Strong words from Claude Lanzmann about the pro-Hamas Lies in the MSM concerning the Turkish Thug Armada

Claude Lanzmann is a rare bird on today's political landscape. He was an assistant to Jean-Paul Sartre as a young man and inherited Sartre's mantle and legacy as chief editor of Sartre's heavy weight intellectual journal, Les Temps Modernes, after Sartre's death. He had strong words for Hamas and its Western supporters and sympathizers, including those in the French press and media, over the Turkish Thug Armada and the fighting on board the Mavi Marmara on 31 May 2010. We translate below his speech given at a rally in Paris on behalf of freedom for Gilad Shalit on 22 June 2010, as well as presenting the speech in French below that. Lanzmann's pro-Israel position shows once again the falsehood of the "right-left political spectrum" notion, especially but not only in regard to Israel.

Who Is Delegitimizing Israel?
by Claude Lanzmann

What happened after Israel's boarding and seizure of the so-called humanitarian flotilla and what we could read and hear in so many newspapers, on all of our television networks, our radio stations, on a thousand unsupervised blogs, in discussions among web surfers in which hatred fought it out with stupidity, was really frightening. What joy, my friends, my brothers, what happiness in being able once again, without any restraint, to stigmatize Israel, a scapegoat laden with all crimes, and first of all with the original sin of existing. Those who were so prompt to condemn Israel, without having any other source of information than that thundered by Hamas propagandists and their faithful, didn't care one bit about the reality of the facts, of their genesis, of the reasons for the blockade, or of the warnings given by Tsahal to the "peace activists." They were only motivated in fact by one single dream: to get into a fight and thereby tear the veil off the true face of the Jews before the world: drinkers of blood, starvation-causers, thieves, cowards and I won't bother to go on; or, what comes down to the same thing, to unveil the true face of Israel, a pirate state. We instantaneously read and heard this obscene refrain in the dailies, on the broadcasting stations, and the networks, whose names it would be best not to mention.

The blockade has an origin: It is called Gilad Shalit, a young soldier fallen, in Israeli territory, into an ambush set by Hamas, and held hostage for four years now by his kidnappers, who play on the nerves of his family and the country by promising a phantom release. Hamas or Hezbollah have most usually handed back dead bodies for hundreds of live Palestinians that Israel had released, because this pirate state --it has proven it a hundred times-- has always been ready to repatriate its dead or its living at any price.

The second origin [of the blockade] is the Hamas itself, which declares itself in a state of war with Israel, having conducted indiscriminate bombardments of its villages for months without respite. This is the Hamas that calls in its press, its schools, in all its propaganda, for the eradication of the Jewish state. It is first of all by Hamas that the blockade was cynically imposed on Gaza. By Hamas but also by Egypt that, fearing for its regime from the jihadist contagion, has closed its land border at the south of the Gaza Strip. But, as we know, a profitable trade which enriches Arab millionaires brings all the merchandise possible and imaginable to Gaza through tunnels dug in the sands of Sinai.

Know this, detractors of Israel. You are being lied to and you are lying. Gaza is stuffed with goods. You can find there televisions, the most modern computerized gadgets, the IPhones, the IPads, the top of the line refrigerators, etc. And especially, people there eat as much as they need. No one in Gaza is dying of malnutrition nor suffers thirst nor hunger. Where are the fleshless bodies, where the skin hanging from the bones in the photographs of the plump, well-fed high officials of the Hamas government? Have you seen faces of emaciated children, skeletal bodies? We can be certain that if, by chance, they existed, the Hamas' master propagandists would transmit them to us continuously ad nauseam. No, Gaza is not the Warsaw Ghetto, though that may displease the true believers who hurriedly visit for several hours, though that may displease the UNRWA and Mister Goldstone. And let's finish off another lie. Israel never wanted to starve Gaza. It has, as is its right, demanded to inspect the merchandise. It forbids some things for security reasons and sends every day dozens of trucks that, starting from the Ashdod port, unload their contents at the northern entrance to the Gaza Strip.

Out of the six ships of the abovementioned flotilla, five, we know, let themselves be brought to Ashdod after being boarded non-violently by the Israeli navy. What they were carrying was put on the dock, checked and immediately shipped to the northern border of Gaza, where the Hamas people refused to accept delivery. The perishable materials spoiled in place. All that remained under the sun was a comical number of wheel chairs brought by the "humanitarians" for the legless amputees who form --in the "humanitarians'" minds the majority of the people of Gaza.

Don't imagine, good people, that Gaza is a brotherly, classless society. There are poor and rich in Gaza, billionaire land owners, living on the heights of luxury residences, who never raised a finger to help their supposed brethren of the poor neighborhoods and the refugee camps.

It was necessary that Gaza remain --and this is what Jean-Paul Sartre reproached them for before me in 1967, three months before the Six Day War-- a morbid focus of attention, a canker sore defying any solution (while it would have been so easy for the oil rich to help them) , thus making it possible to condemn Israel forever. That continues. The unanimous concert of loud, angry voices aroused by Israel's refusal to allow the humanitarian convoy to pass is the best proof of that. On the sixth boat, chartered by the Turkish branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is the Palestinian branch, the Israelis were awaited by armed men determined to make Jihad. That is, to kill and be killed, certain of being immediately received in Allah's dwelling by caressing maidens.

If we do not have the right to rebuke Israel for boarding and seizing the ships, we may be astonished at the impressive naiveté with which the soldiers acted. The naval commander had told them: "You will be greeted with spitting, insults, burning cigarettes. Above all, don't retaliate." What happened was entirely different: Coming down from a helocopter in a geostationary position above the Mavi Marmara, the soldiers slid down one by one on a smooth rope, letting themselves be picked off by long clubs, sling shots, iron bars, long knives, etc, before even touching the deck. Many were injured, some very seriously, one being thrown from the upper deck to the lower deck. He was found with his back broken. It is the rule in the Israeli army: the soldiers have the right to shoot if their lives are in danger. This was the case.

The investigating commission formed by Israel, a model democracy, will give its conclusions and it should be believed. The barking dogs understood moreover that they had gone too far and are now putting a muffler on their vitriolic invective. In such circumstances, we Jews have a duty of solidarity toward Israel in danger, threatened in the North as in the South by Ahmadinejad's allies. Meanwhile Ahmadinejad is readying his nuclear arsenal. The same duty of solidarity commands us to express and to bring, as rightful citizens of the French Republic, a severe judgment of contempt for the pathetic fools who call for a boycott of Israel and demand removing Israeli films from a schedule, which is a way of calling for its death. We will not allow that. It is not the policy of Israel that delegitimizes that state, as some would have us believe. It is first of all the irredentism of the Arab extremists and, we regret that a certain number of complacently conformist Jews, who have been silent up till now, were not more perceptive when they signed a text which, as the flotilla affair has unmistakably demonstrated, was a tissue of unrealistic ideals, unrealistic principles and unrealistic aspirations.

(a speech given on 22 June 2010 in Paris, during the demonstration organized by the CRIF, in support of Israel and Gilad Shalit) [the CRIF is the umbrellas organization of French Jews]

«Qui délégitime Israël ?», par Claude Lanzmann

Ce qui s’est passé après l’arraisonnement par Israël de la flottille soi-disant humanitaire, ce que nous avons pu lire, voir et entendre dans tant de journaux, sur toutes nos chaînes de télévision, nos stations de radios, sur mille blogs incontrôlés, dans des discussions entre internautes où la haine le disputait à la stupidité, est proprement effrayant. Quelle joie, mes amis, mes frères, quelle félicité de pouvoir à nouveau, sans retenue aucune, stigmatiser Israël, bouc émissaire chargé de tous les crimes et d’abord du péché originel d’exister. Ceux qui étaient si prompts à condamner Israël, sans avoir aucune autre source d’information que celle tonitruée par les propagandistes du Hamas et leurs affidés, se souciaient comme d’une guigne de la réalité des faits, de leur genèse, des raisons du blocus, des avertissements prodigués par Tsahal aux « activistes de la paix » qu’un seul rêve animait en vérité : en découdre et dévoiler ainsi au monde le vrai visage des Juifs buveurs de sang, affameurs, voleurs, lâches et j’en passe, ou, ce qui revient au même, le vrai visage d’Israël, Etat pirate. On a lu et entendu instantanément cette obscène rengaine dans des quotidiens, des stations et des chaînes, dont il vaut mieux taire le nom.

Le blocus a une origine : elle s’appelle Gilad Shalit, jeune soldat tombé, en territoire israélien, dans une embuscade tendue par le Hamas, et otage depuis maintenant quatre années de ses ravisseurs, qui jouent sur les nerfs de ses proches et du pays en promettant une libération fantomatique. Hamas ou Hezbollah ont le plus souvent restitué des cadavres contre des cen taines de Palestiniens bien vivants qu’Israël relâchait, car cet Etat pirate —il l’a cent fois prouvé— a toujours été prêt à rapatrier ses morts ou ses vivants à n’importe quel prix. La deuxième origine, c’est le Hamas lui-même, qui se déclare en état de guerre avec Israël, ayant procédé pendant des mois et sans répit à des bombardements indiscriminés sur ses villages, le Hamas qui appelle, dans sa presse, dans ses écoles, dans toute sa propagande, à l’éradication de l’Etat juif. C’est d’abord par le Hamas que le blocus est imposé cyniquement à Gaza. Par le Hamas, mais aussi par l’Egypte qui, craignant pour son régime la contagion djihadiste, a fermé sa frontière de surface au sud de la bande de Gaza. Mais, on le sait, un fructueux trafic, qui enrichit des millionnaires arabes, amène, par des centaines de tunnels creusés dans le sable du Sinaï, toutes les marchandises possibles et imaginables à Gaza. Sachez-le, détracteurs d’Israël : on vous ment, vous mentez, Gaza regorge d e biens, on y trouve les téléviseurs, les outils informatiques les plus modernes, les Iphone, les Ipad, les réfrigérateurs de grand luxe etc. Et surtout, on y mange autant qu’il se doit : nul à Gaza ne meurt de malnutrition, ne souffre de la soif ou de la faim. Où sont les décharnés, où la peau sur les os, dans les photographies des membres bien en chair du gouvernement du Hamas ? Avons-nous vu des visages d’enfants émaciés, des corps squelettiques ? Soyons certains que si d’aventure ils existaient, les maîtres propagandistes du Hamas nous les repasseraient en boucle ad nauseam. Non, Gaza, n’en déplaise aux dévots pressés, visiteurs de quelques heures, n’en déplaise à l’UNRA et à Monsieur Goldstone, n’est pas le ghetto de Varsovie. Et finissons-en avec cet autre mensonge : Israël n’a jamais voulu affamer Gaza, il a, comme c’est son droit, demandé à contrôler les marchandises, interdit certaines pour des raisons de sécurité et envoie chaque jour des dizaines de camions qui, à partir du port d’Ashdod, déchargent leur contenu à l’entrée nord de la bande de Gaza. Sur les six navires de ladite flottille, cinq, on le sait, se sont laissé conduire à Ashdod après leur arraisonnement non violent par la marine israélienne. Ce qu’ils transportaient a été mis à quai, vérifié et expédié immédiatement à la frontière nord de Gaza, où les gens du Hamas ont refusé d’en prendre livraison. Les matières périssables ont pourri sur place, seules demeurent sous le soleil un nombre comique de chaises roulantes apportées par les « humanitaires » pour les culs-de-jatte qui dans leur esprit forment la majorité du peuple de Gaza. N’imaginez pas, braves gens, que Gaza est une société fraternelle et sans classes. Il y a à Gaza des pauvres et des riches, des très riches, milliardaires propriétaires des terres, vivant sur les hauteurs dans de somptueuses demeures, qui n’ont jamais levé un doigt pour venir en aide à leurs prétendus frères des bas quartiers et des camps de réfugiés. Il fallait que Gaza —et c’est ce que Jean-Paul Sartre leur reprochait déjà devant moi en 1967, trois mois avant la guerre des six jours— reste un abcès de fixation, un chancre défiant toute solution (alors qu’il eût été si facile aux opulents du pétrole de leur venir en aide) et permettant de condamner Israël pour l’éternité. Cela continue, le concert unanime de vociférations suscité par le refus de laisser passer l’escadre humanitaire en est la meilleure preuve. Sur le sixième bateau, affrété par la branche turque des Frères Musulmans dont le Hamas est la branche palestinienne, les Israéliens étaient attendus par des hommes en armes résolus au Djihad, c’est-à-dire à tuer et à se faire tuer, certains d’être reçus aussitôt chez Allah par de caressantes pucelles.

Si on n’a pas le droit de reprocher à Israël l’arraisonnement des navires, on peut s’étonner de la naïveté formidable avec laquelle ses soldats ont agi. Le Commandant de la marine leur avait dit : « On vous accueillera avec des crachats, des insultes, des cigarettes enflammées. Ne ripostez surtout pas. » Ce fut tout autre chose : à partir d’un hélicoptère en position géostationnaire au-dessus du Mavi Marmara, les soldats qui glissaient un par un sur une corde lisse se faisaient cueillir avant même d’avoir touché le pont par de longues matraques, des lance-pierres, des barres de fer, des coutelas, etc. Beaucoup furent blessés, certains très grièvement, l’un d’eux fut balancé du pont supérieur vers le pont inférieur, on le retrouva avec le dos brisé. C’est la règle dans l’armée d’Israël : les soldats ont le droit de tirer si leur vie est en danger. C’était le cas. La commission d’enquête formée par Israël, démocratie exemplaire, rendra ses conclusions et il faudra la croire. Les aboyeurs ont d’ailleurs compris qu’ils avaient été beaucoup trop loin et mettent maintenant une sourdine à leurs vitupérations. En de telles circonstances, nous autres Juifs, avons un devoir de solidarité envers un Israël en péril, menacé au Nord comme au Sud par les alliés d’un Ahmadinejad, qui fourbit son arsenal nucléaire. Et le même devoir de solidarité nous commande de l’exprimer et de porter, en tant que citoyens de plein droit de la République française, un jugement lourd de mépris sur les tristes imbéciles qui appellent au boycott d’Israël et demandent la déprogrammation de ses films, ce qui est une façon de crier à la mort. Nous ne le permettrons pas. Ce n’est pas la politique d’Israël qui, comme on a voulu le faire croire, délégitime ce pays. C’est d’abord l’irrédentisme des extrémistes arabes et l’on regrette qu’un certain nombre de Juifs bien-pensants, et qui se taisaient jusque là, ne s’en soient pas avisés avant de signer un texte dont l’affaire de la flottille démontre sans fard l’angélisme.

(Allocution prononcée le 22 juin 2010 à Paris, lors de la manifestation, organisée par le CRIF, de soutien à Israël et à Gilad Shalit; voir ici)

Arab Fibbing Goes Way Back

One of the outrageous phenomena of our ongoing war with the Arabs is not only that they lie often to the press/media, telling some extravagant and outrageous lies sometimes, groundless lies, sometimes merely silly fibs that only influence fools in the West --but that the Western media and fake "human rights" and "peace" and "humanitarian" outfits are quite pleased to accept the Arab lies, that is, they don't mind being lied to if Arabs do it. Among the more notorious Arab lies in the Oslo War that started in September 2000 are the Muhammad al-Dura hoax [2000], the Jenin massacre hoax [2002], the lie that the war began with Ariel Sharon going up onto the Temple Mount in late September 2000 [more on the actual beginning time of the war in later posts], etc.

But the Arab propensity to lie --even about things that are relatively unimportant-- goes way back. Byzantine Greeks noticed this habit of mendacity back in the Middle Ages.

. . . many Byzantine authors complain indignantly of the unreliability of the Saracens. Indeed one searches the Byzantine sources in vain for a favorable judgement about the Arabs.
[Vassilios Christides, "Saracens' Prodosia in Byzantine Sources," Byzantion XL (1970), p 12]
. . . the constant Byzantine suspicions of Arab trustworthiness.
[p 13]

The propensity of the Arabs to lie, Arab mendacity for short, puts Israel at a disadvantage in the contest for world public opinion and the diplomatic support of governments. Even Shimon Peres is said to have mentioned this in a strategy discussion with an American Jewish professor back in the 1970s. "We can't lie like the Arabs can," Peres is supposed to have explained to the professor. At that time, Peres' Labor Party was still in power in Israel.
At any rate, Peres made the mistake, in my view, of failing to see the propensity on the part of the Western press/media, diplomats, governments, politicians, and "humanitarian activists" of various labels to accept these lies, even the silliest and most unlikely, and to spread them [on the part of the press/media] as an even greater threat to Israel than the lies themselves.
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Coming: More on Obama the war candidate, More on the anti-Jewish racism of the "Peace Process," Jews in Jerusalem, Hebron, the Land of Israel, archeological updates, peace follies, propaganda, etc.

British AgitProp Agencies Assault Israel, Skynews Omits Mention of Karsenty Acquittal

Was it a coincidence that 5 or 6 weeks after the alleged killing by an Israeli tank shell of a Gaza Arab cameraman working for Reuters, the story was revived on Skynews on 5-22-2008, a day after a French appeals court had acquitted Philippe Karsenty of libel for calling the alleged killing by Israeli troops of 12-year old Muhammad al-Durah [30 September 2000] -- a hoax?? British anti-Israel agitprop seems to be moving into high gear not only to deflect attention from the court decision in Paris but to intensify their usual smearing of Israel.

Now, it's not just coming from the BBC but from Sky and Reuters which are also British agencies. Coincidentally or not, just a day or two after a court in Paris ruled that Philippe Karsenty was not guilty of libel for calling the alleged Muhammad al-Durah killing [Sept 2000] a hoax, Skynews ran a similar, although not identical, smear of Israel with the cooperation of Reuters. The questionable character of the coincidence is confirmed by the fact that Skynews did not report the verdict in the Karsenty-France2-al-Durah case, which I ascertained from searches on Sky's website of posts between 5-20 & 5-24.

The French court made its ruling after the judges viewed extended but incomplete footage of events at the Netsarim intersection that day in 2000. The judge had called for all footage still in the hands of France2 to be shown to the court's next session [France2 and its employes had earlier alleged that 27 minutes of film footage remained that had not been broadcast] . However, France2 did not comply fully with the court's order and only showed 18 minutes of the alleged 27 at the next session [November 2007]. Some or all of the missing 9 minutes had been seen several years ago by Richard Landes, a history professor at Boston University, Luc Rosenzweig, a former chief editor of LeMonde, Denis Jeambar and Daniel Leconte, both journalists, separately on at least two separate occasions. Jeambar and Leconte published their reaction to viewing the footage, the "rushes," in an op ed in the French daily, LeFigaro. Rosenzweig published his conclusions on the MENA website which is available through the Guysen Israel News website linked to from our blogroll. Much info on this matter is found on Menahem Macina's debriefing website, including Jeambar & Leconte's op ed.

What the judges saw in the 18 minutes that France2 did bring to court indicated that the boy was alive after allegedly being killed according to the original France2 broadcast in 2000, even shifting a red cloth in his hand that in a still photograph might seem flowing blood. The judges were impressed that the death of Little Muhammad was not proven, let alone that Israeli bullets had killed him. They criticized France2, a state TV broadcaster, and Charles Enderlin, the France2 Jerusalem correspondent responsible for the original blood libel of late September 2000, among others. A pdf file of the court's verdict is available here.

Curiously indeed, after a French court rejects the al-Durah blood libel, Skynews and Reuters bring up the slightly stale case of a Gazan cameraman working for Reuters, insinuating that Israeli soldiers had deliberately killed him, knowing that he was a journalist. And this is done with considerable emotive verbiage on the part of Sky "news" presenters and Alistair MacDonald, head of the Reuters Jerusalem bureau, who is interviewed in the Sky feature story. MacDonald arrogantly asks: Why the Israelis had killed Our cameraman who was Only Going About His Business. Right there we have a dubious and unsupported factual claim, that is, that the Israelis knew that they were killing a cameraman. MacDonald's approach is like that of asking a man when he is going to stop beating his wife. Such a question presumes that the man beats his wife, without facts, without admission on his part.

Now, if we assume that the cameraman is indeed dead, then we need to point out that the tank was 1 kilometer or more away from the cameraman when it fired. Further, the film showed him carrying a film camera on his shoulder, which could easily look like a RPG launcher or like an anti-tank missile launcher to an observer a kilometer away. Moreover, Gaza Arab terrorists have in the past disguised themselves as journalists as well as medical personnel, painting the word "PRESS" on terrorist jeeps and hiding in ambulances, transporting weapons and explosives on ambulances, even using ambulances as car bombs. Obviously, on a battlefield, it is difficult to know who is that figure standing one kilometer away, besides the fact that Arab journalists in Gaza not only sympathize with one side over the other but have often provided direct help to terrorists in the form of information, carrying or concealing weapons, etc. Therefore, it was not likely that the tank crew knew that they were aiming at a cameraman. Of course, even if they were close to a man carrying a camera --shoulder-mounted or not-- and wearing an iridescent yellow press vest, they could not be sure that he was really a cameraman or journalist.

Another problem with this story as presented on Skynews on 5-22-2008 is that the number of dead victims in the incident has jumped from 3 [including the cameraman] on 4-16-2008 to nine [9] on 5-22-08. So the problem is not only the mendacity of Arab journalists & cameramen but the mendacity of Western journalists too. [see quotes below].

Indeed, it is a problem that journalists [including cameramen] with proper press credentials may take part in "news" hoaxes, like the Muhammad al-Durah "killing" hoax, which was perpetrated by Gaza cameramanTalal Abu Rahma with Charles Enderlin's cooperation. Indeed, Prof Richard Landes reports that when he viewed the rushes with Enderlin in the latter's Jerusalem offices, and that he [Landes] pointed out that much of the footage seemed fake, Enderlin answered: "Oh, they're always doing that" [that is, the Arab cameramen working for Enderlin].

On the other hand, it must be taken into account that anyone going onto a battlefield knowingly and willingly must know that he is taking a risk to his life, even if he is Only Going About His Business, in the words of the Sky/Reuters agitprop presentation. A battlefield is not a playground [שדה קרב אינו מתחם משחקים ] .

Now, despite engaging in moralistic high dudgeon over what they insinuate to have been the deliberate killing of a Reuters cameraman by Israel, neither Sky nor Reuters mentioned that Gaza Arab terrorists have been shooting rockets at the Israeli civilian population for more than seven years. If we search the Skynews and Reuters websites, we note that --although rockets are shot into Israel every day, mainly at the small city of Sderot-- there was no mention of Sderot by Sky between 19 March 2008 and now [6-6-2008]. Nor did Reuters mention Sderot from 28 April 2008 till now [6-6-2008]. This latest Reuters mention of Sderot focusses not on Israeli victims but on Gaza Arab victims. Hamas terrorists [al-Qassam] claimed that they had shot rockets at Sderot "in response to" Israeli attacks that had allegedly killed civilians in Gaza. But Hamas and other jihadist gangs shoot at Israel every day, usually at Sderot and neighboring farming communities, more recently at the larger city of Ashqelon. Apparently, Sky and Reuters would rather engage in a high dudgeon passion play over an allegedly dead Arab cameraman working for Reuters "going about his business" rather than make it the business of Sky/Reuters reporters and cameramen to go to Sderot or nearby kibbutzim to find out what it's like to be bombarded daily by Arab jihadi terrorists. By the way, a factory worker was killed yesterday [5 June 2008] on a kibbutz near Sderot. He was the father of three children.

The hypocritical --indeed, rather silly-- propaganda onslaught on Israel fits into a larger strategy, not only to demonize and dehumanize Israel and Israelis and Jews generally, but to support the Hamas campaign to raise the minimal blockade of Gaza [which gets food shipments from Israel regularly]. This propaganda assault is done by Hamas in cooperation with UN officials in Gaza who constantly speak of a humanitarian crisis in Gaza [where most of the adult population supports genocidal terrorists] but not the humanitarian plight of Jews in Sderot, Ashqelon, and neighboring towns, villages, and kibbutsim. The "humanitarian crisis" in Gaza is blamed on an Israeli "siege." But this "siege" is so light that it does not prevent medium-sized weapons from being brought in from Egypt through tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border, and maybe in other ways too. If there is no "humanitarian crisis" for Jews in Sderot, Ashqelon, etc, according to UN officials, Hamas leaders, NGO spokesmen, and the major media --especially British media-- then maybe that means that Jews are not human. That's the purpose of the Skynews/Reuters propaganda assault.
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HOW DID THREE BECOME NINE in ONLY FIVE WEEKS??

Original BBC report, with video, on this incident (Augean Stables post, analysis and commentary on this incident) . According to the original BBC report, there are only 2 casualties besides the cameraman, not 8 [Sky report of 5-22-2008]. Two plus one equal three.

In other violence throughout the day, a Reuters cameraman was among three killed when his car exploded, apparently after being hit by an Israeli tank shell.
Two others died in the blast that killed the Reuters cameraman
[BBC 4-16-2008]

Here's the Reuters report on the incident:

GAZA, April 16 (Reuters)- A Reuters cameraman and two other Palestinian civilians were killed on Wednesday in what local residents said was an Israeli air strike in the Gaza Strip. [Reuters 4-16-08]

Five weeks later:

Five weeks on from the death of Palestinian cameraman Fadel Shana, Israel has yet to announce the findings of its investigation into the incident - which also killed eight civilians, most of them teenagers or children. [Skynews, 5-22-2008, updated 5-23-08]

It seems that Time is not only a Great Healer but a Great Multiplier. This is a three-fold multiplication of the number of victims in only five weeks [4-16 to 5-22], from three to nine!!!

Film recovered from his camera shows an Israeli tank opening fire several hundred metres away, Reuters adds. [BBC, ibid.]

"Several hundred" is an indefinite number. Use of an indefinite, indeed vague, number is an old media trick meant to disguise an amount either too small or too large for purposes of the political message, without exactly lying. "Several hundred" might mean anything from 300 meters to 2 kilometers or more. Of course, measuring an exact distance is not easy without surveying tools.
On the other hand, Sky puts the Israeli tank "a mile away" [1 mile is nearly two km].

Shana was filming Israeli tanks on a ridge a mile away, when one of them opened fire... [Skynews. 5-22-08, updated 5-23-08]

Sky reports that:

Reuters news agency is demanding to know why the Israelis killed one of its cameramen as he was legitimately going about his business in Gaza.
[Skynews. 5-22-08, updated 5-23-08]

I have a demand too. I demand to know how 3 victims reported by BBC on 16 April had multiplied to 9 victims in Sky's report of 5-(22 & 23).

By the way, note that the collateral victims, besides the cameraman --sanctified simply by belonging to the press, are mainly "teenagers or children" [according to the Sky report quoted above]. What are children, or even teenagers, doing on a battlefield?? Weren't there any responsible adults to tell the kid victims to go home?? Bear in mind that the classical anti-Jewish blood libel, such as Simon of Trent, involves Jews allegedly killing a boy. So alleged death story of the Reuters cameraman also alludes to boys being killed, as was the case in the Muhammad al-Durah hoax.
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Skynews passion play about the cameraman here1, here2, here3 by order of date. The first two are videos, the third is text.
Reuters report on French court decision absolving Karsenty of libel charge.
BBC report on the same.
Seconddraft and Augean Stables sites which bring much info about the Al-Durah Affair.
Draft English translation of the French court ruling.
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Coming: more on Jews caught up in the Armenian genocide, archeology in Jerusalem, peace follies, obama's subtle fakery, propaganda, etc.

CNN [christiane amanpour] Does It Again -- The Jewish Holy City of Hebron is "Arab land"

One of the things to think about when watching a "news" report or a feature story on TV is: What are they leaving out? What did they not mention? What has been omitted?

CNN & Christiane Amanpour did that big time today in an excerpt that I saw of her three part series "God's Warriors." The excerpt focussed on the suffering of Hebron's Jewish community. However, CNN & Amanpour manage to blame the Jews there for the fanatical Arab violence against them. Indeed, one interviewee, the bearded but short on brains Gershom Goremberg, suggested that Muslim fanatical violence world wide was due to the Jews in Hebron. The context that CNN gave to his words indicates that that is CNN and Amanpour's position.

1- The male announcer introduces the story by saying that some Jews are living on "Arab land." This is false history and racist Judeophobia as well.
a) during the excerpt that I saw there was no mention that Hebron was continuously inhabited by Jews from First Temple times until 1929, with a possible break during the Crusades. See earlier posts on Hebron on this blog, especially the lengthy quotes from the American writer John Lloyd Stephens who stayed with the Hebron Jewish community in the early 19th century.
b) CNN & Christiane did not mention that Hebron is considered one of four Jewish holy cities. The others are: Jerusalem, Safed, and Tiberias.
c) nor did anyone mention the massacre of Jews in Hebron in 1929 which was perpetrated by Arabs but in which British officials collaborated. See Pierre van Paassen's books, Forgotten Ally [circa 1944] and Days of Our Years for more on the Hebron massacre, including Van Paassen's interview with the acting British High Commissioner at the time.
d) Amanpour claimed that only "500 Jewish settlers" live in Hebron. That number has been given by the media for about 15 years now. The true number is probably more like 900, including Yeshiva students.

2- Attention was given the murder of Rabbi Shlomo Ra`anan who was murdered by an Arab in Hebron about ten years ago. His daughter was allowed by Amanpour to narrate the story of his murder. He was in the kitchen of his home [a modular, mobile home called a "caravan" in Israel] when the murderer entered and killed him. Yet the impression was given that it was all because the "Jewish settlers" had infringed Arab [or "palestinian"] rights and sensitivities by living on "Arab land."

3- Yet CNN & Amanpour did show that the hatred and violence and fanaticism come from the Arabs, not the Jews, who are shown studying Jewish holy books in Hebrew. To be sure, Amanpour had already belittled the Jewish holy books and the Biblical accounts of Jews in Hebron by her use of the raised eyebrow and the pregnant pause. Naturally, she is ignorant [sincerely ignorant, I believe] of the Greco-Latin accounts, including those of Christian Church Fathers who wrote about Jews in the Land of Israel and Hebron after Emperor Hadrian had changed the name of the Province of Judea [IVDAEA] to "Provincia Syria-Palaestina" [135 CE]. That is , Jews were living in large numbers in the Land of Israel and in Hebron in the late Roman and Byzantine periods. It is quite possible that neither Amanpour nor anyone else at CNN knows anything about this.

4- Amanpour brought in one bearded but short-on-brains-&-knowledge Gershom Goremberg to make her point that Muslim violence worldwide is on account of Israel's possession of any part of the Land of Israel, Hebron in particular. Goremberg may defend himself, saying That's not what I meant. But he remains an ignoramus.

Islamic hatred of Jews goes way back to the Middle Ages and is evident in the Qur'an and the Hadith traditions. The Hamas charter [Article 7] contains a medieval Muslim Hadith fable that goes like this: At Judgement Day, the Muslims will fight the Jews who will hide behind rocks and trees. The rocks and trees will cry out: O Muslim, a Jew is hiding behind me. Come kill him.

How plain do the Muslims have to be to convince a fool like Goremberg?

Anyhow, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Bin Laden's lieutenant [successor?] has recently made it clear that Spain too is "occupied territory." El Pais reported [on 29 July 2007]:

On the past 19th day [of July], Ayman al-Zawahiri, the Number Two of Al-Qaeda, took credit for the attack against the Spanish troops in Lebanon that caused the death of six soldiers. And he mentioned once again Al-Andalus [= Spain] and Ceuta and Melilla [enclaves on the Moroccan coast that have been in Spanish hands since before 1492 when the Arabs were defeated in Granada in southern Spain. Spain considers them its sovereign territory] as occupied territories.

El pasado dia 19 [de julio], Ayman Al Zawahiri, el numero dos de Al Qaeda, se atribuyo' el ataque contra las tropas espanolas en Libano que causo la muerte de seis soldados. Y cito' una vez ma's Al Andalus y a Ceuta y Melilla como territorios ocupados.

It seems to me that the Islamist fanatics have set their eyes on a lot more than just Hebron or Israel. Spain too is considered "occupied territory."
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Coming: more on Time whitewashing Hamas in Gaza, Jews in Jerusalem and Hebron, peace follies, propaganda, James Baker & US policy on Israel, etc.