When burning Jews isn’t news
By Stephen M. Flatow/JNS.org
On Aug. 30, Palestinian terrorists
set a Jewish man on fire in Jerusalem, and on Sept. 1, other Palestinian
terrorists tried to set an entire bus full of Israeli Jews on fire.
Yet I couldn’t find any mention of these horrific
attacks in the New York Times, the Washington Post, or any other
major American news outlet. Why is it that news about burning Jews is not
considered fit to print?
The first of the firebomb attacks
took place in Jerusalem’s
City of David neighborhood. A Molotov cocktail—a flaming bottle of gasoline which explodes upon contact—was hurled through the window of a
historic 19th-century house known as Beit Meyuhas. One of the residents, a
45-year-old man, was struck by the firebomb and set on fire. He suffered first
and second-degree burns to his face and head. Second-degree burns often result
in permanent scarring and require skin grafting.
Burning one Jew is not enough to
satisfy the appetite of Palestinian terrorists. On Sept. 1, two firebombs were
thrown at an Israeli bus traveling on Route 505, between the towns of Migdalim
and Kfar Tapuach. The attackers’ goal was to set the entire bus on fire and burn all of its
passengers alive. They almost succeeded. The flaming bombs exploded as they
crashed through the front windshield of the bus. Flying glass slashed the
driver. It was only by a miracle that he was able to stop the bus without
crashing—and
that the flames did not spread through the entire vehicle.
Palestinian terrorists sometimes use
rocks instead of firebombs. Stoning is, after all, a time-honored method of
execution in that part of the world. Recently, they certainly have been trying
to do just that.
On Aug. 20, Palestinian rock-throwers
attacked an Israeli automobile traveling near the Yitzhar junction. An
11-month-old baby was wounded. Medics on the scene were quoted as saying that
it was a “miracle” she survived, since the rock that
hit her was the size of a fist.
Three days later, Yedaya Sharchaton,
his wife Hadassah, and 1-year-old daughter Nitzan were driving in the Gush
Etzion region. Arab rocks smashed through the front windshield, causing Yedaya
to lose control of the car. It flipped over. All three family members were
injured; Yedaya suffered internal bleeding. It turns out that my family was on the same road as the
Sharchaton’s just a few days before as we headed to celebrate my
granddaughter’s bat mitzvah by serving hot dogs to Israeli soldiers at a
base in the Hebron hills.
On Aug. 29, a mob of Palestinians
emerging from prayers in the Al-Aqsa Mosque on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount threw rocks at Israeli police officers. It
would be interesting to know if anything in the sermons they had just heard
encouraged them to try to murder Jews. Two of the rock-throwers were arrested;
they were minors. One wonders what they are learning in school about the idea
of stoning Jews to death.
The next day, Palestinian
rock-throwers targeted Israeli policemen in another section of Jerusalem. Three
of the officers were injured. Their names were not mentioned by the Israeli
media. Nor were the extent of their injuries. Did one of them lose an eye? Was
one of them permanently disfigured? Three more anonymous, forgotten victims of
Arab terror.
On Sept. 1, the rock-throwers chose
the northern Jerusalem neighborhood of Pisgat Ze’ev. Spotting an Israeli bus coming down Uzi Narkis Street,
from Pisgat Ze’ev
to the adjoining Arab neighborhood of Shuafat, the would-be killers attacked.
The rocks smashed the windows, one striking and injuring a 3-year-old girl. The
Magen David Adom paramedics who rushed to the scene to provide emergency
treatment knew that the difference between life and death for that little girl
was just bad aim.
So once again, they are burning and
stoning Jews. Yet the New York Times and the others are not interested.
Why? Because it doesn’t
fit their preferred narrative.
Most of the editors and reporters in
the mainstream media subscribe to a narrative of the Israeli-Arab conflict in
which the Israelis are the aggressors, and the Palestinians are the victims.
That narrative supports the political outcome that most editors and reporters
personally endorse: an Israeli retreat to the 1967 lines, a division of
Jerusalem, the rise of a Palestinian state.
But when you report about
Palestinians burning and stoning Israelis, that changes everything. Americans—from the average person in the street
to Members of Congress—regard
such behavior as barbaric. They naturally conclude that giving a state to such
violent extremists is crazy. Telling the truth about Palestinian behavior makes
it harder to mobilize pressure on Israel to give in. That’s why in the editorial offices of the
New York Times and so many other newspapers, news about burning Jews isn’t fit to print. Sadly, it’s that simple.
Mr. Flatow, a New Jersey attorney, is
the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered by Palestinian terrorists in 1995.
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