Israel-Gaza War: "I woke up this morning, and none of the news was good"

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz, which has daily Hebrew and English editions, is known for its solid reporting that often puts it at odds with dubious claims by the Israeli government and for its critical commentary on Israeli government and Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) claims.

But it’s not as though Haaretz doesn’t cover and sometimes amplify those claims.

This recent article may be and indication of the pressure Haaretz is under: “How Media Outlets Like Haaretz Are Weaponized in the Fake News Wars Over Israel and Hamas.”¹

For the news of the Israel-Gaza war, I’ve been following Haaretz’ coverage along with others. Looking at the headlines on a daily basis, I’m often reminded of the opening lines of Steve Earle’s song “Jerusalem”: “I woke up this morning and none of the news was good.”

So here I’m giving some reactions to Haaretz headlines of December 12:

Haaretz headlines for the iPhone version in their daily roundup “Israel-Hamas War Day 60”

Main Headline: Netanyahu Rules Out International Force in Gaza

Netanyahu is showing no obvious intention in public to discuss anything other than unrestrained Israeli control of Gaza. He has even said he wants to “thin out” the (Palestinian) population of Gaza. (See below.)

Since Sunday, seven soldiers were killed in Gaza fighting

Giving the number of combat deaths for the home country is perfectly normal and a good thing to do. I would have liked to see major American news organizations during the Iraq War give regular daily updates on US deaths in that war.

IDF expands Gaza ground offensive to Khan Yunis, southern Gaza’s largest city

Israel evacuated most Palestinians in northern Gaza, telling them to go to southern Gaza to avoid Israeli bombing. Now the IDF is conducting massive bombing in southern Gaza. This is a strong indication that the Netanyahu government may be trying to drive Palestinians out of Gaza into the Egyptian desert. Netanyahu himself recently said he wants to “thin” the population in Gaza “to a minimum.”²

Hostages’ families livid after Netanyahu tells them ‘not possible’ to return all captives now

Even for someone who wasn’t a rightwing extremist jerk like Bibi Netanyahu would find dealing with hostage families a difficult situation. To do it right would require a sense of delicacy and decency, and there is little evidence Netanyahu is capable of either. Part of the urgency for families of hostages is that they know defense requirements have to take priority over the lives of hostages and they want to do all they can to make sure freeing the hostages remains a strong priority. Despite the special features of the hostage situation, this is part of the larger story of why Netanyahu’s anti-democracy government is so unpopular among Israelis.

U.S. imposes visa bans on Israeli settlers who engaged in West Bank violence against Palestinians

This is a good move by the Biden Administration. But unless the US is willing to impose serious cuts in military assistance to Israel if it doesn’t restrain from war crimes, it’s basically just a public-relations gesture at this point.

Rocket barrages fired at Tel Aviv, central and southern Israel

Yes, Hamas has rockets. Firing them indiscriminately at Israeli cities is a war crime and, yes, “Israel has a right to defend itself.” The missiles are relatively low-tech and the Iron Dome anti-missile defenses have apparently proven very effective against them. The civilian casualties inflicted by those missiles are a fraction of those Israeli bombing in Gaza are causing.

Anti-tank missiles fired from Lebanon to northern Israeli border town

See previous item. This is also important, because despite the horror that is occurring now in Gaza, the war could become a much wider one if Iran and its allied forces in Hezbollah become more heavily involved. Preventing the war from spreading is a major concern of the Biden Administration. But Israeli hawks have been trying for at least the last two decades to get the US involved in a war with Iran. A wider war could make the current situation much more catastrophic.

At least 1,200 civilians and soldiers killed in Israel since Oct. 7; over 138 hostages still held in Gaza

See “Since Sunday” item above. And see the following item.

Hamas-run health ministry: at least 15,899 dead in Gaza

Even Israel’s government has been using figures that largely track the Palestinian Health Ministry figures. Despite the propaganda point of insisting that reporters use “Hamas-run” before “health ministry,” (see video below³), the Palestinian Heath Ministry is actually an organization that covers both the West Bank and Gaza and is directed by the West Bank’s Palestinian Authority, although Hamas has been the de facto governing body in Gaza. Prior to October 7, the UN and news organizations had generally taken the Health Ministry’s death counts as credible without labeling it “Hamas-run.”

IDF increases number of Israeli hostages held in Gaza to 138

Official public IDF claims during an active are very suspect. They are an army, not a news organization.

Israeli army releases names of two reserve soldiers killed in northern Gaza Strip fighting

See “Since Sunday” item above.

Israeli air strike kills 45 in central Gaz’s Deir al-Balah, health officials say

See “Rocket barrages fired…” item above. At least the headline omitted the “Hamas-run” tag on this one.

Lebanese army says one soldier killed in Israeli shelling in south Lebanon

See “Antitank missiles fired …” above

Report: Israel weighing plan to flood Hamas’ Gaza tunnels

All Israeli claims about the tunnels in Gaza need careful scrutiny. Their elaborate claims about the tunnels complex under the Al-Shifi Hospital in northern Gaza which were allegedly used as Hamas’ central command center there remain dubious.⁴

Reports from Khan Yunis: Recent attacks are some of the largest since start of war

See “IDF expands Gaza ground offensive” item above. Khan Yunis is “southern Gaza’s main city.”⁵ As Reuters reports:

"We are in the most intense day since the beginning of the ground operation," the commander of the Israeli military's Southern Command, General Yaron Finkelman, said in a statement.

He said Israeli forces were also fighting in Jabalia, a large urban refugee camp and Hamas hotbed in northern Gaza next to Gaza City, and in Shuja'iyya, east of the city. [my emphasis]

Basically, the IDF seems to be treating this like open season on Gazan civilians in both the northern and southern parts:

After days of ordering residents to flee the area [in and around Khan Younis], Israeli forces dropped new leaflets on Tuesday with instructions to stay inside shelters and hospitals during the assault.

"Don’t get out. Going out is dangerous. You have been warned," said the leaflets, addressed to residents of six districts amounting to around a quarter of Khan Younis.

"Sixty days after the war began, our forces are now encircling the Khan Younis area," said Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, chief of Israel's General Staff, referring to the Oct. 7 Hamas incursion into Israel that triggered the conflict.

The accompanying video says that the war in Gaza “has driven 80% of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents from their homes.” The number of displaced Palestinian Arabs in the 1948 War of Independence in what’s known as the nakba (catastrophe) is usually estimated as 700,000.⁶

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Haaretz also carried this photo on their main online page on the same day. This relates to a talking point that Israel has been emphasizing the last several days which ludicrously claims that women’s-right advocates in the West have been ignoring the use of sexual violence by Hamas forces. It’s particularly notable here that the photo features a banner that says “believe all women,” a version of the long-time feminist anti-violence motto, “Believe Women.” One certainly hopes that Haaretz doesn’t intend to let claims made by women officially speaking for the Netanyahu government or the IDF go without critical examination.

Haaretz has been doing serious reporting on the investigations of actual cases of systematic use of rape by Hamas, including the article headlined in the image above, which focuses on the work of the Civil Commission headed by Dr. Cochav Elkayam-Levy.⁷ This is a serious and important issue, however it may be instrumentalized by various parties, including Islamophobic ones.

To emphasize it again, the accusation that Western feminists support Hamas or any other military force in committing rape is absurd and downright sleazy. CNN’s Dana Bash offered a recent example of using this claim in a plainly ridiculous way.⁸

1. Benjakob, Omer (2023): How Media Outlets Like Haaretz Are Weaponized in the Fake News Wars Over Israel and Hamas. Haaretz 12/04/2023. <https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-12-04/ty-article/.premium/how-media-outlets-like-haaretz-are-weaponized-in-the-fake-news-wars-over-israel-and-hamas/0000018c-3076-d15f-a7af-b27664390000> (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

2. Grim, Ryan (2023): Netanyahu’s Goal for Gaza: “Thin” Population “to a Minimum”. The Intercept 12/03/2023. <https://theintercept.com/2023/12/03/netanyahu-thin-gaza-population> (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

Heer, Jeet (2023): Biden’s Bear Hug of Netanyahu Is a Disaster. The Nation 12/04/2023. <https://www.thenation.com/article/world/biden-netanyahu-bear-hug-disaster/> (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

3. MSNBC Cancelled Mehdi Hasan’s Show After This Inteview. The Majority Report w/ Sam Seder YouTube channel. (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

4. Scahill, Jeremy (2023): Al-Shifa Hiospital, Hamas's Tunnels, and Israeli Propaganda. The Intercept 11/21/2023. <https://theintercept.com/2023/11/21/al-shifa-hospital-hamas-israel/> (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

5. Massoud, Bassam & Mustafa, Ibraheem Abu (2023): Israeli forces storm Khan Younis in south Gaza, killing scores of Palestinians. Reuters 12/05/2023. <https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-intensifies-southern-gaza-offensive-us-un-urge-civilian-protections-2023-12-05/> (Accessed: 2023-06-12). Includes video.

6. Drauss, Joseph (2023): In Israel’s call for mass evacuation, Palestinians hear echoes of their original catastrophic exodus. AP News 10/14/2023. <https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-gaza-evacuation-history-nakba-a1bec1ee3477573e80b39b4044a48111> (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

Interestingly enough, this 2017 Al Jazeera report gives an unusally low estimate, which would make the contrast to the current Gaza displacements even greater: The Nakba did not start or end in 1948: Key facts and figures on the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. Al Jazeera 05/23/2017. <https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2017/5/23/the-nakba-did-not-start-or-end-in-1948> (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

7. Glazer, Hilo (2023): The Scope of Hamas' Campaign of Rape Against Israeli Women Is Revealed, Testimony After Testimony. Haaretz 11/30/2023. <https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-11-30/ty-article-magazine/.highlight/hamas-campaign-of-rape-against-israeli-women-is-revealed-testimony-after-testimony/0000018c-2144-da36-a1de-6767dac90000> (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

8. Jayapal Attacked After Condemning BOTH Hamas And IDF Violence. The Young Turks YouTube channel 12/05/223. (Accessed: 2023-06-12).

Jayapal BLASTED For 'Both Sides'ing Alleged Hamas' Sexual Violence On Oct 7. The HIll YouTube channel 06/11/2023. (Accessed: 2023-06-12). This segment cites a Max Blumenthal commentary as evidence for supposed progressive claims. Blumenthal actually has had limited credibility from most left-leaning journalists for years, despite some of his earlier investigative reporting of the American far right, such as his book on the Christian Right, Republican Gomorrah: Inside the Movement that Shattered the Party (2009).