Friday Updates (From the Top) on Gaza-Israel Tragedy

11:30  Watch, Bill Maher again backs Israel, says of civilian carnage "people die in wars," and battles with guest Reza Aslan over it.   Glad to see point that it's with American weapons is raised. This is Amnesty report that backs Aslan on Hamas not using "human shields."

9:30  NBC:  Hamas claims Israeli soldier, if captured, probably killed in Israeli bombing--or ambush, the stories vary (see Reuters).   Who knows but it did seem bizarre to me that Israeli unleashed massive bombing in the very area the soldier was captured.


9:15  Video is said to capture final moments of Palestinian journalist Sameh Al Aryan (left)   as he filmed air raid.  Ambulance pulls up about the 5:00 mark and then it gets blasted with another explosion and camera falls to ground and keeps shooting in dense haze but he is gone.  Friends say he is indeed dead. Committee to Protect Journalists confirms.

4:50  @Mogaza, who has tweeted credible eyewitness accounts of bombings, now says Rafah again under constant barrage now, ambulances unable to reach victims and "UN office burning....homes in Saudi neighborhood, built by UN, is under constant bombings."

3:40 p.m. ET  Daily Beast reporter just posted piece on uncovering what seems to him to be a "mass execution" by Israelis at close range in Khuzaa.  But he adds, who knows, might have been Hamas murdering Israeli collaborators.  But finds Israeli shells right there.

Revealing--C-span cuts from covering remarks by the Palestinian beaten by Israeli police, Tariq Abu Khdeir, to Barbara Boxer making her umpteen speech backing Israel to an empty U.S. Senate chamber.  Boxer revealed more than she realized when she boasted that her latest pro-Israel measure got 79 or 83 (can't recall) co-sponsors which you can't even get for something backing Mother's Day, she proclaimed.

VICE reports: "Racists Are Rampaging Through Streets of Israel."  Story is maybe better than headline.

The usual Israeli equation:  You capture one soldier on the battlefield, we kill 62 and injure 250 (overwhelmingly civilians) in city.  And that's Rafah alone.

1:00  p.m. ET  A new low?  Column in Times of Israel (based in U.S.)with headline:  "When Genocide Is Permissible." Concludes: "If political leaders and military experts determine that the only way to achieve its goal of sustaining quiet is through genocide is it then permissible to achieve those responsible goals?" UPDATE:  They've just removed the post--but stench remains.  Imagine this: Editor there apparently felt this reflect enough of the (largely private) mood in Israel and/or U.S. to find it worthy of posting.  You can read pulled op-ed here.

The usual: David "Fake Photos" Frum on MSNBC discussing Gaza. Never any penalty for such folks.

NYT reveals Israel just told all media Israel must review all stories that cover capture of soldier.

Takedown at Mediate on weak Gaza-Israel coverage at MSNBC (except for Hayes) with particular hit on Rachel Maddow as missing in action. 

Al Jazeera's Charles Stratford from Khuzaa (new AP photo left) in the south: "The town has been utterly flattened and looks like a painting from World War One, the smell of death is overpowering."  Reports of Israeli tanks firing on medics and ambulances and people attempting to aid loved ones.

Captured soldier said to be second or third cousin of Israeli defense minister and possibly dual British citizenship.   

I expressed doubt last night that the 72-hour "humanitarian ceasefire" would last the day.  Israel insists on taking "defensive" actions against tunnels, I noted, which they could interpret rather broadly.  And Hamas always on edge. Now in response to capture of Israeli soldier in the south their forces entered the city, Hamas fired, Israel bombed and many dead (50 more more) and wounded (200 or so). And the White House, which never used this word to describe 1000 dead civilians in Gaza, calls the capture of one soldier "barbaric."  John Kerry said "rather barbaric." Two other Israeli soldiers possibly died.  And the usual equation plays out:  Israel then unleashed massive bombing that kills three dozen, no doubt vast majority civilians, and U.S. gets to blame Hamas and perhaps wash hands of the whole tragedy.

The Guardian editorializes on attacks on kids.

James Fallows is too kind to his Atlantic colleague David Frum here in his post --no, his apology was not that "sincere" since he framed it with many more sentences on why his labeling of the NYT/Reuters photo as fake was so understandable (for him) plus linked to same type of source that got him nailed the first time (see my critique)--but the larger issues he raises are fine.  Note that he originally said that Frum had "promptly" apologized, then corrected when readers pointed out it took six days.

Jay Rosen on AP deleting and changing that tweet the other day--you know the one that first claimed members of Congress were "falling over each other" to back Israel (too true), then simply said "many" backed Israel.  Analyzes why AP did it.