Call it the pro-Israel media bias, or perhaps delve towards the paranoid and label it typical propaganda from the Zionist conspiracy, or perhaps it was simply one point of view from a biased opinion, but when I recently read the article “History of Terrorism in Israel” I was not at all surprised by the fact that it was nothing more then a typical play for sympathy towards Israel based on the suffering of India and the Mumbai killings.

I am not without my bias either, not will I ever pretend to be, however I am on the other side of the coin. So when I see an article entitled “History of Terrorism in Israel” and it singles out the atrocities of one side while ignoring completely those perpetrated by the other side. So now that we have seen one side, please allow me to respond with the other.

In response to the “Arab Riots of 1920” the local Jewish communities formed a paramilitary defense force known as the Haganah. The underground military organization of the yishuv initially was nothing more then a militia charged with the protection of Jewish settlers. Over the next decade they were able to manufacture, and import arms and grow in power eventually forming a legitimate military body, that although illegal under the British Mandate had tacit acceptance from the British, who helped establish the Jewish Settlement Police—J.S.P., and also, Jewish Auxiliary Police—ghafirs. The Haganah moved beyond their directives for defense after World War II by means of subversion of British Mandated Law on immigration, assisting over 100,000 illegal refugees to enter Israel (helping to increase Jewish presence even further from 30% to over 50%); With either tacit approval or active cooperation they watched the Irgun bombing of the Kind David Hotel – an attack on the British killing at least 91 people; Assault on the British Atlit detention camp; Attack of the British Railway in Israel (which included, sinking 3 British guard boats, destruction of over 150 points across the railway, and an assault and subsequent destruction of a train station); during this time they conducted numerous other raids and sabotage to British interests.

The Irgun was a splinter group formed by former Haganah officers who pressed for a more militaristic stance in its official operations. The most spectacular assault by the Irgun was their bombing of the King David hotel (where they disguised themselves as Arab workers), but however it was far from their only action. Their attempts on the British Embassy on in Rome and the Sacher Hotel in Vienna, which was the regional British army headquarters, stand out as impressive overseas operations, while the bombings of and attacks upon British police and security forces as well as on Arabs were no less important, and far more frequent.

The LEHI Group or Stern Gang was another early terrorist organization formed as a splinter group of the Irgun, who split with the Irgun under the leadership and ideology of Zeev Jabotinsky. Its stated purpose was to take over Israel by armed force, as illustrated in their words “demonstrating its desire for freedom through military operations.” In 1944 the Stern gang murdered Lord Moyne the British Minister of state for the Middle East in Cairo, and started a series of bomb attacks on British installations. In 1948 LEHI members assassinated United Nations Security Council mediator in the Arab-Israeli Conflict of 1947-1948, while he was pursuing his official duties. According to a compilation by Nachman Ben-Yehuda, LEHI was responsible for 42 assassinations altogether, more than twice as many as those of the Irgun and Haganah combined during the same period. Of those LEHI assassinations that Ben-Yehuda classified as political, more than half the victims were Jews. LEHI was also responsible for numerous kidnappings including Judges, soldiers, and police. Of the most infamous LEHI moments took place late in 1940, when LEHI representative Naftali Lubenchik was sent to Beirut where he met the German official Werner Otto von Hentig and delivered a letter from Lehi offering to “actively take part in the war on Germany’s side” in return for German support for “the establishment of the historic Jewish state on a national and totalitarian basis, bound by a treaty with the “German Reich”. LEHI officials tried to establish contact with the Germans again in December 1941.

This is just of the founding fathers of Israel, and not yet an examination of the individual massacres. The following is but a sampling and not a complete listing of the Israeli massacres of Palestinians/Arabs.

Baldat al-Shaikh

Following an argument which broke out between Palestinian workers and Jewish workers in the Haifa Petroleum Refinery, leading to the deaths of a number of Palestinians and wounding and killing approximately sixty Jews. The Zionest ganges planned to take revenge on behalf of fellow Jews who had been killed by attacking Baldat al-Shaikh and Hawasa where most of the workers live. On the night of January 30-31, 1947, a mixed force composed of the First Battalion of Palmach and the Carmelie brigade (estimated at approximately 150 to 200) launched a raid against the two towns under the leadership of Hayim Afinuam. Taking the homes by surprise as their inhabitants slept, the terrorist attack led to the deaths of approximately sixty citizens inside their homes, most of them women, elderly and children. According to a report written by the leader of the terrorist operation, “the attacking units slipped into the town and began working on the houses. And due to the fact that gunfire was directed inside the rooms, it was not possible to avoid injuring women and children.”

Deir Yasin

On the night of April 9, 1948, the Irgun Zvei Leumi surrounded the village of Deir Yasin, located on the outskirts of Jerusalem. After giving the sleeping residents a 15 minute warning to evacuated, the Irgun (under the leadership of Menachem Begin) terrorists attacked the village of 700 people, killing 254 mostly old men, women and children and wounding 300 others. Begin’s terrorists tossed many of the bodies in the village well, and paraded 150 captured women and children through the Jewish sectors of Jerusalem. Ironically, the Deir Yasin villagers had signed a non aggression pact with the leaders of the adjacent Jewish Quarter, Giv’at Shaul and had even refused military personnel from the Arab Liberation Army from using the village as a base. Jacques de Reynier, Chief representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross made an official statement declaring that he was bullied, stalled, delayed and threatened over his participation of any investigation into Deir Yasin. Former Haganah officer, Col. Meir Pa’el, upon his retirement from the Israeli army in 1972, made the following public statement about Deir Yasin that was published by Yediot Ahronot (April 4, 1972): “In the exchange that followed four [Irgun] men were killed and a dozen were wounded ... by noon time the battle was over and the shooting had ceased. Although there was calm, the village had not yet surrendered. The Irgun and LEHI men came out of hiding and began to `clean’ the houses. They shot whoever they saw, women and children included, the commanders did not try to stop the massacre ....In the meantime, 25 Arabs had been loaded on a truck and driven through Mahne Yehuda and Zichron Yousef (like prisoners in a Roman `March of Triumph’). At the end of the drive, they were taken to the quarry between Deir Yasin and Giv’at Shaul, and murdered in cold blood ... The commanders also declined when asked to take their men and bury the 254 Arab bodies. Zvi Ankori, who commanded the Haganah unit that occupied Deir Yasin after the massacre, gave this statement in 1982 about the massacre, published by Davar on April 9, 1982: “I went into 6 to 7 houses. I saw cut off genitalia and women’s crushed stomaches. According to the shooting signs on the bodies, it was direct murder.” Dov Joseph, one time Governor of the Israel sector of Jerusalem and later Minister of Justice, called the Deir Yassin massacre “deliberate and unprovoked attack.” Yet unashamed of his actions Menachem Beigin said “The massacre was not only justified, but there would not have been a state of Israel without the victory at Deir Yassin.”

Sabra and Shatila Camps

On the morning of September 16, 1982 a high-level meeting was held in which Israel was represented by General Amir Dawri, Supreme Commander of the Northern Forces. The job of carrying out an operation against the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon was assigned to Eli Haqiba, head of the Lebanese Kata’ib intelligence apparatus. The intent was to eliminate the Palestinian presence from the Israel/Lebanon border.

The process of storming the camps began before sunset on Thursday, September 16, and continued for approximately 36 hours. The Israeli Army surrounded the camps, providing the Kata’ib with all the support, aid and facilities necessary for them to carry out the massacre. They also set off incandescent bombs in the air in order to turn night into day so that none of the Palestinians would be able to escape. And those who did flee - women, children and the elderly - were brought back inside the camps by Israeli soldiers to face their destiny.

At first they started killing people with knives so that they wouldn’t make any noise. Then on Friday there were snipers in the Shatila camp killing anybody who crossed the street. On Friday afternoon, armed men began going into the houses and firing on men, women and children. Then they started blowing up the houses and turning them into piles of rubble. At noon on Friday, the second day of the terrorist massacre, and with the approval of the Israeli Army, the Kata’ib forces began receiving more ammunition, while the forces which had been in the camps were replaced by other fighters. On Saturday morning, September 18, 1982, the massacre had reached its peak, and thousands of Sabra and Shatila camp residents had been killed. Information about the massacre began to leak out after a number of children and women fled to the Gaza Hospital in the Shatila camp, where they told doctors what was happening.

The massacre continued until noon on Saturday, September 18, leaving between 3,000 and 3,500 Palestinian civilians dead, most of them women, children and elderly people.

Beit Hanoun

In response to the capture of an Israeli soldier in a cross-border raid by Palestinian militants on 25 June, Israel launched a major military operation that went on for more than four months and led to the death of around 350 Palestinians many of them civilians. During that time, three Israelis soldiers have died.

In one of Israel’s biggest raids into Gaza, troops carried out three air strikes and encircled the town of Beit Hanoun. The town of Beit Hanoun has been under the very tight control of a large force of tanks and troops who have ordered the tens of thousands of local people to stay off the streets for all but very brief periods. The Israeli soldiers destroyed the infrastructure of Beit Hanoun, cut the water pipes and the telephone lines. Hundreds of men have been rounded up and questioned, and some have been taken away to Israel. The entire town of Beit Hanoun remains under Israeli control and troops have ordered residents to stay indoors. More than 60 Palestinians and an Israeli soldier were killed in a week-long operation.

Al Aqsa Mosque

Several days before the events of the massacre began, the “Temple Trustees” group distributed a statement to the media on the occasion of a religious festival of theirs which they call “the Throne Festival”. In the statement the organization announced that it intended to stage a march to the Temple Mount (or so they call it). The statement called upon Jews to participate in this march since, according to the statement, it would involve the decisive act of placing the foundation stone for what is called “the Third Temple.” In addition, the founder of the organization, Ghershoun Salmoun, announced that “the Arab-Islamic occupation of the temple area must come to an end, and the Jews must renew their profound ties to the sacred area.” The march, in which 200,000 Jews took part, headed toward al-Aqsa Mosque in order for “the foundation stone” of the so-called “Third Temple” to be put in place.

On Monday, October 8, 1990 at 10:00 A.M., half-hour before the beginning of the massacre, Israeli occupation forces began placing military barriers along various roads leading to Jerusalem in order to prevent Palestinians from getting to the city. They also closed the doors of the mosque itself and forbid Jerusalem residents to go in. However, thousands had already gathered inside the mosque before this time in response to calls from the imam of the mosque and the Islamic movement to protect the mosque and to prevent the “Temple Trustees” from storming it.

When the Muslim worshippers began resisting the Israeli group to prevent them from placing the “foundation stone” for their so-called temple, Israeli occupation forces began carrying out the massacre, using all the weapons such as poison gas bombs, automatic weapons, military helicopters, etc. The soldiers and Jewish settlers where firing live ammunition in the form of a continuous spray of machine-gun fire. The result was that thousands of Palestinian worshippers of various ages found themselves in a mass death trap. Twenty-three Palestinians were killed, and 850 others were wounded to varying degrees. The Israeli soldiers began firing at 10:30 A.M. and stopped 35 minutes

This list is far from complete and only serves as a reminder that to every story there are two sides. Israel has a long history of terrorism, so to actively promote the imagery of victimization at the hands of fanatical terrorism is nothing more then hypocritical propaganda. Please do not rest alone on my words, or those of any singular source. Before judging the situation please investigate on your own, using all available resources, and weighing them for what they are before coming to your own conclusions. The Chinese general Sun Tzu one said “In times of peace prepare for war and in times of war prepare for peace” I think it is time to prepare for peace.