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Shelbyville, Tennessee ~ Friday, January 9, 2009
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Bias and blame in the Middle East


Saturday, June 9, 2007
To call these guys sore losers would be an understatement.

I'm talking about the 40th anniversary of the 1967 Six Day War, where a number of Arab counties ganged up on Israel, and got their collective backsides handed to them in what is considered one of the shortest armed conflicts in history.

For those not up on your Middle East history, 40 years ago this week, nearly every Arab country in the region contributed troops, tanks and aircraft to "destroy Israel." But after the dust cleared, Egypt had lost the Sinai Peninsula and Gaza Strip, Syria had to relinquish the Golan Heights, and Jordan gave up the West Bank and east Jerusalem.

So of course, everything bad that happened to these countries since then has been blamed on the tiny Jewish country. Problems ranging from the rise of religious extremism in the region to the lack of democracy is considered the fault of Israel.

Even extremely personal problems with their love lives.

According to a column by Egyptian Wael Abdel Fattah, Arabs blame the 1967 defeat for "everything" -- from "price hikes, dictatorship, religious extremism, sectarian strife, even sexual impotence."

Boy, that must have been one serious military defeat.

Well, get ready to send more shipments of Viagra to that part of the world, because according to various Middle East media sources, Syria is getting ready to rumble again this summer.

The Jerusalem Post has reported that a member of the Syrian parliament confirmed that they are actively preparing for war with Israel, which they expect to break out sometime this summer.

Speaking with Al Jazeera, the favorite television network of terrorists, Muhammad Habash said "it was no secret that the Syrian military was arming itself for the upcoming confrontation with the IDF [Israeli Defense Forces]."

The sheer hatred exhibited this part of the world in regards to Israel is so ingrained in their societies after generations of anti-Semitic propaganda, it is unlikely that another crushing military defeat will do any good. It will only reinforce the hatred for several more generations.

Their state-run television stations constantly refers to Jews as "the offspring of apes and pigs," but many in the Western world ignore these vile broadcasts while instead focusing on Israeli responses to constant attacks, calling it oppression and overreaction.

Last year, I pointed out the obvious bias seen in stories from this continuing conflict. During the brief war between Israel and the terrorist group Hezbollah last summer, several media outlets allowed photos of questionable authenticity to be published, some of which were either outright fabrications or likely staged by Hezbollah sympathizers.

One lead paragraph from the Associated Press last December read: "After weeks of restraint, Israel said Wednesday that it will renew attacks on rocket-launching militants in the Gaza Strip, threatening to derail an already shaky, month-old truce."

You see, the Palestinians can fire rockets at the Jews every single day, yet the "truce" is only "derailed" when Israel finally decides to defend against the attacks. According to the AP, Israel must be the aggressor because they "threaten to renew attacks," even though militants had been violating the truce for nearly a month.

As I wrote then, it's not much of a truce when the other side is constantly shooting at you, is it?

Sooner or later, the whole mess between Israel and everyone else living there will come to a head again and when it does, we can only hope that the conflict will be reported accurately.

But judging from the recent track record of the main stream media on this topic, I seriously doubt that will happen.



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