A news story from the Middle East in which the victims are Israelis has made the news.
This relatively rare occurrence has arisen because a terrorist shot up a Jewish school, thereby making it nearly impossible for the incident to be ignored, despite its victims being Jews.
Ordinarily, only the Israeli response to an attack, and not the attack that prompted it, makes the news, but this was too big a deal for even the inexplicably-pro-Palestinian press to ignore.
They have nevertheless found subtle ways to advance their agenda.
For instance, the headline on the Associated Press wire story on Thursday was �Gunman infiltrates Jewish seminary in Jerusalem, at least 8 killed.�
By comparison, an earlier story from the region notes that �Israeli forces clashed with militants in Gaza; infant killed.�
So, Palestinian terrorists are �gunmen� and �militants� while the Israelis are the much more imposing-sounding �forces.� And the terrorists �infiltrate,� while the Israelis �clash.�
The Palestinian infant was killed, we learn later in the story, accidentally, by somebody�s ricocheting bullet. The eight Jewish students, on the other hand, were intentionally murdered. Yet, in these headlines, similar motivation is implied by omission.
The AP story describes how the murderer entered the library of a rabbinical seminary and opened fire on students, killing eight and wounding nine, before being killed.
The story also notes that Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip praised the massacre, and about 7,000 Gazans marched in the streets, handing out sweets to moving cars, as militants fired mortars into the air to celebrate the murder of unarmed, unsuspecting students. I cannot even imagine reading about Israelis celebrating the deaths of innocent people, under any circumstances.
This was the second act of violence by Palestinians against Jews that day, the story says, the first being a deadly ambush of an army patrol. The Palestinians were so tickled they couldn�t pass out candy fast enough.
Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev reportedly said, �It is clear that those people celebrating this bloodshed have shown themselves to be not only the enemies of Israel but of all of humanity.�
You�d think so, wouldn�t you? But that rarely seems to be borne out by most world reaction. By next week, the UN Human Rights Council will no doubt have found a way to condemn Israel for this.
It turns out the killer came from east Jerusalem, where Palestinians have Israeli ID cards and can travel freely inside Israel. By rights, that policy should come under review, now that that freedom has been used to kill Israelis. If it is, however, Israel will almost certainly be accused of collective punishment and over-reacting.
Unlike the typical AP article when Israelis are the victims, this one actually describes what happened to the students in some detail.
�The whole building looked like a slaughterhouse. The floor was covered in blood. The floors are littered with holy books covered in blood,” said the head of a rescue service.
Witnesses described a terrifying scene, with students jumping out windows to escape the shooting, according to the story.
Hamas reportedly “blessed the operation,” and promised more at mosques in Gaza, and many residents said prayers of thanksgiving, �only performed in cases of great victory to thank God,� the story said.
Great victory, massacring innocent students.
This, the story said, was the first major attack by Palestinian militants on the Jewish side of Jerusalem in four years, although police and the military claimed to have foiled many attempts.
Between 2001 and 2004, Jerusalem was a frequent target of Palestinian attacks, including suicide bombings on buses. Israel recently announced it’s testing a bomb-proof bus.
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