BBSNewsArguing for a REAL Middle East Peace

BBSNews 2010-07-31 — With news of possible direct talks in the air between Mahmoud Abbas and Bibi Netanyahu in the air – the issue of illegal “settlement” building is sure to get another look because President Obama wants to extend the “freeze” that Bibi never implemented in the first place.

Never mind that Phase One in former President George W. Bush’s Road Map for peace, that Israel signed onto, clearly stated that all illegal “settlement” activity should end way back in 2003; the supposed freeze due to expire in September has been a farce the entire time.

In yet another of those stories that should have been on every front page across America and instead has been relegated to the dustbin where all criticisms of Israel’s illegal acts under international law go, a woman from Israel works quietly behind the scenes in the West Bank, diligently visiting the growing illegal colonies still under construction and documents them with her camera.

Hagit Ofran was profiled this week by Christian Science Monitor’s Ben Lynfield. She is a brave woman who has to be extremely cautious as she goes about her work, as director of the Settlement Watch Team for Peace Now in Israel.

The “settlers” don’t much like her, and neither do the Israeli government. Lynfield writes that Danny Dayan, chairman of the Yesha Council say Ofran “is not objective”. Although it is hard to see how objective one has to be to recognize that not only are the building of each and every one of these colonies over a period of decades has always been against international law, there is also the violation of the Road Map and this latest farce of a “settlement” freeze.

It’s hard to know just why President Obama has abandoned the Palestinians and is now pounding them into submission to agree to direct talks with an Israeli government that simply has no intention of ending the illegal colonies, but that is exactly what has happened.

President Obama backtracked from his original stance that was completely within international law and past agreements, and then Bibi steamrolled right over him and got the White House photo-op he needed to show he again has the American President, and people, fooled.

Meanwhile, Hagid Ofran will continue documenting the illegal building as it continues apace, failed “peace process” or not.

Prediction. The Chrysler commercial using a pitchman from a stereotypical American church in an evangelical setting will go down as one of the most infamous flops of 2010.

BBSNews 2010-07-15 — It’s not unusual that basic facts about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are incorrect in stories throughout the media. Some far more egregious than others.

In this case, it concerns an article entitled “A Whole Bunch of Inconvenient Truths“, written by Larry Gellman over in the World section at Huffington Post.

On Tuesday afternoon I pointed out an error of fact concerning the Goldstone Report to the author, in the comment section:

“Mr. Gellman, on the whole a well balanced article. Although you also exhibited the same tendency you were describing. You write:

“It also didn’t acknowledge the fact that nearby Israeli towns were suffering frequent missile attacks from inside Gaza and that the Israelis had to do something to make it stop.”

This is incorrect, I request that you correct your piece and note the change. See the Goldstone Report at p 31:

“20. Impact on civilians of rocket and mortar attacks by Palestinian armed groups on
southern Israel

…Palestinian armed groups have launched about 8000 rockets and mortars into southern
Israel since 2001…

…The Mission has taken particular note of the high level of psychological trauma suffered
by the civilian population inside Israel…

…The rocket and mortar fire has also adversely impacted on the economic and social life of
the affected communities…

…These acts would constitute war crimes and may amount to crimes against humanity…

Read the entire section. There is much greater detail about the adverse impact of indiscriminate rocket fire in the report in the above cited section and others. From PTSD to education, it is all there. There is simply no room for me to produce the entirely of Goldstone’s coverage here.

Please correct your article to reflect the facts.

See: The Goldstone Report.”

To Mr. Gellman’s credit, the article was mostly a fair point on today’s reporting about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Knee-jerk reactions at the outset of a story often frame the narrative as they did in the case of the Goldstone Report, a report that is being vindicated more and more by the week.

To be fair, Larry Gellman did answer my comment the next day, Wednesday, writing “I stand corrected”.

However, the story has not been corrected yet as of this writing on day three, Thursday.

Sadly, two of the comments that I wrote to Mr. Gellman, pointing out that the story still had not been changed, never saw the light of day due to a HuffPo “moderator” apparently making the decision to simply ignore that the record had not been set straight – this does seem contrary to the spirit of Web logs in the first place; to explore and expose facts not often included by mainstream media…

A sub-story as it were…

Mr. Gellman closed his article thusly:

“At the end of the day, many of us must need villains more than we need hope, real solutions and intellectual honesty.”

Yes, and the fact that an analysis that explores that very issue, yet retains factual errors that have been accepted by the author as incorrect, is indeed “inconvenient” and it really mars the ending of the article.

And it harms the overall effort to come to a realistic and peaceful solution in the region.