The media fiddles while Israel burns - by Sean Durns

The press is failing to provide readers with coverage of a developing and dangerous situation in a country that is frequently the subject of disproportionate, and sometimes trivial, news coverage.

Sean Durns..
JNS.org/CAMERA..
09 September '20..

For weeks while communities in Israel burned, many major U.S. news outlets kept silent. Hamas, the U.S.-designated terror group that rules the Gaza Strip, has been intermittently launching firebombs into the south of Israel for years. Yet Hamas’s terrorism by fire was largely ignored during the summer of 2020.

By repeatedly launching incendiary devices into Israel, Hamas and other Gaza-based terror groups have violated numerous ceasefires. The damage has been extensive.

According to an Aug. 28 press release by Jewish National Fund-USA, almost “600 fires caused by incendiary and explosive-laden balloons sent by terrorists in the Gaza Strip have plagued Israel’s Gaza Envelope region over the past 19 days as thousands of acres have been destroyed.” On Aug. 23 alone, more than 28 fires were started by devices launched from Gaza. Nor is it merely balloons; as the Times of Israel reported “rockets have also been fired on multiple occasions at Israeli cities and towns, including over a dozen projectiles” on Aug. 20.

JNF-USA has helped to combat the fires by investing in firetrucks and firewagons. The threat to many communities in Israel’s south has been so pervasive that JNF-USA has helped develop “new, often fortified playgrounds, schools, parks and other amenity-enhancing projects.” Keith Isaacson, the head of security for Israel’s Eshkol region, lamented: “You can see that the forests are suffering. The wildlife is suffering. Instead of green behind our houses, we have black.”

As Ynet news previously reported, in February 2020 explosives-laden balloons landed in a preschool in the southern Israeli Kibbutz Sa’ad. More recently, others have landed near playgrounds. On several occasions, terrorists have attached the balloons with Disney characters—a tactic meant to entice unsuspecting children.

Israel, meanwhile, has responded with targeted strikes aimed at the terror network and its infrastructure.

Terrorist groups targeting children with balloon bombs and causing massive ecological damage is certainly newsworthy. Yet many major Western news outlets have completely ignored the story.

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