Gaza through a NY Times lens

Leo Rennert
American Thinker
18 December '10

NY Times Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner journeyed to Gaza to report on conditions there two years after Israel's counter-terrorism offensive, following several years of incessant rocket fire from the Hamas-ruled territory against civilian targets in Israel. ("Gaza Mends, But Israelis See Signs Of Trouble" Dec. 17, page A6)

While Bronner gets a few things right -- Hamas tightening its grip on Gaza, persecuting members of its rival, Fatah, a booming economy thanks to generous foreign aid and growing supply shipments from Israel -- his article is flawed by some conspicuous anti-Israel spins.

First, his account of Israel's Cast Lead operation against thousands of rocket barrages aimed at Sderot and other Israeli communities near the Gaza border. Bronner's version is that this was a "three-week war that destroyed thousands of buildings, killed about 1,300 people and largely deterred rocket fire."

Bronner's formulation -- Israel killed "1,300 people'' -- gives a false impression that Israel mounted an offensive against Gaza's entire population. The opposite is true. Israel went to extraordinary lengths to spare civilians -- sending warnings by telephne and leaflets to warn residents to get out of areas where terrorists were embedded -- and did its utmost to aim its attacks instead against Hamas operatives and other terror groups.

The result: Most fatalities were Hamas operatives and members of other terror groups, as Hamas itself now has admitted.

(Read full "Gaza through a NY Times lens")

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