Donate Us

Help us keep this free site alive with a small contribution from you. Select an amount below.

Thursday, July 24, 2014

It started this morning with a tweet from UNRWA head Chris Gunness:

It spread like wildfire, with over 1200 retweets.

Gunness piled on, urging his followers to retweet his messages about supposed Israeli atrocities:


Soon it was in the news:

CBS:

NBC:


The Washington Post's headline was "Israel shells UN-run school in Gaza Strip." (since changed.)

The New York Times (since changed):


Even the Jewish Telegraphic Agency joined the bandwagon:


I had written  at the outset of this war that the number one mistake reporters were likely to make is assuming that all Gaza casualties are the result of Israeli fire.

And that is exactly what happened.

As usual, the IDF was slow to respond. And they still have not responded definitively. But here's what we know so far from them, facts that Chris Gunness and Hamas are unlikely to admit:


Times of Israel adds the latest:

Errant Israeli shell, Palestinian rocket may have hit school — Channel 2
An Israeli mortar shell may have hit the UNRWA school in which 15 Palestinians are said to have been killed today, Channel 2′s Ehud Ya'ari says, citing Israeli military sources. It was one of nine shells fired at a Hamas target — but went off course, "possibly" hitting the school instead.

Ya'ari adds, however, that a Palestinian rocket also hit the compound, and indicates that UNRWA officials have acknowledged this. Two hours ago, UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness tweeted that Hamas rockets were falling in Beit Hanoun, where the school is located, earlier today.

So either someone fired from the school and the IDF responded - unlikely, based on how careful the IDF was to ensure the Wafa hospital was empty before firing at it - or Hamas rockets hit the school, killing the innocent, or there was a mistake on Israel's side with an "errant shell."

Whatever the truth is, to make a blanket assumption that Israel is at fault is not reporting, but advocacy.

The media across the board assumed that this was an Israeli strike, based on sources known to lie and to be consistently biased.

I tweeted these questions out to the world.

If it wasn't an airstrike, why does the media think it is more likely that Israel shelled a UNRWA school than Hamas? Is it more inconceivable that Hamas would attack its own people than Israel deliberately attacking civilians? Who gains from such an action?

The only explanation for the headlines is that, to the world media, Israel is a bloodthirsty nation.

The logic is sickening.

On the one hand there is a professional army, with mountains of guidelines and layers of lawyers all for the purpose of ensuring that their wartime activities are legal under international law. An army that has weapons that can be aimed carefully and precisely. An army that can destroy a car of terrorists while leaving people a few meters away unhurt. An army that warns the enemy populace to leave so they don't get hurt.

And, an army with huge disincentives to kill innocent civilians.

On the other side are - terrorist organizations, in the purest sense of the word. Groups that purposefully put their people in harm's way. Groups that shed their uniforms and purposefully place themselves and their weapons among civilians. Groups that shoot their own fellow Arabs because of feuds, or suspicions, or honor.  Groups that have killed dozens of their own people this year from assassinations, work accidents, and rocket misfires.

Not to mention that these are groups that are frustrated that they have not managed to kidnap any Israelis, and frustrated that their best fighters are being killed by the dozen.

And even more importantly - groups whose major strategy is to influence world public opinion by maximizing deaths among their own population.

Forget the likelihood of this being an accidental Qassam rocket or mortar volley. How unlikely is it that Hamas would purposefully fire into a UNRWA building - a building that symbolizes the entire world community - in order to deal a crushing blow to Israel's ability to wage war against it? Who has the most to gain from the deaths of dozens of civilians?

If the media was remotely objective, there is no way that they would assume that the IDF had fired those shells.  On the contrary, they would have been asking these questions of Chris Gunness within minutes of his first tweet, instead of slavishly retweeting it themselves (as many did.)

The IDF isn't perfect, but if the IDF was as bloodthirsty as the headlines imply, then Gaza would have 70,000 dead by now, not 700.

There is no objectivity here. The a priori assumption of IDF guilt is evidence that the media truly thinks that the IDF is a sickeningly depraved army, the exact opposite of what has been seen over and over again even during this conflict (for those who care about the truth.)

Assuming that the IDF is morally depraved and at the same time not even entertaining the idea that Hamas, which brags that it targets civilians, could be behind this incident is proof positive that it is the media that is depraved and immoral. 

--
Posted By Elder of Ziyon to Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News at 7/24/2014 01:30:00 PM

0 comments:

Post a Comment

EoZTV Podcast

Powered by Blogger.

follow me

search eoz

Recent posts from other blogs

subscribe via email

comments

Contact

translate

E-Book

source materials

reference sites

multimedia

source materials for Jewish learning

great places to give money

media watch

humor

.

Source materials

Sample Text

EoZ's Most Popular Posts Ever

follow me

Followers


pages

Random Posts

Pages - Menu

Elder of Ziyon - حـكـيـم صـهـيـون

Donate!

Tweets

Compliments

Monthly subscription:
Subscription options

One time donation:

Interesting Blogs

Categories

Best posts of 2016

Blog Archive

compliments

Algemeiner: "Fiercely intelligent and erudite"

Omri: "Elder is one of the best established and most respected members of the jblogosphere..."
Atheist Jew:"Elder of Ziyon probably had the greatest impression on me..."
Soccer Dad: "He undertakes the important task of making sure that his readers learn from history."
AbbaGav: "A truly exceptional blog..."
Judeopundit: "[A] venerable blog-pioneer and beloved patriarchal figure...his blog is indispensable."
Oleh Musings: "The most comprehensive Zionist blog I have seen."
Carl in Jerusalem: "...probably the most under-recognized blog in the JBlogsphere as far as I am concerned."
Aussie Dave: "King of the auto-translation."
The Israel Situation:The Elder manages to write so many great, investigative posts that I am often looking to him for important news on the PalArab (his term for Palestinian Arab) side of things."
Tikun Olam: "Either you are carelessly ignorant or a willful liar and distorter of the truth. Either way, it makes you one mean SOB."
Mondoweiss commenter: "For virulent pro-Zionism (and plain straightforward lies of course) there is nothing much to beat it."
Didi Remez: "Leading wingnut"