Incitement and Murder
A short while ago, a family of five Israelis was murdered in their West Bank home. According to the Associated Press, citing Israel’s YNet news website, “The family — including an 11-year-old, a 3-year-old and an infant — was all stabbed in their sleep…”
The infant was reportedly one month old.
The brutal attack comes only days after a West Bank Palestinian youth center announced a soccer tournament named after Wafa Idris, the first female Palestinian suicide bomber, who killed an 81-year-old man and injured over 100 other Israelis.
The glorification of this suicide bomber, though, was virtually ignored by Western media outlets, many of whom did find time to report, in great detail, on the first home game by the Palestinian national soccer team.
The latter event makes for an interesting human interest story. The former helps explain why peace has been so elusive in the Middle East. It’s likely that the terrorist who wiped out the family knew of the soccer tournament named after Wafa Idris. And if not he — or she — certainly knew that scores of other suicide bombers have been lauded as heroes by the Palestinian government and media. The killer undoubtedly internalized the message, reinforced time and time again, that it’s noble and heroic to kill Jews. The same goes for the person who planned the attack, and the one who transported the killer, and any other enablers.
We’ve seen in the past that Western pressure can help convince Palestinians to scale back incitement. Late last year, for example, a Palestinian government website posted a report claiming that Judaism has no relation to the Western Wall, the holiest Jewish place of worship. After the Obama administration condemned the report, it was pulled from the site. (It later resurfaced on the official website of the Palestinian Authority news agency.)
By ignoring this type of incitement, though, Western press makes such pressure unlikely, or impossible. After all, we can’t protest against incitement that we don’t know about. And so the incitement continues. And so does the killing.
More from SNAPSHOTS
Swarthmore Students Are Learning: It Was Never About Palestinian Rights
May 14, 2025
Students at Swarthmore College are so close to understanding the conflict. An article in the Swarthmore Phoenix details the frustrations of student activists with the college’s Students for Justice in Palestine. The gist of their criticism is [...]
AFP Arabic Stops Mislabeling Northern Israeli Communities ‘Settlements”
August 10, 2021
A view of Metulla, northern Israel (Photo by Hadar Sela)After failing to set the record straight last May when Agence France Presse's Arabic service repeatedly referred to Jewish communities in northern Israel as "settlements," the [...]
NY Times Praises Ilhan Omar’s Book While Glossing Over Her Antisemitism
August 19, 2020
A recent New York Times book review boosts Rep. Ilhan Omar’s (D-MN) autobiography while glossing over her antisemitism. In the paper’s Aug. 16, 2020 edition, NYT reporter Christina Cauterucci writes: The memoir offers breathing room [...]
When TV Interviews of Ilhan Omar Constitute Journalistic Malpractice
August 11, 2020
Rep. Ilhan Omar’s (D-MN) documented animosity toward Jews and Israel was ignored in recent interviews by MSNBC and C-SPAN. MSNBC’s The Beat for July 23, 2020 included host Ari Melber’s 10-minute conversation at 6:16 [...]
Boston TV Station WCVB Teamed Up With Terrorist Supporter CAIR
July 7, 2020
WCVB-TV (channel 5) (Boston’s ABC network affiliate) recently misled area viewers about a matter involving antisemitic propaganda. This occurred on its local Sunday show Cityline hosted by Karen Holmes Ward who is described by the [...]
Harper’s Magazine Echoed Palestinian Propaganda Condemning Israel And America
June 2, 2020
Writing in Harper's, Kevin Baker condemns the U.S. Middle East peace plan [“The Striking Gesture,” Easy Chair, May 2020], mischaracterizing it as, “Give up all your [Palestinian] hopes and your holiest places, embark on a [...]