In the world of political ‘spinning’ as in combat–and especially, perhaps,
in the political spinning that surrounds combat– there is
a really handy maneuver some people use which is to launch a diversionary
attack.
You’d think that Sharon and the leaders of the IDF had taken a lesson right
out of Karl Rove’s playbook with the way that over the past few days they spun a massive campaign aimed
basically at diverting world attention from the vastly disproportionate
and escalatory campaign they launched against northern Gaza at the end of
last week.
The diversion? To accuse the UN relief agency UNRWA of allowing one
of its ambulances in Gaza to transport a rocket to the front-line on behalf
of the Palestinian militants…
The IDF even swore they had visuals of the incident, taken by one of the
many drones they have flying over the battle-torn areas of Jabalya refugee
camp.
Sharon’s government made such a song and dance about this allegation
that Kofi Annan immediately said he’d send a high-level investigation team
out to Gaza to investigate the whole incident.
Oh, the halls of the United Nations were abuzz with discussions of the whole
allegation!
UNRWA boss Peter Hansen averred that the images showed only a stretcher being
put into the ambulance. In today’s Ha’Aretz, reporter Amos Harel has
this:
last night, in the wake of media pressure, the IDF had updated
its assessment: The officers said the object in the ambulance was a weapon,
but nonetheless “it’s impossible to swear” that it wasn’t a stretcher…The problem facing the IDF is that the eye of the professional and the eye
of the average news watcher differ greatly. What appeared obvious to the IDF
analyst seemed to the civilian to be an UNRWA man carrying a stretcher into
the van.
Oops? So was it all a horrible mistake on behalf of the IDF?
Probably not. Harel continues by noting this:
It looks that the debate between Israel and the UN will not end
with this round. The IDF will continue its surveillance and the UN will likely
stand by its assertions.However, the Israeli spin of the story diverted public attention, at least
in Israel, from the main issue.Out of the whole debate on whether a Qassam was or wasn’t put in the back
of the ambulance, it has nearly been forgotten that there is an issue
of greater substance on which there is no dispute: that nearly 80 Palestinians,
a quarter of them unarmed civilians, have been killed since the start of Operation
Days of Penitence. In one week the number of Palestinian dead is approaching
the total of Israeli losses since the start of 2004.
Harel also, along the way, notes that there have been previous accusations
from Israel that Palestinian militants were using UNRWA ambulances to ferry
around armed men…
To some of the accusations there was no evidence, and the Israeli
public relations machine ignored the other side, including testimonies of
IDF soldiers of targeting UNRWA ambulances in the territories, and the use
the IDF itself made of ambulances in the arrest of Marwan Barghouti.
He also notes that there’s a deeper, long-running campaign against Hansen
and against UNRWA as a whole.
All of that is quite true. What I would note in addition is that this is
far from the first time that a resort by an Israeli government to a substantial
escalation of violence against the Palestinians has been accompanied by a
large-scale attempt at diversionary spin.
One of the most notorious examples of that was back in early 2002, during
the Battle of Jenin. At that time, Shimon Peres was the main spinmeister.
He made the quite diversionary claim that “Israel’s opponents” were
quite wrongfully accusing Israel of having carried out a “massacre” inside
Jenin refugee camp.
At that point, no-one had even openly aired such a claim. But Peres
got up a fine act of being in high dudgeon at the very thought, and said
this just “proved” that the world was full of people making unfounded claims
against Israel, etc etc.
At that point, the whole international discussion of what had happened inside
Jenin became focused on the question of whether it had been an Israeli-perpetrated
“massacre”, or not… And I believe that several human rights organizations
came out with judgments to the effect that they did not have clear evidence
that it had been one…
All of which ignored a couple of simple points. (1) The term “massacre”
is nowhere defined precisely in atrocities law– unlike, for example, “genocide”,
“crimes against humanity”, etc. So what you call a massacre I may call
something else; and vice versa. It is not any kind of a precise term
of art. (2) Regardless of whether it was “massacre” or not (which is
essentially indefinable: see #1), the Israeli forces undoubtedly committed
several serious breaches of the Geneva Conventions in their actions in the
camp; and it is possible that the Palestinian militants committed some, too.
… Diversionary spin. We’ve seen it a lot in Israel over the
years. And of course Karl Rove ain’t too shabby at it either. Look
at the whole “Swift Boat Vets” episode.
Regarding Gaza, Sharon’s people have really been behaving very badly over
the past week. But I should write more about that, later.
Another Veto
US Ambassador John Danforth (to the UN) vetoed a draft resolution condeming Israeli’s ongoing invasion of Gaza (Xinhua). Ambassadors from Germany, the UK, and Romania all abstained. Meanwhile, the head of Islamic Jihad, Bashir ad-Dabbash, is reportedly…
The only reason for seeking proportionality in violence would be if one is after the psychological closure that revenge brings, specially in the Arab tradition and culture. You lob a missile that kills two children, so I kill two and we are even.
Israel seems to be after reducing the ability and the will to lob missiles from Gaza, not after revenge.
Just like the joke about the doctor, if sending Qassam missiles causes you inordinate pain, don’t do it.
Isn’t Sharon in the process of abandoning Gaza? What are the missiles for? They want him to stay?
David
Which of the dozens of dead civilians lobbed these missiles?
David, isn’t the reasoning that you can change the actions of one part of a society-the militants- by harming the rest of the population very similar to the reasoning of terrorists who attempt to change the actions of one part of society- government- by terrorizing the public?
David, I think you have a double standard. Just the names of the illegal Israeli operations such as “grapes of wrath” indicate retribution. Israel started the occupation, has created an apartheid society, and has visited physical, psychological, societal, and economic violence on the Palestinians day in and day out for decades. Nonviolent resistence by Palestinians is met with bullets and indefinite detention. I blame Israel for the violence occuring today.
Can you accept holding Israelis and Palestinians to the same objective standard?
edq:
Nonviolent resistance by Palestinians has also resulted in expulsion – a violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention.
david, last time the idf went into gaza to “put an end to the qassam attacks” the result was just the opposite – they increased. so, if we are going to use the ridiculous “if it hurts to do it, stop doing it” logic, then it seems that israel should stop its incursions into gaza. as for sharon’s “process” of abandoning gaza, the “process” part seems to have not too much to do with getting israel out of gaza (which hasn’t happened) and a lot more to do with killing palestinians in gaza (which has happened and is happening).
I do hold Israel and the Palestinians to the same standard. That’s why I say that the Palestinian Authority has no right to exist, while Israel has the right to use as much massed artillery as necessary to annhilate its enemies.
The standard is creating a modern, rational, free society. While Israel is far from perfect, it wins by a landslide when compared to the PLO or just about any Arab state.
What you said makes perfect sense if the hallmark of a “modern, rational, free society” is the willingness to “use as much massed artillery as necessary to annhilate its enemies”.
Please don’t bother replying. I’m really not interested in having a conversation with you.
Shirin,
I think Israel fears non-violent Palestinians more then the violent ones. During the first Intifada the Israelis decided to expell a leading Palestinian pacifist named Awad as I recall. What does it tell you that out of all the Palestinians they expell Awad?
Jax, you certainly are a civilized person. We need to spread your values all over the world.
For whom does the Israeli state work? It is an apartheid system based on giving Jews rights over non-Jews.
You complain about the Arab governments. The Middle East would be much better off if the Europeans had just stayed out of the region. They have created a plague of problems for the region. Many of the current governments were installed and are presently backed by the West. One of the most notorious examples was the Shah of Iran. I think western governments are quite happy to have corrupt, tyranical governments in the Middle East. The last thing they want are strong, well functioning governments that act in the interests of their people. Look at how Hugo Chavez is being treated.
Jeremy, the missiles don’t come with return addresses. Lately Isarel has been pretty lucky in using drones to track the launch event and fire back to the source instantly. I am sure you’ll find something wrong with that as well. It would be much simpler and cheaper to just return fire period.
Edq and Alex, it is very simple to separate cause from effect. Just remove one stimulus and see if the action stops. The stimulus from Israel’s point of view is Palestinian violence. For the Palestinians the stimulus is Israel’s existence. Just like the other proverbial joke told about a mother in law “she is a fine lady, but has only one problem, she breaths”.
Somebody explain why launch missiles from Gaza when Sharon announced and is fighting internally to abandon Gaza. And for extra credit go on record by stating that Qassams will stop once Israel is out of Gaza. Any takers?
David
David, the “cause” going on here is that Israel invades Palestinian territory and gradually ethnicly cleanses the area of non-Jews through illegal land confiscations and making life impossible for Palestinians. The effect is that Palestinians respond, first non-violently and then violently. This is the same “cause and effect” that lead to the French resistance against the Nazis, the Algerian rebellion against the French, and any other colonial war you care to name. The Palestinians have tried many times to reach some sort of truce with Israel but Sharon isn’t interested.
Incidently, who remembers that Sharon is a mass murderer?
As far as Israel’s methods are concerned, they are illegal. Unlike with Iraq, few in the U.S. seem to care whether Israel complies with international law. Could racism be operating here?
edq,
So France had control of Syria 60 years ago. So somehow France is to blame if the Syrians assist terrorists straight from the dark ages? Really, for how many more decades are the Arabs going to blame all their backwardness and savagery on the West? The Arab world was falling behind the West before there was any European control of the region, and has gotten worse since the Europeans gave up control.
Israel is the only representive of Western Civilization in the Middle East. That is why it is the free, modern, and prosperous – in stark contrast to its neighbors. Of course that is why it is hated by the primitives, both in the region and in Western humanities departments.
Edq,
There is no colonialism in action, it is a national conflict, and is not between an empire and some natives. Arafat’s PLO was founded in 1964, before there were so called occupied territories. And if Israel was doing ethnic cleansing you wouldn’t have more than a million Israeli Arabs? Nonsense.
The Palestinians may have used tactical truces, like the PLO did 120 times with King Hussein in Jordan until Black September, but they never removed violence as their raison d’etre, and if you read their books, listen to their speeches, they are not about to change. When you proudly dress up and picture your toddlers as suicide bombers, not only you are either different or profoundly sick, and you are not about to embark in peaceful compromise.
Please save us the propaganda, if there is one corrupt and racist system it is in the Arab world. From the Saudi refusal to let non-Moslems set foot in Mecca, to their Iranian’s cousins refusal to participate in Olympic sports with Israelis, to Egypt’s production of racist TV series regurgitating czarist Russian antisemitic lies. And I could go on until the cows come home. Just ask.
The immense, retrograd, and shameful Arab world should get its house in order before crying wolf again.
David
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