LA Times headline, October 10, 2015. (Screenshot)
Despite dozens of stabbing attacks against Israelis, western media outlets refuse to acknowledge the culpability of Palestinian terrorists. Instead, leading news outlets frame each terrorist attack as Israeli security forces shooting Palestinians while Israelis are killed by unnamed assailants.
After an October 3 stabbing attack resulted in the deaths of two Israelis, the BBC and the Washington Post ran misleading headlines implying that Israeli forces killed a random Palestinian rather than a Palestinian terrorist responsible for the murders. “Palestinian shot dead after Jerusalem attack kills two,” said the BBC, while the Washington Post stated, “Palestinian is killed after fatal attack.” Qatari-based Al Jazeera similarly phrased a Twitter tweet as, “Palestinian shot dead after fatal stabbing in Jerusalem; 2 Israeli victims also killed.”
On October 7, the Huffington Post ran a smear piece against the IDF’s Duvdevan Unit, which infiltrated a group of Palestinian rioters in order to break up the mob and reduce violence. The article was titled, “Undercover Gunmen Open Fire At Palestinian Stone-Throwers,” and strongly implied that that the IDF soldiers were responsible for inciting the stone-throwing despite weeks of such attacks.
(Screenshot)
The UK’s Daily Mail told its readers, “Amateur footage shows Palestinian woman executed in Afula” in reporting on an October 9 terrorist attack in which an Arab-Israeli woman from Nazareth attempted to stab an IDF soldier at a bus station in Afula. She was stopped when police officers shot her, and was evacuated to the hospital in moderate condition. The amateur footage in question clearly shows that she was not killed, leading the Daily Mail to change “executed” to “shot,” but otherwise leave the headline intact.
On October 10, the Los Angeles Times told its readers, “Four Palestinian teens are killed in Israeli violence.” Two of those teenagers carried out a stabbing attack in Jerusalem, leaving a 13-year-old boy and a 25-year-old man in critical condition. The other two were participating in a violent demonstration in Gaza. Yet the newspaper says that it was the Israelis who were acting violently.
False equivalence has also been on display in the media. CNN lamented the “wave of violence between Israelis and Palestinians” in an October 9 article. The Associated Press carried a timeline of “the latest developments in ongoing tensions between Palestinians and Israelis.”
