Israel: United, Except When It's Not
According to our stellar American media, Israelis are united behind their country's military actions in Gaza.
New York Times:
JERUSALEM -- To Israel's critics abroad, the picture could not be clearer: Israel's war in Gaza is a wildly disproportionate response to the rockets of Hamas, causing untold human suffering and bombing an already isolated and impoverished population into the Stone Age, and it must be stopped.Yet here in Israel very few, at least among the Jewish population, see it that way.
It's very east to make generalities like that when one doesn't include Israeli dissidents, who are jailed when protesting the war against the Palestinian people:
Israel National News:
Five leftist protesters were arrested Saturday night at a demonstration in Tel Aviv against the IDF's operation in Gaza. The marchers attempted to enter the Ministry of Defense compound but were prevented from advancing by police. One demonstrator was injured.Protesters said that the Gaza operation would not contribute to the security of the country. "No one can say that a massacre of Gaza residents will protect the residents of Sderot and Ashkelon," one of the protesters told a reporter from the Hebrew-language newspaper Haaretz.
Israel: United is a convenient slogan when one completely neglects to mention the hundreds of Israeli Arabs, who apparently don't count when referring to this vague concept known as "Israel."
Haaretz:
Seven hundred protesters against the Israel Defense Forces operation in Gaza, mostly Israeli Arabs or residents of East Jerusalem, have been arrested since the operation began, and dozens have been indicted. The protesters, 226 of whom are still in custody, are suspected of involvement in disturbances, illegal demonstrations or stone-throwing, police said. Of the detainees, 237 are minors. Most of the protests that led to arrests took place in Jerusalem or the north.
And what does the Times say of all of this?
But voices of dissent in this country have been rare.
Oh. Well, I guess they're rare if you don't report them.
I think New York Times editors erred seriously this time in not labeling Bronner's article as "analysis" or "opinion," which they usually do with pieces like his.
That said, I do not want to see them discourage reporters who are also doing boots on the ground reporting from writing pieces like this that give their own interpretation of what the majority of the local society is thinking. This kind of piece is no different from what many bloggers on the ground do, and I value that kind of input just as much as I value cool attempts at objectivity and "balance." An article like Bronner's just should be clearly and properly labeled as "how it appears here to me," by calling it analysis or opinion. Matter of fact, some of my favorite reading has always been those pieces in the Sunday New York Times "Week in Review" section where they let boots-on-the-ground reporters write articles with more personal interpretation of the situations they are assigned to report on in the main news section.
I also think those who ever expected a single source or entity to be responsible to report the "truth" to them might as well just not read any news sources at all and just rely on the bible.
January 13, 2009 2:35 PM | Reply | Permalink