Remember?. I certainly do. It was with the supposed death of the young boy Mohammed al Durah that the Palestinians found the perfect vehicle for spreading the idea around the world that the Israelis are evil and purposely target children. And as with the more ancient blood libels, the world ate it up.

I wrote a great deal about the topic, and the subsequent defamation trials in France (one of which I attended), back in the early days of this blog. You can find the posts here.

From No Pasaran on the anniversary:

Tuesday marks the quarter-century anniversary of the beginning of one of the biggest scandals of the past 50 years, the Mohammed al-Dura affair, which saw French television video and photos of a 12-year-old Palestenian and his father being supposedly felled by Israeli bullets in Gaza, and which led to the creation of a new word — Pallywood. …

Before we take a look at the Philippe Karsenty interview, a must-read is the piece that Richard Landes penned in The Jerusalem Post five years ago — as the Abrahamic accords were being signed — about the twentieth (20th) anniversary of “one of the most disastrous events in the year 2000”. It’s a hard, indeed a mind-boggling, read — check out RL’s blog, The Augean Stables — especially coming three years before the October 7th massacre.

It was Landes who coined the phrase “Pallywood” and Karsanty who was one of the defendants in the defamation trials. I know both of them, although we haven’t been in touch in several years. Both are brilliant and courageous.

From Landes’ article on the 20th anniversary:

The image of Muhammad al-Dura via the narrative that the IDF had targeted him became the global symbol of Palestinian suffering at the hand of Israeli cruelty. It rapidly became an “icon of hatred” that had a greater immediate and long-term effect on the new century than any other such vehicle of incitement.

A cry arose, for some of pain, for some of rage, but for all a clear sign that the Infidel, led by the twin Satans Israel and USA, were making war on Muslims. Indeed, no single event so far has done more to arouse the spirit of jihad against the West than this footage, which, as Bin Laden quickly pointed out in his recruiting video for global jihad, demanded vengeance against al Yahud and their allies. …

Instead of Christians or Muslims replacing Israel as the true Chosen People, it was the former chosen people replacing the Nazis, and the poor Palestinian victim suffering the fate of the Jews. The progressive refrain, “Israel has lost the moral high ground.” …

… Al-Dura justified terrorist attacks on Israel in the minds of both Muslims and non-Jews, especially Europeans. “What choice do they have?” progressives responded when Palestinians targeted Israel civilians. They were merely resisting …

… … The icon of al-Dura was the first successful blood libel in the West since the Nazis rode their ecumenical Jew-hatred to mega-death for all in 1930s and ‘40s. …

… Whether we know it or not, those of us entering this very grim-looking third decade of the 21st century are the inheritors of this al-Durah-triggered new wave of Jew-hatred and its accompaniments: fake news, conspiracy theories and violence.

… As some honest Arab journalists point out, #FakeNews is something of an Arab specialty, and for far too long public opinion has been manipulated by dishonest and malevolent actors masquerading as journalists.

Not only did Osama bin Laden explicitly cite the al Durah incident as motive, but he also cited the Daniel Pearl murder as revenge for it. Not only that, but it helped launch the bloody Second Intifada by the Palestinians. And it was all a fake. As Karsanty says:

It’s crucial to understand that we moved from the notion of “deicide” to “genocide.” In Christian tradition, Jews were stigmatized as “Christ-killers.” With the Al-Dura case, the Jews were recast as child-killers, genocidal by nature. This image of Mohammed Al-Dura, supposedly shot by Israeli soldiers in 2000, became the ultimate weapon of demonization against the Jewish people.

And that lie didn’t just get halfway round the world, it’s taken over most of the world.

Please read the whole thing.