Moral equivalency and victim blaming.

On October 12, two Arabs cousins, one 17 (some sources say 15) and the other 13 set out on a mission to hunt and kill Jews. Armed with knives, the felonious duo traveled to Pisgat Zeev, a quiet Jewish community in northern Jerusalem to carry out their act of savagery.

Their first target was a 25 year old man who sustained serious injuries but nonetheless managed to escape his attackers. Their second target was a 13-year old boy on his bicycle who had just exited a candy shop. They stabbed him in the neck and kicked him in the head while he was on the ground before being chased off by bystanders. The boy was brought to the hospital in critical condition, hovering between life and death but miraculously recovered from his dreadful injuries.

The stabbing spree finally came to an end when police officers shot and killed the older knife-wielding assailant while the younger felon, Ahmed Manasra, was run over by a car driven by a civilian. Manasra was given life-saving treatment at Hadassah Hospital where he informed his treating physicians that he “went there to stab Jews.” That candid and horrifying admission was corroborated by CCTV footage showing both assailants armed with long knives prowling for their victims and then attacking them mercilessly.

The two Arab terrorists who executed this cowardly attack were motivated by the same xenophobic factors that prompted white supremacist Frazier Glenn Cross, to carry out his murderous shooting spree at two Jewish affiliated sites in Overland Park, Kansas. Base anti-Semitism, inspired by age-old conspiracy theories, was the single motivating factor for both attacks. Anyone arguing otherwise is either naïve, delusional or deliberately mendacious.

The New York Times, the paper that played host to the notorious Max Blumenthal, a man admired by Frazier Glenn Cross, unfortunately falls into one of these three categories but probably the latter. Over the years, the Gray Lady has steadily evolved itself into a mouthpiece for Palestinian propaganda and conspiracy theories. Its writers who cover the Arab-Israeli topic area have readily acknowledged adopting the Palestinian narrative and throwing objectivity out the window.

Israeli (and US citizen) motorists murdered in Palestinian rock-throwing attacks are deemed unworthy of mention and when their murders are belatedly noted, they’re sanitized as simple “car accidents.” Palestinian terrorists killed while executing terrorist attacks are generally treated as victims killed by Israeli occupation soldiers in attention grabbing headlines. Only when delving deeper into the article is the reader informed of the actual circumstances of death.

The New York Times’ reporting of the October 12 Givat Zeev attack approaches the incident with the same remarkable deceitfulness. The juvenile felon who attempted to murder two people is portrayed sympathetically.

Disregarding the weight of evidence, including Manasra’s own revealing admission to Hadassah doctors as well as actual CCTV footage of the incident, NYT reporters Rami Nazzal and Isabel Kershner give credence to the notion that Manasra was merely an unenthusiastic participant under his older cousin’s influence. They cite an absurd claim by Manasra’s lawyer that Manasra attempted to stop his cousin by shouting that the knife attack against the boy was “Haram,” Arabic for forbidden. Absent from their reportage was Manasra’s damning admission that he came to Pisgat Zeev to stab Jews.

In an attempt to garner yet more sympathy for the terrorist, the authors note that following his capture, Manasra was subjected to taunts and verbal abuse by “Israeli passersby” and that an Israeli interrogator shouted “aggressively” at him prompting him to cry and “pound his head.” Meanwhile, the knifing victims of the brutal attack are given mere cursory mention. The authors place Manasra’s hurt feelings on the same pedestal as a slashed jugular.

Perhaps even more absurdly, the authors rehash libelous Palestinian claims that Israelis are subjecting innocent Palestinians to extrajudicial executions and planting knives at the scene. Other than baseless Palestinian accusations, the authors provide not a scintilla of evidence to back such spurious allegations. The objective is to surreptitiously plant the idea of Israeli maleficence in the reader’s mind by regurgitating nonsensical Palestinian claims that amount to the modern day version of a Passover blood libel. I guess the blood found on the knives lying next to those dead Palestinians came from Israelis who stabbed themselves before framing the scene; clever Jews.

The article’s theme is one couched in moral equivalence where terrorist is portrayed as victim; a victim of his cousin’s overbearing influence and in a larger sense, a victim of the so-called Israeli “occupation” and Israeli policies with respect to the Temple Mount. There is of course no mention of Palestinian incitement and base anti-Semitism broadcast repeatedly on Palestinian Authority media and “educational” outlets as well as in religious Islamic sermons. Jews in Palestinian society are routinely vilified as usurpers and depicted as apes, pigs and monkeys who “desecrate [the Al-Aqsa] with their filthy feet.”

This incessant brainwashing represents the core source for Palestinian terror and perpetuation of conflict. Of course the New York Times editors would dare not expose their readers to such information for that would run counter to the narrative the Gray Lady wishes to present. It is indeed a sad day for journalism.