FresnoZionism.org — ציונות פרסנו

The LA Times has published a false, tendentious, and hateful article by Moussa Abu-Marzouk of Hamas on its op-ed page.

Writing from Damascus, Abu Marzouk lies about history, lies about Israel’s actions, and lies about her intentions. He compares the Hamas charter’s poisonous antisemitism to the US constitution’s counting slaves as partial persons — but Hamas has passed no 14th amendment.

Abu Marzouk believes that murder of Israeli civilians inside the 1967 borders constitutes ‘resistance to occupation’. There can be no peace between Israel and the Palestinians in Marzouk’s view, unless Israel vanishes:

One of Hamas’s founding principals is that it does not recognize Israel. We [participated in] the elections and the people voted for us based on this platform. Therefore, the question of recognizing Israel is definitely not on the table unless it withdraws from ALL the Palestinian lands, not only to the 1967 borders. –Moussa Abu Marzouk, tr. by MEMRI

Abu Marzouk’s speech is hate speech. It is incitement to murder. Nevertheless, a newspaper in the US can legally print almost anything.

However, we don’t have to read that newspaper, on paper or on the Internet. We don’t have to link to articles on that newspaper’s website. And we don’t have to buy advertising in it.

I call on everyone who is opposed to murder and terrorism to say NO to the Hamas mouthpiece, the Los Angeles Times.

Update [11 July 0810 PDT]: Email the LA Times and tell them that they are giving a platform to murderers.

Update [11 July 0927 PDT]: Read HonestReporting’s response to Marzouk’s lies here.

Update [2011 22 June 1047 PDT]: Note that this was originally posted in 2007, almost four years ago. The LA Times is at it again, with another op-ed by Marzook on June 12, 2011. See Join the Boycott.

Technorati Tags: LA Times, Abu Marzouk, Abu Marzook, Hamas

A couple of weeks after publishing an op-ed by Hamas spokesperson Ahmed Yousef, the New York Times continues to present Hamas in the best possible light. In an article today, Isabel Kershner and Taghreed El-Khodary seem disappointed that

Hamas’s role in securing the release of Alan Johnston, the kidnapped BBC correspondent, was not enough to warrant any immediate change in policy toward it, Western and Israeli officials said today.

While Hamas, the more radical of the two main Palestinian factions, presented the release as proof of its ability to restore order in Gaza now that it is solely in control there, Western and Israeli officials said it would not translate into international recognition and support for the group — which the United States, Israel and the European Union still classify as a terrorist organization and formally boycott…

Nevertheless, Hamas has undoubtedly improved its image and gained some measure of respectability with Mr. Johnston’s release.

What actually happened was that Hamas, finding the time ripe, made some kind of deal with the criminal Dagmush clan and the related “Army of Islam” group (which may or may not be one and the same), and produced a typical Pallywood movie sequence, surrounding the Dagmush compound where Johnston has been held, and ‘forcing’ his release.

Johnston, a BBC journalist quite friendly to the Palestinian cause, was held for almost four months in what apparently started as a ransom scheme — the BBC having very deep pockets. If the BBC did pay for his release, they are of course not saying. But Hamas expertly orchestrated the release of Johnston, who was taken to a photo-op with Hamas leader Ismail Haniya before finally being allowed out of Gaza.

The Times also implies that Hamas has had success in bringing ‘security’ to Gaza:

“I feel extremely secure,” said Mona Bseiso, 43, a lawyer who works for the Palestinian Authority in Gaza City, and whose husband works for the intelligence service. “We are Fatah,” she said, but since Hamas took over, ”there is no theft, no crime and there are no bullets.”

Of course she is comparing the situation today to the nasty little civil war immediately preceding the Hamas takeover, in which Hamas guerrillas roamed the streets and settled scores, crippling and killing opponents, especially those associated with Fatah.

The piece ends with a filler, perhaps intending to contrast the clean, honest, secure atmosphere in Hamastan with a corrupt Israel:

In Israel, the parliament approved a cabinet reshuffle of ministers from Prime Minister Olmert’s Kadima party. Haim Ramon will serve as vice premier in place of Shimon Peres, who was elected to the largely ceremonial post of president; and the former interior minister, Ronnie Bar-On, will serve as minister of finance, replacing Abraham Hirchson, who resigned because he is under criminal investigation, accused of embezzlement in a previous position.

Mr. Ramon had previously resigned as justice minister, and recently performed 120 hours of community service after he was convicted of forcibly kissing a female soldier. [my emphasis]

Technorati Tags: Hamas, Israel, Johnston, NY Times

As I wrote in the previous post, terrorism lives in a symbiotic relationship with the media. Terrorism works by creating fear (or some other more complicated emotion) in the target population — either the enemy of the terrorist or some other group that the terrorists want to influence — and then the target population acts in response to the emotions generated.

One example is the way the Madrid train bombing in March 2004 may have swung the immediately following general election against the Partido Popular of José María Aznar, which lost power as a result (either of the bombing itself , the PP’s handling of the affair, or both).

The broadcast Monday of the Gilad Schalit audiotape and the Alan Johnston videotape on Web sites linked to Islamic terror groups, and the impact the broadcasts have on the national agenda as their images beam around the world, attest to the fact that modern terrorists have adopted the mass media as their weapon of choice, say top Israeli media experts.

“The better the show is, the higher the ratings are. The higher the ratings, the more people receive the terrorists’ message,” said Eviathar Ben-Zedeff, a research fellow at the International Institute for Counter Terrorism at the Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, on Monday…

“The terrorists wish to influence three sectors: the enemy public, in this case Israelis; the wider international audience; and lastly, their own domestic audience. They want to cause fear among the enemy public, to make the international community understand that they constitute a crucial side in reaching an agreement and to receive money and support from their domestic constituents. These manipulations of the media are targeted to reach political success at the lowest cost. And it works.” — Jerusalem Post

Tuesday, Ahmed Yousef, author of the New York Times op-ed I wrote about in the previous post, actually called Noam Shalit, the father of kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit, during an on-camera interview with an Israeli TV station!

Can you imagine receiving a call from Eichmann to discuss your son’s health at Auschwitz? The combination of cruelty and real-time exploitation of terror to activate emotional forces among a population — in this case, the Israeli public, who Yousef hopes will pressure its government to release more prisoners, and more dangerous ones, in return for Shalit — is unprecedented.

Technorati Tags: terrorism, media, Israel, Hamas

Where’s Dan Parkinson when The Beeb needs him?

The BBC apologized this week for referring to Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, and promised not to repeat “the mistake,” following a complaint by four British organizations.

Arab Media Watch, Muslim Public Affairs Committee, Friends of Al-Aksa and the Institute of Islamic Political Thought sent a joint complaint to the BBC after a presenter on its Football Focus program on March 24 mentioned that Jerusalem was Israel’s capital and “historic soul.”

In a letter to the complaining NGOs, Fraser Steel, head of editorial complaints at the BBC, said: “We of course accept that the international community does not recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, and that the BBC should not describe it as such…”

[Israeli] Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said in response: “Jerusalem is Israel’s capital. It is the right of every sovereign state to determine which city will be its capital. If this is not accepted by everyone today, I am confident it will be in the future.”

London-based Arab Media Watch told The Jerusalem Post: “Under international law, neither east nor west Jerusalem is considered Israel’s capital. Tel Aviv is recognized as Israel’s capital, pending a negotiated settlement between Israel and the Palestinians.” — Jerusalem Post

I’m not a lawyer, but this is impossible. West Jerusalem, where the Knesset is located, has been in Israeli hands since 1948. Before that, it was controlled by the British, and prior to that, the Turks. Possibly Arab Media Watch thinks that ‘International law’ means ‘any old UN resolution’.

Indeed, the US recognizes Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, despite the fact that the State Department is afraid to allow its embassy to be moved there.

Technorati Tags: BBC, Israel, Jerusalem