On July 22, Yahoo News published a piece by Christian Science Monitor correspondent Natasha Khullar Relph, titled They’ve faced brutal cops abroad. Now they’re advising US protesters that equated the ‘violent’ tactics used by Israeli security forces to those of some of the world’s most authoritarian regimes.
As cities across the United States erupted with protesters demonstrating against the killings of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd and demanding an end to police brutality, on the internet, Twitter was erupting, too: with advice.
And who was this advice coming from? Relph continues:
From the identification of weapons to protecting one’s self when shot at, users from the Palestinian territories, Kashmir, Chile, and Hong Kong, gave advice on each and every aspect of demonstrating against brutal police states”
Totally missing from this piece is any sense of context. Relph’s article draws no distinction between Israel’s unique security situation, and the country’s methods for addressing these challenges, and those of such notorious human rights offenders as China. This is much more than a simple falsehood: it’s an old antisemitic trope.
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Putting Israel in very bad company
Relph’s piece offers no proof, eyewitness or otherwise, to buttress her assertion that Israel is among a rogue’s gallery of nations, employing police brutality to quash peaceful acts of civil disobedience. The closest this article gets to actual data-driven evidence is this quote from the US nongovernmental organization Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), which claims that law enforcement around the world is increasingly responding to popular protests with crowd-control weapons (CCWs):
The proliferation of CCWs without adequate regulation, training, monitoring and/or accountability, has led to the widespread and routine use or misuse of these weapons, resulting in injury, disability, and death.
This analysis is akin to asserting that cars can kill people. While technically correct, vehicles driven by people under the influence of drugs or alcohol are much more likely to be involved in fatal car crashes.
Facts do matter, but context is equally as important when reporting on the news of the world. By glossing over the terror tactics that have been employed by Palestinians against Israel, this piece portrays the response of Israeli law enforcement to these acts as a human rights violation.
Peaceful Palestinian protesters or terrorists?
Relph cites Rana Nazzal for background on how Israel deals with Palestinian protests, and how Palestinians manage to ‘stay safe’ when their protests are being violently broken up:
In Palestine, we usually keep [protester identities and knowledge of weaponry] under wraps… I’ve still never touched a weapon; I don’t know that much about them. But now I can identify by looking or hearing the sound. It was one of the things that took me the longest to learn and when I did, it was life-changing.”
The image that Relph portrays, via Nazzal, is one of peaceful Palestinian protesters who aren’t even familiar with weaponry. In other words, Israeli security forces are using maximum force when little more than gentle persuasion is apparently required.
Related reading: Debunking the ‘Disproportionate Force’ Charge
Here are a few questions that a diligent journalist would have asked Nazzal about her experiences as a Palestinian protester:
- When and where did these protests take place?
- While Nazzal has never touched a weapon, did she happen to notice any of her fellow protesters hurling rocks, or Molotov cocktails? How about explosive balloons?
- Who organized these protests?
Hamas is legitimate, so why resist it?
Had the writer performed even a cursory background check into Rana Nazzal, she would have quickly found out that this alleged expert on peaceful Palestinian resistance views the tactics of an internationally recognized terrorist organization, Hamas, as a ‘legitimate’ form of resistance.
This is the same group that has been orchestrating violent attempts by masses of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip – civilians and operatives – to sabotage and destroy Israel’s defensive security infrastructure along its border with Gaza, penetrate Israel’s territory, harm Israeli security forces, and overrun Israeli civilian areas and harm Israeli civilians.
Related reading: Coronavirus Exposes Hamas Disregard for Gaza Human Rights
And while the piece portrays Palestinian resistance to Israel as civilian in nature, it isn’t. Hamas has organized, led, and supported the border events logistically and financially. Hamas operatives are amongst the crowds, and carry out attacks and incite the crowd to try and breach the border. Specifically, the Gaza border events have involved shootings, grenades, firebombs, improvised explosive devices, and other weapons. Mines and booby-traps have been placed on the border to be detonated on IDF patrols. These weapons reach IDF forces, military infrastructure and the civilian communities across the border.
Yet despite this massive security problem on its border, Israel continues to exercise extraordinary restraint. A report by the High Level Military Group (HLMG) found that:
As in their reactions to previous bouts of violence, the IDF have adopted a graduated response. They airdropped thousands of leaflets and used SMS, social media, phone calls and radio broadcasts to warn the people of Gaza not to gather at the border or approach
the fence. They contacted Gaza bus company owners and asked them not to transport people to the border. When these appeals were nullified by Hamas coercion against the civilian population the IDF used tear gas to disperse the crowds that approached the fence. In an innovative effort to increase precision and effectiveness they sometimes used drones to deliver the teargas. Next, IDF forces used warning shots, fired overhead. Finally, only where absolutely necessary, ball ammunition was used, aimed to disable rather than kill. Although in some cases, shooting to kill would have been lawful, the IDF maintain that even then, they still only fired shots to disable.
Related reading: Flawed BBC Documentary Proves Israeli Narrative Right
Police brutality, as defined by Hamas
Over the last few months, protests for racial justice have taken place in the United States, Israel, and many other countries around the world. By drawing a false equivalence between Israel’s uniquely complex security situation, and the anti-democratic crackdowns taking place in other countries, this piece is keeping crucial facts and context from Yahoo News readers.
People seeking to learn how Israel copes with frequent security issues are being told, effectively, that there’s no difference, morally or otherwise, between democratic forms of government and authoritarian regimes. This narrative is most suitable for the websites of Hamas, the BDS Movement, and other extremist organizations. It’s most inappropriate for Yahoo News or the Christian Science Monitor.
Journalists have a responsibility to practice due diligence when researching a story. This call to journalistic ethics isn’t only about better practices: all too often, falsehoods and exaggerations lead to hatred that starts online, but doesn’t stay online.
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Featured image: megaphone icon via flaticon; police badge icon via flaticon
