Fake threats, fake news

News that dozens of bomb threats against Jewish community centers in the US were allegedly made by an Israeli-American teen in Ashkelon has left the Hebrew-language media, and much of the Jewish world, baffled and confused. While the name of the suspect is under a gag order in Israel, and details about him or his possible motive have been scant, his identity is deemed to make it hard for American-Jewish groups to maintain their claims that extremism and anti-Semitism in the US have been on the rise since the election of Donald Trump, and Israel’s weekend papers are keen to point out the consequent problems.

“A surge in anti-Semitism because of Trump — Fake news originating in Israel,” reads Israel Hayom’s headline. The right-wing daily, which not-so-subtly supports Trump, takes note of the US president’s war on mainstream media and makes sure to point out that news organizations across the globe were wrong in their assertions of a connection between his rise to power and the JCC bomb threats.

“What is clear now is that the attempt to tie the Trump administration and the bomb threats was wrong and mistaken,” writes Israel Hayom’s Boaz Bismuth, who typically makes it a priority to take swipes at any media outlet left of center. “We call this an agenda.”

In Yedioth Ahronoth, the focus is less on the mistakes of the media and more on the significance of the fact that the suspected perpetrator of the anti-Semitic acts, who according to reports worked from home and used a computer lab with sophisticated equipment, encryption and transmission systems, emphatically does not fit the profile of a white supremacist.

“The anti-Semites are rejoicing,” writes Yedioth contributor Nadav Eyal. “This act is embarrassing because it backs the claims made by anti-Semites according to which the Jews are trying to ‘extort’ public opinion in their favor.”

Israel’s anti-fraud squad arrested the 18-year-old suspect at his home in the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon Thursday. The teen’s father was detained and brought in for questioning as well, on suspicion that he was aware of his son’s alleged actions. Since January, nearly 150 bomb threats have hit JCCs, Jewish day schools and other institutions, causing the evacuation of dozens of Jewish community centers and prompting some parents to remove their children from JCC programs.

Haaretz devotes a small portion of its front page to the JCC threats, but the paper is more interested in a recent report indicating that Hamas operatives in the Gaza Strip have been abandoning the terror group en masse in order to join more hard-line Salafi organizations. Haaretz’s military correspondent and defense analyst Amos Harel writes that more than 550 Salafis are being held in Hamas prisons in the Palestinian enclave.

In other news rocking the country, a video emerged Thursday showing an Israeli police officer assaulting an Arab truck driver and a number of others in the Wadi al-Joz neighborhood of East Jerusalem, apparently unprovoked. Even Israel Hayom, which has in the past rushed to take the side of law enforcers even when their version of the events was disputed, can’t find a way to defend the actions shown in the clip. The paper describes the incident as a “serious case of violence,” and prominently features the truck driver’s testimony regarding the attack.

The video drew condemnation Thursday from the Israel Police as well as Gilad Erdan, the minister who oversees its affairs, who described the incident as “grave and deserving of all condemnation.” Footage of the incident shows the officer from the elite police reconnaissance unit Yasam in a heated verbal exchange with the driver. The argument quickly turns violent as the officer headbutts the driver before repeatedly punching and kicking him. The officer was suspended following the emergence of the video clip.

The weekend papers are united in offering their condolences over the death of iconic Israeli sportscaster Meir Einstein, who passed away Thursday at the age of 65. Einstein announced late last year in an emotional broadcast that he was suffering from a muscular disease and was confined to a wheelchair. The sportscaster, who became somewhat of a national meme following his ecstatic, hoarse screams during his coverage of the Israeli national soccer team’s surprise 3-2 victory over soccer giant France in 1993, continued his work covering sports until his health began to seriously deteriorate in recent days.

“[Einstein was] a man who knew that soccer was so much more than a game,” President Reuven Rivlin said Thursday. “When you shouted with joy at that goal that will forever be engraved in the pages of history — we jumped up with you… During painful (sports) losses, we were sad with you, and how sad we are [now over your loss].”