Misreporting Hebron shooting incites ignorance and hate

It’s the case of the year that is politically dividing Israel. Two Palestinian terrorists had stabbed two IDF soldiers in Hebron last March.  One terrorist had been killed. The other, Abdel Fattah al-Sharif, was shot by IDF combat medic Sgt. Elor Azaria. Azaria was convicted of manslaughter for shooting the terrorist who was lying on the ground, moving, his knife within reach, amid fears that al-Sharif had hidden a bomb under his bulky jacket.

Israeli citizens are divided over whether Azaria should be pardoned for his crime, with 67% disagreeing with the court’s decision and only 19% against a pardon, according to a Channel 2 News poll. Polls vary, but many say that there was enough perceived threat for the shooting to be justified, considering the suspicious and violent events leading up to the shooting. Moreover, we will never know what truly went through Azaria’s mind, but much of the international media believes they know exactly what happened—while conveniently leaving out important details in order to promote their anti-Israel narrative. Indeed, the foreign-funded anti-Israel NGO B’Tselem’s video of the event was instrumental in the conviction. “Carefully selected camera angles and video editing of the incident by Arab members of NGOs at the scene at the time, released instantly to the media, practically became judge and jury with accusations of ‘cold blooded murder’ against the young soldier within hours,” wrote Hana Levi Julian in the Jewish Press.

{mosads}Sky News, The Telegraph, Al Jazeera, NPR, ABC and AP, and The Independent reported in its headlines that Azaria was convicted of killing a “wounded” or “injured” Palestinian, without mentioning that the Palestinian was wounded while he was attempting a murder. While they are quick to assume Azaria’s intentions, they leave out the fact that witnesses reportedly warned Azaria that the terrorist was carrying explosives.

In the Al Jazeera article, the fact that al-Sharif was in the process of stabbing a soldier when he was wounded was completely left out of the report.

Similarly, NBC, BBC, International Business Times, and the Financial Times headlines left out a description of the man entirely, saying that Azaria simply killed “a Palestinian,” as if he happened on him and shot him out of nowhere. By omitting any reference to the attack that led to shooting, the headline implies that an Israeli soldier shot a peaceful Palestinian for no apparent reason.

This kind of biased reporting is systemic, often propagated by the same offenders. Portraying the Palestinians as David and Israel as Goliath, the international media promotes its anti-Israel agenda with easily digestible narratives such as referring to a knife-wielding Palestinian terrorist as a “wounded person” or just “a person” rather than an attacker or terrorist.

The grave reality about dishonest reporting is that it never ends at dishonest reporting. Anti-Israel bias legitimizes anti-Semitism and foments anti-Israel hate. Such is clearly visible in the comments sections of these articles. In the aforementioned Al Jazeera article, pro-Nazi commentators make Holocaust jokes and call Jews “inbreeding winged Hebrew monkeys” in addition to various unmentionable expletives mocking Israelis and Jews. Zionists are blamed for “starting all wars” and some commentators exhort other readers to rid the world of Zionists entirely. By no coincidence, that is exactly what al-Sharif was trying to do.

Eliana Rudee is a Jerusalem based fellow with the news and public policy group Haym Salomon Center. Her bylines have been featured in USA Today, New York Daily News, Forbes, and The Hill.