Jerusalem at night in CIA image
A formal request has been submitted to the World Organization of the Scout Movement for officials to eject a group of Middle East members after the Palestinian Scout Association posted on its website a photograph of a "terrorist murderer" and offered him as a leader.
The demand comes from officials with the Palestinian Media Watch, which monitors, reports on and analyzes the media reports across the Middle East.
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The Palestinian organization had offered on its website an image of Baha Alyan in a scout uniform, presenting his "as a role model for the new Palestinian Scout Leaders."
But, PMW reported, he actually was a "terrorist murderer. He boarded a bus in Jerusalem last October armed with knives and a gun, and together with an accomplice he murdered three Israelis: Alon Govberg (51), Haviv Haim (78) and Richard Lakin (76)."
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The course offered under Alyan's name was "organized by the Committee for Training and Developing Leadership of the PSA," PMW reported.
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"The PSA's choice to present a terrorist murderer as a role model for future scout leaders contradicts the goals and mission of the World Organization of the Scout Movement," PMW reported.
Its letter to the international group said, "We ask that you take steps to guarantee that the distinguished World Organization of the Scout Movement will have no part in training future scout leaders to see terrorist murderers as role models by immediately canceling the PSA's membership.
"There is no greater impediment to peace than bringing up children to see murderers of innocent civilians as heroic role models. Should you allow the Palestinian Scout Association to keep its membership in the World Organization of the Scout Movement at the same time as they are presenting a murderer as a role model for future scout leaders, then your organization is effectively a co-sponsor of this terror promoting course."
In the PMW report, by director Itimar Marcus, he included an excerpt from "an official PA daily article about the Palestinian scouts' course."
"Yesterday the practical studies for the [scout] deputy unit leaders … Martyr (Shahid) Leader Gbaha Alyan Course began at the Shabab Al-Eizariya Club in the Jerusalem district."
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The Palestinian scouts had been "conditionally recognized" as a member, without voting rights, in 1996. The group was declared a full member with voting rights on Feb. 27, 2016.
The report provides details that Alyan, 22, and Bilal Ghanem, 23, "boarded a bus in Jerusalem's Armon Hanatziv neighborhood with a gun and a knife and attacked passengers, killing [the three.] Alyan was shot and killed by an Israeli security guard at the scene and Ghanem, a Hamas terrorist who served time in Israeli prison in 2013-2014, was wounded. Ghanem is serving three life sentences and an additional 60 years for these murders."
