- On December 25, an Israeli assassination squad killed
five Palestinians in Gaza, and injured fifteen. Three of the dead were
civilians. A short time later, a Palestinian blew himself up at a bus stop
in the Tel Aviv suburb of Petah Tikva, killing four Israelis, three of
whom were confirmed by Ha'aretz to be soldiers.
-
- Many leading media organizations were quick to declare
that these two incidents marked the end of a period of "relative calm"
or "lull" in Israeli-Palestinian violence, that had supposedly
lasted since the last Palestinian suicide attack in Haifa on 4 October.
-
- In fact, the period since 4 October has been one of intense
Israeli violence, in which 117 Palestinians were killed, including 23 children.
At the same time, Israel destroyed almost five hundred Palestinian homes
throughout the Occupied Territories.
-
- Mass amnesia again strikes Middle East correspondents
-
- A front-page Los Angeles Times headline declared "12-Week
lull in Mideast Ends," and misreported that the "back to back
spasms of violence" on 25 December, "shattered more than two
months of relative quiet and dealt a fresh setback to peace efforts"
(26 December 2003).
-
- "Mideast quiet shattered: Suicide bombing kills
four Israelis shortly after assassination in Gaza," declared The Montreal
Gazette on Page 1 (26 December 2003).
-
- The Chicago Tribune reported that "Coming less than
an hour apart," the 25 December "attacks broke a lull that had
lasted more than two months and raised fears of a slide into violence"
(26 December 2003).
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- CNN reported on its website that the Petah Tikva attack
"was the first suicide bombing in Israel since an October 4 attack
in Haifa. That incident killed 21 people. There has been a relative calm
since the Haifa bombing" ("Suicide bomber kills three in Tel
Aviv, " 25 December 2003).
-
- Even the usually careful U.K.-based Reuters news agency's
report (which had an identical headline to the CNN report) stated that,
"the attacks on Thursday shattered well over two months of relative
calm that had spurred efforts to revive talks between Israelis and Palestinians
on a U.S.-led plan for ending more than three years of conflict" ("Suicide
bomber kills three in Tel Aviv," 25 December 2003).
-
- In an extraordinary act of forgetfulness, a New York
Times report by Richard Bernstein and Greg Myre declared that "The
suicide bomb attack in Petah Tikva broke a tense sort of relative calm
that has existed on both sides since October" (26 December 2003).
But just a few paragraphs above this sentence, the same article reported
that "Less than an hour before the suicide attack, Israeli gunships
fired missiles at a car in Gaza, killing a commander of Islamic Jihad,
who Israeli officials said was planning a 'mega' attack inside Israel"
(emphasis added). The report also stated that four others were killed including
"two bystanders" and 14 people were injured.
-
- Not only did the Times forget what had happened just
an hour before the Petah Tikva bomb, it had apparently wiped from memory
a report by the same Greg Myre on 24 December, headlined "Israelis
Kill 8 Palestinians in Raid on a Camp in Gaza." According to the Palestinian
Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), a total of nine Palestinians were killed
in the Israeli attack on Rafah refugee camp about which Myre reported.
Among the 37 injured, eight were children, and 116 families were made homeless.
-
- What really happened during the period of "relative
calm"
-
- Contrary to the pervasive media claim that the period
between 4 October and 25 December was one of "relative calm,"
"quiet" or "lull," it was actually one of intense Israeli
violence on Palestinians throughout the Occupied Territories.
-
- Using the meticulous weekly reports of the Palestinian
Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), EI counted that Israeli forces killed 117
Palestinians from 2 October to 25 December. The vast majority of the dead
were civilians and 23 of them were children. Hundreds of civilians were
injured by Israeli fire. During the same period, PCHR documented that Israeli
occupation forces destroyed 486 houses and apartments, rendering thousands
of Palestinians homeless.
-
- During the same period, few Israeli soldiers and civilians
were killed in Palestinian attacks, and there were indeed no suicide attacks
since 4 October. Israel claims that the huge drop in violence against its
civilians was largely because it "foiled" such attacks. But,
the New York Times reported on 5 December that, "Israeli officials
have concluded that the Islamic movement Hamas has suspended its suicide
bombing campaign in recent months, a senior Israeli military officer said
Thursday, citing that as one reason Israel has not suffered any deadly
bombings in the past two months."
-
- What is indisputable is that Israel was killing and injuring
Palestinians by the hundreds. Here are a few examples of incidents that
occurred during the media's period of "relative calm":
-
- * On 10 October, a large contingent of Israeli forces,
armed with over 80 tanks, armored bulldozers and helicopters, entered Rafah
refugee camp in southern Gaza. During the two-day long attack, 8 Palestinians
were killed, including 3 children, and 53 were wounded; 20 seriously. Israeli
forces destroyed 170 homes rendering more than 2000 Palestinians homeless.
-
- In response to this incident, Amnesty International issued
a statement saying "The repeated practice by the Israeli army of deliberate
and wanton destruction of homes and civilian property is a grave violation
of international human rights and humanitarian law, notably articles 33
and 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, and constitutes a war crime."
-
- * On 20 October, Israeli occupation forces carried out
two assassination attacks that killed eleven Palestinians. Eight of the
dead were bystanders. The first attack occurred in the morning, when Israeli
helicopters fired a missile at a car stopped at a traffic light in Gaza
City. The missile killed the two occupants of the targeted car, and the
driver of an adjacent car. Nine passing civilians sustained injuries, one
of them serious. That evening, seven Palestinians were killed, including
a child and an on-duty doctor when Israeli forces carried out a failed
assassination attempt in Gaza's Nusseirat refugee camp. The targets of
the attack escaped, but in addition to the seven civilians killed, 50 were
injured, including 11 children. An eighth civilian later died from his
injuries.
-
- * On 26 October, Israeli occupation forces in Gaza killed
three members of the same family who were on their way to visit relatives
to celebrate Eid al-Fitr, the end of the fasting month of Ramadan. The
three men, Khaled Ahmed Ibrahim al-Sumairi, 40, Ussama Suleiman 'Aayesh
Al-Sumairi, 30, Ibrahim Mousa al-Sumairi, 32, got into their car at approximately
8.45 PM at their home in Wadi Salqa village in the central Gaza Strip.
When they were approximately 300 metres from their house, Israeli forces
opened fire on them without warning, injuring all three. The occupation
forces then imposed a military curfew on the area, preventing Palestinian
ambulances from reaching the men for more than 90 minutes. By the time
ambulances were allowed to tend to the victims, two had died. The third
died of his injuries upon arrival at Deir al-Balah hospital. After initially
claiming that the three men had been armed, the Israeli media reported
that the occupation authorities admitted that the men were in fact unarmed
and had been killed "by mistake."
-
- * On 8 December at approximately 3 PM, Israeli forces
stationed at "Neve Dekalim" settlement, west of Khan Yunis, in
Gaza opened fire at the al-Namsawi area of Khan Yunis refugee camp. A Palestinian
schoolchild, Fatima Mousa Khalafallah, age 10, was wounded by a live bullet
in the chest while she was in her school approximately 700 metres away
from the source of fire.
-
- These are just four examples of the dozens of violent
incidents that took 117 Palestinian lives, and injured hundreds more since
early October.
-
- Despite the continuous bloodshed, mainstream media organizations
have habitually described this period as being one of "relative calm"
or "quiet" that ended only when several Israelis were killed.
-
- This widespread pattern is the most persistent and pernicious
failure of the media in reporting the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. It
represents not only a shocking lack of professionalism and objectivity,
but a double standard that treats the lives of one set of human beings
as being inherently more valuable than those of another.
-
- - Ali Abunimah is a co-founder of the Electronic Intifada.
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- ©2000-2004 electronicIntifada.net
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- http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2301.shtml
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