Posted on 07/25/2014 3:01:15 AM PDT by Star Traveler
Hamas is employing a new tactic to conceal its true terrorist nature from the world. It has begun asking Gaza’s social media users to disseminate lies throughout the West and the Arab world.
This news will come as no surprise to those familiar with the radical Islamist organization’s usual methods. However, now mainstream media outlets will have to think twice before blindly quoting reports from Hamas about what’s really happening in Gaza.
The Middle East Media Research (MEMRI) published Thursday a translation of a new Hamas internet campaign to provide guidelines for Gaza’s social media users. According to MEMRI, the Hamas Interior Ministry has instructed Gazans to use Facebook and Twitter to “play their part in strengthening the home front and properly convey information worldwide.” The guidelines in fact instruct social media users to mislead the public and propagate disinformation worldwide.
The interior ministry’s “Be Aware – Social Media Activist Awareness Campaign” centers around an instructional video and posters published on the ministry’s Facebook and Twitter pages. Gazans are taught, first and foremost, to refer to all terrorists as innocent civilians.
“Anyone killed or martyred is to be called a civilian from Gaza or Palestine, before we talk about his status in jihad or his military rank,” the guidelines state. “Don’t forget to always add ‘innocent civilian’ or ‘innocent citizen’ in your description of those killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza.” Mainstream media outlets would do well to remember this when quoting distorted reports from Gaza of civilian casualties.
The guidelines go on to tell Facebook and Twitter users how to spin Hamas terrorist activity aimed at harming Israeli civilians to appear legitimate.
“Begin [your reports of] news of resistance actions with the phrase ‘In response to the cruel Israeli attack,’ and conclude with the phrase ‘This many people have been martyred since Israel launched its aggression against Gaza.’ Be sure to always perpetuate the principle of ‘the role of the occupation is attack, and we in Palestine are fulfilling [the role of] the reaction.”
Social media users in Gaza are instructed not to mention Hamas’ exploitation of civilians as human shields. Nor the fact that it urges civilians to ignore the IDF’s warnings about impending strikes.
“Avoid publishing pictures of rockets fired into Israel from city centers. This [would] provide a pretext for attacking residential areas in the Gaza Strip. Do not publish or share photos or video clips showing rocket launching sites or the movement of resistance [forces] in Gaza.”
“Narrative of Life vs. Narrative of Blood”
Hamas’ interior ministry also published a series of suggestions for navigating the cultural differences that its supporters may encounter when communicating with those in the West.
“Avoid entering into a political argument with a Westerner aimed at convincing him that the Holocaust is a lie and deceit; instead, equate it with Israel’s crimes against Palestinian civilians.”
Ultimately, Hamas reminds its supporters to remember that Westerners will not identify with the glorification of martyrdom, and to adjust their messaging accordingly. It calls this “the narrative of life vs. the narrative of blood.”
“[When speaking] to an Arab friend, start with the number of martyrs. [But when speaking] to a Western friend, start with the number of wounded and dead.”
Yesterday I heard on talk radio that Israel is calling this a fight to the death. I agree.
IDF needs to start their Press Briefing with calling Gaza what it is! Hamasstan!
Officially recognize the “State of Hamasstan.” Go the UN and act as a proxy to request recognition for the new State. That way it can be officially wiped off the earth.
You do know, I hope, that the IDF has said that they don’t want to completely destroy Hamas, much less destroy Gaza. Their reasoning (and this is from the IDF) is that Hamas will be useful to control the other miscellaneous terrorist offshoots I’m Gaza.
They do, however want to severely degrade the capacity of Hamas to launch these rockets into Israel and also destroy their attack tunnels.
I’m certain nobody in Hamas is firing rockets into Israel, its just an illusion. (sarc)
An example of a common tactic used by terrorists is to stage photos of children who have been killed or wounded by the IDF or US when a church or school or hospital is bombed. In this case, the IDF bombed a UN school because it had rockets stored there. My guess is that the IDF insured there were no children there when they took out the building. However the liberal press went bonkers over it showing the staged photos non-stop.
There are casualties from some of these IDF bombings, as in one the IDF is investigating now. So even though there are some of these staged events, there are others that are real. What the IDF is saying about this recent one is that Hamas wouldn’t let the people leave as the IDF was about to strike.
A consensus is building in Israel that Gaza should be occupied and Hamas destroyed.
I suspect that the only reason it has not been articulated by Netanyahu is that Hamas, as an appendage of the. Muslim Brotherhood, is an ally of Obama and Israel is trying to keep his wrath at a slow burn until osrael’s actions have been accomplished.
There are no voices in Israel calling for preserving Hamas as an objective of this war.
Israel is saying that the deaths of the children in the school probably were caused by Hamas bombs that fell short and not by the IDF.
It is true also that Israel is reporting that Hamas kept them inside and would not let them follow Israeli instructions to evacuate.
It looks like it might have been both the IDF and Hamas, however the IDF is investigating.
Israel Opens Investigation into Claims IDF Shelled UN School
The IDF has opened an official investigation into claims by Gaza terror groups that the IDF shelled a UN school in Gaza on Thursday afternoon. According to the groups, at least 17 people, including children, were killed, and over 200 injured.
Israel has not yet commented on the report officially, but an official for UNWRA, the UN organization which ran the school, told Israel Radio that the school was one that was housing Gazans who had left their homes due to the Israeli shelling of Gaza neighborhoods. The official claimed that UNWRA had given the IDF the coordinates of the school, requesting that it be left alone.
Israeli sources said that it was very possible that the school was hit because Hamas terrorists were operating nearby. The sources said that the neighborhood where the school is located is one favored for firing rockets at Israel by Hamas terrorists, and that it contained a large number of rockets and other weapons.
In the last few minutes some of the circumstances around the alleged shelling of the school have become clearer, as IDF sources told Channel 2 of heavy exchanges of fire between soldiers and terrorist gunmen.
Sources told the channel that it was possible that a stray mortar shell fired by IDF troops may have hit the hospital, but that a rocket fired by terrorists also hit the building.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/183314#.U9I7iGK9KSM
Israel says Gaza ground operation aims to restore calm, not oust Hamas
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3181746/posts
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-says-gaza-ground-operation-aims-to-restore-calm-not-oust-hamas/
Thousands of Israeli soldiers backed by tanks poured into the Gaza Strip on Thursday night, escalating a 10-day military operation to try to destroy Hamas’s weapons arsenal, rocket firing abilities and tunnels used to send terrorists from the Palestinian territory into Israel.
The goal of the ground operation was to restore security for Israel’s citizens by stopping Hamas attacks, Israeli diplomatic sources said, and not to reconquer Gaza and oust Hamas.
The high-stakes move was compelled by Israel’s growing exasperation over unrelenting rocket fire and followed the collapse of Egyptian-led efforts to broker a cease-fire. It also came after a failed attempt by 13 terrorists to infiltrate Israel earlier Thursday through a tunnel under the Gaza-Israel border near Kibbutz Sufa, only to be stopped by an Israeli strike at the mouth of the tunnel.
That was last week’s public’s statement. Lots has changed since then.
Just today the Jerusalem Post has an article about Phase 3, which will entsil occupation and dismantling Hamas’s military capabilities.
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There’s been no stated change. It’s not impossible to have some change, but it’s pure speculation if one says there is some upcoming change.
I just go on what Prime Mimister Benjamin Netanyahu says and/or what the IDF says or some other Israeli government official who is able to speak on it ... in other words, something confirmed.
If we were to SPECULATE ... I would say that the next item that is “up” on the agenda is a “cease-fire”. Israel has already agreed to a cease-fire and it’s only Hamas that is holding it up. So, Hamas may finally be ready to “cry uncle”! .... :-) ...
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