Associated Press Provides Israel with Protective Camouflage

by Michael A. Hoffman II
©2006 RevisionistHistory.org

This morning's Associated Press (AP) report ("Mofaz: Hamas PM Could Be Israeli Target"), on Israeli threats to assassinate the Palestinian Prime Minister-elect, is twenty-four paragraphs long but never once mentions the words "assassinate" or "assassination."

Instead, in line with Israel's own propaganda rule-book, the AP, one of the most staunchly Zionist wire services in the West, describes Israeli assassination by every protective camouflage it can summon, however awkward, terming assassination by the Zionist government, "Israeli pinpont attack."

Israeli assassinations are also called "air strikes," "targeted attacks" and "pinpointed Israeli killings" by the AP.

Western media policy directs that Israeli state murder of Palestinian suspects is seldom to be called assassination, even though similar allegations against Syria in Lebanon, are constantly reported by the western media and the AP in particular, as "assassination" and "murder."

Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, himself a terrorist responsible for numerous massacres of Palestinian civilians, including in Jenin in April of 2002, is allowed by AP to refer to Hamas as a terror organization twice in one paragraph: "...Hamas, a terror organization...presents us with the challenge of having to confront a terror organization..."

And while the Palestinian Hamas party is described by the AP itself in no uncertain terms as possessed of a "violent, anti-Israel ideology," no similar assessment of the violent, anti-Palestinian ideology which prevails in Israel, is offered by the AP.

Finally, the Palestinian civilians killed in the March 6 terror bombing by Israel in Gaza City, including two children, are referred to by the Associated Press as "bystanders," not civilians, a bland euphemism which also conforms to the Israeli government's guidelines on how its actions are to be reported in the media.

In a majority of recent Associated Press stories, Israel's murder of Palestinians suspected of engaging in armed resistance against Zionist occupation is not called assassination; and the victims of Israeli terror bombings ("air strikes"), including children, are not described as civilians.

Why these dainty euphemisms on the part of the Associated Press when describing Israeli depredations? The protection of Israel's image is priority number one with the Associated Press. The AP does not want future historians to research AP dispatches on Israeli actions and find any significant citation of Palestinian "civilians" killed or leaders "assassinated."

Terrorists kill civilians and conduct assassinations. Israelis, by definition, are not and cannot be terrorists. The record must not be allowed to contradict the image.

[Hoffman is a former reporter for the New York bureau of the Associated Press]

MOFAZ: HAMAS PM COULD BE ISRAELI TARGET
by Amy Teibel | Associated Press Writer
4:10 AM PST, March 7, 2006
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/wire/ats-ap_top10mar07,0,2013629,print.story

JERUSALEM — Israel's acting prime minister vowed on Tuesday that his Kadima Party would shave billions off settlement spending, while his defense minister advised the incoming Palestinian prime minister to fear for his life if Hamas militants start attacking Israel again.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's comments marked the first time he said explicitly he would scale back funding for Israel's 40-year-old settlement enterprise, which has cost the state tens of billions of dollars.

Polls show Kadima significantly outstripping rivals in Israel's March 28 elections.

Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz's warning to Hamas, recently elected to rule the Palestinian Authority, was the first to identify Hamas' prime minister-designate, Ismail Haniyeh, as a potential target for an Israeli pinpoint attack.

"No one is immune," Mofaz told Army Radio, a day after an Israeli air strike on an ice cream truck killed two Islamic Jihad militants and three bystanders in Gaza City. Two of those killed were children, ages eight and 14.

Olmert, in a speech in Tel Aviv, said "billions" in settlement spending would be diverted to Jerusalem and to the Negev Desert and Galilee, underdeveloped areas in southern and northern Israel.

"It's no secret that we won't invest in coming years the same sums we once invested in construction and infrastructure development in areas over the Green Line," Olmert said, referring to Israel's frontier before the 1967 Mideast War.

Olmert took over from Ariel Sharon after the Israeli prime minister suffered a stroke Jan. 4. Olmert spoke just days after his main security adviser, Avi Dichter, said Kadima plans more unilateral withdrawals in the West Bank and hopes to draw its final border within four years.

Kadima, formed by Sharon in November to push ahead territorial pullbacks, has been slipping in the polls, and the recent policy disclosures were seen as an attempt to shore up support. Reducing Israel's presence in the West Bank after its summer pullout from the Gaza Strip is the key plank in Kadima's platform, and the party's main appeal to voters.

Settler leaders said Israel should invest more money in the settlements, not less.

"For the state of Israel to survive and exist, it has to deepen its presence and invest more in the settlements," said Noam Arnon, a spokesman for the small Jewish community in the West Bank city of Hebron.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat urged Israel to resume negotiations on a final peace deal immediately after the Israeli election.

"If they withdraw from the West Bank, and if we have the two-state solution, we can devote so many of the resources that now go to war and conflict, to reconciliation and peace," Erekat said.

Negotiations broke down years ago, and did not receive the hoped-for momentum from the Gaza withdrawal.

Prospects for renewing talks grew even dimmer after Hamas militants sworn to Israel's destruction won January parliamentary elections, reducing the maneuvering power of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who was elected separately last year and favors a negotiated accord.

Hamas, which is in the process of forming a Cabinet, has rejected international calls to renounce its violent, anti-Israel ideology, but has maintained a year-old moratorium on suicide bombings.

On Tuesday, Mofaz warned that Hamas leaders, including the incoming prime minister, Haniyeh, could be targets of pinpointed Israeli killings.

Israel's policy of targeted killings has proven effective, and will continue, the defense minister said.

"There is no question about its efficacy," Mofaz said. "Look what happened to Hamas in the years it conducted an untrammeled suicide bombing war against us. When we started the targeted killings, the situation changed, he said, referring to Hamas' suspension of attacks.

Asked if Haniyeh would be a target if Hamas were to resume attacks, Mofaz replied: "If Hamas, a terror organization that doesn't recognize agreements with us and isn't willing to renounce violence, presents us with the challenge of having to confront a terror organization, then no one there will be immune. Not just Ismail Haniyeh. No one will be immune."

Haniyeh brushed aside Mofaz' warnings, and accused Israel of trying to disrupt the formation of a Hamas-led government. "The continued escalation aims to shed more Palestinian blood, confuse the situation and hamper ... the formation of the Palestinian government," he told The Associated Press at the Palestinian parliament.

Hamas headed into a domestic confrontation on Monday by voting to strip Abbas of powers his then-ruling Fatah Party granted him in its last session.

Fatah delegates walked out of parliament in protest, charging that Hamas was twisting the rules. On Tuesday, they boycotted the parliamentary session, and filed suit in the Palestinian Supreme Court to overturn Hamas' action.

The conflict between the two parties has been simmering since Hamas swept Fatah out of office in January.

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