| I've been looking for Palestinian news sites, but I couldn't find any neutral ones. Perhaps the news sites in Arab language that I couldn't translate were neutral, but those that were also in English projected a clear message of hatred along with each article.
News reporting should be as neutral as possible. They should report facts and try to avoid posting their own opinions.
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/am/publish/
This site for example calls Israeli defense forces IOF instead of IDF, means Israeli Occupation Forces. It also changes "Israelis" into Zionists. After the suicide bombing in Jerusalem, I couldn't find anything related to it on the site except this:
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Last week, a young Palestinian boy from Hebron blew himself up at an Israeli bus, killing 16 Israelis, including several soldiers.
Israel routinely resorts to collective punishment against Palestinians, thinking that the punishment would discourage Palestinians from resisting the Nazi-like Israeli occupation of the Palestinian homeland.
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and now that another incident happened to the Israeli side - the site didn't mention a single word about it. Instead, it contains anti-Israeli slogans and shows support for organizations like Hamas. The Israeli government is called there "the Zionist regime".
http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/am/publish/boycott_israel.gif
where would you find such a sign against Palestinians in haaretz.com / nana.co.il / msn.co.il / walla.co.il or any other Israeli news reporting site?
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Eyewitnesses said Israeli tanks stormed the Tulkarm Refugee camp where trigger-happy soldiers began house-to-house searches for suspected Palestinian resistance fighters.
In al-Khalil, in the southern part of the West Bank, Israeli occupation soldiers opened fire on children playing in the streets, seriously wounding a five-year-old child. |
They make it sound as if IDF do it for fun and for no reason.
The official site of Palestinian Authority is quite similar, but since the Israeli Government site is similarly being Pro-Israeli I can only say that both sites should be changed.
http://israel.org
http://www.pna.gov.ps/index.asp
One of the differences that I can see is that the Israeli site tells how many Israeli were killed, shows statistics of terrorist attacks only and contains links to articles of suicide bombings and the Palestinian site doesn't explain why IDF arrested or killed this and that...
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“Israeli tanks swept the neighborhood of Barazil (south of Rafah), then randomly opened fire on our houses injuring three,” eyewitness, Imad Abu Jazar, told IPC’s.
In the northern Gaza Strip city of Beit Hanoon, Israeli undercover units killed Palestinian citizen Mohammad Alza’neen, 23-year-old, Al-Shifa hospital official in Gaza said. |
Why would undercover units kill an innocent citizen?
Shortly, both sites are extremistic.
I have visited Israeli sites (that are pro-Israeli) a few times before, just the opposite from these sides, it made me feel some hatred and anger towards the Palestinians, but luckily I didn't ignore the fact that there are two sides of the story and these sites are not objective - they may even contain lies. These Israeli sites are not so popular and neither are official.
(for example: www.middleeastfacts.com - note that Israeli middleeastfacts.com and Palestinian mideastfacts.com are exactly opposite) In middleeastfacts.com you won't find any anti-Palestinian pictures but only anti-Israeli pictures with explanations of how Palestinians hate Israel and documented pictures of armed Palestinians... as true and documental it is, it still shows only one side of the conflict.
Me and (as I believe) most of Israeli citizens read more or less neutral news like in haaretz.com
I don't know if they report everything that happens in the territories, but they report Israeli actions and Palestinian ones equally (or at least try to do so). When Israeli news report Israel's actions (what they did in the territories, curfews, assasinations, arrests, etc.) it makes some Israelis oppose this policy and feel sorry for the Palestinians. I believe that if Palestinian TV, newspaper and websites start to show a wider picture of this conflict and not "Palestinians fight for their freedom, Shahidis are heroes, Israelis are terrorists" there would be more Palestinians who would wish for peace, there would be less hatred and bigger chances to solve this conflict once and for all. | |
