Daily News Egypt, which reported without skepticism the statement of the Egyptian army spokesman, a statement that has nothing to do with reality.

The statement said, “A security forces member, in charge of securing the international border line, breached on Saturday morning the security barrier and opened fire while chasing drug smugglers on the borders, which led to the death of three members of the Israeli forces and the injury of two others. The Egyptian security personnel was also shot dead....Appropriate legal measures will be taken based on the findings. Our condolences go out to the families of the deceased. We wish a speedy recovery to the injured.”

That same spokesman later tweeted, "Lieutenant General / Mohamed Zaki, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Minister of Defense and Military Production, made a phone call to the Israeli Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant, to discuss the circumstances of today's accident, offer condolences to the victims of the accident on both sides, and joint coordination to take the necessary measures to prevent the recurrence of such incidents. these incidents in the future."

Yes, the Egyptian army offered condolences on the Egyptian murderer, calling him a victim.

There is no condemnation of the incident. They are officially calling it an "accident" and making up a story about the murderer chasing drug smugglers into Israeli territory, a complete lie.

Arabic-language tweeters celebrated the attack in the responses to this tweet, as well as elsewhere all over social media. They have been spreading fake photos of what they say was the attacker and his gun. (The attacker's name has not been released.)

This is why you simply cannot trust Arabic media nor official statements from most Arab officials. Between official censorship and blatant disregard for the truth, they are all simply propaganda outlets.

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