JUNE 6, 2011 16:12 BY SIMON PLOSKER
Once again a flood of headlines present Israel as an aggressor responsible for the deaths of dozens of unarmed civilians. Was this really a peaceful protest or another Syrian-engineered attempt to breach Israel’s border? Where did the media get it right and where did it go wrong?
Syrian Media: A Credible Source?
For many weeks, Syrian state controlled media (and it is all state controlled) has failed to report on President Bashar Assad’s brutal and murderous assault his own citizens’ peaceful protests against the Syrian regime."...
And yet, the Times follows this ambiguous paragraph about the death toll with a declaration: “Even so, it was the worst bloodshed in the Golan Heights since Israel and Syria fought a war there in 1973.” How does the Times know this? How does the Times know how many people died? The only source for the death toll is the Assad regime’s propaganda apparatus.
Protestors or Infiltrators?
Events on the Golan played out in similar fashion to the events of the so-called Naqba Day one month previously as did the press coverage. Many headlines referred to Israel opening fire on “protestors”. But this was not your run of the mill protests, nor was it peaceful. This was an attempt to breach Israel’s borders in a hostile act.
Source: HonestReporting.com
The entire article is linked above:
HonestResporting.com continues:
State ‘journalists’ appeared to have recovered their ability to count bodies stating at least twenty had been killed
While the world watches the pictures from the Golan, it will be distracted from the bigger story, Syria’s slaughter of its own people and the gradual demise of the Assad regime.
What Really Happened?
After investigating the incident, the IDF believes that many of the Syrian rioters were responsible for their own deaths by igniting mine fields on the border. YNet News reports:
Responding to Sunday’s violence, IDF sources said the protesters who ignited minefields on ‘Naksa Day’ did not bring fire extinguishers with them and thus posed a danger to themselves and others by behaving irresponsibly. Others threw firebombs near Quneitra crossing to the same effect, they said.
....
Honest Reporting Concludes:
The sources are also assuming that many protesters were hurt or killed as a result of the Red Cross’s inability to reach them, due to protesters’ refusal to cease violence in order to allow for medical evacuations.IDF officials say commanders ordered three ceasefires, each of which were taken advantage of by the protesters in order to gain ground.Whatever the real story behind what occurred on the Israeli-Syrian border, once again Israel finds itself damaged by a media that rushed to produce sensationalist headlines based on the less than credible propaganda organ of a brutal dictatorship with no regard for its own people let alone the Palestinian pawns in its war on Israel.
Send your considered comments to the following media outlets:
- The New York Times – letters@nytimes.com
- Time Magazine – letters@time.com
- Daily Telegraph – dtletters@telegraph.co.uk
- The Times of London – letters@thetimes.co.uk
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