The double standard at "Terrorism News"

One of the politically opposite blogs I enjoy picking on is Terrorism News, albeit the relationship is in its infancy.

Terrorism News mostly serves as a clearing house for stories touching on terrorism in at least some vague sense (though stories on global warming might also appear, as I understand it). Their point-of-view is biased toward against the USA and Israel, though of course I find nothing wrong in that per se. My issue with the folks at Terrorism News is the length to which they go to defend their views in the discussion threads. I have in mind _H_ and DJEB particularly, since I don't recall having any discussions with "STEFAN" or "TOBY."

Sadly, the rhetoric those two employed against "Frank" (noted here) seems fairly typical of their interaction with those who criticize.

The latest example concerns their offensive defense of a ridiculous piece authored by Tom Clonan (found here courtesy of "Norman G. Finkelstein").
Clonan argued that the missiles fired by Hezbollah could not be fired from the inside of buildings "as has been suggested by the IDF" but Clonan offered no quotation and no evidence that the IDF had ever made that claim apart from placing quotation marks around "asset" as though it had been a key term used by the IDF. In searching for the source of the quotation, I found it credited in a partial quotation of IDF spokesman Jacob Dalal: "there was a specific Hezbollah asset."
Finding the full quotation proved difficult.
I found a CNN transcript that had a Dalal making a parallel statement: "Our target was a Hezbollah asset."
(the URL is worth following, by the way, since it has a more complete description of circumstances by Dalal)

Google found nothing beyond the limited quotation including those exact words (I also tried alternate spellings of "Hezbollah"), so we're evidently stuck with a statement shorn from its immediate context.

Lacking any evidence of an IDF suggestion that missiles had been fired from inside buildings, I posted a comment under the article at Terrorism News.

Bearing in mind that the hosts have criticized me for not staying on the topic of the article, note that DJEB makes a comment about how another participant in the comment thread will demand supporting evidence for my statement about smaller Katyusha rocket launchers that may be moved into and out of buildings (I presume that was the issue, anyway).

_H_ really gets things going, however.

He wades in with his second suggestion (the first time he said he as joking) that my purpose was to "psychoanalyse" the folks at Terrorism News. That smacks of an attempt to poison the well by suggesting that my comments will be directed at the hosts rather than toward the issue. This post will run long if I spend time cataloguing every fallacy, however, so let's move quickly on.
_H_ reviews for us portions of the article that do not address my point as if the opposite were true. He finds it relevant to point out that I neglected to mention that Clonan says that it would be difficult to hide a truck-mounted launcher or truck in the building. How does that address Clonan's failure to mention smaller launchers that need not be mounted on trucks? I have no idea.
Then _H_ ridicules the notion of a small Katyusha launcher ("Your asinine comment about portable Katyusha launchers is a pure gem"--italics in the original) before claiming that Hezbollah uses Zelzal-2 missiles "when attempting to target communities and cities."
_H_ is wrong on that count, of course. The vast majority of the missiles coming from Lebanon are Katyusha-type rockets, and nothing prevents Katyushas from being used to target communities and cities. Certainly their shorter range limits the target potential. The IDF page shows a graphic indicating three target areas within Katyusha range from Qana. The coastal city of Haifa is beyond Katyusha range and is also included as a target in the graphic, but the missiles used against Haifa appear to have been the Khaybar-1 type.

The Israeli military did not know what the other rockets were and said only that they were not Iranian-made Zilzals, which have a longer range than Katyushas.
(CNN)

Just in case doubt lingers about the existence of easily-portable Katyusha rocket launchers ... see "arash" ("single launch tubes," 9K132 analog, 20 kilometer range).

_H_'s initial reply is essentially a bald claim that the original article is such fine work that I must not have read it properly (thus accounting for my failure to appreciate its greatness and perfection).
At the end, _H_ asks (rhetorically?) "[W]hy is there no sign of any Hizbollah 'asset' in the rubble?"

Now, having read the article, I knew that Clonan didn't say anything about not finding any sign of the asset in the rubble. Clonan never established the identity of the "asset" for that matter. He simply implied that the IDF was claiming that it was a rocket launcher or the like--without providing supporting evidence for that claim--and then proceeded to extrude a thin argument in favor of the notion that there could not have been a rocket launcher at the site.
When I point that out, _H_ is unfazed.
"the aritcle [sic] states 'the question remains as to what kind of "asset" the question remains whata kind of asset the IDF could credibly alleged to have been contained within the building.' (punctation converted to more appropriate form, spelling left intact)

Apparently _H_ and I talked past each other. _H_'s question implied that there was no evidence of the "asset" in the rubble. That implied premise was not part of Clonan's argument. That was my point. _H_ seemed to take it that I was saying that Clonan wasn't making an issue out of the existence of the "asset" whereas I was simply saying that (missing) evidence of the asset amidst the rubble wasn't part of the argument.

There was plenty more to critique; an abundance of fallacies--particularly personal attacks minus a treatment of my arguments. The thing that finally induced me to drop the conversation over there was the double standard in the replies. First, it is suggested that I quote "selectively" (out of context? I don't think so) and it is implied that I need to provide more complete answers to the interrogatory grilling (they dodge the burden of proof over there like crazy, not that I'm always averse to doing the lion's share in providing the evidence). Then, they say I'm rambling and they need to allow others to have their say, which I took as a thinly-veiled suggestion that they had in mind to edit further comments I might submit.

Now, it's their site and God bless 'em they can run the site as they see fit. On the other hand, I've got the freedom and the opportunity to critique the way they do things while running my blog the way I see fit. The admonishments in their rules to refrain from attacking the person in favor of attacking the argument ring hollow in light of their behavior in the commentary threads. Likewise, the insistence on presentation of evidence applies to commentary, not to the articles that they post. Apparently Clonan won't get challenged regarding his claims because those claims fit the accepted ideology, and the suggestion that Clonan hasn't presented evidence requires some sort of evidence apart from the self-evident fact that Clonan didn't present evidence.

Consistency (logical consistency) is a beautiful thing.
Terrorism News is an ugly place by that measure.