When commentators are unable or unwilling to acknowledge the deadly nature of Palestinian terrorism, they do not simply leave out critical details; they fundamentally change the entire story and sanitize the truth.

In his November 5 opinion column in The Toronto Star, “Israel’s arrest of young Christian Palestinian woman another example of misguided decisions,” contributing columnist Michael Coren took issue with Israel’s arrest of Layan Nasir, a 25-year-old Palestinian arrested by Israel.

Coren wrote that she was first arrested “allegedly for her links to the Democratic Progressive Student Pole, a student group Israel claims is a youth wing of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, an illegal organization in Israel and several other countries.”

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) is not simply “an illegal organization in Israel and several other countries,” but a banned terrorist group both in Israel and in Canada, and for good reason.

While distinct from groups like Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in that it is not Islamic in nature, PFLP is nevertheless a fanatical Palestinian terrorist group that has a long history of murders, suicide bombings and other violent attacks stretching back more than five decades.

This downplaying of a murderous terrorist group to be characterized merely as “an illegal organization” effectively serves only to whitewash the violent threats Israel faces from groups like PFLP, and instead frames Israel’s arrest of Nasir as overkill, saying that “her friends dispute the link.”

Interestingly, later in his column, Coren, attempting to dismiss Nasir’s alleged extremism, writing that “it’s difficult to see how Layan Nasir is a genuine threat to anyone. Her views are little different from those of most Palestinians and she has no links to violent activities.”

While it is not publicly known what specific crimes Nasir has been accused of, violent terrorism doesn’t just rely on those carrying out attacks. It also relies on an extensive network of financial and logistical support.

But Coren’s throwaway line that Nasir’s “views are little different from those of most Palestinians” is somehow a mitigating factor is bizarre. Given that huge swathes of Palestinians hold extremist views, including support for the October 7, 2023 massacres and terrorism in general, if Nasir’s views are in line with most Palestinians, that is not a defence of her, but a damning indictment of Palestinian society.

In fact, a recent poll by the Palestinian Center for Policy & Survey Research found that a majority of Palestinians said that the decision by Hamas to invade southern Israel on October 7 and massacre some 1,200 Israelis, along with kidnapping hundreds more, was the “correct” move, and if that figure is even remotely correct, it exposes a society that is deeply radicalized and hateful.

But rather than shining a critical light on how a 25-year-old Palestinian woman could become involved in a terrorist group – and what widespread radicalization in Palestinian society helped to foment such hatred – Coren’s commentary instead sought to trivialize this extraordinary problem among Palestinians.

Coren, a longtime commentator in the Canadian media, has previously made eyebrow-raising comments, including claiming that Jesus was Palestinian, came to the defence of extremist anti-Israel British politician Jeremy Corbyn, and attempted to draw a moral equivalence between supporters of Israel and those who seek to destroy it. His November 4 column reflects a continuation of his past anti-Israel polemics.