After watching and listening to Professor Jackson's soliloquy for Module 6, I immediately thought about how this past week's conflict between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and the rowing of the Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 are playing out in the global public sphere. The media coverage of these events has the public following these stories and drawing conclusions of culpability.
The Palestinians are seeking sympathy from the global public sphere and in particular from the Arab world as the death toll increases inside Gaza. Their leaders are calling it a genocide by the Israeli military who have been conducting airstrikes. On the other hand, most reporting in the United States media has focused on how Hamas keeps launching rockets that are targeted for heavily populated areas throughout Israel. Therefore, the American media has portrayed Israel as justified in targeting Hamas political leadership and its military infrastructure within Gaza even as Palestinian casualties continue to mount. The public sphere can sometimes zoom in on a story like four Palestinian boys that were killed by an airstrike while playing on the beach. In focusing on some of these dramatic individual stories, sometimes the public loses its context of the bigger picture.
The second big story was the downing of MA Flight 17 from what appears to be a Russian supplied Buk SA-11 surface to air missile that killed all 298 passengers from 11 different countries. The Netherlands lost 191 of its citizens. Malaysia lost 44, and Australia lost 27. This event has re-focused attention on the support that Russia has been providing rebels in eastern Ukraine. While the infiltration, occupation, and annexation of Crimea by Russia resulted in rhetoric and some sanctions, this shot down of the Malaysian airliner has resulted in outrage globally. Although the facts are not yet clear, it seems that the global public sphere will prompt some sort of action taken against Russia and President Putin if the evidence is convincing.
It’s hard to believe that it’s been nearly two weeks since the crash and forensic experts just now attained access to the wreckage. It seems as though the pro-Russian separatists did everything in their power to slow down the recovery process and prevent investigators from collecting evidence. Russia even called for a second UN resolution regarding the downing of the plane before investigators were allowed to collect evidence. When you posted this entry, I originally though blame would be determined within a few days. I’m shocked by how many obstacles have been artificially imposed to delay investigative procedures.
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