"Accurate and Reliable" - SANA
OR
"AS THE WORLD TURNS" (SOAP OPERA)
June 5, 2011
SANA is now reporting that 14 "youths" were killed at 225 injured at the Syrian border today.
They claim that all of them were shot.
They also claim that the IDF fired directly at ambulances.
Furthermore, they are claiming that the IDF fired "phosphorus bombs."
Needless to say, the story does not show a single picture of a "martyr", of bullet holes in an ambulance, or of any life-threatening injuries.
All of this is highly suspect, but watch to see Western news agencies starting to quote it as if it is true, without qualifications. Or, more likely, the wire services will quote the "death toll" without mentioning the more outrageous claims that make the death count look suspect.
YNet adds:
IDF sources said that some four landmines exploded inside Syrian territory, several hundred meters from the border. The blasts near the Quneitra crossing were caused after protestors hurled Molotov cocktails which started a fire. The fire detonated the landmines and left some protestors wounded.
UPDATE:
From the Reform Party of Syria:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Washington DC, June 5, 2011. The Reform Party of Syria has learned today, from intelligence sources close to the Assad regime in Lebanon, that Syrians storming through the Golan Height next to the Quneitra crossing are Syrian farmers who have migrated in recent years from the drought-stricken northeast Syria to the south. Estimates put the number at 250,000 impoverished migrants.
Information received cite the regime has paid hundreds of these farmers $1,000 each to show-up and $10,000 to their families should any of them succumb to Israeli fire. In Syria, an average salary is about $200 a month and to these impoverished farmers, such a one-time sum can keep them economically afloat for six months.
Such tactic was used in the past by another defunct Ba'ath Party in Iraq, under Saddam Hussein, to pay Intifada-driven Palestinians the sum of $25,000 to their next-of-kin should they die throwing stones. That measure had a worldwide impact and it seems the Assad regime is using the same play from a twin playbook.
It is obvious, with this action, Assad wants to divert the attention of the world away from his own massacres and brutality that resulted in some 70 deaths yesterday and about 30 today in Jisr al-Shoghour. RPS expects, on the basis of today's success, for these operations of incursions to multiply in scope in the near future for two reasons: 1) Divert the attention away from Assad's barbarism and savageries, and 2) Stand tall again in the eyes of the regime's supporters whose morale has taken quite a beating the last 3 months because of the violence perpetrated by Assad against unarmed civilians.
On this day of Naksa, RPS strongly believes in ownership and title of its Golan Heights. But unlike a regime bred on the use of violence, the Syrian people, demonstrating how peaceful they are as they endure one massacre after another, believe in peaceful negotiations to repatriate our lands. If Assad really wanted the Golan Heights, he would walk the same peaceful path Anwar Sadat walked long before him. But then, if he does, how can he justify his own existence as the "Commandant de la Résistance". For Assad, winning through peace means also losing the war against his own people.
(h/t Challah Hu Akbar and Silke)
Update x2: Need I note that there are squads of reporters at that spot, on both sides, and none have yet corroborated a single death?
UPDATE x3: Now Syria is claiming 22 dead. They even have photos now!
Oh, and they also are saying that Israel hurled grenades towards them.
The Western media is eating up the death figures and ignoring the other parts that are obviously nonsense. Yet they choose to believe part of the same nonsense.
