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<h1 id="reader-title">Media promote Israeli distortions as
civilians dodge airstrikes in Gaza</h1>
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<p class="node__submitted">
<span class="field field-author"><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/rania-khalek"
typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label
skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Rania Khalek</a></span>
<span class="field field-blog"><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blog/rights-and-accountability"
typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label
skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Rights and Accountability</a></span>
<span class="field field-publication-date"><span
class="date-display-single" property="dc:date"
datatype="xsd:dateTime"
content="2016-05-07T14:33:37+00:00">7 May 2016</span></span>
</p>
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<p>In recent days, has Israel launched a series of
aggressive military actions in the besieged Gaza Strip,
killing a Palestinian woman and injuring several other
people, including <a
href="http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=771402">three
children</a>.</p>
<p>And like clockwork, mainstream Western media swooped in
to throw the narrative in Israel’s favor, brushing aside
Israel’s relentless violations of the Gaza ceasefire and
its killings of dozens of civilians in the besieged
territory.</p>
<p>But first, the facts.</p>
<h2>Israel started it</h2>
<p>As is almost always the case, the Israeli military
initiated the latest round of violence with ground
incursions into Gaza as part of a supposed mission to
destroy cross-border tunnels.</p>
<p>This is the same pretext Israel used to justify its
ferocious military assault on Gaza in the summer of
2014, which killed 2,251 Palestinians, including 1,462
civilians, 551 of them children.</p>
<p>The independent inquiry commissioned by the UN Human
Rights Council into the 2014 assault <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/balance-un-gaza-report-cant-hide-massive-israeli-war-crimes">found</a>
that Hamas “tunnels were only used to conduct attacks
directed at IDF [Israeli army] positions in Israel in
the vicinity of the Green Line [the Israel-Gaza
boundary], which are legitimate military targets.”</p>
<p>Despite this, Israel continued to <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/rania-khalek/gaza-laboratory-us-mexico-border-tunnel-warfare">whip
up fears</a> – often <a
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/29/world/middleeast/tunnels-lead-right-to-heart-of-israeli-fear.html?_r=0">aided
by pliant outlets</a> such as <em>The New York Times</em>
– about Palestinian “terror tunnels” leading into
kindergartens, as a way to justify Israel’s cruelty
towards Gaza.</p>
<p>The Israeli army claims to have located such a tunnel
in recent days based on information it says it <a
href="http://mondoweiss.net/2016/05/mainstream-civilians-retaliatory/">extracted
from a captured</a> member of Hamas.</p>
<p>It is also possible that Israel is using this as an
opportunity to test out anti-tunnel technology it has
been developing with a <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/rania-khalek/gaza-laboratory-us-mexico-border-tunnel-warfare">$120
million</a> grant from the US administration of
President Barack Obama.</p>
<p>Hamas insists the tunnel Israel discovered is old and
predates the 2014 war.</p>
<p>The Tel Aviv newspaper <em>Haaretz</em> <a
href="http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.717782">cited</a>
senior Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzouk, explaining that
Israeli forces had been attempting to “set new facts on
the ground 150 meters inside Gaza which he said
‘compelled resistance forces to intervene.’”</p>
<p>The Israeli army said that Hamas fired “more than five
mortar rounds at forces during operational activities
adjacent to the security fence with the Gaza Strip.”</p>
<p>According to <a
href="http://www.qassam.ps/statement-1514-Israeli_escalation_on_Gaza_borders_clear_violation_of_2014_agreement.html">the
Qassam Brigades</a>, the military wing of Hamas, since
3 May, Israeli forces had made incursions into two
separate areas near the Gaza boundary to a distance of
up to 300 meters into the territory.</p>
<p>It called the incursions – which Israel’s military
spokesperson <a
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/06/world/middleeast/israelis-find-second-tunnel-from-gaza-and-may-know-of-others.html">acknowledged</a>
– a “clear violation of the ceasefire agreement in 2014
and a new aggression on the Gaza Strip.”</p>
<p>Palestinians have every reason to be concerned about
Israel trying to expand its self-declared “buffer zone”
inside the boundary with Gaza. This is an area extending
hundreds of meters into Gaza where Israel has <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ryan-rodrick-beiler/how-israel-makes-money-blockading-gaza">killed
and injured dozens of Palestinians</a> in recent years
who were simply trying to grow essential food supplies
on their farmland.</p>
<p>Qassam said Israel should “stop invoking reasons to
justify its violations, and should leave the Gaza Strip
immediately.”</p>
<p>But instead Israel escalated the situation by pounding
Gaza with at least 29 artillery shells and 11 air
strikes since Wednesday, according to a <a
href="http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/gazans-israeli-shelling-harkens-back-2014-offensive-1553063739">tally</a>
by the group Euro-Mid Monitor for Human Rights.</p>
<p>One of these strikes killed 54-year-old Palestinian
grandmother Zaina Attia al-Amour at her family’s farm in
the al-Foukhari neighborhood near the Gaza boundary.</p>
<p>As Gaza-based journalist Mohammed Omer <a
href="http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/gazans-israeli-shelling-harkens-back-2014-offensive-1553063739">reported</a>,
“Al-Foukhari was one of the worst-hit areas during the
2014 Israeli offensive on Gaza, with many people killed
and some trapped underneath the rubble of their homes
until rescue teams were able to dig them out days
later.”</p>
<h2>Tunnels!</h2>
<p>As Israel’s airstrikes once again terrorize an already
traumatized population, Western media outlets have
rushed to Israel’s aid, promoting its government talking
points about Hamas tunnels.</p>
<p>“Israel finds Hamas tunnel under border with Gaza” <a
href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/05/israel-discovers-hamas-tunnel-under-border-with-gaza">blared</a>
a headline in <em>The Guardian</em>, which buried vague
details about Palestinian casualties in the eleventh
paragraph.</p>
<p>In an article titled, “Israelis Find Second Tunnel From
Gaza and May Know of Others,” <em>The New York Times</em>
<a
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/06/world/middleeast/israelis-find-second-tunnel-from-gaza-and-may-know-of-others.html">toed</a>
the Israeli line about tunnels completely unchallenged.</p>
<p>Still, that wasn’t enough for Israeli army spokesperson
Peter Lerner, who took issue with the <em>Times’</em>
rare, albeit probably unintentional, acknowledgement
that “the Israeli effort to find tunnels from Gaza,
which Hamas considers a strategic asset, has led to a
flare-up of violence along the border in recent days.”</p>
<p>“#Hamas terror tunnels caused the flare-up,” Lerner <a
href="https://twitter.com/LTCPeterLerner/status/728560171061026817">protested</a>
in a tweet to the <em>Times</em>.
</p>
<div class="file file-document file-text-oembed
oembed-rich oembed-default oembed-twitter"
id="file-37291">
<div class="oembed-content">
<blockquote data-width="550" class="twitter-tweet">
<p dir="ltr" lang="en">.<a
href="https://twitter.com/nytimesworld">@nytimesworld</a>
that tweet is misleading. Actually <a
href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Hamas?src=hash">#Hamas</a>
cross border terror tunnels have lead to a flare
up.</p>
— Peter Lerner (@LTCPeterLerner) <a
href="https://twitter.com/LTCPeterLerner/status/728560171061026817">May
6, 2016</a></blockquote>
</div>
</div>
<h2>What ceasefire?</h2>
<p>The Associated Press pinned the blame entirely on
Palestinians, <a
href="http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_ISRAEL_PALESTINIANS?SITE=AP">reporting</a>,
“Gaza militants have fired mortar rounds at Israel over
the past three days, prompting Israeli retaliation.”</p>
<p>In perhaps the most convoluted revisionism of all, the
AP added that “Hamas used tunnels to attack Israel
during the 50-day Gaza war in 2014 and fired thousands
of rockets. The recent exchanges of fire are among the
most serious since the war ended.”</p>
<p><em>The Guardian</em> ran with a similarly line,
painting Palestinian fire at invading Israeli soldiers
as “the most serious escalation since the end of the
2014 Gaza war,” adding, “Israel and Hamas have largely
observed a ceasefire.”</p>
<p>These claims are categorically false and erase from
history Israel’s killings of dozens of Palestinians in
the last year.</p>
<p>Indeed the ceasefire, if there is one, is completely
one-sided.</p>
<p>Just last month, Israeli defense minister <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/moshe-yaalon-0">Moshe
Yaalon</a> <a
href="http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/210369">admitted</a>
that Hamas has “not fired a single bullet” since the
ceasefire went into effect.</p>
<p>A senior Israeli commander even <a
href="http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.717782">told
<em>Haaretz</em></a> this week that “Hamas had created
a force to police the border region, preventing
terrorist attacks and rocket fire at Israel.”</p>
<p>Israel, by contrast, has flouted the ceasefire so
frequently, it is difficult to keep track of the
violations.</p>
<p>In the first few months alone, Israel violated the
ceasefire <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/israel-violates-gaza-ceasefire-nearly-every-day">almost
daily</a>.</p>
<p>As journalist Dan Cohen <a
href="http://mondoweiss.net/2016/05/mainstream-civilians-retaliatory/">recalls</a>,
“During the four months I have spent in Gaza since the
August 2014 ceasefire, I have seen and heard Israeli
gunfire on a daily basis.”</p>
<p>Indeed, the Israeli army never stopped firing on <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/gaza-fishermen">Gaza’s
fishermen</a> as well as at Palestinians near the
boundary.</p>
<p>Israel killed 25 Palestinians in Gaza in 2015, <a
href="http://www.ochaopt.org/poc26april-2may-2016.aspx">according</a>
to the UN monitoring group OCHA.</p>
<p>Many of them, including <a
href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/10/israeli-forces-shoot-dead-palestinian-boys-gaza-151010141202215.html">two
children</a>, were <a
href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/10/israeli-forces-kill-gaza-border-protesters-151016134046980.html">shot
dead</a> while protesting Israel’s devastating siege
near the Gaza border.</p>
<p>A Palestinian <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israel-kills-toddler-and-pregnant-mother-gaza">toddler
and her pregnant mother</a> were killed by an Israeli
airstrike in October.</p>
<p>Six Palestinians in Gaza have been killed so far this
year, including 9-year-old <a
href="http://www.dci-palestine.org/brother_and_sister_in_gaza_killed_by_israeli_missile_fragments">Yassin
Abu Khussa</a> and his 6-year-old sister Isra.</p>
<p>The youngsters were killed by an Israeli airstrike as
they slept in their beds.</p>
<h2>Collective yawn</h2>
<p>The international community has almost always responded
to these killings with a collective yawn, raising their
voices only when the occupied retaliate.</p>
<p>Palestinians, it seems, are expected to stand down, to
tolerate their ghettoization in silence and to let their
occupier subjugate them in peace and relative quiet.</p>
<p>But Palestinians in Gaza refuse to play by those rules.</p>
<p>“We do not call for a new war, but we will not allow
these incursions or for new realities to be imposed on
our people in Gaza,” <a
href="http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=771418">said</a>
Hamas deputy leader <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/ismail-haniyeh">Ismail
Haniyeh</a> on Friday.</p>
<p>“We call for lifting the siege,” he added, referring to
the illegal Israeli blockade by air, land and sea that
has cut Gaza off from the outside world for almost a
decade. “Enough of this historical injustice suffered by
two million of our people.”</p>
<p>Dozens of international human rights organizations and
development agencies <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/international-aid-agencies-call-sanctions-israel-over-gaza-stalemate">called
for sanctions</a> on Israel if it didn’t lift the
siege — a form of relentless, silent aggression against
an entire population.</p>
<p>But since that call a year ago, Israel has continued to
enjoy complete impunity.</p>
<p>The military wing of the Popular Front for the
Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) was similarly indignant,
calling Israel’s incursions an attempt to “test the
patience of resistance” and vowing
that it “will not stand idly by while Israel continues
its crimes against Palestinian people.”</p>
<p>And Islamic Jihad <a
href="http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=771412">accused
Israel</a> of attacking civilians to “push the
resistance to reciprocate.”</p>
<p>Israel, meanwhile, reserves the right to continue
military provocations and assaults in Gaza indefinitely
and has labeled any Palestinian resistance to its
violence as terrorism, which is exactly how Western
media outlets continue, compliantly, to frame it.</p>
<br>
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