Israel, Zionism and the Media

Tag: Gaza (Page 13 of 13)

Hamas Propaganda and the Lies About Gazan Casualties (2)

The Jerusalem Post reports more information about the alleged attack by the IDF on a UN school in Gaza during the recent conflict.

If you remember, the world, and in particular, John Ging UNRWA Head in Gaza, were outraged by an attack by the IDF that reportedly killed 42 people INSIDE the school. Ging later claimed he never said this and that the casualties were ‘near’ the school.

Since Operation Cast Lead the Gaza Coordination and Liaison Administration (CLA) has been meticulously gathering information and statistics about casualties. Here are its findings with regard to this specific incident:

“12 Palestinians were killed in the shelling near a UN school in Jabalya, north of Gaza City – and not 42 as claimed by Palestinian officials at the time”

The names of 7 of the dead have been disclosed to the JP, 5 men and 2 women. This makes 9 names out of the 12 killed that the CLA has now discovered.

The IDF claimed that it was returning mortar fire from the vicinity of the school.

But here’s the clincher:

“On the day of the incident, officials further said, officers from the CLA contacted the Palestinian Health Ministry and were told that three Palestinian civilians had been killed and that Hamas was hiding the identities of the remaining casualties. “

Yet the UN is still seeking “to gain clarity” and is compiling its own figures. No doubt they are going back to the very people who lied to them in the first place, namely Hamas. The same people who held up UNWRA employees at gunpoint and stole Aid intended for Palestinians in need. The same Hamas who the UN left to guard a weapon stockpile which subsequently mysteriously disappeared.

I cannot give any credence to the statistics of the UN or any of their operatives when their source is Hamas or people who are being terrorised by Hamas, namely the people of Gaza, who will spout any lie that will protect them from the retribution of a vicious gang of thugs and murderers.

Can We Have Our Munitions Back Please

So you are the UN operating in Gaza and you decide that it is incumbent on you to go round the Strip collecting unexploded munitions from the recent Israeli-Hamas conflict.

You decide to place these munitions in a warehouse for future safe disposal and you need someone to guard them.

So who do you pick? Why, Hamas of course!

Then when you find that the warehouse is suddenly empty you plead with Hamas, “can we have our munitions back please?”

What kind of madness is this?

1. Hamas is classified as a terrorist organisation by the UN

2. UNWRA workers were recently held at gunpoint and had tonnes of aid stolen by Hamas

3. Who do the UN think Hamas might use these munitions against?

It is totally unbelievable. Now tell us that the UN is not deeply implicated with Hamas in Gaza. Where is their judgement? Where is their commonsense?

The UN has now, effectively, turned itself into a partner for a terrorist organisation.

BBC’s Web Spinning is Biased (no news there then)

BBC headline today: "Fresh violence shakes Gaza Strip" What are they reporting? It’s an Israeli retaliatory attack for several rockets fired into the Western Negev Sunday and today. So why wasn’t the headline "Fresh rocket attacks on Israel".

Hamas’ attacks and those of other groups in Gaza (who call themselves by a variety of names so they can claim that Hamas did not violate the cease fire) are never reported UNLESS Israel responds and then it’s headlines of this sort we always see subtly implying that all violence is from one side in response to rockets that, by pure chance and not by intention, cause no Israeli casualties.

Hamas Propaganda and the Lies About Gazan Casualties

During the recent Gaza conflict UNWRA was the main source for Gaza casualty figures and these figures were used by the world’s press, including the BBC, as absolutely undeniable because they came from the UN. But the figures did not come from the UN, they came from Hamas and the gullible UNWRA gave the Hamas lies cover due because everyone believes the UN, don’t they?

Throughout the conflict Israeli sources could just about be heard in the background stating that the Hamas figures were exaggerated and many combatants were included as civilians. Now, at last, and, as often is the case with the Israeli government, too late to change the world’s impression of the conflict, the Israeli figures have been published.

The Jerusalem Post reports here that the Palestinian Center for Human Rights has quoted 895 Gazan civilians killed which represents more than two-thirds of all deaths. But  the IDF has carefully compiled the actual names of many of those killed and its figures show a very different story. The IDF puts the percentage at about one third which is about 450.

Dealing with real human lives lost in a statistical war of words is a regrettable course to have to follow but a necessary one in order to expose Hamas lies and attempt to redress the balance of world opinion.

Another, and very important ‘detail’ that had UNWRA and the world and the BBC et alia exercised about Israeli ‘war crimes’ was the incident near a UN school in Jabalya. The Jeruslaem Post reports:

Initial Palestinian reports falsely claimed IDF shells had hit the school and killed 40 or more people, many of them civilians.

In fact, he said, 12 Palestinians were killed in the incident – nine Hamas operatives and three noncombatants. Furthermore, as had since been acknowledged by the UN, the IDF was returning fire after coming under attack, and its shells did not hit the school compound. 

Yet most of the world still believes the Hamas lies (only 48 of its fighters killed as opposed to about 900 now reported by the IDF) reinforced by news reports, including Israeli newspapers, and the UN itself who prefer the story of a group it classifies as a terrorist organisation over the counter claims of one of its own members, namely Israel. And the rest of the world goes along with this analysis.

When will Israel get its act together and realise how important it is to rebut the lies of Hamas as they occur.  The JP reports that “the IDF was considering setting up a response team” for just this purpose.  About time! 

So, more than 400 children killed? Hardly when the total of non-combatants is around that mark.

So will the world’s press now issue rebuttals of its previous reports and tell the world the actual truth. Fat chance. Will Jeremy Bowen of the BBC report the IDF findings in his blog? 

I blame the Israeli government and organisations like Shin Bet for not doing enough to counter Hamas claims and the falsified, exaggerated and emotional images they trot out hour by hour in any conflict.

Even though several impressive spokespersons were put forward this time for the very purpose of better serving Israel’s case, they failed miserably because they could not counter the terrible daily images coming out of Gaza. Quite often they themselves did not seem to believe in their own story. This is a measure of how successful Hamas propaganda is and how poor Israeli counter-propaganda is.

What we need to see now is a further detailed analysis of homes, schools, hospitals, mosques and civic building destroyed or damaged and how many of those as a result of IDF actions and how many as  a result of secondary explosions caused by Hamas weapons dumps.

There is also the matter of the use of white phosphorus but that brings up the whole question of the appropriateness of some articles of International Law in the new reality of assymetric warfare, something I intend to write about in a future article.

These three elements: casualties, destruction of property and use of certain weapons such as WP and tank shells in built-up areas all need to be thoroughly analysed and answered quickly by Israel; not because they are obliged to do so, but because they need to provide evidence to counter the vicious worldwide assault on Israel’s right to defend itself.

Israel and Accusations of War Crimes

Why is it that Israel’s military campaigns seem always to provoke the media, human rights groups both inside and outside Israel and governments all over the world to accuse the Jewish State of ‘war crimes’?

Why is it that no other state or political entity ,where breaches of international law are much clearer cut, are not subject to the same media attention and are not described in the same terms?

Let me provide a few examples:

Much has been made of Israel’s apparent attacks against schools and hospitals in Gaza. John Ging, head of UNRWA in Gaza, publicly proclaimed that ‘a war crime MAY have been committed’. Subsequently Ging said that he never claimed that the UN school had been hit at all but the shells landed in the vicinity killing about 30 people. Very little was made of this subtle difference in the media and most people would still think that Israel targeted a school for no good reason. Meanwhile, in Sri Lanka, reports of Tamil Tigers shelling a school killing 10 people and wounding dozens of others does not prompt outrage in the media or calls for war crimes investigations. But more pertinent is the never-mentioned fact that Hamas deliberately time their rocket attacks to coincide with the beginning of school in Sderot and elsewhere in order to target children. Hamas rockets, as indiscriminate and unguided missiles, are a flagrant breach of international law in any case, but little, if anything, is made of this in the media.

Israel is accused of targeting civilian dwellings (which it claims were used by Hamas fighters). More war crimes investigations are called for by various governments and organisations across the world. But, when a house in Helmand province is struck by the British army, killing an entire family, everyone accepts their explanation that the Taleban were using that house to fire at the British troops, but by the time they responded the terrorists had fled and the occupants of the house became the victims of the Taleban’s deliberate attempt to cause as many civilian casualties as possible to discredit the Coalition. Sound familiar? So when will there be a war crimes investigation against the British army?

Again, Sri Lanka; this time a hospital is hit and has to close. Accusations ensue on both sides as to the culprits. Did the UN call for an investigation? If so, do we hear about it?

Stephen Sackur of the BBC recently interviewed Isaac Herzog , Israel’s Welfare and Social Services Minister, and pressed him strongly about the need for an independent investigation into alleged war crimes committed by Israel in Gaza. Herzog reacted strongly stating that Israel was a fully democratic country quite able to make its own investigations into its own conduct of the war. Has anyone ever suggested an independent investigation into Hamas’s war crimes, breaches of human rights, extra-judicial executions and murders of fellow citizens? Has anyone proposed such investigations into the Sri Lankan, Sudanese, Chinese, British or American conduct in the conflicts that they are involved in and trumpeted such proposals loudly on prime-time television? It is only Israel that is involved in a direct existential threat against implacable enemies who have torn up every article of decent human behaviour and ethical conflict. Meanwhile, only Israel makes 125,000 phone calls and drops millions of leaflets warning Gazans to leave the area before an attack; only Israel takes lawyers to the battlefield to confirm the legality of any military action.

I don’t ask that Israel be given exemption from criticism, I just wonder why they are not treated like any other democratic state. I think I may know the answer. Do you?

Sir Gerald Kaufman gives succour to Holocaust Deniers and anti-Zionists

On Friday last week the Labour MP for Gorton, Sir Gerald Kaufman, made a statement in the House of Commons where he accused Israel of behaving like Nazis in its conduct of the operation against the Hamas terrorists in Gaza. He also uttered one of the most offensive and potentially damaging sentences I have ever heard come from the mouth of a fellow Jew: “The present Israeli government ruthlessly and cynically exploits the continuing guilt from Gentiles over the slaughter of Jews in the Holocaust as justification for their murder of Palestinians.” This followed his description of his grandmother being shot dead in her sick bed by a German soldier during the Holocaust: “”My grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers in Gaza.”

Sir Gerald thus aligns himself, by his use and careful choice of language, with every anti-Zionist, Holocaust denier or trivialiser, and every Jew-hater here and abroad. This is the latest in a long history of Kaufman’s outspoken attacks against Israel and its policies.

Sir Gerald, despite claiming to have “been a long-term supporter of Israel”, went virtually unchallenged by the media and the Jewish community. Louise Ellman MP, someone for whom I have immense admiration for her forthright defence of Israel and the Jewish people, could only find a somewhat vapid riposte: “”The Nazis were about rounding up and exterminating people because of their origins..” No, Ms Ellman, they were about a lot more than that. And this is why the invidious comparison places Sir Gerald firmly in the camp of Israel’s and the Jew’s enemies.

Let’s examine Sir Gerald’s claim that the Israeli government were behaving like Nazis, a claim for which he provides cover by revealing his authority on the subject since his own grandmother was a victim; so he should know Nazi behaviour when he sees it, right? A Jew knows what a Nazi is, surely? Well, in Kaufman’s case, decidedly not.

Kaufman was not specific about which particular aspect of the IDF’s behaviour was comparable to the Nazis. It is the use of these broad smears which are the hallmark of prejudice and ignorance. Let’s help him out here by providing a litany of Nazi policies, actions and atrocities and see if they stand up to comparison with the actions of the Israeli government and its armed forces in Gaza.

Did the IDF round up every man woman and child and send them without food, water or sanitation in a cattle truck for several days and then humiliate them, gas them and burn their bodies? No, Sir Gerald, they did not.
Did the IDF enter hospitals and old-age homes and throw Gazan’s from windows or shoot them and their doctors on the spot. No, Sir Gerald, they did not.
Did the IDF string anyone up from lampposts?
Did the IDF standby whilst hundreds of thousands of people died of starvation and disease?
Does the Israel government have a policy of exterminating every last Palestinian?
Did Israeli doctors carry out experiments on the living tissue of Palestinians without anaesthetic? Sir Gerald?
Were any Palestinians forced to dig trenches and then made to strip naked before being shot in the back of the head and dumped into the graves they had dug for themselves? No, no, NO!
When you compare anyone to a Nazi you have to understand fully what that means; it is not a term of abuse to be bandied about recklessly. To do so trivialises the actions of the Nazis and insults the memory of the millions who died, Jew and Gentile, at the hands of these murderous scum. How dare you, Sir Gerald compare Israel to its oppressors. How dare you trivialise the murderers of your own grandmother. How dare you give succour to our enemies by using the language of hate.

This is what Arutz Sheva reported today on its website: “15 Gazan children with cancer will be transferred to Israeli hospitals Monday. They will first go to the medical clinic at the Erez crossing before being transferred.” How many children did the Nazi’s treat for cancer, Sir Gerald? The report goes on: “Residents of Gaza routinely receive medical treatment as part of Israel’s humanitarian aid to Gaza. In addition, 200 trucks of humanitarian aid were transferred to Gaza Monday.” How much aid did the Nazi’s send into the ghettos or the shtetls, Sir Gerald?

Sir Gerald swallows whole the statistics which come from Hamas and the UN via Hamas. They are unverifiable, completely one-sided and do not tell the truth about what really happened in Gaza and why innocents were killed.  An Israeli soldier reports: “..in Gaza, where there are bombs all over the place all the time, we’ve seen kindergartens filled with 150 or 200 children, and the kindergartens are boobytrapped! They even shoot rockets from inside mosques..”

The real Nazis are not the IDF, but Hamas. They are the ones who seek to exterminate the Jews with their openly genocidal policies. It is they who terrorise Gaza with murder and assassination. It is they who use their own citizens as human shields. It is they who forced their own people into areas the Israelis warned the Gazans to evacuate so that they would maximise casualties. It is their munitions which were placed in huge dumps within the centres of population which caused deaths and widespread destruction.  It is Hamas that hijack aid convoys and then sell it to their own people. It is Hamas that fire from schools, hospitals, mosques and media centres to force the IDF into perceived atrocities. It is Hamas who have infiltrated UNWRA schools to teach hate by day and build rockets by night. And it is Hamas who take the Geneva Convention and laugh at it whilst firing rockets indiscriminately into urban areas to maximise civilian deaths and at a time when they know Israeli children will be going to school. Who are the Nazis, Sir Gerald? Who?
Israel estimates that the majority of casualties and deaths in the conflict were Hamas fighters. Yet the world just accepts 1300 dead as if they were ALL innocent. The world and Sir Gerald believe Hamas but ridicule Israeli claims.

There is no doubt that innocents were killed. There may well have been mistakes made. But consider if you will, Sir Gerald, if it were Hamas entering Tel Aviv. No doubt their actions would be seen as ‘understandable’ as a result of the ‘occupation’ and 60 years in ‘refugee camps’. No doubt, Sir Gerald, you would be the first to excuse them along with Jenny Tonge and the other enemies of truth and justice who crawl out the woodwork to spit hate and venom at Israel every time it dare defend itself. Where were your Nazi jibes against Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe or the Janjaweed in Sudan or the Taleban in Afghanistan. Instead Sir Gerald dismisses Hamas as a nasty group of ineffective insurgents. “We had an IRA bomb in Manchester which destroyed much of the centre – we didn’t send troops over to Belfast to murder 1,000 Catholics”. He thus makes another false analogy which his rhetorical brilliance covers. How absurd. The IRA did not send a barrage of rockets onto Manchester for 7 years. Manchester citizens did not have to live in shelters for fear of their lives. Belfast is part of the United Kingdom, Gaza is not part of Israel. Hamas are the rulers of Gaza, the IRA were not the rulers of Ulster. The IRA did not seek to exterminate every last British citizen. Israel did not murder 1000 innocents, it eliminated hundreds of terrorists bent on its destruction. Maybe if the Irish Republic was shelling Belfast everyday, Dublin and its citizens would not have escaped the wrath of the British Army.

Whilst Sir Gerald pours out his hatred on the Israeli government, the rest of us have to live under the increased threat of violence from the usual suspects in British society who can now point a finger at Sir Gerald Kaufman and say, “Look, even the Jews think Israel is a Nazi, apartheid, racist state”, and thus justify their attacks on synagogues, shops and British Jews going about their everyday business. Thanks to Sir Gerald Britain has become an even more uncomfortable place for Jews of all persuasions, even a Jew like him.

Thoughts on the Manchester Rally for Peace in Israel and Gaza

On Sunday I had the great privilege of being able to attend the Rally for Peace for the People of Israel and Gaza held in Albert Square with hundreds of people from the North West of England.

I think all those who attended would agree that the most inspiring, uplifting and moving speech was made by a non-Jew, Lorna Fitzsimons, former MP for Rochdale and now CEO of BICOM (British Israel Communications and Research Centre), an organisation dedicated to tell the truth about Israel and its detractors and to counter the half-truths, lies and bias of the British media. She spoke of her recent visit to Sderot and her passionate support of Israel and the Jewish people. To hear such truth from someone not of a Jewish background drew the loudest cheers and many tears. Lorna proclaimed that it should not be left to the Jewish People alone to tell the world the truth but that it was the duty of everyone.

What a striking contrast, then, to those Jews of Jews for Justice for Palestinians who stood ‘shoulder to shoulder’ with Islamists, left-wing agitators, Stop The War Coalition and others. As Joy Wolfe asked for one minute’s silence to remember the victims in both Israel AND Gaza, the counter-demonstrators, who had kept up a constant barrage of noise and abuse throughout, could be heard to chant ‘Kill The Jews’. What did the Jews in that counter-demonstration feel at that point, I wonder. Although these misguided individuals have every right to their beliefs and opinions and also to march or demonstrate in support of those beliefs, it is beyond appalling that they should associate with the Jew-haters, islamo-fascists and left-wing dupes and find themselves actually marching IN SUPPORT OF HAMAS, an organisation dedicated to kill every Jew in the world, including (well-meaning) them. Make no mistake; if they thought they were marching to show that Jews too feel for the people of Gaza and Palestine then not only should they have been with us inside Albert Square, but they were naive to the point of recklessness. How sad it is that our fellow Jews should send such a message to the world. Frankly, their behaviour is scandalous and I hope they learned a lesson that day.

In London and Manchester the calm, thoughtful and dignified rallies for peace and life were in stark contrast to the rabid behaviour of the anti-Zionists and Jew-haters who clearly showed just why Jews need their own state and a state that is militarily strong enough not only to defend itself but to have the strength of will to act in the teeth of world ‘opinion’. The prostrate leaders of the world’s democracies have shown themselves to be more concerned about potential insurrection at home from an enemy within than the pursuit of peace and the facing down of these jihadis and their deranged fellow-travellers.

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