[Uh-Oh]Israel and Gaza on the brink of all out WAR

Yes. Could you ask a more obvious question? Iran would love to wipe the United States off the face of the earth.

 

Currently based in Abu Dhabi, UAE. Just like the U.S. and its news networks would be biased towards Christianity and Israel, you can imagine here they are biased towards Islam and Arab countries.

It's interesting to read local media spin on a major conflict like this and how it compares to the U.S. news sites.

Here's a picture of the front page of today's paper (WARNING - includes a disturbing graphic image not meant for the weak!). Pretty safe to say you won't find this on a U.S. paper. You can get an idea of who they think the bad guy is, and of course somewhere else, the other side is considered the bad guy. If you ask me, there is no "good" here and the innocent civilians on both sides are the losers here. Just ****ing sad.

Spoiler

At least the U.S. news sites I've checked recently at least acknowledge the Palestinian death toll. No way they would get this personal and use shock value to this level though.

 

Unless of course it has to do with a local "terrorist plot" uncovered by the FBI.

 

From front page of UAE news website:

Very far from being an unbiased place to get news, but please don't delude people into thinking there is some extreme form of bias going on in the UAE in relation to this issue.

You would have to be an absolute moron to think UAE residents read "Western" media as little as non-UAE residents read non-Western media. We all expect more and better from the NY Times than we do from Gulf News. This goes without saying.

As if posting a picture of murdered children is somehow less accurate journalism than.. oh I don't know - no pictures of dead children at all in a conflict where 15-20% of only civilian casualties have been children. This is everyone's concern. The death of soldiers, pilots, rocket launchers, generals, etc is the least of my concern in this conflict.

Today the death tolls are 70+ Palestinians and 7 Israelis. Fair reporting is not about giving equal time/space to all sides. You spend months on 9/11 and you spend a half a day on the terrible traffic situation. If the goal is to inform the public of things they need to know, they should be spending far more time/space on Palestinians.

You want to see truly outrageous? Try this on for size:

You may have heard of this guy.

 

Never said the Gulf News was extremely biased. Just pointing out that the media will lean to a certain side based on where you are. The picture on the front page along with the text and first paragraph clearly suggests they are leaning on one side (in fact it's the text that shows more bias than the picture).

 

Really? You can put one picture there. Let's hear your suggestion for what is a more important story than the death of innocen children in this conflict?

Please, do tell. What should be the picture on the front page which indicates that the edior is focusing on the most important issues regardless of side?

 

http://www.salon.com/2012/11/19/ariel_sharons_son_says_flatten_all_of_gaza/

 

There are rockets being launched from both sides, no? Let's not pretend that Palestine is acting like Gandhi here. Both sides are at fault here for the image we see on the front page. However if you look at the text, it's easy to infer they are trying to establish who (along with its allies) are the villains.

 

Resistance does not simply encompass organized peaceful protests or methods that you support. Again, your problem isn't with me or what I'm saying, it's with international law, which states that people living under occupation have the right to resist by using a wide-range of methods.

It may not be "occupied" in the traditional sense of the term, but the Israeli regime turning into an open-air prison, engaging in collective punishment, laying siege, conducting a blockade, and assaulting the Gaza Strip are even worse. This is how Israel, using American weapons, views "defense." If you can't see how Israel is culpable, then you are either uniformed or more extreme in your views than any Zionist I've ever seen or heard.

You made some serious claims in refutation of what I said earlier, but you never backed them up with facts, examples, and evidence. I asked you to do so, but received no response. I wonder why.

 

There is no Palestine. You mean Hamas. Even the conceptual Palestine includes the West Bank and the West Bank has not done anything, is not involved other than one "coincidental" item - they are planning to shortly request non-member statehood from the masters of the United Nations.

Both sides are launching attacks. Here is the difference:

The entire economy of Gaza is a nominal GDP of about $3bn about 25% of it being foreign aid.
>>Israel spends about $18 billion on defense. It receives over $3bn from the US alone which it uses to purchase weapons/defense systems. Israel has the highest ratio of defense spending to GDP and as a percentage of the budget of all developed countries.

All of Hamas is 12,000 people.
>> Israel has 176,500 active troops and can call up about a half million reserves (compulsory service).

Hamas's weapon is rockets which they create using fertilizer. Their most powerful rocket barely reaches Tel Aviv. They have almost no accuracy whatsoever, even when firing as close as southern Israel.
>> Israel is in the top 10 militaries in the world. It owns chemical weapons. It is the only Middle Eastern nation which owns nuclear weapons (100-200 depending on who you believe since they are kept secret, undeclared and not party to the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty). Its airforce is recognized as among the most powerful and most advanced in the world - our resident military obsessors or resident Israelis can attest to that.

During this conflict, they have murdered between 3 and 7 Israelis (have seen both figures around).Since 2001 when they began, Hamas has launched just under 11,000 rockets which have unfortunately killed just under 40 Israeli civilians.
>>Israel has killed more civilians than that in the past week. You can see from my earlier posts in the thread, they have thus far attacked journalists, two sets of kids playing football in the street, a father and daughter on the beach, as well as an entire family of 9 (including 4 children). The ratio of civilian deaths from war, generally, is 6 Palestinians for 1 Israeli. 126 Israeli children have been killed by Palestinians and 1,476 Palestinian children have been killed by Israelis since September 29, 2000. Since 2000, Palestinians have killed about 1,100 Israelis and Israelis have killed 6,500 Palestianians.

Even more important, Gaza is a territory under complete siege of Israel and previously Egypt. Its borders are tightly controlled. It receives food supplies as per the Israeli government's instructions to meet the basic minimum caloric needs of a human being. It is essentially an open-air prison where the violent extremists and the mothers and the children are locked in together. Kind of like fish in a barrel. The economy is entirely in the hands of Hamas since they receive the aid, the supplies and are in control of the illegal tunnels where they get whatever maniacal goods they wish.

So yes, we can callously throw around the generalization of "well neither side is acting like Gandhi here!" but that's the type of literature best saved for an episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians. This is not really a battle. This is an assault from one side, and a paltry attempt to retaliate from the other. You are right, neither side has good intentions. But Israel's intention is far more valid given its capabilities, demonstration and propensity for aggression as evidenced by their consistently low rankings in the Global Peace Index (bottom 10 out of 153 nations) despite being among the most capable destructive forces in the world. It is unacceptable that Gazan civilians have to face a ten-fold retaliatory effort from the IDF for the actions of people whose power over the civilians is increased by the siege.

But back to the question... What image should a journalist place on the fontpage of a newspaper disregarding sides which would appropriately characterize the information which is most essential to the public?

 

Interesting and Enlightening

Rocket River

 

FIFY.

 

Excellent. So what should be the fate of the population of a territory whose government engages in war crimes? I got some MIGHTY FINE examples for you, and I bet they weren't prophesized in your imaginary bible either.

 

You're starting to sound a lot like some of the other posters.....DD????

 

I don't have "own people" like you, I'm not a flag worshipper like you seem to be.

Perhaps you can answer the question which both of you are squeezing out of..

What should be the fate of the population of a territory whose government engages in war crimes? I want to give you some examples of war crimes.