Golriz Ghahraman has no idea how right she is when she makes her many factually incorrect claims about the Israel – Palestinian territories conflict.
My favourite claim of hers is her claim about Apartheid, and she is so so right: it does exist. Yes, there is a place where one race is not allowed to purchase land or vote or even live but wait…it is not in Israel, it is in the Palestinian territories ruled by the terrorist group, Hamas.
Then there is the claim that hate is being promoted and she is quite correct it is. It is being funded by UNRWA who along with distributing anti-Semitic textbooks to Palestinian school children have also been caught sharing violently anti-Jewish social media posts.
Golriz likes to talk about the Palestinians being oppressed and she is quite right even though she is wrong about who is oppressing them. They are oppressed by Hamas. Hamas take all the aid money sent to the Palestinians to enable them to build schools, hospitals, homes and a thriving economy and use it to dig tunnels and buy weapons of war. They also brutally punish Palestinians who step out of line.
Then there are the claims this week of aggression and acts of incitement but wait…the media have neglected to mention the long list of incitements by Palestinians that led up to Israel’s eventual retaliation.
Monday this week more than 160 rockets were fired into Israel from Gaza and that is not even counting the long list of incitements that came before the firestorm of rockets.
Imagine here in New Zealand hundreds of indiscriminately targeted rockets raining down on your town or city.
Below is a video taken six years ago when my husband Cam was in Israel with a group of other journalists from around the world. See how scary just one rocket was to them and then imagine 160 rockets where even the miracle that is Iron Dome cannot destroy them all before they hit.
Golriz, like the mainstream media, likes to talk about military force not being proportionate, and she is right even though she is wrong. Israel sends precisely targeted missiles and only hits the targets it intends to hit.
Israel also sends a warning missile that makes a lot of noise but that doesn’t destroy anything to give civilians in the targeted area notice that the building is about to be destroyed giving them time to get out.
Hamas on the other hand indiscriminately sends multiple if not hundreds of missiles that are not targeted, with no concern at all about hitting civilians including their own people. They don’t give any warnings because they have zero care for civilians.
Next time you hear Golriz Ghahraman (President of the Tablecloth Wearing Association) open her yap to condemn Israel, consider how right she is even though she is completely wrong. The evils she complains about are very real. There is Apartheid, hate is promoted, the Palestinians are oppressed, there are acts of incitement and military force is not proportionate.