There are great moments in the annals of network news journalism.
CBS had Dan Rather's time traveling documents from the Vietnam War that were somehow written in Microsoft Word. (The fact that the media routinely praised Rather as a paragon of journalism tells you everything you need to know about them.)
NBC News had its rigged truck explosions and Brian Williams surviving more made up close calls than Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden combined.
Now ABC News has its own shining moment. "Why Palestinians Throw Stones: A Reporter's Notebook".
Let me help explain this to ABC News.
You throw stones at another human being because you want to injure them. Conversely, when you don't wish to injure them, you don't throw stones at them.
It's really that simple.
Like so many media hacks, Julia MacFarlane tries to claim that throwing rocks at people is a symbol of "defiance".
No, throwing rocks is not a symbol. The Statue of Liberty is a symbol. The golden arches above a fast food restaurant are a symbol. Kafka's works are filled with symbolism. But when we drop bombs on ISIS, it's not a symbol. It's a bomb.
In the Muslim world, if you want to throw something symbolic, you hurl a shoe. When you're throwing rocks, it's because you want to cause injury or death.
ABC News would have an easier time grasping the symbolism of rock hurling if the objects were flying at the heads of its reporters.
But if Julia and ABC News really want to delve into the symbolism of Muslims throwing rocks at Jews, it's an anti-Semitic custom that predates the current struggle between the indigenous Jewish population and the Egyptian-Jordanian settlers occupying parts of Israel.
In former times--and in remote places even today--it was common for Muslim schoolboys to stone Jews. When the Turks conquered Yemen in 1872, an envoy was sent from the Chief Rabbi of Istanbul to inquire what grievance the Yemenite Jews had against their neighbors. It is indicative that the first thing of which they complained was this molestation by the schoolboys. But when the Turkish Governor asked an assembly of notables to stop this nuisance,there arose an old doctor of Muslim law and explained that this stone-throwing at Jews was an age-old custom (in Arabic 'Ada) and therefore it was unlawful to forbid it.
Film at 11.