The Israelis say Syria paid protesters to go to the Golan Sunday to protest the ongoing Israeli occupation of the heights as if this justifies using live fire against unarmed demonstrators in which as many as 25 people were killed and 350 wounded.  That the accusation rather than the killings gets the lede is insane.

When Libya killed half that number in Benghazi it was pretext enough for France and Britainto declare war on Colonel Qaddafi.  While the Benghazi shootings were headline news and sparked mountains of official outrage, the Israeli killings were buried in the press: two paragraphs deep inside Libération, a page four article in the Herald Tribune, for example.

To begin with, Arabs in general and Palestinians in particular do not need to be paid to protest Israel’s horrendous treatment of  non-Israelis in the region.  Israel has killed literally tens of thousands of  Palestinians and Arabs since 1980 and yet they continue to protest.  Obviously they are courageous enough that they do not need money to voice their anger.  And God forbid the mainstream press should ever give reason to that anger rather than apologizing forIsrael.

 But the insanity of justifications just thickens.  A ‘left-leaning’ Zionist colleague of mine justifies Israel’s commando attack on a peace flotilla in international waters a year ago in which ten activists were killed saying “nine of them were Islamic militants.”  Since when is being an “Islamic militant” a crime punishable by summery execution in international waters?  Why is being an “Islamic militant” seen differently than being an Orthodox Jewish radical occupying Palestinian land illegally or a Christian fundamentalist homophobe picketing military funerals with posters reading “God hates fags”?  

 What was the crime of these “Islamic militants” anyway?  They wanted to bring food to the people of Gaza suffering under an illegal and inhuman Israelis blockade.  Have we gone mad?

 Let’s admit for the sake of argument that Ben Laden had in fact not died years ago and was killed in Pakistan by Seal Team 6 on May first.  Since when is it acceptable to violate a country’s sovereignty, shoot dead an unarmed suspect and then dump his body in the sea?  Under rule of law all defendants are entitled to a fair trial.  As a citizen I am entitled to a public trial so that I can learn the truth.

Moreover, despite what Obama would like us to believe, Ben Laden was not wanted for 9/11.  He was wanted in connection with the 1998 embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar Es Salaam.  Linking Ben Laden to 9/11 is very much like Bush linking Iraq to that attack.

 The mainstream press tells us Sudan’s al Bashir and Libya’s Colonel Qaddafi have to be brought to trial for crimes against humanity.  Their crimes blur before the million dead in Iraq and I-don’t-know-how-many in Afghanistan.  Under rule of  law,  Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove and their cabal should be tried for breaking almost every law in the book from launching an unprovoked war (Nuremberg) to torture (Geneva Conventions) to unwarranted spying on US citizens (The Constitution).

 On Tuesday Russian envoy Mikhail Mergelov said inBenghazi: “We truly believe that Qaddafi lost his legitimacy after the first bullet which was shot against the Libyan people.”  This is coming from the country that killed 200 thousand Chechens and destroyed Grozny.  But then Chechens are Muslims and they don’t supply us with oil.

 Why is it alright for the United States to be bombing people in Yemen?   Even if they are al Qaeda,Yemen is supposed to be a sovereign state.  Yemenis say hundreds of civilians have been killed in these covert operations.  The same goes for the bombings in Pakistan.

 The press tells us the war waged against Libya or the one France waged against the Cote d’Ivoire to oust the elected president there was to protect civilians.  Yet, how many people have heard of the Arab League request for a no-fly zone over Gaza?

 To whip up anger against Pakistan, the press hammers home that the US gives Islamabad three billion dollars a year and yet they harbour ‘terrorists’.  The US gives Israel much more every year just to see the Israelis destroy America’s standing in the world, not to mention that the aid is used to shoot unarmed civilians and build illegal housing in occupied territories as well as build nuclear weapons.  Thanks to American tax payers, the Israelis have a social welfare and health system Americans could not even dream of obtaining.  Why isn’t this an issue?  Have we lost our minds?

 What is happening in the press is not double standards.  It is pure psychopathic schizophrenia.  The thing that really angers me is we are letting them get away with it.