“Deporting The Hope For Peace?” Newsweek asked. The hope for peace was Hamas.
The year was 1992. The Clinton administration was trying to get Israeli Prime Minister Rabin to sign on the dotted line of the peace process to create a' ‘Palestinian’ state, but Hamas terrorists wouldn’t stop killing Israelis.
15-year-old Helena Rapp was stabbed to death at a bus stop on the way to school. Several days later, Rabbi Shimon Biran, a father of four, was murdered by an Islamic terrorist.
Fed up with the latest killings, Prime Minister Rabin put 417 Islamists terrorists, including top Hamas leaders, on buses and dumped them in Lebanon.
On the six buses were Hamas leader Ismael Haniyeh, Hamas co-founder Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi, who would vow, “by Allah, we will not leave one Jew in Palestine”, Abu Osama, who helped draft the Hamas charter calling for the extermination of the Jews, Hamas co-founders Mohammed Taha, Hammad Al-Hasanat, and Mahmoud Zahar, who threatened “They have legitimized the killing of their people all over the world by killing our people”, Hamad Al-Bitawi, who proclaimed that “Jihad is a collective duty” along with Abdullah al-Shami, the head of Islamic Jihad, and many other present and future Islamic terror leaders deported to Lebanon.
The New York Timesheadlined its coverage, “Ousted Arabs Shiver and Wait in Lebanese Limbo”. Newsweek also sympathetically described how the Hamas terrorists were “shivering in the cold.” The Washington Post lingered on their handcuff “welts”. The Associated Press provided detailed coverage of their cases of diarrhea turning the bowel movements of Islamist terrorists into an item worthy of international coverage.
In reality the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists had been equipped by Israel with raincoats, blankets, food and $50 each: more than enough to buy whatever they needed in Lebanon.
“We are thirsty, cold and hungry,” said Dr. Abdul-Aziz Rantisi,” is how the Times began its story. It mentioned that Rantisi was planning a hunger strike, not that he was a terrorist leader.
The Los Angeles Times suggested that the “free speech” of the terrorists had been violated. It asked them to “define Hamas’ membership conditions” and ”many answered, ‘To pray and be good Muslims.’”
That is how the media explained the Islamic terror group to Americans.