Tag Archive for: Free Gaza

Loneliness of the Long Distance Propagandist

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A remarkable discussion has taken place on Meccsa, an academic mailing list for media, communications and cultural studies, sparked off by my previous blog, Behind the News from Gaza. With more than 150 messages in three days, very little of it had anything to do with what I actually wrote, and I’ve no complaint about that—it’s just one of the dynamics at work on the internet, and that’s what made it so interesting. The discussion was kicked off almost immediately by a doubting response from a list member in Israel, which gave me the feeling that she hadn’t read the full blog on Putney Debater but reacted impulsively to the snippet which appeared on the list. Thirty-six messages later, a correspondent posted the information that Elina Bardach-Yalov is listed on Linked In as a former Political Communications advisor for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Read more

Behind the News from Gaza

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When the issues become too sharp and the contradictions too blatant, the news media are severely challenged to contain them within normal bounds. They generally try to keep stories apart in order not to have them contaminate each other, but just recently this became impossible. The events in Gaza and Ukraine are not directly connected, yet in the mediasphere they became coupled by their coincidence in time and their jostling day by day for the top story slot. As a result, it was impossible not to see, for example, the shameless hypocrisy of the British Prime Minister berating France for selling warships to Russia while everyone’s military support for Israel continues unabated. In Britain’s case, it has emerged that the value of all British military exports to Israel currently being processed stands at £7.9 billion, including a single deal last year worth more than £7.7 billion for cryptographic technology. Read more

Activists return; Osama tells his story

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Report on return of British members of Gaza aid flotilla attacked in international waters by Israeli commandos on 31 May 2010. Osama Qashoo recounts his experience.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqHz-Twu8hs]

A message from Osama

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June 3rd
Dear All
Your love and energy kept us strong all the way through to face the ugly face of hate, death and injustice

I am back again and tonight I saw the story for the first time on TV. I was not aware that you could see us as we did not know that people were watching us live and we are sooooooooo glad that our media strategy worked to reveal the true ugly face of Israel Read more

Release Osama Qashoo & the Gaza Flotilla activists

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The figure in this grab from C4 news on Monday evening of the scene aboard the Mavi Marmara at the moment of the Israeli attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, is Osama Qashoo, an award-winning documentary film-maker, a Palestinian peace activist from the West Bank, and a member of the Free Gaza Movement. He arrived in England in 2003 as a political refugee, gained a place at the National Film School, and now holds British nationality. Read more