“How to be a Palestinian supermom” is the title of a recently released Al Jazeera article and video.
The “Palestinian supermom” featured in the video is Manal Tamimi, a member of the Tamimi clan from Nabih Saleh. The Tamimi clan is quite notorious.
Manal’s husband Bilal runs a media operation that feeds misleading footage and photos to international media and anti-Israel groups. I explored the Tamimi media operation in How a Family Became a Propaganda Machine.
Bassem Tamimi, who was featured in Legal Insurrection coverage when he urged 3rd graders in Ithaca, NY, to become “freedom fighters for Palestine, provides children to confront Israeli soldiers. Bassem has a long history of providing children to confront Israeli soldiers for the cameras, as I documented in Bassem Tamimi and the Use of Children as Political Props.
The most notorious Tamimi clan member is Ahlam Tamimi, the mastermind of the 2001 Sbarro pizzeria bombing, who is held in high regard by the Tamimi clan. Ahlam now is in Jordan, where the government refuses to extradite her to the U.S. for murdering Americans in the Sbarro bombing.
The Tamimi clan are the darlings not only of media such as Al Jazeera, but of western media and activists as well.
The infamous anti-Israel activist Ariel Gold of Ithaca, NY, who arranged for Bassem Tamimi to sneak into the 3rd grade class, frequently posts photos of herself and her children with the Tamimis. In response to the Al Jazeera article, Gold pledged her “love and respect” to Manal and asserted that “it is parenting like hers that gives hope for the future”:
But is this “Palestinian Supermom” really deserving of “love and respect.”
If all you knew was what was in the Al Jazeera article and video, you might think she is just a sweet victim of the Israelis:
As I have documented in previous posts, the Tamimis are experts in using their children as props for their political propaganda. In this sense, Manal Tamimi can indeed be described as a “supermom”.
Let’s start with the deplorable fact that she uses her daughter’s image for her Twitter account, where she has often displayed her intense Jew-hatred and her ardent support for terror attacks.
Associating your young daughter with this kind of ugly views is arguably child abuse. But Al Jazeeera’s “Palestinian supermom” has no regrets: I have documented her outpouring of hatred and support for terrorism twice, and each time Manal Tamimi reacted with defiant pride and proceeded to reaffirm her views.
In one of her most repulsive tweets, the “Palestinian supermom” posted an antisemitic cartoon depicting a “Jew rat” being beaten by a uniformed Nazi. The comment Manal Tamimi added to the image – “Hhhhhhh palestinian and zionists” – obviously equated Palestinians with the Nazi figure.
When a well-meaning Twitter user objected in Arabic that she had posted “a picture of Nazism” even though “the Palestinians are more honorable than the Nazis, they are defending their land and their freedom,” Manal Tamimi rejected the implied criticism and confidently declared: “The important thing is the idea, we the Palestinians are the ones who are going to teach Israel a lesson, we are going to hurt them and we also will achieve victory over them.” In other words, Al Jazeera’s “Palestinian supermom” hopes that – just like the Nazis – the Palestinians will “hurt” the Jews and “achieve victory over them.”
Imagine your mom publicly stating that she views the Nazis as a role model while using your image as her avatar – and imagine that a supposedly serious and professional media organization would praise this mother as a “supermom”.
Manal Tamimi’s social media posts also reveal how she is pushing even her youngest son to get involved in the efforts to provoke Israeli soldiers that the Tamimis regularly stage. About a year ago, she posted a series of photos praising the child who is clearly not even ten years old as a “freedom fighter.” One photo shows the young boy posing with a Palestinian flag in front of Israeli soldiers; another seems to show the boy throwing something at an IDF jeep; and a third photo shows him standing next to two jeeps making some gesture that is probably meant to indicate “victory.”
Al Jazeera’s “Palestinian supermom” also posted an image showing her son on a hill waving a Palestinian flag and flashing a V-sign at soldiers standing at the foot of the hill. The image includes two photoshopped packs of diapers next to the boy and the text: “HEY ZIOROACHES, GOT DIAPERS FOR ALL OF YOU HERE!” Manal Tamimi added the comment: “Free diapers for your toy soldiers from the Tamimi’s.”
So while Al Jazeera emphasizes that Manal Tamimi’s older sons have been injured in clashes with Israeli soldiers, it is clear that Manal Tamimi encourages her children to seek confrontations with soldiers almost as soon as they can walk.
She also teaches her children to view Israeli soldiers as despicable “Zioroaches” who should be ridiculed and despised as fearful cowards. The message to her children is clear: if you want to please your “Palestinian supermom,” go out and try to provoke Israeli soldiers – and if you manage to get hurt, it’s even better, because your parents and adult relatives will celebrate you as a hero. As this cartoon posted by Manal Tamimi’s husband two years ago shows, the Tamimis think that it’s up to their children to “shatter the myth of the Zionist army.”
And while the children do as they’re told and try to “shatter the myth of the Zionist army,” the parents will hover in the background, proudly filming and photographing the efforts of their kids to provoke confrontations with Israeli soldiers. The frightening cynicism reflected in this conduct is also openly displayed by “Palestinian supermom” Manal Tamimi on social media: on the one hand, she teaches her children to regard Israeli soldiers as “toy soldiers” who are just despicable “Zioroaches” and cowards in need of diapers; on the other hand, she likens Israel to Nazi Germany and claims the Palestinians are victims of a holocaust – while at the same time hoping fervently that the Palestinians will eventually be
able to “hurt” the Jews and “achieve victory over them” just like the Nazis did.
According to Al Jazeera, Manal Tamimi is heroically resisting Israel’s occupation, and she is simply “fighting for her children’s future and defending their rights.” Unsurprisingly, Al Jazeera fails to inform its audience that as far as Manal Tamimi is concerned, Israel has no right to exist in any borders.
Al Jazeera also prefers not to tell its audience anything about Manal Tamimi burning hatred for Jews, which she expresses freely on social media.
Glorifying someone like Manal Tamimi as a “Palestinian supermom” will seem Orwellian, if not downright obscene to anyone who believes children must not be exploited for a political agenda. Indeed, in view of the fact that the Tamimis’ agenda includes support for terrorism, which is fueled by a fervent Jew-hatred and the hope to achieve a Nazi-like “victory” that would eliminate the world’s only Jewish state, Al Jazeera’s effort to present Manal Tamimi as a “Palestinian supermom” will strike many decent people as truly sinister.
Yet, anti-Israel activists like Ariel Gold will only be pleased: Gold shared the Al Jazeera video on her Facebook page with the comment: “Love and respect to my friend Manal Tamimi. It is parenting like hers that gives hope for the future.” Manal Tamimi responded: “Thanx habibti, you your self are one of my role model freedom fighter and a great person who believe in humanity, justice and freedom, By fighting together side by side I’m sure we will win and celebrating our freedom sooner no latter.”
So in conclusion, let’s remind ourselves how Ariel Gold’s dear friend Manal Tamimi hopes to “win.”
The Al Jazeera article and video were a whitewash of a vile anti-Semite who spreads hatred and incitement on social media.
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Petra Marquardt-Bigman is a German-Israeli free-lance researcher with a Ph.D. in contemporary history whose work focuses on anti-Semitism and efforts to delegitimize Israel.
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