Media outlets around the world are showing dead and dying Palestinian babies in hospitals — but what they are not showing is who murdered these babies.
The answer is clear. American intelligence has now revealed that Hamas has built its command centers and its tunnels underneath hospitals. It has also revealed that Hamas has been stealing fuel intended for hospital generators.
Babies are now dying because Hamas has stolen the fuel to run these generators. Babies are also dying because Hamas is using them as human shields to protect its murderous terrorists.
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Yet much of the media and the international community continue to point the finger of blame at Israel for these dead babies. That only encourages Hamas to continue to use its decades-long “dead baby strategy,” which works because the media continues to show the dead babies without explaining the truth about who killed them.
The time has come — indeed it is long overdue — for the media outlets to start telling the truth. But they won’t, in part because they prefer bloody images of dead babies over thoughtful analysis of the root causes of these tragic deaths. “If it bleeds it leads,” and if the bleeding comes from babies, it leads even more powerfully.
The main cause of these deaths is Hamas strategy, and a secondary cause is the role of the media in implementing the Hamas strategy. A third group that bears some responsibility for the dead Palestinian babies is comprised of Gazan doctors, United Nations personnel and other supposed do-gooders.
Representatives for these groups appear regularly on television categorically denying that there is any Hamas presence in or beneath the hospitals. One such doctor recently said that, in the 10 years he has worked at the hospital, he has never seen a Hamas terrorist.
The reality is that Hamas could not operate in and around the hospitals without the knowledge and complicity of hospital administrators, doctors and the UN. These organizations have undeserved credibility with the media because of their titles, but the reality is that they toe the Hamas line and repeat its propaganda.
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Babies — both Palestinian and Israeli—will continue to die as long as the cynical Hamas strategy is successful, as it has been for decades. The world is turning against Israel and in favor of Hamas as the terror group causes the deaths of more and more Palestinian babies.
The only way to break this cycle is for the media and the international community to expose and condemn it as a clear violation of the laws of war, which expressly prohibit the use of hospitals and patients to protect terrorists. Yet this gross and highly visible violation is not condemned by the United Nations, the International Criminal Court nor other credible organizations.
Israel, on the other hand, is repeatedly condemned for attacking terrorists who hide in hospitals and use patients as shields. Under international law, any hospital that is used for military purposes loses its status as a protected medical facility. Israel must still make reasonable efforts to avoid hurting patients, as it is doing. It has offered to evacuate patients to field hospitals and hospital ships, but Hamas tries to prevent patients from moving because they’re needed to shield their terrorists.
Israel has now produced videos of the military bases underneath the hospitals, as well as of Hamas terrorists stealing fuel that was intended for medical use. It has also shown videos of an armed Hamas terrorist walking into a hospital with a rocket launcher clearly visible on his shoulder. But these images are largely ignored by viewers and commentators in favor of the more dramatic images of the dead babies. That too is part of the Hamas strategy.
So next time you see a dead Palestinian baby on TV, shed a tear for that innocent victim. But point the finger of guilt at Hamas, not Israel, if you don’t want to see more dead babies murdered by Hamas.
Alan Dershowitz is professor emeritus at Harvard Law School and the author of “Get Trump,” “Guilt by Accusation” and “The Price of Principle.” Andrew Stein, a Democrat, served as New York City Council president, 1986-94. This piece is republished from the Alan Dershowitz Newsletter.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect those of teh Tampa Free Press.
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