The West: It's Always Israel's Fault

As always, Melanie Phillips has written a great column: "As Gaza’s rockets are fired at Israel, so are media missiles. Behind western hostility to Israel and indifference towards Iran lies a baleful explanation"

Here are some excerpts.

"We know it’s coming. We can write the script in advance. Yet it never fails to sicken and to shock.

"This week, Israel was once again forced to take military action to defend itself against increasingly deadly attacks. As ever, western media presented this as if Israel wakes up in the morning and decides to bomb Gaza through some insatiable lust for violence.

"Once again, such media outlets omitted or downplayed the crucial context for this military action. Once again, questions asked by some interviewers were framed through a maliciously distorted prism.

"The most notable element of Israel’s Gaza strikes this week has been their pinpoint accuracy and limited collateral civilian deaths.

"Targeted Israeli air raids killed three senior members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in simultaneous strikes on their apartments. Hundreds of rockets were subsequently fired from Gaza at southern Israel.

"sraeli bombers then targeted PIJ rocket and mortar launch sites. Another strike killed the head of the PIJ rocket launching force in his apartment, along with two other PIJ operatives. Later in the day, a further strike killed his deputy.

"As The Spectator noted, the BBC World Service Newsday show omitted crucial context. On Wednesday morning, it reported Palestinian officials saying, “Two young men have been killed during an overnight Israeli army raid near Jenin … hours after Israel carried out air strikes on Gaza, targeting militant commanders. Fifteen people were killed, including ten civilians. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Palestinian militants that any retaliation would be met with a crushing response”.

"As Israeli journalist Lahav Harkov pointed out to the Newsday presenter, the report failed to say that the operation in Jenin followed the start of the rocket barrage from Gaza and that the 'two young men' had been shooting at Israeli soldiers.

"Worse, however, was to follow. If the operation was to target PIJ and ten civilians were now dead, said the presenter, did this reveal 'where the thought process of Mr. Netanyahu and the coalition government and the leadership is at the moment?'

"From that question, we could see this presenter’s assumption that Israel’s prime minister and his coalition partners were motivated by a lust for killing innocent Palestinian Arab civilians. This was not only a malevolent and twisted prejudice —from a supposedly objective BBC journalist — but directly contradicted by the remarkable precision of the Israeli air strikes.

.....

"And here’s the most terrible thought of all. The prospect of widespread carnage in Israel doesn’t concern the west because, to its way of thinking, the historic role of Jews is to die in large numbers.

"Then the west will eulogise them, weep crocodile tears over them and sentimentalise their memory. While the west refuses to tolerate the idea of Jewish power — and so will always demonise Israel for using it to defend Israeli lives — what it loves is dead Jews.

"Harsh? Certainly. But harsher and more terrifying by far for Israel."