Syrian Warplanes Bomb Palestinian Refugee Camp
December 17, 2012 6:06 by Pesach Benson
Everything you need to know about today’s coverage of Israel and the Mideast. Join the Israel Daily News Stream on Facebook.
Today’s Top Stories
1. Two separate Palestinian polls don’t bode well for peace prospects. In the first, conducted by Arab World Research and Development (AWRAD), 88 percent of the Palestinians said they believe armed resistance is the best way to achieve independence. The second poll, from the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) found that if elections were held today, Ismail Haniyeh would easily beat Mahmoud Abbas.
Elliott Abrams‘ response to the polls hits the nail on the head:
But the most striking number is that the vast majority of Palestinians support Hamas’s “armed struggle,” which is to say terrorism. The only good news here is that Hamas as an organization has not won the “hearts and minds” of a majority of Gazans during its five years of misrule. The very bad news is that it has apparently persuaded Palestinians that “armed struggle” is the way forward.
2. Reuters: Syrian warplanes bomb Yarmouk refugee camp; 25 Palestinians killed. Later in the day, Reuters/Maan News reported Syrian army forces massing outside the camp. The NY Times says the attack caused many pro-gov’t Palestinian fighters to switch allegiances, adding:
For many Yarmouk residents — refugees from conflict with Israel and their descendants — the attacks shattered what was left of the Syrian government’s claim to be a champion and protector of Palestinians, a position the Assad family relied upon as a source of domestic and international legitimacy in more than 40 years of iron-fisted rule.
But the story’s not so simple. Alex Thomson of UK Channel 4 tweeted from Syria:
3. Ankara’s playing dirty, using Turkey’s Jewish community for leverage on Israel. The Times of Israel explains how:
Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization (MIT) has launched an investigation of at least five Turkish citizens it believes collaborated with Israel in the 2010 takeover of the Gaza-bound ship Mavi Marmara, according to Turkish media reports.
MIT believes the suspects either assisted the Israeli troops who boarded the vessel or later took part in the interrogation of the ship’s activists in Israel, the Turkish daily Yeni Safak reported on Friday . . .
Rafael Sadi, spokesperson for the Association of Turkish Immigrants in Israel, told Maariv that the Turkish authorities “are trying to intimidate the Jews” as well as to send Israel the message that if Turkish demands are not met, the Turkish Jewish community is liable to suffer the consequences.
4. HonestReporting readers broke with tradition for the 2012 Dishonest Reporting Awards. See our roundup of the year’s most skewed and biased coverage.
Israel and the Palestinians
• The NY Times corrected the record on E1 development, confirming that plans wouldn’t really destroy the contiguity of a Palestinian state. Despite the hype, E1 doesn’t cut West Bank in two.
• PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad calls for economic boycott of all Israeli products — not just ones from settlements. The Jerusalem Post writes:
He said his call for a total boycott of Israeli products came also in response to the Israeli government’s decision to withhold tax revenues belonging to the PA.
• Australian blowback against The Age cartoonist Michael Leunig’s recent poison pen continues. Commenting in The Age, Nick Dyrenfurth comments:
But criticisms can be made without resorting to Nazi comparisons. Such analogies are intellectually lazy, deliberately cruel and counter-productive attempts to simplify a complex political situation. Often they are anti-Semitic.
Dyrenfurth’s criticisms are especially noteworthy because he has expertise in political cartooning having contributed to this scholarly eBook on the topic.
m
9:23 pm
Dec 17, 2012
Not to sound too harsh but any Jews stupid enough to want to remain in ANY islamic shit hole, deserve what they get.
Typical of islamic cowards in turkey (gobble gobble) to threaten a tiny and powerless community.
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Lou VanDelman
9:33 pm
Dec 17, 2012
I wonder how long it is going to take for the world to condem Israel in the bombing of the Palestinian refugee camp in Syria.
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Michael Podgoetsky
10:49 pm
Dec 17, 2012
Israel did not do it! But I see what you mean, not long
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Henry Federman
12:00 am
Dec 18, 2012
If the “Palestinians ” want to boycott all Israeli products let them start by giving up their cellphones,computer software,medical advances,medicines and all the benefices they get from Israel water,power sources,close all hospitals and refuse to help them,then you will see who gives up first. I know that this might be a little harsh but unfortunately war is war no matter what. It seems that what they want to get,without actual fighting. Let them cry uncle,no matter who their uncle is. Be it the Saudis,the Iranians or the miserable UN.
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emes
1:10 am
Dec 18, 2012
Why is it that the turks are so incensed with what Jews and Israelis do to survive? – they can talk! – in the 1550′s they were party with christians in making slaves of Jews for ransom – taking them off ships, and selling them to the highest bidder if they were wealthy, if they were not they were beaten and tortured, often lashed to death. The business of selling slaves went on for 300 years within the confines of a Maltese slave-prison where, strangely, there were also some Turks imprisoned, as well as Jews and Moors. Napoleon ended the trade.There was a collaboration between Jews and Turks by Jews helping to take Malta during the great siege of 1565 then the Reformation intervened.
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M.Otero
3:43 am
Dec 18, 2012
While traveling across Turkey in 1919, my aunt’s train was stopped several times and people were grabbed and hanged along the way. I saw her photos of this.
The press spoke well of Turks as our allies in the Korean war because they were so savagely brutal.
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Andrew
6:30 am
Dec 18, 2012
i am curious, when did citizens of Turkey become Palestinians, or am I to understand that the whole Middle East has suddenly become Palestine, the only border I really thought was so named, was the old line of Philistia.
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emes
8:10 pm
Dec 18, 2012
All of these blood-sucking countries have decided to become “palestinians” ever since Jews re-built Israel to its present day magnificence. When arabs had this land during our incarceration, for two thousand years they left it to rot into a shit pile and ever since the Balfour Declaration and subsequent AUTHORISED decision to let Jews return thus booting out the British, is when life returned to Israel now everyone else wants a piece. – Did they help rebuild it, no! Are enemies of Jews trying again to destroy the place yes! – Are they trying to eliminate Israelis, and international Jews? Of course,but this time Israel shall be defended till the last bullet used from the last remaining Jew.
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Andrew
6:37 am
Dec 18, 2012
Also, when did Syria become Palestine, I am soooo confused now
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hfiers
7:17 am
Dec 18, 2012
The Palestinian polls indicate a trend started by Yasar Arafat to slowly take apart Israel. The latest phase is to build upon the Hamas charter and Fatah ideology of eliminating Israel. Now the media must present the views of most Palestinians in their quest through “armed resistance.” Shame on them. Where is the indicated belief in the Koran of “peace?” The expansion of LEGAL settlements, the so-called VICTORY proclaimed by Hamas, and the recent statements made by ALL Palestinian leaders should put Israeli politcos on guard for yet another reality yet to come. Democracy and fortitude to do the right things are on Israel’s side.
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Syrian Warplanes Bomb Palestinian Refugee Camp | Blogs about Israel aggregation
11:59 am
Dec 18, 2012
[...] Continued on Page 2 [...]
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Channah
12:05 pm
Dec 18, 2012
I would hope that Honest Reporting would do something more than the other news sources and dig a little deeper into some of the stories. While the poll results may be true- or not – the fact that they in part disagree with other previous polls raises more questions. PSR also reported on polls that showed around 40% of “Palestinians” polled would prefer Jewish Israeli sovereignty to Arab sovereignty. There’ve been reports that 70,000 Arabs have moved into areas of Jerusalem that will be under Israel if any final status talks are ever held, G-d forbid. Also, we’re told that Pals don’t answer polls honestly out of fear, so they give the PC answers. So really, we don’t know how Pals think.
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