Israelis Worry About Whom?
Latest update: May 6th, 2012
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TimesWatch.org is a website every serious consumer of news should have on his or her ‘favorites’ list. The site tracks the misreporting and outright deceptions found day in and day out in the news pages of The New York Times.
The following critique of a quite ridiculous story on ‘Jewish terrorists’ that appeared last week in the Times is just one example of what one finds on a regular basis at TimesWatch (www.timeswatch.org):
“Terror in Israel, Real and Imagined
“[Times correspondent] Ian Fisher finds a new twist on terror in Israel: Instead of downplaying terrorist attacks by Palestinians on Israelis (as the Times often does) Fisher focuses on hypothetical future Jewish attacks on Palestinian civilians.
“Talk about bad timing: That very day, a Palestinian suicide bomber blew up a busload of Israeli civilians. Tuesday’s front-page story, ‘Israelis Worry About Terror, By Jews Against Palestinians,’ profiles the father of Shalhevet Pas, a 10-month-old Israeli girl shot to death in her stroller by a Palestinian sniper in Hebron.
“Fisher notes: ‘Last month, her father, Yitzhak Pas, a settler who lives here, was arrested with almost 10 pounds of explosives in his car. Investigators have not publicly linked the two events, but the little they have said about Mr. Pas hints at something more than revenge against his daughter’s killer. Rather, their remarks suggest, he and five others, including three arrested last week, are members of a Jewish underground group who were aiming to carry out attacks
on Palestinians.’
“Fisher then blames ‘radical’ right-wingers for fomenting attacks that haven’t yet happened: ‘But at the faltering start of a peace effort opposed by many right-wing Israelis, worry about terror attacks by Jews is growing. In the last two years, a top Israeli security official said, at least 7 Palestinians have been killed and 19 wounded in unsolved shootings attributed to Israeli civilians in the West Bank. The major source of that concern, the official said recently, is dozens of “hill people” – radical Jewish settlers in the West Bank, like some of those who
live here – who present a “very serious situation for the democracy of Israel.” ‘
“He makes a moral equivalency argument between Jewish settlers in Hebron being killed by Palestinians and Israeli Jews enforcing curfews and ‘harassing’ Palestinians, describing ‘streets now empty as a ghost town: empty of the Palestinians who fled curfews and harassment by settlers and the army that protects them; empty, too, of Israelis who fear to venture out and those who have been killed - some 20 soldiers and settlers, according to the settlers, since
November alone.’ ”
“Fisher’s main source is Shlomi Swisa, researcher for pro-Palestinian ‘human rights’ group B’Tselem, which compares the Palestinian terrorists to an underground army. Swisa says Israelis ‘don’t need a Jewish underground. The army apparently does enough to protect them and does it very hard, for their taste.’
“Of course, Fisher’s diagnosis of the dangers toward Palestinian civilians looks rather out of date after Tuesday’s bus bombing in Jerusalem…..”
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Jason Maoz can be reached at jmaoz@jewishpress.com
tell a friendAbout the Author: Jason Maoz is the Senior Editor of The Jewish Press.
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