Tuesday 30 December 2008

Two comments about Hamas getting zapped

Actually, I am going to make three comments.

First comment. "The people of the Gaza Strip are suffering from extreme poverty".

In that case, why do I count three satellite dishes in the photo below? Either they are not suffering that badly, or they are suffering because the Big Men have siphoned off all the money and lavished it on themselves, allowing the peasants to starve. [I take it this house was bombed because a Hamas Big Man lived here.] Or they've lavished it on rockets.

Guns or butter, guys. Guns or butter. Take your pick. You choose guns? Then stop crying about the lack of butter.

I guess with all those dishes, they can watch themselves being bombed on TV.

The caption on this photo states that it is a "targeted location". I saw the same photo elsewhere described as a Hamas rocket launching site. Calling it a "targeted location" kind of takes all the sting out of the reason why the site was hit. Those evil Israelis might have decided to "target" a baby milk factory - the phrase "targeted location" leaves it open to interpretation, whilst the phrase "rocket launching site" leaves no ambiguity as to why the site was whacked.


Having written that, I can't remember what my third comment was going to be.

------

Now I remember. The top photo shows a blitzed house. However, when I see a closely framed photo like this, I wonder what it would look like if the photographer walked backwards a bit and took a more widely framed shot. They always take closely cropped photos to give you the impression the place has been more blown up than Stalingrad, when the truth is often that one house has been flattened and the rest around it are intact. I remember that trick from the whatever-it-was "massacre" of a few years ago.

It's interesting how the media likes to distort and manipulate the images that we are shown. However, I doubt my kids will learn about this sort of distortion in media studies classes at school. Nooooo. Because it is the right sort of distortion.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

"The people of the Gaza Strip are suffering from extreme poverty".

Ha!

"Prior to Israel's August withdrawal, the residents of Gaza's Gush Katif slate of Jewish communities ran greenhouses known for producing high-quality insect-free vegetables. The Gush Katif gardens featured some of the most technologically advanced agricultural equipment and accounted for more than $100 million per year in exports to Europe. The greenhouses also supplied Israel with 75 percent of its own produce.

The hothouses were passed to the Palestinians in September in a $14 million deal brokered by former World Bank President James Wolfenson and several wealthy Jewish Americans....

Now the Palestinian owners have asked the United States Agency for International Development, which has been involved in reconstruction efforts in Gaza, to hire former Jewish Gaza greenhouse owners as consultants for their declining vegetable businesses."
http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/1463

Palestinians looted dozens of greenhouses on Tuesday, walking off with irrigation hoses, water pumps and plastic sheeting in a blow to fledgling efforts to reconstruct the Gaza Strip.

American Jewish donors had bought more than 3,000 greenhouses from Israeli settlers in Gaza for $14 million last month and transferred them to the Palestinian Authority. Former World Bank President James Wolfensohn, who brokered the deal, put up $500,000 of his own cash."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9331863/

kae said...

I want to say

Typical fucking sand-goblins.

But I reckon that might be considered racist.

But they are. Looting the greenhouses. What about all the other stuff that was left, productive equipment and so on, ruined by them.

Sixth century suits them. Superstition and poverty. They love it.

And they blame everyone else for their shit situation.

/rant

WV: PRONGS

lolz

1735099 said...

It's been at least twenty years since the media placed more emphasis on the written word than the image. Watching "Frost/Nixon" with my second son who is studying media was enlightening as he was able to point out how the producer exploited the power of the image. Even in a scenario as limited as an interview situation, imagery is manipulated for effect.
Remember Napalm Girl (Huynh Cong Ut), Tank Man (Tiananmen Square) and Vietcong Execution (Tet Offensive).