Media Vs. Israel (I)
Israel is not only fighting a war against Hamas but also against the international media which – in words, photos, and videos – slander it as a savage state slaughtering civilians.
This was not the case when America fought its hugely disproportionate wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. For example, during the American and British attack on Fallujah, Iraq, at the end of 2004, about 10,000 buildings and 60 mosques were destroyed, and 800 civilians were killed even though no Iraqis had fired missiles at New York.
As many as 40,000 Tamil civilians were killed by the Sinhalese majority at the end of the civil war in Sri Lanka in 2009. Where were the cameras to record that monstrosity?
Whenever America is involved in a war, the plight of American soldiers is highlighted while the suffering of civilians in the poor civilians in the countries under attack is barely covered. Their humanity hardly matters.
Only when it comes to Israelis, who live in the developed world, and Palestinians, who live in the developing world, is the portrayal of the terror of war for the latter magnified.
Jacob Mendlovic
Toronto, Canada
Media Vs. Israel (II)
We keep hearing about how many Palestinian civilians have been killed in Gaza. But the media never mention that Hamas does not have a military base and its subhuman members do not wear uniforms. It’s difficult enough to avoid civilian casualties in any war but virtually impossible when Israel strikes back against Hamas.
We keep hearing about how on the Israeli side it’s mostly soldiers who are killed, giving the impression that Hamas was somehow going out of its way to avoid harming Israeli civilians. Is there anything more misleading and dishonest?
Josh Greenberger
(Via E-Mail)
Media Vs. Israel (III)
Your August 1 editorial “Losing the PR Battle” argued that “Israel is being battered in the court of world public opinion…. How could it not be, given the propensity of the media outlets like The New York Times [to slant the news]?”
But The New York Times is not the only player in this game. In recent days the Washington Post published two lead editorials calling for “the disarmament of Hamas” and suggesting that no economic aid should be given to Gaza unless Hamas surrenders its missiles.
And a number of world leaders have ignored The New York Times and sided with Israel. On July 15, Tony Blair, Middle East envoy of the Quartet and former prime minister of Great Britain, called for action to remove Hamas’s “military infrastructure.” On July 22, the European Union declared: “All terrorist groups in Gaza must disarm.” On July 24, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators introduced a resolution calling on the Obama administration to make the disarming of Hamas a central part of any cease-fire proposal.
And of course public opinion polls continue to show that far more Americans support Israel than support the Palestinians.
Moshe Phillips Benyamin Korn
Members of the Board
Religious Zionists of America
Media Vs. Israel (IV)
Every time I see images in the media of suffering Gazan children I can’t help but think of the thousandsof Syrian children whose homes have been destroyed and whose lives have been ruined. Many of them have been made refugees from their own country and are living as orphans in Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, and Turkey.
The Western countries and the UN have done little or nothing to help these poor children. The media have devoted little if any coverage to the suffering of those children.
And what about all the poor kidnapped girls in Nigeria? After a few days of media attention, they’ve long been forgotten. No one is holding demonstrations or shedding any tears for them. Why? Are they less pitiful now than they were when they were snatched by their Muslim captors?