Too often, when an Arab youth is killed by Israel Defense Force (IDF) soldiers during an attack by that youth against those soldiers, media cries, 'IDF kills youth'. The inference is, the IDF is cruel and brutal. The IDF kills boys.
Here's a headline from October, 2015 from England that illustrates this point: "Israel security forces kill boy, 16, after stabbing in Jerusalem as violence continues", independent, October 10, 2015).
The first paragraph of this news item read, "A 16-year-old boy has become the seventh Palestinian shot dead by Israeli security forces in just 24 hours as a wave of violence continues" (ibid).
What actually happened was, a 16-year old 'Palestinian' had attacked two elderly religious Jews who were walking home from prayers on Shabbat morning. After stabbing the Jews, he attacked police officers with his knife. In that attempt, he was shot dead by the police (William Jacobson, "Israeli security forces kill boy, 16", legalinsurrection, October 10, 2015).
That 'boy' wasn't just shot by IDF soldiers who were guilty of an 'extrajucidial' killing. He was shot in the act of attempting to kill.
Those who support the 'Palestinian Cause' neglect to tell you that 'Palestinian youth' were attempting to kill when they died. That truth is typically ignored because it doesn't promote the narrative of 'brutal Israelis killing innocent youth'. That 'boy' wasn't just shot by IDF soldiers who were guilty of an 'extrajucidial' killing. He was shot in the act of attempting to kill.
Take a look at something more truthful about 'innocent Palestinian youth'. These pictures come from the website, pallywood:
The caption on this picture is "A child practicing non-violent resistance"
This last picture came from a somewhat unique blog called, alah: Arab lesbians against hate.Needless to say, this blog doesn't appear on my top-1,000 favorite blogs list. But the writer, someone called only, 'Fatima', had something important to say about this last picture. Take a look. I've edited her essay to fit my format:
She writes, "I've been asked to talk about the differences in the casualty rates between Palestinians and Israelis in the Palestine/Israel conflict. I've been asked, doesn't this [difference in casualty figures] prove that the Israelis are the aggressors?]"
Here's some background to understand what Fatima will write: during the 2014 Gaza-Israel war, Hamas manipulated the press into reporting inflated casualty numbers to buttress its claim that Israel was using 'disproportionate' force. Hamas' goal was to 'prove' that Israel wasn't attacking Gaza to defend itself, but to kill Gazans indiscriminately (Britain Eakin, "Israel's war of disproportionate force on Gaza", aljazeera, July 20, 2014).
The world jumped on that bandwagon. Even the UN accused Israel of killing so many civilians that it committed 'massive war crimes' (Abdus Sattar Ghazall, "Israel committed massive war crimes in Gaza in 2014: UN report", themilligazette, July 3, 2015). This 'disproportionate-indiscriminate' accusation (with its inference that Israel is a 'massive' killer of innocent people) has carried through to this year's Democratic Primaries race (Daniel Greenfield, "Bernie Sanders: Israel killed 10,000 'innocent people' in Gaza", frontpagemag, April 5, 2016) [In fact, less than 2,250 were killed in Gaza; of those, somewhere between 800-1,394 civilians were killed, depending upon whose numbers you believe; that's not 'massive killing'. Bernie Sanders' figure of 10,000 dead completely distorted facts to demonize Israel).
The point of these accusations is to 'prove' that Israel is brutal. After all, less that 76 Israelis (soldiers and civilians) were killed in the 2014 Gaza war. More than 2,000 Arabs were killed.
For the world, that difference was 'disproportionate'. That difference supposedly proved Israel's brutality. It supposedly proves Gaza was the victim of 'indiscriminate' killing by Israel.
The writer, Fatima, addresses these false conclusions:
She says, Well, "look at World War II casualty figures. Japan lost over 2,000,000 soldiers. America lost 400,000 [these two numbers look accurate]. Does this difference indicate that Japan was the victim? Does this indicate that the US used disproportionate force?
Look at the German figures. Germany lost over 5 million soldiers [appears accurate]. Are the Nazis the victims of WWII?
Look at the civilian figures. Germany lost 3 million civilians [possibly correct]. Japan lost half-a-million civilians during that war [probably correct, or low]. The US lost a bit over 1,000 [perhaps as many as 1,800]. Surely, that proves the US was the aggressor, doesn't it?"
[Her conclusion is,]There's more to the question of who is good or bad in war than the raw numbers of those killed.
Other factors that affect casualty figures:
1. [referring to the picture just above]--I can't remember the last time I saw an 11 year old Israeli child throwing a molotov cocktail, can you? Palestinian boys, on the other hand, engage in many dangerous militant activities that result in injuries and death. They are used as soldiers and human shields [remember, this is an Arab writing. It takes courage for her to write these words. She could be arrested for writing this way about the Palestinian Authority and, as a writer on a lesbian site, could be accused of being a lesbian--and meet a terrible death].
2. Israel protects its civilians better than the Palestinians do. They build bomb shelters for civilians. Palestinians don't.
3. Martyrdom is not promoted in Israel.
4. Palestinian children are frequently around live munitions, make-shift bomb factories and rocket firing sites. Israeli children aren't.
5. Israel has invested in state-of-the-art medical facilities. Though many Israelis are injured, many get better. Palestinians don't build hospitals.
6. Statistics lie. When news media report 'Israelis killed', they often do not include non-Jewish foreigners who are killed while visiting Israel, thereby keeping down Israel's casualty numbers [I can't vouch for this assertion]. By the same token, a Palestinian killed by a misfired Hamas weapon is counted as a Palestinian casualty killed by Israel [This has been verified].
Finally, the death of any child is a tragedy. But we need to remember to hold Palestinians complicit in the deaths of boys used as soldiers and as shields.
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My comment: this is a brave public statement for an Arab to make.This Arab writer in particular risks her life to speak the truth because, writing on a lesbian site, she may herself be gay. Gays and Lesbians in the Palestinian Authority (PA) risk their lives to be gay in the PA ("Palestinians uninterested in support from gays", israeltoday, July 1, 2015). While being gay in the PA is not a crime, gays and lesbians must nevertheless live in secret if they wish to survive (ibid); the Arab culture is that hostile to gays.
With regard to the Arab-Israel conflict, proponents of the 'Palestinian Cause' will tell any lie they can in order to forward their false narrative about a brutal, Nazi-like Israel. They will distort any fact they find to demonize Israel. For me, that includes Bernie Sanders of the US (Greenfield, above).
We must fight those lies. When Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas accuses Israel of "extrajudicial killings of our ('Palestinian') youth and children" ("Abbas: Israel changing Temple Mount status quo, executing Palestinians", timesofisrael, November 24, 2015), we must fight back (those 'youth and children' weren't innocent; they died while perpetrating terror attacks against Jews). We must never stop fighting.
While we fight those lies, we must always remember to ask a simple question: if the 'Palestinian Cause' is so just, why do Palestinians' need to lie so much?
The answer is equally simple: they lie because they have to. Truth is not on their side.
Just ask 'Fatima'.
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