A June 9, 2006 photo, of a Palestinian girl on a Gaza beach wailing in mourning for her family killed by an Israeli shell, went viral. Press reports later, after complaints of 'anti-Israel media bias,' changed the subject and equivocated on details (see previous blog post of 5 tactics to make 'case for Israel') of who fired the shell was it Israel or a buried weapons cache that exploded and killed the family. The change of subject also had the effect of shifting blame from Israel with, at least, a controversy startup that inhibited dialogue and preserved mass first impressions from challenge by making the subject 'impolite' to 'bring up' under 'social rules of getting along with people' not to 'bring up' 'controversial' subjects.
A similar change of subject 6 and a half years later, Nov 15, 2012 to be exact, from the subject of a Washington Post front page picture to who is pictured shows the same messaging methodology used by pro-Israel occupation security advocates at the JCRC of Greater Washington. A picture of a child looking defiant or violent has better influence for Israeli conflict narrative messaging as the child looks less like an innocent victim. The messaging tactic is to start a controversy about the picture to inhibit further dialogue to prevent the picture from having influence that the pro-Israel occupation security advocates don't want. That June 2006 beach shooting had the influence of ending a 16 month truce on rocket firings Hamas imposed on itself despite having been blockaded in the West Bank and Gaza since Israel's Sept 2005 withdrawal that started the destruction of Gaza's export-based economy. Hamas had been freely and unexpectedly elected by too many people making protest votes against Fatah corruption, taking power then in the West Bank and Gaza on Mar 30, 2006, and was never given a chance to govern.
David Makovsky, of the AIPAC-founded Washington Institute for Near East Policy, claimed Hamas planned an April 17, 2006 suicide bombing of a Tel Aviv falafel restaurant in the old central bus station, in a May 10, 2006 interview on the NPR program To the Point syndicated by kcrw.org. In fact Palestinian Islamic Jihad had actually claimed responsibility. The connection to Hamas was never clearly stated by Makovsky in the To the Point guest appearance. The only connection CNN made was similar wording against Israel's right to exist as a country, in a poor phrasing of opposition to a country's policies, in the charters of the two groups. Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas are as separate organizationally, while allied ideologically, as the pro-Israel occupation security groups like regional JCRCs and JCPA and AIPAC and RJC and camera.org are.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/04/17/telaviv.blast/index.html for accurate reporting of who claimed responsibility for the April 17, 2006 bombing.
Makovsky gave a conference call on Nov 20, 2012 to the JCRC of Greater Washington describing events in the Nov 2012 Pillar of Defense war.
Ahmed Jabari, whose killing started the current escalation of violence by Israel, was involved in negotiating, with an Israeli who had already helped negotiate the release of Gilad Shalit on Oct 12, 2011, another truce on rocket launches and he had the power to enforce any agreements.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israeli-peace-activist-hamas-leader-jabari-killed-amid-talks-on-long-term-truce.premium-1.478085
http://radioornot.com/blog/eve-of-destruction/
Ahmed Jabari may have done, or been an accessory to, evil acts of violence in the past but turning to negotiating made him a combatant for peace in action. Visit combatantsforpeace.org for more examples of former Palestinian militants and IDF soldiers turning to peaceful coexistence.
Remember two days later, on Nov 17, 2012, the Washington Post printed a picture of an anti-war protest in Cairo with a child held up by adult protesters.
http://news.yahoo.com/photos/photo-of-the-day-slideshow-slideshow/egyptian-boy-leads-protesters-chanting-slogans-against-israeli-photo-163608287.html
Don't focus so narrowly on each article or photo look at many articles and photos over a short period of time for a cumulative view. When media coverage is monitored cumulatively, not article by article in a vacuum from other articles, the coverage quite often favors the Israeli occupation as a security measure and supports the continuing placement of security for Israelis as a priority over Palestinian freedom of movement of people and goods. The possibility that allowing more freedom of movement of people and goods by and for Palestinians would also make Israelis more secure is rarely stated directly and unambiguously.
A similar dispute related to messages communicated by pictures of children occurred in June 2007 when a standwithus.com poster of a child dressed as a bomber with the 'Hamas Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad change your charters and change your future' tagline was placed in Washington, DC metrorail stations to counter an endtheoccupation.org '40 years is enough' poster showing a boy walking to school in front of an Israeli tank promoting a
[Updated June 7, 2017 new links and photos added]
June 10, 2007 anti-occupation rally. The picture was an accurate representation of what many Palestinians must live through to carry out routine life activities like school or job commuting because all are criminal suspects because of the actions of a few violent extremists or terrorists. The headline in the articles in the latter 2 links describing the ad as "anti-Israel" can be misleading because of the ease of reader and 'media monitor/activist' misinterpretation of what the 2007 rally to demand an end to 40 years of civil legal inequality and injustice was against - a country's (Israel's) existence or the existence of the policies of the government of a country (Israel).
CBS Outdoor and WMATA have, since 2007, raised their prices for rail station billboards based on numbers of people entering and exiting as well as requiring higher minimum billboard buys. A sponsor, 'political' or commercial, must buy more than one board sometimes in more than one station. Despite the price increase to generate more fare-supplementing revenue either CBS Outdoor or WMATA itself has left the spot purchased by endtheoccupation.org in the Gallery Place-Chinatown WMATA station
without a custom-made poster frame to hold ad posters if WMATA or CBS Outdoor sells the wall space at all. The few times in the subsequent 10 years an ad has been sold, in the same space, the poster (April 2017 ad for last circus performance photo at left) has been glued directly to the concrete wall
instead of hung in a frame as the two ads are framed in the photo below.
The poster space that in April 2017, was sold to promote the Big 10 basketball tournament closer to the left support column, had been sold to standwithus .com from May-June 2007.
<sarcasm alert> When 'pro-Israel occupation security' advocates show posters like the standwithus.com posters in June 2007, or change the subject from Israel killing an innocent Palestinian child to who the parent works for or who caused the deaths of a family on a Gaza beach in June 2006, it's providing full context to a story about a newsworthy event. <sarcasm alert>
If Palestinian supporters (also of peace and justice for both sides to prevent war) point out Israeli nationalist (zionist) extremism and hatred toward Palestinians it's <sarcasm alert> (in words of pro-Israel occupation security advocates) 'justifying the unjustifiable with 'moral equivalence/blindness/relativism.' <sarcasm alert>
Or if news organizations publish pictures of harm or death to civilians caused by Israel acting allegedly in 'self defense' it's allegedly 'anti-Israel media bias.' No, pro-Israel occupation security advocates, Palestinian supporters and the news organizations called 'biased against Israel' are providing full context to a newsworthy event that the pro-Israel occupation security advocates simply don't want heard by greater numbers of the American people who could then influence Congress
(such as by way of a "Stop Attack on Gaza" salsa.democracyinaction.org google ad that used the picture of the Palestinian father mourning his dead child)
to cut or make conditional military aid to Israel, based on compliance with Arms Export Control Act and Foreign Assistance Act human rights regulations, the way aid to Palestine is made conditional.
WMATA decided to stop selling 'political' ads in its rail stations after court cases forcing them to sell billboards to the AFDI run by Pamela Geller, represented by David Yerushalmi, in 2012 that were more to the USA and Israeli political right, by both Jewish community and secular community standards, than even standwithus. com was.
By 2014 WMATA had raised its poster ad rates for rail stations as well as requiring higher minimum poster and location buys, instead of allowing single poster buys in one or few locations, that even the deeper-pocketed, than the Campaign for Justice and Accountability, far-right AFDI could only afford to buy ads on buses (moving billboards).
