Monday, March 30, 2009

Media Targets Israel


Of Innocents and Savages -Leslie J. Sacks

Google "Congo killings" and the search engine will find you 3.56 million references. The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is 2.3 million square kilometers, and is home to 62.6 million people.

Enter "Gaza killings" and Google will locate 8.56 million references. The Gaza Strip is 360 square kilometers, and home to 1.5 million people. That is one-thousandth of the land mass, and two-hundredths of the population, of the DRC.

The media (both 'new' and 'old') bias is indisputable.

Less than 1,000 Gazans were reliably documented as killed in their last war with Israel, many of which were armed militants. In Congo, over four million unquestionably innocent civilians have now been killed in the past twelve years. Horrific stories of rape, burnings, and mutilations abound. And yet, the media's fixation on Israel's 'oppression' of the Arabs continues.

The question is evitable: why is there such a focus on deaths in Gaza-a war triggered by the firing of over 6,000 rockets at Israeli civilians-while the exterminations in the DRC are comparatively ignored?

Is it because the Congolese are black and invisible people who cannot help but murder each other? Or is it because Hamas and the Gazans have been granted victim status, giving 'activists' everywhere a perfect whipping boy in Israel?

Either way, it doesn't speak well for the evolution of mankind: blacks, apparently, are still savages, and Jews still deserve to be killed.
[Leslie J. Sacks Blog]


UPDATE:

Israeli Military Closes Probe into Gaza Misconduct -Howard Schneider

The Israeli military's top lawyer closed an investigation into alleged misconduct during the recent three-week war in Gaza, concluding that charges made by graduates of a military preparation school were "based on hearsay" and had been "purposely exaggerated."
(Washington Post)
*

2 comments:

LHwrites said...

You cannot use number of references as a guide, as Google often will have numerous references to the same or similar literature. Also, this may show a problem for Congo, not a bias against Gaza, as many more people seem, to be more intensely interested in the Middle East for a variety of reasons. The cries of war crimes seem troubling and unwarranted so far, and sadly during war these things are not solely acts of any one nation, as evidenced by all the crimes seemingly committed by US soldiers in Iraq from Abu Ghraib to the recently convicted retaliation killings. While there does seem to be a bias against Israel, this does not make the case.

Bruce said...

Yep, the Google numbers alone only tell part of the story. But i really liked this pithy, succinct piece...could not resist posting it for the last sentence was delicious.