The people of New York — and perhaps a good many other Americans as well — are in need of new TV sets and radios to provide them with balanced views of events outside their country. Or at least to make them aware that there just might be another viewpoint and a different idea. A news item recently quoted New York Governor George Pataki as saying that he would lead a solidarity mission to Israel to support Israelis. Pataki adds: “New Yorkers intend to send a strong message to the Israeli people that we have not forgotten them and that we stand ready to support them in their hour of need.”
How lucky the people of Israel are! The governor is no doubt an avid viewer of TV news, sandwiched as it is between commercials and flashy advertisements. It does seem, however, that his TV must be selective in choosing what it shows: it has to be careful to show only one side of the picture instead of the whole canvas. Not realizing this one-sidedness, he sticks to what he is shown and seems unaware that there might be something else on the canvas. No doubt such a busy and important man can’t be bothered to investigate issues more carefully.
The bottom line after all is who cares? Most New Yorkers seem to have the same defective TV sets as their governor and since Americans are so rabid on freedom of the press and human rights, then obviously what they see on their TV screens is 100 percent moral, correct and right. Isn’t it America? Theirs is the best which means to them that it is also right! The poor Israeli soldiers, well-armed with the latest American weapons for which they didn’t pay and never will — gifts from the American taxpayer thanks to the powerful Jewish lobby — definitely need help. They need help to be saved from the savage Palestinians who are attacking Israeli machine guns with their bare bodies, not to mention the children, those horrible little creatures who are terrifying Israeli soldiers and disturbing them by throwing stones on, whose homes are being bulldozed and destroyed and who are then forced, if they are lucky, to live in tents. No mention will be made here of what humiliations the Palestinians then endure in order to feed themselves or their families. Just keep in mind that those well-armed Israeli soldiers need help against those savage Palestinians whose lands have been stolen and whose livelihoods are nonexistent. How lucky that the good people of New York and their governor are going to straighten things out! And about time too!
It is now distressingly evident, and has been for ages, that many people in the civilized world — i.e. America — such as the worthy New Yorker Pataki cannot understand issues nor see things clearly. The reason is that their TVs have such limited historical background and information and since they also lack those important but intangible entities, they have no motive to do anything about the situation. They learned things this way and so what they learned must be right. No force on earth and certainly no facts or accurate historical information is going to convince them to change the way they think.
It strikes me as useless and frustrating to wait for the world to help the Palestinians. We simply have to realize that the battle is ours and we must fight it. There is certainly nothing to be gained — except an elevated blood pressure — by listening to the uninformed senseless remarks of the honorable New York governor or his army of couch potatoes, all of who seem to view the world as shown on their American TV screens.