THE MASSACRE THAT NEVER WAS

A world that wants to believe the worst about Jews

In 2002 Israel waged a military operation in the West Bank town of Jenin in response to the fact it was used as a launch pad for Palestinian terror attacks against Israeli civilians.

The next day I went into a newsagents in Great Britain. I was a kid just out of university and living in Oxford. As I walked in a middle-aged, middle-class white guy came up to me holding up a copy of leftwing Guardian newspaper. “Look at this” he said to me a complete stranger. “Look at what those bastards in Israel have done.” In big letters it said MASSACRE IN JENIN on the front page. I knew nothing really about Israel at the time but I knew Jewish history and I knew the general rhythm of our hearts which crave peace over conflict. I instinctively urged caution and said we don’t know what actually happened yet. “Of course those bastards did it” he said quite comfortably to a complete stranger before leaving. When I left the shop I phoned up my brother. “Have you seen the paper? It’s saying Israel has massacred people. That can’t be true can it? There’s no way? If they have there’s no way I can support Israel? I can’t believe they would have actually massacred people?” “I get you” he said. “Lets wait and see…”

I waited and I saw. There was no massacre. The British media had almost uniformly adopted the Hamas line distributed to the Western media without any journalistic standards of enquiry. They had happily spread the lie of a massacre to the world. It turned out that 23 Israeli soldiers had also been killed in what was described as a hard battle that lasted 11 days. The majority of those Palestinians killed were armed combatants engaged in this battle. Not only that - the Palestinian leadership who cried “massacre” to English-speaking audiences and which was eagerly lapped up were describing the battle amongst themselves as a great “VICTORY”. It is still regarded by Palestinian militants as an inspiring victory against the Israelis.

How on earth could it have been a victory and a massacre at the same time?

The Guardian eventually offered a feeble article tucked away somewhere that tried to explore how the British media irresponsibly jumped to apportion blame to Israel, but by then it was too late, the lie and the damage had been done and was seared into people’s hearts.

That pompous man in the newsagent taught me a lesson about a phenomenon I have seen played out over and over again - that people are not only willing to believe the worst about the Jews - but they WANT to believe the worst about Jews.

Throughout history, the most outlandish and unsubstantiated slanders against the Jewish people have been able to take hold because people have wanted to believe they are true. Now that Israel exists it is in turn treated as the “Jew of the nations” - with people willing not only to believe the worst about Israel but wanting to believe the worst - and to then broadcast it’s alleged villainy to others.

In 2018, the world screamed massacre and swore blind to indiscriminate killing by a gung-ho IDF after Palestinian terrorists tried to breach Israel’s border behind the shield of a manufactured crowd. The pathetic weeping and crying presented to the world by Palestinians dedicated to bloodshed was that this was a peaceful protest. The world loved the story. They’re hooked on this story. The world gets a righteous thrill from the performative crying of Palestinians and the fairytale depiction of Israelis as big, bad ogres.

Yet a few days later Hamas themselves announced that 50 of the 60 killed during their attempt to breach Israel’s border were not innocent civilians but were active members of the armed terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad - groups whose stated goal is to destroy Israel, to kill every Jew on earth and whose mission that day was to infiltrate Israel under the cover of human shield protesters and “tear out the hearts” of Israeli citizens half a kilometre away. (Quote from Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar).

40,000 people were at the Hamas organised assault on Israel’s border that day.

60 were killed.

50 of those were active members of genocidal antisemitic terror organisations.

That’s 83% of the killed confirmed as being members of terror organisations - by Hamas - not Israeli sources of information.

What does this statistic prove?

It proves that, as with Jenin, everyone who reflexively attacked Israel and accused them of indiscriminate shooting in defence of their border were completely wrong in their characterisation and assessment of the situation and completely irresponsible in their rush to pass unbridled condemnation. It shows they were willing to not just believe the worst, but wanted to believe the worst. If the IDF were firing indiscriminately into a crowd of 40,000 people we would expect those killed to be a completely random cross section of people. But the figures are not random, not in the least bit. The fact that 83% of those killed were Hamas and Islamic Jihad proves there was an attempt to be as considered as possible behind each shot fired by the IDF and that “indiscriminate” shooting of Palestinians is far from what occurred. It proves that there are moral considerations guiding the actions of the IDF when engaged with an enemy that deliberately blurs the boundary between civilian and combatant and who hides behind human shields of women and children.

In the massacre that never was in Jenin 2002, the world’s media regurgitated verbatim the headline pitched to them by the genocidal terror group Hamas because they were willing not only to believe the worst about the world’s only Jewish state - but they wanted to believe the worst. In Gaza 2018, the world’s media, politicians and no end of people online were not only willing to believe the worst about Israel - but they wanted to believe the worst. They have been brainwashed into antisemitism and/or easily nudged into it because of pre-existing anti-Jewish bias.

And it happens over and over. Again and again. Yesterday, today and tomorrow.

This desire to be as uncharitable as possible to the Jewish state is seen most palpably in the refusal to acknowledge the dilemma Israel faces - and the demanding of a solution that doesn’t exist. In 2018 Hamas was always going to get at least part of what they wanted. Either Israel shoots and gives them their “martyrs”, or it lets them get through the border to murder Jewish families. In this situation Israel chose the option any other country would pick - including you and your country.

It’s a government’s primary responsibility to protect it’s citizens and the role of lethal force is a dilemma none of us equivocate over too long when it’s closer to home.

In 2018, Jihadists armed with machetes, firebombs and IEDS tried to infiltrate Israel and kill it’s citizens. They were shot by Israeli security forces. Baulking at the ugly reality of conflict, British people condemned Israel for protecting it’s citizens.

Yet only a year earlier, in 2017, jihadists armed with machetes stalked the streets of Britain with a view to kill British citizens in and around London Bridge. They were shot to death. British people applauded Britain’s security forces for protecting it’s citizens. There was no opining or moralising along the lines of, “Why wasn’t non-lethal force used against these terrorists? Why weren’t they tazered? Why weren’t they restrained in another way?” There was no, “Surely British security services could have used riot control techniques against these jihadists who wanted to stab to death British families?” There was no, “The shooting was disproportionate because the terrorists at London bridge were armed only with knives. There can be no comparison made between people with knives and the full might of the British security services! Shooting those jihadists who wanted to slaughter British citizens was an act of murder!”

There was none of this when Britain was faced with three attackers trying to kill its citizens. Yet hear the cry that comes when the world’s only Jewish State has an entire terror infrastructure on its doorstep and has the audacity to defend itself from untold numbers of jihadists trying to storm their border and murder their families.