Soundoff: The Crisis in the Middle East

WTF is wrong with Israel? Israel has the right to defend itself from any types of attacks either verbally or physically and Barack Obama used a perfect example when he said that if anyone threatened the lives of his daughters he would everything in his power to make sure that their lives were never in danger, but to use that example, if Barack were to go and try to protect his daughter's lives by fighting people that have nothing to do with his daughters then his cause is a cause unworthy of praise or effort. It would be a cause gone astray because there would be no use of it happening in the first place. If Barack were to go and address people involved with the situation in the matters that were necessary then that would make total sense. So let's go to this situation in Israel. Hamas, for reasons unknown, decided to break it's truce and attack southern Israel with missiles. These missiles killed or injured many Israelite civilians. But let's remember that this is a terrorist group. OK, Israel and the rest of the world condemns the attacks by Hamas against Israel. Israel responds by saying that if these attacks do not stop then they will respond, the prime minister goes on Arabic television in Gaza and the West Bank and warns that Israel is stronger than Hamas and that Israel has such powerful arms that there could be a disaster could be started. The attacks do not stop so Israel does what is best for them and attacks Gaza and the West Bank back. Israel as I said before has the right to attack anyone who puts their citizens in danger because Israel wants their citizens to live in peace. BUT....let's stop there. Israel is attacking Hamas because HAMAS is the group that started this whole attack. But Israel does'nt immeadiatley attack HAMAS, they decide to attack innocent civilians which really gets me pissed off. When you decide to attack innocent people in mosques, random neighborhoods, schools, universities and HOSPITALS!!!!! then maybe, just maybe you should'nt be considered as a country but a terrorist group yourself, because instead of stepping up against Hamas and attacking HAMAS PROPERTIES, you decide to attack random places where people learn, and worship whoever their God is, that is totally unacceptable and you are basically stepping down to the same level as Hamas rather than being an example and attacking the places that need to be attacked. Do those little kids in the hospital who are just living their lives and might not even be aware of what's going on deserve to be persecuted in this way? Do they look like terrorists to you? And the worst thing about this is that after the kids have been injured by attacks that happen at their schools they go to hospitals where they are being treated and those HOSPITALS are under attack as well. COME ON ISRAEL, KEEP IN MIND EVEN THOUGH HAMAS DID THAT TO YOUR PEOPLE, THEY ARE A TERRORIST GROUP, YOU ARE A SOVEREIGN COUNTRY, YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE, AND YOU ARE STRONGER THAN HAMAS WHICH MEANS YOU WILL HAVE MORE OF AN EFFECT WHEN YOU ATTACK THAN HAMAS WOULD!!!!! COME ON NOW!!! DON'T STEP DOWN TO HAMAS STEP UP! Israel probably has the 2nd or 3rd best intelligence team behind the US and Russia, and China is not far behind from Israel; anyway through your intelligence you should know where, not all, BUT majority of these terrorists are at. You should be able to define and understand their daily lives and know where they might be hiding in order to get them back, but instead of doing that, you decide to make a statement to the people, when the PEOPLE did absolutely nothing to you. Come on Israel! STEP UP!

MEDIA BIAS
I have noticed (and I'm not surprised) that many different media organizations have been biased in their coverage of these airstrikes occuring in Gaza. Western media organization i.e BBC, CNN, FOX, NBC, ITN, ABC, CBS etc. have been pro-Israel in all of their coverage. In the coverage of the attacks provided by Western media, they have shown the civilians that have been injured in the Gaza strip but have focused Hamas' failure to abide with the cease fire, in interviews with Palestinian officials, they have been holding officials from the Palestinian gov't and Hamas accountable for these attacks. For example on BBC World News, they conducted an interview with a Palestinian representative from the U.N., the anchorman mentioned that most of the world leaders have sided with Israel and asked why Palestine was holding themselves above international law, the rep responded that in a security council meeting at the UN in New York, everyone agreed with Palestine's rep that the ceasefire should continue and that the US in particular told Israel that while realizing that they have the right to defend themselves, that they should stop the ruthless attacks; the anchorman responded by saying that what goes on privately and publicly with US could be totally different and he noted that the outgoing and incoming administrations are both on Israel's side, the anchorman also appeared pretty angry while responding to the rep. I wish I had the video. In the Arab world, the bias is pro-Palestine, in particular Al-Jazeera English (which I have to admit in terms of international news coverage is better than BBC, CNN and everyone else, and with it's coverage of Africa is way better, and it is underrated) focused on the innocent people that have been wounded by these attacks, one boy was interviewed and said that he was waiting for his mom to pick him up from school when his school was attacked and he was wounded. I have been watching this channel for about a year now ever since the election crisis in Kenya occured (which had even coverage) and this is the first time that I can say that tey were a little biased, they tended to ask softball questions to the Palestinian officials while asking tough questions to the Israeli gov't officials, it was vice versa for the Western TV News organizations. The only place that has been even minded in my opinion has been a TV show on PBS called "Worldfocus". They were able to provide insight from both sides as well as bring in officials from both sides, reporters from both sides and professors to analyze the conflict, they also showed how the media around the world is covering the situation. I would definitley recommend it. Here is a link to yesterday's episode which was a special edition where the whole show was dedicated to the Gaza attacks from Israel.

LINK:
http://worldfocus.org/blog/2008/12/29/monday-december-29-2008/3406/