Israel Fights Terror and Terrorists
or
The Media motto:
Give me a good story - don't confuse me with facts

by Yechiel Kimchi

Last :   August 15, 2011  Arab and Palestinian Position
        :   August 15, 2011  Palestinian Education
        :   August 15, 2011  Others' Opinions

A Muslim View: Magdi Allam and in Hebrew ("Haaretz", July 2nd, 2007)

What you do not see on CNN, BBC, etc.

Introduction (supplement (added: May 16, 2005))
A Jewish Terrorist (added: Aug. 6, 2005)
Facts
What is Terrorism
Sources for facts
How this page begun
e-mail correspondence
Israelis guts feelings
Arab and Palestinian Position (Created August 15, 2011)
Palestinian Education :   August 15, 2011
Israel's false portrayal: International Media and alike
Israel and the UN
Hezbollah
Others' Opinions :   August 15, 2011
My personal thoughts
Copy Rights

Introduction
Let's start with two quotations by the late Mrs. Golda Meir, a former prime-minister of Israel (let me emphasize that I did not vote for her in the two elections that she was nominated - and won) - I think she really got the essence of the practical human side of the Israeli-Arab conflict: In light of the suicide murderers that are sent by the Arab terrorists in recent years, some of them as young as 16 years old, the latter quotation takes a whole new meaning - not anticipated by Mrs. Meir.
(But it happened before, Egyptian President Saadat said he would sacrifice 1,000,000 soldiers to fight Israel and, only recently, Arafat said he would send 1,000,000 suicide murderers (well, he called them martyrs - "shaheeds") to free Jerusalem.)


Note: the following is a kind-of prolog (lately added), which is a short explanation of the above statements of Ms. Meir that turned to be a longer description of my perspective of some events around the year 2005. While I believe these are interesting in their own sake,
you may want to skip it and go directly to the main parts of this document.
Please remember to come back

(added: May 16, 2005) (last July 17, 2005)
Although this is only the introduction section, some clarifications may be appropriate.
The term "Arabs" in the above quotations may mean either one of "Arab nations", "Arab states", "Arab leaders". While I am not 100% sure that Mrs. Meir did not use one of the more explicit terms, I am quite confident she used the general term, and probably meant the middle one - "the Arab states". Although it is true that not all Arab states are the same (neither all Arab leaders, nor all Arab nations [and no nation is homogeneous]), generalization by itself is not an evil - I have heard no objections to statements like "the Europeans were against the 2nd Gulf-War" despite the well known fact that Britain took part in it, and there were great differences, among the European states, in the level of opposition to that war. In short, generalization is an evil when it is used to mislead. Specifically, I am sure that not all opinions are the same among Arab people, whether citizens of Israel or citizens of the Arab states. A somewhat extreme example for that is the American-Arab Joseph Farah (see his well known article about Myths of the Middle East that sets the basic facts in plain words, and see a critique of it, that I cannot completely agree with (but I partially do)), Unfortunately, as noted below, the voices of those that oppose the mainstream opinions in the Arab states (and Arab societies) are rarely heard in the world - and almost never in the Arab states. Likewise, not all Jewish voices are the same - even to the extreme point where they become anti-semitic - but, in contrast to the Arab voices that critisize Arabs, these voices are well heard both in Israel and all over the world.
Moreover, it is not always easy to separate between leaders/states/nations when they act coherently. For example, it is quite reasonable that the wide spread of antisemitic school-books, in the Palestinian Authority, as well as in other Arab states, is governed by the authorities there (i.e., civil service people), but it could not have been executed without the leaders agreement (at least - if not by explicit instructions), and would probably failed if there was public opinion (nation) expressed against this.
( links, July 17, 2005) Likewise, antisemitic   cartoons in the Egyptian   newspapers   (a forgiving "explanation" by the BBC), as well as an antisemitic   series   in the   Egyptian   TV (end of links, July 17, 2005)
(which was accepted with great enthusiasm by Arab people both inside and outside Egypt), could not have been consummated unless approved by the government (last elections president Mubarak won 99% of the votes). As the last example, the demonstrations of Palestinians (as well as in some other Arab states) applauding the terrorist attacks of Sep. 11, 2001 were probably spontaneous (at least in part) "by the nations", but the Palestinian Authority reaction was not to condemn the demonstrations (and maybe trying to convince people to retire from them). Instead, the only actions the Palestinian Authority took were to confiscate media recordings (stills films, video cassettes) of these demonstrations, and in some cases arresting the media people who made these documents (see #3 in my letter of Sep. 22, 2001).
Looking at it from a different angel, practically all Arab states (of that time) had invaded Israel the day she was born on May 14, 1948, and almost all of them participated, one way or another, in the blockade of Israel and fighting her in 1967 (Lebanon was probably an exception). Jordan was one of the major Arab states that did not participate in the 1973 war - and it was greatly appreciated by both the people and the leaders of Israel (and Mrs. Meir quotes above are dated prior to 1973).
In short, as long as there is no Arab movement parallel to the Israeli Peace Now movement, I am very pessimistic about the prospects of peace between the Arab states and Israel, the Jewish state. Please note that I have never supported the attitude and goals of the Israeli "Peace Now", but I have always supported their existence, because I am happy that the Israeli society is heterogeneous and democratic - something only to be desired for the Arab states (yes, Lebanon is heterogeneous, but unfortunately they kill each other).
(added: June 1st, 2005)
The Egyptian writer (satire, plays) Ali Salem was invited to Israel to receive an honorary doctorate from Ben-Gurion University in Beer-Sheba. This award was offered to him for his efforts, leading a very small group of Egyptian intellectuals that support the normalization of the relationships with Israel. (It should be noted that the majority of intellectuals in Egypt, as well as in the other Arab countries, are the leaders of the movements that call to disengage any contact with Israel - even when their government had signed a peace treaty with Israel.) Although he was visiting Israel several times before, he was denied the permission ( Hebrew) to leave Egypt this time, and had to call - just a few hours before the ceremony - to advice of his absence.     (added: July 10, 2005) A follow up   (print     Hebrew).

(added: Aug. 6, 2005) A Jewish Terrorist
Unfortunately, we, the Jews, have our share of terrorists. The horrific incident in Sheffar'am (Aug. 4, 2005), an Israeli town where Christian Arabs, Muslims and Druz live together, where a Jewish deserter soldier shot many bus passengers (in the Druz neighbourhood), killing four of them, is, in my view, nothing less than a terrorist attack, and he is nothing less than a terrorist. This is despite the fact that his attack is not part of a systematic plan. In my view, in this case what matters is his intentions, hoping that killing innocent civilians will result in political gains (and maybe hoping that others will follow him).
Having said that, there are some interesting points that should be exposed:
  1. I do not support the lynch that was done to this terrorist by the local mob (while he was already handcuffed by policemen), though I do not shed even a single tear over his death - he got what he deserved. Nevertheless, I expect that the same investigation (or non-investigation) level will be performed if Jewish mob lynches an Arab terrorist.
    (added: Aug. 7, 2005) Yet, it is astonishing that "The Srab Israeli Follow-up Committee" ("Va'adat HaMa'akav Shel Arviyei Israel") was threatening the Israeli police (and establishment)
    not to try and find the terrorist's killers (sorry, in Hebrew) - this is unbearable for me.
  2. It is important to mention the different ways terrorist attacks are perceived in the Israeli society as opposed to the Palestinian.
    It has been always the case that the Jewish community in Israel (and I am sure all over the world) is shocked by this murder, and many feel shameful - I can safely say always because, unfortunately, this is not the first incident of a Jewish person killing innocent Arabs (there were about five such cases before, but those were not politically motivated (as far as I know) but, rather, motivated by blind hatred to Arabs. Other cases where Arabs were killed by civilians were more of a case of confrontation, where there was a confrontation between an Arab and a Jew, and (at least a possibility of) that it was a self-defense case).
    Even if there are one or two thousands in Israel that support this act of terror, this is less than half per-mill of the Jewish population in Israel (assuming 5.5 million Jews, 2000 is 0.036% of the population). Condemnations of this act of terror and sympathy for the victims and their families, and also to the general population of Sheffar'am and the Israeli Arab community, are heard from all people in Israel, officials (politicians, civil servants, military commanders) and unofficials (media people, private citizens) alike.
    In contrast, when there is a terror attack of Palestinian terrorists against Jews (whether in Israel or abroad), there is practically no condemnation heard from the Palestinian society (in fact, in most cases there were joyful demonstrations - see Terrorism-Sep11.text #3), nor from Palestinian officials (on sporadic occasions, mainly when there was a heavy pressure on the Palestinian Authority, there were "half toned" condemnations, that usually followed by a big donation to the terrorists or their families (in case of suicide terrorists)).
    Although not much praises to Palestinian terrorist attacks are heard from Israeli Arabs (I believe it is unlawful to express such opinions), one should wonder why there are not so many condemnations heard either. Moreover, more than one (but not all) of the Arab Knesset (The Israeli Parliament) Members were recorded, while in Israel and while visiting their colleagues in Gaza, or in Syria, to express explicit support of the terrorist organizations and their attacks. (I hope to find records about that, on the Internet.)
  3. It is important to compare the families (of a suicide terrorist) reaction to the attack. Of course, there are families that are shocked and mourn their family member. But I clearly remember cases where Palestinian mothers where praising their child action, up to one mother saying "I wish all my sons do the same, in fighting the Zionist enemy."
    In contrast, the parents of this Israeli terrorist at Sheffar'am were trying to prevent the possibility of his action: when he deserted the army they call everyone they could, his officers, the military office of their home-town, the local police, etc. to draw their attention to the fact that he became extremist in his political views, that he left home, and that at least his gun should be taken from him because they were afraid he was able to do something terrible. In fact, they are now accusing the government for not doing enough to stopping their son - and, based on the numerous cases they called the authorities, they may have a case.
  4. More ...
(more to come)
July 17, 2005



Facts
This page is about facts. Nevertheless, facts need interpretations, and when I think that interpretations are necessary - they will be clearly noticeable. When I cannot be silence about my opinions they will be marked accordingly. You will also be able to notice that I make links to variety of opinions, not only those that coincide with mine, and I will not always stress where my opinion differs - because the most important thing is that you will have enough information in order to make up your own mind. This is exactly the reason why I will try to emphasize where, to the best of my knowledge, they (intentionally or not, explicitly or not) mis-stating the facts.
If you find any inaccuracy, please mail to me

What is Terrorism?
Let me give you a definition of "Terrorism" that I cannot think is debatable:
Terrorism is a systematic assault targeted at innocent people,
intended to spread fear in order to gain political benefits.
I hope this is a fair translation, from the Hebrew version of a book edited by Benjamin Netanyahu (former Israeli. PM, 1996-1999). English version (1987)

Sources for Facts about the Israeli Arab dispute   (Last June 2, 2008)
What you do not see on CNN, BBC, etc.
In the beginning
I have started writing stuff about terrorism and terrorist countries at the time of the Gulf War.
Eventually it will be put here.
I will quote one comment I gave at the time about Oslo Agreement:
when a friend asked me, then, "what do you say about the latest peace accord?"
I replied "What peace?" I wish I was not that right
A later beginning was after Sep. 11, 2001. and it is here March 11, 2007
(the original link was named Sorry, I told you).

My correspondence with friends began with this e-mail and a a subsequent e-mail followed as a reply to a friend (that will remain anonymous unless he tells me to put his name there).
Many of the links on this page (and other pages to come) were mentioned in that reply.

Israelis guts feelings
Then I sent an e-mail about the letter by Dov Shoham, an Israeli manager replying to a customer in Denmark. (the company site and the letter)
Obviously, I had sent it to the person in Denmark, from whom I have received an auto-reply that describes the views of a Danish organization (SiD) that blames everything on Israel. I will comment about this letter sometime later, but one thing should be noted:
there are three references to terrorism in that letter
  1. Israeli PM Sharon causes terror from both sides (wasn't there Arab terrorism when Rabin was a PM, and Peres after him, and Netanyahu after that, and Barak after that?
    And what about Arab terrorism in the 1970's - remember Munich Olympic games?
    And what about 1950's Arab terrorism - even before there were "occupied territories"?)
  2. Israeli PM Izaak Rabin was killed by an Israeli terrorist
    (no, he was, and is, a monstrous murderer, but not a terrorist).
  3. Both parties should stop terror. (Well, the fallacy of equating Israel's defense actions with the Palestinian terrorism, that is so popular in Europe these days, is the main subject of this page.)

Arab and Palestinian Position   (Created August 15, 2011)   Last August 15, 2011

How Palestinians educate their children?   Last August 15, 2011

Israel's false portrayal (February 17, 2008)

Israel and the UN
What is it that makes Israel (and Israelis) so upset when criticized by civilized nations? Fighting the Hezbollah:
        The July attack by Hezbollah and the Israeli response. (October 17, 2006)
A Collection of Other People's Opinions and Observations (added: June 25, 2005)   Last :   Aug. 15, 2011
Can the Arab-Israeli conflict be solved?
(a personal view, 2002)


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Copyright © 2002 - 2008 Yechiel M. Kimchi. All rights reserved.
http://www.cs.technion.ac.il/users/yechiel/Terrorism/entry.html
Created: 2002/05/10       Last updated: 2011/08/15 05:03 PDT

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