Marta González

24 years ago, the Palestinian propaganda machine invented one of its most notorious fake massacres — and (shockingly, I know) the world believed it instantly. In the spring of 2002, suicide bombings had become almost daily events inside Israel. They reached their horrifying peak with the Passover Massacre on March 27, when a terrorist walked into the Park Hotel dining room in Netanya and murdered 29 people — many of them elderly Holocaust survivors. Israel had had enough. On March 29, the IDF launched Operation Defensive Shield to dismantle the terrorist infrastructure in Palestinian cities that had become safe havens for Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. Nowhere was that infrastructure more entrenched than in Jenin — the self-proclaimed “suiciders’ capital.” During the operation, the Palestinian "brand-Israel-as-war-criminals" routine immediately went into overdrive. They screamed the IDF had conducted a “massacre” in Jenin - more than 500 Palestinians slaughtered in cold blood, they said. The international media and the UN swallowed it whole. Headlines screamed about “Jenin: the new Srebrenica.” Demands for war crimes investigations poured in. Then the truth slowly dribbled out. The actual Palestinian death toll? Around 52, the vast majority of whom were armed terrorists. Oh, and roughly the same number of Israeli soldiers died clearing the camp house-by-house — because Israel deliberately chose the riskier ground-troop route to spare civilian lives instead of leveling the place from the air. The “massacre” was a lie. A deliberate, coordinated lie. This is the standard playbook in the anti-Israel propaganda war: invent a shocking atrocity, flood the media with it, let the world condemn Israel in real time … and by the time the facts prove it was fake, nobody cares anymore. We saw the exact same pattern again in October 2023 at Gaza’s Al-Ahli Hospital. Palestinian officials and their allies screamed that Israel had bombed a hospital and murdered 500 civilians (same false number claimed in Jenin 21 years earlier). World leaders rushed to condemn Israel. The libel raced around the globe. Then the evidence emerged: it was a misfired Islamic Jihad rocket. No Israeli strike was involved, and the death toll was far lower. But by then, the damage was done. Large parts of the international community love to tell and share the story of Jews as bloodthirsty killers. They buy it hook, line, and sinker - every ... single ... time. I try to push the historically verifiable facts into the open, one post at a time; but I know, by sheer numbers, that I can never "win" this battle. The anti-Israel propaganda machine is too loud, too well-funded, and too massive. But I can chip away at it, little by little, every day. Because the truth still matters. Even when the world would rather believe the lie.

Yesterday, I spoke with Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian, as well as with U.S. President Donald Trump. I urged the resumption of the negotiations suspended in Islamabad, the clearing up of misunderstandings, and the avoidance of any further escalation. It is essential, in particular, that the ceasefire be strictly respected by all parties and that it include Lebanon. It is equally important that the Strait of Hormuz be reopened unconditionally, without restrictions or tolls, as soon as possible. Under these conditions, negotiations should be able to resume quickly, with the support of the key parties concerned. France and the United Kingdom will also host a conference in Paris this Friday, bringing together by videoconference non-belligerent countries ready to contribute, alongside us, to a multilateral and purely defensive mission aimed at restoring freedom of navigation in the strait when security conditions allow.

Lebanese Minister Ghassan Salamé: "If the Israelis have been unable to produce a complete disarmament of Hamas in Gaza in more than two years… how do you expect a much smaller, much weaker army to do it in Lebanon?" "The members of that armed group are not foreigners. They are part of the population. You are not fighting against a foreign enemy."

BREAKING: 18-year-old Niloufar Esfahani from Qazvin, who was arrested for participating in recent anti-regime protests in Iran, is set to be executed. She has been sentenced to death on charges of “waging war against Allah” by protesting against the regime. She has been subjected to torture to force a confession to these charges, and she is scheduled to be executed by hanging. She is one of many political prisoners that the Islamic regime of Iran intends to execute in order to inflict horror and terror on Iranians.