The Fading Two State Solution is a New York Times editorial that makes the observation that “even truth telling can ignite a firestorm.” Quite a claim considering the lack of truth-telling in the editorial itself.
The editorial begins by defending U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro’s speech in which he accused Israel of having double standards when administering law and order in the disputed territories.
Palestinians have been victims of assaults and acts of vandalism by Jewish extremists, including an arson attack in July that killed a toddler and his parents in the West Bank village of Duma. None of this is acceptable.
The reality is that in the case of the Duma arson, the security establishment has been pursuing the case with the same sense of urgency and tools that would be used against Palestinian terrorists. Many would argue that the state is using more resources to bring the perpetrators to justice than in other cases.
Yet this is one egregious case of an attack in which the victims are Palestinians. The Times implies that there are more attacks that are comparable to the terrorist attacks in which Jews have been the victims. But the numbers prove this is not the case.
Since 13 September 2015, 29 people have been killed (including a Palestinian, a foreign worker and a U.S. citizen), and 289 people injured in Palestinian terrorist attacks. These attacks include 110 stabbing attacks, 38 shootings, and 22 vehicular (ramming) attacks. During the same period, there have been no stabbing, shooting, or vehicular attacks against Palestinians. This, of course, does not include cases where Palestinians have died in the course of committing these attacks. Is the Times claiming that there is no difference between self-defense and unprovoked attempts at murder?
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Next, the Times editorial board takes a shot at legislation currently before the Knesset.
Here is how the Times describes it:
An odious bill introduced by Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked would require activists to wear badges when they met government officials, and if groups received funds from foreign entities, they would have to declare it on all correspondence.
Actually, the legislation would require all advocacy groups that receive a majority of their funding from foreign governments to publicly acknowledge the source of their funds. The legislation does not currently require the wearing of badges by representatives of these foreign-funded lobbying groups. Only public documents published by these groups would require them to declare which foreign governments have provided their funding. These are basics facts that the Times should have been able to discover and communicate to its readers,
Yet in an editorial that lauds Shapiro for his truth-telling, it is the Times editorial staff that needs to be more accurate.
You can send your objections to the Times Public Editor by emailing [email protected]
