NBC Report on Escalating West Bank Violence Conceals Palestinian Violence

By: Tamar Sternthal January 15, 2024

Only by ignoring the last two and a half years of growing Palestinian violence in the West Bank could any observer refer to that arena as a “new front.” In his Jan. 12 NBC Nightly News broadcast about increasing West Bank violence, Richard Engel did just that [beginning at approximately 12 minutes into the video below]:

Already at war with Hamas in Gaza and under threat from Iranian-backed militias across the Middle East, Israel may face a new front closer to home. Since the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7th, Israel troops have intensified counter-terrorism raids in the Palestinian West Bank where locals accuse Israel of heavy-handed tactics.

Engel’s subsequent reporting is heavy on Palestinian accusations against Israel but short on fact-checking and professional coverage of Palestinian violence.

Thus, the NBC correspondent continues:

We recently traveled to the Nur al-Shams refugee camp. Suleiman al-Zuheiri, a community leader, took me to a building where he says, Israeli troops arrested a man accused of making bombs and then blew up three apartment.

[Al-Zuheiri states:] “This is what we call collective punishment for the people down the street.”

Destruction of the IED and weapons laboratory in the Nur al-Shams refugee camp, Dec. 26 (Photo from IDF website)

Engel neglects to report that during the Dec. 26 arrest in the Tulkarem refugee camp, the Israeli military found dozens of improvised explosive devises and rockets in that same building. The Israeli military reported:

Additionally, during searches of the building, an explosives lab containing dozens of improvised explosives ready for use and explosives materials were found and destroyed.

In addition, more than 30 weapons were discovered in the building, improvised rockets and additional arms which were confiscated. The suspect who was found in the building in which the lab was located was arrested. [Translation by CAMERA]

Had NBC probed the possibility that secondary explosions due to the weapons cache, as opposed to “collective punishment,” were responsible for destroying three apartments? In any event, what’s clear is that Engel concealed the existence of the weapons cache and explosives lab from viewers.

He likewise expunged evidence of Palestinian violence in his account of the Oct. 19 Israeli military raid in Nur al-Shams, selectively reporting that Sarah Mahmeed

showed me the spot where she filmed her 16-year-old brother as he was shot by Israeli soldiers during another raid. Her cell phone video is difficult to watch. When her brother, on the left, looks around a corner, he’s shot dead. When her father tries to recover the body, he’s shot too. Seriously injured. He manages to limp back home. “Our blood is cheap for them. They’re killing us every day,” Sarah says. The Israeli military said its troops fired on terrorists during an operation in the area. At the time we attended the funeral for Palestinians who’ve just been killed during another Israeli operation.

Engel reports Taha Mahmeed‘s identity as a terrorist as an unverifiable he said/she said matter, with the sister and the Israeli military providing conflicting claims. But Hamas itself confirmed the Israel Defense Forces’ information, acknowledging that the younger Mahmeed was one of “its martyrs” killed “during confrontations” with the IDF. Hamas’ poster about Mahmeed (at left) states (translation by CAMERA Arabic):
To the masses of our mighty Palestinian people and the free people of our Arab and Islamic nation, Hamas – the Islamic Resistance Movement mourns its martyred hero Taha Mahameed who ascended [to heaven] at dawn of Thursday, 19.10.23 by the occupation’s fire in the Nur Shams refugee camp east of Tulkarm during the clashes of the Al-Aqsa Flood campaign.
NBC’s report gives no indication that Mahmeed belonged to Hamas, a designated terror organization which just that month had pulled off the most barbaric massacre targeting thousands, inflicting unparalleled torture and horrific rapes, in recent history.
In short, for a broadcast titled “Violence escalating in the West Bank,” NBC’s Richard Engel does a remarkable job concealing Palestinian violence in the West Bank.

With research by CAMERA Arabic.

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