Echo Chambers, Mirrors and Henny Penny Temple-Raston

Juan Cole and NPR Check reader, informedveteran, recommended Tom Englehardt's excellent piece on the Washington Echo Chamber's reaction to the revolutions sweeping the Middle East. Englehardt writes:

"It would seem like a good moment for Washington - which, since September 12, 2001, has been remarkably clueless about real developments on this planet and repeatedly miscalculated the nature of global power - to step back and recalibrate.

As it happens, there's no evidence it's doing so. In fact, that may be beyond Washington’s present capabilities, no matter how many billions of dollars it pours into 'intelligence.' And by 'Washington,' I mean not just the Obama administration, or the Pentagon, or our military commanders, or the vast intelligence bureaucracy, but all those pundits and think-tankers who swarm the capital, and the media that reports on them all. It’s as if the cast of characters that makes up 'Washington' now lives in some kind of echo chamber in which it can only hear itself talking."

(Enter Dina Temple-Raston stage far-right)

Dina was not about to let her bread and butter (banging the al-Qaida fear drum) get drowned out by the inspiring and historic events in North Africa and the Middle East. On Thursday's ATC she dragged out a trio of "those pundits and think-tankers who swarm the capital" to rattle on about the terrifying opportunities that the uprisings provide to al-Qaida. The statements of these "experts" provided some rich irony:

Bush stooge Juan Zarate said,

"That is to say, al-Qaida has been very good at focusing the attention of their constituents and of the world on this idea of the far enemy. That is that all of the world's problems, all of the angst and grievances of the Middle East can be blamed on the United States, or at least can be affected by attacking the United States."

Seems to me there was some other terrorist organization that focused its constituents' attention on a far enemy and blamed every problem on a distant foe.

Then Temple-Raston trots out NPR regular & CIA-award winner, Bruce Hoffman to state that al-Qaida will

"exploit whatever issue is served in front of it, and do so equally adroitly. So for now it will focus on the near enemy."

Oh my God, enemies of freedom and civil rights focusing on the "near enemy"!

Lastly Temple-Raston highlights the expertise of Rick "Ozzie" Nelson whose "last military assignment was with the Joint Special Operations Command" (can you say JSOC?) Regarding Yemen and Libya, special operative Nelson explains that al-Qaida's leadership is

"probably best positioned to exploit the weakness in those countries."

Imagine the cynicism of a group that exploits weakness and upheaval in troubled countries to indiscriminately murder civilians.

Seriously, one of the things that I love about these uprisings in the Middle East is how starkly they expose the history of US government actions in the region as being based on complete contempt for the human rights and dignity of the actual people in the region. The fact that al-Qaida apes Washington in its contempt for the people it claims to champion and - like the US government - is willing to use extreme methods of violence to achieve its aims is almost laughable compared to the decades of such behavior by Washington.

But it's not laughable if you are one of the media "professionals" who depend on the Washington echo chamber that Englehardt critiques. In that case you have to keep hammering on the same discredited themes that earn you access to the "expert" think-tankers and counterterrorism wankers that populate your predictable reports. These reports are predictable that you'd think a journalist would be embarrassed. Not Temple-Raston, she was back on Saturday morning squawking about the terrible danger of al-Qaida rising Phoenix-like from the turmoil in Libya. Want to guess who her experts were? Bruce Hoffman, Juan Zarate, and Rick "Ozzie" Nelson. Now where have you heard those names before?

Tank Diving with Jackie Northam

Jackie Northam is one of the worst of the Think Tank Scrapers™ at NPR. She gained early recognition on this blog for her tanking prowess way back in Oct. 2006, again in Dec. 2006 and March 2007, and was still going strong in March 2009. So on Thursday morning when I heard that Northam was covering US and Israeli talks focusing on Egypt, I wondered how deep her think tank plunge would go. I think she may have set a new low mark in this area.

Northam's first "expert" is Robert Danin of the Council on Foreign Relations. The most stellar part of his bio has to be his role as

"Former head, Office of the Quartet Representative, Tony Blair, in Jerusalem" (Tony Blair...ouch!).

Danin also has been employed and recognized by the US State Department with "Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards."

Northam's second guest, Aaron David Miller, from the Woodrow Wilson Center is also a standard State Department award winning expert. As Miller's bio indicates:

"...he served at the Department of State as an advisor to six secretaries of state, where he helped formulate U.S. policy on the Middle East and the Arab-Israel peace process....received the department's Distinguished, Superior, and Meritorious Honor Awards."

But it is Northam's third expert that sets a new low standard. To bring in the Israeli perspective Northam features Dan Schueftan, a professor who has made the following classy and nuanced remarks:

• "The Arabs are the biggest failure in the history of the human race.”
• "While Israel sends while sends a sophisticated satellite into space, the Arabs come up with a new kind of hummus." "
• "There is nothing more fucked up under the sun than the Palestinians."
• "The Palestinians are a repulsive part of the Middle East, let’s leave those ratbags."
• "All over the Arab world they fire shots at weddings in order to prove that they have at least one thing that is hard and functional and can shoot."

How's that for a diverse line-up? And what do these three have to say about the situation in Egypt?

• Danin makes the relatively innocuous comment that "There have been a few comments out of Israel, but for the most part they're keeping quiet, and that is wise."
• Miller also contributes a rather dull observation: "I think the administration is doing a lot of hand-holding and minding of the Israelis. But then again, why would the Israelis bet on our assurances?" Later his comments expose his State Department roots, noting that "The critical point will come once the transition is secured and once a process of political reform is underway, to see exactly how constraining the new Egypt is to American interests, how hostile it may be toward Israeli interests."
• Schueftan - speaking like the Neocon that he is - rails "There has been almost unanimity here in understanding the significance of the American policy vis-a-vis Egypt, namely you can't trust the Americans. More specifically, you can't trust Barack Obama.

Of all the substantive reflections and analyses that one could find on the effects that the Egyptian uprising might have on Israel and US behaviors in the region, this lousy lineup is the best that Northam and NPR can offer.

When the Shit Hits the Fan - Make Brownies!

The bombshell release of The Palestine Papers by Al Jazeera and The Guardian hit the news this week and provide stark evidence of the moral bankruptcy of the Israeli government and the US government in the sham "peace process" - (not to mention the craven subservience and collaborative nature of the Palestinian Authority). As The Guardian editorialized

"It is hard to tell who appears worst: the Palestinian leaders, who are weak, craven and eager to shower their counterparts with compliments; the Israelis, who are polite in word but contemptuous in deed; or the Americans, whose neutrality consists of bullying the weak and holding the hand of the strong. Together they conspire to build a puppet state in Palestine, at best authoritarian, at worst a surrogate for an occupying force."

So what does NPR do when someone else has done all the work for them and hands them a huge trove of damming evidence?

First, Lourdes Garcia-Navarro did a decent job of reporting on reaction by the Palestinian Authority, Palestinians, and the Israeli government.

This modest piece was followed by a sad hodgepodge of spin from the awful Michele Kelemen - a story that the NPR scribe monkeys titled "Release of Palestinian Papers Raises Issues for the US." Raises issues!? Sheesh...

Melissa Block introduces the piece, asking "And how does the U.S. try to revive talks when all sides seem to be losing credibility?" as if the complete lack of US legitimacy and credibility has not been exposed in these documents. From there Michele Kelemen turns to Professor Kurtzer of Princeton who states that one thing the documents show is that the gaps between Israel and the Palestinians

"are far narrower than people would have assumed....therefore...the administration...now has evidence that the bridge can be built."

Kelemen then turns to - as she says -

"Another U.S. veteran of the peace process, Robert Danin, of the Council on Foreign Relations, cautions against reading too much into the documents."

Kelemen and NPR definitely take this advice to heart, and - instead of any scrutiny or critical assessment of these damning records of the US/Israel/PA attempt to destroy any hope of justice for Palestinians - opts to continue airing the views of other US official participants in the peace process sham. As if to drive the point home that the revelations will have no effect on Michele Kelemen and NPR's determination to echo the views of the US State Department, Kelemen allows State Department spokesperson P.J. Crowley to have the final word:

"The best and only way to fundamentally resolve the core issues, reach an agreement and end the conflict once and for all is through a negotiation, not through unilateral statements, unilateral actions."

Unbelievably, it's not meant as some kind of sick joke...

Roads Not Traveled

NPR gets credit for getting French-speaking reporter, Eleanor Beardsley into the capital of Tunisia by Friday morning. Her reports have provided some dramatic first-person accounts of police repression and the chaos of the revolutionary scenario in the capital. However, NPR's general coverage lays the blame for the uprising on Tunisia's dictatorial regime and the spike in food prices - while avoiding any in-depth discussion of two important elements of the Tunisian uprising:

1. The way in which the the Tunisian dictatorship reflects the gross hypocrisy of the US-led "war on terror" which has created increased global repression (and terrorism).
2. The role that US/European economic neoliberalism has had in bringing on the misery which helped ignite the Tunisian rebellion.

A discussion of these two threads practically begs to be covered, given the WikiLeak cable on the US awareness of repression and corruption in Tunisia - a cable that was widely know and discussed in Tunisia [and terrifies our newest thug ally in the "war on terror."] And more cables on US complicity in Tunisian repression and cronyism were released yesterday. Amazingly, Beardsley trumpets the role of social media in the Tunisian uprising but WikiLeaks is never mentioned (search NPR "heard on air" for Wikileaks + Tunisia and you get zilch as of Sunday afternoon!).

As far as the role of neoliberal economics (and US foreign policy) in compounding North Africa's miseries, not only does NPR completely ignore it, but to explain rising food prices there turns to Gary Blumenthal, who

"served as Deputy Assistant for Cabinet Liaison to former President George Bush, and as Special Assistant to the President for Agriculture Trade and Food Assistance....served as Executive Assistant and then as Chief of Staff to then Secretary of Agriculture Clayton Yeutter, providing oversight of all operations in this large federal agency (110,000 employees) and exercising continuous scrutiny over $65 billion worth of programs including research, education, production, domestic and international marketing, food safety and inspection, nutrition, environment, public affairs, economic analysis, legal counsel and administration matters related to USDA's mission in the U.S. and in 60 countries around the world. He also served with the Foreign Agricultural Service as Legislative Director, and as a Legislative Assistant to Congressman Larry J. Hopkins (R-KY)."

Mr. Blumenthal explains that rising food prices in the Maghreb are the result of increased demand and "imperfect weather." How's that for insight?

Eleanor Beardsley has mentioned several times in her reports that people in Tunis are watching Aljazeera TV - too bad none of Aljazeera's coverage is finding its way into NPR's coverage. I'd also recommend Juan Cole's Informed Comment for far more substantive coverage and analysis of the Tunisian revolution.

Web Foxes

(click on the picture to Supersize it)

Somebody should start a blog that simply tracks all the utterly stupid things that appear on the NPR web site and the web versions of their stories. Notice that "War on Christmas" is not in quotes - see, there really is a war on Christmas... And in case you were confused by facts and thought that US foreign policy is in complete lockstep with Israel's policy of destroying the Palestinians and rendering any humane solution impossible, the web scribes are there to remind you that Clinton is trying another approach to "peace" in Middle East... Finally, you have to love the Ally Bank ad: "Everyone needs an ally" (hee...hee).

Temple-Raston Busted Under New Restrictions

Damn! I guess Ms. Temple-Raston forgot to read the new policy I posted (see note below) for NPR employees about using stupid and misleading language such as "bad guys" in a report. If she had read it she would know that she now owes $1000 for this zinger during yesterday's glowing report on data mining software that will supposedly help catch terrorists:

"That's how it's supposed to work if you start with a specific target in mind. The harder problem is whether this approach can find a bad guy no one has already suspected was a terrorist..."

Actually, Temple-Raston's report was really a twofer - managing to promote a data mining software company AND to throw out some lop-sided propaganda about Hezbollah being nothing but a terrorist operation with "global reach." Given that NPR doesn't want to "take sides" when shooting off it's loaded-language pistol, I'm guessing Hezbollah (a political party and armed resistance group that repelled an aggressor, occupying power out of a sovereign nation) qualifies as a terrorist operation for killing and kidnapping civilians during its history. All right, if purposely targeting and killing civilians (and kidnapping them) qualifies a group as terrorist, then according to my own data mining I found a group that "no one [at least no one at NPR] has already suspected was a terrorist": the Israeli Defense Forces, of course!

Given the nature of her transgression, I hereby order Ms. Temple-Raston to donate $1000 to the inside source of the information on Israel's latest operation of civilian mass killings - the soldiers of Breaking Silence. She can just click right here and make a donation, and she can feel good about it because they definitely are "good guys."

NOTE: In my original memo to NPR I stated that the use of the phrase "bad guys" was forthwith prohibited. Temple-Raston - being very FBI sneaky - tried to get around this by dropping the "s" from "guys" and claiming that she was, therefore, not in violation of said policy. I submitted our dispute to binding arbitration and Temple-Raston was found to have clearly violated the spirit and intent of the guidelines and was ordered to make the payment immediately. Sorry Dina...

Tristan Who?

(Click on photo to see the actual graphic in context)

How about NPR's stellar coverage of the Israeli attack on US citizen Tristan Anderson? Click the graphic below to see for yourself.



Coming 6 years after the murder of Rachel Corrie, I guess one shouldn't be surprised. As Mondoweiss points out, this is typical for the US press - but, really, with the videotaped evidence of the unprovoked attack and with ABC and even the AP covering it, you might think it would get a mention. Oh, but wait, unlike the Rachel Corrie killing, which NPR did cover, the US State Department hasn't cleared the way for our intrepid NPR journalists by calling for a probe first.

Under Fire

If you haven't heard yet, Chas Freeman - Obama's pick to head up the National Intelligence Council - has been torpedoed by the neocon "pro-Israel" extremists. NPR's threadbare coverage of this important story bears comparison with another Obama appointee who withdrew under criticism of his record: John Brennan.

I posted quite a bit on NPR's (and especially Tom Gjelten's) distortions regarding the withdrawal of Obama's first pick to head the CIA, John Brennan back in late November-early December last year. At the time several significant journalist bloggers strongly criticized the appointment of Brennan due to his praise of intelligence gathered by CIA torture and his explicit support of torture/rendition flights and illegal wiretapping. NPR repeatedly claimed that Brennan's only fault was being a CIA associate during the time that such practices were going on. Furthermore NPR frequently used derogatory terms to belittle the efforts of bloggers to highlight Brennan's documented shortcomings: "a campaign of liberal bloggers," "the hubbub these liberal groups were raising," and "those people who were stoking the fires of criticism."

Compare this with the general and normative descriptions given to the radical crew of Likudist neocons who attacked the Freeman nomination:

On Tuesday's ATC Gjelten stated that "in recent years as a private citizen Freeman has been an outspoken critic of some US policies, especially regarding China and Israel. Because of that his appointment...was vigorously criticized..."

Again on Tuesday, Mary Louise Kelly stated, "Freeman has a record of speaking his mind on policies regarding China and Israel in particular, so Freeman's nomination faced opposition from the start..."

Oddly we NEVER get the substance of Freeman's remarks. His thinking on Israel can be found here, and as Andrew Sullivan points out, the outrageous nature of his "anti-Israel" comments are as follows:

"Tragically, despite all the advantages and opportunities Israel has had over the fifty-nine years of its existence, it has failed to achieve concord and reconciliation with anyone in its region, still less to gain their admiration or affection. Instead, with each decade, Israel's behavior has deviated farther from the humane ideals of its founders and the high ethical standards of the religion that most of its inhabitants profess."

As far as Freeman's China remarks go, they appear to have been dishonestly obtained and purposely distorted. Other rather tame and rational ideas of Freeman's can be seen here. The important story is that the successful attack on Freeman indicates that even mild and perfectly rational critiques of US-Israeli foreign/military policy are not open for debate or discussion. (A policy which dovetails well with NPR's coverage of Israel-Palestine issues.)

Amazingly NPR never presents Freeman's remarks or focuses on the sleazy nature of the organizers of the attack on Freeman. Tonight Siegel had a thin and tepid interview with Freeman offering him the opportunity to rebut one critique of him, which he did quite effectively - but that's it.

Again, when presented with an easy opportunity to offer informative and substantive reports on a pressing issue - NPR fails to deliver.

If It Walks Like a Hawk, Talks Like a Hawk and Acts Like a Hawk , Then It Must Be...a Dove!

Worse than worthless. How else can one sum up NPR's coverage of the Israel - Palestine conflict?

Yesterday morning first featured Michele Kelemen redelivering Secretary of State Clinton's talking points (Hamas is a terrorist organization, blah, blah, blah, Hamas has to renounce violence, blah, blah, blah, US is giving tons of money to Gaza, blah, blah, etc.). OK, so she's accompanying Clinton on the trip, what else can you expect from NPR?

After that four minute-plus State Department summary what does NPR offer? Who would you go to for expert analysis? How about someone who has "has advised six American Secretaries of State." Yep, NPR serves up the stale ideas of Aaron David Miller - again. Miller has a way with words that only a six Secretary of State big league hitter could have. Here he is explaining Netanyahu:

"He's an ideologue; there's no question - leaning and ensconced in the right. But he's also capable of tremendous pragmatism...the history of peacemaking in Israel has really been a history dominated by the right or the center right. It's really a question in Israel of doves talking the talk, and hawks walking the walk. The right in Israel has been capable of actually making agreements with the Arabs and actually delivering on them."

Miller mentions Netanyahu's negotiations with Arafat at the Wye River and the Hebron withdrawal. Throughout the interview, Linda Wertheimer just nods along like a bobblehead. I think she forgot to see how the actual settlement policies went under Netanyahu back when he was Prime Minister. Nothing about what that great Hebron concession really meant for Palestinians. Nothing about Netanyahu's provocations that even an editor from the rightist WINEP takes note of. Nothing about Netanyahu's Jerusalem expansionist efforts.

It would be hard to do more pro-Likud, pro-Zionist coverage of the Palestine conflict. That someone on an NPR news report can claim in all seriousness - with no challenge from the the NPR host - that a person with such far-right and low ethical standards as Netanyahu is in fact the real pragmatist and the real peacemaker says far more about NPR's current orientation than it does about anything actually happening on the ground in Israel and Palestine.

Yardwork with Anne

Goodness me, I thought that Israel's Gaza Massacre was all about slaughtering children and attacking UN safe havens. How wrong I was - turns out that "Operation Cast Lead" was just a bunch of Israeli groundskeepers going in to Gaza to mow the grass. Seriously, I learned that from brush-clearing Anne Garrels tonight on NPR as she claimed to be presenting Israeli "analysts, who cover the political spectrum..." One of these brilliant scholars, "Efraim Inbar says, the best that can be hoped for is conflict management. He calls it mowing the grass." Honestly, that's what Garrels said, and then let Inbar speak for himself:

"We go in, do some damage to the terrorist infrastructure knowing well that this type of hatred toward Israel cannot be totally eliminated and we'll have to do it again."

Yes, Garrels really covered the breadth of Israeli opinion in the piece that she opened by claiming, "The one thing Israelis agree on is that Israel showed, after what many consider a humiliating defeat in Lebanon two years ago, it can respond forcefully." I guess Amira Haas and Uri Avnery and Btselm workers don't fall qualify as Israeli analysts, but the following do:

• Efraim Inbar, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies (a pro-expansionist Zionist institute)
• Yossi Klein Halevi, a senior researcher with the Adelson Institute for Strategic Studies (a completely pro-expansionist, Zionist institute)
• Avi Issacharoff, Arab affairs correspondent for Haaretz (the only non-extreme partisan of the three - but no critic of Israel)

I hope Anne doesn't feel too bad for wielding the old, bloody hedge-trimmer for Israel, she's in good company with a couple of other brush clearers - Ronny and W.

And Speaking for the IDF

I noticed Left I on the News had a telling post about how, in spite of the Israeli Defense Forces rationales for attacking civilians being given huge amounts of press time, the corporate press will actually repeat these rationales even when IDF spokespersons aren't present. Left I writes, "No need for the Israelis to make excuses; the press will do it for them! Unbelievable."

The same could be said for Inskeep this morning as he talks to Eric Westervelt in Gaza this morning. I have to say that Westervelt has seemed to try and maintain a sense of humanity in his reporting on this crime against Palestinians. I recall that in his first story after the initial surprise air attack by the Israelis, he sounded shaken by the extent of the killing. One can also read the transcript of his decent January 11th report on the Israeli targeting of a building filled with civilians and the IDF's refusal to provide or allow medical assistance to the wounded.

So this morning after Israel's blockade of journalists from Gaza, Westervelt is in to survey the damage. Westervelt is noting the massive extent of the damage he sees and Inskeep jumps in to say:

"I wonder now that you are on the scene of some of these explosions; you talk about destroyed living rooms - of course we've heard about destroyed schools - Israel has said that anytime it was striking targets like that it was firing at Hamas rocket launchers nearby, or fighters of one kind or another..."

Pretty incredible really. No acknowledgement that the wanton slaughter and devastation was intentional (at least according to the IDF plans laid out in October of last year), and that the goal of the Gaza Massacre had little to do with the rockets of Hamas, but as John Mearsheimer points out was "...part of a broader strategic goal: the creation of a 'Greater Israel.' Specifically, Israel’s leaders remain determined to control all of what used to be known as Mandate Palestine, which includes Gaza and the West Bank. The Palestinians would have limited autonomy in a handful of disconnected and economically crippled enclaves, one of which is Gaza. Israel would control the borders around them, movement between them, the air above and the water below them."

Interesting that these rather obvious stated and implied goals are never mentioned on NPR, but the ridiculous claims and excuses of the IDF (and the US government) are repeated and repeated and repeated.

Plungers and Breakers

Just had to note that NPR on Wednesday felt the need to immediately publicize the fact that Joe the Plunger (no toilet too nasty or clogged) is joining the society of no-nothing journalists (maybe there's some sympathy at NPR for such?) by heading off to Israel.

Also, this morning I had to post a comment on NPR's web site about the US being a peace broker in the Israel Palestine conflict. Ari Shapiro is interviewing Aaron Miller - yet again (see here and here). Is there a rational, thinking human in the world who actually thinks the US is some kind of fair broker between Israel and the Palestinians?

Memory Hole - NPR Style

If you've been listening to NPR's coverage of the Gaza Massacre you've probably heard some fairly imaginative history. I recall being treated to some fine HistoryLite™ by former US tool Philip Wilcox who claimed that Hamas emerged in the 1st Intifada. You've also heard Inskeep claim that Hamas broke the ceasefire and others assert that Hamas had no interest in a ceasefire.

Just to set the record straight there are a few missing factoids in the NPR storyline:

Hamas was around before the 1st Intifada, and was strengthened and supported by...Israel! How curious, seems like there were a few problems with a secular, nationalist Palestinian movement - perhaps the greatest problem being that it was willing to accept a two state solution before Israeli expansionism was complete.

As far as the Hamas "takeover" of Gaza - that little plot was conceived and midwifed by old birth-pangs-Rice, Bush and the complicit "Quartet."

As far as the broken ceasefire, even CNN had someone who actually read a few articles to see if there was an actual record of a major Israeli violation - there was. Johann Hari also pointed out that not only did Hamas not flagrantly break the ceasefire, it actually wanted to continue it. He sites the source of his information as Shin Bet chief, Diskin, who is quoted in Haaretz saying, "Make no mistake, Hamas is interested in continuing the truce, but wants to improve its terms. It wants us to lift the siege [on Hamas-ruled Gaza], stop [IDF] attacks, and extend the truce to include Judea and Samaria [the West Bank]."

O, memory hole, thy name is NPR...

Targets and Goals

(click on image for source)

On Wednesday morning Steve Inskeep displayed the extent of his woeful ignorance (or stupidity). He was interviewing Mustafa Barghouti, an independent lawmaker in the West Bank city of Ramallah and asked the following question:

"There was a ceasefire in Gaza for months. It expired, as you know, and then Hamas began firing rockets into Israel knowing there might be a harsh Israeli response. Why did Hamas do that?"

One has to love Mr. Barghouti's reply:

"No sir, I think what you have described is the Israeli narrative and it's not correct..."

Barghouti then patiently explained how throughout the ceasefire Israel tightened its total blockade and committed a violent and flagrant violation of the ceasefire toward the end.

Unfortunately, nothing seems to penetrate the pro-IDF bubble in which Inskeep operates. During a discussion with Mike Shuster this morning he says,

"As they begin to run out of new targets to hit...are the Israelis any closer to their goal which is to stop rocket fire from coming out of Gaza into Israel?"

You could spend a lot of time unpacking such a statement. Who says the goal of the Israelis is to stop rocket fire coming out of Gaza? What rockets were driving Israel's ghettoization and utter destruction of a Gaza when rockets weren't being fired?

And targets? Since when do mosques, police stations, homes, and thousands of wounded and killed civilians count as "targets"? The whole of Schuster and Inskeep's talk is riddled with the use of the "target" euphemism and claims based solely on Israeli Defense Forces statements:

• Inkseep: "Israeli jets struck multiple targets including the Palestinian Parliament building in Gaza City. Israeli naval forces also fired at targets inside the territory."
• Shuster: "Israeli airstrikes on tunnels...where Israel says Hamas has been smuggling in weapons....the Israelis targeted what they called a weapons manufacturing and storage facility in central Gaza. The Israeli navy has gotten into the operation with ships off the coast hitting Hamas coastal outposts and rocket launching spots according to the Israeli Defense Force....500 sorties by warplanes against targets in Gaza...hundreds more carried out by helicopter...looks like Israel is beginning to run out of new targets to hit."

Shuster and Inskeep aren't the only ones at NPR using the vague "target" language. I hear about "Hamas targets" almost anytime I catch one of NPR's hourly updates. Why not just state the fact that the whole of Gaza is being targeted by both bombardment and the blockade of basic necessities such as food, fuel and medicine?

But Some Are More Equal Than Others

NPR continues to suppress news of the ongoing war crime being committed by the Israeli government against the civilian population of Gaza. On Saturday Juan Cole, noting the Independent's article "Chronic malnutrition in Gaza blamed on Israel," sarcastically asks, "Oops, you mean it is not a headline in the U.S.? How odd? Why is that?" Maybe NPR fears ruffling Israeli government feathers, and they can always claim that they just couldn't get any reporters into Gaza anyway, how convenient.

Honestly, can you imagine the wall-to-wall coverage NPR would be giving to a US ally suffering a food and fuel blockade? I guess all civilians are not equal - some are more equal than others.

Simon Says

Saturday morning Scott Simon puts on his uber-somber/emotional voice to do a little typical NPR surgery on history. He's interviewing Colonel Timothy J. Geraghty, U.S. Marine Corps (Retired), who was in charge of the 24th Marine Amphibious Unit in Beirut when it was attacked with a massive truck bomb on Oct. 23, 1983.

The gist of the report - based on Geraghty's recent article - is that the truck bombing marked the beginning of a new tactic in terror - the suicide car/truck bombing. However, as Mike Davis has pointed out in part one and part two of his history of car bombings, the Beruit attack simply added the kamikaze dimension to a terror tactic which has a long and storied history (one in which the US and Israel have happily participated when it served their ends).

No surprise that NPR doesn't touch that one, but a Simon also censors a more obvious bit of information on the Beirut bombing. He opens the report by saying "220 US Marines and 21 other US service members died that day, along with 58 French paratroopers; they had been sent to Beirut as peacekeepers." Well, yes, they may have been sent there as peacekeepers, but it's funny that Simon doesn't mention a bit of what happened later. Even Geraghty, in his article writes

"It is noteworthy that the United States provided direct naval gunfire support-which I strongly opposed for a week-to the Lebanese Army at a mountain village called Suq-al-Garb on 19 September and that the French conducted an air strike on 23 September in the Bekaa Valley. American support removed any lingering doubts of our neutrality, and I stated to my staff at the time that we were going to pay in blood for this decision."

Leatherneck.com forum has a similar note of the US political decision to veer from neutrality. The author of the post notes that after an initial positive reception by forces in Beirut,

"the perception of the United States as an impartial peacekeeper changed and, with it, the attitude of the Moslem population toward the marines. General Mead cited the U.S. training of the Lebanese Armed Forces, an essential element in the rebuilding of national authority, as one of the first developments perceived as U.S. bias in favor of the Christians.....The latest, and perhaps the most significant, change was the use of naval gunfire in support of the Lebanese Armed Forces during the September fighting at Suq el-Gharb."

This is no small quibbling with details. That so many men were killed is tragic - but it is hardly a simple act of "pure terrorism" as Geraghty states in the NPR piece with Simon. The Wikipedia article on the Beirut Barracks Bombing rightly notes that

"Under international law, peacekeepers are regarded as non-combatants due to their peacekeeping role, but in Lebanon the U.S. Marines had become allied with the Maronite Christians and were actively engaging in battles, thus waiving their non-combatant status. The U.S. still categorised this attack as an act of terror as it was directed against off-duty servicemen, which the U.S. defines as non-combatants. However, no international law defines sleeping or off-duty servicemen as non-combatants."

Simon, needless to say, doesn't raise this issue at all. Besides, that would also get in the way of the other message of the NPR feature: Iran and Syria were behind the attack and the US should have retaliated (and maybe still should?).

BTW, I'm also looking forward to see how NPR covers another act of "pure terrorism": the sneak attack on a little country which resulted in about a hundred deaths and was conveniently launched just two days after the Beirut bombings, thereby helping to erase that failure from the public's awareness (those Reagan years were such golden times!).

No Comment Necessary

Yesterday, introducing a report on the Israel/Palestine conflict and Olmert's announcement that he will retire, Michele Norris states:

"At the State Department today, Condoleezza Rice tried to keep the push for Middle East peace on track."

I guess if Henry Kissinger can win the Nobel Peace Prize, anybody can be a pusher for peace...

Benny Gets a Pass

I hope Tony Karon over at Restless Cosmopolitan is right that Iran is definitely not going to be attacked by the US or Israel, because Robert Siegel's distorted interview with Benny Morris is bloodcurdling in its implications. Siegel raised a few weak challenges to Morris' logic, but here are some Morris statements that essentially went unchallenged:

"I think Iran is bound for nuclear weaponry...if they get it there is every chance they will use it against Israel..."

"...Israel must consider the military option."

"Bush a true and trusted friend."

"Israel has never threatened any country with destruction..."

"the Iranians on the other hand...have been threatening Israel with destruction for the past few years."

Iran is "driven by religious fanaticism."

"Iranian regime is completely different...these people are not rational by our lights."

"[the Iranians] look offensively and aggressively at places like Israel...want to destroy it..they say that every day."

To his credit Siegel mentions Israel's nuclear arsenal, but he never mentions that Iran has not attacked or threatened to launch an offensive military attack on any state for over a hundred years. And of course, Siegle never mentions that Israel has a history of invading and (as in the 2006 invasion of Lebanon) trying to destroy sovereign states. He doesn't mention that much of Israel's occupation and annexation is driven by religious fanaticism. Siegel also doesn't challenge the idea of Iran being completely irrational: he could have noted that Iran has actually behaved quite rationally for the last several years - it's manuevering in Iraq would have been an excellent case in point where it has played its political hand in a very rational manner or he might have mentioned Iran's willingness to accept a two state solution if Palestinians approve it.

More Balance

Obama is touring Israel and Palestine and NPR is on it. This morning Inskeep and Gonyea report with a big emphasis on balance:

Inskeep tells us that Obama's tour "is taking him to both sides of the dividing lines between Israelis and Palestinians. But while visiting both sides..."

Gonyea insists that Obama "is trying to balance things...probably the trickiest day of Senator Obama's overseas' trip."

Too bad our intrepid NPR journalists don't report on some of that tricky balance. They could have started with that slightly imbalanced US aid to Israel (you can also click on the graphic above to see another breakdown of this aid). They also could have gone looking into the balanced killings and human rights abuses between Israel and Palestine. Or reminded us that one side is an internationally recognized state which has used the full force of its military and US alliance to occupy, annex and repress the other side for over forty years instead of treating the situation as if it were a conflict between two balanced forces.

The other interesting aspect of this Morning Edition report is that Gonyea's pretense to being an authority on the full spectrum of Israeli and Palestinian opinions. Consider this exchange:

Inskeep: "What questions do Israelis have about Obama?"

Gonyea: "They are worried that in dealing with the peace process with the Palestinians that in forcing compromise and trying to broker a deal, he might push the Israelis harder, he might side a bit too much with the Palestinians...and that's obviously reflected in the kind of things we're hearing from Jewish voters in America."

Inskeep: "Are Palestinians any happier about Barack Obama?"

Gonyea: "They have some concerns as well...will no doubt have a warm meeting with Mahmoud Abbas, but there is concern...he might bend over backwards to please Israel."

I'm just curious how Gonyea knows what they are worried about? Who is this mythical they anyway? Gonyea is not reporting on surveys or polls. It's sloppy to report as if Israelis have some kind of unified opinion on Obama (or just about anything for that matter), and in spite of the reactionary politics of many American Jewish organizations - there are diverse opinions about US policy in Israel/Palestine (Jewish Voice for Peace or Tikkun for example). And of course, Gonyea is not talking about even a sampling of Palestinians, but only the US/Israel approved Palestinian officials who supposedly represent the "other side" in the conflict.

War Erupting and The People's Army

Tonight's coverage of the exchange of bodies and prisoners between Israel and Hezbollah/Lebanon provided a good case of contrast and compare on NPR. Reporting from Israel, Eric Westervelt had some interesting comments:

"....since they were seized in an ambush on July 12th, 2006 while on a routine patrol near the Lebanese border. Hezbollah guerrillas rained machine-gun and rocket-propelled grenade fire down on their armored jeeps. Three Israeli soldiers were killed on the spot and Goldwasser and Regev were taken captive. They were reservists Israeli soldiers doing their annual duty in what many here call 'The People's Army.'"

That is some colorful storytelling. I searched and searched and could find little details about the ambush itself. The Washington Post and the BBC both had some sketchy information about the operation in which the two Israeli soldiers were captured. Both quoted Hezbollah officials claiming that they had seized the two men in order to force prisoner exchanges. I couldn't find anything about the machine-gun and rocket-propelled grenades, although one might assume such weapons were used given the deaths of the soldiers. The bit about the "People's Army" was just plain salesmanship for the militarized state of Israel.

From Lebanon, NPR has Ivan Watson reporting on the reactions of citizens, government officials and Hezbollah supporters. Unfortunately, Watson - who did some of the better reporting from Lebanon when it was being pulverized by the IDF - has switched to the unoffending passive voice in describing Israel's planned destruction of Lebanon in the summer of 2006. He states,

"When Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers in that 2006 raid, Israel refused to negotiate. Instead a vicious five week war erupted which left much of Southern Lebanon in ruins."

War didn't just "erupt," it was planned and premeditated with US assistance. However, the part about Lebanon in ruins was true, but it didn't occur by happenstance.