Associated Press [AP] executive editor Sally Buzbee said the Israel should be investigated for war crimes for leveling the 12-story Gaza City Building, giving all lessees plenty of time to evacuate. Israeli Defense Forces [IDF] claim the building was also being used by Hamas intelligence precisely because they assumed the, like the AP, that the building was sacred ground in a war zone. AP shows the kind of cosmic temerity seen by media organizations thinking for some, unknown reason, that they’re above the fray reporting in war zones. Targeting an office building that happens to house media organizations is not a war crime, the crime is Hamas terrorists shooting missiles into Israel and thinking that Israel is obligated to perform surgical strikes when Hamas embeds itself in civilian places likes, schools, mosques, and, yes, even the Gaza City Building that house certain press organizations.
No longer reporting about the conflict, the AP has now become the victim, like residents of Gaza, because they happened to rent in a war zone. Israel doesn’t have to justify which buildings get hit and which do not. They’re in the process of prosecuting was war against a mortal enemy. But, no, to the AP, the war is now against them because their offices were hit, inconveniencing their reporters. AP CEO Gary Pruitt said he couldn’t comprehend Israel hitting the Gaza City Building, thinking, because it houses press groups, it was exempt from destruction. Pruitt insisted that the result will be less press coverage of the war in Gaza. Well, there are certainly other places the AP or Al Jazeera can go to house journalists to report on what’s happening on the ground in Gaza to perpetuate the war. AP’s now part of Gaza conflict, taking sides, blaming Israel for leveling their leased offices.
AP doesn’t threaten to take Hamas to the International Criminal Court for shooting rockets at Israel. No, it’s Israel that must be investigated for war crimes because they targeted a building housing journalists. Buszbee demanded evidence, outright proof, that Hamas was operating in the Gaza City Building. If AP knew that Hams or Islamic Jihad were renting office space in the building they wouldn’t have cancelled their lease because Hamas or some other terrorist group are ubiquitous in Gaza, most likely housing its terrorists all over the Mediterranean seaside enclave. Called al-Jalaa Tower, the AP claims it’s as housed their reporters for the past 15 years. “We are in a conflict situation,” Buzbee said. “We do not take sides in that conflict. We heard Israelis say they have evidence were don’t know what that evidence is,” acting like Israel must answer to the AP.
In case the AP hasn’t figured it out, they’re in the middle of a war zone, thinking somehow they’re exempted from battle between combatants. Targeting one building or another, Israel isn’t preventing the international press from covering the war. Once the war began, it’s prudent for corporate executives to assess the risk and find alternative locations to house their personnel. No one in a war zone is sacrosanct, including news organizations. “We think it’s appropriate at this point for their to be an independent look at what happened yesterday—and independent investigation,” Buzbee said. But even if Buzbee’s presented with facts that Hamas or other terror groups leased space in the Gaza City Tower, they’d still complain that their offices should not be hit. No, the AP shifts its reporting to building a case against the IDF for targeting an office tower housing their journalists and support personnel.
Filing a complaint in the International Criminal Court at The Hague doesn’t change the basic facts surrounding the war with Hamas. Hamas, whose charter specifies the destruction of Israel, thinks they have every right to fire missiles into Israel. President Joe Biden, who said Israel had a right to defend itself, is under pressure from his party’s left wing that has strong sympathies toward Palestinians. Rep. Rashid Tlaib (D-Mich.), a Palestinian refugee, routinely calls Israel an “Apartheid” criminal state, referring to Jews as “Zionists,” the same kind of anti-Semitic trope used by the Nazis and other racist groups calling for Israel’s destruction. AP senior editor Buzbee should get more familiar with Israel’s enemies, how they’re committed to destroying the Jewish state. Whatever happened to the Gaza City building, AP was given plenty of advanced notice to evacuate the building.
When it comes to war, there are no good guys or bad guys, only warring parties doing everything possible to win the battle. Israel has been a war with Hamas four times since seizing the Gaza Strip in 2007. U.S., U.N. or EU officials have no peace partner with the Palestinians because the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority led by 85-year-old Mahoud Abbas has no control over Hamas. Or, truth be told, they’ve given their blessing to Hamas’s rocket war against Israel. Palestine Liberation Organization [PLO] founder Yasser Arafat went to his grave Nov 11, 2004, using Hamas over the years as his de facto terrorist wing of the PLO. But even if Abbas didn’t agree with Hamas’s rocket war, he had no power to stop it. Hamas Leader 56-year-old Leader Ismail Haniyeh wants Abbas to know he’s no longer in charge. AP should report on that, not about losing its offices.
