[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Aditya Kane and Evi Indrawanto, Rashtrakut. Rashtrakut said: From the blog: Why does so much of the world see things differently than #America? http://goo.gl/fb/0Szh […]

Whether Americans are getting the “straight” story on the Israeli/Palestinian issue from their media is beside the point. Americans get it right when they throw their weight or bias behind Israel and not the Palestinians and their sympathizers. Like it or not, Israel is the only democracy in the Mideast. The Palestinians in Gaza have been victimized by so many other forces other than the Israelis, such as the Egyptians and Muslim fundamentalism, and their own sorry leadership, as much as they have been victimized by the Isreaelis.

Bottom line is that if Mexico sent rockets into Nogales or El Paso every now and then, and refused to acknowledge the U.S.’right to exist than you’d see some pretty strong retaliation on the part of the United States akin to swatting a fly with a hammer.

So because the Palestinians have also been victimized by their leaders and their own leadership and because Israel is a democracy, it gets a free pass on how it treats the Palestinians? If there is outrage at the rockets (and there should be) shouldn’t there be some for using airplanes to bomb urban areas where civilians reside? Why is Israel entitled to a deference never given to any other American ally?

I’m not sure Israel has gotten a free pass on how it treated Gaza civilians. Perhaps now I’m changing the argument but the fact of the matter is that the Mideast is a “rough neighborhood.” Israel should be held to high standards because it is a democracy and because it receives significant American aid. Still, in 1982, as Rashtrakut knows, the Syrians leveled Hamah, killing between 10 and 25k civilians while they bombed urban areas and the only way I ever learned about it was through Thomas Friedman’s book.

I don’t think the Syrians have exactly got a free pass on Hama (which I have noted many times in the blog when I refer to Iran). That said the Syrian attack on Hama itself is part of a double standard because of who the Syrians killed. Western governments were not shedding too many tears for the dead Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood. Likewise, Saddam Hussein’s poison gas attack on the Kurds at Halabja got coverage in the press but a muted response from Washington because he was also gassing the Iranians at the same time. However, there is also a difference between not calling out Syria and Iraq, vs. absolving Israel for any action that some would like to do. I agree, Israel is in a rough neighborhood and the fact that many of the people hurling darts have very unclean hands of their own. You might find this article from the Democracy in America blog a good read as well.