Hollywood-Style ‘Documentary’ Invites Sympathy for Palestinian Terrorists

Al-Jazeera short called ‘Inside the Jenin Battalion’ draws on viewers to empathize with gun-toting terrorists who are planning attacks on innocent Israeli civilians.

By Rachel O’Donoghue, HonestReporting

Imagine a scenario in which a global news organization released a slick movie trailer that glorified a murderous terror group like ISIS, for example.

Picture the outrage as viewers were invited to sympathize with balaclava-clad militants as they sharpened their blades before executing a weeping hostage crouched before them in an orange jumpsuit.

Unfortunately, one need not envisage such a scene considering Al Jazeera just released something very similar.

Masquerading as a serious piece of journalism, the seven-minute short titled, ‘Inside the Jenin Battalion,’ takes viewers through the streets of the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) city dubbed the “Palestinian terror capital” and draws on them to empathize with gun-toting terrorists who are planning attacks on innocent Israeli civilians.

The “documentary” is anything but a factual insight into the group’s activities, but rather a piece of pure propaganda from a Qatari-owned news channel with a long track record of smearing the Jewish state.

The clip opens with dramatic music and spliced footage showing militants stalking the Jenin streets while clutching automatic weapons, presumably searching for the “Israeli enemy” that supposedly frequently intrudes on the city’s refugee camp but is nowhere to be seen on this particular night.

A voiceover from one paranoid terrorist explaining the group’s activities can be heard:

“We’re trying to protect our lives and we try to inflict as much damage as possible, so they [the Israeli army] learn that in this camp you will pay the price for coming in.”

A text overlay written in block capitals suddenly fills the screen — Al-Jazeera has some fact-free “context” to offer its audience:

“Israel’s far-right government is overseeing a wave of military raids into the occupied West Bank, aimed at dismantling armed groups. The Jenin Battalion has formed to keep Israeli forces out.”

But the suggestion that the founding of the group is connected to a new “far-right” Israeli government that has stepped up incursions into the West Bank city is simply absurd.

The Jenin Battalion already emerged in May 2021, after the Hamas-initiated Gaza war, and was initially formed as an Islamic Jihad chapter in the refugee camp, with the members of Hamas and Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades soon joining.

If Al Jazeera wanted to dispel any notion that it is an apologist for terrorism, it certainly did not do so here.

No facts or figures are offered to balance ludicrous statements from militants who are quoted at length saying things like Israeli soldiers “kill whoever is in front of them.” Al Jazeera fails to tell viewers that the overwhelming majority of Palestinian casualties in the West Bank were confirmed terrorists.

Additionally, the violence by the Jenin Battalion is framed as solely defensive measures aimed at keeping out an aggressive invading Israeli military that raids homes in Jenin to subjugate and humiliate its downtrodden Palestinian population.

Not one reference is made to any of the group’s high-profile attacks that have prompted such raids, including the November 2022 kidnapping of Israeli-Druze teenager Tiran Fero, who had been critically injured in a car crash near Jenin. According to Fero’s family, Battalion terrorists murdered him by disconnecting life support equipment.

The group is also accused of opening fire on the West Bank community of Shaked and Meirav, a kibbutz in northern Israel.

At one point in the documentary, viewers can watch the militants take part in “nightly training,” which apparently consists of whipping out a pistol and firing it aimlessly into the air.

Naturally, the grieving mother of one dead terrorist is interviewed by Al Jazeera just in case any viewers were finding it hard to relate to militants wearing ski masks daubed in Arabic.

The film closes on a mournful note.

Just days after the piece was filmed, we are told, “an Israeli raid killed six Palestinians” and that this year is now on track to be the “deadliest year in decades for Palestinians.”

Omitted is the relevant detail that the raid was for the purpose of arresting the Hamas militant responsible for the cold-blooded murder of two Israeli brothers and that all six of the dead were claimed by terrorist groups.

But when has Al Jazeera let facts get in the way of slandering Israel?

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