A Sky News online article and video report by their Africa correspondent John Sparks, reporting in Gaza, focused on Ibrahim Abu Salah, a Palestinian who recently succumbed to shrapnel wounds suffered during the war between Israel and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
The reports (“‘He was trying to escape the heat’: One more casualty in Gaza’s incurable conflict”, Aug. 13) are extraordinarily biased and tendentious, emoting about Palestinian rage about the 15 year blockade without mentioning Egypt’s blockade or the cause of Israel’s security measures: the need to protect its citizens from rockets and other deadly weapons that terror groups continually try to smuggle into the territory.
Sparks also notes that at least 49 Palestinians were killed during the war, without mentioning that a large number – 16 per AP, and 19 per Haaretz’s Amira Haas – were killed by misfired Palestinian rockets.
But, the most serious omission appears in the following sentences:
The Israelis may have mistaken her husband for a militia member, said Lobna, as she sat under a collection of lebbeck trees.
In an aerial video of the strike posted by the Israeli military, an official said militants were using the location to set up rocket launchers.
Israelis didn’t “mistake” Abu Salah for a “militant”. He was a Fatah terror operative, according to the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Centre, which could explain why he was killed when the IDF targeted rocket launchers.
Also, here’s Fatah notice of their “martyr’s” death, appearing on Facebook:
Translation of the Arab text above by CAMERA Arabic:
The national Palestinian liberation movement Fatah – northern Gaza area – Beit Hanoun martyrs region – mourns its martyr son Ibrahim Shahdeh Abu Sallah. We ask Allah almighty’s mercy and forgiveness for him and that he would get him to the highest heaven”
(Above that text is the usual Quran quote cited for “martyrs”.)
Also, see the photos below of the funeral showing Abu Salah’s coffin covered with a Fatah flag. Given that the Sky journalist covered the funeral procession, as noted in his video report, he presumably would have seen that:
Palestinians carry the body of Ibrahim Abu Salah, who was killed by an Israeli air strike, during his funeral, in Beit Hanoun, northern #Gaza Strip on August 10, 2022. Photo by Ashraf Amra pic.twitter.com/MwcKZPegxM
— Ashraf Amra (@amra_ashraf) August 10, 2022
We’ll be complaining to Sky News editors about this serious omission.
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UK media reporters should get it into their collective heads that, despite their craven attemps otherwise, Israel “ain’t going nowhere”. Israel does not seek to expand its borders – but will defend those borders indefinitely against allcomers.
It’s as simple as that.