A Telegraph article about the fire, published on July 24, and written by their foreign reporter Iona Cleave, is among the more inaccurate and agenda-driven pieces about Israel that we’ve seen at the normally reliable outlet. The deception begins in the headline, which is akin to what you’d expect to see at the Guardian.
Rarely have we seen so much disinformation in so few words. Those coming across this headline would be led to believe that Israeli settlers burned down a Christian town, when nothing of the sort happened. In fact, even the grossly misleading text in the article doesn’t make such an assertion.
Yet, the headline’s claim is repeated in a short video embedded in the piece.
As you see, despite the propagandistic and grossly inaccurate chyrons in the film, even Cleave doesn’t repeat the headline’s assertion that settlers burned down the town. That is a complete fiction, presumably added by an editor.
What she does allege is that, on July 7, some Israelis set a fire in an area adjacent to an ancient church, an accusation – framed as an indisputable fact, without any qualifying language such as “reportedly” – repeated in the opening sentences of the article, deceptively written as if it’s a first hand account, despite the absence of a quote supporting that narrative by any witness cited in the piece:
The Israeli settlers crept up to the ancient church [ruins] perched above the West Bank’s last Christian-majority town.
As they reached the outer walls, they crouched down to light a ring of fire. Then they revved the engines of their secret weapons brought to fan the flames: garden leaf blowers. Residents watched in horror as the blaze spread closer to the Church of St George, which dates back to the fifth century.
Cleave’s certainty about what allegedly occurred is especially troubling given that, as our CAMERA colleagues reported, this framing was challenged by the Israeli news outlet TPS-IL four days prior to the Telegraph’s article.
According to TPS, an Israeli shepherd (who’s under-age and can’t be named) who attempted to put out the fire said “he was in the field with his animals when a fire ignited a few meters away. He alerted the farm owner and tried to extinguish the flames with his shirt—only to be confronted by Palestinians emerging from the cemetery, shouting and throwing objects at him.”
Further, the TPS article reports, contrary to the Telegraph’s claim, that Jewish settlers were using a leaf blower to put out the fire at the Taybeh historic church ruins.
Here’s the still shot in question, used by both the Telegraph and TPS:
Leaf blowers, it should be noted, can be used to put out certain types of fires. Alternatively, they can also make fires worse, depending on the nature of the fire, the wind conditions, and other factors. To observe that the single image, in and of itself, is not evidence of the leaf blowers being used by settlers to worsen the fire is an understatement.
So, the Telegraph journalist didn’t so much as question the Palestinian narrative that 1) Israeli settlers set the fire. 2) Israeli settlers tried to make the fire worse.
Further, TPS notes that the July 7th fire, as well as two additional fires in the area on July 8 and 11, in areas near the church compound were all reported by “a Jewish farmer whose farm is next to the church compound complained to the police that someone had torched the area where his shepherd was grazing“. TPS reports that it “obtained time-stamped documentation of those reports“.
Yet, almost all of the article is devoted to advancing the predetermined conclusion that anti-Christian settlers are the guilty party.
In the 1,731 word article, a mere 161 words were devoted to official Israeli responses to the allegations – and those were relegated to the final five paragraphs of the piece. It included a statement by the Israel Police confirming that they received reports from residents of an arson attack near the church and that a “thorough investigation” would be carried out.
It also quoted an IDF spokesperson, who said that “fires near the church…were extinguished by Israeli civilians“.
So, despite the definitive army statement that church fire was “extinguished by Israeli civilians”, practically the entire article – including the incendiary and extraordinarily dishonest headline – conveys the message that their denial of the charge that settlers started and fanned the fire is meaningless, and that readers should believe, as a matter of faith, the unevidenced accusation that Jews are to blame.
This isn’t journalism. It’s advocacy.
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