U.S. media coverage of the conflict - a recent CBS Face the Nation
show with host Bob Schieffer
Bob Schieffer: In the Middle East, the Palestinian people find themselves in the
grip of a terrorist group that is embarked on a strategy to get its own
children killed in order to build sympathy for its cause—a strategy that might
actually be working, at least in some quarters. Last week I found a quote of
many years ago by Golda Meir, one of Israel’s early leaders, which might have
been said yesterday: "We can forgive the Arabs for killing our
children," she said, "but we can never forgive them for forcing us to
kill their children."
Noam Chomsky: Well, we don’t really have to listen to CBS, because we can listen
directly to the Israeli propaganda agencies, which he’s quoting. It’s a
shameful moment for U.S. media when it insists on being subservient to the
grotesque propaganda agencies of a violent, aggressive state. As for the
comment itself, the Israel comment which he—propaganda comment which he quoted,
I guess maybe the best comment about that was made by the great Israeli
journalist Amira Hass, who just described it as "sadism masked as
compassion." That’s about the right characterization.
