Sunday, July 23, 2006
Required - Middle East media filter
Trouble in the middle east again. So what's new this time around ? The same series of actors are taking the centre stage again - Israel, Hezbollah, Hamas, Syria etc etc. They go around their usual business, which is ruining the fragile peace in the region and displacing scores of helpless civilians. If you observe closely, conflict in this region never makes it to the headlines. Conflict is a routine, an everyday event here. It's only when the conflict 'escalates' or violence 'heightens' that it makes it to the news. Crazy !! The world is tired of this nonsense (don't know about the world, atleast I am tired of it)
In fact the only news from this part of the world that should ever deserve attention is, if and when one of the following happens -
- The Israelis and the Arabs kiss and make up and propose a toast to celebrate the formation of an independent Palestine .
- The Hamas,Hezbollah and co. decide that there is more to life than simply blowing oneself up/blowing others property up for a cause.
- Or perhaps the sunnis and shias finally realize that both are infact Muslims at the end of the day.
The complicated bit about media reports from the middle east is deciphering the content that they report and arriving at a logical conclusion. The western media strives to be neutral when they start reporting an incident but as the conflict intensifies its clear that Israel is the good guy taking on the Arab warmongers. Is that really the truth then? Reminds me of the George Carlin quote (source: Pamsy's extensive Carlin collection) - 'Israeli terrorists are called commandos, while the Arab commandos are called terrorists'
I am sure Al-Jazeera or any other Arab channel would project an image completely contrary to what the western media have to say. Heck !! You cant even take sides in this conflict when you don't even know which side is atleast remotely righteous.
