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At last! The ugly truth is out for all to see

It has been a constant complaint that the media have portrayed and skewed the news in favour of Israel - even in the wake of a horrendous pounding of Gaza with significant numbers killed, mainly civilians and a large percentage of those, children.

Israel has been able to dominate the air-waves in all manner means - use of the Israel Lobby to pressure the media, using PR spokes-people well-versed in English, having an American as the ambassador to the USA, utilising the media to good effect, etc. etc.

No more! - as this piece from The Independent explains.

"The Gaza atrocities are now being reported on a constant basis by eyewitnesses, be they professional correspondents representing major media organisations, or amateur locals under fire. Because all you need is a mobile phone and a Twitter account.

It is those devices which brought us heart-rending images – some too horrific to be shown on television – of children with their limbs or half a head blown off. Children covered in shrapnel wounds screaming for dead parents; surviving parents carrying tiny bodies. Sights which caused the battle-hardened BBC correspondent Lyse Doucet to sob during a live broadcast.

They are all on Twitter now, should you care to look. This is the shape of wars to come. Anything less than total nuclear annihilation will, from now on, be recorded for posterity by the victims, as well as the victors, in their own versions. Imagine if this was the case in Bosnia, Rwanda and Darfur, not to mention earlier massacres. Historians will finally have both sides’ stories to work from, and the evidence with which to back up their words.

But far more importantly, aggressors will have to live with the consequences of their acts, unable to hide behind hollow rhetoric. Because the Israelis had and have nothing with which to balance those images of bloodied, mangled little corpses in Gaza. Yes, as of today they continue to bludgeon Gaza in defiance of the UN Security Council and polite requests from John Kerry to stop. But they never cared about that. On the other hand, mass protests marches from California to Chile are taking their toll.

The Israeli army is getting more resistance online than on the ground. It’s  not used to it and cannot cope."

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