.@UNRWA press release: Palestinians are "killed." Israelis "die."

UNRWA issued a press release against a planned demolition of a home where a terrorist lived.

Look at the wording they use:

The demolition orders were given for stabbing attacks perpetrated by individual members of the families outside Jaffa gate, Jerusalem Old City on 23 December 2015. Two Israeli civilians died during the attack while a third civilian was seriously wounded. The perpetrators were shot dead by Israeli Security Forces.

Israelis just happen to die by coincidence when they are involved, somehow, in stabbing attacks. But Palestinians who are involved in those same attacks are "shot dead."

The United Nations has repeatedly condemned all attacks against Israeli or Palestinian civilians, including in statements by Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon.

This seems to imply that the stabbers were civilians who were "shot dead" by Israel. The only other interpretation is that UNRWA is trying to minimize the targeting and stabbing of Israeli civilians by saying, hey, both sides have people dying. The UN simply cannot condemn an attack on Jews without watering it down.

 On 16 November 2015, during a punitive demolition in the same refugee camp, 19 Palestine refugees were displaced and 46 persons were affected. Two Palestine refugees were also killed during the clashes that erupted during the operation.

Again, Palestinians who are in the act of throwing rocks are "killed" but Israelis who are stabbed simply "die" during attacks. The passive voice is used to minimize Jewish deaths and Palestinian responsibility while the active voice is used to emphasize Palestinian deaths as well as Israeli culpability.

This is not an isolated incident, either. From an UNRWA report in 2002:

Following the killing by Israeli forces of a leading Palestinian militant on 14 January in Tulkarm, another wave of violence began. Six Israelis died in a suicide attack in Hadera on 17 January, and Israel responded the next day with air attacks against Tulkarm. One Palestinian was killed and 60 were reported injured in the raids.

The writers of UNRWA press releases don't do this with malicious intent. They try very hard to ensure that they are seen to be even-handed. But the wording betrays their subconscious bias that Israeli terror victims are somehow culpable for their own deaths while Palestinians are wantonly killed for no reason.

Deep down, they are against the very existence of Israel and they regard the Jewish residents of the land as invaders who do not belong. UNRWA teaches this to generations of students. They try to stifle their true feelings when writing press releases and speaking to the media, but they cannot stop their subconscious feelings. 

---

---

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Read More

UNRWA releases, and buries, report on Lebanese Palestinian poverty

UNRWA  together with the American University of Beirut released a 240 page report on the situation of Palestinians in Lebanon, both the population that has been there since 1948 and the more recent refugees from Syria.

While it correctly mentions the institutionalized discrimination against them, it obscures one important point:

More than 67 years after their initial presence in Lebanon, Palestine refugees are still considered as foreigners under Lebanese law, which does not grant them any special legal status and deprives them from basic rights enjoyed by the Lebanese. This prolonged foreigner status mainly stems from the strong rejection by the Lebanese authorities of the naturalization of Palestine refugees, which is sometimes used as justification for the various discriminatory policies against them. On a political level, Palestine refugees have also opposed naturalization. Accordingly, despite their longstanding presence in the country as refugees, PRL remain excluded from key aspects of social, political, and economic life. They face legal and institutional discrimination; they are denied the right to own property and face restrictive employment measures such as a ban from some liberal and syndicate professions. 

Palestine refugees in Lebanon (PRL) face one of the worst socioeconomic conditions in the region, and these have been deteriorating given the country’s weakening socioeconomic situation and the prolonged Syria crisis. A little short of two thirds of the PRL population is poor, a proportion that has not changed since 2010, and the discriminatory laws against them hinder their ability to improve their living conditions and livelihoods. Decaying infrastructure, a dearth of recreational spaces, insufficient access to roads, deteriorated water and sewage treatment systems, contaminated water, and jerry-rigged electrical wires along with open drainage ditches paint a gloomy picture of camps where over 63 per cent of PRL reside. 

UNRWA is not being entirely truthful when it says "On a political level, Palestine refugees have also opposed naturalization." Yes, self-appointed leaders keep saying that they don't want to become citizens in order to keep the dream of destroying Israel through "return" alive, but in reality Palestinians in Lebanon are clamoring to become citizens and whenever a loophole opens up, tens of thousands of them apply.

The report also admits that UNRWA inflates the figures of "refugees" in Lebanon, keeping hundreds of thousands on its rolls who no longer live in Lebanon:

Some 495,985 Palestine refugees are registered with UNRWA in Lebanon.58 However, it is estimated that the actual number of Palestine refugees who still reside in the country ranges between 260,000 and 280,000 following the results of the 2010 socioeconomic survey conducted jointly by UNRWA and AUB.

UNRWA has no mechanism to remove people from its list of "refugees" so even the ones who live permanently in Europe are considered "refugees" - phantoms who are still useful in agitating against Israel.

The report issues no recommendations as to how to fix the situation. Lebanese discrimination and apartheid is considered normal and not worth making a stink about. Because Lebanon might respond by making things worse.

Unlike other UNRWA reports, this one has barely been mentioned in the media and certainly hasn't been publicized much by UNRWA. Mostly because Israel cannot be blamed for Lebanese discrimination against Palestinians.

So this report will sink into obscurity, and do nothing to help the actual lives of actual Arab who remain as pawns between their leaders, Lebanese leaders, the Arab world, UNRWA and the anti-Israel Westerners who claim to care about Palestinians but whose concern doesn't go beyond blaming everything on Israel.

---

---

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Read More

UNRWA keeps pushing Pallywood

This is the pinned photo that has been on the top of the Twitter feed of Raquel Marti, UNRWA's executive director in Spain, for months. She captioned it "Bath time in Gaza:"

The original photo was taken by Emad Nassar, with this description:

June 26, 2015 . Salem Saoody, 30, is getting his daughter Layan (L) and his niece Shaymaa 5 (R) in the only remaining piece from their damaged house, which is the bathing tub. They now live in a caravan near the rubble.

One minor question: Where did the water come from?

There is no rain in Gaza in June. The house does not appear to have running water. There is no hose visible in the picture.

What are the chances that Salem Saoody takes his daughters out of their mobile home and they carry over 100 liters of clean water with them to their former home to take a bath?

Emad Nassar saw the chance for a dramatic photo, so he staged it to win awards. And the girls were happy to play in a mini-pool on a summer day. So, it appears, Nassar and Saoody spent a morning carrying water to the old bathtub for the perfect photo.

The idea that the Saoodys are forced to give their girls a bath in their old bathtub does not pass any sanity test.

Last June, when this photo was taken, I noted that Hamas had turned the Shujaiyeh neighborhood into a showpiece to bring foreign reporters to show Israel's evil - even though thousands of Gaza homes were being repaired, Hamas left Shujaiyeh untouched. There were a series of such obviously staged photos published by Hamas-leaning and duped photojournalists. And while the terror group kept the neighborhood as a zoo for gaping Westerners, it was building tunnels underneath the very same area.

UNRWA has something in common with Hamas. Both groups wanted to keep families in Shujaiyeh homeless, and the rubble uncleared, for as long as possible so they could maximize its propaganda value and get more funds from credulous Westerners. UNRWA actually made an entire film of such staged scenes in the neighborhood last year,

Of course, if you want to paint Gazans as eternal victims and implicitly blame Israel at every opportunity, this staged photo and inaccurate caption is perfect for you - and perfect for UNRWA and its lackeys. UNRWA created an entire film of such staged scenes in this neighborhood and told kids there to act in ludicrous scenes such as creating a makeshift see-saw in the middle of rubble.

---

---

We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.

Read More