Reading beyond the headlines: the reality

[link to unlvrebelyell.com]


The media muddles aspects of conflict in Gaza

So it turns out Jews actually don’t control the media. Relax. You’re most likely reading this article in the privacy of your mind, so take a moment to let these words float through unfiltered and recall the jokes you have heard.

If anything, this recent conflict between Israel and Hamas proved that, while the Jewish state may militarily devastate its foe, it could still take a pummeling from the world media.

For weeks now, you’ve probably heard a vast barrage of harsh criticisms lobbed at Israel. News sources around the globe posted seemingly damning headlines, announcing that over 1,300 Palestinians were killed in operation Cast Lead.

You probably gasped at reports claiming that nearly 900 women and children made up these causalities. While I realize that headlines stating, “1,300 killed, 22,000 buildings destroyed in Gaza,” printed in all caps on CNN.com cause great alarm, I beg one thing of the readers: Read beyond the headlines.

The situation in Gaza was undoubtedly dire. But, it was made only more tragic by the fact that most of the news sources covering the conflict encompassed only fragments of truth.

Many groups denounced Israel’s offensive in Gaza, criticizing the state for allowing the type of collateral damage illustrated by the previously mentioned headline. You had to dig halfway into that particular article past the blaring heading to discover that the Palestine Liberation Organization reported these fatality rates, ones provided by none other than Hamas itself.

Only a handful of news agencies and journalists reported on a contrary estimate based on field interviews in the Gaza strip. One such source was an Italian reporter named Lorenzo Cremonesi.

His article “Gaza doctor refutes casualties reported in Cast Lead Op” referred to evidence that casualties in the region may have been half of the figure that was claimed by the PLO.

If you don’t believe such a gross exaggeration is possible, then Google the 2002 Battle of Jenin, where the PLO claimed that the Israelis slaughtered about 1,500 Palestinian refugees. The U.N. later reported that 52 people died in the incident, the majority being militants.

Realize, however, that these statements are not meant to cheapen the lives of the Palestinian civilians caught in the crossfire. No matter what the real figures turn out to be, the loss of innocent lives is a tragedy.

The world media only compounds this calamity, however, by relying solely on accounts provided by Hamas. And, at the end of the day, it is not Israel devaluing the Palestinian fatalities, but rather Hamas itself. Somewhere during this conflict Israel fell into a public relations sinkhole and the public followed. By the war’s end almost every major news network in the world had painted a skewed narrative of the war.

Somewhere along the way, Hamas transformed into some legitimate political actor, one locked in battle with Israel over the right of national self-determination. This notion couldn’t be further from reality.

If anything, this article must enforce a central truth: Hamas is a terrorist organization. The media must stop casting them as the legitimate government of the Gaza Strip and show them as the monsters they truly are.

In the end, Hamas is nothing more than a group of fundamentalist militants who in 2007, after being elected to Gaza’s legislature, launched a bloody coup to seize complete control of the region. They are the same mold of extremists who trained 14–year-old boys to blow themselves up in Israeli buses and restaurants.

Aside from the loss of human life, the greatest tragedy in this recent conflict was how hungrily the media swallowed up Hamas’ propaganda. These terrorists have spent the last year firing thousands of rockets at Israeli schools, hospitals and homes. Children and parents live in constant terror, knowing they have only 15 seconds to run to a shelter at the sound of a siren. Worst of all, Hamas has committed crimes against humanity while purposely surrounding itself by a human shield.

If you don’t immediately recognize this atrocity as Hamas’ M.O. then check out the YouTube.com video of militants firing mortars from the inner wall of the Beit Hanoun School for Boys in Gaza.

These terrorists frequently launch rockets from Palestinian schools, hospitals and mosques, a fact constantly illuminated by bi-partisan U.S. resolutions. Hamas has no regard for human life, whether it is Israeli or Palestinian. They only wish to murder the children of Israel while using the children of Gaza as expendable ammunition in the global war for positive press.

Everything said, I don’t want you to believe that I am somehow attempting to portray Israel as perfect. It is a nation as flawed as any other. But in opposition to Hamas’ propaganda, it is not composed of monsters that relish in the death of Palestinian civilians. The majority of headlines portrayed Israel as carelessly assaulting Gaza’s infrastructure. How many news sources reported on the 2000 truckloads of humanitarian aid Israel provided to the region during the operation?

In the end, I ask only that you read past the headlines, past the propaganda and past the blatant lies. Judge Israel with understanding, while contemplating how the U.S. would respond if al-Qaeda began launching rockets at your home from Mexico City using its inhabitants as human shields.

Such an act would be pure evil. Unfortunately, that is exactly what Israel deals with on a constant basis, one of the last living remnants of real evil. It is up to the world to realize this fact and to call Hamas by its real name.