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The PA’s moral murder: Kill the parents, spare the children

Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik  |
 
The PA's moral murder:
Kill the parents, spare the children


 
Official PA daily boasts that Palestinian murderers
twice killed parents in front of their children
but did not kill the children

 
by Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik

Today a Palestinian terrorist murdered two Israelis in a stabbing attack in Tel Aviv. One of the prime motivators of the current wave of terror attacks is that the PA leadership is giving its support and blessings to the terror by justifying and honoring the killers, as Palestinian Media Watch has documented repeatedly.

One example of this support for murder is the Palestinian Authority's presentation of two recent murderers who killed parents in front of their children as acting with a moral conscience - because the murderers chose not to murder the children as well. Last week, a Palestinian terrorist shot and killed Israelis Ya'akov Litman and his 18-year-old son Netanel when they were driving. The rest of the family, the mother and four younger children, were also in the car at the time and were wounded.

Now, the official PA daily has chosen to present this murderer of two civilians positively because he did not murder the woman and the other four children who were with them. Calling the murderous terror attack "the Hebron operation," the paper's headline boasts that "The Palestinians have again not killed children or women":

Headline: "The Palestinians have again not killed children or women"...
"'The perpetrator of the operation prepared an ambush at the side of the road and waited for an Israeli car to come. When it came, he shot at it and retreated from the scene.' ... Israeli media sources noted that the perpetrators forced the car to slow down, shot 10 bullets at it, and then verified the death of the settlers. Likewise, they emphasized that they saw a boy and 3 women in the car, but didn't injure them, similar to what happened in the Nablus operation (i.e., Hamas terror attack in which 2 parents were shot to death in front of their 4 children) less than 2 months ago."
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 14, 2015]

The paper drew a parallel between this supposedly ethical murder and another recent terror attack in which Hamas terrorists killed Naama and Eitam Henkin, two parents in front of their four young children.

Another article in the PA daily also presented the Henkin murderers as following some kind of murderer's moral code, noting that "the members of the Nablus cell (i.e., who murdered two parents in front of their four children on Oct. 1, 2015) confirmed, after they were arrested, that they refrained from shooting the settlers' children." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 11, 2015]

The following are longer excerpts of the two reports presenting murderers positively because they spared the children when they killed the parents in front of them:

Headline: "Hebron operation:  The Palestinians have again not killed children or women"
"Israeli media sources publicized yesterday [Nov. 13, 2015] evening the details of the shooting operation (i.e., terror attack in which 2 Israelis were shot to death) which took place on Route 60, which leads to the settlement Otniel, south of Hebron, that led to the death of 2 settlers, and the injury of 3. The sources said: 'The perpetrator of the operation prepared an ambush at the side of the road and waited for an Israeli car to come. When it came, he shot at it and retreated from the scene.' ...
Israeli media sources noted that the perpetrators forced the car to slow down, shot 10 bullets at it, and then verified the death of the settlers. Likewise, they emphasized that they saw a boy and 3 women in the car, but didn't injure them, similar to what happened in the Nablus operation (i.e., Hamas terror attack in which 2 parents were shot to death in front of their 4 children) less than 2 months ago."
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 14, 2015]

The Litman murders - Israelis Ya'akov Litman and his son Netanel were murdered in a shooting attack on Nov. 13, 2015, on Route 60, near the town of Otniel, south of Hebron. His wife, Noa, and 4 other children were wounded. Security forces arrested 28-year-old Palestinian terrorist Shadi Ahmed Matawa, an Islamic Jihad member, after his father reported him to Israeli security forces.
A Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance which passed the scene of the attack refused to give medical care.

The Henkin murders - Israelis Naama and Eitam Henkin (also an American citizen) were murdered in a shooting attack on Oct. 1, 2015, on the road between Itamar and Elon Moreh in the West Bank. Their four children, aged 9, 7, 4, and 4 months, were also in the car and witnessed the murders, but were not physically injured.
Five suspects in the murder, members of a Hamas terrorist cell, were arrested by Israel and confessed to the murders. The leader of the group, Ragheb Ahmad Muhammad Aliwi, has served time in an Israeli prison for security related crimes.

Op-ed by Hafez Al-Barghouti, regular columnist for Al-Hayat Al-Jadida

Headline: "The occupation and luring children"
"We said from the beginning: 'Do not throw your children into the battle although the occupation, in its oppression, does not differentiate between children, youth and elderly, and although the settlers intentionally burned children, and although the occupation, through its barbaric oppression which provokes every living being, is trying to lure children to [battle].'

Nonetheless, the members of the [Hamas] Nablus cell (i.e., who murdered two parents in front of their four children on Oct. 1, 2015) confirmed, after they were arrested, that they refrained from shooting the settlers' children, as was the case with Thaer Hammad, (i.e., terrorist who shot and killed 10 people) the sniper from Oyoun Al-Haramiya who refrained from shooting the settler and her children, and instructed her to go back. So far, since the beginning of last month, dozens of children, who have nothing to do with the stabbings and the struggle, have died as Martyrs (Shahids), but the occupation, who publicized the video of the interrogation of the boy Ahmad Manasrah (i.e., young boy who stabbed two), tried to address an audience of children while still abusing the boy. This was in order to provoke children like him [Manasrah], and urge them to do as he did, and this is what happened yesterday [Nov. 10, 2015] in the settlement of Pisgat Ze'ev in Jerusalem (i.e., when two Palestinian boys, 12 and 13, stabbed a security guard on a train). The most important principle in resisting the occupation is to avoid any action that may make you resemble the occupation and its actions. Namely, you should refrain from inhuman actions in order to preserve your human emotions, even if the occupation has lost its humanity, as it is not your duty to imitate it...
Barbarity is a problem of whoever acts this way, and we should not recruit children into a cycle of violence they are unable to handle. We remember how, in one of the battles, the noble Prophet [Muhammad], refused to recruit a young boy, although the boy stood on his tiptoes in order to look older. Therefore, I believe that the stabbing operations (i.e., attacks) in such cases have become pointless. It is more appropriate to distance our children from demonstrations at which there are confrontations with the occupation. It is true that their future under the occupation is uncertain, like the future of all of us, but it is appropriate that we distance them from the confrontations so that they can experience their childhood. Miserable as it might be, it is better than a childhood of a wounded, a prisoner, or a Martyr with no childhood."
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 11, 2015]

Thaer Hammad - serving 11 life sentences for shooting down 3 civilians and 7 soldiers with a sniper rifle from a hilltop in Wadi Al-Haramiya in the West Bank on March 3, 2002.

Pisgat Ze'ev stabbing attack - On Oct. 12, 2015, two Palestinian terrorists, Hassan Manasrah (15) and Ahmad Manasrah (13), stabbed Yossef Ben Shalom (21) in the Pisgat Ze'ev neighborhood of East Jerusalem, then repeatedly stabbed a 13-year-old boy (name undisclosed at time of writing) who was riding his bike. Hassan Manasrah was killed while fleeing the scene, and Ahmad Manasrah was shot by Israeli police and hospitalized. Both victims of the attack were seriously injured. The terrorists, who were cousins, came from the nearby Palestinian neighborhood of Beit Hanina.

Stabbing attack on light rail train in Pisgat Ze'ev - Two Palestinian terrorists, Muawiyah and Ali Alqam, aged 12 and 13, stabbed and wounded an Israeli security guard on Jerusalem's light rail train in the Pisgat Ze'ev neighborhood, on Nov. 10, 2015. Israeli police shot and wounded the 12-year-old stabber and the second one was held by train passengers until security forces arrived.

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