Believing Lies Will Lead to Tragedy

Ron Ross
BFP News
Email: ronrossbfp@hotmail.com

26th August 2006

The spokesman for Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was Dr Rannan Gissen. When Ehud Olmert came into the Prime Minister's Office Gissen quietly disappeared. He retired, we were told.

Many of us wanted to hear his comments on the recent war with the terrorist group Hezbollah and this week he broke his silence.

He described the brilliant, even masterful technique applied by the terrorists and the media to change the very context and meaning for the intensive fighting that disrupted Israel and Lebanon.

"Instead of the war being about Israel's right of self-defence, Hezbollah was able to turn it around so the issue on the international agenda became Israel's destruction of Lebanon. Israel should have been seen as the victim. We were being attacked. We were the ones who fulfilled all of the requirements of the game. We were true to the international border, we restrained ourselves, we held back. Why should it be that once we started attacking, we immediately lose in the diplomatic arena? Because Nasrallah and his patrons in Iran successfully integrated the `ABC's' of public diplomacy into their long-term strategic war doctrine." he wrote. (See the complete article at www.jcpa.org).

Nissen describes how Nasrallah ordered his men to remove their identifying uniforms and mix with the civilian community. They fought from fighting units planted within civvy street.

CNN reporter Nic Robertson was led to `appropriate' locations in Beirut, arranged by Hezbollah representatives. He reported from press releases they provided. He was critical of the attacks on civilians by Israel. He showed rubble which had once been homes and reported, there is no sign that there was ever a military establishment here.

A week later on CNN he told how the Hezbollah spokesman gave him no time to check his stories. He could only go to locations arranged by the terrorists. He described how Hezbollah had total control of the area and journalists were not free to report the situation without the Hezbollah approval or presence. (See Honestreporting.com)

Two Foxnews journalists have been kidnapped in Gaza. Steve Centanni (USA) and NZ cameraman Olaf Wiig were taken by a previously unknown gang.

This has sent the Fatah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and their terrorist kind into a frenzy. How can they wage a propaganda war if all the foreign press is removed from Gaza? Who will tell their story? d.

In the past two weeks blogs from around the world have discovered press photographs faked to make Israel look bad. Alert analysts have discovered press pics of a woman crying over the loss of her house. The problem arises when we find her in three different photos crying over the loss of three different houses.

A Sydney newspaper jumped on a news report used in Tehran.

It showed a graphic photo of a ship being blown in two with a headline: "Hezbollah sinks Australian Destroyer." .

The Australian press was mystified until they discovered the photograph used on the Tehran tale was from a navy action at sea by the Australian fleet. No Hezbollah at all!!!.

I am always bemused by `the experts' who rant about the Middle East and the Israel involvement from armchairs a long way from the scene

It is the naïve who take the media at face value.

"Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world." (1 John 4: 1)

The media in many ways, is actively driven by `the spirit of this world.' If you fall for anything they show you, or anything they tell you, you are submitting to a spirit of falsehood.

We must also get any thought that terrorism is the outlet of uneducated, disorganised thugs.

Raanan Gissen said, "Israel had been operating on the assumption that Hezbollah was a terrorist organization like Hamas or the PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization) that had to be neutralized in order to bring about stability. But these are not merely terrorist gangs. This is an army - a well-trained, well-organized and ideologically indoctrinated guerrilla army - and Israel did not make that point strongly enough at the beginning of the war, neither to the world, nor to itself."

Ignorance of the enemy and his tactics will protect no one from the consequences of underestimating what Israel and the free world is facing.

In Sydney this week a radical group linked to the recent London bombings was distributing pamphlets throughout the suburbs. They called for a holy war. The group is called Hizb ut-Tahir and their call for jihad (holy war) includes the destruction of Israel.

They are banned in Germany and British Prime Minister Tony Blair is moving to have them outlawed there as well.

So far they are not banned in Australia.

The ho-hum Aussie attitude is to shrug our shoulders and mumble, "She'll be right, mate."

Those days are over, even for "The Lucky Country."

Ron Ross resigned as Senior Pastor of Noosa Baptist Church to become National Director of Bridges for Peace Australia. Three years ago he joined Bridges for Peace in Jerusalem to establish international radio news and an audio service webcast at www.bridgesforpeace.com Ron was Sports Editor of WINTV for 20 years before joining the full-time missions. You can contact Ron at : ronrossbfp@hotmail.com