Painting Israel as the villain, again

The AP spins the death of two more Palestinian terrorists as anti-Israel as possible.

Israeli Troops Kill Palestinian Gunmen

Note that in a headline dealing with dead terrorists, the active voice is always used, and Israel or the IDF are always blamed. Remember that when Palestinian terrorists kill Israeli civilians with “crude, homemade rockets,” the headline often states that the rockets killed the Israelis. Palestinians are almost never held responsible.

Israeli troops killed at least two Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, a day after rejecting an unofficial truce offer from the besieged Hamas rulers of the coastal territory.

Two anti-Israel cracks in one sentence. First, Israel rejects the “unofficial truce offer,” making Israel look like the intransigent side that wants war, not peace. Then we get the word “beseiged,” which is using the language of Hamas propaganda against Israel, making it look like Gaza is under siege by Israel, which it patently is not. And this is the first paragraph in the story’s lede. Way to go, AP, this one takes a prize.

Now for the rest of the lede. Remember, only the first three to five paragraphs make it into the World News section of your local paper. Paragraphs two and three are relatively normal. But check out paragraph five, the one that will end many articles in many local papers:

A military force operating in central Gaza shot two approaching gunmen, the army said. Two militant groups, the Popular Resistance Committees and Islamic Jihad, each announced that one of their men had been killed.

Israeli infantry and armored troops were in the area conducting a routine operation against militants who fire rockets and mortar rounds at southern Israel, try to infiltrate into Israel, and plant bombs aimed at troops, the military said.

Palestinian militants launched a rocket into Israel Thursday morning, hitting several dozen yards away from a school in the town of Sderot, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said. There were no casualties, Rosenfeld said, but several students were treated for shock.

Israel vowed to retaliate with further military operations.

Note how the defense of her people from terrorists is labeled “retaliation.” No, that’s what the terrorists do when Israel takes some of them out. They “retaliate” by blowing up civilians. And here is the quote that was labeled a “vow to retaliate”:

Israel will continue with its efforts to stop these rocket attacks and prevent the same type of tragedy that nearly occurred today,” said David Baker, a spokesman for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

That is neither a vow nor a statement of retaliation. Terrorists nearly murdrered children in school. The IDF is responding.

Gaza militants fire rockets and mortar shells daily into southern Israel; the projectiles have killed 12 people in six years.

As always, downplaying the effect of having potentially deadly rockets fired into your towns on a near-daily basis. Over 2000 rockets have been fired by terrorists in 2007. That’s the number the AP published only once. It didn’t make it into the boilerplate, nor does the fact that hundreds have been wounded and homes have been destroyed. When the AP finally gets around to calling a terrorist a terrorist, it isn’t until the very end of the article:

Responding to Haniyeh’s offer, a spokesman for Olmert said Israel would not deal with Hamas unless it accepts three international conditions: recognizing Israel, renouncing violence and accepting past peace accords. Hamas has always refused to do that.

Haim Ramon, Israel’s deputy premier, said Thursday that Haniyeh’s overture was proof that Israel’s strategy of blockading Gaza and battling militants there is working.

“All of these … comments, and the messages coming in all kinds of strange ways, all of these things are a kind of smoke screen that just shows that Israel’s recent policy toward Palestinian terror is bearing fruit,” Ramon told Army Radio.

If Palestinians stopped firing rockets into Israel, Israel would have no reason to attack, Ramon said.

Once again, the AP is the terrorists’ best friend.