Today, The Guardian published a report by Kate Shuttleworth (Stabbed Israeli man mistaken for Arab lashes out at escalating violence, Oct. 15) about several Israeli revenge attacks against Arabs amidst the recent wave of terror attacks targeting Jews
After noting a few recent examples of Arabs (or Israeli Jews who were believed to be Arab) being assaulted, Shuttleworth pivots to the narrative being advanced by many Palestinians suggesting that Israeli police and soldiers have used ‘disproportionate force’ in response to terror attacks.
Here are the relevant paragraphs near the end of her article.
In some cases where Palestinians have been shot as they were allegedly carrying out, or about to carry out attacks, suspicion has been raised over whether this was the case. Arab leaders have criticised Israeli police for being too quick to shoot stabbers instead of arresting them.
The Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, accused the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, on of “incitement and lies” after he claimed in a speech in Ramallah on Wednesday that Israel engaged in the “execution of our children in cold blood” and waved a photograph of 13-year-old Ahmed Manasra.
Mansara and a 17-year-old friend allegedly stabbed two people leaving one in a serious condition and one critically wounded. Palestinians were enraged by footage showing the wounded Ahmed lying on the ground after the attack, as bystanders yell: “Die!” at him, but he is not dead and is being treated at Hadassah hospital, in Jerusalem.
So, whilst Shuttleworth commendably refutes the lie by Abbas that the Palestinian child was “executed”, she nonetheless fails to challenge one final false Palestinian allegation in the final passage of her article.
Palestinian leadership claim he is innocent and he was shot in an attempt to kill him.
However, despite such “claims”, a video was released by Israeli officials – taken by closed circuit cameras stationed at the scene of the incident – clearly showing that the Palestinian boy (Ahmed Manasra) was NOT innocent and was shot only after charging at responding officers with his knife.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0affBFnOO8M]
You’d think that, after all these years, professional journalists would have learned to be as skeptical of claims made by Palestinian leaders as they always are with Israeli claims.