BBC and CNN covering different planets
By Omanly Ismail
Special to NileMedia from Los Angeles

I was watching the coverage of yesterday's massacres in the Holy Land. I turned to the BBC and listened to their report. First they had Edward Said from Columbia who would never ever be allowed to speak on CNN or MSNBC or any of the networks. "Israel is employing colonial tactics", "Israel has declared war on Palestinian civilians", "Of course its an occupation army!", "Sharon is a war criminal for his activities 20 years ago and he's using the same mode of operation today", "This borders on genocide"... The BBC also talked about some of the civilians killed and the Italian journalist killed by Israelis...

Now to CNN:
"Seven Israelis were killed when Palestinian gunmen...." ,"The Israelis have been ferreting out terrorists in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank", "About 33 suspected palestinian militants were killed","Italian journalist was struck by a tank fire"...

Now to Local Channel 9:
"Palestinians strung up another Palestinian who was accused of sympathizing with Israel". "The Israeli army has been fighting terrorists in the West Bank and Gaza".

You would think that these were entirely different planets. I have gone to the trouble of writing tomorrow's headline for CNN. "One Hard Working honest Israeli soldier was wounded while attempting to ferret out Palestinian terrorists in Rammallah. In response to this vicious attack, Israel was forced to make an incursion into the city of 200,000. 26 Palestinian terrorists were killed when they attacked the Israeli army that was only asking them to turn themselves in like common criminals. four Palestinian children were also killed when they jumped underneath an Israeli tank. The wounds to the Israeli soldier were minor, but his wife and children joined him in the local Israeli hospital and were shocked at brutality of the Palestinian gunmen. The soldier, who is 26, regulary attends the Synagogue, loves his pets and waters his flowers..."

Or maybe I could write it the Nile Media way. Ariel Sharon, showing that he can compete with the likes of Stalin and Pol Pot, mobilized a force of 20,000 soldiers to invade and pulverize the Palestinan town of Ramallah. After holding the Palestinian President Yasser Arafat as a hostage for three months, they recklessly smashed into ambulances and cars and murdered everyone on their way to shooting up a refugee camp. Not surprisingly, 33 people, most of them innocent, were killed. Thats what you get when you send hundreds of tanks and 20,000 armed men into an urban area of another country. The Israeli army chiefs assessed the dead and after a few moments had no problem categorizing 6 year olds, old women, and even pregnant women as "terrorists". CNN, by now an integral part of the IDF, was there to take notes and to vilify a murdered Italian journalist as "an enemy agent".

By the way, if you haven't noticed, the new term that everyone loves is "terrorists". Every one is a terrorist. If you have a tank that mows down your kids while they are playing ball and you try to stop them, you are a terrorist. Apparently, the terrorists need to smarten up and get some tanks and a war criminal general. Then you get to be an army, call everyone else a terrorist and get pats on the back from CNN for every child you kill.