Pericles,

Do you have any reason to believe the youtube clip is not genuine?

I don't know whether, or not, it is.

But how can you be so sure it isn't?

stevenlmeyer, I have no factual evidence for the YouTube clip being staged, only circumstantial.

The way the camera tracks their movements, particularly the way the kid and the soldier are oh-so-conveniently framed, from top left to down right - classic cinematic shot. How amazingly fortunate.

The way the soldier stops, turns and retreats after having one rock thrown at him is highly unconvincing.

Despite all the time the cameraman seems to have, the soldier is still unrecognizable. If the action did occur as it appears, wouldn't you take the opportunity to zoom in a little closer - at least once? We instead get some edited-in close-ups (i.e. post-production, not a camera effect) and a classic pan back at the end - which, incidentally, reveals a couple of bystanders looking extremely incurious, showing no reaction at all to the events.

No, I don't have any factual evidence. But it is a highly odd and inconsistent piece of filming, extremely convenient(in propaganda terms), and highly unconvincing.

But while I am personally sure that it is fake - and also sure that this will be confirmed in due course - my post was more about the alacrity with which Boaz jumps on these events in such an unquestioning way, and reproduces them as incontrovertible fact, in order to support his paranoid fear and hatred of anything remotely Islamic.

He does this regularly, hence the reminder of his instant reproduction on OLO of the "The virginia Uni massacre.. done by a Muslim? 'Ismail X'" innuendo.

Pericles.. what you should consider is that the youtube vid was placed there by a Muslim, or.. (to accomodate your skepticism.. someone 'claiming' to be a Muslim)..
Are you into 9/11 conspiracies also ? :)

In this regard we need to look at all the facts. The title was "brave boy, cowardly soldier"... not 'Stupid boy, compassionate soldier"

It appeared to me that the boy made a split second decision when he saw the soldier was not going to shoot, he was emboldened in the adrenaline rush.

I also saw footage, (different vid) where an Israeli soldier shot a young palestinian at point blank range. I have a feeling this one was genuine, but even if not, it certainly illustrates, if not actually support, the reality of the power balance there. It 'is' rather silly for Hamas and company to constantly gee themselves up at funerals and rallies and shoot their pop guns into the air, when on the other side of the military coin is an army which could wipe them clean in a couple of days.

That people hold such lop sided views of life and struggle, is one of the many reasons the middle east is important.

That they persist in their delusion of empowerment, of Allah intervening, of..whatever emotional/spiritual drug they are on, is a continual source of amazement to me. Its tantamount to the Aboriginal activists who try to re-claim Australia... why bother?

So, while I recognize your concern for me not being duped by cheap propoganda.. this one only had the effect of making the Israeli look like a coward and the youth look like a hero.. (to the palestinian eye) to my eye..I saw restraint.

Boaz, if you did just a little more digging - just a little, not very much at all - you will find that the same footage was posted over two months ago with the headline "coward Israeli soldier in palestine".

No reference to the boy at all.

>>In this regard we need to look at all the facts. The title was "brave boy, cowardly soldier"... not 'Stupid boy, compassionate soldier"<<

Facts, Boaz? Facts? The title does not make it factual - if anything, it underlines the fact that it is blatant propaganda.

>>It appeared to me that the boy made a split second decision when he saw the soldier was not going to shoot, he was emboldened in the adrenaline rush<<

Well, that's what you wanted to see, so that's what you saw. But the intention - "coward Israeli soldier in palestine", remember - was to show an Israeli soldier running away.

If you were to dig just a little further, you will find that there are also questions about the uniform, whether it is actually an Israeli uniform, and the gun (AK47? Galil?) the former not in use with, and the latter not favoured by, the Israeli Defence Force.

You see what you want to see, Boaz, and say anything that comes into your head, whether it might be true or not.

That would just be sad, if it wasn't also rabble-rousing.

Boaz,

“I as a Christian would prefer to see the Jewish Temple there”

Few posts above you said that Dennis Michael Rohan (below) belonged to a church that you don’t believe in, yet above comment means you sympathise with his cause and action.

"In the morning of August 21, 1969, a fire at Masjid al-Aqsa, the al-Aqsa Mosque opposite the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, gutted the southeastern wing of the mosque. By the following day, it become apparent that a non-Jewish tourist from Australia was responsible for the blaze. On August 23, Dennis Michael Rohan was arrested for arson, suspected of starting the fire. Rohan was an Australian Protestant follower of an evangelical sect known as the Church of God. By his own admission, Rohan hoped to hasten the coming of the Messiah by burning down the al-Aqsa Mosque. Rohan told the court that he acted as "the Lord's emissary" on divine instructions, in accordance with the Book of Zechariah, and that he had tried to destroy the al-Aqsa Mosque in order to rebuild the Jewish Temple on the Temple Mount. He was hospitalized in a mental institution, found to be insane and was later deported from Israel."

Clear question Boaz: in your mind now, the action of D. Michael Rohan is a clear act of terrorism or not?
Please use a Yes or No comment.

F.H...... his action was a.... ummm...arrr... *bites tongue*.... cough... choke... maybe.. kinda..... possibly...

YESSSS it was an act of TERRORISm and the bloke who did it claimed to be a Christian. History is history, I cannot deny it.

I never said I wanted it removed 'that' way, but I would approve the Israeli government legislating it out of the way, and then the lawful bulldozers could come in and do their thing.
Lets face it, at one point in time, the Islamic 'bulldozers' of Omar's successor (probably slaves) removed the Church and built the mosque.. the Christians (and the Jews) had zero voice or choice about it.. something I would be seriously reminding Muslims about if they disagreed with its removal.

It so happens though, that while I prefer to see great hidious crimes of history reversed, (which of course would include the treatment of indigenous Aussies) -in this particular case, from what I've seen, the Mosque is not exactly on the real temple site. It would be possible to re-build the temple just near the mosque.

It would not be possible though, to have the mosque so close due to ritual purity reasons I think.. (not 100% sure on that)