Yes, I should have but I didn't recognize that fact at the time, just reacted to the usual biased presentation, and it's obviously biased in any case.
Riiiight because AOL is so liberal and anti-Israel. I guess if you believe the lie of the "liberal media" then nearly everything you see, hear or read will appear biased.
Well, I have a different impression. I would guess that they'd cover the casualties, certainly, but along with that coverage they'd be sure to be "balanced" and show the Lebanese side. Which they didn't do in their coverage of Qana.
Well, I can't seem to find any archived photo galleries from the Haifa attacks on the AOL site, so I went looking elsewhere. I found that two of the bastions of the "liberal media,"
The NYTimes and
The BBC both had articles and videos concentrating on the Haifa attacks without interspersing them with images of Lebanese victims (the NYT video is titled
Smoke and Tears and the BBC's is called
Hezbollah's strike into Haifa in northern Israel). The NYTimes site also has a
complete coverage section on the Middle East with articles about both sides and many
photo galleries including day by day reports representing the news from both sides of the border.
Also, uber-liberal
CBSnews.com has an extensive archive of videos reporting on the attacks on Haifa.
On top of the above, other sites such as
MSNBC (citing a Washington Post article) have print articles that describe the attacks in Haifa without inserting any information about the retaliatory actions by Israel or their effects.
And there are plenty more where those came from.
So much for that argument.
You're simply playing apologist for what is obviously biased coverage. There was no need to show Israeli soldiers at all if their intent was to show the damage in Qana. The contrast they intended to make is obvious.
The section on "latest news" from your AOL site was not only aout Qana (I know I brought up the point that it was about Qana, but it does, in fact, cover other subjects. I apologize) and the pictures also depicted the protests in Beirut. I do question the inclusion of the smoking soldier's picture because it isn't particularly newsworthy, even though the caption states that he is newly returned home from "an incursion into Lebanon (I don't find it "sinister" but, rather, the close-up nature and the fact that he is dirty and obviously tired shows a humanity and normality to the viewer that can then extend to all the Israeli soldiers), but the photo of the soldiers returning home is part of the "latest news" theme because it happened on Saturday and the patrol and the soldier setting up the explosive are in the village of Maroun al-Ras which was
captured by Israeli forces on Satuday. So the images are not just arbitrary counter points to the images of death and ruin in Qana.
So much for that argument.
Read the link I posted back there about how the Israelis are hiding in shelters and that isn't covered. Death isn't the only story here.
Ahhh, but it is covered.
From
NYTimes article on Haifa refugeesHAIFA, Israel, July 26 ” Haifa, a city of 250,000 people, beautifully rising along a mountain, on Wednesday looked like a Hollywood set during an actors’ strike. The streets were almost empty, the shops shuttered, the gas stations closed, the street lights blinking their cycle of stop and go for no particular reason.
There have been periods of threat before, especially farther north in Nahariya and smaller towns, but missiles had never reached Haifa. Now, with Hezbollah employing more sophisticated and longer-range Syrian and Iranian missiles, this multiethnic city, one of Israel’s jewels, is suddenly vulnerable.
Dozens of missiles have struck Haifa in recent days, completely paralyzing it.
They have driven residents into shelters or out of the city, and many who have stayed have sent their children farther south, where the missiles have not yet reached.
The people here are intermittently anxious and combative, troubled and proud at this new challenge that history has thrown at them.
Emphasis mine
NYTimes article on Haifa refugees and how they are coping
Reuters AlertNet article on Israeli hotels being packed with refugees
Boston Globe article mentioning "Whole families sleeping on mats"
Sydney Morning Herald article describing tent cities and mentioning bomb shelters
CBS affiliate site reporting on Israelis heading to bomb shelters earlier in the conflict
Salon.com article about plumbers being dispatched to an Israeli shelter
NPR audio link entitled "Rockets Drive Israelis Into Bomb Shelters"
San Francisco Chronicle article about a couple getting married in a bomb shelter
Also the MSNBC article I mentioned above describes refugees as does one of the CBS videos -
Israel shelters up.
So much for that argument.
And the coverage as usual focuses in on the most emotional stuff. When you focus in on individual wailing sufferers you are only intending to provoke an emotion-based judgment, you aren't interested in giving objective coverage of the overall situation. You are made to believe that what you are seeing is what they tell you it is, but as that link I posted says, you know no such thing.
I agree that showing "wailing sufferers" is presented in order to evoke an emotional response from the viewer, but it happens on both sides (for example, see Smoke and Tears video above and look up old video from suicide attacks in Israel). However, seeing the effects of war on other human beings is news and, besides, that is not all that is shown. Do you think that news organizations showing videos of Katrina victims took away from the fact that the preparation and response was horribly inadequate or did it highlight that fact? Do you think that showing images of famine victims in Africa disallows one from looking at the situation objectively? How about images of Hiroshima?
Showing images of death, misery and destruction is not necesarily showing bias and it definitely is not bias if both sides are presented and, as I have already shown, they are.
So much for that argument.
The numbers mean nothing. The point is that the coverage insinuates that there is no good reason for Israel's actions, insinuates that everything that happens in Lebanon is some kind of fault of Israel's, some callous targeting of civilians or some such, all manipulated judgments. The number of deaths does NOT tell the real story.
No, the point is that there are 10+ times as many Lebanese victims as there are Israeli victims and they also tend to happen in larger numbers at once in Lebanon. The Haifa attacks and the emotional aftermath were and are covered as well as other Israeli casualties, including military casualties. So stop pretending that the media are ignoring the Israeli side because that is a bogus claim.
As for the supposed insinuation that it's "all Israel's fault," I will say that sometimes it just may be. I do not believe that there can be any justification for attacking a civilian convoy after Israel tells them to evacuate or for attacking clearly marked rescue vehicles or civilian cars fleeing a besieged area or shelling a known UN outpost. As I have stated in a previous post, it does not matter if Israel believes that an attack originated from that area. They have the surveillance capability to scope out the area before they launch a counter attack and make sure that they are not targeting innocent civilians. I do agree that accidents happen, but Israel does not seem to be taking all the appropriate measures to avoid them and are shifting the blame to Hezbollah instead of using some sense. An ambulance should NEVER be a target no matter if they are suspected of carrying enemies or weapons.
And the number of deaths is definitely part of the story. Just because the US doesn't like to tally civilian casualties does not mean it should not be done.
Exactly. Just what the media manipulate you to believe. The Israelis may be knocking themselves out to avoid civilian casualties as a matter of fact but nobody would ever know that from the coverage that focuses only on the flat results and insinuates an anti-Israel interpretation of them.
See above.
You have jumped to the conclusion that the bombing is "indiscriminate" and "simply because terrorists may be in the area." This is what the media coverage leads you to believe. Did you read my link about the disinformation war?
from a timesonline.co.uk articleThe 1949 Geneva Conventions state:
Article 48 ” Basic rule
Parties shall at all times distinguish between the civilian population and combatants and accordingly shall direct their operations only against military objectives.
Article 51 ” Protection of the civilian population
Indiscriminate attacks are prohibited. Indiscriminate attacks are:
(a) Those which are not directed at a specific military objective;
(b)
Those which employ a method or means of combat which cannot be directed at a specific military objective
Among others, the following types of attacks are to be considered as indiscriminate:
(a) An attack by bombardment which treats as a single military objective a number of clearly separated and distinct military objectives located in a city, town, village or other area containing a similar concentration of civilians;
(b)
An attack which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated.
Emphasis mine
The article mentions both sides being in danger of war crimes charges. I also abhor Hezbollah's indiscriminate killing of civilians (wether or not they are actually targeting civilians is another story...they may just have bad aim and are missing the oil depots in Haifa), Israel is claiming the moral high ground and is a signatory of the Geneva Conventions (many of whose provisions are based on the war crimes perpetrated against the European Jews) and also has the technology to bomb with near perfect precision and the duty not to target an area where there will be assured civilian casualties if the "near perfect" isn't perfect enough.
And I did read your link and have been researching the claims made. I have to do more research on the 1982 invasion in order to respond (I'll probably respond to the post containing the link), but I do have some articles to counter this claim:
quote:
The press is also spending a great deal of time talking to Lebanese civilians and their relatives in the United States and highlighting the difficult conditions they are enduring. This is no doubt the case since they are living in a war zone; however, the media has spent almost no time talking to the Israelis living under the constant threat of rocket attacks. Few reporters have gone into the bomb shelters to interview the frightened Israeli families. No one seems interested in how the relatives of Israelis in the United States feel about their loved ones being under siege.
NYTimes article presenting support from both Jewish and Arab Americans
Arizona Republic article reporting fears from Americans on both sides
Palm Peach Post article reporting on Israel support rallies
MSNBC article reporting Newsweek interviews of youths returning from Israel and Lebanon
MSNBC article about Americans moving to Israel despite the conflict
LA Daily News article about American teens in Israel
Houston Chronicle article about the important role the Internet is taking in the lives of Israelis staying in bomb shelters
BBC article about a Haifa resident having to take refuge in his apartment's bomb shelter
BBC article entitled In the Israeli Army - relatives speak
One in a daily series of BBC articles entitled Voices from the conflict
MSNBC article citing kids responses to the conflict while in bomb shelters (there is also a video in which the correspondent is witness to a fatal strike)
Well, that along with a few from earlier in this post pretty much refute that claim. I'll get to work on the others soon.
Just how precise do you expect a bomb to be?
And do you have the military experience to recommend this?
If people are allowing children to be in an area that Israel has warned them it is going to bomb, that's the people's fault, not Israel's.
I don't have any personal military experience, but I have family and friends in the military who can answer my questions and I also work with a man who is Israeli and, of course, served in the Israeli military and, while we differ somewhat ideologically, he is happy to answer my questions as well. I do not believe that Israel currently has "smart bombs" in their arsenal (although the US is
expediting a shipment of these and "bunker busters" to Israel).
That said, I expect the bombs to be precise enough to avoid hitting ambulances, clearly marked UN outposts, civilian convoys and the like. The Qana incident may very well have been an accident, but when you have a recent history of hitting civilian cars that are evacuating and targeting roads and bridges you cannot expect people to trust that they will not be killed while fleeing and you should be aware that there are still civilians in the area and take more caution. Also, what about the people who cannot afford to leave or do not have a car or are too sick or old to leave? Do they deserve to die?
Well, there you have it. You swallowed the propaganda whole.
Why? Because I don't think that civilian casualties should be shrugged off as "collateral damage" when their deaths could be avoided? I think I've proved my point well enough.
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