Briefly, explosive watermelon version

Yes, watermelons are really exploding: Watermelons are exploding in China because farmers gave them growth chemicals—and then it rained a lot. Watermelons as land mines—what a concept.

Oh, look. The Palestinian elections have been postponed. Not that this will stop the EU and UN from plowing ahead with their attempt to create yet another failed Arab state, but hey, stranger things have happened. (No, I don’t really believe that.) The AP spin? Whatever the Palestinians tell them to say. The elections are postponed until they can be held in both Gaza and the West Bank. The peace talks are not happening because Netanyahu won’t freeze settlements. Same-old, same-old.

New spin by AP: Israeli is targeting Hamas. Seriously. Check out this headline:

Israel’s Netanyahu Takes Aim at Hamas

And check out the AP explanations of why there is no peace. Note the transposition—now Israel is making “demands” of the Palestinians. Also note that the Palestinians spokesliars are doing their usual thing of trying to appropriate the phrases Israel uses about them and turn them around on Israel. The AP is only too happy to oblige.

In his speech Monday, Netanyahu reiterated a long-standing list of demands from the Palestinians. Among them: recognition of Israel as the Jewish homeland, retaining major Jewish settlements in the West Bank and keeping all of Jerusalem under Israel control.

Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, retorted that the Palestinians don’t have a partner on the Israeli side. “Netanyahu has chosen settlements over peace,” Erekat said.

The Palestinians claim all of the West Bank and east Jerusalem, areas captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war from Jordan, as parts of an independent state. They decline to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, fearing it would undermine their backing of the “right of return” of Palestinian refugees, a concept Israel rejects.

And here’s the boilerplate which, as Barry Rubin points out, is false:

Sunday’s unrest occurred as the Palestinians marked the “nakba,” or “catastrophe” — the term they use to describe their defeat and displacement in the war that followed Israel’s founding on May 15, 1948 when Israel overcame the armies of surrounding Arab states as well as local Arabs who attacked after the Jewish state was declared.

Arabs were battling Jews in British Mandate Palestine before the state was recognized, thanks to the Nazis aiding the Arabs in trying to kill all the Jews in the world. But as the media don’t acknowledge the pre-1967 narrative, they also don’t acknowledge the Jewish history on the land of Israel, so why would they acknowledge that Arabs were murdering Jews in 1947 (or 1946, 1945, etc., etc.).

They also ignore utterly the Jews who were displaced from Arab lands, and whose property was stolen by the Arabs. But hey, we can’t mess with the narrative. The Jews? Victims? Not anymore. They’re the racist, brutal oppressors of the valiant, put-upon and put-down Palestinians, whose land they stole. Jewish history on the land? Doesn’t matter. They left. The Palestinians are the real “indigents.” Just ask them.

These are difficult times. I am not optimistic.