A Sunday morning report in Israel's largest Hebrew-language news site, Yediot Acharonot's Ynet, seeks to warn readers that the IDF's anti-rocket offensive is causing a "crisis" in Gaza. However, 82 out of 83 talkbacks [at the time this article was prepared - ed.] were not swayed, refusing to show compassion for rocket-launching terrorists.
Just 36 hours after Israel began its offensive in retaliation for dozens of Katyushas and Kassams against Israel - in Ashkelon, Sderot and the western Negev - Ynet's Avraham Zino presented the view from Gaza's main hospital.
The eight paragraphs that follow the article's introduction devote four sentences to the number of dead on both sides, and conclude with a call by "Physicians for Human Rights" for hospitals to be allowed to deal with the injured. The remainder of the article is all Dr. Halil Nahal, the director of the emergency ward in Gaza's Shifa Hospital.
Zino quotes Dr. Nahal at length speaking of the crowded conditions in the emerency ward and the lack of medicines and equipment. The doctor also laments the fact that the injured cannot be transferred to Israeli hospitals "because the crossings are closed."
The responses of the first group of 83 talkbacks to the article indicate that left-wing media does not have as strong an effect as right-wing media monitors have long feared.
Over 80 of them responded that the attacking party need not expect compassion from the party it attacks - and some of them criticised Ynet for turning the doctor's words into a full-fledged article.
"To Ynet - please stop reporting how much they're suffering. Yes, I'm sorry about children who don't have a childhood; our children, too, don't have a childhood...
"See once again how the media is melting our hearts," one wrote, "and now you will understand who was to blame in the Second Lebanon War, and also in this offensive."
Another one responded, "To Ynet - please stop reporting how much they're suffering. Yes, I'm sorry about children who don't have a childhood; our children, too, don't have a childhood, and that's what really bothers me, as a mother of two..."
Army Radio Broadcaster Prefers Zionism to Good Media
In another war-related media matter, Avri Gilad - who mans the left-wing slot in Army Radio's talk radio left-right debate show with right-wing Uri Orbach - attacked his colleagues for preferring a "good media item" over the Zionist enterprise.
Army Radio's Razi Barkai, together with guest interviewer and former television news anchor Chaim Yavin, had interviewed Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai earlier on Sunday. They wished to speak to Vilnai regarding his recent threat that "the terrorists in Gaza are liable to bring a holocaust upon themselves, because we will respond in full force to those who fire rockets at us."
In light of the fact that Palestinian Authority leaders immediately took advantage of the expression - Mahmoud Abbas, for instance, said that the deaths of over 50 people in Gaza in Israel's air attacks were worse than the Holocaust - Barkai and Yavin challenged Vilnai over his use of the expression. Vilnai was forced to explain that he did not say "the Holocaust," but only "a holocaust," and did not retract his words.
In a moment of candor, broadcaster Avri Gilad said, in the next hour of Army Radio talk radio that in time of war, Israeli officials need not be blamed for taking a tough stance. "It is sad," Gilad said, "that sometimes we journalists choose a certain topic simply because it is a good media item - seemingly without concern for the fact that in the process we are causing tremendous harm to the entire Zionist enterprise."
Gilad also expressed his negative opinion to Army Radio's new policy of announcing "Color Red" warning alerts in real time, saying that he believed this gives the enemy too much information about the results of their rocket launchings. He was forced to announce two such alerts during the course of an hour.