Earlier this week an Israeli friend sent an email asking how to respond to this article which claims that "one Palestinian child has been killed every 3 days by Israel for the past 13 years."***. This blood libel was prepared as a Palestinian propaganda defence mechanism in the aftermath of the murder of the Israeli schoolboys. Published in the "Middle East Monitor" (MEMO) it was widely tweeted by anti-Semites and Islamist supremacists but also by many who claim to 'support Israel but feel for the Palestinian suffering'; it was even included in the Jewish Chronicle in David Aaronovitch's half-page Editorial article (4 July). Rather than question the validity of the claim Aaronovitch actually accepted it and used it to support his ludicrous moral equivalence argument (Muslims kill kids but so do Jews and the fanatics on both sides are as bad as each other). So another blood libel becomes part of accepted anti-Israel folklore.
For the record, MEMO is run by Daud Abdullah who is affiliated with Hamas. He signed the Hamas Istanbul Declaration which calls on the 'Islamic Nation' to fight any 'foreign warship' attempting to block arms smuggling to Hamas. MEMO bases its reports on Hamas 'sources' and classifies any Palestinian under the age of 20 as a 'child' (including of course terrorists and other types of combatants) and classifies any Palestinian killed (no matter how) as having been killed by Israel even though most are killed by other Palestinians. It even includes Israeli Arabs killed by Palestinian terrorists. And, of course, the article ignores the fact that most Palestinian deaths occurred during what were effectively short bursts of war started by Hamas rocket attacks against Israeli civilians (when the Palestinians used civilians as human shields). Even if the number of deaths claimed by MEMO had been correct then using exactly the same logic you could also state that Britain killed SIX German children every day since 1943 since 350,000 Germans - of whom about 30% really were children - were killed in Allied bombing raids during 1943-1945.
Daphne Anson also covers the Palestinian lies, while Elder Of Ziyon describes how NGOs make up lies against Israel.
***My first reaction was that perhaps they were referring to the same child.
A common technique in Palestinian lying is to put false spin on every victimization of Israelis: to spread the idea that it was the Israeli's who staged it for propaganda purposes. Like 9/11 was caused by Jews. So when the 3 Israeli teens went missing, the libel was that Israel is faking it on purpose. Then, of course, their bodies were found. So instead of them being called civilian student teens, they're called settlers, as if to imply that they got what they deserved. The death of the Palestinian teen was immediately blamed on Israeli extremists as a revenge killing. This young man could have been killed by Palestinians-for being gay; for having been labeled a collaborator; for an "honor" killing; for speaking out against Hamas or Fatah. We don't know, but Jews are blamed. I frankly doubt that Jews would burn the corpse to a char. Palestinians are the ones who have mutilated dead bodies. Israelis intent on revenge would have killed three or more Palestinians, not one. The instant blame of Israelis and Jews is libelous.
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