Palestine

Readers of my commentaries know that I usually send one a week. Last week, however, I sent two because the Helen Thomas incident occurred after I had finished my regular weekly article, and I thought the Thomas affair required a response from me. I called for her to step down, which she did.

The following is a transcript of a TRNN interview with Ralph Nader. You can view the video of the interview here.

The fact that writing about Helen Thomas just a few days after she resigned feels like old news, tells you something about what's wrong with the media and our country today.

After a journalism career spanning almost seventy years, Thomas was taken down in less than two minutes. Which is the running time of the video where she made the remarks that forced her to resign her job, lose her book collaborator, her lecture agent and have a high school cancel a graduation speech she was scheduled to deliver.

If one good thing can come out of the Helen Thomas brouhaha, it would be questioning the meaning of the term "anti-semitism."

I have gone back and forth on the whole Thomas affair. One point that has always been clear to me is that her statement was "anti-Israel." A second is that she should not have been be fired for shooting off her mouth (being "pro-Israel" should not be a requirement to hold a job in media or anywhere else). And, third, is that her statement, while anti-Israel was not anti-Semitic.

The truth is out there. But who would've expected to find it in a comedy show?

While many Christian churches act as a supportive shill for America's government, and peddle more propaganda about Israel than politicians, the truth exposing the absolute epitome of ignorance and intolerance enveloping America was revealed June 9, 2010 in an episode of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, for which he deserves a Pulitzer Prize.

In trying to change direction and find "a better approach" to dealing with the long running crisis facing Gaza, the Obama Administration is confronting several deeply entrenched obstacles.

Originally published on Youthradio.org, the premier source for youth generated news throughout the globe.

By Nora Barrows-Friedman

By Avner Gidron, Senior Policy Adviser at Amnesty International

Yet again we are witness to the double standard that results from the criticism of Israel. To watch the venerable (and, admittedly, increasingly irrelevant) Helen Thomas go down in flames for her comments on Palestine is yet another moment of suck in the mutually masturbatory relationship that exists between the US and Israel.

Was what Helen Thomas said inappropriate?

Possibly.

Was what Helen Thomas said rude?

Sure.

Media coverage of two events -- both related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict -- demonstrated why Israel's image has suffered so grievously in recent years.