#824 10/16/16 – This Week in the Washington Post: “Haram al-Sharif … and other Muslim holy sites in the West Bank”

 

WHILE YOU STAND ON ONE LEG: Jews and Christians rightfully protested UNESCO’s “Occupied Palestine” resolution this week.  Lost in the outcry is that the mainstream Western media, at least the Washington Post in this morning’s Philadelphia Inquirer, went UNESCO one further in referencing as exclusively Muslim names places no less holy to Christians and Jews. 

This Week in The Washington Post:  “Haram al-Sharif … and other Muslim holy sites in the West Bank”

This newsletter is a “media watch,” by which I mean it focuses not expressly on international injustices to Jews, but on how our mainstream media misreports injustices to Jews.

What the UNESCO Resolution Said

There was at least one major international injustice to the Jewish people (and btw Christians) this week.  The UNESCO branch of the United Nations gave initial passage to a resolution, titled “Occupied Palestine,” roasting “Israel, the occupying Power,” for, inter alia [emphasis added],

***  “the continuous storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif by Israeli right-wing extremists and uniformed forces”;

***  “the continuous Israeli aggressions against civilians including Islamic religious figures and priests, … the forceful entering into the different mosques and historic buildings inside Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif by different Israeli employees including the so-called ‘Israeli Antiquities’ officials ….”;

***  “obstruction of the immediate execution of all of the 18 Hashemite restoration projects in and around Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif,” while stating that UNESCO “deprecates,” among other Israeli actions, “the enforced creation of a new Jewish prayer platform south of the Mughrabi Ascent in Al-Buraq Plaza ‘Western Wall Plaza’”; etc.

Note the contrast between Al-Buraq Plaza, not in quotes, and the immediately following “Western Wall Plaza,” in quotes, and the cheap shot   “so-called ‘Israeli Antiquities’ officials.’”

The resolution repeatedly referenced capital-E “East Jerusalem,” and insistently referred to the Temple Mount over and over exclusively as “Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif,” and as the Temple Mount not at all.

Somewhat on the other hand, though, it referred to “the two Palestinian sites of Al-Haram Al Ibrahim/Tomb of the Patriarchs in Al-Khalil/Hebron and the Bilal Ibn Rabah Mosque/Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem,” with no quotes around the Jewish/Christian names for them, and acknowledged that UNESCO “shares the conviction affirmed by the international community that the two sites are of religious significance for Judaism, Christianity and Islam.”

How the Media Reported It

So what do we have a right to expect from the Western media in reporting on this resolution?  Better than what was reported in a short article this morning by the Washington Post (Philadelphia Inquirer, Sun, 10/16/16, A4, WP, “Israel: Cooperation with U.N. Group Halted”).

The Inq’s WP article began by reporting that Israel was suspending cooperation with UNESCO, “contending that the international body ignored Jewish ties to its holiest site.”  It stated that Israel rejected Thursday’s resolution “that criticizes Israel’s actions in an around Jerusalem’s holiest site and fails to explicitly refer to the Jewish connection to the place.”

Fair enough.  The resolution did fail to refer to what Jews (and Christians) have referenced as the Temple Mount for millennia as “the Temple Mount,” the site where the two Jewish Temples had successively stood for a millennium.  But the entities that Jews and Christians had the most right to expect would refer to the Temple Mount as “the Temple Mount” were not the seven Arab countries which introduced the UNESCO resolution, but mainstream Western media pillars including the Philadelphia Inquirer and Washington Post.

Instead, what Inq and WP readers got was, not only exclusive Inq and WP use of the Muslim name, Al-Haram/Al-Sharif, for the Temple Mount, but even Inq and WP omission of Jewish-Christian connection (let alone names, which even the resolution’s Arab drafters used in parallel) to the Patriarchs’ and Rachel’s Tombs.

Washington Post today in the Inq:

“The resolution, which was submitted by seven Arab countries at a meeting in Paris, highlights a long list of what it called Israeli violations of the Haram al-Sharif and al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest site after Mecca and Medina, and other Muslim holy sites in the West Bank.”  [emphasis added]

It is not a good omen for Westerners’ perception of Jewish-Christian Holy Land links that the mainstream Western media refers to the Tomb of the [Jewish] Patriarchs and [Jewish matriarch] Rachel’s Tomb as “Muslim holy sites in the West Bank,” and that it refers to the Temple Mount as “the Haram al-Sharif and al-Aqsa Mosque.”

Jewish and Christian uproar this week was directed, rightly, at UNESCO, for exclusively calling the Temple Mount, over and over, Al-Haram Al-Sharif.”  Less noticed was that the Western media, at least the Washington Post in this morning’s Inq, did the UNESCO resolution’s Arab drafters one better.  The WP not only exclusively used the Muslim name for the Temple Mount, as did the resolution, but, which the resolution did not, exclusively called the Patriarchs’ and Rachel’s Tombs “Muslim holy sites in the West Bank.”

Previous Instance

Incredibly, this is not the first time that the Washington Post has gone the U.N. one better.  BSMW #731 of 1/4/15 noted that thanks to the vote of an African leader named Goodluck Jonathan, a UNSC resolution that week blasting Israel had failed by one vote, obviating need for a U.S. veto.  The resolution had called for two-state solution “borders based on the 4 June 1967 lines” [emphasis added], i.e., the 1949 Israel-Jordan ceasefire lines, expressly defined as military ceasefire lines only, not as political borders.  But the Washington Post’s article of 12/31/14 (Inq, A10) wrote that the resolution called “for Israel to withdraw to its 1967 borders,” and that the resolution “said a final deal should be based on borders that existed before the 1967 war.” [emphasis added]  “Borders” have an international law gravitas which military ceasefire lines, including the 1949 one that left Israel 9-miles-wide in the lowland most-populated center, don’t.

“Temple Mount” vs “Al-Haram/Al-Sharif” – Not Laches Yet

“Laches” – “negligence or delay in doing something, especially in pursuing a legal claim”

Some of the Jews with whom I plead to stop saying “West Bank” dismissively smile and (by me, shamefully) say, “I’m not going to fight that battle, it was lost a long time ago.”  (I don’t even ask them to stop calling Palestine’s Arabs “THE Palestinians,” which used to be, or at least include, Palestine’s Jews, though they should.)  Well, here’s a few battles – Temple Mount, Tomb of the Patriarchs, Rachel’s Tomb – that are just now being lost.  Not laches yet.