August '06, Israel

Thought I’d write some of my thoughts from the past few weeks in Israel.

What always amazes me the most about this country, is how fast you
can go from extreme to extreme. One day feeling good and optimistic,
and the next feeling like all hope is lost for every having a chance to
live in a quiet, peaceful environment. But, as always, you can pretty
much live in Tel-Aviv and not know that the country is taking part in a
full-on war. but once you open TV and talk to friends who are doing
reserves in the army, you get sucked into it all bigtime.

I was suprised at the differences in the media coverage between New
York and Israel. I flew to Tel-Aviv from New York when the fighting in
Lebanon began. I remember the night I left New York, there was an
article about an Israeli fighter plane hitting a building full of
civilians and killing around 60. All that was shown was the wreckage
and an Israeli spokesperson apologizing. When I opened the TV news in
Israel the following day, they explained that there were half the
amount killed, that there was a 7 hour interval between when that
building was hit and when it fell down and that hizbollah was seen
firing missiled from within that building. All this was not reported
anywhere else. So whwat to think? Who to believe? On one side, the
Israeli media is (obviously) EXTREMELY pro Israeli, and we almost don’t
see any of the destruction images from Lebanon, but on the other hand,
not all information is presented worldwide, leading viewers to opinions
that don’t have a strong base.

The circle of people around me in Israel, very left winged,
pro-peace & for giving away much of the Israeli conquered land,
suprisingly, all supported Israel going into this war. There is much
criticism now against our prime minister for not acting faster. People
feel like the Israeli army lingered far too long before entering the
south of lebanon. I was unfortunate enough to know a guy who was
killed, fighiting in this pointless war. A guy, just like us, just
finishing university, who was called for reserves, to fight in Lebanon.
A military funeral is probably the worst type that exists, usually I
think because the air aournd reaks of waste. A waste of someone who
could’ve still enjoyed many years of life. That day, there were 15
other mothers who buried their kids. that just makes all my bones
shiver. What a fucking waste!

Now that the fighting is over, the results are very clear: There was
absolutely NOTHING achieved from this past month of fighting. The south
of Lebanon is completely wrecked with many civilians and hizbollah
terrorists dead, the Israeli army soaked many deaths as well, and
almost none of the points from the cease-fire agreement (drafted
between France-USA) are being followed through: the kidnapped Israeli
soldiers are not returned and the hizbollah is not going anywhere. So
there is much frustration here and a lot of disappointment. However,
people continue with their lives and try to place the horrible
incidents of the past month in the back of their minds. And as the
world forgets, scars from this war will stay here for many years.

I know for a fact that a lot of the damage, to both countries, is
caused by the media; unjust and/or not projecting the truth. But how
can you know the absolute truth? Is there one?

My design expo team, the past semester, tried to take a shot at this
problem, by creating a collaborative way for people to produce news
articles for television. Some information about this project can be
found online ( Soapbox News Network ).

Doing research for dabble.com, the
online video marketplace website, over the summer, made me realize just
how much information is out there and the potential for all this to
occur. Its amazing how many people upload content to these sites, and
the new possibilities that arise with online video. Ultimately, a user
(or group of users) can use dabble to locate relevant videos, create an
article, and have all the content linked to the original files.
Hopefully one day in the near future, these files could be downloaded
anywhere, to any device, including TVs, and seen worldwide. Having this
push, I believe, would make more and more people want to create and
submit articles on topics they care about.

I guess that’s the little hope I have of doing something I truly believe in, to start making some sort of change.

For the next week, though, I’ll still be on the tel-aviv beaches…