Skip to main content

A fight to survive against overwhelming odds

It's a telling indictment of the news media that what is reported in relation to Israel and the Palestinians is so very much from an Israeli prospective. The ignorance of the world to what is happening to the Palestinians will only so long - until something really dramatic happens!

The Nation reports on an all too familiar situation:

"Jerusalem bulldozer 'terrorist' kills 3 in rampage," read the headline of a CNN article describing the recent attack of a Palestinian construction worker that left three Israelis dead and scores wounded. A Google news search indicates that the brutal assault was mentioned in 3,525 news articles. USA Today, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, BBC, Fox News and Al Jazeera as well as all the other major media outlets covered the incident. Lesser-known media sources, such as the Khaleej Times in the United Arab Emirates, the Edmonton Sun in Canada and B92 in Serbia, also featured the event. Indeed, one could safely assume that almost all news outlets around the globe provided some type of coverage of the attack.

Another Google news search, this one using the name Ni'lin, produces only seventy-five results. A few major outlets have carried the story about the brave resistance to Israeli seizures of land staged by the residents of this Palestinian town in the occupied West Bank, but CNN, the LA Times and USA Today have not. Sources like the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times provided a short caption, no more. Considering that over the past two months the residents of Ni'lin have managed to make a mark on the history of popular opposition, the limited coverage of their campaign is not a mere oversight.
Ni'lin's story is one of incremental dispossession. The residents of this agrarian town lost a large portion of their land in the 1948 war. After the 1967 war, Israel took advantage of the town's location near the internationally recognized Green Line and began confiscating its land for Jewish settlements. First, seventy-four dunams (four dunams equal one acre) were expropriated for the settlement of Shilat. Next, another 661 dunams were seized to build the settlement Mattityahu. In 1985, 934 dunams were confiscated to build Hashmonaim, and six years later 274 dunams were appropriated for Mod'in Illit. Finally, in 1998, twenty more were sequestered for the settlement of Menora. All together, more than 13 percent of the town's land has been expropriated for settlements."

Read the complete piece here.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Robert Fisk's predictions for the Middle East in 2013

There is no gain-saying that Robert Fisk, fiercely independent and feisty to boot, is the veteran journalist and author covering the Middle East. Who doesn't he know or hasn't he met over the years in reporting from Beirut - where he lives?  In his latest op-ed piece for The Independent he lays out his predictions for the Middle East for 2013. Read the piece in full, here - well worthwhile - but an extract... "Never make predictions in the Middle East. My crystal ball broke long ago. But predicting the region has an honourable pedigree. “An Arab movement, newly-risen, is looming in the distance,” a French traveller to the Gulf and Baghdad wrote in 1883, “and a race hitherto downtrodden will presently claim its due place in the destinies of Islam.” A year earlier, a British diplomat in Jeddah confided that “it is within my knowledge... that the idea of freedom does at present agitate some minds even in Mecca...” So let’s say this for 2013: the “Arab Awakening” (the t...

Palestinian children in irons. UK to investigate

Not for the first time does MPS wonder what sort of country it is when Israel so flagrently allows what can only be described as barbaric and inhuman behaviour to be undertaken by, amongst others, its IDF. No one has seemingly challenged Israel's actions. However, perhaps it's gone a bridge too far - as The Independent reports. The Foreign Office revealed last night that it would be challenging the Israelis over their treatment of Palestinian children after a report by a delegation of senior British lawyers revealed unconscionable practices, such as hooding and the use of leg irons. In the first investigation of its kind, a team of nine senior legal figures examined how Palestinians as young as 12 were treated when arrested. Their shocking report Children in Military Custody details claims that youngsters are dragged from their beds in the middle of the night, have their wrists bound behind their backs, and are blindfolded and made to kneel or lie face down in military vehi...

Wow!.....some "visitor" to Ferryland in Newfoundland