Israel's moral refusers are fake news
Israel's moral refusers are fake news

Thirteen Arab parliamentarians at the Israeli Knesset interrupted US Vice President Mike Pence's speech by brandishing slogans such as “Jerusalem, the capital of Palestine” and shouting remarks in Arabic. In no other legislative body in the Middle East, on the condition that you find another democracy, could such a scene occur.

Israel protects the right to any opinion, even those considered unfair and scandalous in a country at war since its foundation (Haaretz even published a page inviting boycotts of Israel). But the media around the world, including Italians, have been publishing articles about Israeli objectors for a month, a phenomenon which could fall into the category of fake news.

It is now the turn of the pilots of El Al airline who are opposed to the repatriation of African migrants. Newsweek headlined: “Israeli pilots refuse to deport refugees to Africa”. “I will not send refugees to death. I will not participate in this barbarism”, wrote one of the pilots on Facebook, Iddo Elad. Another pilot, Shaul Betzer, always on Facebook: “As a pilot and as a human being I do not intend to participate in any way in the transport of refugees in a place where the chances of survival are reduced to zero for them”.

Then you find out that it is only 3 El Al pilots. 3 pilots out of the 600 currently employed by the Israeli flag carrier, one of them an extreme leftist. But 3 are enough to make news all over the world.

Then there was the case of “rabbis” who asked people to hide African refugees at their homes, “as in the story of Anne Frank”. The idea and the comparison, a bit shameful, come from Susan Silverman, a progressive rabbi in Boston, sister of the comic Sarah, as well as head of the Rabbis' organization for human rights. It is an ultra minority group linked to the extreme left and with zero influence in the Israeli society. But enough to collect the applause of the media around the world.

A few days earlier it was the turn of the letter, also bounced in the newspapers around the whole world, of 63 Israeli high school students who refused to serve in protest of the “Israeli occupation”. Every year, Israel brings 7,000 new recruits into the ranks of the army. 63 new soldiers over 7,000.. But enough to spam the media.

The 650 Israeli high schoolers, soon to be new recruits, who responded with a counter-letter to that of the 63 didn't deserve to appear in the global media: “We will serve wherever Israel needs us. We want to declare that we will continue to serve in the army and in national service to defend people and our country”.

The New York Times, not the last of the media in the world, has published an article by one of these objectors entitled: “Why I will not serve in the Israeli army”. Israeli newspapers are full of such stories, the pledge of a pluralism that makes Israel the only democracy from Morocco to India. But the New York Times would never publish the article of one of the 650 young Israelis proud to serve Israel.

How was that on fake news?