The Scotsman, in one of the most outrageously anti-Israel pieces I’ve read in months.
We begin with scare quotes in the headline:
Israel kills four ‘militants’ in Gaza Strip night attack
The clear impression being: Israel says these guys were “militants,” they were probably innocent little palis just out for a midnight stroll.
ISRAELI forces raided the Gaza Strip early today, killing four Palestinians they claimed were Islamic Jihad militants who planned to fire rockets
It was the first time the army had ventured so deep into the area since the withdrawal in September..
The scare quotes are gone, but the use of the word “claim” is clearly intended to make the reader doubt the Israeli version.
The fighting began as a cross-border spat shortly after midnight, but rapidly evolved into troops hunting down and killing militants they claimed were preparing to fire homemade rockets at Israeli towns.
Note the downplaying of what actually happened. Terrorists regularly fire rockets into Israel, and the Scotsman has chosen to call the deliberate act of war a “spat.” You know, like a married couple fighting over what to watch on TV.
Israel’s air force also sent helicopters in to back the troops, raining missiles down on the militants.
It isn’t raining rain you know, it’s raining Hellfire missiles. But let’s take a look at what really happened. Amos Harel, writing for Ha’aretz, has impeccable credentials. Here’s what he wrote:
Special forces units, operating in a rare IDF ground operation deep inside the northern Strip, killed at least three members of an Islamic Jihad Qassam crew setting up to fire rockets into Israel in the pre-dawn hours.
The clash was followed by Israel Air Force helicopter missile strikes in the same area, which killed at least one armed man, witnesses said. A fifth armed man may have been killed in the air strikes.
It was the first time since the Gaza withdrawal last summer that the IDF has acknowledged a ground operation within the Strip, but military sources said that a number of raids have been carried out without public notice.
The soldiers set up an ambush within the ruins of the evacuated coastal settlement of Dugit, close to the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahia. When an Islamic Jihad Qassam crew arrived, intending to fire rockets at the northen Negev, the IDF force opened fire, backed by an IAF helicopter gunship.
At least three of the dead in Gaza were identified as members of the militant Islamic Jihad group and the fourth man belonged to the PA’s Force 17 presidential guard, who witnesses said rushed to the scene with medics to offer aid.
Funny, the difference in the storytelling, isn’t it? Now let’s go back to the end of the Scotsman piece.
The Palestinian rockets rarely kill anyone, but are a sore point for the army, which has failed in more than five years of fighting to halt the fire.
Since the withdrawal, army officials have said the only way to halt the fire is to re-enter Gaza, something Israel has been reluctant to do.
In one fell swoop, the Scotsman downplays the threat of palestinian rockets — which have killed and wounded people, including palestinians who live near the border — and manage to accuse the IDF of being upset that they are unable to stop the rocket fire — not that the rockets are being fired to begin with. Yet another example of how palestinian crimes are utterly whitewashed and ignored, and Israeli self-defense actions are demonized.
The fact of this matter is that it was a purely military operation. IDF soldiers penetrated enemy territory to prevent the enemy from firing rockets into its civilian areas. The military action was successful. Terrorists were killed, with no collateral damage, and no harm done to the IDF soldiers. The soldiers went in, did their job, killed the enemy combatants, and got out unharmed.
But you wouldn’t know it from reading the Scotsman piece.
I don’t wonder that the British teachers’ unions hate Israel. Britain’s media have been flogging Israel for decades, no matter what she does. When they can demonize a purely military, perfectly justified defensive action like this, it tells you more than you need to know about Scotland and Jews.
May I say now, if I haven’t said it in the past: I am very happy that my great-grandfather chose to leave the U.K. and come to the U.S. in 1914. Thank you, Zayda, for not making me grow up having to read this crap on a daily basis.
The picture, don’t forget that picture! It come from impeccable AP, and shows a Qassam in the background. So here…
My paternal grandfather also left the United Kingdom at the beginning of the 20th century and I bless his memory for that.
I think you would get a better view of what “real” British people think from the Mail, Express and Sun newspapers. In terms of total numbers the frankly antisemitic press the Independent, the Guardian and Scotsman have a very small readership in comparison.
But the problem is that the influential liberal politically correct middle class feel both guilty about the British Empire, and are terrified of the ethnic minorities. They stupidly think that if Israel disappeared they will be left alone, and would probably convert to Islam if they thought it would mean “peace”.
There are less than 400,000 Jews in the UK we could all fit very nicely in North Dakota.
Norm, if Britain goes the way of the Netherlands you just may have to.
The same in the german press:
The frightening thing is that the “white working class” in their desperation will turn to the right wing British National Party. They are very anti-American [they want the protective bases and the dollars but no alliance] and of course anti-“Zionist”. Umm.
Then shovelling snow or cleaning out rest rooms in a Fargo Walmart will be very enticing.
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My grandfather left what is now Poland, then the Russian Empire, in 1912, on his way to America. We had family in Paris who urged him to stay there, and he knew someone who tried to convince him to go the Great Britain.
But his goal was America and he wound up coming into the US through, of all places, Galveston, Texas.
He’s been gone for a couple of decades but thanks, Grandpa, for making sure that in a world-historical sense I hit the Jewish jackpot and was born here…and not in France or England.