At first glance, today’s New York Times article on Israel’s massacre in Gaza looks like an improvement from its first efforts at whitewash. The piece actually reports that the respected Israeli human rights organization, B’Tselem, has taken out newspaper ads asking Israeli soldiers to disobey future orders to shoot at the Gazan demonstrators.
But on closer inspection, the article turns out to be just as biased as the Times’s previous reports. It reads more like a theoretical discussion about when lethal force is justified, instead of a genuine effort to find out what actually happened on March 30 inside the Gazan border.
First, the Times does give the Gazan death toll, which is now up to 19 after four more of the injured died. But it nowhere reports the number of Palestinians who were injured by Israeli live ammunition, which ranges somewhere from 700 on up to 1000. Surely an honest report on the use of force should have included such a figure.
Next, the Times covers up the fact that no Israelis, soldiers or anyone else, were injured at all; none of them got as much as a scratch. Any assessment about whether Israel had the right to open fire should report this fact.
Then, although the paper does have a stringer in Gaza City, the article does not include a single interview with any Gazan eyewitnesses to the slaughter on March 30. But the Times did find time to participate in a “conference call with reporters” conducted by General Ronen Manelis, an Israeli army spokesman, and the paper reported his preposterous claims without vigorous challenge.
At least today’s report ended with one truthful paragraph, even though it was buried at the very end of the article — a lengthy quote from Hagai El-Ad, the executive director of B’Tselem:
This is not complicated. To see Israeli soldiers, inside Israel, firing live ammunition from a distance at unarmed Palestinian protesters inside the blockaded Gaza Strip — with the figures of injuries and fatalities that resulted from that — you do not need to be a legal expert to look at that and say that this is outrageous, illegal, immoral and unacceptable.”
Here’s a suggestion for the Times: contact Breaking the Silence, the human rights organization of Israeli soldiers who are determined to give their eyewitness accounts of the awful occupation of Palestine, and ask them what really happened on March 30.
At least, the last paragraph cited B’Tselem:
“This is not complicated,” he said. “To see Israeli soldiers, inside Israel, firing live ammunition from a distance at unarmed Palestinian protesters inside the blockaded Gaza Strip, with the figures of injuries and fatalities that resulted from that — you do not need to be a legal expert to look at that and say this is outrageous, illegal, immoral and unacceptable.”
Nothing about this subject on NY Times Twitter stream, although other foreign news is abundant enough. BTW, the death toll is now 21, with 1400+ maimed.
Phil Weiss, you need to submit this to the NYTimes as an op-ed. Will it be published? Obviously not, but someone at the Times will at least have read it.
A more descriptive headline for this piece? “New York Times doesn’t give up on its defense of indefensible Israel”
Nonetheless, my compliments to Mondoweiss for its strengthening opposition to fascist racist Zionist Israel with their pieces yesterday:
Seven things you need to know about Israel’s latest attack on Gaza
https://mondoweiss.mystagingwebsite.com/2018/04/things-israels-latest/
Israel just lost American Jews
https://mondoweiss.mystagingwebsite.com/2018/04/israel-just-american/
I gave these pieces broad distribution on both Facebook and Twitter, and especially to the Israeli trolls at the New York Times, including its new publisher, A.G. Sulzberger, son of Arthur O. Sulzberger, Jr. recently retired as publisher. Footnote: A.G. is every bit as bad as his father was in defending the indefensible brutal, racist, genocidal, ethnic cleansing, land-stealing, fascist, terrorist Zionist Israel!
If the Times would spend the same amount of time reporting the truth as obscuring it they’d be a newspaper worth reading. How to keep their Zionist contributors busy would be their only problem.
The sad reality is the Times think they are clever – these propagandist believe their readership is made up of fools. Maybe they’re right.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/44078-in-wake-of-gaza-massacre-israeli-leaders-should-be-prosecuted-for-war-crimes
“In Wake of Gaza Massacre, Israeli Leaders Should Be Prosecuted for War Crimes.”
Truthout, Friday, April 06, 2018
By Marjorie Cohn**
EXCERPT:
“On March 30, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers shot 773 unarmed Palestinian protesters in Gaza, killing 17 and wounding 1,400. Twenty remain in critical condition. The protesters were marching to demand the internationally mandated right of return of refugees to their cities and villages in what now constitutes Israel.
“The Israeli leaders who ordered the massacre were in clear violation of international law. They should be prosecuted for war crimes.”
“Premeditated Use of Deadly Force Against Peaceful Protesters”
“The use of deadly force against the peaceful protesters was premeditated. The IDF deployed 100 snipers to the border fence between Gaza and Israel, where 30,000 to 40,000 Palestinians had gathered for the Great March of Return. In a damning tweet, later deleted, the IDF wrote, ‘Nothing was carried out uncontrolled; everything was accurate and measured, and we know where every bullet landed.'”
**”Marjorie Cohn is professor emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, former president of the National Lawyers Guild, deputy secretary general of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers and an advisory board member of Veterans for Peace.”