Hamas Hiding Its Casualties
Hamas’ online announcement prohibiting the publication of information on fighter casualties
The Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center reports:
1. On January 10, at 21:41 , all web surfers on Hamas’s PALDF forum (the movement’s main message board) received a message from a user nicknamed “Samed” (“He who stands firm”). He is one of the forum’s moderators (the user was said to be a muraqib, Arabic for “inspector”). The message said that according to the policy of the terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip (“the jihadist resistance”), it was forbidden to publish photographs, names, or details of those members of the resistance (i.e., terrorist organizations) killed or injured in the fighting until the end of the “Israeli aggression” in the Gaza Strip. The moderator said that any message violating those principles would be removed from the forum. He added that they were all “soldiers of the resistance” who should avoid providing assistance to the enemy (see Appendix for the complete message and its translation).
2. The message reflects the policy of Hamas, which has refrained from publishing the names of its operatives who were killed or injured since the beginning of the ground phase of Operation Cast Lead. As part of that policy, almost no names or photographs of killed operatives have been published on PALDF in the course of the past week (unlike in the first week of the operation, in which the names and photographs of scores of killed Hamas operatives were published). It should be noted that a similar policy was followed by Hezbollah in the second Lebanon war, when it purposefully did not publish the names of killed operatives, preferring instead to bury them in secret, without media coverage, to reinforce the “divine victory” myth it sought to create.
This is confirmation of what was earlier reported about casualty information coming from the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza, run by Hamas.
More from SNAPSHOTS
AP Avoids Calling Farrakhan Comments “Anti-Semitic”
November 9, 2018
For some mysterious reason, the Associated Press felt Louis Farrakhan's mutterings on international relations deserve close attention. "Louis Farrakhan, in Iran, warns Trump a Mideast war possible," a Associated Press headline announced, as if the [...]
Israeli Peace Offers, Palestinian Rock Throwing Are M.I.A in Post Report
July 26, 2018
A June 28, 2018 Washington Post report, “Prince William visit Jerusalem’s holy sites, concluding historic visit,” omitted key context and details about the Duke of Cambridge’s trip to Israel and areas controlled by the Palestinian [...]
Media Story About Ultra-Orthodox Responsibility for Lengthy El Al Delay Disputed
July 11, 2018
Israeli journalist Sivan Rahav Meir reports in The Times of Israel today ("That Ultra-Orthodox flight delay? It didn't happen") that media claims, based on a Facebook post by Israeli rapper Chen Rotem, that a group [...]
One Haaretz Page-One Sentence, Lots of Errors
July 11, 2018
One sentence in a page-one article of Haaretz's's English print edition yesterday packed in multiple errors. Headlined "Netanyahu: Israel to close commercial Gaza crossing over airborne firebombs," the article erred: Palestinians began flying the devices [...]
Media Largely Ignore Alleged Hamas Payment to Dead Baby’s Family
June 25, 2018
A New York Times caption which definitively claims that Layla Ghandour "fell ill after inhaling tear gas," despite the fact that the accompanying article itself acknowledges that the story involving tear gas was disputed Western [...]
PCUSA Stands By While Palestinian Activist Harassed by Extremist
June 20, 2018
Palestinian human rights activist Bassem Eid walks away from an aggressive and hostile “intersectionality” activist Bassem Masri outside the Presbyterian Church (USA)’s General Assembly taking place in St. Louis. (Screenshot from Twitter.) Palestinian human rights [...]
AFP Whitewashes Gaza’s Serial Arsonists as ‘Activists’
June 19, 2018
June 20 Update: Multiple Media Outlets Amend Captions Calling Gaza Arsonists 'Activists' Numerous Agence France-Presse photo captions in the last couple of days misidentify Gazans responsible for airborne arson attacks which destroyed 28,000 dunums of [...]
Newsweek Headline Fail on Israeli Attacks in Syria
June 18, 2018
A grossly misleading Newsweek headline ("Israel Bombs Syria to Stop Refugees Fleeing to Europe, Netanyahu Says," June 14) falsely suggests that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel is bombing Syria in order to [...]