Friends Like These

Tom Gross wonders why the BBC’s Gaza offices were spared the Palestinian frenzy of kidnapping and looting after Israel’s raid on the Jericho prison:

In their usual intimidatory way, they also targeted journalists, briefly seizing two French reporters and a South Korean one. Armed gunmen also raided the offices of the German TV station ARD, shooting in the air. But what is interesting is that the BBC is housed in the same building as ARD in Gaza, and yet the Palestinian militant groups – who are much better organized and more sophisticated in their choice of targets than some in the media would have us believe – deliberately did not enter the BBC offices.

It seems that even on a day of widespread attacks on western targets in Gaza and the West Bank, the Palestinian gunmen know who their friends are.