In democratic elections held two years ago this week, the Palestinian people chose armed resistance against Israel instead of negotiating for peace. Fed up with a Fatah-led government rife with corruption and cronyism, Palestinians elected a terrorist government that campaigned under the banner of “Change and Reform,” promising to improve public services, to revive the Palestinian economy and to destroy Israel.

In response to the shocking election results, the international community acted swiftly and unanimously. The United States, the EU, the UN all refused to formally recognize or interact with Hamas. They demanded that Hamas recognize the State of Israel and renounce terrorism. The United States and Europe cut off financial aid to the Palestinians, while Israel froze Palestinian bank accounts.

Shunned by the West, the new Hamas leadership nearly collapsed under the weight of crippling sanctions. Basic services broke down throughout the region—particularly in the Gaza Strip. Unpaid government workers staged angry protests. Unemployment and inflation was rampant.

Then the terrorists played the humanitarian disaster card. And within months, the Western will weakened. After all, why should the Palestinian people have to suffer when the real problem is an oppressive, radical Islamic regime?

Anti-Israel Media Aids and Abets Terrorists

The resumption of international aid in mid-2006 allowed Hamas to regroup. A year later, they seized control of the Gaza Strip in a violent civil war with Fatah, setting the stage for another humanitarian crisis. In response to the civil unrest, Israel temporarily sealed its border with Gaza.

And so did Egypt. According to Agence France Presse, “Fearing an influx of thousands of refugees from the tiny but densely populated coastal strip, dozens of extra police have reinforced the 750 paramilitary troops already guarding the border fence” (June 21, 2007). Egypt’s foreign minister blamed Iran for the Hamas takeover and accused the Islamic Republic of threatening Egypt’s security. “Iran’s policies encouraged Hamas to do what it has done in Gaza and this represents a threat for Egypt’s national security because Gaza is a stone’s throw from Egypt,” said Ahmed Abul Gheit. Stratfor analyzed the threat Hamas poses to Egypt on January 11:

The Muslim Brotherhood is the strongest opposition force in Egypt, and is also the regime’s greatest worry. Hamas was created in 1987 as an outgrowth of the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood and has maintained connections with its parent organization. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s regime has gone to great lengths to stifle the Muslim Brotherhood through force and does not want to see Hamas’s influence spill over the border and contribute to a more potent Islamist opposition threat in Egypt.

In the case of Israel, of course, Hamas is not just a security threat—it threatens Israel’s existence. Hamas helped trigger the Second Lebanon War in 2006 after murdering two Israeli soldiers and kidnapping another who, to this day, is still held captive.

Then there are the rocket attacks. Since Israel disengaged from Gaza in 2005, Hamas has launched 4,200 rockets at southern Israeli cities. After a barrage of 220 missiles last week, Israel again sealed its border and cut off supply lines into Gaza. Hamas responded by again playing the humanitarian disaster card, and their sympathizers in major media outlets have offered tremendous support in circulating the propaganda.

Melanie Phillips has closely monitored the media coverage of the events in Gaza this past week. On Tuesday, she quoted Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, responding to last weekend’s blackout in Gaza, widely reported as Israel’s fault. He said,

The supply of electricity to Gaza from the Israeli and Egyptian power grids (124 megawatts and 17 megawatts respectively) has continued uninterrupted. These 141 megawatts of power represents about three quarters of Gaza’s electricity needs. While the fuel supply from Israel into Gaza has indeed been reduced, due to the Hamas rocket attacks, the diversion of this fuel from domestic power generators to other uses is wholly a Hamas decision—apparently taken due to media and propaganda considerations.

Even Palestinian journalists admitted the blackout was a farce. On Wednesday, the Jerusalem Post said there were at least two instances of staging blackouts in Gaza this week:

In the first case, journalists who were invited to cover the Hamas government meeting were surprised to see Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and his ministers sitting around a table with burning candles.In the second case on Tuesday, journalists noticed that Hamas legislators who were meeting in Gaza City also sat in front of burning candles.But some of the journalists noticed that there was actually no need for the candles because both meetings were being held in daylight.”They had closed the curtains in the rooms to create the impression that Hamas leaders were also suffering as a result of the power stoppage,” one journalist told the Jerusalem Post. “It was obvious that the whole thing was staged.”Another journalist said he and his colleagues were told to wait for a few minutes before entering the chamber of the Palestinian Legislative Council so that each legislator would have time to light his candle. He said that when he saw that the curtains had been closed to prevent the light from entering, he realized that Hamas was trying to manipulate the media for political gain.

Yet, when the lights went out last weekend, as Phillips wrote in her blog, the West uncritically swallowed the Hamas claim and blamed Israel for switching off the electricity.

The “Scuffle” at Rafah

Even as Israel was supposedly laying “siege” upon Gaza, Egypt escaped media scrutiny—that is, until its own border crossing blew up Wednesday morning. But before that, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak willingly helped pile blame on Israel for the Gaza crisis. On Monday, Mubarak phoned Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and insisted he “stop the Israeli aggression” and end the blockade, as if Israel was the only nation bordering Gaza. Israel’s border with Gaza had been closed for four days. The Egyptian border crossing, on the other hand, had been locked down for seven months—ever since the civil war ended in the Gaza Strip.

On Monday night, Gazan protesters, mostly women, assembled at the Egyptian border crossing in Rafah. The following morning, the demonstration turned violent. According to the Associated Press,

Ten Egyptian police and about 60 protesters were hurt as protesters hurled stones at the Egyptians and Palestinian gunmen fired briefly in the air. Hundreds of protesters briefly broke through the border terminal, pushing back helmeted Egyptian riot police who fired in the air to try to contain the crowd.The clash came at the end of a protest of several thousand women carrying Hamas flags and calling for a lifting of the full closure of Gaza imposed by Israel last week. The protesters hurled insults at Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.”Hosni Mubarak you are a coward, you are an agent for the Americans,” they chanted. “Gaza women will not be humiliated.”

By mid-afternoon, as theTrumpet.com reported Tuesday night, that ap story had been strategically revised. Editors softened the title from “Clashes erupt at Gaza-Egypt border” to “Israel eases blockade; scuffles between Gaza protesters and Egypt guards.” Within the article, everything about the Egyptian guards fighting off women was removed.

A few Middle Eastern news sites, however, reported the story as it happened. According to the Palestinian news agency Ma’an,

Egyptian riot police used water cannons and clubs to suppress a surging crowd of demonstrators. … A number of women lost consciousness in the ensuing violence. The security forces arrested the women, using dogs to break up the crowd. …Crowds of women gathered at Rafah crossing on Tuesday morning in a demonstration organized by Change and Reform, the Hamas bloc in the Palestinian Legislative Council.

The Jerusalem Post added tear gas and live ammunition to the collection of weapons Egyptian border agents used against the women. The Post said 90 Gazans were injured in the clash, most of them women. The story quoted an Egyptian official who blamed Hamas for the incident: “The Egyptian government has delivered a strong warning to Hamas following the incident,” he said. “We hold the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip responsible for the riots that occurred along our border today.”

Hamas officials called the Egyptian use of force a disgrace. The Post quoted one representative as saying, “In the morning, we heard that the Egyptians were sending reinforcements to the border with the Gaza Strip. We thought the reinforcements were intended to help the Palestinians, who have been without water, electricity and medicine. But it later turned out that Mubarak sent his troops to beat women who were staging a peaceful demonstration.”

Can you imagine what kind of frothing media frenzy this incident would have set off had it been Israeli soldiers clubbing Arab women at the Erez border crossing? But since the perpetrators were Arabs and not Jews, the major media attempted to cover it up. The Associated Press even tried to distort the facts—downgrading the incident from an erupting “clash” to a mere “scuffle.”

The next morning, at the site of the scuffle, Hamas militants set off 17 explosions along the Rafah border fence, flattening over half of the 7-mile-long steel barrier. Approximately 300,000 Gazans poured into Egypt looking for supplies and food.

Score One for Egypt Too

On Thursday, two days after his border agents were spraying tear gas at female protesters who had been staged by Hamas officials, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak announced that he advised his security forces to allow the “starving” refugees to cross the border. He at least admitted that Egypt forced them back on Tuesday. “But [Wednesday] a great number of them came back because the Palestinians in Gaza are starving due to the Israeli siege,” Mubarak told the Jerusalem Post.

After successive public relations disasters, Mubarak managed to wriggle free from criticism by blaming the Jews. “We are not opening the Rafah crossing just for everybody to cross—we’re opening it because it’s a very dire humanitarian situation,” said Egypt’s Foreign Ministry spokesman the day after 300,000 Gazans stampeded across the blown-up border.

Yes—that’s what happened. Egypt “opened” the border because it wanted to help.

Which brings us to Israel. Lost amid these propaganda coups for Hamas and Egypt, a global outcry quickly forced Israel to ease the ban on fuel and supplies crossing into Gaza. Besides this, Israel has provided 70 percent of Gaza’s electricity needs, without interruption, since the disengagement in 2005. In return, Hamas has supplied the Israeli town of Sderot with an uninterrupted supply of rocket attacks.

On Thursday, the Jewish consulate in New York placed 4,200 balloons in front of the United Nations—one balloon for every rocket Hamas has fired since the disengagement. “Up until this day, every attempt to raise the issue and make it part of the American media’s agenda has been unsuccessful,” consulate spokesman David Saranga said.

On the day of the balloon protest, the United Nations passed a resolution demanding Israel to lift the Gaza “blockade” and calling for international action to protect the Palestinian people—those who elected Hamas two years ago.

Meanwhile, Jewish residents in the beleaguered Israeli town of Sderot feel helpless and abandoned. Yesterday, Hamas launched seven Kassam rockets into southern Israel.

The media yawned.