Tag Archives: Israeli settlement

May 2 2013

‘Pallywood Light’ at the Guardian, part 2: The Phantom Israeli Rock-Thrower

Earlier today we posted about a Guardian video which purported to show Israeli settlers attacking Palestinians, following the murder of 32-year-old Evyatar Borovsky by a Fatah affiliated terrorist at a bus stop in the West Bank on Tuesday, but which didn’t in fact include any clips of Jewish violence.

As we noted, there were indeed multiple reports elsewhere of retaliatory attacks (including rock throwing) by Jews against Palestinians in the area near where the terrorist attack occurred, but the Guardian video on May 1 – though titled ‘Jewish settlers attack Palestinians in the West Bank‘ – simply included short clips of Israeli soldiers using crowd control measures against Palestinians near the village of Orif.

However, upon looking at the film again, we noticed something else – an opening still shot of what appears to be an Israeli rock thrower which doesn’t actually appear anywhere in the actual video.

Here’s how the video is presented on the side of the Guardian’s Israel page. Notice the rock-thrower wearing a blue shirt.

video

When you open the link you also briefly see the rock thrower:

video 2

After a few seconds however, the image above disappears and the full video begins.

Here’s the video again.

Nowhere in the video does the (presumably Israeli) rock thrower in the blue shirt appear.  And, whilst we were unable to find the video corresponding to this particular still shot, if you Google the title you can find other uploads of the video which appear on YouTube without the mysterious rock-thrower.

youtube

Original Guardian video at top. Seen below is the very same video, uploaded by another YouTube user.

It seems that the image in question was spliced from a completely different video and added by Guardian editors to the May 1 video report to buttress the narrative.  

In fairness, this technique is used in other Guardian videos (and on other news sites).  Nonetheless, in this particular case it seems highly misleading – especially in light of the fact that, as we noted, the video itself contains no footage whatsoever of Israelis throwing rocks or otherwise attacking Palestinians, despite its quite explicit title to that effect.

I guess the more accurate title for the video which editors could have used, ‘Various clips and still shots which, when spliced together, still only suggest Israeli settler violence to the trained Guardian reader’, wasn’t quite as catchy.

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May 2 2013

Pallywood Light: Guardian video claiming to show ‘Jews attacking Palestinians’ fails to deliver

Following the murder of an Israeli man, 32-year-old Evyatar Borovsky, by a Palestinian terrorist in a stabbing attack at a bus stop in the northern West Bank on Tuesday, the Guardian’s Harriet Sherwood reported on the incident, as well as on subsequent retaliatory attacks by “Jewish settlers”.  

The Jewish ‘attacks’ evidently occurred near the Yitzhar community where Borovsky lived, as well as in the Palestinian villages of Burin, Hawara, and Orif – and a nearby highway (route 60). According to multiple reports, some Israelis threw rocks at Palestinians and some set Palestinian fields ablaze.

The claim that there were some retaliatory attacks by Jews following Borovsky’s murder doesn’t appear to be in doubt.

However, the Guardian also published a video story on May 1, with the following title:

video

Here’s the video caption:

A group of masked Jewish settlers set fire to a house and fields across villages in the West Bank before attacking Palestinians. Palestinian villagers clash with the settlers on a hill overlooking the village of Orif. Israeli soldiers arrive to disperse the crowd with stun grenades. The attack was in retaliation to the killing of Israeli settler Eviatar [sic] Borovsky

However, upon viewing the one minute and six second Guardian video, we couldn’t help but notice the absence of any clips actually showing ‘Jewish settlers attacking Palestinians’, despite text on the bottom of the screen at various moments stating that such attacks were taking place.

Here’s the video in its entirety.

Here’s what we just saw:

  • Israeli soldiers on patrol
  • Israeli soldiers talking to what appear to be Palestinians
  • Tear gas and stun grenades are employed by Israeli forces
  • A Palestinian man (at the 54 second mark), purportedly injured, being carried to an awaiting ambulance

Here’s what we did not see, despite claims made in the title and accompanying text:

  • Jewish settlers attacking Palestinians
  • Jewish settlers burning Palestinian fields

Whilst the events described by the Guardian may have indeed occurred, the video they produced and posted certainly did not present any visual evidence to buttress these claims.  

Though there have been far more egregious examples of ‘Pallywood‘ in action (i.e., intentionally misleading or doctored Palestinian film footage; and the staging of certain scenes) it is reasonable to ask why the Guardian editor who published this video failed to engage in basic journalistic critical scrutiny of what the clips were claiming to document.

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Apr 3 2013

Will the Guardian be inspired by AP and stop referring to Jews as “illegal”?

H/T Yisrael Medad

Associated Press, one of the largest news agencies in the world, will no longer use the term “illegal immigrant” to describe those who migrate to a country in violation of their immigration laws, their Executive Vice President announced on Tuesday.

Their style guide will no longer permit the term ‘illegal immigrant’ or the use of ‘illegal’ to describe a person.  It will now only use of the word “illegal” to describe an action, such as “living in or migrating to a country illegally”.

It is believed that most of the 1400 U.S. newspapers which use AP will likely follow their decision on the use of such a loaded term and will, for instance, stop referring to the millions of unauthorized Latino migrants to the US as “illegal”.   

ABC reported the following:

…most of America’s top college newspapersand major TV networks, including ABC, NBC and CNN, have vowed to stop using the term. Nearly half of Latino voters polled last year in a Fox News Latino survey said that they find the term “illegal immigrant” offensive. A coalition of linguists also came together last year to pressure media companies to drop “illegal immigrant,” calling it “neither neutral nor accurate.”

Whilst many Americans are applauding the decision by AP as a victory for accuracy and diversity, we can only wonder whether serious news organizations – and the Guardian – will similarly drop the loaded and value-laden term “illegal settler” to characterize Jews who, consistent with the parameters of the Mandate for Palestine, live beyond the 1949 armistice lines (in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem).

An "illegal" Israeli settler boy, Purim 2011

An “illegal” Israeli settler boy in the historic Jewish city of Hebron, Purim 2011

A quick search of the Guardian’s site shows a few references to such ‘illegal’ Israelis.

Guardian film critic Philip French wrote the following in his Oct. 21, 2012 review of the documentary ’5 Broken Cameras’:

Behind this pair, but no less endangered, is Emad, recording some of the fiercest footage of assaults and atrocities on the West Bank that I’ve ever seen, as well as the arson wreaked on Palestinian olive groves by illegal Jewish settlers.

A July 24, 2012 story by Phoebe Greenwood on Palestinians facing eviction from ‘unauthorized’ homes in the southern Hebron hills included this variation of the charge:

Hila Gurani, the state’s attorney, wrote that the second intifada and the second Lebanon war exposed gaps in IDF preparation that requires more extensive training in firing zones, which the illegal Hebron residents are preventing  

And, a report by Nicholas Watt about the call by some within the UK Labour Party to label products which are produced in the West Bank included this passage:

Labour is opposed to boycotting Israeli goods but [Yvette] Cooper believes consumers should be informed whether products are produced by illegal settlers.

Moreover, a Google search using the words “illegal Israeli settlers” turns up 727,000 hits, and included references to the proscribed Jew in many “mainstream” publications. (Obviously, another variation of these specific words, in a different order, would likely produce further examples.)

The implications are fascinating. 

If, for instance, we use AP’s logic as a guide, and only use the term “illegal” to describe an action, shouldn’t the Guardian and other sites stop referring to Jewish communities and homes in places like Ariel, Ma’ale Adumim and eastern Jerusalem as “illegal”?  If so, we might one day look back at the ubiquitous use of such subjective terminology (there were more than 5,000 references to “illegal settlements” at the Guardian’s site) as an embarrassing chapter in their paper’s history.

Whatever the Guardian editorial position on the desirability of a future Palestinian state which may include most of Judea and Samaria, we can hope that they’ll catch up with the times, heed their liberal calling and stop labelling – in one manner or another – hundreds of thousands of Jews residing within the boundaries of their historic homeland as “illegal”.   

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Mar 18 2013

The complete Daniel Finkelstein – Michael White Tweet timeline

While covering the exchange in Tweets between Guardian assistant editor Michael White and Times journalist Daniel Finkelstein, there were suggestions made of additional Tweets not shown which would have better contextualized the one which was the focus of the row.  Indeed, White made this argument himself in the comment section of our blog.

So, to be fair, here is the full conversation timeline on Finkelstein’s Twitter page, beginning with his original Tweet on March 14 (regarding news Lord Ahmed’s antisemitic remarks) which led to the reply by White about “Israeli settlements” (which we argued was antisemitic) and ending with Finkelstein’s last Tweet where he wishes White well.

(I added a red arrow to indicate the Tweet by White, preceding the one about settlements, which wasn’t previously included, and which White felt was important. The “settlements” Tweet has a blue arrow.)

new tweet

better snapshot

white timeline

threadAny additional relevant Tweets which didn’t involve Finkelstein can be found on White’s Twitter page. 

 

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Mar 6 2013

The factual and logical failures behind accusations of ‘racist’ Israeli bus lines

There seems to be no evidence whatsoever to back up accusations, in the Guardian and throughout the media, that new bus lines in Israel, serving Palestinians who live in the West Bank but work in central Israel, serve ‘Palestinians only’.  

Prior to the launch of the new lines Israeli buses did not stop in towns controlled by the PA, and Palestinians were dependent on transportation services by “pirate” (Arab) companies. (Alternately they could travel to an Israeli settlement, such as Ariel, and take a bus from there to Israeli cities across the green line.)

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Conal Urquhart’s Guardian report on the issue, which, in fairness, is no worse than others in the mainstream media, was titled “Israel to launch ‘Palestinian only’ bus service“, March 4, and begins thusly:

The Israeli government will on Monday begin operating a “Palestinians-only” bus service to ferry Palestinian workers from the West Bank to Israel, encouraging them to use it instead of travelling with Israeli settlers on a similar route.

However, at no point does Urquhart attempt to buttress this sensational claim, nor indicate the source of the (“Palestinians only”) quote.

In fact, he then notes the following:

Officially anyone can use them, but the ministry of transport said that the new lines are meant to improve services for Palestinians.

…

In a statement to the Israeli newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth, the ministry said: “The new lines are not separate lines for Palestinians but rather two designated lines meant to improve the services offered to Palestinian workers who enter Israel through Eyal Crossing.

As Lori Lowenthal Marcus pointed out, the ‘restrictions’ pertain to ‘only’ stopping at Palestinian towns in the territories, where Jews don’t live.

Urquhart continues:

Information on the new services, which are operated by the company Afikim, have reportedly only been advertised in Arabic and distributed only in Palestinian areas of the West Bank.

However, if the goal of the new bus line is to improve service for Palestinians living in the West Bank but working in Israel, it would certainly make sense to advertise the lines in Palestinian towns, and only in Arabic.

Again, Urquhart:

Palestinians used to use Palestinian minibuses and taxis to travel into Israel but Israel has increased the number of permits it gives to Palestinians which has led to more mixing on shared routes.

Indeed, Palestinians were dependent upon transportation services by unauthorized Arab companies which charged far more than the new Israeli lines do, and Urquhart, further in his report, quotes the Transportation Ministry official making a similar point.  

For example, the fare for Palestinians traveling to Raanana is reportedly 5.1 shekels (roughly $1.35), and to Tel Aviv will cost 10.6 shekels ($2.85). This is compared to roughly 40 shekels ($10.75) that passengers have been charged by the private transportation services.

Additionally, Transportation and Road Safety Minister Yisrael Katz was quoted in Israel HaYom as explaining that “Palestinians were permitted to use any public bus line they wished, including the ones used by settlers.”

Lowenthal Marcus makes the following point:

The new bus lines are not, as the misleading headlines suggest, only for Arab Palestinians, the restriction they have is that they only stop at Arab towns in the territories, where – few would disagree – Jews with or without special identification would not dare go for fear – a legitimate one – of physical violence.  The fact remains that any Israeli citizens, Jewish, Christian or Zoroastrians, who live in the “Jewish” towns, were able to and did use the pre-existing bus lines.

As Seth Frantzman observed in the Jerusalem Post today:

The website of the bus company, Ofakim, shows that the No. 211 bus route begins near Kalkilya and travels to Tel Aviv with stops in Petah Tikvah, Bnei Brak and elsewhere. It doesn’t indicate that it is a “Palestinian only” bus or that Jews may not ride it. Ofakim claimed “We are not allowed to refuse service and we will not order anyone to get off the bus.”

Frantzman also argued that “nothing obvious prevents Arabs from commuting to a bus stop near a large Jewish community, to take a bus serving Ariel for instance.” He added that “there is no ‘segregation’, no ‘separate but equal’. No one is ‘sitting at the back’.”

But, one question remains: How would it be racist against ‘Palestinians’ if service on a bus line operating in the West Bank was for ‘Palestinians only’?  That is, how could Palestinians be victims of racism if service on a public transportation system was  denied to Jews?  

Typically, the canards employed by those who assault Israel’s legitimacy are framed in the opposite manner, with suggestions that public accommodations in Israel are restricted to prevent non-Jews from using them.  A great example of such a false claim, advanced by Haaretz and definitively refuted by CAMERA, was the myth of “Jews only” roads in Israel.

While there are no ‘Jews only’ roads in Israel, there are areas within the state for ‘Palestinians only’.

Put another way, is this sign racist?

No Israelis Allowed

Sign warning Israelis not to enter a Palestinian town

First, it would obviously be extremely dangerous for an Israeli Jew to enter Palestinians cities in Area ‘A’. It’s also prohibited by the IDF.   When I went on a media tour of Ramallah in 2011 I was required to sign a document essentially stating that I understood the risk involved and that the Israeli government was not responsible for my safety. 

Palestinian cities in the West Bank such as Ramallah are for ‘Palestinians only’.

Whilst the future of the new bus lines which are the focus of the latest anti-Israel media storm may be in doubt, let’s be clear about two things:

First, contrary to claims made in the media, there are no ‘Palestinian only’ bus lines.

If, completely hypothetically, there were such buses, it beggars the imagination how policies which excluded Jewish passengers could be characterized as racist against Palestinians. 

The latest row demonstrates that when it comes to reporting on Israel, facts and moral logic are necessarily subservient to sensationalist anti-Zionist narratives.

Dec 25 2012

‘The Jewish state which ruined Christmas in Bethlehem’: A Guardian Production

wise-men-tunnellingChristianity is close to extinct in the Middle East.

The only place in the region where Christians are free, and indeed thriving, is the Jewish state.

In contrast, a new study, highlighted at the Telegraph, warns that “Christians suffer greater hostility across the world than any other religious group” and quotes estimates that “between half and two-thirds of Christians in the Middle East have left the region or been killed in the past century.”

Yet, like a holiday ritual, Harriet Sherwood, in the spirit of Phoebe Greenwood’s ugly Guardian piece last year (‘If Jesus were to come this year Bethlehem would be closed’, Guardian, Dec. 22, 2011) chose to advance, as if by rote, a predictable Christmas tale of Israeli oppression against Christians.

Sherwood’s piece, Bethlehem Christians feel squeeze of settlements, avoids entirely any context about the comparative treatment of Christians in the Middle East, and myopically obsesses on the putative threat to Christians posed by Israeli “settlements” in the Jerusalem region.

Sherwood writes:

“In the birthplace of Jesus, the impact of Israeli settlements and their growth has been devastating.”

Sherwood then allows the following quote by Mahmoud Abbas to go unchallenged:

“For the first time in 2,000 years of Christianity in our homeland, the Holy Cities of Bethlehem and Jerusalem have been completely separated by Israeli settlements, racist walls and checkpoints.”

First, as CAMERA pointed out in response to Bob Simon’s 60 Minute piece:

“Maps provided by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the United Nations, B’tselem, and the PLO all indicate that the security barrier is located to the north and west of the city, and does not completely surround Bethlehem.”

Further, all Sherwood would have needed to do was visit the site of the Palestine Visitor Information Center, where she could have found the following helpful information:

“Most of the travellers arrive to Bethlehem via Jerusalem.

Bus  no. 21 runs from the Arabic Bus Station at the Damascus Gate (“Bab el-’Amoud”) in East Jerusalem via Beit Jala to Bethlehem. The average trip length is 40 minutes and costs 7 NIS.”

The Palestine Visitor Information Center helpfully suggests other bus routes, the option of driving, or even, for the physically ambitious, a walking route.

There’s no warning on their site reflecting Abbas’s claim that the two Biblical cities are cut off.

Sherwood continues:

“The city is further hemmed in by the vast concrete and steel separation barrier, bypasses connecting settlements with Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, and Israeli military zones. With little room to expand, it is now more densely populated than Gaza, according to one Palestinian official.”

The Palestinian official was lying.

According to the PA’s own statistics, Bethlehem’s population density is 3,383 person/km, while the density of Gaza is higher at 4,603 person/km.  It should also be noted that Gaza is not even in the top 50 of most densely populated places on earth. (If the PA official was comparing Bethlehem to Gaza City, as opposed to the entire Gaza strip, naturally the disparity in density would be even greater).

Sherwood then turns to economic issues, writing:

“The wall already snakes around most of Bethlehem, its 8m-high concrete slabs casting a deep shadow, both literally and metaphorically. At the Christmas Tree restaurant, where there are almost no takers for the “Quick Lunches” on offer, business has slowed to a standstill since the wall blocked what was once the main Jerusalem-Bethlehem road. Scores of shops along the closed-off artery have shut down altogether.”

…

“…the lack of routine access has had a dire impact on businesses and employment rates.”

The suggestion that Bethlehem is economically depressed is another profound distortion, as the city has been experiencing an economic boom over the last few years, with the number of tourists (and hotel stays) having dramatically increased over the last few years.

In fact, the narrative advanced in Sherwood’s passage was contradicted by Sherwood herself, in a piece published a couple of days earlier (Dec. 21), ‘No room at the inn – but Bethlehem’s popularity is a boon to Palestinians‘, where she wrote:

“Tens of thousands of pilgrims and tourists are expected to visit the birthplace of Jesus over Christmas. All of the West Bank city’s 3,700 hotel rooms are likely to be filled, with thousands more visitors making day trips from nearby Jerusalem.

This year has seen a 20% growth in the numbers of visitors to Bethlehem compared with the previous year, and officials hope for a further rise in tourism to Palestine next year. The biggest number of tourists – more than a quarter – come from Russia.

Officials are heartened by the increasing number of visitors who are opting to stay in hotels in Bethlehem rather than just making the trip from Jerusalem. The number of overnight stays is expected to reach 1.5m by the end of this year.

The city is planning to increase the number of hotel beds, offer improved packages and invest in marketing and promotion…”

Undeterred, Sherwood continues:

“Bethlehem has one of the highest rates of unemployment of all West Bank cities, at 18%, says Vera Baboun, who was elected as its first female mayor in October. “We are a strangulated city, with no room for expansion due to the settlements and the wall.”"

However, according to the PA’s own statistics, any suggestion of a causation between the security fence and unemployment in Bethlehem is not supportable. In 2002 for instance, two years before the fence’s completion om 2004*, the unemployment rate was higher (at 20%) than the current rate.  Inexplicably, unemployment in Bethlehem actually dropped in 2005 and 2006 to 13.4 and 13.7% respectively. So, at the very least, unemployment figures for Bethlehem don’t seem at all to correspond with the fence’s construction history.

Sherwood’s narrative then descends even further with the following passage:

“In a booklet to mark Christmas 2012, Kairos Palestine, a Christian alliance, says: “Land confiscation, as well as the influx of Israeli settlers, suggest that there will be no future for Palestinians (Christian or Muslim) in [this] area. In this sense, the prospect of a clear ‘solution’ grows darker every day”.

However, Kairos, as CAMERA has documented, is certainly not a group dedicated at all to “peace, love and understanding”.

A 2009 Kairos document calls the Israeli “occupation” a “sin against God,” and characterizes Palestinian acts of terror as “legal resistance.” 

The document also states that if “there were no occupation, there would be no resistance, no fear and no insecurity.”

As CAMERA asked in response to such specious occupation causation:

“Really? Then why did the rocket attacks against Israel increase after it withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005?”

More importantly, the Kairos quote insidiously suggests something of a policy of ethnic cleansing (Israel’s “solution”) of both Muslims and Christians in the West Bank, a suggestion which is matched in sheer malice by the demographic lie. Here are a couple of population facts:

  • The population of Christians in Bethlehem and surrounding area has increased since 1967 (when Israel took control of the West Bank), which (as CAMERA noted) stands in “contrast to the decline of the Christian population in the West Bank when it was under Jordanian control.”
  •  The Christian population in Israel proper has risen from 34,000 in 1948 to over 150,000 today.

Additionally, as Akus noted in a post last Christmas, the Church of England, for instance, is quite aware of the demographic realities for Christians in the Middle East. A report by the Church noted the following:

“While Christians have fled from areas controlled by Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, in Israel their numbers have grown rapidly. The Statistical Abstract of Israel 2008 reports that Israel’s Christian population grew from 120,600 in 1995 to 151,600 in 2007, representing a growth rate of 25 per cent — a rate faster than the growth of the country’s Jewish population.”

That the place in the Middle East where the population of Christians is growing just happens to be the sole country where Islamism is not a serious threat is essential to understanding the fate of Christianity in that part of the world – context about the contrasting religious freedom, tolerance and democratic values in the Middle East which Harriet Sherwood’s reports on the region do not provide.  

Finally, the report linked to in the first sentence of this post concluded that the “lion’s share” of persecution faced by Christians arises in countries where Islam is the dominant faith”.  Specifically, the reports adds, “the most common threat to Christians abroad is militant Islam“, and further argues that oppression against Christians in Muslim countries is often ignored because of a fear that criticism will be seen as “racism.”

Such religious bigotry – in places like Gaza, Lebanon, Egypt, Turkey, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Bangladesh and elsewhere - includes physical violence, attacks on churches, forced conversions, and the imposition of Sharia law.  

Moreover, is it really even debatable that the antagonist in Sherwood’s Christmas tale, Israel’s security fence, was only necessitated by terror attacks launched largely by adherents to the same brand of radical Islamism which has prompted so many Middle East Christians to flee?  

While truly fearless crusading dailies would boldly tackle the real cleansing of Christians from Arab lands as the result of Islamist militancy, CiF Watch does not monitor a broadsheet which engages in such truly courageous journalism.

We monitor the Guardian.

(*Fence construction information obtained from Dany Tirza who served as the IDF’s chief architect for the Security Fence.)

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Dec 21 2012

‘Articles of Faith’: The absence of critical thinking about Israeli settlements

kh

Kohav Hashachar

CiF Watch has no official position on Israeli homes built across the 1949 armistice lines - the settlements.

As a blog dedicated to combating antisemitism and the assault on Israel’s legitimacy at the Guardian, however, it is within our purview to expose misleading or erroneous geographical, political or legal claims about the settlements by Guardian journalists and commentators – and to combat the demonization of Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria. 

One of the most stubbornly held (often logically and politically under-explored) beliefs about the Israeli settlements (at the Guardian and elsewhere) is that their existence (or growth) represents the biggest obstacle to peace between Israel and the Palestinians – and even, some would argue, between Israel and the larger Arab world.

Whilst reasonable people can oppose Israeli construction across the green line for any number of moral, political and legal reasons, it is peculiar how few critics even bother to defend their view that Israeli withdrawal from the disputed territories will lead to peace (and foster co-existence) with the Palestinians or, at least, will make the Jewish state more secure.

These articles of faith typically ignore historical evidence and political facts which contradict their thesis.

For instance, if this theory is valid, why didn’t Israeli withdrawals from Gaza, S. Lebanon (and ceding military and civilian control over parts of the West Bank to the PA) result in peaceful outcomes? Why didn’t the rocket attacks on Israeli communities, and other acts of terrorism, cease?  

If Palestinian/Arab anti-Zionism, antisemitism, extremism and terrorism, is in fact fed by ‘the settlements’ – and represents Islamist terror group’s raison d’être – why weren’t Hezbollah and Hamas (and extremist movements active within the PA) politically neutered by the absence of settlements (and IDF presence) in these territories? 

What evidence is there that Israeli withdrawal from most or all of the West Bank (and eastern Jerusalem) will result in the creation of a peaceful, non-extremist Palestinian government and political culture?

The absence of critical thinking about the issue is often typically accompanied by disinterest in Israeli opinion – expressed in political polls and Israeli elections – which demonstrates that while most Israelis support the idea of a two-state solution, they support withdrawals from land necessary for a Palestinian state only if the creation of that state truly leads to peace. 

A strong majority of Israelis – who have lived through Intifadas, thousands of rocket attacks and (just as important) the absence of international support for military actions to defend their nation from such assaults - believe that (under current political conditions) such withdrawals will not, in fact, lead to peace or improved security.

Those who insist that the ‘settlements’ represent the biggest obstacle to peace should be asked to explain why recent history in the region should be ignored and why Israeli fears about such a monumental military decision (which can’t easily be undone) are unfounded.

What do they know that Israelis don’t? 

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Jan 29 2012

Did Guardian journalists violate international law? Delegitimization of the settlements jumps the shark

As I’ve noted on several occasions, the allegations by Guardian reporters that Jews living anywhere beyond the green line (that is, where Jews have lived for centuries, with the exception of the period between 1949 and 1967) are in violation of international law are leveled as frequently as they are lazily. Such reports rarely even bother inserting a hyperlink to a source on the adjudication of the illegality of such Israeli communities.

Charges have been legitimized by the Guardian’s Harriet Sherwood that Jerusalem’s light rail line – which audaciously serves both Arab and Jewish neighborhoods – is arguably a violation of international law.

Israelis attempting to violate international law by boarding Jerusalem's Light Rail

And, more recently, Israeli quarry mining in the West Bank, which provides economic activity and employment for Jews and Palestinians alike, was characterized in a report by Harriet Sherwood similarly as a possibly ‘illegal” act per international law.

Internationally outlawed economic activity: Quarry Mining

And, until recently, I thought the most surreal accusation that Israel was in violation of international law was when the Jewish state stood accused, by the NGO Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, of committing a WAR CRIME when they, in 2010, reopened a synagogue in Jerusalem’s Jewish Quarter, which had been destroyed by the Jordanians following the the 1948 War.

Synagogue in historically Jewish neighborhood of Jerusalem: Violation of International Law

However, the following report by International Middle East Media Center truly jumps the shark with such accusations. 

Their story, titled “International media complicit in legitimization of Israeli settlements“, Jan. 27, by Alessandra Bajec, includes the following:

Unbelievable, but true: over 70 journalists from international mainstream media took part in a tour through Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank last Thursday 19th… guests of the Head of the Samaria Regional Council Gershon Mesika and the Minister of Information and Diaspora Yuli Edelstein. 

Participants included journalists from well-known media outlets such as the British Guardian, the Reuters news agency, as well as reporters from France, Poland, China, Germany, South America, the United States, Radio London and several TV stations from Russia. 

Bajec can hardly contain her rage:

What calls immediate attention is the very fact that a (large) delegation of international media professionals went on a tour around Israeli settlements, all deemed illegal under international law. In other words, a host of media people, from the same countries that condemn illegal settlements in occupied Palestine, partook in something that essentially breaks international law.

The simple act of touring settlements in occupied Palestinian territory is an affront to international law…international media buying into a tour of this kind shows that they are complicit in covering up Israel’s war crimes. 

Who’s to blame for such a journalistic apostasy, per Bajec? Yeah, you guessed it:

…pro-Israel lobbies and Zionist networks…and the Israel influenced mainstream news agencies for whom they work [which] made them turn a blind eye on the topical settlement issue…

While I really wish I knew which Guardian journalist participated in the tour and, thus, flagrantly violated international law, I guess, any way you look at it, it’s becoming harder and harder to avoid reaching the conclusion that the Guardian Group is merely another tool of the international Zionist network.

Journalists' partaking in an internationally illegal meal in Shomron Region

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Jan 3 2012

No, Harriet, Jews living across the green line are not in violation of international law

The Guardian refrain that Jewish communities across the green line (including in “East” Jerusalem) represent a clear violation of international law is repeated so many times that even those who don’t possess antipathy towards Israel could be forgiven for uncritically accepting this as fact.

Indeed, Sherwood’s latest piece, “Israel and Palestinian negotiators meet for first time in a year“, Jan. 2, contains this characteristic throw away line about the “settlements”:

The Palestinians argue that there can be no meaningful talks while Israel continues expanding its settlements in the West Bank, which are illegal under international law.

Of course, Sherwood, as with the countless other Guardian reports alleging the “illegality” of such settlements, doesn’t bother citing a source for such an international adjudication, as no such determination has ever been reached or definitively codified.

What Palestinians, and their advocates at the Guardian, are likely referring to is the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention, the first international agreement designed specifically to protect civilians during wartime.

They specifically charge that the settlements violate Article 49(6), which states: “The occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into territories it occupies.”

To settlement opponents, the word “transfer” in Article 49(6) connotes that any transfer of the occupying power’s civilian population, voluntary or involuntary, is prohibited.

However, the first paragraph of Article 49 reads: “Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive.”

Unquestionably, any forcible transfer of populations is illegal.

But what about voluntary movements?

According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, Article 49 relates to situations where populations are coerced into being transferred. There is nothing to link such circumstances to Israel’s settlement policy.

Historically, over 40 million people were subjected to forced migration, evacuation, displacement, and expulsion, including 15 million Germans, 5 million Soviet citizens, and millions of Poles, Ukrainians and Hungarians.  The vast numbers of people affected and the aims behind such population transfers have no relation to Israeli policy.

International lawyer Prof. Eugene V. Rostow, a former dean of Yale Law School and U.S. Undersecretary of State, stated in 1990:

[T]he Convention prohibits many of the inhumane practices of the Nazis and the Soviet Union during and before the Second World War – the mass transfer of people into and out of occupied territories for purposes of extermination, slave labor or colonization, for example….The Jewish settlers in the West Bank are most emphatically volunteers. They have not been “deported” or “transferred” to the area by the Government of Israel, and their movement involves none of the atrocious purposes or harmful effects on the existing population it is the goal of the Geneva Convention to prevent.

Ambassador Morris Abram, a member of the U.S. staff at the Nuremberg Tribunal who was later involved in the drafting of the Fourth Geneva Convention, is on record as stating that the convention:

…was not designed to cover situations like Israeli settlements in the occupied territories, but rather the forcible transfer, deportation or resettlement of large numbers of people.

Similarly, international lawyer Prof. Julius Stone, in referring to the absurdity of considering Israeli settlements as a violation of Article 49(6), stated:

Irony would…be pushed to the absurdity of claiming that Article 49(6), designed to prevent repetition of Nazi-type genocidal policies of rendering Nazi metropolitan territories judenrein, has now come to mean that…the West Bank…must be made judenrein and must be so maintained, if necessary by the use of force by the government of Israel against its own inhabitants. Common sense as well as correct historical and functional context excludes so tyrannical a reading of Article 49(6.)

Jews have lived in Judea and Samaria—the West Bank—since ancient times. The only time Jews have been prohibited from living in the territories in recent decades was during Jordan’s rule from 1948 to 1967.

So, characterizing any Jewish presence across the green line as illegal would seem to ipso facto endorse Jordan’s illegal ethnic cleansing of Jewish communities from these lands following the armistice agreement of 1949. 

As David M. Phillips noted:

Concluding that Israeli settlements violate Article 49(6) also overlooks the Jewish communities that existed before the creation of the state in areas occupied by today’s Israeli settlements, for example, in Hebron and the Etzion block outside Jerusalem. These Jewish communities were destroyed by Arab armies, militias, and rioters, and, as in the case of Hebron, the community’s population was slaughtered. Is it sensible to interpret Article 49 to bar the reconstitution of Jewish communities that were destroyed through aggression and slaughter? If so, the international law of occupation runs the risk of freezing one occupier’s conduct in place, no matter how unlawful.

While reasonable people can of course disagree with Israeli settlement policy – in the context of efforts to one day reach a final status agreement with the Palestinians – lazily asserting that such settlements are “illegal” has, at best, a questionable basis in international law, and certainly no basis in morality.

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Sep 20 2011

“It’s All Netanyahu’s Fault,” the Guardian and much of the MSM Say. But Is It Really?

A guest post by Elan Miller, who blogs at Destination Israel.

Over the last few weeks and months, a spurious lie has been spreading. Nothing new, perhaps, lies are told the whole time. But this one is a particularly important lie, and it needs quashing with immediate effect.

The lie goes as follows. The Palestinian people want to live in peace. They want to live in peace, alongside Israel. They want to live in peace, alongside Israel, the Jewish state. They want to live in peace, alongside Israel, the Jewish state, but Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is an extremist and prevents them from doing so. Benjamin Netanyahu and his cohorts, the lie goes, are the sole reason why the peace process appears to be dead in the water.

To understand the claim better, we must go back some time. Earlier this year, Wikileaks collaborated with the Guardian to reveal hundreds of secret documents online. The Guardian went through the archives and found an astonishing incident. In an article entitled, “Israel spurned Palestinian offer of ‘biggest Yerushalayim in history”, we are told that “Leaked papers reveal [Palestinian] negotiators proposed concessions on East Jerusalem settlements, Sheikh Jarrah and Old City holy sites” and that Palestinian chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat said the following: “It is no secret that … we are offering you the biggest Yerushalayim [the Hebrew word for Jerusalem] in history.” The Guardian had a field day with this quote, using it as proof that the Palestinians were ready to make mass concessions. What was not mentioned in the headline, or in the analysis articles, was that Erekat went on to say, “But we must talk about the concept of al-Quds [Jerusalem in Arabic].”

The Guardian is quick to inform us that an “unprecedented offer” was made “on the East Jerusalem settlements”, carefully picking and mixing quotes that painted a story of Palestinian negotiators adopting a conciliatory approach, going so far as to propose “that Israel annex all Jewish settlements in Jerusalem except Har Homa.” Put like this, it sounded very much like the Israelis were acting unreasonably, wantonly even.

In the ensuing debacle, Israel was roundly criticised for deliberately missing an opportunity to forge a real, lasting peace with the Palestinians. Had this been the end of the story, I would no doubt have not been writing about Palestinian lies, but about Israeli ones.

But the story does not end there. There is much that the Guardian neglected tell us in its editorials or headlines. For while Israel was indeed offered concessions by Palestinian negotiators, they were rendered obsolete and utterly invalidated when placed in the context of the greater plan put forward. Deep in the article, toward the end, we are told that Israel’s negotiator, was “recorded as dismissing the offer out of hand because the Palestinians had refused to concede Har Homa, as well as the settlements at Ma’ale Adumim, near Jerusalem, and Ariel, deeper in the West Bank.” Intriguingly, we are told that “Israel’s position was fully supported by the Bush administration.” Whatever one might say about the Bush administration, is worthy of note that the Israeli position was fully supported. No reservations were expressed. It was clear as day to the Americans that an offer on Jerusalem offset by a situation in which Ma’ale Adumim and Ariel would have to be ceded by the Israelis to Palestinian control was wholly unacceptable.

Not only this, but we might bear in mind recent statements made by Maen Rashid Areikat, the Palestine Liberation Organization’s ambassador to the U.S., who said that the future Palestine should be free of Jews. After the firestorm that followed, Areikat then incriminated himself further when reiterating his position to the left-leaning Huffington Post stating that “Israeli soldiers and settlers — ‘persons who are amid an occupation, who are in my land illegally’ — would be rejected from the new Palestinian state.” So, not only would Israel have to give Ariel and Ma’ale Adumim over to the Palestinians, but in excess of 56,000 people would be forcibly ejected from their homes and compelled to find a new place to live. Is it any wonder that Israel rejected such a proposition? The peace process is dead in the water, but not for lack of Israel trying. It is dead in the water because the Palestinian leadership has led us so far up a futile and fruitless path that there is nowhere else to turn but to yet more ridiculous measures. By acting like a petulant child, not only is the Palestinian leadership dismissing Israel’s concerns and requirements, but it is effectively sabotaging the demands and needs of its own people, too.

For almost two decades now, there has been an implicit understanding that negotiations will take place based on the cease-fire line of 1949 commonly known as the “1967 borders”. This line was never intended to constitute a border. How it came to be regarded as sacred has been one of the greatest deceptions of our time. So when President Obama states that Israel will need to find a solution based on this line, this is a massive break with previous agreements and understandings. Instead of focusing on the abominable racial incitement and insidious accusations of land theft being propagated by the Palestinians, a blind eye is turn to such indiscretions and the heat is turned on Israel for having the gall to demand that tens of thousands of people not be uprooted from their homes.

It is revealing that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas saw fit to select Latifa Abu Hmeid, the mother of several terrorists involved in multiple attacks on Israeli civilians, to be the ambassador for the Palestinian independence bid. Abbas might be a moderate relative to his predecessor Yassir Arafat, but there can be no doubt that he is absolutely not moderate. In choosing such a person to endorse the bid, we are told everything we need to know about his vision and aspirations.

It would be bad enough if this was an aberration from the norm. But it’s not. Previously, Abbas has overseen the dedication of a town square near Ramallah to another Palestinian national icon, Dalal Al Mughrabi, the terrorist who killed 37 people, including 13 children, after hijacking an Israeli bus in 1979. At least two schools and numerous summer camps are amongst the recipients of having the dubious honour of being named after this murderer. Such are the heroes of the Palestinian people.

Even more disturbingly, you might have missed such enthralling television as this, in which little children are shown dressing up as suicide bombers and clutching mock AK-47 rifles. Similarly, another odious clip depicts a little girl facing the screen telling viewers that Israel “stole” all the land, and “changed the names”. It’s bad enough that the current generation make unreasonable demands of Israel. Much, much worse is that the current generation are being indoctrinated before our eyes, being led to believe that Israel – in its totality – has no right to exist at all.

So. Do the Palestinian people want to live in peace? To be fair, I imagine the answer is that many do. Most people in the world do. But do the Palestinian people want to live peace alongside Israel? Well, no, not if repeated attempts to portray the residents of Tel Aviv, Haifa, west Jerusalem and other internationally undisputed Israel-controlled areas as land thieves and aliens are anything to go by. As long as the entire Jewish state is repeatedly deemed illegal and a travesty of justice, then it follows that the Palestinians are not prepared to accept an Israeli state alongside it. As long as such agitation reigns unchecked, what hope is there for peace? 

It would take someone with all the vision of a Cyclops to believe that Netanyahu is responsible for Abbas’s endorsement and glorification of terror and his subsequent refusal to engage in negotiations. Benjamin Netanyahu’s fault? Israel wilfully spurning opportunities to make peace? Palestinians forced to a final resort? Hardly. Don’t believe the lie, no matter how many times you hear it.

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Mar 12 2011

Harriet Sherwood’s reprehensible moral equivalence in reporting the murders in Itamar

We are told that the language we use dictates the way we perceive the world and react to what goes on in it.

This manipulation of discourse is evident in the Guardian and particularly on CiF, both of which are good at cranking up ill feeling towards Israel and Jews but dismally incompetent at providing contextual information to their readership so that they can come to a balanced conclusion about what they are being told.  Harriet Sherwood is an arch-practitioner of this manipulation of discourse and truth, but thankfully she is not very clever at it.

Thus, when she writes about the heart-wrenching murders in Itamar of five members of a Jewish family (among them a baby of only three months old) and two of whom had their throats cut, somehow she cannot bring herself to call the perpetrators of that infamy what they really are – terrorists (for their attack was calculated to instil terror after all) – preferring rather to refer to them as “militants.”

In line with her usual dispensation with any pretence towards ethics and balance, Sherwood then refers to “continued tension” between Palestinian villagers and what she calls “hard-line settlers,” with regular skirmishes over the destruction of olive trees.  She also goes on to tell her no doubt eager readership (many of whom, remember, are being carefully fed whatever nastiness they want to hear about Israel, according to the Guardian’s assistant editor, Michael White) that Itamar is “intensely nationalist-religious” and populated by Jews who believe they have a divine right to the land.

Nowhere in this shabby pretence towards “journalism” is there any mention of the fact that residents of Rafah, in Gaza, came onto the streets to celebrate the murders, and, as their grisly customs dictate, handed out sweets.   One of them declared that joy was a “natural response” to harm inflicted by settlers on the West Bank.  (Our Harriet, of course, would not want to feed that to her readership – it might be too strong meat even for them).

Instead, by mentioning the continuing tension between Palestinians and “hard-line” and “intensely nationalist-religious” settlers (by which, presumably, we are meant to believe that the murderers of Israeli civilians are not in any way hard-line or intensely nationalist-religious, nor did they perpetrate this outrage because they believed they had no divine right to do so), she nastily implies that this poor family was to blame for the violence perpetrated against them.

So, I would like to ask you, Harriet Sherwood:

Do you believe that these terrorists have the right to murder an Israeli family in retribution for the destruction of olive trees?    (Come, come Harriet, YOU have linked the two as though you believe – whatever that might be worth – that the one is responsible for the other, and to raise the question in your readers’ minds.  If you do not believe that to be the case, that the two are not linked, then why mention it at all?)

Why did you not define these perpetrators as terrorists?

Do you believe that murders of innocents are fitting retribution for whatever perceived wrongs perpetrated are against Palestinians , ie do you agree with the terrorist who said that “joy” was a natural, or fitting, or even an understandable reaction to them?

Why have you referred to the residents of Itamar as “hard liners”, without making clear that the Palestinians who attacked them are more hard-line and intensely nationalist-religious, to the extent that they perpetrated murder for their nationalist-religious beliefs and others celebrated that inhuman act?

Finally, a slightly tangential question:   Why is there no opportunity to comment below your piece?   Is there perhaps a glimmer of awareness on your part that you really have galloped headlong out of the realms of decency this time?

Nov 17 2010

BUYcott Ahava! Come and stand up to the bullies, and buy Israeli goods.

From the UK Zionist Federation:

Every second Saturday, a nasty group of bullies stands outside the Ahava Dead Sea beauty products shop in Covent Garden, disrupting trade and chanting anti-Israel slogans. Their aim is to shut down this Israeli business because they believe in boycotting Israel.

On the weekend of 20-21 November 2010 we will show them that we refuse to be bullied. And we need YOUR help!

The more people who turn up during that weekend to buy some of the wonderful products from this shop (all enriched with amazing minerals from the Dead Sea), the more we will show our refusal to be bullied.

The protestors will be there on Saturday from 12midday – 2pm, and we want them to see a constant line of people filing into the shop to buy products. But our BUYcott lasts all weekend, so please come any time you feel comfortable with. As the protestors are there on Shabbat, we hope that non Jewish friends of Israel might attend then, and the BUYcott continues all day on Sunday, too, for those who cannot attend on Saturday.

This is a perfect opportunity to buy these wonderful Israeli products which are great for the skin in time for Chanukah or Christmas. They make perfect presents. And for that weekend only, if you mention that you are part of the ZF’s BUYcott at the till, you will get TEN PERCENT OFF!

Please support a shop being bullied for selling Israeli products. Please support Israel. We are relying on you and your friends, so spread the word.

You can read more about the protestors here: