Israel/Palestine

President-elect Barack Obama has been curiously silent about the recent flare up in the Gaza Strip. This apparently is causing some anger internationally from folks that bought into his campaign promises of change and hope.Will Obama-loving media care, or continue to focus on his chiseled pecs?  Such was indirectly asked in a marvelous column published Sunday in Britain's Guardian (emphasis added…

Someone really needs to inform Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel editor Earl Maucker that newspapers nowadays are in the business of delivering information, not just print.  We just saw an excellent example of why print needs to be supplemented by video, especially if the latter is necessary to convey the feeling of the event covered. This was illustrated by the incredibly lame coverage the Sun-…

The Cincinnati Enquirer's coverage (photo is from that coverage) of a local press conference and demonstration relating to the Israeli-Hamas conflict in Israel and Gaza has been atrocious. I suspect that the Enquirer is not unique in its egregious journalistic failures. The two stories involved, both by Rebecca Goodman, are (original Cincinnati reference HT to Atlas Shrugs):-- Dec. 31 -- "Area…

As pro-Palestinian media members blame Israel for the recent hostilities in that part of the world, there's an incontrovertible truth being shamefully ignored: rocket and mortar attacks coming from Gaza into Israel have dramatically increased since Hamas won parliamentary elections in January 2006.Such was reported by the Intelligence & Terrorism Information Center Thursday in an analysis…

OK, so Barack Obama isn't really the political Messiah of critics' caricature, despite the fervor of his supplicants. But according to liberal radio talk show host Ed Schultz, Obama qualifies for the less lofty but still impressive description of Hub of the World.Schultz offers an unlikely theory for the renewed fighting in Gaza, one more revealing of the person suggesting it than the subject at…

Comedienne Roseanne Barr called Israel a "NAZI state" Tuesday, while declaring "The destruction of the jews [sic] in Israel has been assured with this inhuman attack on civilians in gaza [sic]."She also liked Hamas to a bunch of street gangs while depicting Israel's military action "equivilent to los angeles [sic] attacking and launching war on the people of watts [sic] to attempt to kill the…

For at least ten seconds there, it appeared Margaret Warner thought PBS stood for the Palestinian Broadcast Service. On last night's NewsHour Ms. Warner, whilst interviewing Israel's Ambassador to the United States Sallai Meridor, posed one of the dumbest questions in the long, dumb history of broadcast journalism.  So banal was her query that there was for nearly five seconds the most pregnant…

Urgent:  Update Below the Fold!CNN, as is their typical style, has ignored facts and reality when reporting an incident involving an encounter with a Gaza relief boat, and an Israeli patrol boat.  Karl Penhaul, a CNN correspondent aboard the pleasure yacht known as Dignity, and frequently on the wrong side of an issue, was pretty much allowed carte blanche in recalling the incident -- an incident…

In an obvious attempt to counter the typically anti-Israeli sentiment prevalent throughout the international media whenever Israel defends itself, the Israel Defense Forces launched its own YouTube channel Monday.As most impartial Americans are aware, old and new media were used against Israel in 2006 to foment international criticism of its attacks on Lebanon not the least of which was a Reuters…

Could this be the most unvarnished insult to someone's intelligence in the recent annals of major network television?  Here was Zbigniew Brzezinski, speaking to Joe Scarborough on today's "Morning Joe." [H/t reader Melody.]You know, you have such a stunningly superficial knowledge of what went on that it's almost embarrassing to listen to you.It was Scarborough's exposition of the widely accepted…

Failing to Grace the WaPo Front PageThe Washington Post has certainly taken a timeworn media tack in it's coverage of the latest instance of Israel stubbornly insisting on continuing to exist.  That being: keep nearly all mentions of the prolonged and incessant attacks of Israel by the Palestinians off the front page and to an absolute minimum, then deliver maximum coverage of the Israelis'…

"World rallies around Palestinians amid Gaza offensive," the December 29 CNN.com headline screams.But the story in question focuses on a few thousands protesting in a handful of countries with no consideration of who is behind organizing the protests and what their political agenda exactly is. Consider, for example, that International A.N.S.W.E.R. (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) promises to…

The Palestinians raise their kids to hate Jews. The Israelis have endured decades of acts of terror against their own children and have generally acted with forbearance in reply. The UN has been vehemently and irrationally anti-Israeli since day one. The questions of "right of return" and the "two state solution" have dogged international politics for a long time. And what is the Timesonline…