i've been spending a lot of time following the news in lebanon and israel lately. as much as i am obsessed with the area, it is interesting to see how many american news sources are focusing entirely on that conflict as well. it's interesting because that conflict is really not this country's war. it's especially surprising when you consider that the u.s. already has its own war in iraq. and yet lebanon has supplanted iraq as the top international story for much of the last week.
i think there's several reasons for this.
first, israel always gets a disproportionate about of coverage. it's not just israel, other countries (like britain) do too. actually, most of rumsfeld's "old europe" does. (compare them, for example, with the amount of coverage we get about africa, central asia, or south america). certain regions in the world are just places that the american public pays more attention to. there's a lot of reasons for israel to be on the list. a lot of americans identify with the country, many americans have visited there, and, of course, a whole lot of americans have religious attachments that particular piece of land.
second, many people seem to believe that the war between israel and hamas/hezbollah/lebanon/whatever you want to call it, is our war. as i've been trolling around the political sites, i've seen countless examples of attempts to conflate hezbollah with al qaeda, or hamas with zarqawi's group in iraq, et cetera. sometimes the comparison is out of ignorance, despite all the attention the region gets a lot of people in the u.s. simply don't distinguish between any arab or muslim groups.
but i also think that there really is a concerted effort by some commentators to conflate the conflicts to justify an american attack on iran, or syria, or maybe both. that's really what's behind the nonsense about "world war three" that i made fun of the other day. the idea is that if israel's conflict can be spun to be the same as our "war on terra," then an invasion of iran is not really a new war but instead just a new battlefield in our already existing war.
various neo-cons have been pushing for an iran attack for a little while now. the WMD thing doesn't seem to be panning out all that well, at least it doesn't seem to be getting the american public slobbering for war. so, i guess, they had to find new exciting ways to sell the plan on the public.
conflating "our war" with israel's war is not a bad tactic. at least it isn't if you look at it from purely a marketing standpoint. the threat that hezbollah poses to israel can seamlessly morph into some imagined threat against the united states. since hezbollah is funded by iran, they argue (rather unconvincingly in my opinion) that they are an extension of iran and that means we should attack iran to end the threat of hezbollah.
putting the focus on lebanon and israel is also a good way to get iraq out of the public's eye. meanwhile, iraq is truly going down the tubes. attacks against u.s. and iraqi forces are up 40%, civilians are dying at a rate of 100 per day, the iraqi government is weak, ineffective, and under constant threat of collapse because the sunni parties keep threatening to walk out. the disaster that is iraq is most effective argument against any strike on iran. with our last military adventure crashing and burning before our eyes, the only logical way to sell us on another adventure is to push something else into our view.
finally, i wonder if some of the attention on lebanon and israel isn't because we're all a little tired of iraq. following iraq can be really discouraging. i used to think that there was a slight chance that we could somehow get out of the country without leaving a total mess behind, but not anymore. sure, i can make up some scenario in my mind, but as time passes the scenarios seem less and less realistic. maybe i began following lebanon so closely because i was tired of reading the same grim reality from iraq.
anyway, you'll note that this post has slipped into the first person. i guess this rant is a little more self-centered than i originally intended it to be. i thought i was commenting on a phenomenon on the media and instead i turned the question on myself, wondering why my blog has turned into all-lebanon, all-the-time.
maybe i should stop this here. my navel is suffering from the effects of over-gazing
