Yesterday we called out the Guardian for repeating the blatantly false claim that Ariel Sharon started the Second Intifada. Today we came across another Intifada related falsehood advanced by the paper – the suggestion that the First Intifada was “largely an unarmed rebellion”.
The claim, which has been echoed by other Guardian contributors as well, was made in a story they published today from the Guardian Archives – a report about the original Oslo Agreement between Israel and the PLO (written by Ian Black) which originally appeared in the paper on Sept. 10, 1993.
Black’s story included the following passage:
Progress towards this historic moment was driven by the intifada, the largely unarmed rebellion that erupted in Gaza in December 1987.
Of course, as anyone familiar with the uprising (from 1987 to around 1991) would know, characterizing it as an “unarmed rebellion” is extraordinarily misleading, as the intifada was violent from the start. Whilst most people remember images of rock throwing Palestinian youths, in fact more than 3,600 Molotov cocktail attacks, 100 hand grenade attacks and 600 assaults with firearms were carried out during that time – violence directed at soldiers and civilians alike.
During this period, over 200 Israelis were killed by such terror attacks, and more than 1,400 Israeli civilians and 1,700 Israeli soldiers were injured.
And, much like the Second Intifada, Palestinian leaders played a lead role in orchestrating the violent insurrection.
Finally, Jews were not the only victims of the violence, as the number of Arabs summarily executed by Palestinian death squads exceeded the number killed in clashes with Israeli troops – incidents which included attacks with clubs, knives, axes, guns, and even acid.
Twenty years ago, the Guardian grossly misled readers about the nature of the First Intifada – a significant obfuscation thoroughly consistent with their broader pattern of running interference for the illiberal and violent nature of the Palestinian national movement.
Related articles
- The Guardian again promotes myth that Ariel Sharon started 2nd Intifada (cifwatch.com)
- The Guardian’s perverse moral logic about terror bleeds onto their culture page (cifwatch.com)
- Peter Beinart’s Open Zion feels the pain of pre-Oslo murderers and their loved ones (cifwatch.com)
- CiF asks Palestinian supporter of ‘armed resistance’ her views on the peace process (cifwatch.com)
- Iran’s Press TV claims army of pro-Israel propagandists occupy BBC (bbcwatch.org)
