Nuggets from "Judgment Day: Islam, Israel, and the Nations" by Dave Hunt

Nuggets from “Judgment Day: Islam, Israel, and the Nations” by Dave Hunt

After reporting in headlines and sensational stories of “eyewitness accounts” that hundreds of civilians had been massacred in early April 2002 by Israeli troops in Jenin, the media was forced to admit that they had been deceived by the Palestinian propaganda machine. Reports that Israel had bombed Jenin into rubble brought protests worldwide and calls for intervention by the United Nations. The truth, as was finally admitted, was far different. In an attempt to minimize civilian casualties, instead of using available planes and artillery, Israeli troops risked their lives taking control of Jenin by fighting door to door. Colonel Gal Hirsh, head of operations in the Central Command declared:

“Many of the Palestinians that were killed were armed terrorists; many had explosive devices strapped to their bodies [when they preteneded to surrender]. I regret that some Palestinian civilians were injured and some were killed. We were fighting against armed terrorists. We asked the Palestinian civilians to evacuate their homes so they would not get hurt; some chose not to.”

One of the many newspapers that trumpeted the bogus accounts in order to cast Israel in the worst possible light, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, finally was forced to admit that its handling of the alleged “Jenin massacre” had been “awful…an editorial disaster…egregious stumble….” The New York Times and Associated Press at last admitted that Human Rights Watch had found “no evidence” of a massacre.

The final count for the ten days of fierce fighting was forty-five Palestinians (most of them terrorists) killed and twenty-three Israeli soldiers.