In an unusual live Wednesday morning broadcast, I finally produced the 2nd episode of Digital Crossroads of the year. I’ve been reading and highlighting and writing about Gaza. This show is about thinking critically before you trust what you read in the news.
Funeral at UN school struck by Israel
Below you can click to listen to the 30-minute show as it aired on Boise Community Radio and Radio Free Moscow. If you make it all the way through the show, please check out the additional 10 minutes I did live this morning on RadioBoise.org covering Obama’s support from the “defense lobby” as well as reports inside Gaza. Hear from Vittorio Arrigoni, an Italian human rights activist, and from Sameh Habeb, a Palestinian photographer. More links and photos after the jump.
In a story published Jan. 9th by Alternet from New America Media, Shane Bauer covers “What You’d Know About Israel if you Watched Al Jazeera TV.”
He writes, the 350 reporters who descended on Israel when the conflict began are stuck at the border between Israel and Gaza. 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.
“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 Thursday. 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. Ging insisted, “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.”
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. But Al Jazeera is finding its way around the problem. Today, Americans can download Livestation, a free program that wil let viewers watch Al Jazeera English and other international networks.
Here’s a timeline looking back at news you likely haven’t seen if you have depended on US network TV and corporate newspapers over the past 2 weeks…
I received an email from Bill Clinton today asking for money to fund Democratic Party politics. This was not good timing on their part, though I didn’t give any money to Democrats over the two-year-long campaign either.
Here is the letter I wrote back. I will post any response I receive, but I’m not holding my breath.
Radioactive Gavin is Out of Print 