The Guardian‘s coverage of Israeli airstrikes against Iranian military targets in Syria includes some disturbing text:
Although the threat of direct confrontation between Israel and Iran has long simmered in Syria – where the Iranian military built a presence early in the civil war to help Bashar al-Assad – the most recent flare-up has come at a potentially dangerous moment.
On the Israeli side the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has long directed bellicose rhetoric towards Iran, is facing the threat of indictment – perhaps as early as February – over corruption allegations, as well as elections in April.
Is correspondent Peter Beaumont suggesting that that Netanyahu deliberately contributed to this “potentially dangerous moment”? Is Beaumont implying that the prime minister orchestrated an escalation to divert attention from his legal woes?
That’s not journalism.
That’s a conspiracy theory.
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Netanyahu’s ‘bellicose rhetoric’
For Beaumont, it is Netanyahu “who has long directed bellicose rhetoric towards Iran,” painting Israel as the aggressor. According to Beaumont, Iranian forces are in Syria simply “to help Bashar al-Assad.”
Only hours after the Israeli airstrikes, Iran’s air force chief Brig. Gen. Aziz Nasirzadeh said:
We’re ready for the decisive war that will bring about Israel’s disappearance from the earth. Our young airmen are prepared for the day when Israel will be destroyed.
Could the threat be any clearer? Readers, however, only get to hear about this in the final paragraph of Beaumont’s report.
Iranian threats against Israel
And this follows consistent existential threats from the Iranians. For example:
- In April 2018, the head of the Iranian army said Iranian forces were working to “annihilate” Israel and predicted they would achieve success within 25 years. “The Army will move hand in hand with the IRGC so that the arrogant system will collapse and the Zionist regime will be annihilated,” General Moussavi said, refering to the Revolutionary Guards.
- In November, 2014, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei tweeted his “nine-point plan” for Israel’s destruction.
- In June 2018, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said: “Our stance against Israel is the same stance we have always taken,” tweeting “#Israel is a malignant cancerous tumor in the West Asian region that has to be removed and eradicated: it is possible and it will happen.”
Our stance against Israel is the same stance we have always taken. #Israel is a malignant cancerous tumor in the West Asian region that has to be removed and eradicated: it is possible and it will happen. 7/31/91#GreatReturnMarch
— Khamenei.ir (@khamenei_ir) June 3, 2018
Granted, in August 2018, Netanyahu said during a visit to the Dimona nuclear reactor:
“Those who threaten to wipe us out, put themselves in a similar danger, and in any event will not achieve their goal,” adding, “our enemies know very well what Israel is capable of, they know our policy, and anyone who tries to harm us—we will harm them.”
Unlike the Iranian regime, Israel has no desire to destroy an entire country and its people. To claim that Netanyahu has engaged in “bellicose rhetoric towards Iran” while downplaying the actual genocidal Iranian threats towards Israel or drawing a moral equivalence with Israeli comments beggars belief.
But then, Beaumont never bothers to ask what the purpose of the Iranian entrenchment in Syria is for and never spells out that Iran, beyond backing Assad in the civil war, is attempting to pose a direct military threat to Israel on its borders.
Iran, you seem to be lost. Here: pic.twitter.com/ByrDyUjWDr
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) January 21, 2019
As far as The Guardian is concerned, Israel is the aggressor, carrying out airstrikes for the personal benefit of the prime minister — against Iranians who just happened to be in the neighborhood on unrelated business.
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