
 |
|
May 22, 2013
John Thorne:
They launched the 'Arab Spring' but now yearn for the good old days of a strongman
May 20, 2013
Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?
Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star
The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting
May 13, 2013
Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation
David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church
May 10, 2013
Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be
May 8, 2013
Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas
Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility
May 6, 2013
May 3, 2013
Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
|
| |
Jewish World Review
Jan. 30, 2009 / 5 Shevat 5769
Palestinian Myth Machine
By
Mona Charen
| 
|
|
|
|
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
"Israel has committed the war crime of the 21st century," cried a Palestinian representative. Using massive force against a crowded refugee camp, Saeb Erakat claimed, the Israelis had "massacred" hundreds of Palestinian civilians. A CNN reporter used the figure of 300-400 dead. Peter Hansen, the commissioner general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) told a Danish newspaper that 300-400 Palestinians had been killed.
The place was not Gaza in 2009, but Jenin in 2002. The great Jenin massacre turned out to be another in a long series of false atrocity stories manufactured by the Palestinians and credulously repeated by the international press (which likes nothing so much as the image of vicious Israelis). Cartoonists across Europe delighted in drawing Israelis in Nazi uniforms. Le Monde ran a cartoon comparing the destruction of Jenin with the Nazi destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto.
In fact, in August 2002, the United Nations and Human Rights Watch (neither very friendly to Israel) put the final fatality figures at 26 Palestinian fighters, 26 civilians and 23 Israeli soldiers. The Israeli casualty figures were comparatively high because the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) decided to fight street by street with soldiers on foot instead of using air power or tanks precisely to minimize civilian casualties. The houses in Jenin were booby-trapped. The terrorists surrounded themselves with civilians.
Now we are told that Gaza suffered 1,300 killed and up to 4,000 wounded. These numbers come exclusively from Hamas sources and have not been independently verified. In fact, the numbers have been challenged by the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, which put the number of dead at between 500 and 600, the majority of whom were young men. Others suggest that as many as 1,000 may have been killed, the majority Hamas fighters.
Certainly the humanitarian crisis in Gaza evokes sympathy. But the full and complete responsibility for that crisis lies at the feet of Hamas. The Palestinian daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida (published on the West Bank) reported on the Abd Rabbo family. The Abd Rabbos had the misfortune to own a farm that overlooked the Israeli town of Sderot. This, the newspaper reports, turned it into an ideal military position for the Palestinian fighters, from which they have launched hundreds of rockets into southern Israel during the last few years. "The Abd Rabbo family members emphasize that they are not (Hamas) activists and that they are still loyal to the Fatah movement, but that they were unable to prevent the armed squads from entering their neighborhood at night. One family member, Hadi (age 22) said: 'You can't say anything to the resistance (fighters), or they will accuse you of collaborating (with Israel) and shoot you in the legs.'"
As in Jenin, Israel took extraordinary measures to limit civilian casualties in Gaza. Reporting in the Weekly Standard, Max Boot notes that the IDF made hundreds of thousands of phone calls and dropped hundreds of thousands of leaflets warning civilians to vacate sites of impending attacks. "When the Israeli Air Force detected Palestinian civilians atop buildings," Boot writes, "it dropped tiny bombs designed to cause little damage. Only when the civilians had cleared off did the air force drop larger munitions that flattened the structure."
Unlike the Israelis, Hamas was keen to increase Palestinian casualties of violence. Gaza is full of munitions, smuggling tunnels, and incitement videos exhorting the faithful to kill Jews, but it's nearly impossible to find a bomb shelter in the Strip. By contrast, the Israeli town of Sderot, where my 12-year-old son visited last week, is covered with them. He sat in the living room of an 80-year-old woman whose son had urged her to take cover in the newly built bomb shelter in her basement. Five minutes after she reluctantly rose from her sofa and left the room a Kassam rocket crashed through the ceiling.
Sderot is home to 23,000 long-suffering people. Boot reports that at no time during the past eight years has Sderot enjoyed more than four consecutive days without a missile attack. I cannot imagine how they bear the anxiety. I felt a tiny shred of what they must go through when I worried about my son's recent visit.
Operation Cast Lead has brought a respite. In the face of an enemy like Hamas, it is the only way.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Comment on JWR contributor Mona Charen's column by clicking here.
Mona Charen Archives
© 2006, Creators Syndicate
|
|

Arnold Ahlert
Mitch Albom
Jay Ambrose
Michael Barone
Barrywood
Lori Borgman
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Richard Z. Chesnoff
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
Christine Flowers
Frank J. Gaffney
Bernie Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Argus Hamilton
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
Ron Hart
Nat Hentoff
A. Barton Hinkle
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
Ch. Krauthammer
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Ann McFeatters
Dale McFeatters
Dana Milbank
Jeanne Moos
Dick Morris
Jim Mullen
Deroy Murdock
Judge A. Napolitano
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Star Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Sharon Randall
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Heather Robinson
Debra J. Saunders
Martin Schram
Greg Schwem
Culture Shlock
David Shribman
Roger Simon
Lenore Skenazy
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Ben Stein
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Dan Thomasson
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Byron York
ZeitGeist
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Baloo
Lisa Benson
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
John Branch
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
Matt Davies
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Glenn Foden
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Walt Handelsman
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holbert
David Horsey
Lee Judge
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Jimmy Margulies
Jack Ohman
Michael Ramirez
Rob Rogers
Drew Sheneman
Kevin Siers
Jeff Stahler
Scott Stantis
Danna Summers
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters
Dan Wasserman

Tech Q&A
Mr. Know-It-All
Ask Doctor K
Richard Lederer
Frugal Living
On Nutrition
Bookmark These
Bruce Williams
|