MSNBC’s designated Israel hit-man, Ayman Mohyeldin is at it again! Reporting in the aftermath of the terrorist attack in Tel Aviv that killed four innocent Israeli citizens on Wednesday, Mohyeldin said he was putting the attack in context, and blamed the attack on the Israeli Government.
“the shift of Israeli politics, including now the current government more to the right to what has been described by Israelis as even more of a extreme right-wing government, some of the measures that have taken place in the West Bank, the siege that continues in Gaza, all of those continue to fester.”
Notice when he says things like that he never describes what he means by “the measures,or “extreme” or “right wing”? He possibly means the fact that Avigdor Lieberman and his party Yisrael Beiteinu rejoined the government and was installed as defense minister eight days before the attack. The only change in defense policy Lieberman installed so far was to approve equal rights for the bereaving families of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender soldiers, not really an “extreme right-wing” program.
By calling Lieberman right-wing was the MSNBC “reporter” talking about the fact that he is a supporter of the two-state solution? Perhaps it’s his position about reducing the role of the rabbinical system in legal matters such as marriage, and death. He also has an interesting idea about peace negotiation (which I don’t agree with) Lieberman has called for a territory exchange—redraw the border between Israel and the West Bank so that Israel would include large Jewish community blocs and the Palestinian state would include large Arab-Israeli population centers. Maybe Mohyeldin says that the new defense minister is right wing because of his proposal for a “no loyalty – no citizenship” policy which he described as requiring new citizens to take a loyalty oath, similar to the U.S. “In the U.S., those requesting a Green Card must take an oath that they will fulfill the rights and duties of citizenship,”
After trying to label the Israeli government (which is “right-wing” in supporting free enterprise) MSNBC’s Mohyeldin continued with talking about the “occupation”
And as a result, the sense of depravation, the sense of frustration, the lack of any clarity on a political process that would lead to a – some kind of peace process, if you will, all of that has been brewing for the past several months. It’s been systematic for the last several years in terms of the ongoing occupation, but really, what we’ve seen is a spike, as Martin [Fletcher] was saying, in the past nine months with these wave of attacks. That has been a huge factor in why we are seeing this sudden spike.
There’s a tremendous amount of frustration among Palestinians who live in the occupied West Bank coupled with the shift of Israeli politics to the right, and that has led to even further measures of what Palestinians say is oppression in the occupied West Bank. The lack of any progress on the front with Gaza, it has been just a very – it’s been a recipe of disaster.
Here’s the “context the reporter/Palestinian propagandist missed. As recently as 2008 Israel offered the Palestinians a deal giving them much of what they wanted. But when Prime Minister (and master of the comb-over) Ehud Olmert was forced to resign in disgrace because of an unrelated scandal, Palestinian President Abbas took the “way out,” and backed away from the near deal because Olmert was no longer going to be Premier (even thought the new (acting) Prime Minister was Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni).
Since he became Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu has offered to negotiate as long as they were face to face and with no preconditions on either side. The recent “French ” effort was rejected by the Israeli premier because the negotiated through intermediaries.
As far as Gaza goes, Israel pulled out of the formerly Egyptian territory and handed it to the Palestinians in August of 2005. Since then Gaza became a launching pad for Hamas terrorism. Because of the terror, Israel instituted a limited embargo, limiting goods such as are weapons, items that can be made into weapons along with some limitations on concrete and other raw materials Hamas has used to build tunnels for terrorists to enter Gaza. If Mohyeldin had really wanted to present context he would have mentioned the fact that if there was no terrorism coming out of Gaza there would be no embargo.
Falsehood and mis-reporting is nothing new for Ayman Mohyeldin. In October of 2015 during a period when there were two-three terrorist stabbings/ a day Mohyeldin appeared on the Jose’ Diaz Balart program. Mohyeldin gave a blatantly false report about an Israeli soldier, saying the soldier shot an unarmed Palestinian even though the video he showed as part of the report clearly showed the terrorist running toward the soldier with a knife in his hand. Diaz’ Balart gently reprimanded Mohyeldin saying that it was important to explain the true actions of both sides, going on to tell the audience the terrorist had been wearing fatigues, broke through a police line, and was carrying a knife.
Below is a transcript and video, of the Mohyeldin comments given on the air Wednesday in a discussion with Anchor Kate Snow and Martin Fletcher (former NBC News’ Middle East correspondent and Tel Aviv Bureau chief). Fletcher, echoed Mohyeldin’s statement. Both of their positions are very popular with members of the progressive leaning Democratic Party.
Mohyeldin: But in the bigger picture, in terms of the context of what has been happening in the occupied Palestinian territories, the occupation, the shift of Israeli politics, including now the current government more to the right to what has been described by Israelis as even more of a extreme right-wing government, some of the measures that have taken place in the West Bank, the siege that continues in Gaza, all of those continue to fester.
And as a result, the sense of depravation, the sense of frustration, the lack of any clarity on a political process that would lead to a – some kind of peace process, if you will, all of that has been brewing for the past several months. It’s been systematic for the last several years in terms of the ongoing occupation, but really, what we’ve seen is a spike, as Martin [Fletcher] was saying, in the past nine months with these wave of attacks. That has been a huge factor in why we are seeing this sudden spike.
There’s a tremendous amount of frustration among Palestinians who live in the occupied West Bank coupled with the shift of Israeli politics to the right, and that has led to even further measures of what Palestinians say is oppression in the occupied West Bank. The lack of any progress on the front with Gaza, it has been just a very – it’s been a recipe of disaster.
Snow: A boiling point, perhaps. Martin, as we – I’m trying to think back, and we’ve heard so much about the knife attacks that have happened last fall, I think, that was the last big spate of them – but is this – if you can put this in context, how significant is an event like this? And we’re talking about three people dead, multiple injuries. I mean, it looks a lot like what we saw in Paris, although not on the same scale. I guess I just wonder whether this will be a call to action on – on both sides.
Fletcher: Well, probably not much will change in the situation because of this. Because it was feared, the Palestinian – different Palestinian groups are trying to do this kind of thing. But it’s a shock, certainly to the Israeli public. It’s a shock because Tel Aviv is always sort of a rather hip, cool place outside the mainstream of the violence. Occasionally it reaches Tel Aviv with devastating effect. There have been bus bombs in Tel Aviv over the years and the attacks like this, but they have been far and few between.
The – I mean, from the point of view of the attackers, this was a successful attack that will shock the Israelis, but actually, will it change anything? Will it lead either side towards any movement towards peace or understanding that they need to make real progress? Probably not. I mean, as Ayman said, the Israeli government – you know, we keep – every few years we say, “Oh, this is the most right-wing government in Israel’s history,” and it just keeps getting more right-wing. So the chances that there’s going to be a move towards peace as a result of a violent shooting is probably the wrong conclusion. If anything, with the new defense minister, Avigdor Liberman, really an extremely right-winger, he will be – a settler himself – he will be calling, clearly as a defense minister, for a strong response of some kind.
Mohyeldin: And this will be, correct me if I’m wrong, but really the first test on the security front for this new right-wing coalition government that was just formed within the last couple of weeks. This is the first, certainly the first significant major incident that has happened since this government has come into formation. And so I suspect, as Martin was saying, you’re going to hear tough talk in terms of measurements, in terms of if they identify and conclude that this is in fact the result of a Palestinian terrorist group or if a Palestinian individual was acting out.
