An official Israeli government report declared Sunday that Mohammed al-Dura, the 12-year-old boy whose picture convinced the entire world that the IDF had killed him, not only did not die but also may never have been shot.

Now, 13 years after the supposed killing that incited the senseless murders of Israelis as well as Jews throughout the world, the Israel government report categorically concluded that the France 2 report was much more of a hoax than thought several years ago.

For a close look at the footage, click here.

“Contrary to the claim that the boy was dead, the committee’s review of the raw footage indicates that at the end of the video – the part that was not broadcast – the boy appears to be alive,” according to the report by the Ministry of International Affairs and Strategy.

“The probe has found that there is no evidence to support the claims that the father, Jamal, or the boy Mohammed, were shot. Furthermore, the video does not show Jamal being seriously wounded. On the other hand, many signs indicate that the two were never hit by the bullets.”

The panel was comprised of officials from the Defense and Foreign ministries, experts from outside the government and the police, and it was headed by Yossi Kuperwasser, former director general of Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs.

The revelation puts another nail in the coffin of the “Al Dura news report” that was challenged by a French Jew, Philippe Karsenty, who charged that France 2 journalist Charles Enderlin created a media lie by broadcasting edited footage that alleged that the IDF killed the boy.

An emotionally wrenching photo that was seen around the world shows Mohammed supposedly crying out as he and his father took cover during a gun battle between the IDF and Palestinian Authority terrorists at the beginning of what has been termed the Second Intifada, also known as the Oslo War, in 2000.

The alleged shooting of Mohammed Al Dura was filmed by Talal Abu Rahma, a Palestinian Authority photographer who free-lanced for France 2. The film lasts for 55 seconds and shows the boy screaming before the sound of gunfire, followed by a scene of the boy apparently dead over his father’s legs.

Enderlin told viewers the boy was killed and had been the “target of fire from the Israeli positions.” The gunfight occurred on the second day of the Oslo War and spread venom throughout the Arab world, inciting terrorist against Israel.

To make matters worse, the IDF apologized within 24 hours even though the military had not verified the alleged shooting.

The timing of Sunday’s government report is astounding because a French court is to rule later this week on a libel suit filed by Enderlin against Karsenty, who previously was backed by a lower French court, which stated that Karsenty presented a “coherent mass of evidence” and that the Palestinian Authority cameraman for France 2 was not “perfectly credible.”

Karsenty’s investigation revealed that France 2 had edited the film and it was not clear whether the boy died from Israeli or Palestinian Authority fire. At the same time, media watchdogs began documenting “Pallywood” productions that the Palestinian Authority staged for journalists, who gobbled up faked scenes of supposedly wounded Arab victims of IDF gunfire who magically were later seen walking around freely after having been shoved into ambulances.

From a further perspective, the Israeli report punctures another Big Lie that has haunted Israel ever since the Six-Day War in 1967 way.

A small sample of other lies includes:

–   Israel  occupied Judea and Samaria, most of which were in fact taken over by Jordan without any international authorization;

–   Children of Arabs who were chased out of Israel or who fled Israel are ”refugees,” a second generation status that the United Nations does not grant to anyone in the world except Arabs who claim Israel as their home;

–  Israel aggressively attacked Lebanese “guerillas” who pulverized northern residents before the “Peace for the Galilee campaign, now known as the First Lebanese War, in which Israel established a security zone in southern Lebanon to defend the north;

–  Israel committee war crimes for years, especially during the Operation Cast Lead counterterrorist campaign in the winter of 2008-2009. The United Nations Goldstone report claimed Israel for dozens of war crimes but the report’s author, Judge Richard Goldstone, later admitted that had he known then what he knows now, he would have reached different conclusions;

–Israel built an “Apartheid’ Wall that creates a separation between Jews and Arabs. In fact, most of the “wall” that runs for more than 200 miles is a fence, which has helped reduce the number of suicide terrorist attacks against to near zero. The fence also does not “keep out” Arabs because Israel operates checkpoints at numerous gates to make sure that Arabs who are not terrorists can travel freely into the rest of Israel; and

–  Israel “degrades” Palestinian Authority Arabs at checkpoints, even though it uses the same search methods that the United States and other Western countries use at airports and borders.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said after the new report was released that the France 2 film in 2000 “was an example of the deceitful delegitimization that we are constantly subject to. There is only one way to battle lies – by telling the truth.”

The supposed killing of the boy has been cited as the catalyst for the grizzly and barbaric lynching IDF reservists the following month in Ramallah, where they had arrived by mistake. The “Al Dura incident” also was said to have incited the murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl as well as Osama bin Laden.

The question remains whether Mohammed al Dura was ever wounded, or if he even was a real person.

There is a less of a question concerning the credibility of international coverage of Israel.

Day by day, reports covering the “peace process” and the “Palestinian struggle” show fatigue in continuing to report Arab claims that have become so ludicrous that they simply are ignored.

Without media support, and without media incitement, the Palestinian Authority is increasingly being left with an audience of one hand clapping.

One other question arises: Can France 2 can be accused of inciting war crimes against Israel?

The Interdisciplinary Center at Herzliya launched the Daniel Pearl International Journalism Institute on Wednesday, named for The Wall Street Journal reporter who was kidnapped and murdered by terrorists in Pakistan 11 years ago.

His murderers posted a video of Pearl, before they beheaded him, in which he stated, “I am Jewish.”

Pearl’s father, Prof. Judea Pearl, said he hoped the institute would be a “towering contribution to Danny’s legacy, his life, his mission and his dreams.”

Prof. Pearl this week lit one of the torches in the annual ceremony at the end of Remembrance Day for Fallen Soldiers and the beginning of Yom Ha’atzmaut.

Prof. Judea Pearl said at Israel’s Remembrance Day for Fallen Soldiers in Jerusalem Sunday night that the terrorists’’ brutal execution of his son Daniel “caused a revolution in our society’s struggle against barbarism.”

He added, “The notion of absolute good and bad was almost erased, but was reborn with the murder of Daniel in Pakistan.” Daniel Pearl, an American Jew who also held Israel citizenship, was working as the South Asia Bureau Chief for the Wall Street Journal when he was abducted in January 2002 by militant Islamic fundamentalists, while researching a story in Karachi, Pakistan.  Nine days after his abduction, Pearl was cruelly beheaded and the terrorists posted online a video in which Pearl stated, “My name is Daniel Pearl. I’m a Jewish American…My father is Jewish, my mother is Jewish, I’m Jewish”

Several months after his death, his wife Mariane gave birth to their son, Adam.

Jewish Agency chairman Natan Sharansky said at the ceremony, “We want to remember all the Jews who were killed in different countries around the world because of their pride as Jews and their connection to the State of Israel. This is one united front in which we stand shoulder to shoulder with IDF soldiers and the entire Jewish people. When those who hate us seek to attack Jews they view Israel as the target. When our enemies attempt to attack Israel and don’t succeed they attack Jewish communities around the world.”

The father of the late Jewish journalist Daniel Pearl will light one the memorial flames at the Memorial Day Ceremony in Jerusalem, the day before Independence Day.

Pearl was kidnapped and brutally murdered in Pakistan while researching a story on Islamic radicals for The Wall Street Journal.

Nine days after his abduction, Pearl was cruelly beheaded. In a video which released his killers, Pearl was filmed stating, “My name is Daniel Pearl. I’m a Jewish American… My father is Jewish, my mother is Jewish, I’m Jewish”

His father, Prof. Judea Pearl will light the memorial flame at the ceremony that honors the memory of Jews killed in terror attacks and anti-Semitic incidents across the globe, in addition to Israel’s fallen soldiers and victims of terror attacks in Israel.

Daniel Pearl’s wife Marianne, and his son Adam, who was born several months after his father’s murder, also will be present.

Pakistani officials have said they arrested a terrorist who may provide the key for unlocking the mystery of who masterminded and carried out the brutal 2002 kidnapping and beheading of Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl.

Pearl, who was Jewish, was murdered one month after he was taken into captivity on January 23, 2002 while traveling to interview a Muslim extremist in Pakistan. The beheading was filmed by the terrorists and sent to the U.S. Consulate. It was seen on the Internet, sending shock waves throughout the Western world.

Pearl’s body was found dismembered three months later.

The latest suspect in the kidnap-murder is Qari Abdul Hayee, whose name is similar to a suspect in a 2011 Georgetown student investigation called the Daniel Pearl Project.

Ruth and Judea Pearl, the parents of Daniel, stated after the report of the latest arrest, “We are gratified with this latest arrest and hope that justice will be served in a timely manner on all those who were involved in the abduction and murder of our son, Danny.”

“As with every journalist murder, any and all perpetrators in the slaying of Daniel Pearl must be prosecuted and punished,” said Committee for Protecting Journalists (CPS) Asia Program Coordinator Bob Dietz. “In order to curb growing impunity in Pakistan, it is imperative that authorities send the strongest possible signal that acts of anti-press violence will not go unpunished.”

Hayee, also known as Asadullah, was arrested on Sunday during a raid in Karachi.

It was not the first time he was arrested on suspicion of involvement with the murder of Pearl.

In May 2003, he was taken into custody for allegedly murdering six Shiite Muslims and was linked in the planning and carrying out of Pearl’s kidnapping and murder.

He was sentenced to death for the murders of the Shiites but was not charged in the Pearl murder. Hayee was freed for some unknown reason.

A recent report by the Center for Public Integrity reveals that only four of the 27 men allegedly involved in his kidnapping and murder were charged and convicted, according to CPS.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, one of the 9/11 masterminds and who was questioned at Guantanamo Bay, claimed he ordered the kidnapping of Pearl and also claimed he personally beheaded him, but he never was charged in the case.

Ahmad Omar Saeed Sheikh, a British-born Muslim terrorist, was sentenced to death for Pearl’s murder, but no one really knows who actually killed the journalist.

Hayee may provide the answers.

Growing up, I remember my father’s Rosh Hashana ritual. He read the story of Rabi Amnon of Mainz, who had his tongue, hands and legs cut off for refusing to convert to Christianity – for choosing to remain a Jews. I would run away from the table sobbing in terror. Even at the tender age of six, I knew that being Jewish made oneself a member of an endangered species.

As I got older, martyrdom for Judaism seemed more remote as I found myself intellectualizing what it means to be Jewish as my way of life – without invoking life or death. In the free and open world of New York, dying for one’s faith seemed as likely as a shark attack.

Then it happened. Ten years ago, Daniel Pearl uttered his last words. “I am Jewish. My father is Jewish. My mother is Jewish,” he said proudly before he was brutally murdered by terrorists.

As a sixteen-year-old burgeoning writer who had previously considered a career in foreign journalism, I didn’t understand how any one could murder someone who was so profoundly innocent.

Daniel posed no threats to the terrorists who savagely murdered him. He was not a soldier, he carried no guns, he came to meet them with a pen and an open mind. Daniel was a gentle and good human being who came to them in good faith, to give them a chance to tell their side of the story. Instead he was abducted, humiliated, and slaughtered, and it seems the only reason for that is that that Daniel Pearl was murdered for being Jewish. The horrors of the past were alive today.

Yet, I found, amidst my anger and sorrow, a sense of wonder. Instead of simply dying for being Jewish, Daniel faced his death and made his last words a declaration of faith. And in that moment, I found myself challenged to figure out what it meant to end one’s life the way he did, what it means to say them with all of one’s heart, all of one’s soul – indeed with all of one’s life. What does it mean to be Jewish?

I asked my friends this question and received varying answers – from “eating kugel” to “accepting others,” to a particularly brilliant answer of purposeful living by famed Jewish educator Allison Josephs. Yet, I still didn’t see how any of that was worth dying for.

My thoughts became darker as I considered what other people are saying Judaism means. College professors openly call for the end of the Jewish state in the name of Judaism, and use their podium as a platform for indoctrinating students to hate Israel – based on lies, distortions and false moral equivalency. The Jewish people must be saved, but the Jewish state must be destroyed. So, what does it mean to be Jewish? Zionism is not the same thing as Judaism, but one cannot divorce the child who says “Next year in Jerusalem” from the state where I hope to spend the next year in Jerusalem.

Many professors declare that being Jewish means being “Jews of conscience,” as Cal State University Northridge mathematics professor David Klein says. According to him that means one must oppose Israel’s existence entirely – he refers to it as the “most racist” state in the world. I’ll happily give that news to Christians in Saudi Arabia, Coptic Christians in Egypt, women in Saudi Arabia, and Kurds all over the Middle East. I do not like arguing that we’re better than brutal despotic regimes, but to paint the freedoms that minorities in Israel enjoy would take twice this article length.

What baffles me is that these people say these things in the name of their faith. How could it be Jewish to undermine the place with the largest population of Jews? I refuse to believe that to be Jewish means to fight other Jews tooth and nail, to likely endanger their lives. If being Jewish means national self destruction, count me out.

Sadly, this seems to be a prevailing thread of thought on the left of the Jewish world. I read people like “anti-racist” Tim Wise who calls the ADL and the Des Moines Jewish Federation “charlatans” for arguing against his right to speak. Wise, you see, has argued that “Zionism has made world Jewry less safe than ever,” and that Israel has a right to exist, “in the sense of not being violently destroyed” but not to exist as a Jewish state. In other words, we have a right to exist, but not as ourselves, as Jewish people. That definitely wasn’t something worth dying for and I apparently wasn’t the only one who thought so.

Chillingly, for some, being Jewish is seen as something to be ashamed of. One Jesse Lieberfeld won the Martin Luther King essay competition by describing Judaism as believing themselves “greatest people in the world—and feel sorry for ourselves at the same time,” and that Jews today live in a “world of security, self-pity, self-proclaimed intelligence, and perfect moral aesthetic.”

“A Mighty Heart”

Starring Angelina Jolie and Dan Futterman

Directed by Michael Winterbottom, Screenplay by John Orloff

Book by Mariane Pearl

Paramount Pictures, 100 minutes, Rated R (for language)

“I Have Never Forgotten You:

The Life and Legacy of Simon Wiesenthal”

Directed by Richard Trank,

Narrated by Nicole Kidman

Moriah Films and Luminous Velocity Releasing, 105 minutes,

         Menachem Wecker is a painter, writer and editor based in Washington, D.C. He welcomes comments at mwecker@gmail.com.