Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Monday, November 19, 2012

Yes, the IDF is the most moral army in the world

It has been difficult to determine the ratio of terrorists to civilians being killed in Gaza. Certainly through Saturday there were more terrorists killed than civilians, it appears that this morning the ratio may be about the same (although this Reuters article uses the more vague term "non-combatants" and the number of dead who are males of military age still seem to be higher than those of women, children and the elderly.)

It is hard to tell; since Gaza authorities are notorious liars and some lists of the dead include those killed by Hamas rockets.

The terrorist websites seem to have all agreed to not identify mujahadeen being killed as they did in the early days of the operation. We saw this in Cast Lead as well, as the public relations advantage of pretending that Israel is perpetrating "massacres" outweighs the normal lionization of brave fighting "martyrs." Some Arab media will say that Israel targeted a "civilian car" without noting that the people inside were leaders of Islamic Jihad.

What we don't know at all, and may never know, is the number of civilians who were killed by errant Hamas rockets and by secondary explosions of terrorist ammunition and weapons caches.

PCHR, notorious for not distinguishing between members of terror groups and civilians but somewhat honest in their descriptions of how people died, has not updated their statistics since Saturday.

It appears though that the ratio of civilians to militants to is still about 1:1, about what it was during Cast Lead. The IDF claims 1:2 this morning.

For all the gruesome photos of dead people and sick photo-ops in Gaza hospitals with babies, it is a remarkable ratio for wartime, especially in urban areas that house legitimate targets. This is far better than the ratio of civilian to militant deaths in Afghanistan, in a far more rural environment. Outside of Cast Lead, it is essentially an unprecedented achievement.

Even more amazing is that there have been over 1000 Israeli strikes in Gaza since Wednesday, and the number of civilian deaths is still less than 50. If anyone needs proof that Israel is not targeting civilians, this is irrefutable.

It needs to be stressed that Israel has zero incentive to kill civilians, and in fact has every reason to avoid killing civilians. The hyperbole about bloodthirsty Israelis and "genocide" and "massacres" is just propaganda.

Unfortunately, the media rarely looks at context, and photos of injured people - real or imagined - is where the ratings are.

It is still notable that the Arab side gleefully shows videos of Israelis panicking during missile strikes and Israelis grieving over their losses. Video clips made by the mainstream media, meant to humanize Israeli victims of rocket attacks, are being shown by Arab websites to gloat. Even the regular Arab audience loves to see terrorized Israelis.

One side sends warnings to save civilians, the other sends warnings to terrorize them. One grieves when the other sides loses innocents, the other cheers.

This is the real difference between the two sides - one side really wants to attack civilians and cause terror, and the other wants to avoid it as much as humanly possible.

Iran denies sending Fajr-5s to Hamas, while Islamic Jihad brags about them

From Iran's Fars News:

Chairman of the Iranian Parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi strongly rejected the Zionist regime's allegations that Iran has supplied Hamas with 'Fajr 5' (Dawn 5) rockets, saying the resistance does not need Iranian rockets.

The Islamic Republic of Iran's Supreme Leader has always stressed that "Iran withholds no assistance to the resistance", but Iran's support is of "spiritual kind", Boroujerdi told Iran's Arabic-language news channel, Al-Alam on Sunday.

The senior Iranian lawmaker reiterated that the resistance has obtained the required capability, power and self-sufficiency and does not need backup or rockets from other countries.

His remarks came after the Zionist regime and some western experts claimed that rockets launched by the Ezzedeen Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic resistance movement Hamas, to target Israeli cities were Iranian-made.

Hamas has been claiming from the start that the rockets they have sent towards Jerusalem and Tel Aviv were their own design, called M75s.

But Islamic Jihad explicitly says that the rockets they are shooting towards Israeli communities are Fajr-5s.

Note that Iran only said they are not sending Fajr-5s to "Hamas," but nothing about Islamic Jihad.

It is still an open question as to whether the "M75s" are simply painted Fajr-5s or if Hamas - which often sends terrorists to Iran for training - is manufacturing rockets with a 75 km range based on Iranian designs.

Either way, the claim that Iran's support for "the resistance" is of the "spiritual kind" is an obvious lie, since the smuggling routes via Sudan and previous attempts to ship huge amounts of weapons to Gaza via ship are well known.

The Fajr-5 is not accurate but can carry a payload of up to 100 kg of high explosives.

On the webpage of the Nedal Brigades of the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades we see an obituary for Hossam Mohammed Hamdan Zini (who has the nom de guerre of Abu Jandal.)

Zini was apparently a rocket launch specialist who worked closely with the Islamic Jihad Al-Quds Brigades. he was killed on Sunday morning together with Islamic Jihad's Ahmed Hussein Agha.

He had, in the words of the memorial, "completed the task of jihad and, in common with the al-Quds Brigades, rained the settlements of the Zionist enemy with missiles of glory and victory."

Fatah goes on to promise that as a result of Israel killing someone trying to kill Israelis, "there will be will be open war and volcanoes from under the feet of the sons of Zion."

And these are the "moderates."

Hamas war crimes poster (1)

I'm thinking of making this a series of posters. And it would be a pretty long series.

I'm basing it on the Protocol I Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts, 8 June 1977.

There are many, many examples there of Hamas war crimes, as I showed in part in this post.

(While the video is unintentionally hilarious, it is still a direct violation of this international law.)

Let me know what you think.

I just heard CNN retract the story that falsely claimed that an Israeli bomb had killed Mahmoud Sadallah, the child cynically used for a photo-op with Egyptian PM Kandil and Hamas terrorist leader Ismail Haniyeh.

The correction was aired on the Don Lemon program. (Lemon has not been very friendly towards the Israeli narrative from what I can tell).

I had noticed the error yesterday and my research has since been noted in numerous media outlets and websites.

The post went viral with some 16,000 hits so far.

The CNN story is still online, however, without any correction as of yet. Neither has the reporter, Sara Sidner, commented about it on her Twitter timeline, although she has not updated it at all since the story.

As far as I know, the Daily Mirror has not issued a correction.

Earlier, Reuters likewise issued a correction for the many photo captions they had that falsely accused Israel.

Let's hope that the media will be more attuned to the fact that Hamas is endangering the lives of Gazans, not only by using them as human shields but also more directly by exposing them to literally hundreds of rockets that fall short - some 20-30% by some estimates. The knee-jerk assumption that every civilian death in Gaza is the result of an Israeli airstrike will hopefully be significantly impacted by this.

Thanks to all who pushed this story on Facebook and Twitter!

UPDATE: CNN's online retraction is as watered down as possible, buried in the middle of an article:

Israel also said Sunday that it was not to blame for the death of a Palestinian child last week -- a 4-year-old boy whose lifeless body was kissed by Egyptian Prime Minister Hesham Kandil during his visit to a Gaza hospital Friday.

CNN visited the child's home, which neighbors said had been bombed five hours previously. Neighbors and family members told CNN they heard an aircraft before the explosion.

But the Israeli military told CNN on Sunday it did not carry out any airstrikes at the time of the child's death. The IDF said had stopped its attacks for Kandil's visit, raising questions about what caused the fatal blast. One possibility could be the misfire of a Hamas rocket intended for Israel, since CNN's crew in Gaza said it saw two such rockets passing overhead -- apparently fired not far from where the boy lived.

CNN here does not admit that they reported the accusation as fact and still pretends that there is still a good chance that the child and neighbor were killed by an Israeli airstrike. Slightly more accurate; but no indication of regret for a slander.

Israel sends aid to Gaza - while Egypt sends human shields

COGAT, the Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories that is a part of the IDF, allowed 70 truckfuls of medical supplies, cooking gas, food and other goods to enter Gaza via the Kerem Shalom crossing today.

Notably, Kerem Shalom was itself under attack only a couple of days ago.

I simply cannot recall another instance of the target of hundreds of rockets allowing the enemy to receive food and medicine through its own territory, especially when there is a perfectly good crossing available from an ally.

Egypt did send some medical supplies - not as actual aid, but as propaganda as they allowed hundreds of anti-Israel activists - really, human shields - into Gaza to show solidarity with the terrorists.

Egyptian border authorities have allowed 400 political activists to cross into the Gaza Strip to express solidarity with Palestinians, as Israeli airstrikes pounded the coastal enclave for a fifth day, organizers said.

“We want the free world to stop the onslaught on defenseless civilians,” said Mahmoud Ali of the Constitution Party, according to state-owned news agency MENA. “We want to relay to the steadfast Palestinian people the support of all Egyptians.”

“We brought them medical supplies in coordination with the Egyptian Red Crescent,” said activist Amira Sheaishaa.

A five-bus convoy transporting members of several Egyptian parties and political movements arrived at the country's Rafah border crossing with Gaza, officials said.

400 people in five buses would not leave much room for "medical supplies." (Another source said 550 "activists" and eight buses.)

Does anyone think that if Israel was indiscriminately bombing Gaza buildings, the way that the Arab and leftist media portray them, that hundreds of Egyptians would be pouring in to "show solidarity"? No, these "activists" want to do what anti-Israel groups always do in the name of "human rights" - protect terrorist infrastructure from being attacked. They know that the IDF won't target civilians the way Hamas and other Gaza groups do.

The idea of leftist activists traveling to Israel's beleaguered communities in Beersheva, Ashkelon, Ashdod and Kiryat Malachi to "show solidarity" is simply too absurd to imagine.

Israel also allowed patients to travel through the Erez crossing into Israel itself:

It is also notable that Hamas was preventing journalists and other internationals from leaving Gaza for several hours today, as well as last Friday, and Israel freely allowed them to travel.

Arab writers more willing to show their anti-semitism during conflict

One of the interesting consequences of the current fighting is that the carefully-cultivated Arab and Muslim mask of pretending not to be anti-semitic is falling off, and fast.

While usually Arab writers are careful to say that they are only against "Zionists," the amount of naked Jew-hatred has been exploding in the Arabic media in the past couple of days.

Al Watan Voice, which already had a problem distinguishing Jews from Israelis in recent months, went all-out in an article today, calling Israel "the Jewish entity" and even claiming that the emir of Qatar said that the aggression of the Jews "must not go unpunished." (The Emir actually didn't say "Jews.") It ends off with a Quranic entreaty to "fight the Jews."

Ma'an, which tries so hard to appear to be a sober, even-handed news source, has an Arabic op-ed that goes off the rails. The author says that the Jews are too cowardly to fight face-to-face, and that even in 1948 the Jews of Tel Aviv cowered in front of brave Arabs. (Apparently, shooting rockets towards Israeli civilians is the height of bravery.) The writer adds that historically, Jews have felt inferior to others, and have brought strife everywhere they lived.

The theme of Jewish cowardice is further displayed in this Palestine News Network article extolling the "hundred" Hamas rocket experts who are forcing millions of Jews to cower in bomb shelters. They claim that the rockets are "shaking the throne of Israel." The author goes on to say that most of the fighters are waiting in their tunnels to kill the Jews who dare to enter Gaza while the mere hundred rocket launchers are causing so much trouble in Israel.

Islam Today also goes to the Koran to find justification for their anti-Jewish hate.

The Sinai jihadist group that claims to have fired missiles into Israel from Egypt also explicitly notes that their enemy is "the Jews."

And as I posted earlier today, Yusuf Qaradawi explicitly called on Allah to punish the Jews at Al Azhar mosque last Friday.

Sunday links

From Ian:

MFA: Hamas detains foreign journalists in the Gaza Strip

"Hamas is not allowing at least 22 foreign nationals who wish to exit the Gaza Strip for Israel to do so. Among the foreigners being detained are nine Italian citizens, one Canadian, one South Korean, a French national and six journalists from Japan. In addition, two Turkish Red Crescent members have been refused exit.
This violation of the human rights of neutral foreigners is yet another example ofHamas’ attempts to manipulate and pressure the press.
For its part, Israel is keeping the Erez crossing into Gaza open, allowing passage to the foreign press, diplomats and humanitarian workers."

[I want to add that this is not the only way that journalists are effectively being human shields. This great video compilation shows how many of the journalists in Gaza say that they hear rocket launches very nearby where they are reporting from:

-EoZ]

IDF Blog: Pillar Of Defense: Fourth Day Recap VIDEO

Israeli patrol fires back at Syrian troops after being hit by bullet on the Golan
No Israeli troops injured in latest spillover of civil war
[Reports that Syrian soldiers may have been killed - EoZ]

Rupert Murdoch Tweets: “Why Is Jewish Owned Press so Consistently Anti-Israel In Every Crisis?”
He also tweeted: “Can’t Obama stop his friends in Egypt shelling Israel”

UK Prime Minister: Hamas ‘Bears the Principal Responsibility’ for Gaza Conflict

Washington defends Israel, blames Hamas for escalation
‘Israelis have endured far too much of a threat from these rockets for far too long,’ White House spokesman says

HuffPo: Jimmy Carter: "Israelis' Policy Is to Confiscate Palestinian Territory"

Arab MKs honor Gazan victims of IDF operation

“Israel is breaking international law in Gaza, all for the sake of Netanyahu’s election campaign,” MK Zoabi charges.
"Not to be outdone, MK Taleb a-Sanaa’s Arab Democratic Party was addressed by one of the leaders of Hamas via video-conference at a party meeting Saturday. Sanaa was reelected as the party’s representative on United Arab List-Ta’al."

Palestinian Authority warns of chaos in West Bank By Khaled Abu Toameh
Protesters throughout the West Bank call on Hamas's Izzadin Kassam Brigades to "destroy Tel Aviv."

In Hebrew Video Hamas Threatens Renewal of Suicide Bombings Against Israeli Civilians (VIDEO)

“We have missed the suicide [bombs]… wait for us soon in stores, buses and cafes,” promises the video according to a translation from the Jerusalem Post.

[Some of the video is hilarious, with Hebrew being displayed backwards or in reverse order. Israelis are openly laughing at it on YouTube. - EoZ]

Hamas warns Gazans against ‘spreading rumors’ that help Israel
Interior Ministry says government is providing the media with all ‘needed information’

Gaza PM goes into hiding, as several key Hamas military commanders killed
Haniyeh heads underground after command center housing his office is bombed; 11 Hamas activists said killed on Saturday

Russia Today Presenter Accuses Israel of “Terrorism” and “Apartheid” (VIDEO)

CIFWatch: ‘Comment is Free’ contributor: Israeli leaders murder Palestinian children to score electoral points

"The enormity of this smear – a staggering moral inversion which evidently was unchallenged by Guardian editors – is difficult to even fathom."

CAMERA: On U.S. Radio, BBC Reporter Misinforms to Defend Hamas Use of Human Shields

"Danahar then quickly pivots to say that "the key factor here" is the accuracy of Israel’s counter strikes. In other words, according to the BBC journalist, the key factor is not the use of human shields by Palestinian terrorists, nor is the indiscriminate rockets that they fire into Israel, but rather the accuracy of Israeli tank shells."

The "Diversity" of New York Times Op-Ed Page

"It's possible that the newspaper might publish an Op-Ed focused on Hamas's war crimes, or on Israel's need to defend its citizens from incessant rocket attacks. But history shows that if you're waiting for anything coming close to balance on the opinion pages, you'll be waiting in vain."

Workers begin digging up Arafat’s grave ahead of exhumation
Job expected to take two weeks before remains of Palestinian leader can be tested for poisoning

Egypt churches pull out of constitution panel
The Coptic Orthodox church's new pope, Tawadros II, said after his election last week that he would reject a constitution if it imposed a religious state in the Muslim-majority country.

10 Years on, Victim of Arab Terror Coulter Remembered Through NY Street

"She was eating lunch with the students in the cafeteria on Hebrew University’s Mount Scopus campus on July 31, 2002, when the Palestinian bomber struck. Nine people, including Janis, were killed in the blast. More than 80 others were wounded."

Former VP Henry Wallace, Forgotten Zionist, Stars in Oliver Stone’s New TV Series

"After a public outcry, Stone expressed “regret” that he “made a clumsy association about the Holocaust” and acknowledged that “Jews obviously do not control media or any other industry.” He did not, however, withdraw his slur about Israel—a statement which, ironically, would have appalled the hero of his new TV series, Henry Wallace."

The Scattered Tribe: Discovering Remote Jewish Communities

"In his new book, The Scattered Tribe, Frank first embarks on a quest to uncover his familial roots in Russia but then discovers a remote Jewish community on the exotic island of Tahiti. Later travels to India, Vietnam, and Morocco reveal intricate histories of Jewish achievement, tragic purges, and a diverse people’s stubborn endurance throughout the centuries. Frank even manages to infiltrate the communist regime in Cuba, where a suppressed Jewish community struggles to revive in the face of politically imposed atheism."

From The Guardian Teacher Network:

Israel's assassination of Hamas' top military commander this week has triggered fears of a whole new surge of violence in Gaza and the Middle East. The Israeli air strike on the Ahmed al-Jabari's car – which also killed a six-year-old girl and an 11-month old baby – was just the first step in a new Israeli military operation to eliminate militants and weapon sites in the Gaza Strip.

So, this is what UK teachers are telling their students?

Of course, the Jaabari hit not only caused little collateral damage, it was an amazingly little amount of collateral damage. As the rival Telegraph reported:

It was a remarkably successful operation even for Israel's security forces, who pride themselves on their skill at despatching their enemies. Grainy black and white footage taken from a drone showed a minibus full of passengers drive past the target's car to a safe distance, seconds before the missile exploded. A piece of chassis is seen spinning into the air, as the vehicle, in flames, continues drunkenly for a few yards.

Unlike targeted killings in the past, there was no collateral damage except for some minor injuries from flying glass. Israel has learnt the hard way that accidentally killing civilians carries a damaging political cost.

I tweeted to the Guardian and to the columnist about the error many hours ago, but they have yet to correct their slander.

The page also has a set of resources for UK teachers to teach about the Middle East. From the descriptions, they seem to be as biased against Israel as the Guardian itself is, by constructing a framework of history that begins around 1920, disregarding the millennia-old attachment that Jews have to the Land of Israel. When your narrative starts at a time when Jews appear to be new colonialists rather than people returning to their national home, everything else cannot possibly be taught accurately. The next generation of British schoolchildren will grow up with an incorrect understanding of the conflict.

It seems entirely possible that this is exactly what the Guardian wants.

See also CiFWatch.

UPDATE: The page was finally corrected. Another small victory for truth.

Hamas' hilarious video "proof" of shooting down plane

Terror sites have been pushing this video all over the place, claiming that it shows Hamas downing an Israeli plane:

Conveniently, they say that the wreckage fell into the Mediterranean, so they cannot recover it.

Their slow-motion sections show an explosion about one second after launch, so either the plane was really, really low - or their claimed Stinger (really, Strela) missile exploded a few feet above ground.

(Although the explosion seems to occur beneath the missile, so perhaps they just faked an explosion to coincide with the launch.)

(h/t Judge Dan for missile ID)

The delayed Saturday linkdump

Late but still a ton of good stuff.

From Ian:

Some questions for the apologists of Hamas by Douglas Murray

"When Hamas launch rockets from beside a pram with a baby in it – as they do – they know that the Israelis have two options: they must either allow the rocket-launcher to remain in place to fire more rockets into Israel, or they must hit the site and risk killing the baby. For Israel these are two terrible options. For Hamas it is a win-win. If the Israelis do not strike then Hamas can fire more rockets at Israel. If they do hit then Hamas have another dead child they can hold up for the cameras and weep fake tears for. Hamas know that these pictures will travel round the globe and bring the anger of much of the civilised world against Israel. For Hamas, the child is worth it, for the child is a tool of their war."

JPost: Editor's Notes: Israel’s Pillar of Defense

"The primary purpose of Operation Pillar of Defense is to restore Israel’s deterrent capability. The message to Hamas, to the world, and ultimately to ourselves is that terrorist groups can no longer attack us with impunity. The constant firing of thousands of rockets and mortar shells at southern Israel from the Gaza Strip over the past 11 years must finally come to a halt."

IDF counts over 800 Gaza airstrikes, with some 180 early Saturday
Targeting follows Hamas’s unleashing of 500-plus rockets, including unprecedented launchings at Tel Aviv, Jerusalem

Israel under fire - November 2012 (Statistics and Maps).
Since the launching of Israel's anti-terror operation Pillar of Defense on November 14, some 400 rockets have struck Israel, landing in the south and in the greater Tel Aviv area, killing three people in Kiryat Malachi.

IDF Blog: Pillar Of Defense: Third Day Recap (Video)
Fajr 5 - The Hamas Rocket That Threatens Millions of Israelis (Video)

Hamas missile launch pad next to mosque, playground. Civilian factories, gas station also half a block from Fajr-5 firing site.

Pictures of IDF Soldiers mobilising

‘Surprise’ rocket fire at Jerusalem shows Hamas flailing but still seeking to escalate the conflict
Gaza’s Islamists, far from cowed, are pushing to their limits in a bid for ‘an achievement’

Hamas – godless killers by David Horovitz
In firing at Jerusalem, the Islamists underlined that they have no compunction about murdering absolutely anybody

Jerusalemites shaken, not stirred, by ‘surprise’ siren
Shrill air raid alarm follows traditional Sabbath siren, startling residents of the capital; mayor Barkat urges locals to keep calm

Hamas rockets burst the Tel Aviv bubble
The targeting of Israel’s commercial and cultural capital brings reality to the doorstep of the beloved oasis

2 Great Cartoons:
The Times - Targets

Spooner – Gilad

CIFWatch Guardian publishes cartoon showing Israeli leader as puppet master controlling Hague & Blair

Glenn Greenwald criticizes Bibi AND Obama’s “policies” of intentionally killing innocent Muslims

"Those within the mainstream American Left who don’t succumb to the false moral equivalence between Islamist terrorists and Western democracies, and who don’t buy into the defamatory suggestion that Obama is engaged in a war against Islam, should begin to view him as, at the very least, a crank – a shrill and vitriolic anti-Obama extremist."

BBC Watch: BBC’s Jeremy Bowen: “a deliberate escalation by Israel”

"In other words, Bowen wants his audience to go away with the feeling that it is Israel – and Israel alone – which is pushing the entire region to the edge of disaster, rather than the actions of terrorist organisations dedicated to its destruction which commit war crimes against civilians on a daily basis."

Richard Millett: Photos and footage from last night’s anti-Israel and pro-Israel demonstrations in London.

Anti-Israel protesters get aggressive with Sun News (Canada) Video

Protesters chant anti-Semitic slogans outside Rome synagogue
Mass student protests across Italy include clashes and pro-Palestinian slogans in capital’s Jewish Quarter

Kardashian's Prayer for Israel Inspires Hate, Death Threats

AP 'Corrects' Itself Calling Jerusalem Israel's Capital
Yes, the correction was for omitting the "self-declared" capital.

The Return of "Tan Jacket Man": CNN Uses Faked Palestinian 'Casualty' Video in Coverage

BBC to Twitter: Stop Tweets from IDF, Hamas
The BBC took to Twitter to let the world know that it thinks that there is no difference between terrorists and victims.

NY Times: Muslim Brotherhood Morsi Torn over Israel
Once again we see a New York Times trying to portray Israel's enemies as perfectly reasonable actors in the Middle East instead of the genocide-wishing, terror-supporters that they are.

Interpol to restart search for Bulgaria bomber
Second round of searches to focus on finding possible accomplices involved in Burgas blast by sifting through Interpol’s database and seeking help from the public

Get ready for Coptic Christian refugees
Eventually, the refugee crisis inside Egypt will spill over its borders and become an international problem
"Borhamy, a physician as well as one of the top Salafist clerics in Egypt, issued a fatwa stating that Egyptian taxi drivers should not stop for Coptic Priests because they are most likely headed to church where they will commit a sin. He has also ruled that Copts and women cannot hold positions of authority in the Egyptian government. Dr. Borhamy further publicly stated that while he deeply hates Christians he is still capable of treating them justly."

Al Jazeera correspondent supports Hamas killing half a million Jews

Clayton Swisher, Al Jazeera correspondent, reacted to the news that a Hamas rocket landed in Gush Etzion this way on Twitter:

Swisher is seriously claiming that the Geneva Conventions actually give Hamas permission to kill Jews who live in the territories?

Yes, he's been on CNN too.

They say the exact opposite. The very name of the Fourth Geneva Convention is "Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War."

From the viewpoint of the Geneva Conventions, civilians must be protected no matter where they live.

From an ethical and legal viewpoint, there is no difference between shooting a rocket into the middle of a community and blowing yourself up in the middle of a community.

Swisher, however, subscribes to the opinion that not only do Israeli civilians who live in Judea and Samaria have no protections under Geneva, but that Hamas has the obligation to attack them. For Swisher, Hamas' suicide attack spree during the intifada was not only acceptable, but a right!

In other words, a correspondent for a major news organization is openly advocating the murder, by Hamas, of a half million Jews. And he claims that Palestinian terrorists have the right to kill them, under a fictional idea of "legitimate resistance."

Swisher, in one small tweet, shows the world that he is ignorant of international law, a bigot against Jews, and a supporter of terrorism.

In fact, given that Swisher clearly accepts the Hamas terrorist definition of the human right to kill Jews, it is entirely possible that he also accepts Hamas' view that all of Israel is "occupied."

Which means that Swisher really wants to see the murder of six million Jews. And he will defend Hamas' attempts to kill as many of them as they can.

This should be beyond the pale even for Al Jazeera.

Beyond that, this hateful bigot has appeared on CNN. He has written for The Nation and The Guardian as well as fringe sites like Electronic Intifada.

Readers may want to ask other Hamas apologists online whether they agree with Swisher's views of the right to kill Jewish women and children, and ask The Guardian and The Nation if they think that such a person should be writing for them.

Yusuf Qaradawi asks Allah to "deal with" (destroy) the Jews

Video:

As my translator "Al Gharqad" notes:

"Allahuma alayka bil-yahud iz-zalimin il-jairin, Allahuma alayka bil-yahud il-mustakbirin il-mutajabbirin"

This means:
Allah, "alayka bi" the tyrannical and despotic Jews, Allah, "alayka bi" the arrogant and tyrant Jews

"Alayka bi" is a curse, which has no exact English translation. It is a prayer to Allah to do something with the subject of the curse. This "something" has been translated in many different ways:

1. "Take" (as in "kill"):
http://www.ctc.usma.edu/posts/imagery/0020
(second line from top)

2. "Destroy":
http://www.kalamullah.com/qunoot.html
(sixth Arabic paragraph from bottom)

3. "Deal with":
Egyptian President Morsi Joins Preacher in Prayer for Dispersal of the Jews
http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/3614.htm
(0:26)

Either way, he isn't calling for Allah to punish Zionists or Israelis - but Jews.

Qaradawi is perhaps the most popular preacher in the Sunni Muslim world and has famously encouraged suicide bombings.

Dead child cradled by Egypt's PM was killed by Hamas! (UPDATED)

The Mirror (UK) on Friday published this, as did many other newspapers:

Egypt's Prime Minister wept today as he kissed the forehead of a boy killed in an Israeli airstrike on Gaza.

And here is how CNN reported the child's death:

CNN takes it as a given that young Mahmoud Sadallah (Sadhala) was killed by an Israeli airstrike. Only one problem: he was killed by a Hamas rocket that fell short in Gaza. There is a lot of evidence for this. Read the New York Times' account of his death:

The Abu Wardah family woke up on Friday morning to word that a hudna — Arabic for cease-fire — had been declared during the three-hour visit of the Egyptian prime minister to this embattled territory. So, after two days of huddling indoors to avoid intensifying Israeli air assaults, Abed Abu Wardah, the patriarch, went to the market to buy fruits and vegetables. His 22-year-old son, Aiman, took an empty blue canister to be refilled with cooking gas. The younger children of their neighborhood, Annazla, in this town north of Gaza City went out to the dirt alley to kick a soccer ball.

But around 9:45 a.m., family members and neighbors said, an explosion struck a doorway near the Abu Wardah home, killing Aiman Abu Wardah as he returned from his errand, as well as Mahmoud Sadallah, 4, who lived next door and had refused his older cousin’s pleas to stay indoors.

It is unclear who was responsible for the strike on Annazla: the damage was nowhere near severe enough to have come from an Israeli F-16, raising the possibility that an errant missile fired by Palestinian militants was responsible for the deaths. What seems clear is that expectations for a pause in the fighting, for at least one family, were tragically misplaced.

The IDF did not launch any airstrikes in Gaza while Egyptian PM Kandil was in Gaza. AP adds:

Mahmoud Sadallah, the 4-year-old Gaza boy whose death moved Egypt's prime minister to tears, was from the town of Jebaliya, close to Gaza City.

The boy died Friday in hotly disputed circumstances. The boy's aunt, Hanan Sadallah, and his grief-stricken father Iyad — weak from crying and leaning on others to walk — said Mahmoud was killed in an Israeli airstrike. Hamas security officials also made that claim.

Israel vehemently denied involvement, saying it had not carried out any attacks in the area at the time.

Mahmoud's family said the boy was in an alley close to his home when he was killed, along with a man of about 20, but no one appeared to have witnessed the strike. The area showed signs that a projectile might have exploded there, with shrapnel marks in the walls of surrounding homes and a shattered kitchen window. But neighbors said local security officials quickly took what remained of the projectile, making it impossible to verify who fired it.

If it was an Israeli missile, you can be sure that it would have been shown to the media!

Furthermore, PCHR, which is keeping track of everyone killed in Gaza (and which admits that most of the dead have been "militants,") did not list Mahmoud Sadallah or Aiman Aby Wardah in their list of victims of Israeli airstrikes, although they even include one person who died of a heart attack.

Put this together with the fact that Hamas and other terror groups were firing rockets throughout Friday morning while the IDF did not, plus the fact that over 100 rockets have fallen short in Gaza (both using past performance and IDF statistics as proof), and the fact that the shrapnel in the video matches almost exactly the shrapnel damage we have seen from rocket fire into Israel, and it is very clear: this child was killed by Gaza rocket fire, not by Israel.

And every media outlet that irresponsibly assumed that Israel killed him must correct their slander, and also make sure that they don't automatically blame Israel for civilian deaths in the future.

Write to CNN, the Mirror and every other media outlet that published this lie. This war needs all of us to get involved. Every newspaper is on Twitter, and they read their tweets.

(h/t Herb, Diana)

UPDATE: The Telegraph verifies that Sadallah was killed by a Hamas rocket:

But there were signs on Saturday that not all the Palestinian casualties have been the result of Israeli air strikes. The highly publicised death of four-year-old Mohammed Sadallah appeared to have been the result of a misfiring home-made rocket, not a bomb dropped by Israel.

The child’s death on Friday figured prominently in media coverage after Hisham Kandil, the Egyptian prime minister, was filmed lifting his dead body out of an ambulance. "The boy, the martyr, whose blood is still on my hands and clothes, is something that we cannot keep silent about," he said, before promising to defend the Palestinian people.

But experts from the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights who visited the site on Saturday said they believed that the explosion was caused by a Palestinian rocket.

Kudos to the Telegraph for doing real research.

So when will the other media outlets issue corrections?

(h/t Honest Reporting)

UPDATE 2: Reuters has corrected their photo captions blaming Sadallah's death on Israel.

UPDATE 3: CNN retracted it on the air, not yet in cyberspace.

Lebanon's Al Akhbar, a site associated with Hezbollah, reports that Hezbollah is in contact with Hamas to replenish its arsenal of long-range rockets that has been reportedly decimated by Israeli airstrikes.

The report says that on Friday an alert was sounded in the ranks of Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. It was raised towards all those who know how to smuggle weapons from Syria, Lebanon, Iran, Sudan and other countries to the Gaza Strip.

During the first hours of the fighting, there was communication between Hezbollah and the terror factions in Gaza, especially Hamas, to determine the size of the damage done to the stores of long-range missiles. Lebanese and Palestinian terror groups along with the Iranian Revolutionary Guards are working to supply groups in Gaza, in anticipation of a prolonged battle. According to the report, the focus is on the transfer of large amounts of long-range missiles.

Sources told the paper that were emphatic that the supply lines will not stop. Although the efforts to transfer arms to Gaza suffered a major setback as a result of fighting in Syria, which was the main waystation in the operations of arming terror factions since before the outbreak of the second intifada, but the decision of Iran and Hezbollah to continue the flow of weapons is said to be "irreversible."

The article goes through a history of Iran sending weapons to Gaza, and Israel's fight against it, including a string of assassinations against those responsible, such as Ali Deeb (Abu Hassan Salameh), Jihad Ahmed Jibril, Ali Saleh, Ghaleb Awali, Brigadier (in the Syrian army) Mohammed Suleiman, and others. Some Hamas fighters were assassinated in Syria and abroad for this reason as well, not to mention Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, who was (probably) assassinated by Israeli intelligence in Dubai in 2010, and even the assassination of Imad Mughniyeh comes, at least partially, within the framework of the Israeli war on the transfer of arms to Gaza.

Al Akhbar goes on to say that the Iranian Revolutionary Guards has been in contact not only with Hamas but with Islamic Jihad, the PFLP and some factions of the Fatah al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the Salah al-Din Brigades of the PRC and the PFLP-GC. Since 2005, the Iranians have been supplying these groups with all types of weapons that can be transferred: from light and medium weapons, to mortars and medium and long-range rockets, as well as ammunition and materials that can be used for the manufacture of rockets and missiles. The reporter goes on to say that they have also been working on the transfer of hundreds of fighters from Gaza to Syria and Iran, where they underwent training programs on military tactics, and the use of sophisticated weapons, including anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons.

I was reporting about terrorists leaving Gaza to get training in Iran, pretending to only travel for Hajj, in 2007. All in all, this Al Akhbar article seems to accurately reflect the thinking at Hezbollah and Iran.

The big question is whether Egypt will act to stop this weapons smuggling - or encourage it. Egyptian security forces have not been too bad, but Morsi has been signalling a different direction, and his Muslim Brotherhood have been staging anti-Israel protests.

The US must communicate to Egypt immediately that if there is the slightest evidence that they are allowing weapons to be smuggled to Gaza that they will lose their $1.5 billion in aid. This is absolutely critical, and I hope that the White House makes this crystal clear.

(h/t Yoel/Walla)