9 jan 2009
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http://www.veteranstoday.com/page/52/?s=gaza+war&x=10&y=4
http://www.ifamericansknew.org/cur_sit/dec08.html
http://www.ifamericansknew.org/cur_sit/dec08.html
January 7-9: Bringing the dead on donkey carts
Nour, evacuated from Zaytoun on Wednesday
I covered another ambulance shift Wednesday night, working with two guys who might turn out to be my favourites. S is a sweet EMT driver with good English, very helpful for me, with the ambition to have a baby born in his ambulance since so far he only knows the theory of the process.
EB is a dad of three, with a wife who he insists doesn’t mind the idea of him having a second wife at some point. S is scathing about the concept of multiple wives. EB is happy for me to work as his assistant so that’s pretty cool. I can actually be useful especially when a medic is outnumbered; Wed night at one point we took on four injured people after a rocket blast near Palestine square, all from the same family home. A little boy with a head wound, two adult men, one with a head wound and the other with a leg wound.
I covered another ambulance shift Wednesday night, working with two guys who might turn out to be my favourites. S is a sweet EMT driver with good English, very helpful for me, with the ambition to have a baby born in his ambulance since so far he only knows the theory of the process.
EB is a dad of three, with a wife who he insists doesn’t mind the idea of him having a second wife at some point. S is scathing about the concept of multiple wives. EB is happy for me to work as his assistant so that’s pretty cool. I can actually be useful especially when a medic is outnumbered; Wed night at one point we took on four injured people after a rocket blast near Palestine square, all from the same family home. A little boy with a head wound, two adult men, one with a head wound and the other with a leg wound.
I’d heard word that Hassan was here in Al Quds, but by the time I got here he’d been sent home, which was encouraging in terms of his wound, and certainly good for his family who hadn’t seen him since the strikes began I think. I’ve since glimpsed the footage A took of his shooting, presented on AlJazeerah, so at least it’s got that far, and I had reports of it being on New York TV.
Dr Halid’s house in Khan Younis was destroyed yesterday. So was EB’s. So was Dr Basher’s, and his next door neighbour’s. He showed me the usual photos of rubble, his personal rubble. Three more homeless families taken in by relatives, whose houses also may be under threat. Is anyone’s home going to be left standing?
Dr Halid’s house in Khan Younis was destroyed yesterday. So was EB’s. So was Dr Basher’s, and his next door neighbour’s. He showed me the usual photos of rubble, his personal rubble. Three more homeless families taken in by relatives, whose houses also may be under threat. Is anyone’s home going to be left standing?
Young boy evacuated from Zaytoun, eye and arm injuries
Wednesday was the first day when there was a truce from 1pm til 4pm. In that time, the Red Cross successfully negotiated for themselves and Red Crescent medics to enter Zaytoun, one of the places where calls for help have not been allowed to be responded to. |
My medic friends described walking for about 4 km, using donkey carts to bring out the few dead and injured they could; they only had time to reach four houses. At times they were shot at by the army despite the advance arrangements. The house of the Samouni family was one of the houses they reached. A medic told me that two days before, there had been a call from this house to the Red Crescent, saying that 25 women and children were there, with about 5 shaheed after shelling attacks.
But on Wednesday when the house was reached, almost all were dead, survivors included one 11 year old boy with a leg injury. What shocked the medic I spoke to was that the majority appeared to have been killed by close range shooting – it seemed an execution had taken place. I have not been able to find out further clear details on this, and in fact there are various confusing versions of this story, speaking of seven families and 100 people in fact being in multiple houses together that were shelled. Ramattan journalists are going to interview a survivor in the hospital this afternoon so it may become clearer.
At other locations children without food or water were found besides dead parents. Some of the injured people brought out are above us here in the Al Quds hospital. I met baby Nour, tucked in a bed with her mother, and another woman with them whose child had been killed.
Following this I obtained permission to go on Thursday’s Red Cross/Red Crescent evacuation back to Zaytoun again during the hours of ceasefire. My impression was they were glad of a second woman and another international. The team was made up of three Red Cross folks and about ten Red Crescent medics. A similar RC evacuation team in another location during ceasefire was fired upon, with one Red Cross worker injured. I am going again today, Friday with the team from Al Quds. I will try to write a description of this process shortly.
We understand also that UN food deliveries were fired upon and one or two UN people were killed. My access to the net is so little that you will be able to find out more accurate reports on these sort of events (ie involving international agencies) with your own searching.
Last night for the first time I went back to my flat with the aim of getting a night’s sleep, having not had more than 2 hours in a row in any 24 since this whole thing started. I wish I hadn’t! Being away from Palestinian or international friends was hard, but being woken 2 hours into my longed for sleep by the sound of shooting outside the house had me in complete confusion, since it wasn’t coming from a hovering Apache.
Since on the evacuation today I finally saw Israeli tanks and soldiers and realised how close their lines are, my sleepy mind immediately decided they’d somehow reached the port area. The drone planes were also going crazy, normally they mainly sound sinister but monotonous, now they sounded like a bunch of very mad hornets, swooping about manically.
I started to think about what to grab for an escape back to my friends, but a little while later I got onto V and he explained that the drone planes have started shooting, something at least us foreigners had no idea they could do. Rockets, yes, shooting, no. Last night apparently for the first time they began shooting at anyone on the street. I shelved my escape plans, but then the hornets started swooping nearing to me and the rockets were rocking the building. So I jumped up, packed a bag for if the building fell apart, got dressed, moved my mattress the furthest I could from outside walls, and then miraculously managed to go back to sleep.
When I visited the Kabariti family yesterday, M told me that the girls are asking him how much it hurts to get injured, and what happens if they die. They are seeing so many pictures of children like themselves wrapped in body bags. He has explained that God sends you into unconciousness if you are hurt, so you don’t feel the pain.
11am: I have just heard that the evacuation for today has been called off, I am unclear whether Israel won’t agree to co-ordination or if the RC, like UNWRA, have frozen their operations after being under attack yesterday. So this means more time to wait, for the people trapped in no-man’s-land.
But on Wednesday when the house was reached, almost all were dead, survivors included one 11 year old boy with a leg injury. What shocked the medic I spoke to was that the majority appeared to have been killed by close range shooting – it seemed an execution had taken place. I have not been able to find out further clear details on this, and in fact there are various confusing versions of this story, speaking of seven families and 100 people in fact being in multiple houses together that were shelled. Ramattan journalists are going to interview a survivor in the hospital this afternoon so it may become clearer.
At other locations children without food or water were found besides dead parents. Some of the injured people brought out are above us here in the Al Quds hospital. I met baby Nour, tucked in a bed with her mother, and another woman with them whose child had been killed.
Following this I obtained permission to go on Thursday’s Red Cross/Red Crescent evacuation back to Zaytoun again during the hours of ceasefire. My impression was they were glad of a second woman and another international. The team was made up of three Red Cross folks and about ten Red Crescent medics. A similar RC evacuation team in another location during ceasefire was fired upon, with one Red Cross worker injured. I am going again today, Friday with the team from Al Quds. I will try to write a description of this process shortly.
We understand also that UN food deliveries were fired upon and one or two UN people were killed. My access to the net is so little that you will be able to find out more accurate reports on these sort of events (ie involving international agencies) with your own searching.
Last night for the first time I went back to my flat with the aim of getting a night’s sleep, having not had more than 2 hours in a row in any 24 since this whole thing started. I wish I hadn’t! Being away from Palestinian or international friends was hard, but being woken 2 hours into my longed for sleep by the sound of shooting outside the house had me in complete confusion, since it wasn’t coming from a hovering Apache.
Since on the evacuation today I finally saw Israeli tanks and soldiers and realised how close their lines are, my sleepy mind immediately decided they’d somehow reached the port area. The drone planes were also going crazy, normally they mainly sound sinister but monotonous, now they sounded like a bunch of very mad hornets, swooping about manically.
I started to think about what to grab for an escape back to my friends, but a little while later I got onto V and he explained that the drone planes have started shooting, something at least us foreigners had no idea they could do. Rockets, yes, shooting, no. Last night apparently for the first time they began shooting at anyone on the street. I shelved my escape plans, but then the hornets started swooping nearing to me and the rockets were rocking the building. So I jumped up, packed a bag for if the building fell apart, got dressed, moved my mattress the furthest I could from outside walls, and then miraculously managed to go back to sleep.
When I visited the Kabariti family yesterday, M told me that the girls are asking him how much it hurts to get injured, and what happens if they die. They are seeing so many pictures of children like themselves wrapped in body bags. He has explained that God sends you into unconciousness if you are hurt, so you don’t feel the pain.
11am: I have just heard that the evacuation for today has been called off, I am unclear whether Israel won’t agree to co-ordination or if the RC, like UNWRA, have frozen their operations after being under attack yesterday. So this means more time to wait, for the people trapped in no-man’s-land.
GAZA: 9 January
Palestinians of all ages are suffering amid shortages, Hatem Shurrab says
I'm using my brother's laptop to type these words - it has an hour left on the battery. The battery on my laptop has already died.
As I write this I can hear the sound of explosions around. Thirteen days on and I can't say that I'm getting used to the sounds of bombs and missiles hitting Gaza.
Today Islamic Relief was unable to distribute any aid as the bombing was so intense - vast parts of Gaza are now under thick black smoke.
Yesterday we were able to distribute 1,000 food parcels to local aid organisations who are helping us to reach desperate families - each parcel has enough food to feed a family of eight for one month.
This morning I heard about six people killed in the Qarrah area - all of them were over 50 years old. They were considered to be the elders in the community and they were respected and loved by all in Qarrah. People are in a state of shock.
Medical crisis
The whole health sector in Gaza is in meltdown. In the hospitals the doctors are sending home the severely injured - they have no choice due to the shortage of beds.
Many of those sent home are in urgent need of hospital treatment and anywhere else in the world they would be expected to stay in hospital for weeks. But Gaza is no ordinary place - it's a place full of deep pain and misery.
The injured are being forced to return to their homes a few hours after arriving at the hospital and are forced to try and recover from their injuries as the bombs keep falling.
The shortage of doctors can be seen in the operating theatres. While a doctor is operating on a patient two more will be brought in for emergency surgery at the same time - it's an impossible situation.
It's not only the doctors; there is a severe shortage of nurses too. The hospitals asked student nurses in their third and fourth years to come and help, as well as other volunteers - such is their desperation.
It's important to remember that Gaza has been under siege for the last 18 months, so the hospitals were already suffering from a severe shortage of medical equipment.
Power fears
Al-Shifa is the largest hospital in Gaza and it just cannot cope with all the injured. In most hospitals around the world generators are used as emergency back-up if anything happens to the electricity.
In Gaza the generators are the main source of electricity for the hospitals and there is no back up. If the generators do not work properly there is nothing the doctors can do. This can happen during an operation.
Islamic Relief is going regularly to the hospitals and supplying them with medical equipment. But what will happen when the fuel runs out in Gaza and the generators no longer work?
Most people in Gaza are already without electricity as most do not have access to generators.
When I sit down to gather my thoughts and write these diaries my mind often goes blank because sometimes it's too difficult to process the full magnitude of the suffering in Gaza.
Often I struggle to find the words to describe what's happening here - I don't think there are any words in the dictionary that can accurately capture what's happening here.
I'm using my brother's laptop to type these words - it has an hour left on the battery. The battery on my laptop has already died.
As I write this I can hear the sound of explosions around. Thirteen days on and I can't say that I'm getting used to the sounds of bombs and missiles hitting Gaza.
Today Islamic Relief was unable to distribute any aid as the bombing was so intense - vast parts of Gaza are now under thick black smoke.
Yesterday we were able to distribute 1,000 food parcels to local aid organisations who are helping us to reach desperate families - each parcel has enough food to feed a family of eight for one month.
This morning I heard about six people killed in the Qarrah area - all of them were over 50 years old. They were considered to be the elders in the community and they were respected and loved by all in Qarrah. People are in a state of shock.
Medical crisis
The whole health sector in Gaza is in meltdown. In the hospitals the doctors are sending home the severely injured - they have no choice due to the shortage of beds.
Many of those sent home are in urgent need of hospital treatment and anywhere else in the world they would be expected to stay in hospital for weeks. But Gaza is no ordinary place - it's a place full of deep pain and misery.
The injured are being forced to return to their homes a few hours after arriving at the hospital and are forced to try and recover from their injuries as the bombs keep falling.
The shortage of doctors can be seen in the operating theatres. While a doctor is operating on a patient two more will be brought in for emergency surgery at the same time - it's an impossible situation.
It's not only the doctors; there is a severe shortage of nurses too. The hospitals asked student nurses in their third and fourth years to come and help, as well as other volunteers - such is their desperation.
It's important to remember that Gaza has been under siege for the last 18 months, so the hospitals were already suffering from a severe shortage of medical equipment.
Power fears
Al-Shifa is the largest hospital in Gaza and it just cannot cope with all the injured. In most hospitals around the world generators are used as emergency back-up if anything happens to the electricity.
In Gaza the generators are the main source of electricity for the hospitals and there is no back up. If the generators do not work properly there is nothing the doctors can do. This can happen during an operation.
Islamic Relief is going regularly to the hospitals and supplying them with medical equipment. But what will happen when the fuel runs out in Gaza and the generators no longer work?
Most people in Gaza are already without electricity as most do not have access to generators.
When I sit down to gather my thoughts and write these diaries my mind often goes blank because sometimes it's too difficult to process the full magnitude of the suffering in Gaza.
Often I struggle to find the words to describe what's happening here - I don't think there are any words in the dictionary that can accurately capture what's happening here.
The Gazan Holocaust: Bil’in demonstrates in solidarity with Gaza
As a gesture of solidarity, residents in the West Bank village of Bil’in demonstrated against the current holocaust on Gaza in outfits symbolic of the clothing worn by victims of the Nazi holocaust.
Bil'in protests in solidarity with Gaza
The Israeli army used several new weapons, one of which is a bullet filled with an unknown chemical substance, against the demonstrators. Five individuals, including a member of Bil’in’s popular committee, were arrested and later released. “Stop the holocaust,” chanted the residents of Bil’in during today’s protest, held in solidarity with the Gazan people. After the Friday prayer, Palestinian, international and Israeli activists gathered to voice their opposition to the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza.
Wearing clothing similar to prisoners in Nazi camps, protestors traded the Star of David badge for a Gaza Strip badge.
“The outfits and insignia are a visual remembrance to the parallel conditions of the Jewish holocaust and the Gazan holocaust. Indiscriminate killing of members belonging to an ethnic group that was put and is trapped in a ghetto: Gaza is the present day concentration camp,” stated Abdallah Abu Rahmah, a member of Bil’in’s popular committee. Protesters hoped to send a message to the world: the international community is ignoring another holocaust.
The demonstrators marched through the streets of the village, towards the Apartheid Wall. An effort to condemn Israeli war crimes against the population of Gaza was met with tear gas, new bullets containing an unknown chemical substance and new bullets termed “0.2”, from Israeli soldiers. The new bullets that contain an unknown chemical substance are round and green and explode upon impact. Several protesters were injured including Muhammad Nabil Abu Rahmeh who had to be taken to Ramallah Hospital for treatment after he was shot at with the new 0.2 bullet. The small bullet went through his leg, causing great damage to muscle.
Also injured by rubber bullets were a photographer from Al Jazeera International, Yase Ashal Mahmud Yasen and a child named Nashmi Aburahma. Soldiers also entered through a road gate into Bil’in and arrested Muhammed Khatib, a member of Bil’in’s Popular Committee, Ashraf Abu Rahma, Samer Ataya and two Israeli activists. They were released later in the day.
The ongoing siege on Gaza, illegal under international law, was intensified when Israeli occupation forces began attacking Gaza with air strikes, shelling from the navy and a ground invasion. The military incursion on Gaza has already led to the death of over 781 people and injury of another 3,300.
Israel continues to indiscriminately attack on the densely populated Gaza Strip: a 40km by 7km remnant of historical Palestine with 1.5 million residents. Even Israeli officials are drawing comparisons to the Nazi inflicted holocaust.
Speaking to Israeli army radio, the Deputy Defense Minister, Matan Vilnai said, “the more Qassam [rocket] fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, [the Palestinians] will bring upon themselves a bigger shoah because we will use all our might to defend ourselves.” Shoah is the Hebrew term for the Jewish holocaust.
Today’s action was a reminder to the international world about the consequences of letting Gazan massacres go unnoticed. As proven by a history that was constructed because of willful ignorance during the Nazi inflicted holocaust, ignoring the Israeli inflicted holocaust on the Palestinians of Gaza is not an option.
Bil'in protests in solidarity with Gaza
The Israeli army used several new weapons, one of which is a bullet filled with an unknown chemical substance, against the demonstrators. Five individuals, including a member of Bil’in’s popular committee, were arrested and later released. “Stop the holocaust,” chanted the residents of Bil’in during today’s protest, held in solidarity with the Gazan people. After the Friday prayer, Palestinian, international and Israeli activists gathered to voice their opposition to the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza.
Wearing clothing similar to prisoners in Nazi camps, protestors traded the Star of David badge for a Gaza Strip badge.
“The outfits and insignia are a visual remembrance to the parallel conditions of the Jewish holocaust and the Gazan holocaust. Indiscriminate killing of members belonging to an ethnic group that was put and is trapped in a ghetto: Gaza is the present day concentration camp,” stated Abdallah Abu Rahmah, a member of Bil’in’s popular committee. Protesters hoped to send a message to the world: the international community is ignoring another holocaust.
The demonstrators marched through the streets of the village, towards the Apartheid Wall. An effort to condemn Israeli war crimes against the population of Gaza was met with tear gas, new bullets containing an unknown chemical substance and new bullets termed “0.2”, from Israeli soldiers. The new bullets that contain an unknown chemical substance are round and green and explode upon impact. Several protesters were injured including Muhammad Nabil Abu Rahmeh who had to be taken to Ramallah Hospital for treatment after he was shot at with the new 0.2 bullet. The small bullet went through his leg, causing great damage to muscle.
Also injured by rubber bullets were a photographer from Al Jazeera International, Yase Ashal Mahmud Yasen and a child named Nashmi Aburahma. Soldiers also entered through a road gate into Bil’in and arrested Muhammed Khatib, a member of Bil’in’s Popular Committee, Ashraf Abu Rahma, Samer Ataya and two Israeli activists. They were released later in the day.
The ongoing siege on Gaza, illegal under international law, was intensified when Israeli occupation forces began attacking Gaza with air strikes, shelling from the navy and a ground invasion. The military incursion on Gaza has already led to the death of over 781 people and injury of another 3,300.
Israel continues to indiscriminately attack on the densely populated Gaza Strip: a 40km by 7km remnant of historical Palestine with 1.5 million residents. Even Israeli officials are drawing comparisons to the Nazi inflicted holocaust.
Speaking to Israeli army radio, the Deputy Defense Minister, Matan Vilnai said, “the more Qassam [rocket] fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, [the Palestinians] will bring upon themselves a bigger shoah because we will use all our might to defend ourselves.” Shoah is the Hebrew term for the Jewish holocaust.
Today’s action was a reminder to the international world about the consequences of letting Gazan massacres go unnoticed. As proven by a history that was constructed because of willful ignorance during the Nazi inflicted holocaust, ignoring the Israeli inflicted holocaust on the Palestinians of Gaza is not an option.
What You'd Know About Israel If You Watched Al Jazeera TV
Al Jazeera Breaks the Israeli Media Blockade Live coverage of the war hasn’t made it into most American living rooms.
By Shane Bauer
Throughout the 11 days of Israel’s pummeling of Gaza, live coverage of the war hasn’t made it into most American living rooms. That’s because Israel, America’s staunch ally, isn’t allowing journalists to enter Gaza while Al Jazeera, called anti-American and pro-terrorist by many in Washington, is the only network broadcasting live images from Gaza to the world.
The 350 reporters who descended on Israel when the conflict began are stuck at the border between Israel and Gaza. Israel says that opening border crossings to journalists would put their soldiers in danger, but many have accused them of trying to control the story. Instead of giving their viewers up-close pictorial evidence of what is occurring in Gaza, television networks have been restricted to showing their viewers plumes of smoke as they rise in the distance.
But Al Jazeera, the Qatari network that has previously undergone attacks and had its reporters arrested by the U.S. military, remains typically defiant. While other networks are increasingly severed from Gaza as phone lines are cut and 75 percent of the territory is without electricity, Al Jazeera is bringing its approximately 140 million English- and Arabic-speaking viewers live images of bombings, tanks rolling through Gaza’s farmland, and interviews with civilians and aid workers inside Gaza city.
Like all of the networks, Al Jazeera gives constant hard-hitting interviews with politicians and analysts from Israel, the West Bank, and the rest of the Arab world. But while others can only balance pundits with more pundits, Al Jazeera has been taking the viewer to the scene to weigh the words of politicians against the reality on the ground.
By Shane Bauer
Throughout the 11 days of Israel’s pummeling of Gaza, live coverage of the war hasn’t made it into most American living rooms. That’s because Israel, America’s staunch ally, isn’t allowing journalists to enter Gaza while Al Jazeera, called anti-American and pro-terrorist by many in Washington, is the only network broadcasting live images from Gaza to the world.
The 350 reporters who descended on Israel when the conflict began are stuck at the border between Israel and Gaza. Israel says that opening border crossings to journalists would put their soldiers in danger, but many have accused them of trying to control the story. Instead of giving their viewers up-close pictorial evidence of what is occurring in Gaza, television networks have been restricted to showing their viewers plumes of smoke as they rise in the distance.
But Al Jazeera, the Qatari network that has previously undergone attacks and had its reporters arrested by the U.S. military, remains typically defiant. While other networks are increasingly severed from Gaza as phone lines are cut and 75 percent of the territory is without electricity, Al Jazeera is bringing its approximately 140 million English- and Arabic-speaking viewers live images of bombings, tanks rolling through Gaza’s farmland, and interviews with civilians and aid workers inside Gaza city.
Like all of the networks, Al Jazeera gives constant hard-hitting interviews with politicians and analysts from Israel, the West Bank, and the rest of the Arab world. But while others can only balance pundits with more pundits, Al Jazeera has been taking the viewer to the scene to weigh the words of politicians against the reality on the ground.
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Take Israel’s claim that there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza. After showing an Israeli politician writing off the assertion of the existence of a humanitarian disaster, Al Jazeera cut to the Al Shifa hospital, the largest in all of Gaza.
There, we saw that there were not enough medical supplies and civilians lying on bloody hospital beds told us that their lives were not only being crippled by bombs falling on their houses, but by the extreme lack of water and food for the people cowering inside them. One man, as he held his dead, pale faced 7-month-old son in his arms, said, "We were in our house for three days before the bombs fell on us. We called for the Red Cross and humanitarian groups, but no one was able to reach us…We have no one but God." Israeli officials continue to assert that they are allowing in humanitarian aid by opening the border, but as Al Jazeera’s Ayman Moheyaldin reported from the |
inside, "The point is not that you open the crossings to allow in 30 to 40 trucks, but that you keep them open and allow a continuous amount of goods to enter for a sustainable amount of time."
The problem isn’t only that supplies can’t get in. People still can’t get out. Most are left searching hopelessly for safety while their stories remain trapped within Gaza’s walls.
"There is nowhere safe in Gaza," an enraged John Ging, head of the UN Relief and Works Agency in Gaza, told Al Jazeera’s Sherine Tadros in front of the Al Shifa hospital today. Those words came after the Israeli Defense Forces bombed a UN school that was being used as a refuge. Later in the day, a second UN school was struck by the Israelis, killing at least 40. "Everyone here is terrorized and traumatized and they have the right to be because there is no safe haven…This violence needs to stop now. Neither side can wait for the other to stop first," he said.
While Al Jazeera might be the only channel reporting from inside Gaza, scores of channels across the Middle East are airing constant commentary as well as images of wailing women, dead children, and burning buildings on loop. On the Syrian satellite station Al-Sham, for example, a pro-Hezbollah series about Israel’s occupation of south Lebanon was alternated with a 20-minute musical piece sung over images of dead babies, American soldiers kicking men in orange jumpsuits, a naked Arab man with a bag over his head running from American military dogs, stone-throwing Palestinian children, and endless footage of blood-soaked Palestinians and Iraqis.
The song’s chorus, "The heart of humanity has died. It died between us brothers. Maybe we forgot one day that all Arabs are brothers," reflects the deep anger that people are feeling toward the inaction of Arab governments here.
By and large, media here is "all Gaza, all the time," and the more people see and hear about what is going on there, the angrier they seem to get. As I rode a bus into the Palestinian refugee camp, Yarmouk, a few days ago, the Syrian radio station was taking calls. A woman screamed into the airwaves, "The people of Gaza don’t need food; they need guns to resist the Israelis!" The bus remained silent, full of straight-faced, clench-jawed passengers.
Many went home and watched the ground invasion live a couple of hours later in night vision-green on Al Jazeera. Since then, the death toll has climbed to at least 598, according to Al Jazeera, with 2,700 injured.
Meanwhile, the world’s only live coverage of the tragedy is kept away from American eyes. While Al Jazeera English competes with CNN and BBC as one of the largest networks in the world, no major American cable provider has been willing to carry the channel since it launched in 2006. Some say cable providers are squeamish about working with a channel popularly perceived in the United States as giving airtime to terrorists.
But Al Jazeera is finding its way around the problem. Today, Americans hungry for inside coverage of Gaza can download Livestation, a free program that will let viewers watch Al Jazeera English among other international networks. Defiant as always, Al Jazeera might break through another media blackout, and into American homes.
The problem isn’t only that supplies can’t get in. People still can’t get out. Most are left searching hopelessly for safety while their stories remain trapped within Gaza’s walls.
"There is nowhere safe in Gaza," an enraged John Ging, head of the UN Relief and Works Agency in Gaza, told Al Jazeera’s Sherine Tadros in front of the Al Shifa hospital today. Those words came after the Israeli Defense Forces bombed a UN school that was being used as a refuge. Later in the day, a second UN school was struck by the Israelis, killing at least 40. "Everyone here is terrorized and traumatized and they have the right to be because there is no safe haven…This violence needs to stop now. Neither side can wait for the other to stop first," he said.
While Al Jazeera might be the only channel reporting from inside Gaza, scores of channels across the Middle East are airing constant commentary as well as images of wailing women, dead children, and burning buildings on loop. On the Syrian satellite station Al-Sham, for example, a pro-Hezbollah series about Israel’s occupation of south Lebanon was alternated with a 20-minute musical piece sung over images of dead babies, American soldiers kicking men in orange jumpsuits, a naked Arab man with a bag over his head running from American military dogs, stone-throwing Palestinian children, and endless footage of blood-soaked Palestinians and Iraqis.
The song’s chorus, "The heart of humanity has died. It died between us brothers. Maybe we forgot one day that all Arabs are brothers," reflects the deep anger that people are feeling toward the inaction of Arab governments here.
By and large, media here is "all Gaza, all the time," and the more people see and hear about what is going on there, the angrier they seem to get. As I rode a bus into the Palestinian refugee camp, Yarmouk, a few days ago, the Syrian radio station was taking calls. A woman screamed into the airwaves, "The people of Gaza don’t need food; they need guns to resist the Israelis!" The bus remained silent, full of straight-faced, clench-jawed passengers.
Many went home and watched the ground invasion live a couple of hours later in night vision-green on Al Jazeera. Since then, the death toll has climbed to at least 598, according to Al Jazeera, with 2,700 injured.
Meanwhile, the world’s only live coverage of the tragedy is kept away from American eyes. While Al Jazeera English competes with CNN and BBC as one of the largest networks in the world, no major American cable provider has been willing to carry the channel since it launched in 2006. Some say cable providers are squeamish about working with a channel popularly perceived in the United States as giving airtime to terrorists.
But Al Jazeera is finding its way around the problem. Today, Americans hungry for inside coverage of Gaza can download Livestation, a free program that will let viewers watch Al Jazeera English among other international networks. Defiant as always, Al Jazeera might break through another media blackout, and into American homes.
Days: Jan 18 - 17 - 16 - 15 - 14 - 13 - 12 - 11 - 10 - 9 - 8 - 7 - 6 - 5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - Dec 31 - 30 - 29 - 28 - 27