Salem-News Under Attack For Israel Stories
By Tim King
12 May, 2010
Salem-News.com
(SALEM, Ore.) - People who are dialed into the news know that Israel struck the people of Gaza during the winter of 2008/2009 in an unprecedented military attack called "Operation Cast Lead" that killed more than 1400 people; primarily civilians, over 340 children among them.
Salem-News.com has been under attack in recent days in every imaginable public setting, because we tell the truth about Israel's military tactics, and oppression of the Palestinians.
The person attacking us claims that photos shown of Palestinian children killed in Gaza are "forged" when there are more published online than anyone could count.
We have said it a thousand times and I will say again now, that we engage this subject for the sake of humanity. We do not believe that any group has the right to subjugate, imprison, or eliminate another group of people.
We are accused of something that is utterly false; we are accused of being anti-Semitic, when the only thing we do is to report from the perspective of the oppressed, the unarmed, poverty stricken, hungry and tired people of Gaza.
We care because these people are under fire.
In fact, among the Salem-News.com team of 52 writers, there is great diversity. Almost, if not every every race is represented. Regarding the three major religions; Christianity, Judaism and Islam, we have multiple writers, of each faith, and we have writers who are not religious at all.
Gaza in Plain Language" by Joe Mowery,
: See the original article by Anthony Lawson
I spent a long time on the telephone with a Rabbi yesterday who is a member of 'J' Street and other peace groups, and this is an individual who does not deny the outrageous, unacceptable treatment of Palestinians.
However, he told me nuance has a great deal to do with it, and the Rabbi strongly believes that using terms like "racist Zionist" is counterproductive. He also believes that any analogies comparing the suffering of Palestinians and the Jews during WWII, "borders on anti-Semitic".
I want to say that this was a good conversation, but I am sad that in the end, it is all about the spoken words; the delivery of the message- more than the message itself.
But I give this Rabbi credit, and I give credit to all people who believe that every human deserves an equal chance. I think his biggest point to me was that if we are going to cause people to open their eyes, we have to be selective with the descriptions we offer. I give merit to his point, regardless of whether I agree.
To those unfortunate people who have been drawn into the snare of an individual who has been viciously attacking us for two days by writing to our advertisers and stating untruths, I apologize. I hope they all understand that there is a machine in place that attacks us if we criticize Israeli policy. We will never stop, we are going to greatly increase our efforts, that is the one single guaranteed result of the attack.
I will bear in mind the conversation with the Rabbi, though I make no promises, because I am not the person or people treating others with a heartless nature; the Israeli Defense Forces do that. Some day they will have to stop.
Today, every week, unarmed protesters are attacked by Israeli forces because they demonstrate for peace. We have shown this over and over, and sooner or later everyone will eventually see it. Some day Salem-News.com won't be the only news group carrying these stories and conveying their relative level of importance, but we have become a central point between well written blog posts and commentary and the mainstream news world. Every day we hear from more people, and we will keep moving it in front of the eyes of our viewers, because this is the information age and the people who commit illegal actions are on the record more than ever.
Bear in mind that a Jewish Judge named Richard Goldstone is who investigated Gaza on behalf of the United Nations. It is he who declared that war crimes had taken place, and it is Barack Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu who ultimately, have blocked it from being fully investigated.
How is complaining about illegal warfare and oppression anti-Semitism? It is not. Yet that is the charge of the individual who has relentlessly emailed our advertisers, churches and synagogues and our writers and far more. This individual brought the team together from our distant locations like never before.
He calls us Israel bashers, when all we oppose is the violence and oppression. We love Jewish people and would defend them the same way. If the Israelis were penned behind walls and surrounded by Palestinians, who believe, because of their religion, that the whole place was theirs, and that the Jews had to live under separate apartheid laws, then baby, we would be only on the side of the Israelis.
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Tim King is a former U.S. Marine with twenty years of experience on the west coast as a television news producer, photojournalist, reporter and assignment editor. In addition to his role as a war correspondent, this Los Angeles native serves as Salem-News.com's Executive News Editor. Tim spent the winter of 2006/07 covering the war in Afghanistan, and he was in Iraq over the summer of 2008, reporting from the war while embedded with both the U.S. Army and the Marines.
Tim holds numerous awards for reporting, photography, writing and editing, including the Oregon AP Award for Spot News Photographer of the Year (2004), first place Electronic Media Award in Spot News, Las Vegas, (1998), Oregon AP Cooperation Award (1991); and several others including the 2005 Red Cross Good Neighborhood Award for reporting. Serving the community in very real terms, Salem-News.com is the nation's only truly independent high traffic news Website. You can send Tim an email at this address: [email protected]
