On Saturday, when Israel attacked the al-Taba’een Hamas command centre in Gaza City, jihadi propagandists swung into action straight away. The group had placed the military facility inside a school compound for precisely this reason. Now it was time to cash in.
At first, things seemed to be going according to plan. ‘Nearly 100 killed in Israeli strike on school, Gaza officials say,’ blared the Washington Post, a typical example. In the story, Mahmoud Bassal, a ‘Gaza civil defence spokesman’, was given space to hype up the attack without any indication that the Gaza civil defence is controlled by Hamas.
Hamas sat back and waited for the international outrage to place Israel under pressure. This time, however, Jerusalem was prepared. In short order, the IDF released a list of the names and mugshots of the terrorists who had been targeted, as well as their ages and the ranks they held within Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
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