By Brigitte L. Nacos
Today’s TV morning shows reported prominently on the world’s
largest cereal maker’s decision to increase the nutritional quality of its snacks and cereal products to
help fight obesity among our children. Certainly a good piece of news that was
worthwhile to report. But as I watched the top of the news, I was mostly struck
by the stark contrast between the images of carefree children here watching
cereal ads and of frightened youngsters in the midst of wildly firing Hamas and
Fatah fighters. There were reports of captured Fatah members executed in cold
blood by Hamas rivals—in front of their children and wives and of peaceful Palestinians
in Gaza shot at as they demonstrated for an end of the senseless violence in
what comes down to another civil war in the region. The Associated
Press quoted a 34-year old Gaza resident who said, “The world is watching us dying and doing nothing to help. God
help us, we feel like we are in a real-life horror movie.” It seems that Hamas
is in control of or on the verge of controlling the Gazas strip. While both the UN and the EU
suspended their humanitarian aid because of the all out violence, a spokesman
for Hamas said on the group’s radio, "We are telling our people that the
past era has ended and will not return; the era of justice and Islamic rule have arrived." What a horrible prospect! Although weaker
in the West Bank, Hamas seems poised to take
the fight there as well. Late today, the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas dissolved the Palestinian
unity government and declared a state of emergency as the Islamic extremists of the rival Hamas movement seemed close to completing their military domination of the Gaza Strip.
Is the rest of the world left to merely watch this nightmare
and the unspeakable suffering of ordinary people who are pleading in vain that
enough is enough?
As for the United States, former the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Martin Indyk, told the New York Times correctly, “We have limited options, and most of them are bad.” If there is a chance to stop what amounts to anarchy in Gaza, it can only come from a speedily assembled United Nations force with troops from countries in the region. It might well be that countries capable of contributing to such a difficult undertaking will not come forward. But it is strange that the Bush administration is reportedly not inclined to support such efforts that some high Israeli and Fatah officials are reportedly favoring as a last resort. With food distributions and other aid measures suspended, the predicament of people in Gaza worsens by the hour.
Of course, Gaza is only one part
of the escalating violence and civil strife in the Middle
East. It seems that news providers get used to violence in far away
lands. How else does one explain today’s headline in the New York Times
(“Several Mosques Attacked, but Relative Calm in Iraq”)
over a story from
Baghdad about “a handful” of Sunni mosques attacked in response to the destruction of a
Shiite shrine? The same dispatch mentioned other violent incidents with women
and children among victims in spite of curfews and increased military presence
in Baghdad and
elsewhere. Or could it be that headline writers at the Times fear the scorn of critics
who accuse the “liberal media” of emphasizing “bad” news—even when there simply
is no “good” news?
And then there is Lebanon sliding deeper towards failing state status with ongoing battles between the Lebanese army and Al Qaeda inspired terrorists and the assassination of yet another anti-Syrian legislator.
Most haunting are always the images of children suffering and of desperate parents who do not worry about too many calories and too many fat little boys and girls.
Can the world really only watch these real life horror movies?
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