PA attacks PMW for "wild incitement campaign"
The PA attacks PMW
for "wild incitement campaign"
against PA radio
- Damaged by ongoing PMW reports, PA Ministry of Information and PA radio launch verbal attacks on PMW
- PA Ministry of Information: "The repeated claims of the Israeli center [PMW] are part of the deceptive Zionist discourse"
By Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik
The Palestinian Authority has reopened its verbal attacks on Palestinian Media Watch. This follows PMW's repeated exposure of incitement to violence on official PA radio, including the broadcast of a recent song calling for Martyrdom for Jerusalem.
A few days after PMW reported that The Voice of Palestine station had broadcast a song encouraging Palestinians to "redeem" Jerusalem "with your life and blood", the station's Director-General Bassam Daghlas, accused PMW of "waging an incitement campaign" against the station."Director-General of [the official PA radio station] The Voice of Palestine Bassam Daghlas said that 'The incitement campaign that the Israeli center Palestinian Media Watch is waging against The Voice of Palestine radio station is not the first case, as it has been subject to similar attacks in the past.' ...
He also emphasized that 'Our media message is clear and will not change, and if they consider playing national songs incitement, they can think what they want."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Jan. 25, 2018]
The PA Ministry of Information also attacked PMW, claiming PMW is waging a "wild incitement campaign" against The Voice of Palestine, and that PMW reports are "part of the deceptive Zionist discourse":"The [PA] Ministry of Information believes that the wild incitement campaign that the Israeli center called Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) is waging against [the official PA] radio station The Voice of Palestine projects on the other... what happens within its own entity [Israel], and that it [PMW] already waged other attacks against the Palestinian, Arab, and international media... The ministry said that the repeated claims of the Israeli center [PMW] are part of the deceptive Zionist discourse - that is full of incitement and that is the sole sponsor of terror and the ugly racism."
[PA Ministry of Information website, Jan, 24, 2018, emphasis added]
The PA has attacked PMW for exposing PA incitement to hate and terror numerous times.Last year, PLO Executive Committee member Hanan Ashrawi counted PMW among the "toxic organizations," accusing PMW of just waiting "to attack": |  |
"And then there are toxic organizations, as you know, and they have been very effective in distorting the Palestinian message on reality... You have the PM Watch which is also waiting for any Palestinian to open his or her mouth, and they attack."
[Youtube Channel of Washington Report on Middle East Affairs,
March 27, 2017]
The Head of the Press Office of the PA Ministry of Information, Nida Younis, told PA TV in 2015 that the Israeli Foreign Ministry "has intensified, for instance, through the PMW organization, the incitement against the Palestinians and the Palestinian curriculum." [Official PA TV, Dec. 17, 2015]
Earlier, official PA TV attacked PMW director Itamar Marcus:
"Welcome dear viewers to a new episode of Israeli Media in the Spotlight. The incitement on the Israeli channels continues... In order to incite against President Abbas and the Palestinian media, Israeli Channel 10 (sic, Channel 20) was helped by Itamar Marcus, director of the Israeli organization PALWATCH (PMW), which specializes in monitoring PA TV. The [Israeli] channel accused President [Abbas] of igniting the escalation [of violence] in Jerusalem."
[Official PA TV, Oct. 3, 2015]
The official PA news agency has likewise attacked PMW:
The current attacks on PMW also follow PMW's exposure of the fact that the PA radio station broadcast at least 28 times PA Chairman Abbas' call from 2014 in which he encouraged Palestinians to "prevent" Jews "in any way" from "defiling" Muslim and Christian holy places:"The WAFA news agency monitors the incitement and racism against Palestinians and Arabs that appear in the Israeli media. Following is what appeared in its report no. 267 ... The Israeli paper Israel Today published an article by Nadav Shragai which incites against Palestinian children. Shragai claimed in his article that 'the Palestinian children nurse hate from their families, and the kindergartens and schools are what turn them into terrorists and murderers.'.. [based on] the new PMW report, Education in the PA - a recipe for hate and terror.”
[WAFA, official PA news agency, Dec. 16, 2015]
PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas: "This is our Sanctuary, our Al-Aqsa and our Church [of the Holy Sepulchre]. They have no right to enter it. They have no right to defile it. We must prevent them. Let us stand before them with chests bared to protect our holy places."
[Official PA radio station The Voice of Palestine, 28 times,
Dec. 6, 2017 - Jan. 1, 2018]
PMW has further documented that a host on official PA radio called Israel a "cancerous entity," stating that "everyone knows [the Jews] have no right to this land":
Official PA radio host: "Those who established and support the Zionist movement created these religious illusions and lies in the holy city [of Jerusalem]... in order to plant the cancerous entity [of Israel] in the Arab region as part of a new colonial scheme to control it... Everyone knows that in the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religions they [the Jews] have no right to this land, and these are firm facts."
[Official PA radio The Voice of Palestine, Sign of Hope, Jan. 1, 2018]
The following are longer excerpts of the reports mentioned above
Headline: "The Voice of Palestine: Our coverage will continue despite the Israeli incitement against us"
"Director-General of [the official PA radio station] The Voice of Palestine Bassam Daghlas said that 'The incitement campaign that the Israeli center Palestinian Media Watch is waging against The Voice of Palestine radio station is not the first case, as it has been subject to similar attacks in the past.' ...
He also emphasized that 'Our media message is clear and will not change, and if they consider playing national songs incitement, they can think what they want. We will continue in our work to convey what is happening on the ground and our full and comprehensive media coverage of events, whether in the Palestinian territories or by monitoring everything related to the members of our people abroad.'
In the same context, the [PA] Ministry of Information... said yesterday [Jan. 24, 2018] in a statement that the repeated claims of the Israeli center [PMW] are a part of the deceptive Zionist discourse - that is full of incitement and that is the sole sponsor of terror and the ugly racism - and [that PMW's claims] are a broken and worn out record."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Jan. 25, 2018]
Headline: "The [PA] Ministry of Information: We are The Voice of Palestine, the voice of freedom, this is who we were, and this is who we will remain"
"The [PA] Ministry of Information believes that the wild incitement campaign that the Israeli center called Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) is waging against [the official PA] radio station The Voice of Palestine projects on the other - whoever it may be - what happens within its own entity [Israel], and that it [PMW] already waged other attacks against the Palestinian, Arab, and international media.
[The Ministry of Information] emphasized that the Voice of Palestine and all of our media outlets are the podiums of Palestine's freedom and the eyes that stand watch in order to persecute the occupation's terror against our people, our land, and the sites holy to Islam and Christianity.
The ministry said that this methodical campaign took place several days before the celebrations of World Radio Day that takes place every Feb. 13.
The ministry said that the repeated claims of the Israeli center [PMW] are part of the deceptive Zionist discourse - that is full of incitement and that is the sole sponsor of terror and the ugly racism - and [that PMW's claims] are a broken and worn our record.
It noted that the occupation is the spiritual father of the incitement, and that it constitutes a fertile ground for extremism, ethnic cleansing, the denial of our people's legitimate rights, defying international law, and closing any opening for a balanced peace.
The ministry blessed the guardians of truth at The Voice of Palestine and all of our media institutions, who are persecuted by a mentality of arrogance and madness, constitute a target for the blind Israeli hatred's bullets, and persecuted by aggressive steps."
[PA Ministry of Information website, Jan, 24, 2018]