by Jeffery Barrett
Israel has launched a massive attack on the
Palestinian cities and towns of the West Bank in the name of
fighting "terrorism". Reporters and news media have been forcibly
denied access to the battle zones and hence can mainly only rely
on the Israeli army and trapped Palestinians and internationals
for news from the region. A comparison of many news sources
around the world, including American mainstream news sources like
CNN and those of the Palestinians, like the Palestinian Chronicle,
reveal major conflicts in the realities being presented. The
Palestinian Chronicle is reporting many first hand accounts from
people trapped in their homes in the West Bank. One such terrible
story revealed tells of how the Israeli IDF tricks residents to
leave their homes for a few hours in order to get food and then
are shot at by Israeli snipers and are forced to stay inside while
some are shot. I have yet to hear of any such story being
reported by any major American news sources. This is only one of
many, many stories that are not being reported because either the
news media cannot see or hear the story and no one is telling it
or the major media is not reporting it or rather hiding it in
order to save face for Israel and its supporters. Now, Pres. Bush
has requested an immediate halt to the Israeli attack on the West
Bank and their withdrawal while sending Secretary Powell to
mediate and implement the recent UN resolution (1407). Bush knows
what Israel has been doing to the Palestinians. He knows that if
he does not make the right statements, namely telling Israel to
STOP!, then what comes after, he too will be held responsible as a
willing supporter. Already, he has given much support to what
Israel has been doing and already really is just as culpable. The
question that remains is whether the truth of what Israel has done
in the Palestinian lands will be revealed after, if and when,
Israel ceases and withdraws from the occupied lands of the
Palestinians. Because it is highly unlikely that Bush will want
anything to do with what Israel has done if it gets out to the
American public the full extent of what has really gone on there.
If and when Israel withdrawals, what picture will the world be able to
see if the free people of Palestine are able to report it and account
it in honest and the world is willing to listen? These are the
details which absolutely must be told to the American public by the
mainstream news:
- How many Palestinians and internationals have been killed by the
Israeli army and the Israeli citizen militias?
- How many young Palestinian men who have been rounded up have
been (1) executed (2) imprisoned (3) tortured?
- How many women and children have been killed or those who held
no arms against the Israeli soldiers?
- How many homes and buildings (and people's cars) have been
destroyed and the extent of damage?
- The condition of streets and infrastructure like electricity and
sewer and water?
This is only a partial list of questions which MUST be answered and
accounted for, not for the sake of numbers for each number
is obviously incalculable, but so that all those who ignorantly defend
this Israeli action can see the real picture that they themselves
helped to create by their support. Because, those who now really do
see the many glimpses of the horrible picture from the little news
coming by cell phone calls from people trapped in their homes, have no
illusion about how much more dark the reality is than that on American
TV. They do not need to wait for CNN to finally show hours of tape of
all the attacks and destruction wrought on the Palestinians because
they already have an idea. It is those Americans who only watch for
the latest news about what is happening from CNN or most American news
sources that are sitting in the dark and need to be shown a true
picture, or THE BIG PICTURE.
So I hope that Israel does STOP and withdrawals immediately or soon
and that the Palestinian people will be able to account for all those
missing, dead and the destroyed houses and cars and will be able to go
to the world, the UN, the mass media of America, and paint for the
world the true picture of what has occurred. This is why Bush made
such a "historic" speech today, because he knows that unless he has
such a speech to fall back on he too will be held responsible for
okaying Israel's actions, although he already is. It is funny really,
how a president goes from talking like an uncaring hick telling Arafat
to stop the violence on Saturday and giving historic peace
speeches detailing Israeli wrongs on Thursday.
But I hope that he made the speech not just to save face but to really
stop ISRAEL's attack and to save lives. And I pray that this is
really what will happen for I would hate to see that this "historic"
speech is just a part of the game of saving face while Powell can
really do nothing and all of this is just part of the big plan! I
hope that Sharon and the supporters or Israel's militaristic solutions
are really just really stupid and not evil geniuses scheming to use
the Palestinians as a lever to incite neighboring Arab countries like
Iraq, Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon so that the US and Israel would
have justification for attacking any one of them, especially Iraq. I
truly hope that Sharon and his supporters are just making ignorant
mistakes and are not acting like someone who attacks and wound's
one's brother and then steps on his wounds in front of him until he
gets a violent reaction from him which he can use to justify attacking
him too.
Source:
